Law: The Pope meets victims of sex abuse

Read the details at NPR.

"Attorney at Large": Priests and Pedophiles, Pain and Puffery
By
James Castagnera
      The Pope’s U.S. visit brought the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal back into the media spotlight.  Several victims of abuse by priests met with the Pontiff to express their pain and accept a Papal apology.  Beyond a doubt these guys deserved that apology.  They probably also are entitled to whatever monetary settlements they won.
       That being said, let’s put the never-ending cycle of litigation and media attention into perspective.  The John Jay Report commissioned by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops came up with documented accusations against 4,392 priests, about 4% of all priests who served in the U.S. from 1950 to 2002.  If accurate, this is said by other researchers to be a percentage approximately equivalent to the estimated number of abusive educators compiled by the U.S. Department of Education.  Other investigators contend that the percentage of guilty priests is as low as one to two percent.
       No amount of sexual abuse is acceptable and cover-ups are even more despicable. It’s the cover-ups that have cost the American Church big bucks and bad press.  In the closely related realm of sexual harassment the courts, led by the U.S. Supreme Court, have fashioned rules to insulate employers from liability when they put policies in place to prevent hostile working environments and take prompt action in response to harassment allegations.  The Catholic bishops should have done the same.  Their parishioners are paying the price of their failures.
        And that having been said, let’s try for a bit of balance.  In the 19th century, New York Sun editor John B. Bogart observed, "When a dog bites a man, that is not news. But if a man bites a dog, that is news.”  Put another way, the media don’t usually report on the plane that didn’t crash.   I attended St. Joseph’s Elementary School in Jim Thorpe for eight years, then Marian Central Catholic High for four more.  During many of those 12 years I was also an altar boy.  I knew a lot of priests.  While I perhaps wasn’t the cutest kid to ever don a cassock, I wasn’t beaten with an ugly stick either.  Yet through all those years and all that contact with priests young and old, fat and skinny, shy and gregarious, pious and puckish, I was never propositioned, fondled, or otherwise inappropriately approached.  Just as most priests can honestly say they never strayed down the pedophile path, I’m sure most former altar boys could join me in saying the experience left me with nothing but happy memories.
       And, lastly, let it also be said that the endless cycle of scandal and litigation has brought the nuts out of the tree branches.  One priest I’ve come to know and respect in my professional life was accused a few years ago by a young woman of having abused her as a girl.  The accusation hit the front pages of the local newspapers and made all channels for the 11 o’clock news.  The priest, by then in late middle age, was forced to take a leave of absence from his post and retreat to one of his order’s monasteries.  About a year later, his name was cleared and the prosecutor’s charges were dropped.  To its credit, the larger and more respectable of the city’s daily papers reported the exoneration on page one.  To my knowledge the town’s tabloid, which had splashed the accusation across its entire front page, was shamefully silent about the subsequent clearing of the padre’s good name.  Naturally, his crazy accuser was judgment proof.  No defamation damages compensated this good father for his suffering.
         All this having been said, I will wait for this piece to appear in print and brace myself for the stones that no doubt will fly my way for my temerity in defending the priests who didn’t transgress and the Church that gave (and still gives) so many in my family comfort in times of tragedy and in old age.  So be it… it needs to said.
[Jim Castagnera, formerly of Jim Thorpe, is the Associate Provost/Associate Counsel at Rider University.  A collection of his “Attorney at Large” columns is available at www.lulu.com.]Access the collection here.