This is a letter I sent to the Archbishop below. It expresses my deeply felt feelings about this shocking practice. In addition I will add that it should be understood that the entire Canon was revised in 1917 by the then Cardinal Secretary of State in the Vatican, Eugenio Pacelli (the future Pope Pius XII). So these "sacred" laws are not "inviolable laws of the Church". They are nothing of the sort. They were written by a man; not received carved in stone in some Moses like event.
His Grace Archbishop Peter A Comensoli
Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Melbourne
Your Grace,
Re: The Confession and "weasel words".
Few things get up my nose and arouse my ire like injustice and people, or organisations, using "weasel words" to try and escape scrutiny and to try and maintain their authority! It is almost as if their only "crime" was to be caught! Doesn’t seem to matter what they did.
In relation to the recommendations of the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuses, you have stated that the church welcomed the extension of mandatory reporting to priests, but maintain that the seal of confessional could not be broken.
"The keeping of the seal in fact might in real ways enhance the safety of children not put them at further risk," you are reported to have said.
You explain that this was because of the anonymity the confessional offered to children.
"The breaking of the seal is not likely to lead to child safety, it's more symbolic than a practical solution," you are reported to have said.
Not likely to lead to child safety! And keeping the seal might in real ways enhance the safety of children!! These are children, abused children, vulnerable children! Words fail me – I’m staggered that anyone, anyone, would make such a claim. Your hypocrisy is breathtaking.
Weasel words indeed! It seems your need to protect the "Sacred" institution of the Catholic Church takes precedent over all other considerations.
In relation to your statement, mentioned above, you will be well aware of what follows – but it is worth repeating.
The Confessional:
This requirement was originally imposed in the Middle Ages, at least in part, by church leaders who expected priests to interrogate penitents and learn if they might be heretics.
Confession and the authority to grant absolution also greatly enhanced the power of the priest. With sins absolved, the believer would gain heaven. Without absolution, death could bring the spiritual pain of purgatory or the eternal damnation of hell.
It would appear that from the very beginnings of the confessional, practices varied widely among both priests and laypeople. Some clergy emphasized compassion and forgiveness and faithfully kept secret what they heard. Others exploited their power and the information captured during the sacrament. The 11th-century monk Peter Damian (1007 – 1072) famously excoriated clerics for the sexual abuse of minors, which often began with the penitent-confessor relationship. In the later Middle-Ages apparently, criminality among confessors was widespread and entrenched. Much of the criminality involved sexual assaults and priestly transgressions against the church's sexual mores.
So, as you can see, nothing has changed! There is nothing "sacred" about the "seal of confession" – quite the reverse. At best a priest should be acting only as a counselor for a troubled parishioner, someone to talk openly with – not hide behind a screen. Hiding behind a screen while confessing, to God presumably, is hypocritical in the extreme. I ask, where is God in all this? Is God only "up there", or is God "everywhere" (as I strongly suspect)? If God is everywhere there is no place to hide – least of all behind a screen!
Furthermore does a "paedophile sinner" require absolution from a priest – also possibly a "paedophile sinner" himself? Please!!
More importantly, does an innocent child’s emotional and psychological future weigh less than a mature, if ethically challenged, adult who knew exactly what he (or she) was doing? The Catholic Church has no claim to any moral authority while it hides behind its so-called inviolable "laws of the Church". They are nothing of the sort.
Has nothing moved in the Catholic Church? It’s high time you realised that this is the 21 Century – 2000 years (and counting) after the birth of the man you profess to worship – the man of justice, the man of peace, the man of love and a man of God – and the man who loved children!
It is a few centuries, I believe, since a Pope had the power to keep a kneeling King waiting in the snow for an audience! Today, Secular Law most certainly takes precedence over Canon Law.
Canon Law can be changed. It’s not as if it is written in stone by God! Men, men of the Church of God, devised and wrote the Canon Law. Men can change it.
If you do nothing I strongly believe that the decline in church attendance will continue at an accelerated rate as trust, that most fragile asset, is further eroded. And you will continue to suffer the censure of many in the public arena.
The requirement for celibacy is another long story!
I will be very interested in any response you may offer.
Yours "faithfully"
Andrew Campbell-Watt
No comments:
Post a Comment