Catholic Agitator / 1 Betrayed: the Child Sex Abuse Scandal
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C A T H O L I C Graphic by Rufo Noriega BETRAYED: THE CHILD SEX SCANDAL ROY BOURGEOIS’ NEW BOOK REVIEWED- p.4 EFFORTS TO SURPRESS THE SCANDAL HAVE TARNISHED THE CHURCH CHILD SEX ABUSE SCANDAL “Apparently, no one has enough integrity to take responsibility for the scandal. Their pathetic ham-handed efforts to suppress the scandal and save face have only more deeply tarnished an already besmirched Church.” BETRAYED We realize the Catholic Church’s hoping to put the past behind him sex abuse scandal may be offensive and move on with a somewhat clean to some of our readers. However, slate. However, it seems that neither with the February 2 court-ordered coordinated their mutual responses release of 50,000 sensitive Archdi- because the next day the Cardinal ocesan documents, and the ensuing came out on the front page of the media storm, we could not remain Los Angeles Times counter-rebuking silent. The following article is our Gomez and defending himself. Ap- response. parently, no one has enough integrity to take responsibility for the scandal. By JEFF DIETRICH Their pathetic ham-handed efforts to suppress the scandal and save face y family home was lo- have only more deeply tarnished an cated in the comfortable already besmirched Church. ocean-side community In some sense it is easy to under- Mof Manhattan Beach, stand the prelates’ fear of, and mis- California, where in 1983 the first steps with, the media. Historically, national media-covered child sex they are used to their internal affairs abuse scandal erupted into public being conducted in secrecy, beyond consciousness. The alleged events public scrutiny. And it is true that, at the McMartin Preschool, which at least since the French Revolution, involved scores of children, endless the “liberal press” has had a justifi- tales of demon worship, underground ably skeptical perspective toward the tunnels, and abusive sex rituals, were church that provoke their simplistic eventually deemed by the court, after responses of denial and its bunker years of trial and investigation, to be mentality. untrue and unfounded. However, that Unfortunately, the Church’s efforts decision did not come until after the of denial, suppression, and bunker defendants had lost their good name, retrenchment have provoked the their home, and their livelihood. scandal to far greater proportions What the McMartin case clearly than if the Bishops had just faced it, illustrated was that sex abuse actu- begged forgiveness, resigned, and ally happens most frequently in the offered to spend their lives in prayer home, with trusted relatives and and penance at a Trappist Monastery; friends, rather than in churches or sought a life of humble service at and schools—something that most “the February 2 release of the local Catholic Worker. parents do not want to hear. There- However, what we must realize is fore, for a long time I approached 50,000 pages of previously that sexual abuse of children, along the Church sex scandal with, if not with numerous other moral and ethi- sympathy for the Church, at least closely-guarded cal scandals, has occurred for cen- with a bit of skepticism. documents, the Los turies within our Church. Today’s However, by the February 2 re- lapses of morality, while reprehen- lease of 50,000 pages of previously Angeles Archdiocese has sible and entirely unacceptable, pale closely-guarded documents, the Los in comparison to the scandals of the Angeles Archdiocese has revealed revealed what many have Borgia popes, the inquisitions, the what many have suspected for a long suspected for a long time: crusades, the burning of thousands time: that Church officials are more of women accused of witchcraft concerned with the preservation of that Church officials are in Medieval Europe, as well as sacramental rites and rubrics than the abuse of young Vatican choir they are with preserving the rights more concerned with boys, who up until the twentieth and dignity of the victims of child century were castrated to preserve abuse. They are more concerned the preservation of their soprano voices. For centuries, about finances and image than they sacramental rites and popes, bishops, and priests have kept are about truth and justice. In con- mistresses, concubines, fathered formity with a consistent pattern of rubrics than they are with children, had homosexual lovers, and abuse reports around the country, abused choir boys and altar boys. sexual predators used the confes- preserving the rights and It takes the Church a long time to sional as a means of both seducing dignity of the victims of catch up with changing public mores. as well as forgiving their victims. Gay liberation, women’s liberation, When church investigators were sent child