This week, the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) holds the latest of its hearings into the Catholic Church and the way it has dealt over the decades with paedophilia. If the evidence is as harrowing as that given at other IICSA hearings into the Churches – both Catholic and Anglican – it will expose the way in which priests who were trusted, by virtue of their holy orders and position in society, betrayed that trust by targeting vulnerable children and assaulting them.
And if the evidence is like that given at other similar IICSA hearings into the Ampleforth and Downside Schools, the Roman Catholic archdiocese of Birmingham and the case of the former Anglican bishop of Gloucester, Peter Ball, it will reveal how people in positions of authority did little to stop the abuse, and often put the reputation of the ecclesiastical institution before the welfare of children.
The lasting impact of these IICSA hearings and coverage of court cases where priests have been put on trial has been profound. Many people seem to suspect any man of the cloth as a child abuser. One priest once recalled to me that an air stewardness on a flight from Rome accused him of being “one of those paedophiles”. Another remembered how, as a young cleric, he would visit families in his parish and would let the young children clamber all over him. Now, he would always avoid such a situation and knew other priests would similarly be careful in case their actions could be misconstrued.
The last few years have also seen a marked decline in church going. Parishes which had been run by convicted priests find their pews are emptying. People have voted with their feet – and their money. Collections are down. Only 722,000 people attended Sunday services last year in the Church of England – a decline of 16,000 on the previous year and a continuing a trend over the past decade. Hatching, matching and dispatching is no longer an Anglican province: people are turning elsewhere for funerals, marriages and thanksgiving for babies.
It’s quite possible the fall-off might have happened anyway, given the trend of the past decade. But when an organisation that is supposed to have moral authority is continually in the news for sexual misbehaviour then it’s no wonder people turn away.
Even more disturbing, though also predictable, has been the instinct of the Church to revive its image by taking supposedly firm action – something that can be seen in the Church of England’s treatment of the late Bishop George Bell of Chichester.
No doubt the Church hopes to prove that it has learnt its lessons on dealing with abuse. It wants to be seen to be on the side of victims after years of failing to take them seriously. But the primary concern remains the standing of the institution.
Bell was one of the towering moral figures of the Church of England in the 20th century, and is remembered today for being a staunch critic during the Second World War of the Allies’ area bombing of the civilian population of Germany, calling the bombing of unarmed women and children barbarian.
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