The crisis does not mean "the end of faith" but rather "the end of a lack of formation and the end of deviance," and a call to return to Jesus' message of love, says Immaculate Conception Sister Marie-Paul Ross.

"If we really want to save the faith, the spiritual experience of the people, the depth of Christianity, and focus on evangelical values, we have no choice but to let go of the structures and build with the inspired heart.

"We must listen to the Word of God and the Holy Spirit."

In her opinion, simply allowing priests to marry and ordaining women will not make sexual problems go away.

Ross says that when religious and priests come to her feeling stuck in their vocation under the pretext that celibacy is not livable, she always tells them the same thing.

"The problem isn't your celibacy, it's your immaturity."

She says recently she's been interested in the abuse of nuns. She's found them to be naive.

"I told superiors: You don't form women who stand up.

"You form little girls looking for their father, and who fall for every man who gives them a wink and tells them a pleasant word, who tells them that she's beautiful.

"I say that there is a lack of formation, of knowledge. When you try to name these realities, they exclude you."

Ross says she believes preventing abuse necessarily requires formation that leads candidates to religious life to "treat deep anxieties," including traumas from their childhood.

"Sexuality is a power. Life and love pass through sexuality. We are beings of love and life," she says.

The church is now "faced today with a humanitarian mess," she says.

Above all, the crisis of sexual abuse occurs in a context where "society encourages pedophilia and sexual deviance," mainly because of pornography, she says.

"Sexual deviance is created by repression and pornography. These are the two extremes. And often, the sexual formation of priests is made of both.

"There is a lot of repression and, in their solitude, with the internet, pornography."

Ross says she has seen many such cases over her decades of practice as a nurse and a sexologist.

Porn creates an "inability to live human sexuality with genital, emotional, biological reactions, in love and commitment to love. It completely dissociates love and sexuality," she says.

Ross points out younger children are exposed to pornography now. In her view, it's up to adults to teach them how to deal with this reality which she says is "impossible" to stop, and to teach them how to develop a critical mind.

"Children have, it seems, a greater capacity than adults to capture the dignity of a human being and the dignity of a body."

Source

• Crux Now
• Catholic Philly
• Image: Global Sisters Report

He is the president of the Centre for Child Protection at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, a member on the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and a consultor to the Congregation for the Clergy.

What follows is an interview with Hans Zollner.

What is your reaction to what we've seen in the United States and elsewhere over the last month?

The strongest impression I have is that it has now reached another level.

The discussion and the awareness and the intensity, especially in the United States, is very surprising because you have gone through this for many years already.

And it brings out the American [social and political] divisions that are visible in the country and in the church.

But why is it so shocking for so many, left and right of the divide?

It is because the extent of the cover-up by church leaders in the past and their co-responsibility for it (no matter what their ideological persuasion) are becoming clearer now.

And then the question is how people deal today with all these issues.

The McCarrick issue I also see somehow linked to the #MeToo movement insofar as #MeToo gave people permission to really confront the untouchables, to get at those persons you never dared to talk about or accuse.

Those who were once attributed with "divine personalities" are now within reach—close enough to be questioned and criticized.

And when it comes to the church, the main focus is no longer on abusive priests but on bishops who covered up. That is something very new, very recent.

It has been there, yes, but the intensity now shows there is another level of sensitivity and another level of need for transparency and authenticity.

It is interesting to hear you talk about how the untouchables have become altogether approachable now. The attacks on the pope would seem like the ultimate expression of that.

Yes, the pope is no longer untouchable.

And I think that is a result, first, of Pope Benedict's resignation, which has shown as clear as daylight that a pope is a human being.

He has demystified the papacy by stepping down; then Pope Francis' being so real, so accessible, is certainly also one of the factors that allow people to feel entitled to attack the popes, very personally (and without, I would say, the necessary respect).

And I believe this is precisely in the line of Francis' understanding of the papacy, of the episcopacy and of ordination—sacrosanct priests are now a thing of the past.

Just as you can criticize politicians and other officials if they don't do what they're supposed to do, you can openly speak about the hierarchy's failings.

What do you think are the next concrete steps the church in the United States has to take?

I would say the bishops need to commit to a code of conduct, and procedures need to be put in place in case there are more allegations of cover-up.

It could be a model for the whole church, if they committed themselves to a process.

For example, there is a bishop that is accused.

Okay, we will call together a jury, or whatever you might call it, of people, a mixed commission, and they will sort out things; they will test the allegation and if there is a confirmed allegation, okay, we report to Rome.

A consequence of such a proposal could also be that they determine procedures in Rome.

Pope Francis, with his motu proprio "Like a Living Mother," has made a start, but we don't know whether that was followed through and what kind of process is in place in case an allegation comes up.

What do you mean by "a mixed commission"?

Laypeople, priests, bishops—all experts who are capable of taking evidence.

One of the problems that we have is that in canon law we don't have a detailed and clearly defined list of punishments for clearly defined crimes, so we will need that.

We will need to know what will be the concrete measure of punishment for a bishop who has covered up abuses.

Also, let's say you're at a Catholic school and it is "Brother Brown" who abuses.

To whom do you write? It is not the Congregation for Clergy. It is not the Congregation for Doctrine.

It's the Congregation for Religious because we're talking about a brother, not a priest.

But again, until now the punishments for a non-cleric who has abused a minor are not specified. T

here is no church-specified punishment for any layperson either. That is also something that I would say we need to revise. Continue reading

• Image: America

The survey results released this week show:

• 30% of American Catholic adults say Francis is doing an "excellent" or a "good" job addressing the issue
• 60% say he is doing an "only fair" or "poor" job handling the sex abuse scandal
• 36% say his efforts on this front have been poor. This is nearly double the share who said he was doing a poor job at the beginning of this year, and triple the share who said this in 2015.

Although US Catholics' confidence has dropped since January's poll, the sex abuse scandal has made the headlines several times in recent months:

• In June, there were widespread allegations against Theodore McCarrick, the former archbishop of Washington, DC, who resigned from the College of Cardinals.
• In August, a Pennsylvania grand jury report said over 300 priests have been accused of sexually abusing minors over the past 70 years
• In late August Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò released a letter alleging Francis and other senior church officials knew about some of the abuses and did nothing. Viganò has suggested Francis should resign because of the scandals.
• Last week, Viganò again wrote to Pope Francis demanding answers in relation to his initial letter.

Although Francis is still rated more positively than negatively for his leadership in spreading the Catholic faith and standing up for traditional moral values, according to the Pew Research results the share of Catholics who say he is doing an excellent or a good job in this work has declined this year.

Source

• Pew Research Centre
• LifeSight News
• Image: The Tablet