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  Pope's Apology Just Scratches the Surface

By Dianne Williamson
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
April 20, 2008

http://www.telegram.com/article/20080420/COLUMN01/804200403/1008/NEWS02

Bernard McDaid's voice mailbox was full on Friday.

Every major news organization wanted a piece of his time. He was interviewed by The Associated Press and on CNN. He told the world about his historic meeting with Pope Benedict, which he called "the beginning of a new start."

As they say, from his lips to God's ear. And what a difference from the decades of silence and denial, when victims of clergy sexual abuse were disbelieved and told to move on, when no one wanted to hear their sad stories because they made Catholics — and just about everyone else — uncomfortable and resentful.

The pope's meeting Thursday with McDaid and a handful of sexual abuse victims is welcome, but even now there's a feeling the victims need to move on, that the crisis that rocked the Catholic Church is old news. The church has acknowledged its mistakes. Enough already. As local readers learn the topic of this column, I can almost hear a collective turning of the page.

Such scandal fatigue is understandable. But if anyone believes that the pope's apology for the crisis and his meeting with the victims will put an end to it and to the years of anguish and anger, they're wrong.

First, forgive my impatience with the pontiff when he blamed the scandal partly on the breakdown of American values. While acknowledging that bishops "sometimes very badly handled" the crisis, he called for efforts to address the abuse "within the wider context of sexual mores."

"What does it mean to speak of child protection when pornography and violence can be viewed in so many homes through media widely available today?" he said. He also said that pedophilia "is found not only in your diocese but in every sector of society."

Um, OK, Your Holiness. Pedophilia is all over the place. But nowhere was it allowed to fester more flagrantly than in the Catholic Church. And I'm not sure how he can equate violence and pornography in the media with the countless priests who lured innocent altar boys into their studies, as their bishops either ignored their crimes or simply transferred the predators to another parish. The subsequent cover-up had little to do with a cultural breakdown, and everything to do with a dysfunctional church hierarchy.

Still, the pope is doing the right thing by speaking with the victims, who seemed moved and encouraged by the meeting. And the session was also a good sign for other survivors of clergy abuse, who have literally prayed for solace from their pope.

Years before The Boston Globe ran a series of exposs that broke the church abuse scandal wide open, Ed Gagne of Spencer was telling his story to the local media and the civil courts, and his lawsuit offered evidence that leaders of the Worcester Diocese were aware that a significant number of their priests were molesting children, yet did nothing to stop it. In 1999, Mr. Gagne reached an out-of-court settlement with the diocese over the suit, which maintained he was sexually abused as an altar boy, and again by the priest he turned to for guidance.

When we published his story in the mid-1990s, we were called vile and disgusting by local Catholics. Lots of readers threatened to cancel their subscriptions. Mr. Gagne was harassed and shunned.

Last week, he said he was heartened by the pope's attention to the scandal.

"He used the word 'shame,' and that's an appropriate word for him to use," said Mr. Gagne, who at one time wanted to be a priest. "I think he has the power to bring healing, more than the bishops and the priests. How could he come to the United States and ignore this important issue?"

Now, after finally hearing from these victims, we'll see if the pope takes them seriously enough to act. For starters, he could remove the bishops who ignored or covered up the abuse. He could bounce Bernard Cardinal Law from his cushy position in Rome.

He could continue, with words and actions, to redress years of church silence and complicity.

"I don't want to diminish the importance of the pope's efforts," Mr. Gagne said. "But if I had to write the script, he'd be saying a lot more, and it should have happened a long time ago."

 
 

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