Last Refuge of Scoundrels

(update at bottom)

This is devastating.

Anti-Catholics everywhere are gleefully rubbing their hands. There is serious blood in the water.

But if the allegations I began hearing about yesterday are true – and it will take a damn sight more than just the MSM saying they are to prove their veracity to me – then Benedict is not the man I thought and we all hoped and he must step down.

For a Church not fully recovered from the American abuse scandals this comes as a major body blow, not a knockout punch (yet) but surely sending us back on our heels.

I say not a knockout punch yet because the Church and the Papacy has endured far worse scandals in its long history. And if they quickly come clean on this it will survive though seriously battered.

But it must come clean. No hiding behind The Seal of the Confessional. If, as a Bishop, Ratzinger knew of these abuses and actively worked to hide them, whether by moving priests around (a charge I heard yesterday morning but cannot, honestly, remember where) or declaring they were covered up by Pontifical Secrecy, then he must step down. He is not fit to lead the Church’s faithful.

It is one thing to hear in a confessional of dark deeds and advise the penitent to be forgiven of his sins he must come clean of them with the law. It is quite another to actively engage in hiding them.

I don’t know that Catholics will continue to follow a man who sits there mute as the most egregious of offenses are laid at his feet. Nor would they follow a man who confesses to them what he did and refuses to stand aside.

The Third Secret of Fatima is said to be the Church’s loss of the faithful in great numbers.

Benedict is Christ’s Vicar but he is still a man and subject to the same laws as us all. If he is found to be hiding knowledge of sins against the most innocent among us it may indeed rend the Church.

Whether they are true or not Benedict himself needs to address them. Not through a Vatican spokesman, but directly himself, not just as the successor to Peter, or the leader of a billion people worldwide, but as a man now accused.

"Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me; but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.

"Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the man by whom the temptation comes!

And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to enter life maimed or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire.

And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.

"See that you do not despise one of these little ones; for I tell you that in heaven their angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven.

Matthew 18:5-10

Independent:

Pope will struggle to survive abuse scandal
By John Cooney
Saturday March 13 2010

A depressing week for Pope Benedict dramatically escalated last night into an unprecedented papal crisis when he was directly implicated in a cover-up of a German paedophile priest when he was Cardinal Archbishop of Munich 30 years ago.

The latest revelations are so potentially damaging to the reputation of then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger that speculation was mounting last night that they could severely, perhaps even irreparably, damage his moral authority as Pope Benedict XVI.

It was being speculated that the German Pope could conceivably have to recognise that his position as supreme pontiff could become untenable -- and do what was until now considered impossible, resign from the Petrine throne.

Dismay

Benedict got a first-hand readout of the scope of the scandal yesterday in his native land from the head of the German Bishop's Conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, who reported that the pontiff had expressed "great dismay and deep shock" over the scandal, but encouraged bishops to continue searching for the truth.

Less than a month after the Pope's summit meeting in Rome with the Irish bishops, at which he ordered them to step united in line behind the papal throne, the abuse issue is no longer "an Irish problem", as one senior Vatican cardinal crassly claimed. Clerical child abuse is now a German problem. It has become a Dutch problem. It is also an Austrian problem.

This Europe-wide dimension, on top of similar scandals and cover-ups in the United States, the Philippines and Mexico, to name but a few, makes it Rome's problem. To paraphrase former US president Harry Truman, the buck stops on the Pope's desk, as the spiritual leader of over one billion Catholics worldwide.

In the Pope's homeland of Germany the number of alleged victims nationwide has soared to 300 since the scandals first broke last month in a Jesuit-run boarding school in Berlin.

The Dutch church has climbed to 350 complaints just a week after the Salesians first admitted they were investigating claims that three pupils in a school were abused in the 1960s. In Austria, the Benedictine arch-abbot of St Peter's in Salzburg has resigned after admitting he abused a 12-year-old boy 40 years ago.

Worse still for Pope Benedict, the public spotlight has zoomed in on his older brother (86), Monsignor Georg Ratzinger, who denies that the issue of sexual abuse came to his notice when he was master of Germany's most illustrious group of choir boys in Regensburg from 1964 until 1994.

A former singer in the choir has alleged it was well known among the boarders that a headmaster of the school, now dead, would summon two or three of the boys from their dormitories to come up to his room, where abuse would take place.

"The issue of sexual abuse never came up but if I had known with what exaggerated brutality he (the former headmaster) had proceeded, then I would have said something," Mgr Georg said on Tuesday.

Questions

Questions are being asked about how the Pope dealt with abusive clergy when he was Cardinal Archbishop of Munich-Freising from 1977 to 1982, before he moved to Rome to head the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith.

Cardinal Ratzinger's central role in handling abuse cases as 'the Vatican Rotweiller' has come back to haunt him as Pope Benedict, principally his 2001 confidential directive to bishops "on more serious crimes". This gave the Doctrinal Congregation control over how the church handles cases of sexual abuse of minors by priests.

This week Vatican spin-doctors robustly presented this directive as an important advance in making sure priest perverts were brought to justice.

