INDIANAPOLIS (IN)
The Reflector
March 6, 2019
By Shayla Cabalan
The day this article is published will be Ash Wednesday, a Christian holy day of prayer and fasting that marks the beginning of the season of Lent. For those unfamiliar with traditional Christian terminology, Lent is a time intended to prepare for the return of Christ come Easter. As a result, the Lenten season is associated with repentance, fasting and above all, giving up sinful habits.
Huge emphasis is placed on this last sacrificial element. Throughout Lent, many Christians attempt to shed bad habits and inclinations. Above all else, Lent is a time of self-reflection and opening up a dialogue between oneself and God in order to improve as a person. Now is arguably a time to open up a dialogue on a plague that has disrupted the church for decades: the clergy sexual abuse crisis.
A week ago, Pope Francis wrapped up an unprecedented Vatican summit intended to address clergy sex abuse of children. The summit comes after a watershed series of revelations within the Catholic Church, chief among these being an explosive grand jury report from Pennsylvania. According to a Washington Post article titled “More than 300 accused priests listed in Pennsylvania report on Catholic Church sex abuse,” a 1,400-page grand jury report revealed that more than 300 Catholic priests across Pennsylvania had sexually abused children over the span of seven decades, identifying 1,000 victims, but suggesting there could be thousands more. Since the report, Francis has encouraged guilty clergy members to turn themselves over to the authorities, and at the closing mass of the Vatican summit, he made an appeal for an “all-out battle” on clergy sex abuse.
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