Tangential Issues #4: A "Dismantling Rape Culture" Rating System for articles and books

Rape Culture: The Personal (fighting crocodiles) and the Systemic (clearing the swamp)

I am beginning to wonder about the purpose of many of the books and articles in the area of biblical scholarship that I have been reading over the last eight months. Are these works attempting to achieve anything vis-à-vis sexual violence against the believer in the pew or only within that group of Christians who make up its interpretative and authoritative strata? I have been finding it more and more difficult to understand how much of the biblical scholarship research that I read (or watch) would make a difference in eliminating rape culture in the long run. 

The #MeToo movement has made it possible to bring back into the foreground the problems of sexual violence in the Christian Bible, theology and norms. However, so often, what I am reading seems uninterested in solving the systemic nature of the problem in Christianity. The authors don't appear to be interested in or believe that there is a systemic nature to the problem in Christianity. If they interpret something differently, then that will be enough. 

You could say that they are worried about the crocodiles, and forget and/or rather don't believe that the crocodiles live in a Christian swamp created over the last 2,000 years. Furthermore, it seems to me that many of them are trying to reinvent the wheel. The ground-breaking work that was done in the late 1980s and early 1990s seems to have disappeared into thin air. What we need is a spaceship that is built on previous biblical and theological scholarship on sexual violence; in other words, a fundamental shift in the understanding of the nature of the universe and divinity. The historian in me sometimes wonders whether they even know that the wheel was already invented!!

So, as I start to put up a number of reviews, I will be asking two questions:

1. How useful is this book in the short run in the goal of helping Christian/ex-Christians survivors come to terms with the attempted murder of their souls.

2. How useful is this book in the long run in the goal of dismantling rape culture? 

My concerns in these books will be about addressing the problem of the systematic structure of rape culture in Christianity. This is a long term goal for many of us. However, helping victims in the here and now is also necessary. There aren't enough of us to walk the long path with the victims as they struggle to become survivors. I do accept that there are short term solutions that will help, and I certainly hope that they will change the face of Christianity in the future. 

Yes, I understand that many of you would argue that rape culture is not systemic to Christianity - stay tuned over the next few months or years to read why I believe that it is. 

My bottom line is that one needs to clean up the mess in one's own house before one even attempts to fix the world.

NOTE: The "dismantling rape culture" part of the title of the post comes from a 2021 book by Tracey Nicholls entitled Dismantling Rape Culture: The Peacebuilding Power of "MeToo". It is available FREE on Kindle or from other sources.

New Covenant Theology: The continuing dissemination of Christian antisemitism

 Prologue to the review:

Why I ended up reading this book: These are two comments that I received from a reviewer regarding an abstract for a book that I was proposing to write dealing with the issues of the Christian Bible and Rape Culture.  

Sentence from my abstract: This  monograph looks at the structural aspects of for Rape Culture in Christianity from the perspective of children who have been sexually abused within its environments.

Comment 1: What about those who argue the opposite? E.g. Helen Paynter in 'The Bible Doesn't Tell Me So'? [today's response from me: in an abstract??]

Comment 2: How can you adopt this perspective? What is your legitimacy or authority in doing so? [today's response from me: have you not read my dissertation? or some of my published articles? again: in an abstract? and furthermore, Helen Paynter is legitimate and has authority because why????? she's a Baptist pastor???? she has a PhD in biblical studies???]

Since I hadn't read what Helen Paynter says in her 2020 book, The Bible Doesn't Tell Me So: Why you don't have to submit to domestic abuse and coercive control, I decided that I would look at it. It was not available through Interlibrary Loans, so I stuck it in my shopping cart. However, the book that is being reviewed below, God of Violence yesterday, God of love today?, was available through ILL, so I ordered it. I was horrified at its implicit/explicit antisemitism. I have since removed the 2020 book from my shopping cart. If it is available through ILL at some point, I will order and read it and answer the first question, specifically.

Title: God of violence yesterday, God of love today?: Wrestling honestly with the Old Testament

Author: Helen Paynter

Publication: Eugene OR: WIPF & Stock, 2019

The Rating System: Not really applicable to this book since it does not deal with intimate partner violence, rape culture or with sexual violence of any sort. However, I have serious reservations about this book that will be discussed below, so I thought that I might as well discuss it.

The Review:

First, as the author makes clear "This is a Christian enquiry into the violence of the Old Testament." [p. 16, italics in the original] 

This book reeks of new covenant theology and this was the starting point for Christian anti-semitism beginning in the "New Testament". I doubt that the author would consider herself an anti-Semite but that is the implication when the "God" of the Old Testament (and no, she does not use Hebrew Bible) is the flawed understanding of God that has to be explained and it is only through Jesus that we can clearly see the good God. The heading for this section of her book reads: The Fullest Revelation of God is in Jesus.

