Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church 

By: Lauren Hunter

                        Artist's Statement

After researching the history of sexual scandals that happened in the Catholic Church around the country and learning what church leaders in the Vatican did to try and fix these problems, I then created a letter addressing one of the Priests who works at my hometown's Catholic Church. This letter consists of the information I found during research that intrigued me while asking the Priest questions about how these past scandals affected his life as a Priest and how they have affected people's views on Catholicism worldwide. My research question is "How can the Roman Catholic Church develop their communication skills and take responsibility for the sexual abuse scandals that happened in the past so they can gain back people's trust in Catholicism?" Therefore, by using a basis of Christian morality and church-state developments, I wanted to educate readers on what happened when these clergy sexual assault cases were exposed to the public and why these issues are still affecting Catholicism in today's world. Choosing this creative letter to a Priest allows the class to get a more educated perspective from someone who has truly been directly affected by these past scandals. 

Letter to a Priest

4/19/20

Rev. Francis Aguilar

Associate Pastor

St. John Fisher Catholic Church

5448 Crest Road, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275

Dear Rev. Pastor Francis,

I am writing this letter to you because I have been doing research on the sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church and I want to get your perspective on the topic. Throughout doing extensive research, I now feel as though I am educated in the history behind these sexual abuse scandals that happened in the Catholic Church, how church leaders reacted to the issues, and why this issue is still affecting Catholicism in today's world. In 2002, the Boston Globe journalists exposed hidden scandals of sexual abuse by the clergy and priests throughout the country which led to huge crisis in the Catholic Church. Not only did these journalists release and publish many documents of evidence against the church, but it opened doors to victims sharing their own personal stories of being sexually abused through their Church and showing the lengths Churches went through to protect its reputation by hiding those cases to keep them secret. The Catholic church finally started to understand how they could not protect their church officials from the law and try to undermine justice for their wrongdoings; and had to start taking responsibility for their crimes. Still, however, many people believed that members of the Vatican showed they did not understand the seriousness of the problem. Pope John Paul had a meeting with Vatican officials and others that hold high power and talked about the need for restoring trust and honesty back into the Catholic Churches. They also discussed how to deal with the damage that has already been done and what to do in the future to respond to these types of scandals. An agreement was made that included six principles on the topic of clerical sexual abuse scandals. The first stated that sexual abuse of children by priests or clergy is a horrible sin and a crime. The second states that the church has to provide help and assistance to the victims and their families. The third states that the Church now realizes the heaviness of this problem and how important it is to fix these issues that keep recurring. The fourth is that the pope and the cardinals have all remained in agreement that there is no link to pedophilia and celibacy. The fifth is that the church leaders should all be teaching these moral lessons on how wrong it is to sexually abuse. And finally, the sixth is that all the leaders have recognized the powers of Christianity and needing to turn away from sin and back to God. Overall, the church and the state's relationship together has been tested in many ways during this fight to solve the problems of sexual abuse in the Churches and having to figure out when the state needs to intervene by law. There is now better communication between the Vatican and the Church leaders about the legal justices that will help to fix these crimes made.

Now that I have shared some background that I have found on this topic, I want to address how this outbreak of scandals that happened in 2002 is still affecting the Catholic Church, 15 years after the bishops set up the 'zero tolerance' policy. I believe that many Catholics felt betrayed by their religion. The Catholic Church ultimately broke their trust between their Catholic people by attempting to hide these crimes by keeping them from the public and the law. This provoked people to have anger toward Catholicism because they seemed hypocritical. Church leaders claim to only live by the word of God and to live with Christian morality remained silent about the clerical sexual abuse allegations which resulted in the loss of credibility throughout Catholicism.

With everything that happened to the Catholic Church, I want to see how they are making the effort on gaining back people's trust and faith in them. It takes much time and patience, but I do believe that the people who turned away from Catholicism can eventually heal and take back their religion. I am curious to know how these scandals affected Priests themselves, and how their jobs in working in churches changed because of them. I want to know your views on the topic and how the allegations affected your life personally. I also want to find out how Catholic Churches are working to gain back their credibility and sustain it. Your thoughts and opinions to this matter will help me and my class obtain an even better understanding on this topic.

Thanks, and best wishes,

Lauren Hunter