Church in
Crisis Scandal diminishes church clout
By CHUCK COLBERT
Boston
In the four months since the clerical sexual abuse scandal began
rocking the Boston archdiocese, the churchs stature and prestige have
been seriously damaged. From the statehouse to the local rectory to gatherings
of everyday believers, the once formidable power of the cardinals office
is being challenged.
The local press here has begun to chronicle how the once bedrock
loyalty of the descendants of Catholic immigrants has turned to outrage over
the conduct of the hierarchy in protecting priests known to be sex abusers,
moving them from parish to parish.
The churchs diminished clout was on display in the Beacon
Hill statehouse, where 75 percent of the commonwealths legislators are
Catholic. As early as Jan. 30, the Massachusetts House, over church objections,
passed by a 140-16 majority a bill requiring employee insurance coverage for
contraceptives and estrogen replacement therapy. The state house also defeated
an amendment that would have broadened exemptions to the mandated insurance
coverage. The broadened exemptions would have covered institutions with
religious affiliations such as Catholic hospitals and social service agencies.
The bill mandating coverage was signed into law and takes effect on Jan. 1,
2003.
More recently, the states acting governor, Jane Swift, who
is Catholic, signed a bill into law mandating clergy and certain laypersons to
report child abuse. The new law adds Massachusetts to 28 other states that make
members of the clergy mandatory reporters.
State legislators in 1983 refused to include clergy in a bill
mandating that other professionals such as doctors, teachers, social workers
and the police report child abuse. Consequently, the archdiocese acted legally
when it concealed abuse from public view. State Attorney General Thomas F.
Reilly, a Catholic who has openly criticized Law and others for their handling
of the scandal, wondered how many children might have escaped harm if the 1983
law had included the clergy.
Law also has lost the support of State Sen. Marian Walsh, long
considered one of his most loyal allies in opposing abortion and advocating
social justice issues.
I never thought that a leading facilitator for child abuse
would be the church, where the church would supply the victims and hide the
perpetrators, she told The Boston Globe.
Noting the evidence of diminished influence, the Globe has
written, under the headline, Scandal erodes traditional deference to
church, that prosecutors, judges and politicians are now holding
the cardinal and church leaders to a higher standard.
Priests in public opposition
While these legislative developments indicate a waning of the
archdioceses influence on relatively mainstream social policy matters,
perhaps an even stronger measure of the cardinals diminishing political
clout came last month at a joint state House and Senate committee hearing. Two
priests publicly opposed the churchs position. The topic was same-sex
marriage.
Dozens of lesbians and gay men gave testimony April 10 at the
statehouse recently, speaking out against a proposed ban on same-sex
marriage. Viewed by the local gay community as potentially
discriminatory, the measure proposes to amend the states constitution. If
approved by the voters, the amendment would prohibit civil marriage rights and
benefits for gay couples, as well as threaten any kind of legal recognition,
rights and benefits for same-sex partners, including domestic partnership
health insurance.
While many of the gay communitys longstanding political,
legal and religious allies gathered in the state house to oppose the gay
civil-rights setback, they were joined -- for the first time in state history
-- by two Roman Catholic priests.
Testifying against the same-sex marriage ban were Jesuit Fr. Tom
Carroll, director of the South Ends primarily gay worshipping community,
the Jesuit Urban Center at the Church of the Immaculate Conception, along with
Fr. Rich Lewandowski, pastor of St. Camillus Parish in Fitchburg.
Ive been waiting 15 years for a Catholic priest to
testify on behalf of our community, said a joyful Arline Isaacson,
co-chair of the Massachusetts Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, one of the
commonwealths leading gay political organizations.
In Carrolls worshipping community, 75 percent self-identify
as lesbian or gay and nearly one-third also identify themselves as having a
same-sex partner. Some of those same-sex couples have children who have been
baptized into the church.
Our concern for the spiritual welfare of these children --
our children -- cannot be without a parallel concern for their broader
welfare, Carroll said, speaking before the Legislatures 17-member
Joint Committee on Public Service.
That broader welfare should not fail to receive in our civil
law protection equal to that afforded to those children whose parents are free
to be, and blessed to be, in legal marriage. We would turn our backs on
Catholic social teaching, on our shared religious and ethical roots, and on the
liberating vision that has grounded and united us as a nation should we
construct
a legal fortress that walls [off] any of our very vulnerable
sisters and brothers, our children, regardless of their parentage.
Lewandowski expressed similar concerns for not only the children
of same-sex couples, but also their parents. My fear is that House Bill
4840, rather than honestly supporting marriage and family life, might be used
to encourage unjust discrimination against gay men and women and their
committed relationships and cause inexcusable harm to the children in those
relationships, he said. Quoting from the 1992 Catechism and Always
Our Children, a pastoral letter from the U.S. bishops addressed several
years ago to Catholic parents of gay children, Lewandowski added: It is
not sufficient only to avoid unjust discrimination. Homosexual persons
must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity.
Although not able to attend the meeting, Fr. Walter Cuenin of Our
Lady Help of Christians Church in Newton, provided written testimony, which was
read aloud. It is certainly important for this Commonwealth to support
the institution of marriage, Cuenins statement reads. But why
do we need to do it at the expense of those who are not married and in a manner
that could seriously harm the children of these other relationships?
Depriving the children
Among Catholic laymen and women who also testified against the
ballot measure, was State Attorney General Reilly. Simply put, he
said, House 4840 sweeps broadly to deprive the children and dependents of
same-sex relationships as less worthy of our protection, less worthy of our
gratitude when their parents or partners are killed in service to us, and less
worthy of our empathy in time of personal hardship and loss.
