MaryAgnes:
Again, I take exception. The Pope was not “pope” when he allegedly concealed the abuse. Having a letter that so states that fact is not merely “looking for deep pockets.”
anyone reasonably knowledgable of the facts of these cases would understand that the attorneys for the victims are looking for the big “score”, and are looking for a “deep pocket”. Some, but not all, are engaging in activity and language that is clearly anti-Catholic; not “allegedly”, but clearly. Most are not Catholic, and know little or nothing of how the Church functions; they have had no previous exposure to Canon law, do not understand how it works, nor do they care how it works.
To anyone who thinks that our system of justice is about pure justice, the reality is going to be somwhat like a cold shower; shocking, and not at all pleasant. The best litigators are capable of whippping up emotions, playing the case as a massive drama, and winning. Winning is what it is all about, and while there are legal restraints and ethical constraints on what the attorneys cand do and say, they are not what most folks think are the rules and the ethics.
There is nothing that Ratzinger did that would have hid anything, in terms of denying legally competent authorities from obtaining information by normal legal processes. If Ratzinger had found a priest to have been a sexual abuser of children, you can rest assured that Ratzinger would have resolved the matter in right short order, were it within his jurisdiction to do so, and that would not have included moving the priest around to abuse further. It would, however, have been handled as a Church matter, and as such, would not have been a public trial. Church trials are not public trials, and there is nothing either in civil law or Church law which woud require it to be.
The attorneys are attempting to make it sound as if Church law would have “protected” the priest. Had they bothered to find out how Church law works, we would not be dealing with this issue, unless the attorney was particularly bone-headed.
What you seem not to understand is that a lawsuit is like a drama; much of what is said is said for effect, not substance. The more the attorney can get publicity (and the press has been salivating at every press conference, waiting for the next chunk of raw, red flesh to be torn off some bishop and tossed to them), the more the attorney can make his case in the public forum instead of the courts of law. Why? Because the jackals of the “free” press aren’t constrained by those rules of law or ethics; they can report the latest sound bite from an attorney as if it were fact. Never mind the attorney would get nowhere with the arguement in court; he is in the court of public opinion, and the more he stirs the pot, the more is going to be retained by 1, 2 or more jurors, sworn to consider only the facts presented at trial.
By the time they get done with the trial, they won’t be able to sort out wht they heard in court, and what they heard two, three, six or more months before the trial started.
The Pope is not subject to any temporal authority.
