In the aftermath of the Lateline report... (Main Forum)

by Brian Coyne , LINDEN, NSW, Monday, May 17, 2010, 23:25 (1101 days ago) @ James

James, I'll be interested in your reaction to the Lateline program. ( http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/05/17/2901859.htm and http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/ ) My own sense is that what is emerging is an incredible naivety on the part of our church leaders. This has been slowly dawning on me for years partly based on personal experiences but in the last month or so has been becoming increasingly evident in fresh ways. The entire culture of seminaries seems to be somewhere near the heart of the problem. (Some one sent me a good article yesterday by the editor of US Catholic, Bryan Cones, that I must dig out and place on Catholica. It wasn't yet online when I looked last night.)

This naivety does extend right to the top. I still find Benedict's response to the Irish people incredibly naive. It was patently obvious at the time that if he didn't respond correctly all this was going to continue to unfold and it would only get worse. It is true he had few options in terms of what the 'right' response might be and I think Garry Eastman's alternative draft letter published in Eureka Street goes closest to the type of response that might have worked and helped put both the victims and the institution back onto some path of healing. But as others keep saying "they simply don't 'get it'!". Part of the problem I am sure is that they have never had the responsibility of bringing up children, particularly teenagers and young adults. They live in this weird, 'innocent' world of what parenthood is all about — that's where this whole picture of Mary the Mother of God as some sexless, unreal picture of womanhood has ultimately come from. What I find most sad is that I doubt if even these latest round of revelations will have any impact on Benedict. (I would hate to be in the shoes of any bishop in this country tonight though. It will be like water off a duck's back to the Pell brigade but a lot of our bishops are, at heart, what we would call "good blokes" and well intentioned. I really do feel for them tonight.)

This naive business of getting all the "we are faithful to the magisterium" elements in the lay Church in Italy to whip up a 150,000 strong rent-a-crowd for the Pope in St Peter's yesterday continues the naivety. As I keep suggesting, you can keep assembling the 5% of the insecure in football stadiums or St Peter's Square or on internet sites and it all looks very impressive. The reality though is that that 5% does not speak for the wider world and they have buckley's chance of ever reaching out to the wider world in a communications' sense. If the institutional leaders insist though on only surrounding themselves with "yes men" and "yes women" who are principally motivated by their desire to protect their own jobs and long term security this whole mess is a long, long way from over. Peter Gogarty comes across to me as the sort of articulate person we are going to be hearing much more from. The people who have spoken up bravely in the media today deserve our support. It is a horrible thing to have to put yourself at the focus of attention like this and takes enormous courage.

Brian Coyne
[Editor & Publisher]