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  Should the Pope Be Arrested or Forced to Resign?

By Fr. Joe Borg
Times of Malta
April 6, 2010

http://www.timesofmalta.com/blogs/view/20100406/fr-joe-borg/should-the-pope-be-arrested-or-forced-to-resign

I am tempted to write that some people have the cheek of brainless chicks. I stoically will resist the temptation. The spirit of the Easter season will impel me to be kind and call them confused darlings.

A certain journalist with the surname of Hitchens said that there should be an "international warrant" for the arrest of the Pope. He, (Hitchens and not the Pope) is really upset that the Queen will meet him (the Pope not Hitchens) while welcoming him at Heathrow Airport. From the tone of Hitchens's writing one would conclude that Hitchens would prefer the Queen to give Pope Benedict permanent residence in the dungeons of the Tower of London. Probably the costs (PR and not monetary ones) would be prohibitive, so some other temporary abode will be provided.

Irish singer Sinead O'Connor is of a similar view. He told the Los Angeles Times that the Pope should be subject to "a full criminal investigation."

My elves in Interpol could not find out what the powers that be at that august establishment terrorising criminals, are doing about this request. A request to Commissioner Rizzo to throw the Pope into a cell as soon as he sets foot in Malta's International Airport is not excluded, reliable sources from the New York Times confirmed - and as we all know, anything confirmed by the newspaper is as solid as mama's jelly tots.

However, not all is lost for latter day papists. Help has come from the most unusual quarter. Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turk who shot Pope John Paul II says that Pope Benedict XVI should not be arrested. He is, in fact, appalled at the suggestion. The Pope should just resign, he told journalists. The news agency AP, in its report said that "there are questions about Agca's mental health." Nothing was said about the mental health of Hitchens and Singer Sinead!

I will undoubtedly be accused that I giving a superficial and banal treatment of a very serious subject. Let me clarify.

Benedict: an enemy of omerta

I have written about child abuse so often that my regular readers know the seriousness with which I treat this subject. I am not banalising child abuse but I treating with the unjust reports against the Pope with the scorn that they deserve.

There is probably no one in the Catholic Church who fought tenaciously, courageously and continuously against child abuse more than Pope Benedict is doing now and did when he was Cardinal Ratzinger. The culture of omerta has an enemy and not a friend in Pope Benedict. It always had and will always have. He was behind the harsh rules made in the beginning of this decade. Under these harsh rules, child abuse has been put among serious crimes like the profanation of the Eucharist. The attempt to try to connect the name of Pope Benedict with the culture of silence is despicable and utterly vile.

They got it wrong

The New York Times abandoned two of the most important principles of journalism in its reporting about the Pope: truth and accuracy. The case of Fr Murphy showed lack of action at the diocesan level not at the level of the Congregation of Faith. The case about the priest in question reached Ratzinger's congregation years after the deeds had been committed. His bishop publicly said that he should have reported the case years before. Now the priest was old and dying. The advice given was that the priest would continue to live in seclusion (he had been living so for twenty years) and admit to what he did. He died a few weeks later.

An AP story claimed that only 20% of reported abuse cases result in full canonical trials. This was based on information given during an interview by Mgr Charles Scicluna. However, the report conveniently mentioned that fact that this happens because in most cases, disciplinary measures are imposed without a full trial. Does this show a dovish attitude to child abuse?

AP did it again when it reported the abuse cases of two priests in Arizona. It said that these cases "have cast further doubt on the Catholic church's insistence that Pope Benedict XVI played no role in shielding pedophiles before he became pope."

AP got it wrong once more. Far from "shielding paedophiles," the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, at Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger's direction, ruled that the two priests - Fathers Michael Teta and Robert Trupia - be removed from the priesthood. Both priests exercised their right to lengthy canonical appeals of earlier disciplinary actions, but were suspended from ministry during that time.

Child abuse is an abomination. It is filthy, disgraceful and criminal. However, untruthful and inaccurate reporting of the phenomenon is also disgraceful. Should the Pope be arrested or be dismissed or should these biased journalists who are abusing their profession be told to do their work properly?

The Church, the media and child abuse

The following extract from the editorial of The Tablet of April 4 completely represents my thoughts and sentiments about the subject.

"Two other things need to be acknowledged. The first is that while ecclesiastical and even civil authorities refused at first to listen to what the victims of sexual abuse had to say, the only people to give them a hearing were in the media. If the voice of the victims seems unduly amplified now - and it is by no means easy to say how much volume is too much - this is some compensation for the silence that reigned before. The second point is that the Nolan inquiry would never have happened without investigative journalism, initially on the part of the BBC. It exposed the grave mistake made by Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor in one notorious case when he was Bishop of Arundel and Brighton, which he quickly admitted with deep regret. He did not blame the press, or claim a media conspiracy, and he eventually emerged with his reputation restored.

"Any institution under sustained media attack is tempted to retreat into a fortress mentality, but it is never edifying and cures nothing. It is usually accompanied by an indifferent or poor public-relations operation, and the Vatican's handling of media interest in these matters leaves much to be desired. Cardinal William Levada, the current head of the CDF, has been virtually invisible. If the CDF has a good story to tell, let him tell it. Indeed, Catholics all over the world are pretty desperate to hear it. But it must be based on the truth, including an admission of failure where failure occurred. That way lies recovery; only that way, indeed, will the Church be led from its long Good Friday to an Easter Resurrection."

 
 

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