Jesus warns against harming children on pain of death. So naturally they interpret that to mean they should aid and abet child rape on a global scale, as long as, you know, it’s all discreet. Gotta love those “shepherds.” Looking back, the fact that this church hunted down and killed Tyndale for allowing the masses to read the bible for themselves probably should have been a tip-off that the church fathers weren’t entirely on the up and up as sole interpreters of truth.

These are very deep waters. Certainly our culture too often applauds the very public confession of lurid personal matters far better left un-confessed.
Your example is a good one, but allow me to suggest that if the son is 17, and beginning to live a philandering lifestyle, is it appropriate for his mother or father to tell him about the damage done by giving in to sexual temptation?
I believe we agree that there are times we should keep things quiet, not repeating them needlessly, but to me, ‘secret’ implies danger and perhaps even the need to lie or cover something up so that it is not found out. That can be very dangerous, too, since it may cause others to sin. We can probably all agree that there would not be nearly the attention paid to the Church’s scandal if not for the notorious way in which it was covered up.
Maybe I’m splitting hairs, but there is a difference between a ‘secret’ and just “none of your bloody business”. My point being that too often, things that are considered ‘secret’ do not deserve to be thought as such at all.

When am I going to learn to re-insert my name when I have to refresh?! Argh!

So reporting crimes constitutes ‘giving scandal’? Doesn’t THAT give scandal?

Mr rod,I didnt read yet a report from other churchs,the same way the catholic did in the john -jay.
Maybe they´re afraid of giving scandal or worried about financial crises that come with these actions.
The greek orthodox church dont have a john -jay report ,ask them to do one.
Certainly they´re prepared to dont give a scandal…

What good would be served by destroying the icon of the father in the child’s eyes?
At a minimum, the child might learn that the father–like all of us–sins and isn’t meant to be treated as an icon. The child might further realize that the world is complicated, and good people make mistakes. He might even learn something that results in a certain amount of compassion and sympathy for people he meets down the road who have made similar mistakes. That might–and I would guess, probably is in most cases–be outweighed by all manner of things, but I think the initial question should be what the benefits are of letting a child live in a Disnified world.
As a general rule, I think you should probably be suspicious when people look after their own interests (here, a father’s desire for his child’s uncomplicated admiration) by telling you to “think of the children.” Um, yeah. Heard that one before.

Kenneth, shut up about what you don’t know.
Tyndale was only one in a long line of translators of the Bible for the common man who could not read Latin. Anybody could read the Bible for themselves, if they could read Latin.
The first translations out of Latin into English, began in the 9th and 10th centuries. Into French, about 1100.Into German, about 1350. Fragments in all language hundreds of years earlier.
Tyndale was punished by burning at the stake for publishing a heretical Bible, not an English Bible.

Are we really better off knowing all of the sordid details about our politicians and celebrities? Back in the day, presidents, actors, and athletes were heroes. The media was more circumspect about trashing them.
Now we have no heroes. And those who might be heroes don’t seem motivated to demonstrate the self-discipline that would enhance their hero status.
Now all we have is short-lived celebrity fame. Famous for being famous. We expect them to have dark secrets and it’s ususally not long before our hunger for scandal is temporarily satisfied.
Digging up the private dirt on a Sarah Palin or a Tiger Woods interferes with them performing their public jobs. Unless I know them personally, why should I care?
If I believe that everyone behaves badly, I guess I can excuse my own bad behavior. That’s scandal.

As a non-Christian (let alone Catholic), I try to maintain a respectful view of internal disputes and conflicts. That I was raised in a mostly Catholic community is not a claim to understanding, though I witnessed daily the interface between Church teachings and personal behaviors.
It is with that in mind that I ask: Are we not looking at a fundamental failure stemming from the notion that sin is strictly between the sinner and God (via Jesus Christ)? In any bureaucracy, postion is more important than belief. In my working world, the realm of belief is one’s competence and knowledge about one’s business. While we (some of us, I hasten to add) stand around condemning a bureaucracy that is based on religion rather than business, it just seems to me an inappropriately emotional exercise. A person in a company commits (let’s say) fraud. The company fails to report that fraud to law enforcement authorities. Whatever else the company does, whether firing the person or transferring him or her to another department, the objective conflict is between internal “law” (“privilege” in the original Latin means “private law”) and the society’s laws.
At some point, while we may not be able to forgive the Church, we still might offer it some understanding, eh?

