News Coverage of Cardinal Edward M. Egan's cover up of clergy sexual abuse in the 1990s while he was the bishop of Bridgeport would be shocking if it weren't so familiar. The list of high ranking Catholic Church officials who failed to report credible allegations of child sexual abuse by priests to law enforcement includes the most prominent prelates of this generation: Cardinal Joseph Bernadin in Chicago, Cardinal Bernard Law in Boston, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua in Philadelphia, and Cardinal Roger Mahony in Los Angeles.
The Egan case does, however, highlight one feature of this ongoing scandal that is frequently overlooked: the role that civil lawsuits have played in uncovering most of what we know about clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church and in motivating Church officials to address the problem.
To begin with, plaintiffs' have lawyers compelled Church officials to produce secret files concerning abuse allegations and to provide sworn testimony about their own failures to adequately address the problem. Media reports about Cardinal Egan's failures in Bridgeport are based on more than 12,000 pages of memos, church records, and testimony from 23 lawsuits against the diocese. Indeed, most media coverage of the scandal--dating back to the early 1980s--has been based on these types of litigation documents.
Civil lawsuits have also shaped our understanding of the clergy sexual abuse scandal as an institutional failure on the part of Church leaders. Throughout the scandal, some within the Church have attempted to focus attention exclusively on the perpetrators, suggesting that clergy sexual abuse is merely a matter of "a few bad apples." Others have argued that the whole matter has been blown out of proportion by plaintiffs' lawyers and their clients seeking to make money off of the scandal by filing lawsuits. One also frequently hears suggestions that news coverage of the scandal is motivated by anti-Catholic media bias. Indeed, Cardinal Egan's successor, Archbishop Timothy Dolan leveled this very accusation against the New York Times this fall.
By contrast, civil lawsuits have focused attention on the failures of Church officials. Plaintiffs' lawyers sue large institutional defendants because they are better able to pay large settlements and judgments, and so clergy sexual abuse lawsuits have emphasized the failure of diocesan officials--especially bishops--to protect children from known abusers.
Media coverage of the scandal has been heavily influenced by this framing of clergy sexual abuse as an institutional failure on the part of Church officials. Litigation and trials have traditionally provided the type of drama that makes them attractive to journalists seeking to draw in readers. In addition, documents filed in court and sworn testimony provide the kind of credible sources of information that journalists like to rely upon.
By framing clergy sexual abuse as a problem of institutional failure on the part of Church officials, civil lawsuits have also motivated dioceses around the country to institute new programs to prevent sexual abuse before it occurs and to report credible allegations of sexual abuse when it does happen. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops reports that over 90 percent of dioceses have instituted such programs and have trained over 7 million people in preventing, investigating, and reporting child sexual abuse.
It is inconceivable that so many U.S. bishops would have instituted such ambitious efforts to address clergy sexual abuse in the absence of the intense media coverage and public attention generated by civil lawsuits--not to mention the liability exposure.
It has been 25 years since the first civil lawsuits were filed against Catholic Church officials for clergy sexual abuse, and much progress has been made as a result of them. That leading prelates such as Cardinal Egan are still fighting so hard to hide the record of their misdeeds indicates that there is more work to be done and that civil lawsuits against Church officials may still have a role in uncovering the truth, highlighting the misdeeds of officials, and providing much needed pressure for reform.
What would Jesus of Nazareth say if He came to the Earth and saw what the church – which claims to speak for Him – has made of His life’s work?
A small group in Germany called“ The Free Christians for the Christ of the Sermon on the Mount in All Cultures Worldwide”is against such shameful sham Christianity. They announced a lawsuit against the Catholic Church. As they put it, they do not want to remain silent anymore on the “brazen labelling fraud,” with which Christ is mocked and His name abused to such an extent. They demand that the Catholic Church no longer call itself “Christian.”
As a Christian, I fully support this. Nothing against the sincere folk and priests who work hard and honestly, upholding the ideals of a Christian life. But as an institution, it has taken on a life of its own, and one could indeed ask if there is anything Christian about it! Perhaps your readers would like to check them out: http://www.christus-oder-kirche.de/christ-or-church/index.php.
Anyone, especially a priest's superior(s)/bishop, who is aware of a priest who is was/is a sexually abusing innocent children, and fails to immediately report this behavior to law enforcement officials is complicit and guilty of harboring a criminal. These Catholic superiors should be prosectued and brought to a court of law to be tried by a jury of their peers.
For anyone to look the other way AND protect an offending sexual pedohile priest is as guilty as someone providing aid and comfort to a rapist or murderer.
Background:
I know of what I write of. At age 15, I was sexually abused and raped by Fr. 'Jack' Campbell, S.J. in the late 1960's. I was attending a Jesuit high school in St. Louis, MO, where I was repeatedly sexually assaulted on the grounds of St. Louis University High School AND on the campus of Saint Louis University, where Campbell served as the University Campus minister. In 2002, I sued the Jesuits and prevailed in winning an out-of-court settlement for Campbell's crime. Unfortunately Campbell, like some many of his fellow pedophiles, avoided criminal prosecution to the statute of limitations.
Kevin O'Connor
Charlottesville, VA
koconnor7878@gmail.com
Thank you for doing the difficult and right thing. May you find healing and peace.
Please tell the Vatican's Cardinal Dario Castrillon-Hoyos and Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, former worldwide head of the Dominicans, that clergy sexual abuse is not particular to English-speaking countries, as both speculated.
See Radcliffe's letter last week to the Times of London at
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/letters/article6937952.ece
Dominican Thomas Doyle, survivor advocate and expert witness in countless lawsuits, wrote in the Irish Times in 2002:
“It’s not about a “current environment of pansexuality” as Vatican Cardinal Dario Castrillon asserted the other day. The moral trends of a society don’t create sexual disorders any more than they breed a lust for ecclesiastical power and prestige.
It’s not about blaming the English speaking world as the Vatican bureaucrats have unsuccessfully tried to do. That’s blame shifting for sure because the problem is all over...it’s just having a more difficult time breaking free of the ecclesiastical bonds in some countries than in others. It’s not about promoting homosexuality, attacking celibacy, supporting radical feminism or advocating a married priesthood. So then, what is it about? It’s about the Church.”
In spite of all the careful selection and training of priests, bishops, cardinals and Popes, in spite of daily prayers, daily Communions, Confessions, retreats, meditations and in spite of the self-proclaimed guidance by the Holy Spirit, the behavior of the Church hierarchy is statistically no better than that of the leadership of the crassest secular organization. So of what demonstratable good is all that stuff? This is a question members of the hierarchy and lay Catholics should ask themselves in rare moments of personal candor. I’d be curious to hear their answers.