In a long post, Rod Dreher takes the measure of the recent resignation of Cardinal O’Brien of Scotland in the wake of charges of untoward advances on seminarians and young priests some thirty years ago.
I have no particular desire to defend the honor, innocence, or reputation of Cardinal O’Brien. But I must admit that I’m mildly exasperated by Rod’s overwrought concerns. The Cardinal is accused of making unwanted advances on seminarians, and the coded language used by the media suggests that he may have used his authority over younger men to coerce them to have sex with him.
Cardinal O’Brien’s alleged conduct is rather more like professors pressuring their graduate students to sleep with them than molesting pubescent altar boys. It’s something to be censored and punished, but surely that fact that some men do these sorts of things doesn’t throw a normal person into a state of anomic horror.
But let’s leave that aside. If the allegations are true, O’Brien behaved shamefully. Nonetheless, this statement by Dreher gave me pause:
Cardinal O’Brien had a reputation for speaking out boldly for Catholic truth about homosexuality and marriage. He was called an anti-gay bigot by his opponents in the UK. And now, if these charges against him are true, he will have been shown to have been a roaring hypocrite, and the UK Catholic witness to Christian truth will be even more diminished and despised.
Come again? I am by no means without sin. I did after all grow up in the worst of the Sixties, which was actually the Seventies. It was a time of hedonism without idealism. Now I run a magazine committed to defending the moral truths taught be Catholicism (as well as Judaism and Islam, among other religions, as well as reason itself in some instances), some of which I have myself sinned against. Am I therefore a hypocrite? Has Rod never heard of confession?
Priests should be held to a higher standard, and etc. This is very true. Moreover, Rod’s right about the diminishment of Catholic witness. The sins of those who represent high moral ideals undermine both the spokesmen and the ideals. Yet we should be aware that we live in a paradoxically moralistic age that is uniquely unforgiving of those who affirm moral truths, especially rigorous ones, but don’t live up to them. That’s very likely because we have an only attenuated sense of office. Our culture is one of celebrity, not station. Much turns on personality; little on position. And so when the man falls, we can’t remain true to the office. When priests sin, we find it hard to believe in the priesthood.
Rod connects this to the general difficulty of belief in our secular age. I don’t mean to gainsay his account of his own spiritual struggles. We all have them. But mine are different. I’ve found belief easier, not harder as I have gotten older. And this is true even as getting older has meant a deeper exposure to the corrupt nature of our humanity, including my own. And it’s true even as getting older has meant a greater awareness of the diversity of culture, the contingencies of belief, and the fragility of faith.
Maybe I’m too postmodern. Maybe some sort of corrosive inner skepticism within me is so powerful that it even undermines the reasons to doubt. (That’s not farfetched. There’s a early modern tradition that sees skepticism as ministering to rather than undermining faith. Pascal, for example.) The same goes for the the sexual abuse scandals. Yes, of course I find it all demoralizing (in every sense of the word). But maybe my knowledge of my own sinfulness is so close and vivid that I’ve become hardened and insensitive. Whatever the reason, I must admit that I never and I still don’t find the dolorous news of clerical decadence, debauchery, and debasement a threat to my faith, anymore than I found the pettiness, lassitude, and dishonesty of so many academics a reason to doubt the noble calling of a life of teaching and scholarship.
There’s more to say about this, of course, but there it is. I deplore O’Brien’s alleged transgressions, especially insofar as they made others miserable, damaged the Church, and undermined people’s faith. But I don’t find them spiritually relevant to me. Or maybe the point is that I do, and because I believe even in spite of my sinfulness, I can in spite of his as well.
February 25th, 2013 | 7:13 pm
I think this is well said. I think most educated Catholics are aware that people like the Borgias existed, for example. They were vicious murderers (and more), and a few actually became pope. So it can get worse than this. But the Church always weathers the storm.
I also wonder what people who believe the “institutional Church” is too corrupt propose as an alternative. No church at all? That would just deprive the good priests of an opportunity to minister, while certainly leaving many opportunities for the wicked ones to just go be wicked somewhere else.
February 25th, 2013 | 7:30 pm
One question that I think deserves serious consideration is whether priests or bishops who have in their past incidents such as Cardinal O’Brien is accused of—no matter how penitent they are, no matter how long ago the behavior was, and no matter how certain they are that they will not repeat it—ought to accept an elevation to bishop or cardinal. If I have the timeline right, O’Brien was a bishop when the incidents are alleged to have taken place. But he became a cardinal in 2003. Like a candidate being vetted for, say, the vice-presidency, might a priest being appointed a bishop, or a bishop being appointed a cardinal, not say, “It will be bad enough if my past behavior is exposed given what I am not, but if I rise even higher, it will be even more scandalous”?
Cardinal O’Brien’s alleged conduct is rather more like professors pressuring their graduate students to sleep with them than molesting pubescent altar boys.
Except the relationship between a bishop and a priest is not equivalent to the relationship between a professor and his or her graduate students. One might say that a priest using the confessional as a way to seduce penitents is rather like a therapist seducing his or her patients, but surely any Catholic would acknowledge it is much worse.