To quote: "We begin with the presupposition that we know God is good because we have seen him revealed in Jesus Christ." (p. 16)

To quote: "If we have not formed an opinion of God that is shaped by the biblical testimony that he is altogether good, then such texts do not present a conundrum. But because we have encountered Jesus Christ and studied his words and life and death, they cause a difficulty." (p. 17)

The assumption here is that if you only read the "Old Testament", your view of "God" would be flawed. Does this not imply implicitly, if not explicitly, that anyone who is a practicing religious Jew has a flawed religion or a flawed understanding of the revealed "god"? Of course it does!

There are two sections at the end of the book under the heading, Interpreting these texts today (pp.154-155). The first points out "that when we  attempt to teach them [that is, children] within the fuller context of scripture , where God is clearly not always on Israel's side, and that we do not encourage children to roll in the blood, as it were". (quotes Is. 9:5 at the end of this sentence) The second segment warns "readers not to equate "ancient Israel" with "modern Israel". Now, since she has been proof-texting throughout her book, I will offer only one text in rebuttal: Gen. 15:17, which reads: "... On that day, Yahweh made a covenant with Abram, "To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphra'tes, the land of the Ken'ites, the Ken'izzites, the Kad'monites, the Hittites, the Per'izzites, the Reph'aim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Gir'gashites, and the Jeb'usites. (RSV)" The following is a link to a map with discussion that charts this verse: Greater Israel map. This is what "text-proofing" gets you! If you are a biblical fundamentalist, then the only answer to Gen. 15:17 is that of new covenant theology!

The book is full of texts proving that the violence in the Christian Bible has a purpose in God's plan. As I read it, she must believe that by quoting violent verses/passages from the "New Testament", as well as the "Old Testament", she is showing a balanced view to help questioners realize that the "Bible" must be seen as a whole (because, of course, it is God's revelation to human beings).  

I could match Paynter prooftext for prooftext but I won't. I was partially raised religiously in a fundamentalist Baptist environment (preached a sermon at Galilean Bible camp on hiding your candle under a bushel and played the piano for services, attended  DVBS,  was a member of ISCF, YFC (our team made it to the Ontario championships for a memorization of Scripture competition ("New Testament"). Mind you, this means that, rather ironically, when scriptures come to the forefront of my mind even today, they are first and foremost in the form of the King James Version) and various revival meetings). My parents didn't see the harm in it, I suppose. However, as soon as the United Church opened a summer camp, that's where my sisters went.

Concluding Remarks: This book contains many of the problems that I believe are, at their core, harmful to a healthy Christianity. There are other issues that I could bring up but I am only concerned with antisemitism as the substrata to the whole book. The problem is that what this book brings to the table is a rather skillful intertwining of the Christian Bible, Baptist theology and its form of new covenant theology. And this is how Christian antisemitism continues to be disseminated.

Glossary:

New Covenant Theology: This is Christian theology - direct from the pages of its primary text. It is embedded in most forms of Christianity whether acknowledged any longer or not. It says that all of the previous covenants that Yahweh/God had with the ancient Israelites that one sees in the "Old Testament" (testament being another word for covenant) are superseded by the "new covenant" that Yahweh/God instituted by the death of Jesus (var. his Son, God himself incarnate. etc.) dying for our sins. And the "New Testament" is where we find this! It is not "new" as some of the Internet links suggest but that is neither here nor there. There are various forms of this. However, in none of them do the Jews come out well. [It can get very complicated but this is the gist of the belief.]

DVBS: Daily Vacation Bible School

ISCF: Inter-School Christian Fellowship, an organisation for high school students within the school

YFC: Youth for Christ

Tangential Issues #3: Five Essential Questions from "Christianity, Patriarchy & Abuse"

 I have decided to focus on book reviews for the next little while. Yes, I am back writing the blog with more consistency. I have created a "dismantling rape culture" rating system to use as I analyse these books. More about that in the next post. 

Some questions that will be in the back of my mind as I write my reviews come from the book where my first ever published article appeared. That article is still close to the most downloaded and quoted work that I have published over the years. It vies with "Remember the Good, Forget the Bad".

In 1989, five essential questions were put to readers of Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse: A Feminist Critique (p. xv) that are still relevant. They are as follows with my comments as of the day that I publish this blog post:

1.        1.  Is patriarchy inherent in Christian theology? My Comment: Can we replace patriarchy with "rape culture", which is what I am primarily concerned with? The latter term is even more of a red flag. Whatever you call it, my answer would be yes - even today. [This was published three years before Elisabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza coined the term, "kyriarchy" in 1992.]

2.        2.  Can we call our “corrected” Christianity Christianity? My Comment: Many of the articles in the original book offered alternatives to the prevailing theologies on whichever issue about which they were writing. Today we can read “queer theology”, “feminist theology”, "biblical feminist scholarship", and “liberation theology” to look for examples of  "corrected Christianity". The question is still relevant and as of my readings to date, it is hard to find anyone who really deals with that question. The problem implies questions of definition, essential beliefs, foundational texts, etc. or "who owns Christianity?".

