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A Gospel of Shame: Children, Sexual Abuse, and the Catholic Church
A documented report on the frequent occurrence of child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church draws on interviews with victims to examine how the Church hierarchy's silence on the issue intensifies the problem and discusses why priests molest children. Tour.
- GenresNonfictionReligionAbuse
292 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1993
About the author
Elinor Burkett
8 books6 followersElinor Burkett is an American journalist, author, film producer, and documentary director known for her incisive reporting, scholarly work, and filmmaking. A film she produced, Music by Prudence, won the 2009 Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject). Burkett earned a doctorate in Latin American History from the University of Pittsburgh and a master’s in journalism from Columbia University. She taught history at Frostburg State University for thirteen years before transitioning to journalism, contributing to The New York Times Magazine, Rolling Stone, and Harper's Bazaar, and serving as chair of the University of Alaska-Fairbanks Department of Journalism. She has held Fulbright professorships in Kyrgyzstan and Zimbabwe, where she continues to train journalists. Burkett is the author of numerous books, including A Gospel of Shame, The Gravest Show on Earth, and Golda Meir: A Biography. She has also directed documentaries, including Is It True What They Say About Ann. Burkett divides her time between New York and Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, pursuing journalism, filmmaking, and writing.
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July 25, 2023
*Trigger warning*
A common message in the church is that forgiveness is to be valued above all else. Anger is also implied to be a tool of the devil, and is constantly invalidated. While this is often presented as virtuous, it serves only to enable the power of abusive systems - if no one ever gets mad, no one ever gets challenged. People who benefit from these environments are therefore incentivized to dismiss anyone who comes across as angry. But these atrocities should make people mad, and I am therefore going to get mad. There are no words heavy enough to articulate how absolutely fucked this system is. The Church's animosity towards science has for far too long allowed mental disorders to go undiagnosed. This is petty, pathetic, irresponsible, fear-based, manipulative, and quite simply asking for abuse to occur. In these instances, those suffering from the negligence of the Church inevitably end up hurting others who are then neglected by the same system which inspired their abuse. While this issue is deep-seated, insidious, toxic, and inexcusable, it is by no means the only issue. A system built on of self-justification, enablement, and silencing threats perpetuates exigent abuse. Here are some quotes which expound on such a reality:
After mentioning being molested by his priest as a child, another priest told him "It may be best to leave it in the hands of the Lord." (p. 4)
"Father Porter had pinched girls' bottoms and given open-mouthed kisses to boys in the middle of crowded classrooms, yet the nuns and other priests who must have seen this did nothing to stop him. The few parents who found out what was happening had reported the abuse to the Church authorities, certain that they would do the right thing. But those authorities simply shuffled father porter to a new assignment and let him continue to work and play among children.... The silence and misplaced trust that had allowed Porter to hurt so many children was not at all unique to his case. It was endemic to a Catholic culture." (p. 6)
When reporting an altar boy being molested by a priest, a young girl was screamed at: "Why are you stirring up trouble?" (p. 10) When she went to tell a nun, she was forced to apologize in class for saying something bad about her priest.
"Father Jay told the boy: This is between you and me. This is something special. God would approve... And Tim believed him. Not once was this ever forcable... He made me feel proud. He never forgot my birthday. Anyway, you can't just go around saying a priest did something wrong in a community where priests almost walk on water" (p. 67)
"We didn't see him as a man, but as an extension of God our Father. " (p. 70)
Regardless of how much those on the outside like to pretend these are environments where people can actively chose for themselves, this is simply not the experience of those inside. God is praised in name, but in reality, the arbiters of God's word are the ones who secure the awe and loyalty of congregants. The result is unbelievable vulnerability to whatever those in power decide.
