Catholic Church Facing New Abuse Scandal

Since the 1990s and afterward, the Roman Catholic Church has been haunted by a problem that many large institutions face – sexual abuse. Lately, this issue has come to dominate national headlines due to recent revelations into how deep the abuse is entrenched within the church hierarchy in the United States.

In March of 2018, the Pew Research Center released a report that showed that fewer American Catholics believe that Pope Francis has adequately dealt with sexual abuse cases within the Church. The number of those who rate the Pope’s handling of the sexual abuse scandal as “good” or “excellent” has decreased from 54 percent to 45 percent since 2015. Recent revelations may impact that statistic even more.

 Pennsylvania’s Grand Jury Report

The release of the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Grand Jury Report, which investigated cases of sexual abuse within the church in 54 of Pennsylvania’s counties, initiated a new discussion about sexual abuse by clergy in the United States. The Grand Jury Report was released on Aug. 14 of this year and identified over one thousand sexual abuse victims and over three hundred clergymen who had committed the abuses.

The over 800-page document, which took 18 months to produce and has faced several redactions since its release, contains the names of priests and victims related to sexual abuse cases that were reported between 1947 and 2017 – seven decades of abuse reports.  In almost all of the cases listed in the document, charges cannot be pressed against the alleged assailants due to Pennsylvania’s statutes of limitations. However, two priests have been charged due to a series of sexual assaults that ended in 2010.

Of the offending clergymen listed in the document, approximately two-thirds are now deceased. However, their victims live on. Many victims are now 50, 60, or 70 years old. One victim, who is 83 years old, testified before the Grand Jury.

The Grand Jury requested a response from each of the six dioceses investigated in the report. The Grand Jury received written responses from five of them, and the remaining diocese’s bishop appeared in person before the Grand Jury. As the document puts it, “his testimony impressed us as forthright and heartfelt. It appears that the church is now advising law enforcement of abuse reports more promptly. Internal review processes have been established. Victims are no longer quite so invisible.”

The release of this document has prompted Attorneys General in many other states to launch their own investigations. The Attorneys General of New York, New Jersey, Illinois, New Mexico, and other states have begun requesting that dioceses in their respective states hand over any documents that detail sexual abuse within those dioceses.

A Controversial Letter

Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò is the former Papal Nuncio to the United States. A Papal Nuncio is an ambassador who represents the Vatican in diplomatic issues. Viganò authored a letter which was published on Aug. 26 of this year. In this letter, Viganò detailed the alleged cover-up of sexual abuse committed by former Archbishop of Washington D.C., Cardinal Theodore McCarrick.

Before he was the Archbishop of Washington D.C., Cardinal McCarrick was the Archbishop of Newark, New Jersey. During that time, he is alleged to have made sexual advances on multiple seminarians. Before then, during his time as a priest in the Archdiocese of New York, he was alleged to have made sexual advances on young men. After these allegations came to the surface and were found to be credible and substantiated by the Vatican, the Archdiocese of Washington announced on June 20 of this year that Cardinal McCarrick had been directed by Pope Francis to refrain from public ministry and activities.

Archbishop Viganò’s letter claims that similar sanctions were imposed upon McCarrick by Pope Francis’s predecessor Pope Benedict XVI, though those sanctions were not made public. During Benedict’s pontificate, however, McCarrick remained active in public ministry. Viganò also claims in his letter that the current Archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, was well aware of the sanctions that had been allegedly placed on McCarrick by Benedict. Wuerl has denied this claim.

Viganò’s open letter addresses multiple high-ranking church prelates, accusing them of covering up the Church’s larger sex abuse scandal, and also accusing them of covering up the alleged sexual abuses committed by McCarrick. In an urge for transparency, Viganò writes, “I implore everyone, especially Bishops, to speak up in order to defeat this conspiracy of silence that is so widespread, and to report the cases of abuse they know about to the media and civil authorities.”

Viganò also claims that Pope Francis was complicit in this cover-up, and that Francis was very much aware of the sanctions previously placed on McCarrick. As Viganò puts it, “[Francis] knew from at least June 23, 2013 that McCarrick was a serial predator. Although he knew that he was a corrupt man, he covered for him to the bitter end … It was only when he was forced by the report of the abuse of a minor, again on the basis of media attention, that he took action [regarding McCarrick] to save his image in the media.”

The letter written by Viganò levies heavy accusations against Pope Francis and many high-ranking church authorities, some of whom are current or former bishops in dioceses of the United States. The letter eventually calls for Francis’s resignation as pope, saying, “Pope Francis must be the first to set a good example for cardinals and bishops who covered up McCarrick’s abuses and resign along with all of them.”

After the publication of his letter, Viganò went into hiding. At present, his location is unknown and he only makes brief remarks to the media.

 The Pope Responds

Francis was unconventionally silent following the strong accusations made against him. On Aug. 26, the day Viganò’s letter was published, Pope Francis was interviewed during his return flight from a papal visit to Ireland. During the interview, the Pope said that he had read Viganò’s letter, and he then urged journalists to read the letter and draw their own conclusions. “I will not say one word on this. I think the statement speaks for itself and you [the reporters] have sufficient journalistic capacity to reach your own conclusions,” he said.

On Sept. 10, the Council of Cardinals, the nine cardinals that serve as advisors to the pope, released a statement in which the Council expressed “full solidarity with Pope Francis with regard to the events of recent weeks, aware that in the current debate the Holy See is about to make the eventual and necessary clarifications.”

Francis himself has made some comments that reference the recent scandal since his initial statement on Aug. 26. At his daily morning Mass on Sept. 11, Francis spoke briefly about the scandal in his homily. “In these times, it seems like the Great Accuser has been unchained and is attacking bishops. True, we are all sinners, we bishops. He tries to uncover the sins, so they are visible in order to scandalize the people,” Francis said. “The Great Accuser, as he himself says to God in the first chapter of the Book of Job, ‘roams the earth looking for someone to accuse.’”

On Sept. 13, members of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) met with Francis in order to discuss the unfolding clergy sexual abuse crisis within the United States. Following the meeting, Archbishop of Galveston-Houston, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, President of the USCCB, released a statement calling the meeting “a lengthy, fruitful, and good exchange.”

Looking toward the future, the Council of Cardinals has announced that a meeting will be convened in late February of 2019 regarding the protection of minors within the church. At the meeting, the pope will be addressing the presidents of Episcopal Conferences from around the world – all of the lead bishops and cardinals of the worldwide church will convene at the Vatican to discuss this pivotal issue that has rocked the Catholic Church in the United States.