Friday July 16, 2010
Media Frenzy over Women’s Ordination Distracts from New Vatican Sex Abuse Norms
By John Jalsevac
VATICAN CITY, July 16, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Critics of the Catholic Church’s handling of the sex-abuse scandals finally got what they wanted from the Vatican this week – a sweeping new set of guidelines on how to deal with sex abuse allegations that will be applied on a global scale.
The document, issued yesterday, includes provisions for the automatic excommunication of and laicization or “defrocking” for any priest who sexually abuses a minor. Additionally, priests who are found to have used child pornography or who abuse the mentally ill or disabled face the same penalty – the most severe possible in the Church’s law.
Also noteworthy, the new norms extend the period of limitations for sex abuse allegations from ten to twenty years after the victim’s 18th birthday, allowing adult victims who were abused in childhood the opportunity to lodge formal complaints, and put in place “fast-tracking” procedures to deal with serious allegations.
But even as the Vatican has moved decisively to clamp down on the crime of sex abuse by clergy, much of the mainstream media, as well as feminist and leftist Catholic groups, are instead focusing their attention on another aspect of the Vatican document – its inclusion of the attempted ordination of women amongst the “delicta graviora,” or grave crimes, under Church law.
The document states that “both the one who attempts to confer sacred ordination on a woman, and she who attempts to receive sacred ordination, incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.”
Numerous secular and liberal commentators and news outlets have reacted with outrage, saying that by putting the two offenses in the same category, the Church has effectively “equated” ordaining women with sexually abusing minors.
Erin Saiz Hanna of the Women’s Ordination Conference in the U.S. complained that, “The Vatican’s decision to list women’s ordination in the same category as pedophiles and rapists is appalling, offensive, and a wake-up call for all Catholics around the world.”
However, Catholic commentators have pointed out that the document includes a whole variety of other offenses (such as the violation of the seal of confession), and not only the ordination of women, as “delicta graviora,” and that merely being in the same broad category does not make the offenses comparable or even of similar seriousness.
“These were just a number of issues that happened to be included in a document that says, ‘These are issues that require action from Rome,’” said Archbishop Wuerl of Washington D.C. in an interview.
Wuerl said that the decision by the U.S. bishops to hold separate press conferences on sex abuse and women’s ordination was taken to highlight the distinction between the two issues. “The two are not linked at all,” he said.
Wuerl’s analysis was seconded by Monsignor Charles Scicluna, an official in the Vatican’s doctrinal department, who helped draft the new document. He told Reuters that including the two offenses in the same document “is not putting everything into one basket.”
“They are in the same document but this does not put them on the same level or assign them the same gravity,” explained Scicluna.
Scicluna also explained that the Church recognizes a key distinction between sexual abuse and the attempted ordination of women that in effect puts them into separate categories. “Sexual abuse and pornography are more grave derelicts, they are an egregious violation of moral law,” he said, whereas, “Attempted ordination of women is grave, but on another level, it is a wound that is an attempt against the Catholic faith on the sacramental orders.”
The new document actually changes very little when it comes to the issue of the ordination of women, which has long been viewed by the Church as a serious crime worthy of excommunication for all parties involved. “The Catholic Church through its long and constant teaching holds that ordination has been, from the beginning, reserved to men, a fact which cannot be changed despite changing times,” said Archbishop Wuerl yesterday.
The new norms merely formalize the punishment for, as well as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s jurisdiction over, such violations of Church law.
The Catholic Church says that its teachings on the male-only priesthood are based upon the example of Jesus Christ, who chose only men to be among the 12 apostles (who the Church views as the first priests and bishops), as well as the fact that the priest is intended to be an “alter Christus,” or a stand-in for Christ, who was a man. However, even in reiterating Church teaching against women in the priesthood in 1994, Pope John Paul II stated that, “The presence and the role of women in the life and mission of the Church, although not linked to the ministerial priesthood, remain absolutely necessary and irreplaceable.”
But while critics of the Church are focusing their energies, and criticisms, on the provisions on women’s ordination, others are praising the new norms to deal with sex abuse. The U.S. bishops issued a statement calling the streamlined and more robust norms a “welcome step” in handling the “terrible crime and sin of a sexual abuse by a cleric.”
“What we read today from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is heartening,” said Bishop Blase Cupich, bishop of Rapid City, South Dakota, and Chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Protection of Children and Young People.
“The seriousness with which the Church views sexual abuse of a minor by a cleric cannot be understated. By putting child sexual abuse by clergy in the same context as the safeguarding of the sacraments, the Church is making it clear that such misconduct violates the core values of our faith and worship.
“This is an important step in the continuing effort to achieve justice for innocent people whose trust in a cleric was violated.”
Gregory Erlandson and Matthew Bunson, co-authors of the book “Pope Benedict XVI and the Sexual Abuse Crisis: Working for Reform and Renewal,” also applauded the Vatican’s actions as further evidence of the pope’s commitment to address definitively the clergy sexual abuse crisis that has dominated much of his papacy.
“The revised norms – which reflect the hard-won experience of the American Church in addressing this crisis – are now universal and will apply to all dioceses worldwide,” Erlandson and Bunson said. “The pope in his words and actions has made it clear the Church will continue to address this issue forthrightly, learning from its past mistakes and making it much easier for Church leaders to quickly remove offending priests from ministry permanently.”
With files from LSN Rome Correspondent Hilary White