Because power is intoxicating, this unbridled authority leads to incessant abuse at the hands of clergy. Evidence has also shown that no amount of accountability stops this. Being given accountability over someone with power is a power in and of itself, and is therefore equally intoxicating. If the power of the person you are keeping accountable is removed, your power is now gone too. Adding accountability therefore only adds layers of incentivized silence. There is overwhelming data to support that the existence of religious leaders is harmful. So why do we allow these roles to continue? Because they hold the power, they don't want to let go of it, and those beneath them listen unquestioningly. Lip service is thus paid to change, but things will never actually change because the problem will not be solved unless those in power abolish the positions of power, and they show no signs of doing so. Because of this, atrocities like the following will only continue:
"When Bonnie was eight years old, Father John hoisted her onto his lap to tell her about a problem he was having. He sometimes had to advise parishioners about sex, but he didn't know much about it himself. He didn't know how it felt to be touched in special places, he told the girl as he slipped his hand inside her panties. She had been chosen by God to help him learn the ways of human flesh, he said as he fondled her vagina. "He explained that God demanded this be our secret," Bonnie recalls. "I was terrified and ashamed at being chosen for such an ugly destiny. But I accepted my fate without question." Twice a week, Bonnie trudged over to the rectory to take her turn at helping Father John. As dusk fell, her chores always ended the same way: in Father John's lap or in his bed. When her breasts developed, the priest found something new to explore. Bonnie doesn't remember how old she was when Father John began to expose himself to her. But she recalls exactly when he first asked her to rub up and down on his penis. She had just turned twelve. Two years later, alarmed at the menstrual blood staining her panties, Bonnie turned to her twelve-year-old sister in the bed they shared: "Father John is hurting me, she confessed. "Me too," Lois responded. Years later when a lawyer asked, "What about your other sisters?" The answer was, "No way, just Lois and me." To be certain, they called their sister and said, "I have a simple question for you. Just answer yes or no. Did father John touch you?" "Yes," Chantelle replied. "At what age?" "It began when I was three." (p. 70-71)
If reading that hurt, try to imagine then going to your mother and having her call you a whore. Then imagine her getting flustered over what might happen to Father John. Imagine being invalidated, told that anger is wrong, and that you must forgive. Imagine that instead of being protected and advocated for, your abuser is defended and you are told to keep quiet because God's mission might be put in jeopardy. This is the most common response to abuse in the Church. More quotes:
"Consider, if you will, the impact on a child who is sexually abused during the week, and on Sundays, witnesses his parents bowing, kneeling, genuflecting, praying and receiving sacraments in graciously thanking the priest for his involvement in their lives" (p. 98)
"It's hard to overstate the awe the Catholic Church inspires in children who kneel before the crucifix on God's altar amidst candlelight and incense. It is equally difficult to overstate the submissiveness that awe inspires in them."(p. 103)
"If staying silent creates a private nightmare, telling often unleashes a public one.... in case after case of child sexual abuse by a priest, victims and their families have learned that no one wants to hear about their pain. Not fellow parishioners, who perceive any challenge to a priest virtue as an assault on their faith and refuse to believe it. Not Church leaders, who fear costly and embarrassing lawsuits and retreat into silence and stonewalling. So they're left twisting in the wind - abandoned by, and alienated from, the very faith community they expected to anchor them in a time of crisis." (p. 111)
In summary, this is awful. Yet the Church will not change because the root of the problem has been found, it is in one the Church would like to ignore. The hierarchy, the patriarchy, the messages of obedience, forgiveness, guilt, sin, submissiveness, kenosis, humility, reverence, and so on all work together to create systems which mirror totalist brainwashing techniques. To actually change what is wrong with the Church would require it to look so different from what is now is or has ever been, that it would practically have to cease existing. But that is a threat to everyone who has ever benefited from the structure (understandably). As such, myriads of insufficient critiques permeate the literature, all trying to deflect and misdirect so that their chosen scapegoat becomes the target and they are left in their comfort. Examples can be seen in the work of Du Mez, DeGroat, Barron, McKnight, Langberg, Cosper, and so many more, all willing to question everything but their system of belief itself. And now, sadly, this book adds to the masses. To be fair, it has come the closest to an honest critique, but despite an incredibly articulate explanation for how there is no way to worship the divine through the lens of another (priest, pastor, theology, etc...) without worshiping the owner of that lens, the authors end their book by saying the ultimate problem is an "out-of-touch hierarchy" (p. 234). I cried a lot while reading this. I about threw up a few times. But no response seems sufficient for what these people have gone through, or how deeply disturbing it is that the Church's continued negligence and willing blindness ensures this will happen again, and again, and again.