Therese Z, while you are telling Kenneth to shut up, and proclaiming to all and sundry that he doesn’t know what he is talking about, please provide some reference for your claims. It is not always true that commonly accepted assumptions are accurate. It is also not unknown that people who find the truth inconvenient will passionately deny it, in precisely the style you have manifested.
You might start by offering three biographical accounts of Tyndale’s life which are NOT written by Roman Catholic apologists. Of course, they need not be written by Protestant Reformation cheerleaders either, and I’m sure you would not offer any sources that were.
It doesn’t enlighten anyone to say “does not, does so” more than once apiece.
As for scandal, there is nothing which brings approbation to any institution like the institutional courage, and courage among leadership, to forthrightly admit errors, and expel malefactors, reassuring all and sundry that the institution is sincere in its professions of principle. This is, in practice, very very difficult for any human being to do, as we each know. The longer a scandal has gone on, the bigger it is in its impact on large numbers of lives, the more the institution needs to show this sort of courage if it intends to emerge with any integrity at all.
If scandal is leading another to do evil, then revealing the evil which already exists can hardly be called scandal.

Rod, I really wish you would just stop with this. Given your very emotional history with this issue, I don’t see why you’ve allowed yourself to begin commenting on it again. I don’t mean to suggest that you have been on the attack. In fact, I think you have kept the tone rather civil. Nevertheless, the amount of recent posts on this issue suggests to me that you are allowing yourself to be dragged back into the controversy.

I’m not particularly interested in discussing the Catholic scandal on this thread, though if you want to, that’s fine. I’m more interested in exploring the concept of “giving scandal,” and principles by which we can judge it better to keep a scandalous secret for the common good, and when the common good requires disclosing it. This is not just a Catholic thing, or even a church thing, but also affects families, companies, and other institutions.
The case about the father, Richard, is helpful. A nine-year-old boy doesn’t need to know his father cheated on his mother, but I can see a case that an older son might need to know that, or at least might benefit in some way by knowing it. That’s why I don’t think there are any hard and fast rules here that apply in every situation. But I am wondering if anybody sees any general principles that should come to bear when contemplating whether it is more scandalous to hide the truth than to reveal it, or vice versa.

Rod – As a longtime reader, I love your writing, loved your book, and appreciate your search for truth and justice. I can also personally relate to some of your pain on this topic.
Given your charism and natural talent to teach and form opinions with a very wide audience, how might you consider your own role in causing scandal? How culpable do you think you are to drawing others with weaker faith away from the sacraments and into spiritual death?

I’ve often thought about the Church’s peculiar “giving scandal” construction, and your excerpt from the catechism confirms my opinion: this use of the word “scandal” has very little in common with our everyday use of the same word, which is closer to “bad p.r. event”. So little, in fact, that I think it’s a mistake to discuss “scandal” as a concept that somehow covers both meanings.

Jerry, I must confess that my first reaction was to offer a sarcastic comment on your post, so with that in mind — and my heartfelt desire to both abide by Rod’s topical scope request and to refrain from sarcasm here — I must ask you: How is your comment not tantamount to shooting the messenger? Thanks.

As a further attempt to serve the topical scope, I submit that the “whistleblower” phenomenon is a key component here. That role cannot exist where openness and honesty are a policy in the governance of an organization, let alone any effort to create and hold to a statement of ethics.

Too easy:
which do you want: articles from non-RC sources that state that he was executed for heresy, not for English translation? http://greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/william-tyndale.html
http://agards-bible-timeline.com/q2_bible_english.html
What Tyndale did, which was a considerable effort, was produce the first complete Bible PRINTED in moveable type and get lots of copies printed and distributed. Wycliffe beat him by decades in translation of the complete Bible in English, and centuries before, fragments were translated (Catholic source with a list of translations from the first centuries onward, with footnotes – http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15367a.htm)
Something I discovered while looking at this material is that Henry VIII’s divorce proceedings were roundly condemned by Tyndale, which didn’t do him a darn bit of good, along with his severe critic Thomas More.
Don’t see the past as a coloring book with neat lines and only three figures per page. Politics and theology and jealousy and disobedience were no different then than now.

