Prosecute Mobile Abusers, for God’s Sake
By John Archibald
This is an opinion column. Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. Sometimes that’s just not enough. Sometimes it’s not complete. Sometimes it’s too little too late, too half-hearted, too forced and weak and watery. Like tears of a condemned man. Like the Catholic Archdiocese of Mobile, with its late and lame revelations that dozens of priests and other clergy abused and molested and scarred children for decades in churches and schools across south Alabama. It had the ring of a deathbed confessional. The Archdiocese last week released 29 names of Catholic priests, deacons and brothers accused of sexually abusing children since 1950. Most of them are dead or dying. Forgive me Father, for I have sinned, and lied about it, and covered it up while the guilty grew old in their own beds while victims grew up in torment and anger and a guilt they did not earn. Yeah, forgive them. For the crimes perpetrated in God’s name, covered up for generations in God’s name, revealed only after God’s name was sullied, defiled, slandered by those who wore his cloth and used it to commit the most heinous of acts. What in God’s name? Of course, too late is better than never. Of course, after the emperor has been shown naked in the streets it is a relief when he puts on some boxers. Deathbed mercy pleas are perhaps preferable to unending guilty silence, and the silencing of victims. But this chapter is not over. This admission is not purifying, or final. It does not absolve those who committed the crimes or covered them up. Even with the pretty words written by Archbishop Thomas Rodi as he released the names of Catholic priests and other church workers – many of them dead or dying or so old they cannot properly answer for their actions – who have been “credibly accused” of sexually abusing children. Rodi asked forgiveness, as he should. “The most vulnerable members of the Church, the children, have been grievously hurt by clergy and religious, the very people who should have been trusted to help and not to injure,” he wrote. “In addition, the Church has at times failed to act as it should have to immediately protect children and to promptly remove those who have preyed upon them. To all the people of the Church, and especially to the victims of child sexual abuse by clergy and religious, I ask for your forgiveness. From the depths of my heart, I ask your forgiveness.” As he should. But there’s more he should do. There’s more the church can do. Rodi, when asked by AL.com’s Chris Harress, who has followed this case for weeks, said the church reached out to the handful of those on the list who are still alive, warning them their names would be released. But he would not say if those men were asked if they committed crimes, or if he believed the allegations against them were true. “It would be for them to say that,” Rodi said. “It’s for us to say our investigation is credible.”
It’s a start. It’s better than we saw from a string of apologist archbishops in years past. But it is not transparency, or release, or anywhere near enough. It is not enough to name names of the dead and dying, to apologize and close the book. There must be more. The diocese must turn the names over to prosecutors, with evidence of any misdeeds. The Mobile District Attorney’s office should pursue it as far as it can go. Those who helped cover this up for generations should be held to account as accessories and conspirators. They should be treated as criminals and villains. Alabama law, which allows only a small window of time for the abused to challenge their abusers in civil court, is archaic and must be changed. Let Heaven forgive, if it can. Let the people of Alabama pursue justice. For God’s sake.
|
.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.