IN LOCO PARENTIS

Well, to the delight of a few, the dismay of others, and the utter indifference of most, the Hog is back, forced by circumstance to take up the cudgel in one hoof, whilst dipping the other all the way up to the ham into a typically uncontroversial subject: religion. Specifically, the saga of the Catholic Church’s attempt to grapple with the seemingly never-ending scandal surrounding the serial and widespread child abuse perpetrated, covered up, and sometimes even encouraged by the church’s minions and overseers. Yes, encouraged, exemplified by the priests who marked vulnerable children as likely targets for other abusers.

You may ask (if you’ve read this far), what is there to be said about this sordid subject that hasn’t already been written, said, blogged, reported, and otherwise opined? Unfortunately, much. For there is a 900-pound gorilla, no, a 9000-pound elephant, no, a 200-ton balaenoptera musculus (blue whale, unfortunately beached for the sake of this metaphor) in the room. In all the blather about who is responsible, there is one group never mentioned. The priests, who perpetrated? No. The non-abusing priests and nuns, who knew but remained silent? No. The bishops and archbishops, who covered up, and who facilitated by transferring known abusers to unsuspecting parishes, where they could prey again on the innocent? No. The cardinals and the popes (former priests, monsignors, bishops, and/or archbishops all) who presided over this undeniably criminal activity? No. All these are known parts of the problem. However, one group so far has been left out of the discussion, and until it is included and its responsibility dealt with, all the weeping and gnashing of teeth will be merely so much noise.

Who are these people? To answer that question, the Hog poses another: who is primarily responsible for protecting children? Not the church, that much we know. The schools, the police, friends, Romans, and countrymen, anyone else acting in loco parentis? Of course not. The responsibility for keeping children safe falls on…the parents. (The Hog recognizes he is venturing into territory bound to make him at least as popular as the proverbial plague of locusts. However, as the philosopher Clichéus says, it is what it is, and since no one else seems willing to go there, we must blunder on.) Yes, the parents. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to groom a child for abuse where the parent or parents are paying strict attention. And part of the process involves grooming the parents. Things don’t get to where the folks will let little Snavely go on an unsupervised overnight with the parish priest, without a trusting relationship between the parents and the padre. And how does such a relationship arise?

Have no doubt these abusers are clever, and know how to ingratiate themselves with the families. Too, they are also very skilled at spotting vulnerable children and yes, parents. They can be very patient, gradually grooming the family for the right time to take advantage of misplaced trust. They can create situations in which the parents would believe the priest over the child. There are the aforementioned transfers of abusers into unsuspecting parishes. And from a legal standpoint, the church certainly depended on the cooperation of good Catholic police, judges, and politicians, many of whom would readily give credence to the clergy. But…

Speaking of belief, there is another factor. Unquestioning belief. The very basis of the church is a willingness to believe without question in God. And in the fiction that the church is God’s representative on earth. Having inculcated parents in this belief, it has been relatively easy for the church to persuade the parents of abused children to believe the church instead of their kids. Or, at the very least, to remain silent, believing that the church will “look into it,” and that remaining silent “for the good of the church” is the right thing to do. Given the sheer numbers of clergy and children involved, is unimaginable that at least a good number of these children did not tell their parents, only to be silenced in the face of credulity in the church. Many more doubtless remained quiet, sensing that the devout parents would credit the collar over their children. And good old Catholic shame surely played a part.

Predators seeking vulnerable children would avoid close families whose members talk with and love each other, which don’t keep secrets, and whose parents exercise proper protective supervision. No, the abusers look elsewhere for their victims.

The church’s corruption of these families is part and parcel of the evil it has perpetrated. This is painful to say. But those parents who believed the church over their children, who stayed quiet “for the good of the church,” who failed to pay attention while they and their children were being groomed, or who otherwise failed to protect their children, must acknowledge and be held accountable for the role they have played in this tragic situation. Yes, to a certain extent the parents were also victims. But that does not excuse the fact that they are primarily responsible for protecting their children.

Needless to say, the church is even more reluctant to deal with the parents’ responsibility than it is to acknowledge its own. For the adults, not the children, contribute the money that is the church’s lifeblood. Without their financial contributions, no more vast real estate holdings, or priceless art collections. No more gold chalices, or silk vestments. Lose the parents, and you lose not only the children, but the money.

Another aspect of this mess is the question of legal responsibility on the part of those involved. It appears the church’s efforts to hide behind statutes of limitations are crumbling. Since the law also places primary responsibility for the children’s welfare and safety on the parents, confronting them with the legal issues raised by the scandal would be a nightmare for all involved.

Yet it must be done. Until and unless all the secrets are laid bare, the evil will continue. It may be a low blow to use the words of Jesus against the church that claims to be his, but the truth must out, to fulfill the biblical homily: “ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Apropos of truth (or lack thereof), Richard Nixon famously said on the Watergate tapes that it’s not the crime that gets you, it’s the cover-up. Here, it’s both, but as long as the cover-up continues at any level no one need take the church’s mea culpas seriously. Just like Nixon, the longer the church hierarchy continues to insist it did not know, the deeper the hole it digs for itself. And that defense will not work for the parents either; they had responsibility, and many if not most, blinded by belief, flunked it.

The truth shall make you free, but not without great cost. The tab has been building for a long time. The church’s and the parents’ treatment of the children leaves a lot of chickens to come home to roost.