Jerry, your question is sincerely meant, and an important one to this topic. I cannot think of a single thing I wouldn’t have written about the Church scandal; indeed, I am only sorry, at a certain level, that I didn’t write more — but more intelligently, and less emotionally. If I had been more controlled in my emotions, I might have done more good, and might not have burned out.
But Jerry, this stuff had to get out there. It simply did. There was far too much evil in the institutional Church regarding the sexual abuse of children and sexual corruption in the clergy and hierarchy — and still is, by the way — that it could not continue. To be silent about it for the sake of keeping up appearances would be to collaborate in a deep injustice, and indeed in what John Paul would have called a “structure of sin.” If people lost their faith or never came to the Catholic faith (or to Christianity) because of this, then that is not my fault, or the fault of anyone else who participated in exposing this evil. You may disagree.
As you know, I am in some sense the victim of my own reporting and writing about the scandal. I finally had my faith in Catholicism eroded past the point of no return. And yet, if I could take a pill that would erase all memories I have of the things I learned when I first started digging, would I swallow it? Not on your life. I wouldn’t want to un-learn what I already know. I’m thinking about the day I stood at the Dallas Farmers Market, talking to a stranger, a man whose life was touched by the abuser priest Rudy Kos. He didn’t know I was a reporter, and he was just talking, but he was a Catholic, and told me about families whose lives were literally destroyed by what that evil pederast did — and by the bishops that let him get away with it. How can I choose not to know that, and still be morally responsible as a Christian, and as a man? You know? If somebody like me had to lose his faith to help the Church repent and rebuild itself on a more morally sane and godly basis, then who’s to say it wasn’t worth it? The truth is, though, I think that not one word I wrote made a bit of difference in the lives of anybody but me — and it cost me my Catholicism. Again, I don’t regret what I did, and would not reverse it. To reverse it would mean forfeiting my integrity. Still, the futility of it all is pretty discouraging.

This definition of “scandal” had faded from my memory, replaced with the common definition. This definition puts a different light on some Vatican comments about the scandal, though, to be honest, I think the Church and believers blend and switch between the two definitions to a great degree.
And I think the example of the cheating dad does, too. How is telling the son about it likely to lead him into sin? What if it, in fact, as others have pointed out, might lead him not to sin? How does defrocking a 38yo priest “give scandal”? To whom? Who is led into temptation by that?
And I really don’t get how the closeted homosexual example has anything to do with the catechismic (catechismal?) definition.

In deciding on scandal vs disclosure, it appears that the issues of crime and justice are also involved. An immoral act is different from an illegal one. Raping a child and keeping a mistress are both scandalous acts, but only one is criminal.
Concealment of a criminal act to avoid scandal is in itself a crime, and would provide a moral basis for the incarceration of most of the Catholic episcopate in the US. Instead the church has chosen to protect and promote leaders such as Cardinal Law who were complicit in concealment of criminal acts.
Metropolitan Jonah’s comments are certainly an improvement over the previous situation, but it does not appear that he has made any effort to bring his criminal predecessors to justice.
When our institutions value justice over reputation, only then will their reputations improve.

I think the hardest part of this issue is coming up with hard-and-fast rules. Rod brought up the example of a son: a young boy might not need to know of a father’s indiscretions, but it might help an older son. It’s very circumstantial in that kind of case. And it’s assentially a private family matter.
Even in an abuse case, I can see cases where a bishop might want to try to keep the lid on things between himself, a priest, and the victim (could be Catholic, Protestant, even Jew though titles change). The problem is that child abuse is a crime and we have an obligation to treat it and report it as such. There’s an easy hard-and-fast rule there.
Society does not benefit from knowing about Mr. X’s personal indiscretions to the extent they don’t affect the society at large. If he wants to engage in porn, for example, he is free to do so. But should he want to look at kiddie porn, that’s another matter. Likewise, if he engages a prostitute, don’t expect the newspaper to not report it because it might damage the man’s bond with his kids.
It’s what makes Tiger Woods’ latest ad so repellent: selling shoes by revisiting a salacious and well-known scandal while coyly trying to make the spot into some Great Moral Question with his father as Voice on High. It’s an unwelcome intrusion because I think it suggests to us that Tiger isn’t really interested in doing anything but getting on with his old life of golf and endorsements.
Abp. Charles Chaput of Denver just dismissed a priest pretty much out of hand over a single abuse allegation (at least that’s been made public). Whatever his faults, it seems to me that Chaput deserves our thanks and praise, like the Archbishop in India who insists that a priest cooperate with American authorities and stop hiding. They recognize that it’s too late for secrets.
So while I understand the desires that motivate secret-keeping, and dislike making too many hard and fast rules, my inclination is always going to be for disclosure in serious matters (defined not as ‘latest boob size’).