February 25th, 2013 | 8:52 pm
Dr. Reno – I think you’re slightly misrepresenting Rod’s argument. He’s not saying that if you ever did x and now you publicly condemn x, you’re a hypocrite. Obv. that’s not reasonable.
The issue is that if you publicly condemn x while being guilty of it at the same time–which is the accusation against O’Brien, if I’m understanding everything correctly. A Christian with a rough and rowdy past who later condemns those behaviors isn’t a hypocrite. But a Christian who is condemning them while engaging in them himself most certainly is. (Essentially, we’re talking about the difference between C.S. Lewis, who took up with a dead friend’s mother as a young man and later wrote in defense of Christian sexual ethics and Ted Haggard.)
February 25th, 2013 | 9:57 pm
Dear Jake Meador,
The news reports say that the alleged “inappropriate behavior” happened in one instance “in 1980″ and in the others “in the 1980s”. That is long before O’Brien became cardinal and before his well-known public statements about matters related to homosexuality. Is there any basis for your saying that he was condemning things “while engaging in them”?
I think people should wait till more is known before drawing far-reaching conclusions.
I wonder what Rod Dreher’s reaction would have been had he been around when all the apostles, save John, abandoned Jesus and when Peter even denied knowing him. Would he have given up the whole enterprise as hopeless?
February 25th, 2013 | 10:35 pm
Anyone who has been sexually abused or who has experienced any form of sexual harassment is apt to see this issue in a very different light. These acts, especially when perpetrated by clergy, not only undermine faith but can cripple the soul. Minimizing it, which this post appears to do, only makes the pain worse for those who have had to deal with abuse or even “untoward advances.” I wonder how many have abandoned the Church because of denial and minimizing, not to mention cover-up of abusers.
February 25th, 2013 | 10:38 pm
“I think this is well said. I think most educated Catholics are aware that people like the Borgias existed, for example. They were vicious murderers (and more), and a few actually became pope. So it can get worse than this. But the Church always weathers the storm.”
Did it, now? Or maybe instead those corruptions were what led to half of Europe deciding the split away. I wonder, would Protestantism have succeeded if there had not been rampant corruption in both the Vatican and the general priesthood?
Sure, there’s still a Roman Catholic Church now, and it’s still the biggest game in town, but imagine what it could look like if there hadn’t been Borgias. Likewise, there will certainly be a Roman Catholic Church in 100 years, but how will it be different because of these scandals from the way it would be otherwise?
February 25th, 2013 | 11:39 pm
I’m very confused here – isn’t “professors pressuring their graduate students to sleep with them” a serious offense? Why is that being forward as an example of something only moderately bad?
February 26th, 2013 | 12:21 am
You have to understand Dreher’s got this traditionalist, crunchy con thing going but at the same time has belonged to three different religious denominations. That’s the aporia that he needs to explain. His tool for doing so is hyping the Catholic church sex scandals. Carl Schmitt’s concept of the political romantic describes Dreher to a T. Right down to his specious attempt to evade the political with his Benedict Option. For political romantics various subjects become pivot points around which to create an effusive lyrical conception of reality. The Catholic Church was once that pivot, now it is the town in Louisiana where he lives. The one unique element to Mr. Dreher, is his acceptance of original sin, which was to Schmitt the remedy to political romanticism.
February 26th, 2013 | 2:29 am
It does not happen often, but I will happily acknowledge it now: I stand in full agreement with everything David Nickol says.
Like Prof. Reno, my faith is not damaged in the slightest by Cardinal O’Brien’s apparent fall from grace. But I can’t shake the feeling that Rod is largely right: as an instance of hypocrisy at the highest level by a prelate notorious for his opposition to gay rights, this development is going to be a serious blow to the Church’s credibility on this issue, and not just in Britain. It’s not fair, but it’s the way the Western world works today.
February 26th, 2013 | 6:47 am
“A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest”. These words are descriptive; not condemnatory, at least not in any ultimate sense. They describe our common fate until we are transformed by grace.
To begin to become good is a lifetime project, well known to those who have tried, failed, tried again and again – and again.
Protestations of people who are thought to be “good” that they are anything but are usually rejected as falsely modest. I believe that they speak the truth. Only God is good; we are all sinners who through the grace of God (and only by his grace) can repent. By his grace we are given opportunities to begin again.
The psalmist who asked God to create “a clean heart” in him was asking for a radically new beginning. He rejected his former state as hopelessly compromised. He hoped to be made a new man. This is in my opinion existential honesty.
February 26th, 2013 | 7:03 am
But I don’t find them spiritually relevant to me. Or maybe the point is that I do.
oh that clears it up.
I see lots of hate the sin.
I see little of love the sinner unless it is a priest.
February 26th, 2013 | 10:55 am
I agree that Dreher’s “anomic horror” is not normal, nor is his pronounced and prolonged hysteria regarding Catholic clergy generally. Makes one wonder if perhaps the Cardinal is not the only one capable of “roaring hypocrisy”.
