The Irish Times – Wednesday, February 8, 2012

PADDY AGNEW in Rome

THE HOLY See’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has had to deal with more than 4,000 cases of sexual abuse of minors in the past decade, according to its prefect, US Cardinal William Levada.

He was speaking at a symposium in Rome, “Towards Healing and Renewal”, which opened yesterday and was addressed by Irish clerical abuse survivor Marie Collins.

Cardinal Levada told the symposium, being held over three days in the Pontifical Gregorian University, that the number of cases of sexual abuse of minors reported to the CDF in the past decade had revealed, on the one hand, the inadequacy of “an exclusively canonical response to this tragedy and, on the other, the necessity of a truly multifaceted response …”

Bishops from more than 100 countries as well as 32 heads of religious orders have gathered for the event, which is intended to help churchmen understand the need for and then develop that “truly multifaceted response”.

In Rome, where until recently it was not uncommon to hear senior Vatican figures dismiss the clerical sex abuse crisis as “an Anglo-Saxon problem”, this may well be a ground-breaking event.

Cardinal Levada indicated something of the spirit of the week when addressing the victims of clerical sex abuse, saying: “For many if not most victims a first need is to be heard, to know that the church listens to their story of abuse, that the church understands the gravity of what they have suffered, that she wants to accompany them on the often long path of healing …”.

While acknowledging the complexity of the issue, Cardinal Levada did however defend the church’s response, pointing out that John Paul II’s 2001 Motu Proprio “ Sacramentorum Sanctitatis Tutela ” instigated a “co-ordinated response” by instructing all abuse cases be reported to the CDF.

Cardinal Levada praised Pope Benedict not only for his role as prefect of the CDF in 2001 in framing that Motu Proprio but also for supporting the approval of “Essential Norms” on child protection in the US church, adding: “But the Pope has had to suffer attacks by the media over these past years in various parts of the world, when he should rather have received the gratitude of us all, in the church and outside it …”

In an address entitled, “Listening, Understanding and Acting To Heal and Empower Victims”, Ms Collins outlined the pain and trauma of having been abused by a priest as a 13-year-old but also of having been blamed when she finally found the courage to tell her story, more than 30 years later.

“I was treated as someone with an agenda against the church, the police investigation was obstructed and the laity misled. I was distraught,” she said.

The best of her life began 15 years ago, she said, when her abuser was finally brought to justice. Since then, she has worked with the church to help improve itss child protection policies while working for justice for survivors.

 

11 Responses to “Vatican body has dealt with 4,000 child sex abuse cases in past decade”

  1. Well to be honest I do believe that we are manipulated by our leaders. I also believe in propaganda which is given out as news. This of course makes me wary of any official things.i dont have illusions about all that . I went to court to be condemed at the age if six. When i was taught about the end of the world. Well i believed them. I was expecting the planet to blow up any moment. Then i discoverd that that was what life was like. So i read and think but if you find this childlike well thats fine.

  2. Martha says:

    Nomme De Guerre wrote:-

    ” …The Vatican puts on a show which detracts from one vital question , namely how these orders have behaved when requested by a government minister to pay their share of the 1.3 billion euro bill footed by the state for crimes these 18 religious orders committed ?. The answer is they told the minister to go away . ”

    And WHY did “the ministers go away” ? The ministers that you speak of are our Irish government? So, why would they obey the orders of the Vatican?

    BTW, Nomme De Guerre, the Irish government are not your Parents. However, they are democratically elected(I presume) to take charge of our country, namely, Ireland. Therefore, if they (the Government) aren’t doing the job they were elected to do, then they shouldn’t have all that power and control over the Irish people. Why should they?

    Would you eat a fish pie in a restaurant when you had requested a curry, without complaining? I wouldn’t.

  3. Martha says:

    Jackson Pauline wrote:-

    “All people are powerless when polititians decide.”

    Hi Pauline, that particular sentence of yours is rather curious, that is, it intrigues me. What exactly do you mean by it, I wonder?

    Do you mean that other people, e.g., politicians, have total control over your life? If that’s what you meant by that, then its time you took some control over your own life.

    Life is such that none of us has total control over our own life. However, sometimes we have to take FULL control of our own life. For example, when we are confronted with a rabid dog we do all we can as the victim of that “Red Raw Nature” to free ourselves from being devoured by *it*. But of course, an adult has more physical power to defend him or herself against such ferocious attacks…

    There’s a BIG difference between being a child and an adult – is all I’m saying.

    Best of luck, Pauline …

  4. Nomme De Guerre says:

    So do you think the 18 religious orders are rushing to the Irish Finance Ministry to pay for their crimes ? , The Vatican puts on a show which detracts from one vital question , namely how these orders have behaved when requested by a government minister to pay their share of the 1.3 billion euro bill footed by the state for crimes these 18 religious orders committed ?. The answer is they told the minister to go away . Put simply if you look at what these religious do as opposed to what they say you will find where their priorities lye and who their real god is . With this show the Vatican has dealt out its last card and it was not to their advantage , you could almost feel they did not themselves believe in what they were saying . The most interesting aspect of the whole show was what was not said . Meanwhile a facilitator of prolonged child abuse sits firmly on his princely throne in Armagh unaware that the empire he serves is slowly strangling itself with a web of lies , spin and magic thinking . Of course this will and already does have schismatic potential as is already the case in Holland and Belgium . In due course this will be the case in Ireland too . No amount of spin will prevent that .