abuse. They are women’s ordination, as well as child out, they were more concerned about sex abuse have unfortunately not the abuse of the sacrament than more concerned about made it onto their moral radar. After they were about the sexually abused all, it took the papacy two centuries victim. finances and image to approve of the democratic system In the revelatory wake of archdioc- than they are about of government and 15 centuries and esan misconduct, Archbishop José six million victims of the Nazi Gomez publicly rebuked Cardinal truth and justice.” holocaust before the Church apolo- Roger Mahony, laying blame for past gized for the historic Christian sins squarely on his shoulders, thus Continued on page 2 ONE WOULD HOPE FOR SINCERE CONFESSION, CONTRITION, HUMILITY CATHOLIC AGITATOR / 1 BETRAYED: THE CHILD SEX ABUSE SCANDAL By TONI FLYNN The stories went on, each more FOR MICHAEL unbearable than the previous one. s a teen, I curled my hair I wept. with orange juice cans, WITH The next morning I avoided the wore a Miraculous Medal SURVIVED GRACE café and the newspapers. I walked Aon a silver chain around loved. way to fatal head-on collisions. on the beach and my thoughts my neck, and liked to write po- I took it hard. Jealous husbands beating wives returned to earlier years when etry during Algebra class. Michael For the rest of the month, a gauzy and wives stabbing wayward hus- Michael and I were teens and the Thomas Horton was my classmate layer of my being, the one that filters bands. whole world—just prior to President and best pal at St. Monica’s Catholic out the full spectrum of despair, Cocky cops banging the heads of Kennedy’s assassination—still felt High School in Southern California. vanished. I missed three days of handcuffed men on cement walls. innocent, at least to us. He was a red-headed, freckle-faced work, hiding in bed, dreaming fitful Young gang members driving One hot summer night, we subver- Venice Boy who loved to surf at dreams. I was sick with a sense of down inner city streets in their cars, sively sneaked over a wall and under Sorrento Beach and wore Hawaiian my own mortality. shooting rival gang members and a fence and into the back lots of shirts to Mass on Sundays. The morning that I finally got up anyone else caught in the crossfire. Desi-Lu Studio where, on contrived I first met Michael at a sock hop and dressed and drove myself to the Foot soldiers and airmen, return- Western sets, we scripted, directed during our freshmen year. By the Steaming Bean Café, I purchased ing home after multiple deployments and acted out cowboy scenarios bor- time we completed our senior year three different newspapers and in combat zones, departing planes rowed from the real and imagined and marched up the aisle in caps and darkly dissolved myself into the in their hometown airports legless, comedies and tragedies of our own gowns to the tune of Pomp and Cir- news of the day. Maybe I wanted to armless, blind, scarred. Others young lives. cumstance, we had seen each other find news of things more insidious injured in less visible ways, feel- We watched James Bond mov- through our respective heartthrobs than cancer. And find it I did. From ing soulless, leaving suicide notes ies outdoors on beach chairs at the and heartbreaks and had sealed a the front page to the back, stories on their beds, putting guns to their back entrance to our local drive-in friendship that would last longer than unfolded like a child’s night terrors, heads and killing themselves. movie theater. We tried our best to any of our high school romances. bad news, sensational news, scandal- Enlisted men, behind the controls solve Sherlock Holmes mysteries on We kept in good touch over the ous news; violent and fear invoking of Predator Drones, striking vari- the black and white TV at Michael’s decades. Eventually, we both found news. ous targets as though it were a video Granny’s house. We drove to LAX ourselves living with our respective It was all there in black ink on the game, knowing that collateral dam- and watched planes take off and families along the California Central paper: age may include innocent children land. Coast, and visited often. Pimps scarring prostitutes who did and pregnant women. Michael experienced hard times in Last month, Michael died of an ag- not perform for enough profit. Manufacturers of B-2 Bombers adulthood, battling alcoholism for gressive form of cancer. It struck. It Drug dealers executing dopers who continuing with production so that, years before finally finding his way hurt. It killed, robbing him of more ratted on them. at a moment’s notice, the Bomb- to recovery. He had a sense of hu- precious time with his beloved wife Homeless addicts dying in gutters, ers can be commissioned to fulfill mor and used it, rather than his fists, and awesome children.