February 26th, 2013 | 11:16 am
“Cardinal O’Brien’s alleged conduct is rather more like professors pressuring their graduate students to sleep with them than molesting pubescent altar boys. It’s something to be censored and punished, but surely that fact that some men do these sorts of things doesn’t throw a normal person into a state of anomic horror.”
This is a ridiculous analogy and a ridiculous moral calculus that deserves outright condemnation, “anomic horror,” and not “mild exasperation.” There are a number of reasons the analogy is ridiculous. One, seminarians are not mere grad students. Two, seminarians are men, whereas the grad students in the analogous situations involve women being pressured into sex by male superiors (also worthy of “anomic horror” and swift retribution). Three, this situation is directly destructive of the faith, whereas the grad student scenario is not likely the case (often a state U problem for non-religious subjects).
There are a number of reasons the moral calculus is ridiculous. Begining with the anthropology of the normal person, we would expect that person to be upset and rightfully angry to find out that professors or Cardinals were abusing their authorities to elicit sex from their inferiors. If it’s against our daughters or against our sons in seminary, swift retribution and condemnation are necessary, and perhaps it’s time for a return of certain public penitential acts reserved for wicked, abusive authorities.
As for the Lord Himself, although he is forgiving, he has shown us a glimpse of his righteous anger, especially against the “brood of vipers” and “wolves” who watch over His sheep. Let’s not forget that the command to forgive does not eliminate righteous anger, nor does the Lamb consume the Lion.
February 26th, 2013 | 11:24 am
Why don’t we all take a few deep breaths, count to, oh let’s say, 100 a few times, and try to remember that the man has been “ACCUSED,” of these behaviors, not “CONVICTED.”
Do we all feel better now?
February 26th, 2013 | 11:58 am
Actually, even if one has one’s sinning in the past and now proclaims that it was sinful and wrong, I would consider it hypocritical. After all, you’ve had your fun, but now you would seek to stop others from having fun.
It’s how I feel about a lot of post-abortive women who become pro-lifers after they marry and get on with their lives. Oh, I see, you got the corrective you needed to have the life you have now, but now you want to keep others from getting that.
February 26th, 2013 | 12:24 pm
William, that’s a good point, and thank you for it. I have a priest friend who was accused, removed immediately from ministry and never convicted. What’s more, he was cleared by the county child services and by some state review board of any wrong-doing. Nevertheless he was never restored by the diocese to ministry. To be accused of this is to be branded, and ex-Catholics like Rod Dreher are more than ready to do the branding, either wittingly or unwittingly.
February 26th, 2013 | 1:34 pm
CK, I find all three of your reasons for “anomic horror” less than persuasive (indeed you yourself contradict reason #2 in the very same sentence). It appears indulging in a little “anomic horror” serves some purpose for you.
February 26th, 2013 | 1:40 pm
“William, that’s a good point, and thank you for it. I have a priest friend who was accused, removed immediately from ministry and never convicted. What’s more, he was cleared by the county child services and by some state review board of any wrong-doing. Nevertheless he was never restored by the diocese to ministry.”
“The world must construe according to its wits.
This court must construe according to the law.” – Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons.
A credible accusation may still fail to find proof under the law. The standards for conviction under the human law, at least in the US, are high. Although one is not proved to be guilty under the human law, it does not follow that prudential judgment should be foreclosed determine whether one should continue to be employed in a public ministry. Such accusations may have been credible, whether proven, and as such the one who has care for the ministry of the diocese must exercise prudence.
Thankfully, Catholics are not bound merely by man’s laws to inform their judgment. We are free to be “wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”
February 26th, 2013 | 1:57 pm
It may be hypocrisy for a man to preach against what he himself currently practices. But to preach now against what he formerly practiced (but does no more) may be a sign of conversion rather than hypocrisy.
February 26th, 2013 | 2:26 pm
Re: Comment by cermak rd:
Please be assured that repentant sinners do not think of their transgressions as “fun”.
Bitter regret and deep sorrow plus a sense of shame and humiliation are actually more common.
Submitting to “ablatio” requires the sculptor’s tools; it is painful. The “refiner’s fire” purifies as fire does.
February 26th, 2013 | 4:29 pm
One day, Rod will notice the abuse in other faiths.
That will be a horrible, horrible day for him.
February 26th, 2013 | 11:04 pm
CK, one of the interesting thing about my friend’s case is that the beginning of his investigation went forward before *any* allegation of sex abuse had occurred. The accusing parishioners–who had a personal beef with him–got him removed on technicalities under the original, unadjusted “zero tolerance” policy. One accusation was that he served wine at a parish dinner where there were minors present. The other was that he grabbed an altar boy’s shoulder in the sacristy who was goofing off before Mass rather roughly and scolded him. (Yeah, you guessed it; kid was the son of one of the accusers.)
THEN after he was put on “administrative leave” lo, and behold! Someone came forward and “remembered” that Father had sexually abused them 30 or 40 years before. So then, voila, the case became a sex abuse case. It never went to trial because it smelled so bad to the judge.
But the weak-kneed bishop left him out to dry rather than try to get justice for him.There were protestants outrage because they knew he was a righteous man. He was set up, then exiled. There is no evidence against him any more than there was evidence against Cardinal Bernardin.
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