  5. Well i read your comment about your family. Fanatics dont make good perents because the objet of thier fanatism comes first.. when i left the industriel school it took me a few years to realise that i would have to have a mental rubbish bin. No i dont believe that the pope is the represtation of god. In fact i see him as the head of a small country and that most of the stuff comes from writers. But i dont believe either that marie antonette said let them eat cake. it was the journalists of the time . But that doesnt mean that blaming the People of ireland will change things. All people are powerless when polititians decide. i saw on internet that the irish is paying for children to be confirmed into the catholic religion. I dont know why but its strange that now the taxpayer is paying for this. its a co pruduction between the leaders of the church and the government. when its all thay know well thats not thier fault. Teachers who teach things as thay are and not a load of superstition that way people can learn while thinking.

  6. Martha says:

    Andrew said:- “Ratzinger himself actually handled 3,000 individual cases of sexual violence by clergy – in NONE of those cases did he alert the civil authorities.”

    Why would he? He is, after all, God’s self-appointed representative on earth. You can’t get more humble – er, I mean – GRANDIOSE than that, now can you?!

  7. Martha says:

    Jackson Pauline said:- “There wont be change unless the pope himself accepts the fact that when he had the chance to change things he stayed solidly on the abusers side.”

    That’s right, Pauline. What else would you expect from the Pope? If he were to do what you would like, there would be no Roman Catholic Church (Vatican) anymore. Its Business As Usual for those guys. Organised religion is BIG BUSINESS – and nothing else!!!

  8. Martha says:

    Evin Daly said:- ” … the protective ‘authority’ of Rome, an ‘authority’ which as we can all see now is a meaningless self-serving illusion.”

    With respect, Evin, some of us (who were born and raised in Holy Catholic Ireland) knew when we were still children that was something VERY WRONG with our society. I know I did as a young teenager, but it took me many more years to UNDERSTAND what was so wrong with my mother and Irish society. The fact that my own mother was a diehard Irish Catholic helped me to understand what was so very wrong with Irish society – I’ve no doubt about that.

    Naturally, as a child/teenager (lacking worldly experience) I hated my mother because she made life for me and my siblings a living hell. But then, such was life for the vast majority of Irish children growing up in 1950’s (and well beyond) Ireland, whether they grew up in Industrial Schools or not. I didn’t. I grew up in a normal (relatively speaking) family home with both my parents who had to work full-time for their 40+ years of marriage, which they did at their respective professions, just to keep their family (which was relatively small by the prevailing RC standards of the time) together. I came to realise what a great struggle it was for them, but not until I fully understood my mother.

    Sorry to “rap on” but when I did finally understand my mother, I was a young mother myself. That didn’t mean that I threw my arms around her and begged forgiveness for not having understood her all those years. I didn’t, because she was far too damaged to understand why she was the pathetic self-loathing woman/mother that she was. I simply let her go (as they say) that is, I left her to her own (de)vices and got on with the hard work of being as normal a mother I could be for my own children. From then on, my mother ceased to play any significant role in my life or my childrens, not least because she remained the brainwashed Roman Catholic she was until her dying day. Tragic, but true.

    I just thought I would share my experience with you (and whoever else reads this) and hopefully give you something to think about.

    Also, you might want to think about this: the God of manmade religion is nothing but egomaniacal arrogance, or, to put it another way: pure UNADULTERATED insanity!

    Take care,
    Martha

  9. Andrew says:

    Ratzinger himself actually handled 3,000 individual cases of sexual violence by clergy – in NONE of those cases did he alert the civil authorities.

  10. Thay are still missing the point. all that is here is about the church wanting to renew the church as it was before. But the safety of children is the most important thing in any society. thay become perents and so much of our develement happens in childhood.A child of 12 is still in childhood and the priests and nuns who destroyed so many lives should be kept away from them. There wont be change unless the pope himself accepts the fact that when he had the chance to change things he stayed solidly on the abusers side. and by lowering the age of consent in the vatican he is adding insults.

  11. Evin Daly says:

    The lack of sincerity makes me want to puke. ‘the Pope has had to suffer attacks by the media over these past years in various parts of the world, when he should rather have received the gratitude of us all.’ The poor pope. He is the self-proclaimed representative of God on earth. As such he has failed miserably in his role and brings God’s reputation into ill repute. My God has no place in His heart for those who instigated, perpetrated, ignored or covered-up the wanton sexual abuse of children. There is a special place in hell for all abusers of children – particularly clerical abusers – and those who hid the crimes and the criminals. Those people include every member of the clerical hierarchy who did nothing to help our children and hid behind the protective ‘authority’ of Rome, an ‘authority’ which as we can all see now is a meaningless self-serving illusion.