3.       3.  Is there an essential message of liberation in Christianity that runs counter to patriarchal oppression? My Comments: This is the question that was and still is addressed by liberation theology. If this question left out the word, essential, then I would probably answer, yes. Certainly, this is a debatable issue. My question is: "What happens to the dispossessed when they become the possessors of the power that oppressed them?" The problem hasn't been, and I would argue, won't be solved by giving women positions of power in any of its institutions, although that is a start. The patriarchal structure of the texts is so embedded in Christianity that even the liberation theology message is bounded by the will of its god who "giveth and taketh away(KJV)" (adapted from Job 1:20-22 NRSVUE).

4.      4. Why do we struggle so hard to remain within the tradition? My Comments: This is so easy to answer. The existence of the Christian God is embedded in children from the day that they are born. The monotheistic Christian god, no matter what denomination or interpretation has one quality above all else that makes it hard to leave the tradition: that god is personally involved in their lives. Furthermore, if the first twenty years within the system was not blighted by abuse, then  one's community was critically important to shaping your life. Thus, challenging your community is like challenging your whole life. As those who read my blog know, this is a struggle that I have had to work through all my life (still working on that one!). I can only say that being raised is the United Church of Canada was a godsend, whether I knew that at the time or not.

5.   5. Is there anything worth saving in the Christian tradition? My Comments: I am sure there is. Which parts are worth saving is a debate that has been ongoing since Christianity's beginnings. The problem is the Christian Bible itself. If there is no Christian Bible, does Christianity even exist? Well, of course not. The problem is that these texts are foundational - but are they revealed by the deity? And what does "being revealed" even mean? Few of the answers to the latter two questions are as clear as the 1992 statement from the United Church of Canada: "The Word of God, in every case, is larger than the text of the Bible." There is also this from the 2023 UCC website. Their statement of faith with respect to the Bible says: “The Bible is the shared standard for our faith, but members are not required to adhere to any particular creed or formulation of doctrine.” It's a beginning.

Sacred Witness 2: Unfinished but a few more thoughts on this book

This is the second part of a book review that I published on October 20th, 2012. Given the research that I am engaged in now, I thought that I would just publish this part as well. It has been in draft mode since November 14th, 2017. There was more that I wanted to say but I am "frying other fish" right now. However, this latest research and writing is definitely related to the problems that I have with this, and many other books. I cannot do a third reading, it would be too depressing. She has written another book called The Bible as Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible (2017) and article (2019) that I will take a look at over the next couple of weeks.  

Book Review:  It Means What I Say It Means - SO THERE!!

Author: Susanne Scholz
Title: Sacred Witness: Rape in the Hebrew Bible
Publisher: Minneapolis MN: Fortress Press, 2010
Details: 279 pages; solid notes for the most part; no bibliography but index of authors, index of bible and other ancient texts and index of subjects. Nonetheless, a bibliography of cited sources would have been helpful.

With apologies to Lewis Carroll, my main complaint with Scholz' book is like Alice's puzzlement - in this case, texts not words:

"When I use a word [read text]," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean— neither more nor less."
    "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words[read texts] mean so many different things."
    "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master that's all."
    Alice was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again. "They've a temper, some of them—particularly verbs, they're the proudest—adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs—however, I can manage the whole lot! Impenetrability! That's what I say!"

I will begin with some of the assumptions that are a given in this book.

Assumption 1: the Bible is the sacred word of God, that is, the Bible is still being privileged

This is a facet of Assumption #2. I read this (and many other works) as trying to "save the bible" by arguing that the reader can determine what the text says and what the text means - this way, one can avoid the necessity of dealing with the god that is created in these texts and by these texts.

Assumption 2: the reader's interpretation has primacy over anything else.

Example (I had more examples but see the prologue above):
Page 112: "he [Harold C. Washington] succumbs to an empiricist-scientific epistemology as if readers were not in charge"

Discussion
To say this in other words, we can carve out our own meaning whenever and however we want to, and to hell with the consequences to the text, to the reader, to the believing community, to the world at large. The ultimate historical "sitz im leben" has no relevance; theological presuppositions have no relevance. And we wonder why people no longer have any idea what is in the Bible or where it came from.

Why this dismissal of all previous research?

Why is this a problem?

Consequence 1:

Proof-texting becomes the sine qua non of biblical interpretation.

Consequence 2:

History be damned. 

Consequence 3:

If we take the "text" out of its historical structure, the destructive social system of patriarchy cannot be held accountable. Why? Because there is no historical social system that matters. If one can make the text say anything that I want it to say, then ultimately it becomes irrelevant. The story of a people's and an individual's grappling with trying to find meaning in the world is undermined to such an extent that it has little to really tell us.

Consequence 4: The biggest consequence of all is that it changes nothing.

Since the reader's interpretation takes priority over everything else, we have reached the apex of individualism.

Let me lay out a couple of things.

First: Anyone who read any part of the "My Story" sequence will have some understanding of where I am "coming from". How they interpret that is out of my control.

Second: I do not believe that the reader's interpretation of a text should hold precedence over historical/cultural/societal readings.

