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BonnerQ uerschnitte Bonn Profiles – Press Reports Phone: +49 4106 804806 · Fax: +49 4106 804807 Email: [email protected]· http://www.bucer.de/bq.html Released for free complete or partial reproduction. A joint platform for the following Bonn organi- zations on the basis of the Evangelical Alliance: Business Coalition of the World Evangelical Alliance (Bonn, BQ 647 – No. 29/2020 Hamburg) Commission for Religious Freedom of the German and the Benedict is mistaken here! Austrian EvangelicalAlliance www.ead.de/akref A commentary by Thomas Schirrmacher Culture and Science Publ. (VKW) www.vkwonline.com ((Bonn, 15.05.2020) A year ago in April 2019, Pope Benedict published a letter intended Department of Theological to explain how the abuse scandal within the Catholic Church came about. Even though Concerns of the World there were many press articles and many statements, most of them quite emotionally. Evangelical Alliance www.worldevangelicals.org/ Rarely did someone discuss the content as a whole and the major thesis of the author. pdf/TN-47-1-Jan-2018.pdf Thus it is time for me to do this away from all emotional turmoil a year later. Giving Hands –International Charity The accusations of abuse www.gebende-haende.de by priests date back International Institute for Islamic decades, if not centuries. Studies (IIIS) of the World Whenever Bishops’ Con- Evangelical Alliance www.islaminstitute.net ferences, as in Germany, International Institute for Religious commission investigations, Freedom (IIRF) of the World they find cases going back Evangelical Alliance (International decades. In the case of Headquarter, EU-Office Brüssel) www.iirf.eu Germany, the files reach back to 1946. International Information Centre for Religious Freedom Germany e.V. (IIRF-D) (Tübingen) Pope Francis assumes that www.iirf-d.de this problem has existed for Martin Bucer Seminary (Bonn, a long time and has never Linz, Zürich, Prague, Tirana, São been tackled fundamen- Paulo, Helsinki, Istanbul, Delhi) www.bucer.org tally. Furthermore, he pre- The Pope receives books on the topic of the persecution of Christians missiotop – Evangelical Forum for sumes that it is a matter of Missions, Cultures and Religions “clericalism” and abuse of © L’Osservatore Romano (German Evangelical Alliance) power, not of factors that emerged only recently. He also sees parallels to attacks by www.missiotop.org priests and bishops on nuns—another severe problem of long standing. Office of Intrafaith and Interfaith Relations of the World Evangelical Pope Emeritus Benedict has now expressed a diametrically opposing view. As I read his Alliance letter, I thought that after the long silence since his resignation, it would have been better Theological Commission ofthe European Evangelical Alliance if Benedict had remained silent. I have read many brilliant texts by Benedict; this is by far www.europeanea.org his weakest. Theological Commission of From 1981 to 2003, Cardinal Ratzinger was Prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the the World Evangelical Alliance www.worldevangelicals.org/tc/ Doctrine of the Faith, which has been responsible for cases of abuse and for the UN Bonn liaison for inter-religious concerns of WEA WEA Sustainability Center Bonner Querschnitte Bonn Profiles – Press Reports www.wea-sc.org Text & Technology: World Evangelical Alliance – Titus Vogt (ViSdP) Office Bonn Vorderer Kamp 52a, D-25479 Ellerau SOS World (Brussels) Phone: +49 4106 804806 www.sosworld.be/page-daccueil/ Fax: +49 4106 804807 Email:[email protected] This text is licensed under the Creative Commons license (by-nc-sa). page 1 BonnerQ uerschnitte Bonn Profiles – Press Reports secularization of priests on account of moral aberrations. Thus nobody has been closer A joint platform for the following Bonn organi- to the evidence than he was. zations on the basis of the Evangelical Alliance: In his letter he now gives the impression that the problem of abuse did not originate in the church, but is really a problem of our modern, godless society that has only rubbed Business Coalition of the World Evangelical Alliance (Bonn, off on the church. It began, he suggests, with the state-prescribed and state-supported Hamburg) introduction of children and youth into the nature of sexuality. He states, “Asociety without Commission for Religious God—a society that does not know Him and treats Him as non-existent—is a society that Freedom of the German and the loses its measure.” Austrian EvangelicalAlliance www.ead.de/akref Although that statement may be true in itself, with regard to the problem at hand I would Culture and Science Publ. (VKW) rather agree with Pope Francis: it is a problem of the Church and not of society. And it www.vkwonline.com will be solved only if the Church changes, not if society changes.And even if the impulse Department of Theological had come from the outside, what kind of church would it be that is so defenceless as to Concerns of the World Evangelical Alliance become submerged in such a rampant pattern of abuse within a very short time on a