Pope in a Box

The news media is sharpening its knives to carve up the Catholic Church again over the sex abuse scandal that has rocked the denomination for more than a decade. While the current reports have all the earmarks of previous coverage, there is one difference. This time the media has painted a big bulls eye on Pope Benedict XVI in an attempt to link him to cover ups of priestly misconduct.

This latest offensive was fueled by a New York Times barrage of news stories, columns and editorials fingering the Pope as responsible for failing to vigorously investigate and prosecute abuse in the U.S. The Times dug up a Wisconsin case, where the abuse occurred from 1950 to 1974, and tried it to hang it around the neck of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. When the case finally reached the Vatican, the year was 1996 and the future Pope was head of the Vatican's doctrinal office.

For its material, The Times drew extensively from documents obtained from cooperative lawyers, who are suing the church on behalf of sexual abuse victims. It is very easy to understand the motivation of the attorneys. They would like nothing better than to link the cover up of abuse all the way to the Vatican. That would open the Vatican's coffers to settlements that would easily dwarf the financial resources of local dioceses. To these attorneys, the Vatican's bank accounts are the Holy Grail.

The media is the willing accomplice in this moral play because they view the Pope as too conservative for their tastes. If the media can raise questions about his handling of sexual abuse cases, it will undermine the Pope's moral authority on issues such as right-to-life, stem cell research and same sex marriage. The media wants to neuter the Pope to the point where the public dismisses the church's position on controversial matters.

Some in the media, including The Times, have called for the Pope to step down in the wake of the latest news reports. Their editors must have the Vatican confused with Congress. Popes don't just resign because of allegations in the media. Deaths end their papacy. The whole notion of a Pope resigning because of unsubstantiated charges in a news articles and columns may be the most preposterous suggestion, even for The Times.

An unbiased reading of the record suggests that the Pope, far from being an enabler in this scandal, has been an outspoken advocate of reporting any evidence of sexual crimes to civil authorities. For the first time, the Pope recently put into place standards and practices to help bishops deal with these abuse cases. These are clear signs Benedict will not sweep abuse under the rug. Now he should be judged on what he does, not just what he says.

What's so interesting to watch is that the media never mentions Pope John Paul II, who served during the height of revelations about the sexual abuse. His papacy began in 1978 and spanned 26 years until his death in 2005. To be charitable, he was gravely ill during the final years of his reign. However, the Pope never appeared to grasp the severity of the crisis. He relied on American bishops to deal with the cases with little guidance from Rome. His record was spotty at best. Yet the media has given him a pass, primarily because news organizations saw Pope John Paul as a modern vicar with a progressive agenda. Never mind that he was even more of a doctrinaire than his successor, Pope Benedict XVI.

The blame for lack of action and cover ups belongs squarely on the shoulders of the bishops, who shielded abusive priests from facing criminal charges. Once the scandals became media fodder, the bishops hid from view and relied on lawyers' advice to clam up. It was a costly mistake. They should have handed over their files on abusive behavior to the authorities and pledged cooperation to prosecute the guilty.

Many Catholics watched helplessly as their church turned a deaf ear to public demand for full accountability. For its reticence, the church was rightfully dragged through the media muck for its painful past mistakes. Once the lawsuits started and the scope of the problem became apparent, Pope John Paul II should have hauled the American bishops to the Vatican and promised to defrock any leader found guilty of protecting abusive priests. Then he should have followed up with an inquiry that would have rid the church of these derelict bishops. To now blame Pope Benedict for this mess seems a stretch even for lawyers intent on collecting millions more in fees.

The thread the media and lawyers are using is the role Cardinal Ratzinger played as head of the Vatican's arcane doctrinal office. The Times and others broad brush his role to insinuate that somehow every new abuse allegation was elevated to Cardinal Ratzinger for handling. The truth is that the Vatican office deals almost exclusively with issues of church doctrine. If abuse cases would have come before the office, it likely would have been in a tangential way. For example, the office might be expected to grapple with the issue of sex abuse as it relates to church doctrine on the celibacy of priests. However, the media has painted a picture of cases files being delivered daily to Cardinal Ratzinger's office desk for his action. That's nonsense. The media either misunderstands the role of the doctrinal office or more likely they are deliberately out to destroy Pope Benedict's credibility.

None of this is to diminish the horror of the sexual abuse scandal. Catholics were again reminded of this ugly chapter in church history this month when the Diocese of Vermont agreed to pay $17.6 million to dozens of former altar boys who alleged sexual abuse by priests. The alleged abuse took place in the 1970's. Most of the cases involved one priest, who has since been defrocked under Pope Benedict's papacy.

Yet even in these dark hours for the church, there seems to be a light. Last year, there were six new cases of abuse reported to authorities. While even one case is too many, at least the perpetrators are slowly being weeded out. By comparison, during the five-year period from 2001-2005, some 2,570 teachers in the country had their credentials revoked, denied or sanctioned because of sexual misconduct.

The decline in reported abuse cases is a sign of hope for a church faithful who have endured some of the most damning revelations about the priests they trusted and then had to cough up funds to pay for their diocese's mistakes. At least now it seems there is a Pope who grasps the enormity of the situation and has pledged to do something about it.