The brief visit of the Pope to England is bringing mixed results for the Catholic Church. While not the first visit to England of a Pope since the English church split off centuries ago (John Paul II made a visit), this is treated as a “state” visit, and he was welcomed by the Queen and by the Archbishop of Canterbury, head of the Church of England, and figurative head of the Anglican Church in Canada, and Episcopal Church in the US.

It was anticipated that there would be reaction on the issue of sexual abuse by priests, and the crowds did not disappoint. The abuse is a scandal that has ripped away at the reputation of the Catholic Church, and will continue to do so well into the future. In his unfortunately quiet, halting, and often poorly-stressed English, the Pope apologized for the damage done in the past. It seemed to fall on deaf ears, since many regard the past and even present reaction of the church to the crimes as being almost as bad as the crimes themselves, and feel the church has fallen far short in the exposure, admission, and punishment of the guilty. A shadow hangs over Benedict himself, as he has been accused of at least dragging his feet, if not contributing to cover-ups and participating in the too common quick relocation of clerics accused of abuse. Some articles suggest that it is only his role as Pope that keeps him from being drawn into current investigations of church response.

Anyone who spends some time researching the issue of abuse by Catholic priests can’t help but be shocked by the extent of the crime. Few countries where the church has had a presence are immune. Canada and the USA have their many victims, but certainly the abuse allegations have torn through Europe, Australia, and, perhaps most significant for its size, Ireland.

The abuse situation in Ireland has that country in shock, and that microcosm perhaps gives us an indication of what allowed the abuse to happen. To be Catholic in the Irish Republic was the norm. The Catholic church was not just where families went on Sunday, but was a significant part of who they were, its threads wound through every aspect of life, in every village. “The priest” was God’s representative on earth, the man to turn to when you had a question, when you doubted, when you reached a fork in your road. He knew what was right. Trust was the byword.

A series of investigations in Ireland over the last decade has thrown that to the winds. Priests have abused young men and children, priests have had babies by housekeepers and hidden it– sometimes with bribes, and it’s alleged that the church has systemically attempted to cover the abuse. To the Irish, it’s far more than the fellow down the street being accused of crime, it cuts to the very heart of what had defined the Irish people. It’s an extreme issue of trust being betrayed.

And for the Irish, for yet unexplained reasons, it extends even further. In the US, where the “Irish Priest” has always been something of a stereotype, this stereotype shows its face where it shouldn’t: reports indicate that a significant number of abuse cases in the US have an “Irish Priest” connection. Attitudes going right back to seminary itself?

At one point, in researching the issue, I thought I had stumbled on statistics that freed the Catholic Church from its position as being the extreme example of this abuse: a matter of keeping the numbers in perspective. People, perhaps particularly those not connected to the Catholic Church, make a poor assumption that all, or even many, priests are involved in abuse. That is, of course, not the case. We have to all be aware that only a small percentage of priests have ever been accused, that the large majority have never crossed these lines. While the reputations of all priests are tarnished by the few, and while trust in all has taken a severe beating, the numbers indicate that an average of about 4% of priests have been accused of abuse. Not that this small percentage does not amount to thousands of priests and tens of thousands of victims, even in North America, but some articles would indicate that it’s “expected”. Accepting that we are a flawed people, social scientists would claim that this is an expected percentage across the board: that you will find this percentage of abusers in other areas of society—in ministers of other denominations, in teachers, in group leaders, in fact in politicians, bankers, doctors, lawyers, fishermen. Is it just that the Catholic Church has gotten the bad press, that they have been the ones exposed, and that the claims of cover-ups has brought them even more into the spotlight?

A depressing, though interesting explanation by those who claim to know.

I don’t buy it.

When I see numbers, when I’m confronted by percentages and statistics, I like to break them down, apply them to my own experience, see if the numbers “add up”. Times’s and goes-into’s. See if it works.

For just over thirty years, I taught school in this county. For about twenty of those years, I was a school counselor, giving me an even larger window on what was going on in the area of abuse. While there was abuse of children by family members, by friends, by step-whatevers, and we unfortunately only ever touched the tip of the iceberg on discovering that, I think I have a decent awareness of what went on with the teachers of this county, at least where it led to open allegations or even court proceedings. For a round number, there are probably just over 200 teachers in this county. When I apply the social scientists’ expected abuse percentage to this, I would get that at least 8 teachers in this small county are sexually abusing young people (probably students). The US surveys on abuse in the priesthood indicated an average of about 2 1/2 victims per priest. That would mean about twenty children being abused in this county (and some certainly coming out and making allegations, and their situations being dealt with by authorities, as is happening with the Catholic Church). I can’t accept that number. In my thirty years, while I have heard of the occasional situation of a young teacher being too friendly with a student (at the junior or high school level), and being told to “back off or else”, I cannot recall a single allegation of criminal sexual abuse. We should have been having a case plastered across the newspapers every few years.

