donderdag, februari 25, 2010

Donna Elza: Eu fique com medo... Since when did the offendors get to dictate the pace of healing for their victims?





I loved my church once, when I believed in it. But I do not anymore. It gives me no pleasure to say so, no satisfaction or closure. I remember the Sacred Heart in the kitchen of my childhood, the faith of my grandmother, the power of the sacraments, the constant presence of the faith as an anchor in all of our lives. I remember how we looked to Church to make real the momentous moments of our lives; birth, marriage and death. I remember the faith of my forefathers and I feel nothing but sadness.

...an essay I contributed to a book ‘What being Catholic means to me’, published by Columba Press last year.

Since when did the offendors get to dictate the pace of healing for their victims?25-02-2010

Has it struck anyone else as obscene that in their rush to rationalise the abject failure of the Pope to properly address the deliberate cover up of the rape and abuse of children by Roman Catholic Priests, Irish Bishops seem to be suggesting that victims must be patient and wait for the Vatican’s grand design for our healing to be revealed?

In a letter from Bishop of Ferns Dr Denis Brennan which was read at masses in the Diocese, Dr Brennan asserted that the visit by Bishops was only one part of a process designed to bring healing to victims.

Well excuse me, but since when did those who were responsible for the cover up of abuse and its resultant trauma get to dictate or design the healing process for victims?

And just why exactly is the Pope unable to name the terrible wrong that the institution he heads is guilty of?

The Vatican, Catholic Bishops and Pope Benedict XVI have now made many statements about clerical sexual abuse. They have blamed the media, the decadence of western society, the sexual revolution, gays and now a “weakening of faith” and countless others for the scandal of clerical sexual abuse.

What they have consistently failed to do is name the simple truth of their own guilt in overseeing a cover up of crimes against children on a grand and global scale.

The Vatican and Pope Benedict XVI are fully aware of the extent of clerical abuse, not only in Ireland but worldwide, and have overseen the cover up of that abuse for decades. The failures exposed by the investigations we managed to force here in Ireland are the result of a deliberate and well orchestrated policy of cover up and denial spanning decades. And at the heart of the cover up, as Supreme Pontiff of the Holy Roman Apostolic Church in all his ermine and finery sits the Pope.

So enough of the lies and half truths and breathtaking arrogance, enough of the blaming everyone and everything else.

If you can’t speak the truth, then perhaps it’s time to shut up.

But do not presume that anyone else can or will wait for you to sanction or ‘design’ their healing process.

The simple truth is that the problem is not a “weakening of faith” or the corruption of society. The problem is a corrupt institution led by an arrogant and deceitful hierarchy

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