A common message in the church is that forgiveness is to be valued above all else. Anger is also implied to be a tool of the devil, and is constantly invalidated. While this is often presented as virtuous, it serves only to enable the power of abusive systems - if no one ever gets mad, no one ever gets challenged. People who benefit from these environments are therefore incentivized to dismiss anyone who comes across as angry. But these atrocities should make people mad, and I am therefore going to get mad. There are no words heavy enough to articulate how absolutely fucked this system is. The Church's animosity towards science has for far too long allowed mental disorders to go undiagnosed. This is petty, pathetic, irresponsible, fear-based, manipulative, and quite simply asking for abuse to occur. In these instances, those suffering from the negligence of the Church inevitably end up hurting others who are then neglected by the same system which inspired their abuse. While this issue is deep-seated, insidious, toxic, and inexcusable, it is by no means the only issue. A system built on of self-justification, enablement, and silencing threats perpetuates exigent abuse. Here are some quotes which expound on such a reality:
After mentioning being molested by his priest as a child, another priest told him "It may be best to leave it in the hands of the Lord." (p. 4)
"Father Porter had pinched girls' bottoms and given open-mouthed kisses to boys in the middle of crowded classrooms, yet the nuns and other priests who must have seen this did nothing to stop him. The few parents who found out what was happening had reported the abuse to the Church authorities, certain that they would do the right thing. But those authorities simply shuffled father porter to a new assignment and let him continue to work and play among children.... The silence and misplaced trust that had allowed Porter to hurt so many children was not at all unique to his case. It was endemic to a Catholic culture." (p. 6)
When reporting an altar boy being molested by a priest, a young girl was screamed at: "Why are you stirring up trouble?" (p. 10) When she went to tell a nun, she was forced to apologize in class for saying something bad about her priest.
"Father Jay told the boy: This is between you and me. This is something special. God would approve... And Tim believed him. Not once was this ever forcable... He made me feel proud. He never forgot my birthday. Anyway, you can't just go around saying a priest did something wrong in a community where priests almost walk on water" (p. 67)
"We didn't see him as a man, but as an extension of God our Father. " (p. 70)
Regardless of how much those on the outside like to pretend these are environments where people can actively chose for themselves, this is simply not the experience of those inside. God is praised in name, but in reality, the arbiters of God's word are the ones who secure the awe and loyalty of congregants. The result is unbelievable vulnerability to whatever those in power decide.
