DISCUSSING THE FACTS
Questions raised by the Boston scandals
By Matthew A. C. Newsome ©2002
By now every major newspaper, and even most local ones, have had some coverage of the priestly sex scandals coming out of Boston and a few other locations. Once the facts have been reported, the editorials and letters soon flow in. Inevitably they ask the same questions, and bring up the same points. People are calling for an end to priestly celibacy, for the ordaining of women, and even for the acceptance of open, practicing homosexuals among the priesthood. As if any of that would deal with this present crisis.
As I read the many commentaries and op ed pieces, I just have to shake my head. So many people, with so many opinions, who know so little of what they write about. Let’s look at some facts.
Firstly, priestly pedophilia – is it pedophilia at all? The technical definition of pedophilia involves an attraction to pre-adolescent children. It is not, and never has been, a sexual attraction of someone to a teenager. This is why a 21 year old who has relations with a girl of 17 is charged with statutory rape, not pedophilia. If we examine the present cases of “pedophilia” among the priesthood, we find that the majority, indeed over 90%, involve post-adolescent, teen-age boys. To spell it out plainly, it is not pedophilia, but homosexual molestation.
When this story first broke, immediately the more conservative in the Church called for stricter screening of homosexual men in the seminaries. The extreme liberals, on the other hand, called for the open acceptance of homosexual priests by the Church. They loudly pointed out that most pedophiles are heterosexual men, so you can’t blame this on homosexuality. And they would have a point, if only these were really cases of pedophilia. If we want to examine this issue we need to call it what it is – the molestation of teen-age boys by men. And you bet it has something to do with homosexuality. Of course these arguments ignore fact that homosexual or heterosexual, a priest is still required to live a celibate life.
People want to blame this on priestly celibacy. The theory, if I understand it correctly, is that if a normal, heterosexual man, is “forced” to live for an extended period without sex, he will then develop an attraction for young, teen-age boys, and eventually molest them against their will. The main problem with this theory – and it’s a big problem – is that not a single credible psychologist, sexual therapist or otherwise qualified professional has suggested that this is the case. As commentator Ann Coulter pointed out, there are 45,000 Catholic priests in America, and so far 55 confirmed sexual abusers. That’s about .001% of the total priestly population. If celibacy indeed was the cause for this abuse, one wonders why that number isn’t any higher. According to a recent Newsweek article, about 5 to 6% of all men have “pedophilic tendencies.”
John Boyle, columnist for the Asheville (NC) Citizen-Times, himself a Catholic, admitted in a March 21 column that ending priestly celibacy would not end such abuse in the priesthood. Yet, he immediately went on to say, “Personally, I think it's time for the church to reconsider celibacy and the all-male priesthood rule to open the door to more people who want to serve.”
In other words, even those who admit that priestly celibacy has nothing at all to do with pedophilia or sexual abuse still want to take advantage of this tragic time in the Church to advance their own agenda. That, to me and to most faithful Catholics, is a scandal in and of itself.
Boyle quotes Kathleen Joyce, assistant professor of American Christianity at Duke, as saying that priestly celibacy only became mandated in the 11th century. The implication here is that the early church did not have a celibate priesthood, so why should we? And he then added women’s ordination to the table almost as an afterthought, without explanation. Sneaky, isn’t it? Whenever someone challenges priestly celibacy, chances are they will also challenge the male priesthood.
Someone well versed in Catholic doctrine and theology, though, could tell them how different these two issues are. If we are going to discuss these matters, let’s take a look at what exactly we are discussing.
Priestly celibacy is a discipline, not a doctrine of the Church. Even today, not all Catholic priests are celibate. It is a discipline practiced in the Latin (or Roman) Rite of the Church, but Catholic churches in the East, such as the Byzantine Rite, do allow married clergy. Even in America today, there are about 100 married Roman Catholic priests, mostly former Anglican priests, who were married prior to their conversion and have a special dispensation to be ordained due to their former careers in the ministry.
Since it is not a doctrine, and has been changed over the course of Church history, it theoretically could be changed again. In that regard, it is a fair topic for discussion. However, it should be pointed out that it has always been the tendency of the Church to promote celibacy in her clergy.
Though the Bible nowhere states explicitly that priests must be celibate, there is much there that praises the celibate life, especially in the writings of St. Paul. From the earliest days of the Church, priestly celibacy was encouraged, if not mandated. The earliest attempt to enforce celibacy was at the Spanish Council of Elvira (between 295 and 302 AD). This was a local, not an ecumenical council, but it began the custom of mandatory celibacy in the West.