Third: A reader is free to do what they want with a text. However, they should be aware that there are not only consequences for themselves, but for the community of believers as well. It is now broken down into distinct entities - all of whom will - inevitably - want to argue that their understanding is correct. That, in the end, subverts the healing power of community.

If you read French, this is a MUST read

Autrement que victimes : Dieu, enfer et résistance chez les victimes d'abus sexuels (Not just victims: God, anger and resistance in the voices of sexual abuse victims)

Authors: Jean-Guy Nadeau ;  Carole Golding ;  Claude Rochon
Publisher: Novalis
Date: 2013
http://www.novalis.ca/Product.aspx?ids=7532038

The publisher's blurb in French. I have done a broad translation of the French (I hope the authors aren't too upset by my paraphrasing at points but I think that I have retained the essence of the blurb.)


Fruit d'un travail de plusieurs années, cet ouvrage offre aux différents intervenants psychosociaux des informations qui leur permettront de mieux travailler avec les croyances religieuses de leurs patients et de les intégrer dans leur thérapie.  Si des victimes trouvent dans la foi ou dans la religion un soutien pour survivre à l'abus, d'autres assimilent ce drame à un abandon ou à l'opprobre de Dieu ; elles se sentent alors davantage coupables, ressentent un sentiment d'exclusion, bref tardent à sortir de leur traumatisme. Enfin, les enfants éduqués chrétiennement vivent très tôt, et avec peu de ressources, l'expérience douloureuse des questions radicales sur les relations entre Dieu, la souffrance et le mal. De nombreux témoignages viennent illustrer ces positions et enrichir la réflexion par des cas concrets.

The fruit of many years of labour, this book offers much information for psychosocial counsellors that will allow them to work more effectively with the religious beliefs of their patients and to integrate these beliefs into their clients’ therapy. Some victims find in their faith or their religion a support that helps them to survive the abuse. Other victims describe their response to this abuse as abandonment by God or as contempt for God; they then feel more guilty, and also feel excluded from the belief system. In short, they take a long time to resolve the issues raised by their traumatic experience. Lastly, with few resources, children who are educated (raised) as Christians live from a very early age with the painful experience of facing radical questions on the relationship between God, suffering and evil. The book contains many firsthand examples that illustrate these issues and the discussion is enriched with these concrete cases.

I have only started to read the book and after reading different chapters and sections, I already feel that it is definitely a wonderful addition to the literature on the impact of the Christian belief system on victims of child sexual abuse within that system. This is not just because they have a lengthy discussion of my Psalm and Eulogy (pp. 104-118) - guess I am a the*logian, whether I like it or not. It is well balanced between those who, like me, felt abandoned and angry at the failure of the belief system to address our needs and those who have found support in the system.

The authors should be looking for a publisher for an English translation so that it can reach a wider audience.

I will comment further after I have finished the entire book. (After all, French isn't my first language and it takes more time to integrate what I am reading!)

Sacred Witness 1

Author: Susanne Scholz
Title: Sacred Witness: Rape in the Hebrew Bible
Publisher: Minneapolis MN: Fortress Press, 2010
Details: 279 pages; solid notes for the most part; no bibliography but index of authors, index of bible and other ancient texts and index of subjects. Nonetheless, a bibliography of cited sources would have been helpful.

I am going to do a number of blogs on this book over the next few weeks. It is an important book and in many ways, I can appreciate what she was trying to do. However, it epitomizes many of the issues that I have dealt with in one way or another in this blog. For example, the Bible is normative and "sacred", thus limiting the available options in her analysis - but more of that later. Already it is clear that there are serious methodological issues coming out of the introduction.

I often start academic books on contentious issues by reading the conclusion, and various parts of different chapters. Of all things, my first gut reaction was: "well, this woman was never raped." I wasn't exactly sure why that was my first thought but a few weeks later when I started the book from the beginning, it turns out that I was right. When I finish the book for the second time, I will reflect on this once more and come up an answer.

"The personal is still political". As a survivor, I come to this issue from a wholly different place than those who only know about it secondhand. It is going to be an interesting exercise.

A Great Little Primer on Vatican II

Author: Massimo Faggioli
Title: Vatican II: The Battle for Meaning
Publisher: New York: Paulist Press, 2012
Details: 140 pages; solid notes; good preliminary bibliography for those interested in learning more about the theological implications of Vatican 2 and the impact that it has had on the Roman Catholic Church over the last 50 years.

For once, I am whole-heartedly recommending a book. It is clearly written and it should give readers an introductory understanding of the development of the theological fault-lines that have developed within the Roman Catholic Church since Vatican 2.  It does require some understanding of Christian theology, but Faggioli is focused on the history of theological movements and the text does not depend on technical terminology to explain his points.

For those who are baffled by the response of the church and its laity, this book may begin to help explain the differences in the interpretations of, and the solutions offered to, the child sexual abuse scandal within the church. It also helps to explain why Vatican 2 seems to be a flash-point for many of the writers and in particular, for the responses coming out of the Curia.

