First Things is the monthly publication of The Institute on Religion and Public Life. While the publication, and the Institute, has a decidedly Roman Catholic leaning, it is nevertheless “an interreligious, nonpartisan research and education institute whose purpose is to advance a religiously informed public philosophy for the ordering of society.” I have subscribed to the journal (though my subscription just expired) which contains excellent, well-research, high-caliber articles on the interface of religion and public life.
The editor, Joseph Bottum, has written about the ongoing scandal of sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic church at the online site of The Weekly Standard. Titled, “Anti-Catholicism, Again” is a lengthy piece rehearsing numerous ways in which the Roman Catholic church has been blamed for society’s ills – both now and in previous generations. Bottum referred to his Weekly Standard piece in a blog piece entitled, “Molesters for Hundreds of Years”. In both instances, Bottum decries the rough treatment being given the Roman Catholic hierarchy.
I commented on Bottom’s blog:
“I do not doubt that most priests, within the long history of Roman Catholicism, were sincere in their devotion to God and in their desire to serve Him by serving their parishoners.
However, one cannot escape the stark truth that the hierarchy regularly and systematically covered the truth and ignored the anguished cries of many, many victims.
Given that the world at large has never had any particular love for Christianity, can one be surprised at the kind of coverage the Roman Catholic church is receiving from the secular press?
As I understand confession and repentance from sin, the repentant person makes unqualified confessions of sin. With a few exceptions, this is singularly lacking in the ongoing public reponse from the Vatican down to the parish church.”
Of course, evangelicals have their fair share of failures – deeply grevious ones at that. We are not without sin. Having said that, I think it singularly unhelpful for major figures in the Roman Catholic world to play the persecution card when journalists, commentators and the general public decry the decades-long Roman Catholic hierarchy’s cover-up of abuse within their ranks.