In Nova Scotia, there are probably about 9,000 teachers. Can’t find the stats on this, but I know it used to be about 10,000, serving about 130,000+ students. Let’s hit this with our “expected numbers”: according to the experts, there should be 360 teachers having criminal sexual activity with children. This should be impacting about 900 children.

Can’t see it. While criminal cases do arise from time to time, generally in the area of male teachers abusing young teen girls, I don’t see even the tip of the iceberg on 360 teachers and 900 students. Certainly it would not all come to light, but certainly as well the statistics on abuse by priests are low to what actually went on; some victims will never reveal what happened. Like the situation in each individual parish of the Catholic Church where abuse has come to light, a discovery of even a portion of that teacher figure would explode across the newspapers of this province, across the national news of Canada. Hasn’t happened.

So what’s unique about the priesthood that has contributed to the scandal their 4% has brought on their heads? There seems to be a number of offered explanations:

— Their position, particularly in the past, and particularly in rural areas, as God’s representative in the location. What the priest said had to be true. Had to be right. What the priest wanted, what he suggested, what he requested, had to be right. If the priest didn’t know what was morally acceptable, who did? Many abuse victims went along with the priest, filled with confusion, but feeling he must somehow be right. They anticipated little support from their parents for their feelings of confusion or even their fears. Many of the few who did bring the matter to their families got the anticipated response: Are you questioning our priest? Are you accusing our priest? Who do you think you are?

Certainly this particular explanation extends across to ministers, evangelists, and others who might foster the belief that they are the interpreters of moral behavior, and who might blind the eyes of parents to detecting the abuse of their children.

— A belief, in certainly only a small percentage of the priesthood, but over long term, that this behavior was acceptable. A perversion of morals to the point where abuse was thought to do no harm, even to the extreme perverse belief by some priests that it was somehow helpful to the child. This perversion extended to some in authority who felt that while they might not get involved in the behavior, they could see it happening, felt it was not as serious as it was, and therefore took as their role protection the church and the priest from undue attention, particularly from secular authorities and courts. Certainly the cover-ups by the administrators of the church, the frequent transfers of priests with only warnings, gave abusing priests some indication that while some in the world might not approve of their behavior, there were those in the church quite willing to look the other way. To the deviant mind, almost an approval. There was a transfer of the crime to that of being caught than to their abhorrent actions.

And a couple of other explanations more hotly debated:

— That the vocation of the priesthood “drew” men with a disposition toward this behavior. Scattered throughout the statistics on abuse are cases of abuse in the seminaries themselves—priests in training being abused by seminary staff, and perhaps attitudes being modeled and promoted. While the gay community loudly decries the attempt by Pope Benedict to portray the problem as too many homosexuals getting into the priesthood, the gay community seeing it– perhaps correctly– as perversions not restricted to any sexual orientation, it is a fact from the statistics that some 80% of the abuse situations involve adolescent boys being targeted.

— That the celibacy requirement of the priesthood is abnormal, and leads natural desires for sexual experience to be fulfilled in abuse of young people. The Catholic Church, understandably does not accept this, and in fact the Pope has indicated, often to the derision of his opponents these days, that the celibate priest is morally superior to other men in society. This may be a serious error, and while celibacy might work for many priests, its failings in the few, if not demonstrated in the abuse cases, comes to light in allegations of sex between priests and parish female staff, even with nuns.

It’s a mess. It’s a mess that seems to have peaked about 1970, but many feel that it peaked only in that many allegations have come out of that time period, that abuse likely has gone on (physical abuse, to the point of terrorism, in some Catholic educational institutions is another whole area of study) for centuries, and perhaps abuse would be continuing to this day if it were not that victims are less accepting of the moral authority of the priesthood (have they any moral authority left?) and the likelihood of being caught is far greater.

I left a friend of mine yesterday, after discussing this abuse issue at Tim’s, with the comment, “I think I’ll go home and Google “Nuns and sexual abuse”.

Can you say, “Rat’s Nest”?

One of many articles reads:

• “Sexual abuse by nuns has gone largely unaddressed and unreported until now, in part because of cultural biases about gender roles and sex, say those knowledgeable about the cases. Women often abuse in seductive ways that silence and confuse victims,” Anderson said.

And when abuse is alleged, it can be difficult for victims to assign accountability in the maze of 450 women’s religious orders. The Catholic Church says it has no jurisdiction over the orders.

But slowly, more victims are telling their stories. The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) says it has received as many as 400 reports nationwide of sex abuse by nuns, “which probably just scratches the surface,” said executive director David Clohessy.

Another commentator indicated the exposure of abuse by nuns was running “about 15 years behind that of priests”.

Did I mention Mother St. Charles whacking us with the yardstick in grade one? I got off easy.
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