Book Review: Sexual Abuse and the Culture of Catholicism: How Priests and Nuns Become Perpetrators

Author: Myra L. Hidalgo
Publication details: NY: The Haworth Maltreatment & Trauma Press: 2007

I'll begin by saying that the book is a good place to start for anyone  trying to come to grips with the issue of sexual abuse of children within the Roman Catholic church, with some caveats.

The Positive

Chapter 5: "Systemic Sexual Shame and Catholicism" This is probably the best reason to read this book. Years ago, I made an off the cuff statement that Roman Catholicism causes an obsession with sex right from a child's earliest awareness. When questioned [after all, it wasn't a popular statement to make :-)], my explanation was - all you have to do is look at the "Virgin" Mary.

The problem is of course that so much of the analysis is based on limited data. One can never make definitive statements based on such small populations. Since 2007, there have been more and more research done around priest offenders. I will discuss some of it in later blogs. However, the chapter is the first that I have read that actually looks at "passive sexual abuse trauma" in the context of the Roman Catholic church. Bravo for that!

The Caveats

One, one must be careful of her prevalence statistics. I'm not sure that they will be found to be all that wrong in the long run - but the information that she basis her prevalence stats on is limited - something that she does acknowledge. One of the things that this book adds to the discussion is the attempt to look at prevalence comparatively, using limited data. This is not easy since there are few surveys and studies out there that does this. She compares Roman Catholic clergy to Protestant clergy, educators (psychology professors), and therapists. As always, it should be noted that these numbers only reflect those who have been "caught". Her numbers are startling - for the population in general, RC clergy are almost 4 times more likely than the general population in the US to abuse children - there are no stats for RC sexual abuse of adults. However, the group that she doesn't include are elementary and high school statistics - they do exist and are relevant to the issue since the commonality - access to children - between the groups is clear. The comparison between Protestant clergy and Roman Catholic clergy is also interesting - in the statistics that she depends, there are no sexual of children by Protestant clergy, although there is plenty of inappropriate peer related sexual contact. But Protestant clergy do sexually abuse children and adolescents - but most of it is anecdotal , in the sense that little data collection has been done in this area to date. But there is some (see some early info in my dissertation).

Just to say, I actually think that her numbers are probably closer to the truth (and probably even low) than, say for example, the John Jay report - but we don't have the data to support it. Then again, they said I would find nothing when I began my dissertation; my 1993 article on Catholic institutional response made a number of predictions: today, I can only say I TOLD YOU SO!!!  A little schadenfreude is good for the soul at times.

Two, there are problems with her historical section. However, this is more because of the lack of depth and analyses in her sources that anything else. She is clearly not a historian and focuses on attitudes towards sexuality as the primary lever for the child sexual abuse scandal. It's that little things that bother me - for example, she thinks that Aristotle would have been a better basis on which to structure Roman Catholic theology - however, it was Aquinas who brought Aristotle and his methods into his scholastic structures around sexuality - viz. women are deformed males, get their souls later than male fetuses, all basic tenets of Aristotle's basing "his explanations of natural phenomena on empirical investigations rather than abstract reasoning alone." (p. 74) etc..

FYI: see my dissertation for a short discussion of priest/father/incest secenario in the introduction - I do agree that it works in explaining the impact on victims - I just don't think that the rest of the analysis really works.

Three: Chapter 4, I don't like family systems theory - it tends to lend itself to an "everyone is the victim here" scenarios. I belong to the school that says adults are supposed to be adults and hence, bear greater responsibility for any abuse that occurs within the family structure.  It can work as an explanatory model, but offers little in the long run for societal change.  [Look for the next blog, which will be my take of FST] Her explanation of systems theory and its use in understanding family dynamics is readable. However, when she tries to apply it to the Roman Catholic church, it gets very confusing.

Some of the confusion:
a) Vatican II versus Pope Paul VI - compares this to marital discord & emotional estrangement between parents - so who is mother and who is father - if PP6 is father and V2 is mother, then is V2 removed from the family, distant, allowing PP6 to abuse the laity (the children)?

a2) Her theory depends on accepting that what happened in the 60s & 70s is a new phenomenon. Thus she is implicitly blaming V2 for the problem, even though she mentions that this has been an historical problem  What she is implying is that although there has been sexual abuse within the ranks of the Catholic church from early days, it is much worse now, and that is caused by the dissension in the ranks. But, if her argument is correct, wouldn't "sexual shaming" (& its impact) always have been the case, minimally since the time of Augustine and, then Aquinas? So it would seem to me that the only reason that this is now a major issue is that society is finally willing to take seriously the victims' stories, and thus, we have people willing to come forward. As I and many others can attest, this was a major problem long before V2 was a glint in JP23rd's eye.

