Atonement in the City of Angels

by Fr. Roger J. Landry - August 10, 2007

Sin always brings with it the need for expiation. And expiation is never easy.

The $660 million settlement the Archdiocese of Los Angeles made with 500 victims of clergy sexual abuse on July 16 is the most conspicuous example yet of the atonement the Church continues to make for the sins committed by her priests and bishops against young people entrusted to their care.

In the last five years, Catholic dioceses and religious orders in the United States have had to pay a staggering $2 billion in settlements and judgments for instances of the sexual abuse of minors stretching back to the 1950s. That figure amounts to about $2 for every Catholic on the planet. But the costs of the scandal go way beyond the financial, and therefore the Church's response and reparation must extend far beyond the fiscal.

There is a temptation for many American Catholics, when they contemplate such huge settlements, to respond with cynicism and anger against almost everyone involved. There is justifiable indignation at the priest abusers. There is anger at bishops who seemed preferentially to protect the institutional aspects of the Church and their own reputations more than innocent children. There is fury against the state legislatures, like in California and in Delaware, that have temporarily changed the civil statute of limitations in order to encourage suits from decades ago, not against the abusers themselves but against the Church and all her good works as a whole. There is antagonism, in our hyper-litigious culture, toward the personal-injury lawyers who stand to make a quarter of a billion dollars in the Los Angeles settlement alone. And there is often anger at the victims for bringing such massive suits that will no doubt have an impact on the Church's mission.

But these stinging financial settlements are a necessary consequence of the Church's failing to bring about real justice for the victims when the abuse was occurring. While there have been some mendacious non-victims who have made false allegations of sexual abuse to try to earn some money at the expense of the Church, the vast majority of those who were actually preyed upon by the Church's ministers are not in it for the money. The money is just a symbol of the justice they had sought in vain from the Church in the past. Had the offending priests been removed by their superiors from active ministry when they first learned of the credible allegations of abuse; had they turned the priests over to civil authorities for their delicts before the criminal statue of limitations had run out; had Church leaders protected them and other kids from the priests, rather than transferred these clerics to other churches where they were able to hurt more young people; then many of them would have felt no need to bring huge lawsuits against the Church to seek justice and bring about proper reforms. Since to a large degree, however, those actions did not occur in the past, many of the victims sought justice in the only way they thought available to them in the present.

God always seeks to bring good out of evil and without a doubt he wishes to bring good from this iniquity. Father Raymond De Souza, in a painstakingly honest and refreshingly direct article in Canada's National Post, listed five reasons why the sexual abuse settlements are a welcome development.

First, "the prospect of civil damages on a significant scale has served to encourage victims to come forward. … The settlement process has allowed many victims to be released from the pain and shame they suffered for too long at the hands of those who should have helped them. Without the settlements, many victims would have continued to suffer, often in silence, often alone.

"Second, the Church has now removed from her ranks those priests who did prey upon the most vulnerable, betraying in a most iniquitous way the grace of their ordination. New procedures, prompted both by genuine horror at the abuse and the fear of future liability, have been implemented so that it would be near-impossible now for an abuser to continue in ministry. Children are indeed safer.

"Third, while the cost of the settlements is staggering, and will result in an unavoidable reduction in Catholic social services to the poorest and most needy, the payments will have an unintended side effect. The Church in the United States has become far too bureaucratic and institutional, rather than innovative and evangelical, over the past three generations. The only way to curb bureaucracy is to starve it of funding. This is not the most pleasant way to do it, but it will serve that necessary purpose.

"Fourth, to the extent that other churches and institutions are interested in dealing with the ubiquitous problem of sexual abuse, the Catholic experience provides many lessons. … The painful experience of the Catholic Church these past years might help our Protestant brethren – to say nothing of schools, hospitals and other institutions – deal with the same problem.

"Fifth, the Catholic experience can be considered expiatory for a society rife with sexual abuse and sexual violence. Some Catholics grumble that we have been singled out for media attention, or that other institutions do not face litigation for something that happened 30 or 40 years ago. That may be true, but the Church is not just another institution. In Catholic doctrine, the Church is the body of Christ, and as she shares in the holiness of the saints, so too she suffers from the wickedness of the sinners. Jesus Christ suffers not only for His Church, but in His Church, too. That suffering has been intense these past few years, but Christian suffering is meant to be purifying and redemptive, and to offer expiation for sins."

Atonement is always a prayer of reparation for the forgiveness of sins. It is a recognition of the need for God's mercy and a request for it. As the Church in the United States continues to make expiation for the sins of clerical sexual abuse of minors, we pray that the Lord will grant the graces of repentance and forgiveness to those who committed these sins, full healing and peace to those who were directly or indirectly victimized, and a new desire among all members of the Church to receive and live the means of holiness God bestows on the Church. This is the way he will draw the ultimate good out of this horrific evil, and make it possible for us all one day to live in the city where the angels abide forever.

Father Roger J. Landry is pastor of St. Anthony of Padua in New Bedford, MA and Executive Editor of The Anchor, the weekly newspaper of the Diocese of Fall River.