A Church of penance

Many Catholics will lose patience with secular commentators who continue to insist that Pope Benedict has failed to apologise for the abuse of minors by priests and other Church personnel.

Closing the Year for Priests, he again offered an apology, begging the forgiveness of those who were abused and from God. The question is not whether the pope has apologised — he demonstrably has — but whether his apologies are being seen as sufficiently complete. Should they have been lacking, as abuse survivor activists are suggesting, then the pope, and the Church with him, must continue to seek the perfect mea culpa.

Such an apology would incorporate an unambiguous confession of failings on episcopal and curial levels, some of them deliberate and some —  presumably most — owing to grave errors in judgment and lack of competence.

With the forgiveness that the pope and the Church seek must come reparation and penance. In many cases, the dimension of reparation has taken the form of financial compensation. But money can’t buy forgiveness. The Church, as an institution, must show that it is willing to do all that is needed to reconcile itself with those who feel betrayed by it.

For a start, bishops who put young people at risk of predator priests must be held accountable — a principle that still seems to be applied inconsistently.

The most genuine (and probably necessary) way of making reparations would involve a full inquest into the Vatican’s role in the scandal.

Cardinal Castrillón Hoyos, the former prefect of the Pontifical Congregation for Bishops, has unapologetically confirmed that his policy counselled against reporting sex crimes to civil authorities. Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna has revealed that moves by the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger to act against abuses were undercut by others in the Vatican. The scandal goes right up to curial corridors.

With that, the Church faces a dilemma. If the whole curial can of worms is opened, will the Vatican lose its authority? But if it isn’t, will the Church merit the forgiveness that Pope Benedict has said it seeks?

Some commentators have mooted a truth and reconciliation commission. This would provide abuse survivors with a forum in which to tell of their terrible experiences, and facilitate the acknowledgment and confession of crimes by sexual predators and gross dereliction  by Church officials.

The inquest into the scandal is not limited to the hierarchs, however. The whole Body of Christ must heal itself. Last week’s moving letter by a reader who acknowledged that she knew abuses were taking place but kept quiet about them must touch all of us.

How many others did not do the same, or are even now justifying the actions of abusers or those who failed to protect the innocent (perhaps understandably so when they knew, loved and respected these people)? How many of us would still turn a blind eye to the crimes of our pastors, teachers, friends or family members?

The whole Church stands accused, and the guilt must be collectively borne.

There are times when collective guilt places obligations and burdens even on those who bear no personal blame. As a minimum, this burden involves the unqualified recogniton that the Church, as an institution, failed terribly, and an awareness that we, as the Church, must address that failure with justice, charity and honesty.

But perhaps our collective penance is not best expressed in public recitation of mea culpas (important as these would be), but in prayerful and brutally honest introspection, as individuals and as a Church, on our failings in protecting and defending the vulnerable.

As the Church seeks forgiveness from those brutalised by priests and by those leaders who placed institutional reputation before justice, it must humble itself to achieve the reconciliation without which it cannot be healed.