b) She blames the general attitude towards women - their powerlessness, lack of integration into the spiritual structures of the church - as a reason why male Catholic child molesters prefer male targets. "It is no wonder that, even among male Catholic child molesters, male victims are the preferred targets for erotic expression." (p. 76) So female Catholic child molesters prefer male victims? How do the female victims of male priests fit into this? I would agree that misogyny is a hallmark of Roman Catholicism, however, as more and more data and information is becoming available about priest perpetrators attitudes towards women is hardly a major indicator of CSA - availability of/access to male children, past abuse, parental trust and adoration of the "father" priest are far greater indicators of victim choice than anything else. [She starts to discuss these in the next chapter - it is my contention that these are probably more important that the FST structure for understanding why priests and nuns offend.]

c) Then there is the case study of the Boston scandal. So the "father" is the institution and the "mother" is the priest? The priests are disillusioned with the Church hierarchy & therefore, just allow their fellow molesting priests to get away with it? What I can't figure out is who the "grandparents" are. She then suggest that the "abused children of the Church finally reached a critical point in their own psycho-spiritual development" (p. 77) and then disclosed. A cursory reading of David France's Our Fathers, for example, would suggest that this is not only simplistic but far from the truth.

Comments on the Final Chapter: There is some good points here, but all I can say is "Good luck with that!" Twice she has  mentioned returning the Church to the people - as the first Apostles (cap. in text). All I can say echoes Richard Sipe's comment: "Welcome to Wittenberg!" (see previous blog). And Wittenberg implies protestantism - & protestants have problems too - hence, my position that there is something fundamentally flawed at the core of Christianity - but that's a story for another day! or read my dissertation!

A Gospel of Shame: Children, Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church

With a new introduction & afterword by the authors
Authors: Frank Bruni and Elinor Burkett
Publication details: New York: Perennial, HarperCollins Books, 2002 (1993)

"My friends, welcome to Wittenberg!" This is the one really new thing that I will take away from this book. It was how Richard Sipe greeted the first meeting of sexual abuse survivors outside of Chicago (p. 224). The book is notable for its realistic look at the scandal. The personal stories are once again, horrifying. The church's responses are as expected.

What is significant for a book from 1993 is its insightful analysis of the problem and realistic assessment of how likely it is that the church will actually face up to what has been happening. The new introduction and afterward were written in 2002, just as the "Boston Church's Tea Party" was beginning to erupt.

As to Wittenberg, I think that few people would have had the insight that Sipe had in 1993, that this particular scandal does have the potential to sever the church. I know because I was battling on the same front academically - and people just didn't (& don't?) want to know.

In 2012, there are more and more calls for major rethinking and (one hopes) restructuring of the Roman Catholic Church. Here is a link to Bishop Geoffrey Robinson's plea for a "total re-examination of Catholic faith. The following is a quote from the National Catholic Reporte:

The "major fault" of the church in the scandal, Robinson said, is that it "refuses to look at any teaching, law, practice or even attitude of the church itself as in any way contributing" to the crisis.
"In studying abuse, we must be free to follow the argument wherever it leads rather than impose in advance the limitation that our study must not demand change in any teaching or law," he continued. "We must admit that there might be elements of the 'Catholic culture' that have contributed either to the abuse or to the poor response to abuse.'"


However, people are walking away from the church with their feet & closing their pocketbooks, in North America and around the world. How about the case of Austria, where people are dis-affiliating themselves from the Roman Catholic church, primarily because of its handling of child sexual abuse cases in Austria.There is even the interesting case in Missouri of  a Polish Roman Catholic church that has broken away from its diocese (& Rome, one assumes). Whether it has anything to do with the sexual abuse scandal is not known, but then again, one can only wonder.  Perhaps worth following up on at some point in the future (note to self! :-) )
 
Maybe things are changing, but ........

We know what the Roman Catholic Church's response was to the Protestant Reformations (Revolution?)  - The Council of Trent, the Jesuits and the Inquisition! So far, it looks as if the church has just replaced the Iron Maiden and the rack with lawyers!!

Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II

Authors: Jason Berry and Gerald Renner
Publication Details: New York: The Free Press, 2004
DVD website: http://vowsofsilencefilm.com
Cast of characters:
The good: Father Thomas Doyle, defender of victims
The bad: Father Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legionaries of Christ
The ugly: the Curia, John Paul II, Cardinal Ratzinger

This is a book that is story of 2 men and their interactions with the "powers that be" in Roman Catholicism. While clearly, the story is a unified whole, Jason Berry is predominantly responsible for the sections on Father Doyle, while Gerald Renner researched the sections on Father Marcial Maciel Degollado. Both men are investigative journalists.

It gives a biography of both men: Father Doyle who is shunned by the Vatican; Father Maceil who is defended and supported by the Vatican under Pope John Paul II. What it does primarily is show where the priorities of the Curia and Pope sit vis-a-vis the child sexual abuse scandal. Published just after the mess in Boston overseen by Cardinal Bernard Law, it puts one more nail in the coffin of the institutional church.