I cannot believe I did that again. The ADHD mind at work. Last post was mine.

Maybe it’s just me, but I always interpreted scandal as the actions that were done that were wrong. For example, when a highly respected person steals, or when a politician lies, that gives scandal.
I’ve never interpreted that as meaning that we should conceal things to avoid “giving” scandal. The scandalizing was done by the person who committed the deed to begin with. Whether what they’ve done should be exposed or kept confidential has, IMHO, nothing to do with scandal but rather a prudential judgment as to the harm to the person’s reputation vs. the harm to others to be avoided.

Rod, I wish you would cease the practice of quoting the Catechism of the Catholic Church, a document you have rejected by leaving our communion. If your purpose is to demonstrate the hypocrisy of Catholic leaders, fine. Join the crowd. But if your purpose is to invoke the Catechism as an authoritative source to make a substantive point, please first be reconciled. Otherwise, it really is unseemly.

Not ‘giving scandal’ in church affairs might be excusable in an age where the Church is incapable of correction but too valuable to abandon. It could be excusable in an age when the laity is incapable of acceptance and proper dealing with the realities involved.
Reading the comments on this blog, it seems that rather a lot of ardent defenders of the Church maintain that we do live in such an age- one of of immaturity and/or incapacity within the Catholic Church relative to many other institutions in the world. Nonetheless they claim it to be the institution that represents moral leadership in the world- an interesting contradiction.

As a Catholic, I can have some sympathy with a bishop wanting to protect the reputation of the Church.
BUT. At the same time we MUST protect other children who might be future victims. I think a large part of the anger and horror comes from the fact that the bishops protected the Church’s reputation by exposing other children to abuse. If they had defrocked the priests or given them assignments where they would have had no further contact with possible victims I think the public reaction might have been more understanding.

Really, Mark? Is it really the case that only Catholics have permission to quote the Catechism of the Catholic Church in order to discuss a moral teaching proclaimed and explained there?
What a bizarre statement you’ve made. You’re saying that only Catholics and people who wish to mock the Catholic church are permitted to quote the Catechism, but not non-Catholics who wish to discuss constructively the application of a moral teaching of the Catechism to our daily lives.
This is not about a principle, Mark, because you aren’t actually defending a principle here, because you have no principle to defend. Why don’t you stick to the arguments here offered, and leave the ad hominem fallacy behind? It would be most seemly.

Part of the problem with scandal and the Catholic Church is, as so often seems to be the case, an almost idolization of the institution of the Church. People don’t seem to be able to grasp or at least keep in mind that the Church is both human and divine, and in its human aspect is as fallible as anything human. If we all remembered this, we’d be less likely to worry about her reputation and more likely to focus on the issue directly at hand.
But further, while I do think there are cases where we should be concerned about giving scandal, e.g., St. Paul’s comments on eating flesh or abstaining, we need to balance this concern with Christ’s dictum about the truth setting us free. That is, we need to take the latter comment seriously. If scandal on a certain level can cause us to mature, something along the lines of Christ’s having to ascend to the Father so that we would not limit our attachment to a partial understanding of Him, then scandal need not have only a negative result.

My understanding of giving scandal isn’t so much to protect the Church, but to protect whoever hears the information. The listener may think,a priest or a sister engaged in this behavior–so it must be okay. Antoher spin on the idea comes from St. Francis Desales: that scandal can lead some people to loose faith, a type of “spiritual suicide”.

This is actually a very good question. I have never seen a good rule for this. I have never been able to formulate one for usage while managing people. I think it ends up depending upon the judgment and the integrity of the person revealing the information. When there is concern that someone else may be harmed by keeping the information secret, then I think making it public should take priority. My experience has been that each situation I have been involved with was different enough in detail to not make firm rules.
Steve

St. Francis de Sales said, “Those who commit these types of scandals are guilty of the spiritual equivalent of murder,” destroying other people’s faith in God by their terrible example. But then he warned his listeners, “But I’m here among you to prevent something far worse for you. While those who give scandal are guilty of the spiritual equivalent of murder, those who take scandal — who allow scandals to destroy their faith — are guilty of spiritual suicide.” They’re guilty, he said, of cutting off their life with Christ, abandoning the source of life in the Sacraments, especially the Eucharist. He went among the people in what is now Switzerland trying to prevent their committing spiritual suicide on account of the scandals. I’m here to preach the same thing to you.

