Four Forces Impacting on Abuse by Clergy
July 28, 2002

Welcome to our Parish Festival. St. Mark the Evangelist Parish is a unique combination of people of various languages and ethnic backgrounds. In ways that might challenge some other parishes we reflect the melting pot (or stew) that images the United States of America as well as the Catholic Church's universality. Our God has blessed us abundantly and we revel in that blessing, for we believe that our life together is a foretaste of the eternal life that we will share with believers from all over the world. So, please enjoy yourself at our wonderful celebration of parish family life.

Summertime for me is always a challenging time in that I juggle parish responsibilities with teaching summer school in the Christian Spirituality Masters Program at Creighton University in Omaha. Sometimes I wish that the heat of summer would be a time of relaxation. Yet, when I look in the eyes of my students each summer, I realize why I travel out west. I am deeply impressed by the men and women in my class: people from different Christian traditions (Catholic, Presbyterian, and Episcopalian), from different countries on three continents (USA, Korea, and Nigeria), from different states in life (priest, Sister, Brother, and lay), vastly different life experiences (single, married, widowed) and exciting experiences of God. Imagine, all of the above in 9 people - and one Religious Sister is Episcopalian!

The conversations among and the concerns expressed by this interesting group of people are very much like those of all caring people who love the Church. Last Monday I was on a panel of three from our faculty who spoke to the sexual abuse situation in the Church. The other two, a priest and a laywoman, gave a very interesting appraisal of why this has all happened in the Catholic Church. One thing I have been struck by in the way the matter has been treated in the media has been a lack of historical perspective. Father Kevin Gillespie, SJ, led off the discussion with a talk on the history of the crisis of clergy abuse. I share some of his observations in the hope that they might help you take another look at what has been happening.

Father Kevin's main point is that the crisis did not "just happen" or that it was the result of media bashing of the Church. He maintains that it was the result of the confluence of four currents or historical forces that converged at this point in history. Clergy sexual abuse is not confined to the Catholic clergy, as clergy of many groups, Christian and non-Christian, have been implicated. Nor is it a matter of the single life called for by celibacy because many married people have been abusers. It is more involved than these simplistic analyses.

The first stream is that of reports in the media. This kind of reporting of clergy abuse did not just happen this year after the revelations in Boston. Since 1983 the National Catholic Reporter has been on this case writing many times on this topic. Many did not want to believe things like this went on.

The second stream is the stream of litigation in the courts. Since 1984, when the first case was judged in Louisiana, many millions, perhaps a billion dollars have been awarded to victims. Why has this happened only recently? The answer lies in the way our culture dealt with victims. Many victims were afraid to come forward and feared being ostracized by fellow believers. This helped keep everything in check.

The third stream is a shift in cultural consciousness. One shift happened when psychiatry gave a name to flashbacks, insomnia, nightmares and startle responses which we now call Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. This notion can be traced back to Freud who reported, "I therefore put forward the thesis that at the bottom of every case of hysteria there are one or more occurrences of premature sexual experiences…" Freud, however, never pursued this finding, preferring to develop his theory of infantile sexuality that saw these events as being wishes, not a reality. With the aftermath of the Viet Nam War and the acceptance of PTS among returning veterans, society saw the same thing happening with victims of rape and sexual abuse as had happened to the veterans. Money was poured into research and the results of surveys shocked people. One such study of a randomly selected group of 900 women found that one in four had been raped and one in three had been sexually abused in childhood.

The fourth stream is the Catholic Church's response to allegations of sexual abuse. In 1985 a small group recommended to the bishops how they might respond to what the authors saw was coming. The report was given to bishops but they decided to implement it according to the wishes of each bishop. By 1988 our Archdiocese had in place a plan to deal with this. Happily, it contained most all of the recommendations. Unfortunately, some other dioceses did not respond in a timely fashion. It must also be said that before 1985, many professional psychologists advised the bishops that priests who had abused could be placed back in parishes safely. In 1992, the bishops agreed to a more comprehensive plan to deal with the problem. For this reason it is very difficult for me to understand why some dioceses still did not do what was necessary. Even though we have suffered much, at least in our archdiocese we have done well in handling the problem.

In my response to Father Kevin's talk, I shared how I have had to deal with both sides: victims and priest abusers. I look for something more than reactions now. I want people to share their anger and hurt as well as try to see what all this means in the sight of God-and how we move to forgiveness. May the Lord help us to love one another.

Return to Father Ken's Archive Page