Benedict is Alive and Kicking

So, the former Pope, Benedict XVI, who retired in 2013, stating that he would devote his remaining life to penance and prayers, has now come out with the product of his first six years: a message to the world about those who are really to blame for sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

EUREKA, he has found the culprits. It is all because of the sexual revolution in the 1960s and those “homosexual cliques” among seminarians and priests. They openly watched sex films and more… Seminarians, he hastens to add, avoided reading his books: “My books were hidden away, like bad literature, and only read under the desk.” Had they only read his books instead.

How about all those bishops and cardinals, who actively hushed things up, hiding the information from the law enforcement agencies, terrorising the victims and their families and when they had no alternative, paying hush money, so the information does not come out? Who is responsible for that, hey? Grown-ups having consensual sex against the rules of the Catholic Church, or the Church apparatus that instructed bishops not to report molesting and raping priests to the police and the bishops who followed Vatican rules instead of the law of the land?

J’accuse, Benedict, is not what penance should be about. Go retract your essay, and try mea culpa  instead. By the way, in your spare time, you could read my book about the Church. It is no longer in print, but I am sure that you will find a copy.

Catholic Church Abuse

Two items caught my eye in today’s NY Times:

In New York the Catholic Church is trying to raise a further 100 million Dollars to compensate victims of sexual abuse by priests of the NY diocese. To date, Catholic dioceses in the USA have already paid over 4 billion US Dollars to abuse victims. Many claims have not yet been settled and this amount does not include the billions paid in other countries across the world.

In the Philippines, the Catholic Church has just actively and successfully lobbied against a government plan to introduce condoms and HIV education into schools. Unlike other Asian countries, HIV infection rates are skyrocketing in the Philippines. The Rev. Jerome Secillano, an officer of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, praised the decision to back away from the plan as “a wise move.”

Let there be no doubt: this too is abuse.

In case you want to understand why the Church is incapable of making the necessary change, read my book, Double Cross: The Code of the Catholic Church.

Better Late than Never (II)

There are probably more prostitutes that have read Double Cross: The Code of the Catholic Church than there are prostitutes who have waited for the papal approval to start using condoms. And yet, better late than never.

The Pope started out by talking of male prostitutes – where contraception is not an issue anyway. The Vatican has widened the approval to include female prostitutes. By talking of prostitutes, the Pope really circumvented the contraception issue but the floodgates have probably been opened now.

Fewer and fewer Catholics in the developed world observed the Church’s teaching on contraception and what the Church was left with were poor people in third world countries dying from AIDS because their bishops told them not to use condoms. At long last, the Pope has understood how scandalous this state of affairs was. Thank God?

The Pope and I

The Pope is coming to Britain and I have been asked (alas, not by him) to give a talk about Double Cross: The Code of the Catholic Church.

My talk will take place on Thursday, 16 September 2010 at 7:00 pm at the Conway Hall, 25 Red Lon Square, London WC1R 4RL

Don't Fire the Pope

The following is from an interview I gave several days ago to an American radio station:

The recent media hype surrounding the Catholic Church includes calls for Pope Benedict to resign. Should he? There are currently two known cases that connect Benedict personally to abuse. As Archbishop of Munich and Freising, he did not prevent the reassignment of a paedophile priest and as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith he acquiesced to the request of an abusive priest and thwarted his defrocking.

Up to now, nothing has come to light that would suggest that Benedict had ever abused anyone or that he knowingly allowed abuse to take place. Indeed, no malice can be ascribed to either Benedict or to most other senior Church figures.

Instead of evil, what we have is total blindness: Blindness to what is important and what is not. In other words, their values were corrupted. Sadly, the brutal end result is the same as if they had been evil.

There is no doubt that Benedict is guilty. He is guilty of being not only part of the machine but also an important, significant and formative part the Catholic Church machine: A machine that had systematically allowed abuse to take place under its auspices. A machine that has a history of acting evilly in other spheres of life too. But Benedict is not guilty of abuse; it is the Catholic Church that is guilty. Therefore it is not a personal resignation that we need but rather a total change in the way this institution operates.

We should ask ourselves what had enabled such corrupt values to thrive in an institution that is all about love and hope, an institution that considers itself to be a lighthouse to humanity. The Pope’s resignation would cause an earthquake within the Catholic Church. Such an earthquake could be helpful. Yet, it might not necessarily produce the change we need. Let there be no doubt, society would have closed this institution had it been secular. Those who run the Catholic Church should be aware of the risk in not making the necessary changes.

The Pope’s Latest Troubles

Many of my friends in Germany are getting worked as the press publishes daily reports about cover up of sexual abuse by the Catholic Church. The great excitement is whether any dirt would stick to the Pope personally. They have already reached his brother, a regular priest, who has admitted to slapping choirboys. (Not that way) The brother denies having indulged in any spaß with the Spatzen of the renowned Regensburg choir.

Those who have read Double Cross: The Code of the Catholic Church should not have been surprised. In the conclusion to the chapter on sexual abuse, I wrote:

The unfolding of the sexual abuse culture of the Catholic Church has exposed her as dangerous institution which runs sophisticated cover-up operations to defend the criminal activities of her priests. This secret and authoritarian institution and its hierarchy have, by their conscious policy of hushing up and covering up, become accessories to sexual crimes perpetrated by their clergy.

SO, if you have not yet got the book, GO and BUY it. The easiest way is to order the book through Amazon.

If you already have the book, buy another copy and give it to a friend: The ideal present for Good Friday.

Avatar vs. Double Cross

The Vatican newspaper and radio station have called the film Avatar simplistic, and criticized it for flirting with modern doctrines that promote the worship of nature as a substitute for religion. L'Osservatore Romano said the movie's plot is unoriginal and its message not new. It faulted Cameron for taking a "bland approach." A few years ago Vatican officials spoke out against The Da Vinci Code.

I am still waiting for my mention in dispatches. Pope Benedict has up to now refrained from attacking Double Cross: The Code of the Catholic Church. Has he secretly been convinced or is my book still in the pile of books waiting to be read by the Holy Father?