Because power is intoxicating, this unbridled authority leads to incessant abuse at the hands of clergy. Evidence has also shown that no amount of accountability stops this. Being given accountability over someone with power is a power in and of itself, and is therefore equally intoxicating. If the power of the person you are keeping accountable is removed, your power is now gone too. Adding accountability therefore only adds layers of incentivized silence. There is overwhelming data to support that the existence of religious leaders is harmful. So why do we allow these roles to continue? Because they hold the power, they don't want to let go of it, and those beneath them listen unquestioningly. Lip service is thus paid to change, but things will never actually change because the problem will not be solved unless those in power abolish the positions of power, and they show no signs of doing so. Because of this, atrocities like the following will only continue:
"When Bonnie was eight years old, Father John hoisted her onto his lap to tell her about a problem he was having. He sometimes had to advise parishioners about sex, but he didn't know much about it himself. He didn't know how it felt to be touched in special places, he told the girl as he slipped his hand inside her panties. She had been chosen by God to help him learn the ways of human flesh, he said as he fondled her vagina. "He explained that God demanded this be our secret," Bonnie recalls. "I was terrified and ashamed at being chosen for such an ugly destiny. But I accepted my fate without question." Twice a week, Bonnie trudged over to the rectory to take her turn at helping Father John. As dusk fell, her chores always ended the same way: in Father John's lap or in his bed. When her breasts developed, the priest found something new to explore. Bonnie doesn't remember how old she was when Father John began to expose himself to her. But she recalls exactly when he first asked her to rub up and down on his penis. She had just turned twelve. Two years later, alarmed at the menstrual blood staining her panties, Bonnie turned to her twelve-year-old sister in the bed they shared: "Father John is hurting me, she confessed. "Me too," Lois responded. Years later when a lawyer asked, "What about your other sisters?" The answer was, "No way, just Lois and me." To be certain, they called their sister and said, "I have a simple question for you. Just answer yes or no. Did father John touch you?" "Yes," Chantelle replied. "At what age?" "It began when I was three." (p. 70-71)
If reading that hurt, try to imagine then going to your mother and having her call you a whore. Then imagine her getting flustered over what might happen to Father John. Imagine being invalidated, told that anger is wrong, and that you must forgive. Imagine that instead of being protected and advocated for, your abuser is defended and you are told to keep quiet because God's mission might be put in jeopardy. This is the most common response to abuse in the Church. More quotes:
"Consider, if you will, the impact on a child who is sexually abused during the week, and on Sundays, witnesses his parents bowing, kneeling, genuflecting, praying and receiving sacraments in graciously thanking the priest for his involvement in their lives" (p. 98)
"It's hard to overstate the awe the Catholic Church inspires in children who kneel before the crucifix on God's altar amidst candlelight and incense. It is equally difficult to overstate the submissiveness that awe inspires in them."(p. 103)
"If staying silent creates a private nightmare, telling often unleashes a public one.... in case after case of child sexual abuse by a priest, victims and their families have learned that no one wants to hear about their pain. Not fellow parishioners, who perceive any challenge to a priest virtue as an assault on their faith and refuse to believe it. Not Church leaders, who fear costly and embarrassing lawsuits and retreat into silence and stonewalling. So they're left twisting in the wind - abandoned by, and alienated from, the very faith community they expected to anchor them in a time of crisis." (p. 111)
In summary, this is awful. Yet the Church will not change because the root of the problem has been found, it is in one the Church would like to ignore. The hierarchy, the patriarchy, the messages of obedience, forgiveness, guilt, sin, submissiveness, kenosis, humility, reverence, and so on all work together to create systems which mirror totalist brainwashing techniques. To actually change what is wrong with the Church would require it to look so different from what is now is or has ever been, that it would practically have to cease existing. But that is a threat to everyone who has ever benefited from the structure (understandably). As such, myriads of insufficient critiques permeate the literature, all trying to deflect and misdirect so that their chosen scapegoat becomes the target and they are left in their comfort. Examples can be seen in the work of Du Mez, DeGroat, Barron, McKnight, Langberg, Cosper, and so many more, all willing to question everything but their system of belief itself. And now, sadly, this book adds to the masses. To be fair, it has come the closest to an honest critique, but despite an incredibly articulate explanation for how there is no way to worship the divine through the lens of another (priest, pastor, theology, etc...) without worshiping the owner of that lens, the authors end their book by saying the ultimate problem is an "out-of-touch hierarchy" (p. 234). I cried a lot while reading this. I about threw up a few times. But no response seems sufficient for what these people have gone through, or how deeply disturbing it is that the Church's continued negligence and willing blindness ensures this will happen again, and again, and again.
March 6, 2017
Mortal sins.