It is, once again, a story of ideology over the pain and suffering of the individual. It was interesting reading about a Roman Catholic order that I had never heard about before - the Legionairies of Christ. It is another ultra-conservative Roman Catholic group similar to the Opus Dei. Both remind one of the medieval church with its saints and abuse of the self. Despite clear evidence of the founder's propensity to child sexual abuse and drug abuse, Maciel was given a pass. Maciel died in 2008 and was forced to leave "public ministry" before his death by Pope Benedict XVI, who as the head of the Inquisition (see previous blogs for why I still call it that), dismissed/ignored Maciel's victims.

As I was finishing the book, I wondered what Berry, Renner and Doyle thought about the election of Ratzinger to the Papacy. They must have died a little inside.  

The order has now to deal with the truth of Berry and Renner's book. See the following article from the New York Times: "Catholic Order Jolted by Reports That its Founder led a Double Life". It is notable for the apology issued by the managing editor of the National Catholic Register:

 Tom Hoopes, managing editor of The National Catholic Register, which is affiliated with the Legionaries, posted an apology on the Web on Tuesday for having dismissed the sexual abuse accusations, saying, “I’m sorry to the victims, who were victims twice.”

The Bishop's Man - Spoiler Alert!

He pulled "a Kazantzakis".

Well, I finished The Bishop's Man by Linden MacIntyre. When it comes out in paperback, I will add it to my bookshelf. The book has a long waiting is at my public library so I brought it back as soon as I was finished reading. No one else that I know has read it yet, so these are my thoughts.

If MacIntyre sounded befuddled about how these things could happen (see previous blog, August 30, 2009), that befuddlement is at the heart of the problems that I have with the book. I was mildy dissatisfied when I came to the end. As I started writing the blog, I must say that I became extremely dissatisfied with the novel.

First, the book is not a bad read. I wouldn't say that the protagonist is a filled out character. In fact, the construction of the story is such that it is a bit confusing rather than compelling. As a novel, its plot is highly contrived. Some of the mysteries were solved, but too much of it left a bad taste in my mouth.

If the author can be said to have had an agenda, it was to explain that a) life wasn't easy for the bishop's man and by extension for all priests; b) it is the institution rather than its members that is to blame for the sexual scandals of the church; c) good priests are being ruined by the sins of a few; and d) celibacy isn't easy. Oh, and priests were abused as children too. Oh, and when children are abused, it's usually by family members. Lord Almighty, this has got to be a comforting book for a lot of people.

In the final analysis, this is a "whodunnit" of child molestation. In my opinion, the book trivializes the problem, although I don't think that was the author's intention. I have heard him being interviewed. However, I do think that it all started with "this would be a good idea"; how will we do this? Oh, I have a good idea. Let's make it a mystery. Let's make it look like the priest did it, but it was really the uncle." Like most of us, MacIntyre is bothered by the problem of priest who sexually abuse children. As a Roman Catholic, I suspect that he would be unable to actually delve very far into the issue without hitting his own brick walls - but that is just my opinion.

In some ways, the book reads like an over-the-top melodrama: a series of bizarre "Three's Companyesque" not so hilarious misunderstandings! The three main examples are:

1. the boy who became the Bishop's Man misunderstood his father's being in his sister's bedroom late at night - we are supposed to think that the father had sexually abused the sister, but really he was having a PTSD moment of something bad that had happened to him in WW2. The Bishop's Man feels guilty about this his whole life until he found out that his sister wasn't an incest survivor. He finally asked her. Except that it is not quite spelled out in the novel exactly what happened.
2. the priest (I think his last name was Bell) whom the Bishop's Man had hidden away with Father Mullins after an unsavory drunken single incident of sexual abuse of a minor in Newfoundland, hadn't abused that boy who commits suicide. However, all the way through the novel, we are led to believe that was what had happened and what was eating away at the Bishop's Man (not that he did anything about it). Whew!!!!!!!!!! It turns out that it wasn't Bell (in fact, the priest, Bell, had been abused as a boy himself and that's why the boy who committed suicide was talking so much with him - victims recognize other victims). The Bishop's Man had spent all that time worrying about it for nothing.
3. then there's the story of what happened in the Caribbean. Another case of mistaken identity This time, the Bishop's Man was having an affair with Jacinta, a good friend of his priest pal, Alfonso. One night Alfonso is murdered by a man sent by Jacinta's ex-husband. However, he was supposed to murder the Bishop's Man. He had been told to kill the "red" one. He thought it meant someone who was a communist (or communist-like). But really, he was supposed to kill the Bishop's Man who had flaming red hair. He was the intended target. Need I mention that the Bishop's Man has also been carrying around that guilt.

Then there are the moral issues.