www.worldevangelicals.org/ broad international level? At least, that is the pattern of infection that Benedict’s letter pdf/TN-47-1-Jan-2018.pdf seems to depict. Giving Hands –International Charity Benedict gives the impression that sexual abuse by priests and bishops (or homosexual www.gebende-haende.de relations in seminaries among future priests) have existed only since the mid-1960s and International Institute for Islamic were a consequence of the sexual revolution. He maintains that a collapse of academic Studies (IIIS) of the World Evangelical Alliance Catholic morality at universities also occurred as a direct consequence of this revolution. www.islaminstitute.net However, no one has ever taught that priests are morally allowed to sexually assault International Institute for Religious Freedom (IIRF) of the World minors! Even very liberal Catholic moral theologians have never taught this. Evangelical Alliance (International Headquarter, EU-Office Brüssel) Pope Benedict says either directly or indirectly: www.iirf.eu International Information Centre 1. Benedict says: There was no sexual abuse of this kind before 1965, or at least it was for Religious Freedom Germany not nearly so serious a problem. (He does not present proof of this assertion.) e.V. (IIRF-D) (Tübingen) www.iirf-d.de Response: What about the trials that took place before that time in the Weimar Republic Martin Bucer Seminary (Bonn, or in the German empire? All enemies of the Catholic Church made use of this topic— Linz, Zürich, Prague, Tirana, São Paulo, Helsinki, Istanbul, Delhi) often for polemical purposes, of course, but this does not change the fact that they could www.bucer.org refer to real, existing cases. missiotop – Evangelical Forum for Missions, Cultures and Religions There is also another problem. The abuse scandal is a global one. How should the sexual (German Evangelical Alliance) revolution of the 1960s in Germany have led bishops in Chile or Mali to be misappropri- www.missiotop.org ating minors at the same time? Office of Intrafaith and Interfaith Relations of the World Evangelical 2. Benedict says: In a very short time, the sexual revolution had a penetrating impact on Alliance the theology taught at universities to priests and bishops. “At the same time, independent Theological Commission ofthe of this development, Catholic moral theology suffered a collapse.” European Evangelical Alliance www.europeanea.org Response: Really? How could the sexual revolution, which took place mainly in the Theological Commission of secular space and at first met with bitter resistance on the part of large parts of society, the World Evangelical Alliance have moved thousands of priests and bishops overnight to abuse minors? Where is the www.worldevangelicals.org/tc/ connection here?And if there were a connection, then it would have taken some time for UN Bonn liaison for inter-religious concerns of WEA WEA Sustainability Center Bonner Querschnitte Bonn Profiles – Press Reports www.wea-sc.org Text & Technology: World Evangelical Alliance – Titus Vogt (ViSdP) Office Bonn Vorderer Kamp 52a, D-25479 Ellerau SOS World (Brussels) Phone: +49 4106 804806 www.sosworld.be/page-daccueil/ Fax: +49 4106 804807 Email:[email protected] This text is licensed under the Creative Commons license (by-nc-sa). page 2 BonnerQ uerschnitte Bonn Profiles – Press Reports the sexual revolution to arrive in the lecture hall, influencing only those priests who began A joint platform for the following Bonn organi- their primary education 40 to 45 years ago at most. In other words, any case of abuse zations on the basis of the involving a bishop or priest age 50 or older cannot be chronologically related to the sexual Evangelical Alliance: revolution. Business Coalition of the World Evangelical Alliance (Bonn, The Australian Cardinal George Pell, born in 1941, received his theological diploma in Hamburg) Rome in 1967. How can his abuse be traced back to the sexual revolution? Were modern Commission for Religious views of sexuality revolution really taught in Rome as early as the mid-1960s? The Freedom of the German and the founder of the Legionaries of Christ has fathered several children and abused seminari- Austrian EvangelicalAlliance www.ead.de/akref ans in Mexico since 1960.Agrand jury of the State of Pennsylvania counted 300 Catholic priests guilty of abuse since the 1940s. Culture and Science Publ. (VKW) www.vkwonline.com 3. Benedict says: Abuse takes place because and if there are no longer any strict sexual Department of Theological ethics. Concerns of the World Evangelical Alliance www.worldevangelicals.org/ Response: However, up to the present day perpetrators know that such abuse is wrong; pdf/TN-47-1-Jan-2018.pdf otherwise, they would not hide such deeds or help to hide the deeds of others. Giving Hands –International Charity 4. Benedict says: “Part of the physiognomy of the Revolution of ’68 was that paedophilia www.gebende-haende.de was then also diagnosed as allowed and appropriate.” International Institute for Islamic Studies (IIIS) of the World Response: That statement is as correct as it is too general.