Reviewing a religious book is not what I like to do; therefore we will go for a summary and a bit of point of view. This book present lots of accusations to priests and the church hierarchy that instead of being compassionate, are interested and involved in concealment. One of the cases that were discussed in this book was related to Frank Fitzpatrick. He is a private detective living in Rhode Island. He mentioned that when he was a child he was molested by a priest; Father James Porter. His search to find the priest takes long time and finally he finds him in Minnesota in 1990. The priest that time was already married. Fitzpatrick with the help of others got the attention of public and media. Hundreds of people accused Porter of molesting them when they were younger. These kinds of heartbreaking news are difficult to accept but impossible to ignore, an abuse of a trust that no one should keep silent.
This book provides examples of a condition that needs to be unmasked in the name of justice, hope and faith.
September 19, 2024
TWO JOURNALISTS LOOK AT VARIOUS ISSUSES
Journalists Frank Burkett and Elinor Bruni wrote in the first chapter of this 1993 book, "In the 1960s... there were no public service announcements about child sexual abuse, no guidance from the schools, no lectures from policemen. But the silence of St. Mary's also bore witness to the lofty, untouchable place that the priest occupied in the lives of these children and their families. A priest brought God into the Eucharist; a priest pardoned their sins. 'How could you tell your parents that God did this to you?' said Patti Kozak after she finally broker her silence. It took her thirty years." (Pg. 10)
They note about the case of (then-)Fr. James Porter (1935-2005), "the Rhode Island statute of limitations had expired. Even if it had not, by that state's laws Porter had committed no illegal act; in the 1960s, rape was defined as forcible intercourse between a man and a woman who was not his wife. Both of Porter's victims were male." (Pg. 17)
They add, "Porter's victims... began to focus more and more on the treachery of the Church. They could understand how a single man---even a priest---might be sick, deranged, beyond therapy. But they would not understand how Church officials could protect such a man's reputation and career at the expense of children whose lives would forever be haunted by his crime." (Pg. 21)
The director of and Menninger Clinic in Kansas said, "The most striking thing is the number of [priest abusers] who went into the profession as a way of dealing with those very impulses. The impulses to molest children, the sexual feelings to molest children, don't emerge de novo after they enter the priesthood. They are there consciously, subconsciously, or preconsciously. They're present when one makes a vocational choice." (Pg. 51)
The authors report, "No myth persists more endurably---or more harmfully---than that most molesters are gay, most victims young boys.... the best available estimates for child sexual abuse in the general population reveal that 71 percent of the victims of male perpetrators are female." (Pg. 68)
They point out, "Few [victims] are able to seek comfort in another house of worship. 'If a Methodist is abused by a minister, he can simply become a Presbyterian,' says Marie Fortune, a United Church of Christ minister who works to heal parishes devastated by the sexual misdeed of their clergy. 'Catholics don't have that choice. They've been taught that theirs is the only true Church.' They are left, then, physically violated, emotionally raw, psychologically damaged---and spiritually abandoned." (Pg. 139)
They observe, "Rome has done virtually nothing to press the American bishops. Indeed, the Vatican has even been reluctant to give American bishops the only significant help they have requested: more leeway and flexibility in laicizing abusive priests, or ousting them from the priesthood. Only the pope has that power and he has been hesitant to exercise it over priest molesters. leaving this country's ecclesiastical leaders with priests they can either keep in parish work or tuck away in relatively safe administrative or hospital posts.... Vatican officials, who sit an ocean away... cannot fully appreciate the American crisis." (Pg. 172)
Later, they add, "So the Church is---and will be---stuck with a certain number of child molesters. Even worse, the Church is unlikely to find out who most of them are. The best reporting policies in the world cannot change the fact that the Catholic Church has encouraged in its parishioners an almost blind faith in its servants." (Pg. 226)
This book was published before the "storm" of controversy beginning in 2002, but it is a fascinating journalistic perspective (that is almost eerily "prescient" in some respects) that will be of great interest to anyone studying this issue.
