3. Sliding panels. A background study of the secular and ecclesiastical developments relating to the sexual abuse of minors in the Roman Catholic Church in the Netherlands (1945-2010). 1 Dr R.S.B. Kool Reason for this study and background Introduction The start of the 21st century saw a stream of accusations concerning the sexual abuse of minors in the Roman Catholic Church . Victims in the United States, but also in Western Europe (in particular Ireland and England) told how they had been abused by priests and members of religious orders in Catholic communities and establishments, in particular in boarding schools. Similar accusations of sexual abuse by priests and members of religious orders in the Roman Catholic Church in the Netherlands were unleashed a few years later, in 2010, backed up by exhaustive reports in the media. The number of complaints submitted to Hulp & Recht (Help & Justice), an organization set up by the Dutch bishops and the Conference of Religious in the Netherlands (KNR), soon became so great that this organization could no longer deal with them properly. 2 The Dutch Conference of Bishops and the KNR therefore asked the prominent Dutch politician W.J. (Wim) Deetman, the former minister of Education and mayor of The Hague, in March 2010 for advice about the advisability of setting up an independent inquiry into this matter. After he had concluded that such an inquiry was indeed called for, the Commission of inquiry into sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in the Netherlands headed by Deetman himself (referred to from now on as the Commission of Inquiry) was set up in May 2010. The Commission of Inquiry had the task of mapping the nature and extent of the reported sexual abuse and of viewing it in the context of the wider structures of responsibility within the Catholic Church at the time. The Commission had to consider the past (what happened?), the present (why is there a flood of complaints about sexual abuse right now?) and the future (what lessons can be learned?). The inquiry had two components: 1. an empirical study (an inventory of the complaints made, how they were dealt with and their interpretation) and 2. a sociological and historical study (the nature of the social discourse on sexuality at the time and the relationship between this and the thinking about sexuality within the Catholic Church and ‘culture of silence’ about the sexual abuse of minors reported there). 3 The present background study is part of the second component of the inquiry, the sociological and historical study. The objective of the study, the question posed and the structure of the study Objective The objective of this background study is to offer the Commission of Inquiry the opportunity to reach an informed conclusion about the criminalization of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church by viewing it in the light of the developments in thinking about sexuality among politicians and in society at large in the period 1945-2010. Point of departure This background study has been written on the basis of the assumption that sexual abuse by priests and members of religious orders in the Dutch Roman Catholic Church should be judged in the light of secular regulations. This choice is implicit in the plan of the inquiry formulated by the chairman of the Commission of Inquiry and approved by the Conference of Bishops and the KNR. Seen from this perspective, the provisions of Book II, Title XIV of the Dutch Penal Code ( Wetboek van Strafrecht , abbreviated Sr from now on) play a key role in this background study. Particular attention will be paid to article 249 of this Code, which states that a breach of trust by any person placed in a position of responsibility for the care, education or supervision of a minor, or in a position of authority over a minor, shall be punishable by law. Developments in legislation, jurisprudence and policy in the period 1945-2010 will be described against the background of social views about the criminalization of sexual abuse. First of all, however, a brief description will be given of political and social thinking in the years before the Second World War and the criminal legislation arising from this. This is needed for a good understanding of the way the political and social discourse on sexuality (and in particular on those forms of sexuality that are open to penal sanctions) has developed in the period 1945-2010. However, this description of secular regulations is not enough for our purposes here. History teaches us that there is interplay between ecclesiastical and secular thinking about criminal sexual conduct. In fact, the present-day sexual discourse is based on interaction between social and ecclesiastical views about what is and what is not permissible in the field of sexuality. Seen from a historical perspective, these two worlds have never been completely separate but have been subject to mutual influences. It is important to consider this interaction here, with special reference to its influence on secular developments. Question posed On the basis of the above considerations, the question posed in this study may be formulated as follows: ‘What developments have taken place in secular and ecclesiastical thinking about the criminalization of sexual abuse of minors in the period 1945-2010, and how are these developments related to one another?’ Structure of the background study This background study is divided into two chapters. The first comprises the introduction, while the second contains a description of sexual legislation in historical perspective divided into five periods and showing a major change in thinking about the criminalization of sexual abuse of minors. Finally, Appendix 1 gives an overview of Dutch sexual legislation and the problems that occur in this context when it comes to dealing with the abuse of minors. Method of investigation This background study has been performed as a desk study. Apart from secular sources, sources concerning and provided by the Catholic Church have been consulted. These last-mentioned sources include some provided by the Commission of Inquiry. Sexual abuse of minors in historical perspective Perspective This chapter gives a historical overview of the development of the criminal legislation on sexual offences and the changes that have taken place in this legislation, especially in the period between 1945 and 2010. It should be realized, however, that the post-war developments were the fruit of previous events. A brief description of the period before the Second World War will therefore be given first, going right back to the introduction of the initial legislation on sexual offences, which was included in the Dutch Penal Code of 1886. It must be stated first of all that the sexual abuse of minors is as old as mankind. What varies in the course of time is the social perception of this phenomenon and the measures taken to deal with it. 4 However, it was not until victims of secular sexual abuse came forward in the 1980s to tell what had happened to them that the scope and seriousness of the problem became clearly apparent. From that moment, the fight against sexual abuse became one of the regular political priorities in the campaign against criminality. But victims of sexual abuse within the church still kept silent, with very few exceptions. It was not until 2010 that the state of affairs in this sector was revealed in the Netherlands. To make it clear what was going on here, the secular and ecclesiastical developments relating to the sexual abuse of minors are discussed in parallel in this study, starting with the historical development of concepts of the criminalization of sexual abuse. When the sexual abuse of minors was made a punishable offence, this sent out a very clear signal that such sexual contacts conflict with what society as a whole regards as acceptable sexual behaviour. It is important to form a view of how this norm took shape in the recent past, and how it was enforced. It is clear however that it was not enforced everywhere – and certainly not in an ecclesiastical setting. The flood of testimonies coming from victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church makes this very evident. Nevertheless, neither those who took advantage of the young people entrusted to their care while they performed their tasks within the Church nor their superiors can have been unaware of the secular norm. After all, the legal standards concerning the criminalization of sexual abuse were strongly influenced by Catholic thinking about sexuality, thanks to the leading position of the Catholic Church in Dutch society from the end of the 19 th century. What was this Catholic discourse, and why did it prove so ineffective in its own circles? What structures led to the apparent unwillingness to bring the sexual abuse within the Catholic Church out into the open, or even to the tendency to deny its existence, while at the same time the Church did so much to control the sexual life of the Catholic laity? Was there awareness of the nature and scope of the internal problems that led to such abuses? To permit an answer to these questions, the historical development of the thinking about criminal sexuality, and in particular the sexual abuse of minors, as laid down in the Dutch Penal Code is described in five successive sections of this study. The social and political developments underlying these standards are considered against the background of the social position of the Catholic Church in the various periods distinguished and the influence it had on the legislative process. 1886-1945: In the beginning A good understanding on criminal legislation on sexual matters must be based on consideration of the underlying ideas about sexuality that were current in society.