First, Pope Benedict casts the sexual abuse crisis primarily as a theological problem, blaming progressive theology after the Second Vatican Council, as if what was needed to combat abuse was an acceptance of the correct theology. Thus, it was largely a problem of orthodoxy. 2/
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But that misses the mark. One of the worst offenders was Father Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, a priest who promoted through his religious order the most “orthodox” theology one could imagine. He was also a serial abuser and a rapist. 3/
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Second, Benedict casts abuse as essentially a problem of morals. Now, pedophilia is obviously immoral, but it is also a disease. One reason it persisted was because it seen as primarily a moral problem. Thus, after “Father” had recognized he had done wrong, we could move on. 4/
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But it is not simply immoral. It is, far more fundamentally, a serious illness, a profound psychological problem. Simply admitting one’s moral wrongdoing is insufficient. 5/
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Benedict’s suggestion that abuse was somehow acceptable by church leaders because of lax 1960s morals also strains credulity. It’s doubtful anyone approved of it morally. Rather, bishops responded to abuse in sinful and criminal ways: neglect, cover up, moving around priests. 6/
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Also, the idea that the sexual mores of the 1960s were to blame (a common refrain in many of Pope Benedict’s earlier writings) neglects the fact that sex abuse happened in the church during the 1940s and 1950s, and far earlier. 7/
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People had sex outside of marriage and molested children in the supposedly wholesome 40s and 50s; and many of the priests who abused did so decades before the late 60s, when presumably the cultural infection was peaking and were educated and formed as priests long before that. 8/
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Finally, it blames the sex abuse crisis on the culture, not the church. It focuses the outside rather than the inside, failing to look at the deep structural flaws and sins within the church (specifically, a clericalism that privileged the word of the priest over the victim). 9/
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This was a disappointing analysis from a brilliant theologian. For a more thorough analysis, consult the John Jay Report, which still offers the most comprehensive examination of the root causes of the sex abuse crisis. 10/10
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Thank you for an incisive response. The letter also fails to account for a case like Cardinal Law--who arrayed himself as a model of orthodoxy and champion of moral order--who nevertheless egregiously shielded offenders, betrayed victims, called down "God's power" on the media.
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