1. MacIntyre wants us to understand that this issue is a problem of an institution that is too big; that it is wrong to place so much faith and time into making sure that an institution is not sullied by scandal. The Bishop is the person who articulates this answer to the question, "Why?". Well at least to the question, "Why the coverup?" MacIntyre needs to go back an take a basic course in Roman Catholic dogma, starting with the Fourth Lateran Council. The Church is Mother; the Church is Father (see B5 for Strazinski's critique on the Roman Catholic church - the Psych Corps: the Corps is Mother; the Corps is Father). The church is also the imago on earth of the heavenly city of God. The Church can do no wrong; the Church has, is and always will be right. Maybe most people in the pew no longer believe that, but I'll wager any money that Pope Benedict XVIth does.
2. Then there is Father Roddy, the priest who teaches philosophy and has been the Bishop's Man's mentor. The Bishop's Man caught him with a young boy. He reported him to the Bishop and that led to th Bishop's Man being sent to the Caribbean (see above for what happened there). Nowhere in the book do we really see the Bishop's Man break ranks - even after he realizes that the Bishop has know all along that Father Roddy has been seuxally abusing young boys for decades. Father Roddy was a close friend of the Bishop. Even after there is a suicide (not THE suicide) and law suits, the Bishop's Man doesn't come forward with what he knew. He just has a fight with the Bishop. In fact, for all those years, he constantly questioned whether or not he had actually seen what he saw.
3. MacIntyre also wants us to understand that the priest's life is a lonely one. They have no one to share their lives with. This is why they drink too much, for example or, I guess, why they sexually abuse children - they need the comfort?
4. Nowhere in the story does anyone try to intervene with the boy, Danny (let's use that name) who commits suicide. Everyone know that there is something wrong. Even in the 90s, this boy is exhibiting behaviours congruent with a sexually abused boy. His parents & family figure he'll grow out of it; his fiancee doesn't understand it. But the priest doesn't seem to suspect it either - sort of. It is not cear when he thinks that maybe that is the problem. The thing of it is that he thinks that maybe it is the priest Bell, whom he placed in that small town. So rather that spend any time really trying to find out what is wrong with the boy, the Bishop's Man hides behind the idea that the boy will eventually come to him. However, he makes it fairly clear that he really doesn't want to talk about it. Besides if Bell had sexually abused Danny, then it was the Bishop's Man's fault and he is unwilling to have that known. Even when he keeps trying to contact Bell, it is not really clear why, except to salve his own conscience? This is a shallow, shallow self-absorbed man. Now it may be that this is what MacIntyre intended, but from the interviews, I don't get that feeling. I think that we are supposed to understand and feel sorry for the Bishop's Man, or at least have some empathy for his difficult life.

The book feels like a whitewash. No institution stands without the men and women who make up that institution. The institution only works if the people in it make it work. It is people like the Bishop's Man who let the church get away with the coverup for years and years - centuries actually (but that is a book in itself).

What really bothers me is that at the end of the book everything is still a secret. Nobody, but nobody spoke for the boy who had committed suicide. So is it enough that Uncle Willy is dead - possibly killed by the Bishop's Man? Is it enough that the Bishop's Man hands in his resignation to the Bishop (at least I think that is what happened)? I haven't even mentioned the reporter who is chasing the different stories and the Bishop's Man lies to him. He may resign but is he going to call up that reporter and tell him the truth? Wouldn't bet a plug nickel or a million$$$ on that!

The book barely scratches the surface of the problem. Could we call it a whitewash? I don't think that Linden MacIntyre did that on purpose. I think that he just doesn't get it. He creates a world where everyone is idolated. In the end, everyone is a victim so you don't have to feel really, really, really angry at the poor priests who are just trying to do their job.

Just once, I'd like to see a priest, bishop, whatever, turn state's evidence - blow the whistle on the whole bunch of them. There are priests like Father Thomas Doyle, but they are few and far between.

Obviously, the author doesn't know any abusing priests (or if he does, I have a hard time understanding why the Bishop's Man's crisis is so muted), nor I suspect is he familiar with the abused (perhaps as reporter with the Fifth Estate), at least not on a close personal level. The objectivity of the reporter just didn't work for explaining a personal crisis that the protaganist was supposed to be undergoing. I really wonder if he sat down and watched Deliver Us From Evil, if only to get a sense of just what an abuser is really like and how the coverup really works. Would the book have been the same if he had?

Why is it important? Many people are going to read this book. It won the Giller Prize, which means that in Canada, at least, a lot more people are going to be comforted by the message of this book, rather than be discomfitted.

The question is why did it win The Giller Prize? The following is the blurb on the Giller website. It reads like a synopsis of the book, not a reason why it won - unless the reason is just that it was written at all.

“The Bishop’s Man centres on a sensitive topic - the sexual abuses perpetrated by Catholic priests on the innocent children in their care. Father Duncan, the first person narrator, has been his bishop's dutiful enforcer, employed to check the excesses of priests and, crucially, to suppress the evidence. But as events veer out of control, he is forced into painful self-knowledge as family, community and friendship are torn apart under the strain of suspicion, obsession and guilt. A brave novel, conceived and written with impressive delicacy and understanding.”

Did we read the same book??? Maybe my personal and professional experience has made me way too cynical.

I am now going to track down as many reviews of the book as I can. I will analyze them in the next blog. Stay tuned!