At a Roman council held in 386 an edict was passed that forbade priests who were married to have conjugal relations with their wives. And by the time of Pope St. Leo the Great (5th century), priestly celibacy was more or less recognized in the West, though of course different areas observed this custom with more or less rigor for the next few centuries.
After the Carolingian Empire broke up, Europe entered an era that was marked by “impurity, adultery, sacrilege and murder” (as described by the Council of Trolsy in 909). This chaos of course bled into religious life, and caused scandal within the Church as well. Priests, and even bishops, openly took wives and had children. Many bishops appointed high church offices to their heirs. The discipline of priestly celibacy greatly suffered.
However, the Church never abandoned it, and throughout the eleventh century, one will find edicts and laws passed to combat this trend, and reinforce the ideal of clerical celibacy in the West, especially under the pontificate of Gregory VII. The final victory for the cause of priestly celibacy came in 1123 at the First Lateran Council, which enacted a law that proclaimed any marriage by those who have taken Holy Orders to be invalid. Priestly celibacy has been the hard rule in the Western Church ever since.
The ordination of women, on the other hand, is something that the Church has never allowed, East or West. Unlike priestly celibacy, which is a discipline, the male priesthood is a doctrine, and therefore cannot be changed. To do so would be like changing the doctrine of transubstantiation, or the divinity of Christ, or the Trinity.
The Bible does not support the ordination of women. The early Church Fathers across the board tell us that, though women did play an active role in the early church, ordination was reserved for men only. This teaching was upheld in the early church, throughout the Middle Ages, and continues into modern times.
Furthermore, in 1994, Pope John Paul II stated, “the teaching that priestly ordination is to be reserved to men alone has been preserved by the constant and universal tradition of the Church and firmly taught by the magisterium, . . . in order that all doubt may be removed . . . in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful” (Ordinatio Sacerdotalis 4).
In other words, it’s not even open for debate as far as the Church is concerned. So, if you want to discuss the possibility of ordaining women to the priesthood, it’s only fair to warn you that you will beating your head against a brick wall. If it makes you happy, go for it. But it won’t do you any good.
The careful reader will notice that those in the media who seem to be so outraged over this sexual abuse scandal ironically want to solve the problem with a loosening of the Church’s teachings on sexual morality. Ordaining women priests, homosexual priests, or allowing priests to marry won’t solve this issue.
In fact, the idea that a priest having a wife would somehow cure his homosexual tendencies flies in the face of what the homosexual lobby has been telling us for years – that one is either born straight or gay and there is no choice in the matter.
If one wants to find the cause for this horrible tragedy in Boston, it does not lie in an all-male, celibate priesthood. If anything, it lies in the fault of the priests who did not live up to their freely taken vows of celibacy. It is closer to the truth to say that the problem lies in seminaries that are too soft on homosexuality, with bishops too quick to ignore or excuse the warning signs.
But the media would never suggest that homosexuality was in any way a part of this problem. This is why this abuse of teen-age boys is cloaked under the misnomer of “pedophilia.” This is why not much is made of the fact that over two thirds of the priests who have abused boys themselves were abused by older men when they were young. When the Boy Scouts were in the news for choosing not to allow gay Scout Masters, the media beat them into a pulp. They were painted as intolerant, uncaring, insensitive bigots. Yet they don’t seem to be having any problem with Scout Masters abusing boys.
When a handful of priests sexually abuse teen-age boys, the media would have us believe that the problem lies anywhere but with homosexuality. Indeed, some suggest that homosexuals in the priesthood would be a part of the solution! The problem must lie in some teaching of the Church!
In all honesty, I believe that if we truly want to examine the root of this problem, we need to heed the words of John Paul II. This small handful of sinful men have marred the image of the priesthood and made the lives of good, faithful, and holy Catholic priests everywhere that much more difficult. And they did that, John Paul tell us, by succumbing to the “mystery of evil.”
Is there a problem in the Church today? Yes. Is there a problem with Western society in general? Yes. What we need to ask ourselves is are all of these public outcries against the teachings of the Church part of the solution, or just another symptom of the problem?
see also "More Questions Stemming from the Boston Scandal"
webbed on 3/25/02
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