Reilly added, House 4840, rather than strengthening the
bonds of marriage, tears at the fabric of our community and divides us. For
this reason alone, the measure should be rejected.
Not all Catholic testimony opposed the anti-same-sex ballot
measure. C.J. Doyle of the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts argued that
if state law permitted civil marriage rights for gays, not only would the
integrity of the family be gravely compromised, but the moral and legal
barriers erected against bigamy, polygamy and incest would be weakened, perhaps
fatally, he said.
However, missing from the ranks at the state house of those who
oppose same-sex marriage were any bishops or Roman Catholic clergy.
One-quarter of the 200 members of the state House and Senate must
approve the ballot measure in a Constitutional Convention, now scheduled for
June 19. Another convention next year would have to approve the measure before
it would appear on the 2004 ballot for approval by the voters.
Law gives deposition
The sex abuse scandal took another dramatic turn when Law was
deposed May 8, 10 and 13 by attorneys representing dozens of victims who allege
sexual abuse by former priest John Geoghan. That deposition lasted three days,
with transcripts of the first days made available to the media via the
Internet. But Laws attorneys prevented the release of the other
two-days testimony for at least 30 days, pending the cardinals
review.
The week before, a group of mostly archdiocesan priests, estimated
between 100 and 200, gathered May 3, at Boston College, away from the media
spotlight. The turnout was the largest ever for Priests Forum, according
to one parish priest who attended the gathering. He and two other members of
the clergy also spoke about the gathering on condition they not be
identified.
Diocesan clergy have been meeting since last fall. In an April 11
Boston Globe op-ed, written by the ad hoc leadership team of the
Priests Forum, eight members of the clergy explained the groups
genesis. Three pastors wondered if other priests felt as they did that
there was a need for priests to come together to talk about issues of
concern, they wrote.
Before long others had joined them. Then the Globe
Spotlight Team brought the issue of priest sexual abuse to light in
the reports. Then need to discuss issues of the priesthood became more
urgent, they added.
Those who co-authored the piece include Frs. Robert Bullock,
chairman, Walter Cuenin, Paul Kilroy, John McGinty, Gerry Osterman, Thomas
Powers, Daniel Riley and Dennis Sheehan.
Fr. Donald B. Cozzens, author of the widely noted book, The
Changing Face of the Priesthood: A Reflection on the Priests
Crisis of Soul, spoke at the May 3 meeting. Cozzens, who served as
president-rector and professor of pastoral theology at St. Mary Seminary and
Graduate School of Theology in Cleveland, is writing another book.
He made two presentations at the Boston College priests
gathering, according to one priest who attended. The presentations were aimed
at addressing the local clergys need to take care of themselves during
the current crisis, according to one priest in attendance.
It was clear to me from the beginning, this priest
said, that this was not a meeting for discussing a statement. The value
of the meeting is that it was the largest group the forum has attracted.
But a different kind of meeting, this one more strategic in focus,
may take shape when the group meets again on June 7.
While priests are gathering and speaking among themselves
privately, many are spending much time listening to the anguished, hurt and
outraged voices of their parishioners. Listening sessions have been held in
nearly every parish throughout the archdiocese. In some cases, parishes have
held several such sessions, with pastors fielding questions from those in
attendance.
Parish priests are also supporting the organizing efforts of the
Voice of the Faithful, the church reform advocacy group that has sprung up in
Wellesley, Mass., one of Bostons western suburbs, among other locations.
Not only are pastors running weekly notices about Voice of the Faithfuls
meetings -- explaining the groups mission and goals -- but some are
assisting laywomen and men in establishing parish voice chapters in their
respective churches.
Wonderful confidence
Some pastors are speaking out on a regular basis regarding the
local clergy sexual abuse scandal, as well as other spiritual concerns. In his
weekly notes from the director, for example, Fr. Tom Carroll of the Jesuit
Urban Center, wrote May 12: Jesus shows us a wonderful confidence in the
ordinary believer, in hearts that know both faith and doubt, both confidence
and fear, both zeal and reticence.
Carroll continued: This confidence in the ordinary believer
marked the dynamic of life in the early church, where bishops could be chosen
by the acclamation of the faithful, and with the shared and full assurance that
the Spirit was poured out on the whole community of believers -- an outpouring
that surprised some among that leadership who first thought their mission was
only to those who first entered the Jewish community.
Finally, Carroll wrote: This confidence in the ordinary
believer was celebrated, as well, in the Second Vatican Council and is
enshrined in the documents of that council
Confidence in the faith of the ordinary believer is also a
recurring theme at the Monday evening meetings of Voice of the Faithful
(NCR, April 26). This past week, another Jesuit priest spoke in public
about the current situation in the local church. Fr. Bill Clark, who teaches in
the religious studies department at the College of the Holy Cross, encouraged a
small gathering of the laity at St. John the Evangelist Church.
Quoting from Lumen Gentium, Vatican IIs Dogmatic
Constitution on the Church, Clark reminded the laity to speak out about their
needs and desires with liberty and confidence which befits children of
God, brothers [and sisters] of Christ. He said reading from the document:
By reason of the knowledge, competence, and preeminence which they have,
the laity are empowered -- indeed sometimes obliged -- to manifest their
opinion on those things which pertain to the good of the church.
Continuing, he quoted from Lumen Gentium, paragraph 37:
If the occasion should arise, this should be done through the
institutions established by the church for that purpose and always with truth,
courage and prudence and with reverence and charity towards those, who by
reason of their office, represent the person of Christ.
Freelance journalist Chuck Colbert writes from Cambridge,
Mass.
National Catholic Reporter, May 24,
2002
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