Journalists Frank Burkett and Elinor Bruni wrote in the first chapter of this 1993 book, "In the 1960s... there were no public service announcements about child sexual abuse, no guidance from the schools, no lectures from policemen. But the silence of St. Mary's also bore witness to the lofty, untouchable place that the priest occupied in the lives of these children and their families. A priest brought God into the Eucharist; a priest pardoned their sins. 'How could you tell your parents that God did this to you?' said Patti Kozak after she finally broker her silence. It took her thirty years." (Pg. 10)
They note about the case of (then-)Fr. James Porter (1935-2005), "the Rhode Island statute of limitations had expired. Even if it had not, by that state's laws Porter had committed no illegal act; in the 1960s, rape was defined as forcible intercourse between a man and a woman who was not his wife. Both of Porter's victims were male." (Pg. 17)
They add, "Porter's victims... began to focus more and more on the treachery of the Church. They could understand how a single man---even a priest---might be sick, deranged, beyond therapy. But they would not understand how Church officials could protect such a man's reputation and career at the expense of children whose lives would forever be haunted by his crime." (Pg. 21)
The director of and Menninger Clinic in Kansas said, "The most striking thing is the number of [priest abusers] who went into the profession as a way of dealing with those very impulses. The impulses to molest children, the sexual feelings to molest children, don't emerge de novo after they enter the priesthood. They are there consciously, subconsciously, or preconsciously. They're present when one makes a vocational choice." (Pg. 51)
The authors report, "No myth persists more endurably---or more harmfully---than that most molesters are gay, most victims young boys.... the best available estimates for child sexual abuse in the general population reveal that 71 percent of the victims of male perpetrators are female." (Pg. 68)
They point out, "Few [victims] are able to seek comfort in another house of worship. 'If a Methodist is abused by a minister, he can simply become a Presbyterian,' says Marie Fortune, a United Church of Christ minister who works to heal parishes devastated by the sexual misdeed of their clergy. 'Catholics don't have that choice. They've been taught that theirs is the only true Church.' They are left, then, physically violated, emotionally raw, psychologically damaged---and spiritually abandoned." (Pg. 139)
They observe, "Rome has done virtually nothing to press the American bishops. Indeed, the Vatican has even been reluctant to give American bishops the only significant help they have requested: more leeway and flexibility in laicizing abusive priests, or ousting them from the priesthood. Only the pope has that power and he has been hesitant to exercise it over priest molesters. leaving this country's ecclesiastical leaders with priests they can either keep in parish work or tuck away in relatively safe administrative or hospital posts.... Vatican officials, who sit an ocean away... cannot fully appreciate the American crisis." (Pg. 172)
Later, they add, "So the Church is---and will be---stuck with a certain number of child molesters. Even worse, the Church is unlikely to find out who most of them are. The best reporting policies in the world cannot change the fact that the Catholic Church has encouraged in its parishioners an almost blind faith in its servants." (Pg. 226)
This book was published before the "storm" of controversy beginning in 2002, but it is a fascinating journalistic perspective (that is almost eerily "prescient" in some respects) that will be of great interest to anyone studying this issue.
August 3, 2017
Okay, I couldn't finish this one. Around the fifth chapter, it starts to talk about the priests' having a ''disease'' which is beyond their control.
NO!
Absolutely NOTHING can justify doing that to a child!
NO!
Absolutely NOTHING can justify doing that to a child!
November 8, 2021
Devastating. The Church has covered up crimes for centuries. I think every parent needs to read this.
November 19, 2015
Opening salvo in the war against pedophile Catholic priests. You'd think that the events in the early 1990s would have alerted people. but then it all happened again in Boston about 10 years later.
One of the more disturbing things to read was how some parishes banded together to decry actions taken against pedophile priests, in the face of all the evidence.
One of the more disturbing things to read was how some parishes banded together to decry actions taken against pedophile priests, in the face of all the evidence.
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