Catholic Church, in Today's News 02.23.10

Catholic Church. Zenit press service reports today that sexual abuse charges are now being made in Germany. "Around 100 former students [in certain Jesuit schools] have come forward in recent days reporting they were abused; most were students at one school."

The German Catholic episcopal conference has responded in perfectly predictable fashion. Archbishop Zollitsch, "I apologize in the name of the Catholic Church in Germany to all those who are victims of that crime." The next steps will undoubtedly be to admit guilt and to offer sizable cash settlements. 

This approach is the 'American model' of how to handle sexual abuse charges. The Irish church leaders have recently charted the same course.

Is there anyone in a position of responsibility in world Catholicism that notices a pattern? Is it possible that perhaps these charges against the Church are being planned and orchestrated on a country by country basis with one aim in mind: to destroy the authority of the Church? Is there anyone who realizes that to try to appease these forces only emboldens these enemies of the Church?

Does it occur to anyone in the Church leadership that 100 people just don't come together spontaneously? Do they have any suspicion that someone(s) is working hard to organize the charges, someone who doesn't have the best interests of the Church in mind? Do they think that maybe, just maybe the German situation is occurring because this style of attack has been so 'successful' in the United States?

The response to the charges that will save the Church is to tell the truth about what these charges represent and who is behind these charges that occur in country after country. Tell the truth that a conscious attack is being made on the Church. Tell the truth about how only the Church is being charged but not other public institutions that have far worse abuse situations. Then in this context determine guilt through Church investigation without governmental interference. Set a standard of guilty conduct, do not accept without question the trumped-up charges being made. Make clear this investigation is Church business and that the Church will handle it. Where apologies are required, they should be made after a clear determination of guilt.

There seems to be little hope that German church leaders (like the American and Irish, and their mentors in the Vatican) will ever recognize an attack on them when it occurs. As a result the Church becomes weaker and weaker, and its authority plummets. 

What is needed is a Joan-of-Arc-type figure. Someone who is unafraid to tell the truth and to take decisive, militant action to defend the Church and its best interests.