Michael Kelly
A woman holds a sign as members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) hold a news conference in front of the Diocese of Pittsburgh. Pope in Ireland
The Pope’s window for showing that child protection is a key priority for his is narrowing, writes Michael Kelly
It was with a mixture of sadness and dismay that many Catholics looked on in January 2018 when Pope Francis jumped to the defence of a controversial Chilean bishop accused of knowing about the actions of a notorious sexual abuser.
Responding to a journalist who asked about the issue, Pope Francis said “the day they bring me proof against Bishop [Juan] Barros, I’ll speak. There is not one shred of proof against him. It’s all calumny. Is that clear?”
The 2015 appointment of Bishop Barros had been sharply criticised by activists and abuse survivors who accused him of covering up the crimes of his long-time friend, Fr Fernando Karadima.
It was a low-point in Francis’ papacy on the issue of safeguarding and wasted huge capital that the Church had built up on demonstrating that it was decisively committed to rooting out the scourge of abuse and cover-up from the Church.
Leadership
Most fair-minded observers acknowledge that Benedict XVI showed tremendous leadership of addressing what he himself described as the “filth” within the Church. In 2001, he took personal charge of the issue and ensured that all complaints of abuse were handled in a uniform fashion rather than the hapless way various departments had struggled to cope before that point.
He warned bishops’ conferences that they had to act decisively to implement robust child safeguarding practices. Of course, the unfinished work of his Pontificate was the absence of a Vatican office specifically charged with child safeguarding.
In March 2014, Francis established the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors headed by Boston’s Cardinal Seán O’Malley. Cardinal O’Malley had served as something of a troubleshooter on the issue of abuse and had been charged by Benedict XVI as one of the Apostolic Visitors to assess the crisis in Ireland. Other members named to the commission were Irishwoman Marie Collins and British-based abuse survivor Peter Saunders.
The office was staffed by Msgr Bob Oliver, the former Vatican prosecutor for sex crimes and the charismatic Irishwoman Emer McCarthy. The body soon began an ambitious programme of work. Progress was painstakingly slow and the only two abuse survivors on the commission Mr Saunders and Ms Collins resigned in frustration. Both cited a resistance in the upper echelons of the Vatican to take safeguarding seriously as a priority for the global Church.
Neither doubted the sincerity of Pope Francis, but his apparent failure to back up his own body or give it the teeth it needed left many wondering whether Francis truly understood the depth of the crisis that had to be addressed.
His words in Chile – for which he later apologised and launched a thorough investigation which led all of the country’s bishops to offer their resignations – had damaged the Pope. Many were now wondering whether an apparent lack of urgency on the issue would be a black mark against his leadership. This was compounded when he allowed the body to lapse for two months when the mandate of members ran out in December 2017.
Now, many are asking whether the Pontifical Commission is up to the job. Almost two years ago, at the instigation of the commission the Pope ordered the establishment of a special Vatican tribunal to deal with bishops who are shown to have misgoverned the Church and put children in harm’s way or covered up for an abuser priest. It never happened. Despite the fact that the Pope’s authority in the Church is absolute, senior members of the Roman Curia resisted the move and the commission was powerless to act.
Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin criticised the commission at the weekend saying it is too small and not robust enough.
He said the body is “not getting its teeth into where it should be” and this “puts all the pressure back on the Pope”.
Pope Francis “really needs a better, stronger and more robust team around him. I’m very fortunate that my predecessor left me a child protection office which was in its early days, but it was robust from the beginning,” Dr Martin said.
Just a day later Francis wrote an unprecedented letter to the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics. In the letter, he acknowledged a culture of cover-up of the crimes of abuser priests and said he wanted to beg forgiveness of those who had been hurt.
The Pope also acknowledged that the Church had been slow to implement guidelines or adopt best practise across the globe.
It is striking that he described abuse as part of the “culture of death” – a phrase usually reserved for issues like abortion and euthanasia. The Pope promised that the Church was learning the lessons and that more concrete action was on the way.
According to campaigners, if the document is to be effective the Pope will have to quickly follow it with practical measures.
Unfinished business
On the face of it, there are two key pieces of unfinished business. Firstly, child safeguarding measures are patchy across the Church. In countries like Ireland, Great Britain and the United States the policies and procedures followed are acknowledged to be top notch. All allegations of abuse are routinely shared with the civil authorities and there is a good working relationship between Church safeguarding offices and law enforcement and child protection services.
In Ireland, there is a veritable army of safeguarding volunteers working in every parish and religious institution on the island to ensure a safe environment for children and vulnerable adults. According to Marie Collins, this is a template that should be shared with the rest of the Church – particularly in developing countries where there is not the heightened awareness of abuse that there is in Ireland.
The other key reform is the tribunal or other mechanism to judge bishops who have failed in regard to safeguarding. Theologians have pointed out that only the Pope can judge bishops. But, the entire raison d’être of the Roman Curia is to assist the Pope in the exercise of his supreme authority within the Church.
Just as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith punishes dogmatic crimes on behalf of the Pope, a similar body can be empowered to prosecute bishops under the Pope’s authority. It is true that the canonical mechanisms do not currently exist for such a body, but the Pope as legislator-in-chief for the Church can establish such norms by the stroke of a pen.
The Pope’s latest letter has been welcomed by some, dismissed as more of the same by others. What’s clear now is that the expectation is that he will take decisive action of the issue. If he doesn’t, it runs the risk of damaging his own reputation and marring his Papacy.