What people forget in the outcry about these old, stale cases is that we are judging the past through the lens of the present. The fact is that sexual abuse was seen in a drastically different way several decades ago. The fact is that you didn’t report it to the police, you kept it “in the family” and as quiet as possible, because there was not just a stigma attached to being an abuser, but a stigma attached to being abused as well. And there was a significant social cost for accusing someone, right or wrong. Furthermore, it was widely accepted that pedophilia and related predatory behavior could be “cured” through therapy. Therefore, the best course available to a bishop in those days was to quietly move the offender to someplace else, often someplace where he would receive intensive therapy to “cure” him, and then place him back out in the wild because assurances were made that he would not reoffend.
You have to understand that a significant investment goes into the formation and ordination of a priest. It is not just a careeer. It is not just a day job. It is a vocation, a dedication of one’s entire life. Years are spent in discernment and formation and years are spent in education afterward to prepare the priest for a lifetime of pastoral duty. It was nearly unthinkable to throw this all away by laicization (“defrocking”) when an otherwise good and holy priest was found to be abusing children. Based on the culture of the time, the bishop did what he could to protect his investment. He might send the priest away for counseling or therapy. He might “imprison” him in a monastery for some time. But it is a priest’s calling and duty to perform public ministry so they were often not out of commission for very long. Remember that the extremely high recidivism rate of sexual abuse was not known to anyone at the time. Anyone! The police and the authorities would have done quite the same thing to an offender if he had been reported, anyway. I do not think you would find such lengthy prison terms and stringent requirements placed on “registered sex offenders” after they had atoned in confinement back in those days.
But now we know all these facts about sexual abuse and, moving forward, we are much better equipped to deal with them. The Church has learned many things she will not easily forget. There are policies and procedures in place now, training programs, heightened awareness, and not just inside the Church but outside as well. The sexual revolution, if anything good can come of it, is the increasing frankness by which Americans speak of sexual abuse and crime. It is the improved teaching of our children how to recognize predators and stay away in the first place. It is equipping law enforcement with the tools necessary to investigate and prosecute these crimes effectively. None of this was in place decades ago. It could never have happened that abusers would have been duly reported and locked up and removed from opportunities to abuse ever again.
What’s done is done. The Church has moved on and so too must the public. Find a new scapegoat for the mainstream media feeding frenzies. We are beyond your reach now - and always have been - we are a holy institution from God. Full of sinners, but destined for Heaven and eternal life because our spiritual mission is much greater than any earthly person or power.