“The first translations out of Latin into English, began in the 9th and 10th centuries. Into French, about 1100.Into German, about 1350. Fragments in all language hundreds of years earlier.
Tyndale was punished by burning at the stake for publishing a heretical Bible, not an English Bible. ”
Well, yes and no. The heresy charge against Tyndale was only part of the issue. The other part was that he had violated Constitutions of Oxford which required anyone wishing to publish an English translation the Bible to obtain permission of the Church (usually through their Bishop).
http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2002/0212fea3.asp
“All this law did was to prevent any private individual from publishing his own translation of Scripture without the approval of the Church.”
This was the “hook”, if you will, that permitted the Church to appeal to secular authorities and demand Tyndale’s arrest.
As to the heresy charge, that is accounted for in part because Tyndale insisted on translating directly from the Greek texts as opposed to the Latin texts approved by the Church. He used the Greek texts (likely the second edition) prepared by Desiderius Erasmus, who caught a some amount of grief from the Church for his actions in producing it. In defense of his controversial renderings of some words he pointed to Erasmus’ notations in his own Greek text which expressed disagreement with the Catholic Church’s rendering of these phrases.
Interesting are the words attributed to Tyndale moments before his death. He is said to have loudly proclaimed from his stake, “Lord! Open the King of England’s eyes.” Within a few short years we see the Great Bible, an English translation of the Bible based on Tyndale’s work, become the official Bible of England.

Here is the citation for the scandal and spiritual suicide quote:
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0526.html

Gee, I never realised that only RC’s were allowed to take guidance and insight from the Catholic Catechism.
I thought that what the Catechism says on issues of morality (e.g. on abortion, or nuclear war, or our duties to the poor) was meant for the guidance of, you know, _all human beings_ of good will.
That’s the whole idea behind natural law, right? That it’s supposed to be perceptible by, and binding upon, all people, Catholic or not?
Really, Mark’s comment is ridiculous.

Ugly, Nasty truth is truth still. Once I saw an older attorney ask the judge if some areas of testimony regarding a young woman could be skipped since the young lady’s grandmother was in the courtroom. The judge thought for a moment, leaned over the bench toward the lawyers and growled, “If the truth kills grandma, then let her die”

So Rick, I guess your saying that the victims of sexual abuse who lost their faith over it are now going to hell, and its their own fault. Somehow I think Jesus has a lot more sympathy and understanding for these individuals than you or St. Francis DeSales.

Mr Rod,
Read the article from Monica Applewhite today at national catholic register.
A very good one.

Beth, didn’t refer to victims I referred to non-victims who hear about the criminal and sinful behavior of priests and bishops and loose faith. I include myself in the group that wants to give up on the Church. St. Francis is simply warning me not to commit spiritual suicide because there are sinful priests or bishops.
I thought the topic of the thread was the catholic concept of “scandal”. Sorry if I misunderstood.

Rod/Hector, on reflection I guess that was a pretty stupid comment, above. Anyone can in fact quote the Catechism, and one need not accept it all to accept or agree with some or most of it.
On the topic, it is a scandal when prominent Catholics like Rod publicly abandon the Church because in so doing they risk drawing others away from the Sacraments or even into schism, which is a serious sin. And as the Catechism says, “The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor’s tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death.”

And that, dear children, is how Rod Dreher, not pedophile priests and the bishops who covered for them, is responsible for helping draw people into spiritual death over clerical sex abuse. Please make a note of it so that, any time you are outraged to the point of despair by clerical criminal behavior, you grasp that making too big a stink of it could turn you into a spiritual serial killer.
What a great system!

Interesting thread to read. I’m a non-catholic and non-believer so the concept of giving scandal doesn’t make any sense to me. Realty should be more durable than a bunch of people going off to hell because someone does something seriously wrong and a third person points it out.
Didn’t an important figure in the history of Christianity say something like” “So have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.”
Seems somehow relevant to me.

Grr in the above post Realty should be Reality. Once again I would like to point out to Beliefnet that many open source comment systems allow the ability to edit a post.