The Vatican spokesman, Fr Frederico Lombardi, stressed it dealt with how canon law treated cases, and insisted this was not a substitute for civil law, which deals with the offence separately.

However, the media has interpreted the directive as a ban on bishops reporting serious accusations to civil authorities. The rub is that a personal letter from Cardinal Ratzinger to bishops accompanying the 2001 document said complaints against paedophile priests were covered by "pontifical secret", to be handled by bishops in strict confidentiality. Thus, the charge of "cover-up" against the Pope.

The Irish bishops at their Wednesday news conference in Maynooth backed the Vatican interpretation and accused the media of misrepresentation of Benedict. The Bishop of Dromore, John McAreavey, said it was clear to the bishops at their Rome summit that the 2001 letter "in no way precluded church authorities from their civil obligations, especially in regard to reporting and cooperating fully with the civil authorities."

The Irish bishops may have made the wrong call. Only hours after the Pope's meeting with Cardinal Zollitsch, the world's attention switched to his involvement in the 'Fr H' cover-up. Benedict is now in the eye of the biggest sex abuse crisis to hit the Vatican. Whether he can survive is doubtful -- if the Catholic Church he rules is also to survive.

- John Cooney


Pastorius adds:
I don't have much to add. But, I will say this;

1) If this is true, and it sounds like it is, then this will be a very pathetic end to the public life of a great man.

2) The greatest of men have their flaws. That being said, this is a TERRIBLE flaw. The Bible says, "No man is Good. Only God is Good."

3) If this is true, then I can only speculate that Benedict falsely believes that it is his mission as a Christian to be forgiving of all sins. It is not an individual Christians place to forgive those who break the laws of nations, or to forgive those who commit unpardonable sins. "Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord." He could have also said, "Forgiveness is mine," for He is the fount of all Forgiveness. We are not. God did not say, "Be ye lawless in the name of Forgiveness." In fact, He said, "Go now and sin no more."

The Pope is not, and has never been, the arbiter of Judgement and Forgiveness, no matter what anyone thinks, even the Pope himself.

(update h/t In Mary's Image)

This would seem to indicate Benedict had no knowledge of the crimes. I desperately hope that is true.

But either way HE NEEDS TO PERSONALLY ADDRESS THIS. The Faithful (and all of us) need to hear either his denial or explanation of the charges directly from his own mouth.

Catholic News Agency:

Vatican: Pope was 'completely extraneous' to Munich sex abuse decision

Vatican City, Mar 13, 2010 / 12:22 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Fr. Federico Lombardi, director of the Holy See's Press Office, released a statement on Saturday morning in which he made three "observations" regarding sexual abuse by people and in institutions of the Catholic Church. He also addressed dismissed as unfounded attempts to link the Pope to a decision to transfer a priest found to have committed sexual abuse when Benedict XVI was Archbishop of Munich.

The first of the three "observations" made by Fr. Lombardi was to point out that the "line taken" by the German Bishops' Conference has been confirmed as the correct path to confront the problem in its different aspects.

Fr. Lombardi included some elements of the statement made by Archbishop Robert Zollitsch at a Friday press conference following his audience with the Pope. The Vatican spokesman highlighted the approach established by the German bishops to respond to the possible abuses: "recognizing the truth and helping the victims, reinforcing the preventions and collaborating constructively with the authorities - including those of the state judiciaries - for the common good of society."

Fr. Lombardi drew attention to Archbishop Zollitsch's affirmation, without any doubts, of the expert opinion that the vow of celibacy of the priest has no relationship to cases of pedophilia.

He also reaffirmed that the Holy Father supports the German bishops in their plan and that this approach could be considered "useful and inspiring" to other episcopal conferences in similar situations.

Secondly, Fr. Lombardi referred to the interview given to Avvenire by the "promoter of justice" from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Monsignor Charles Scicluna, who explained in detail the norms of the Church for investigating cases of sexual abuse of minors.

The Vatican spokesman highlighted the most important element of the interview: that the Church has in no way promoted hiding the crimes, but has put an "intense activity" in motion to confront, judge and punish them in an appropriate manner "within the framework of ecclesiastical ordinance."

He also wrote that it is important to note that special attention was given to these themes when Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, was the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

"His line has always been that of rigor and coherence in confronting even the most difficult situations," added Fr. Lombardi.

The final observation Fr. Lombardi made was that a recent communique from the Archdiocese of Munich answers questions about a priest who was found guilty of abuses after being transferred from Essen to Munich, where Cardinal Ratzinger was archbishop at the time. The communique, he stressed, shows that the archbishop was completely "extraneous" to the decisions made after the abuses were verified.

"It's rather evident that in recent days there are those who have sought - with a certain tenacity, in Regensburg and in Munich - elements for personally involving the Holy Father in the questions of the abuses. For every objective observer, it's clear that these efforts have failed," he stated.

The Vatican spokesman concluded by reaffirming that "despite the tempest," the Church sees the course to follow "under the sure and rigorous guide of the Holy Father."

Fr. Lombardi concluded by expressing his hope that the process might help all of society to "take charge" of improving ways to protect and form children and youth.