The renowned Catholic theologian and dissenter Hans Küng asserts that
even though ‘Rome has recently been asking “for forgiveness” for the
monstrous errors and atrocities of the past … the present-day church
administration and inquisition are producing still more victims’.1
People who live in countries in which the Catholic Church is powerful
are rarely indifferent to her. Religion tends to bring out strong reactions.
It may be its absoluteness, the underlying issues of life and death it deals
with, or the history of its power which cause most people to have not
only a view about religion but very often an emotional one. The Catholic
Church is a worldwide organisation that offers its members spiritual and
moral guidance and support. Her message is love and hope. Based on
the teachings of Jesus, a power structure was built which has outlived
any other political structure in the world. In addition to her religious
services, the Church operates a wide range of social, educational and
medical institutions throughout the world. There are countries in which
the entire medical or educational infrastructures were first established
by the Church and in some of them they are still run by her. Thousands
of Catholic priests, monks, nuns and lay members dedicate their lives
to good work inspired and encouraged by the Church. And yet, not
only outsiders but also insiders believe that the Church must change
and reform herself. Küng speaks of an organisation which ‘deals in a
despicable way with critics … discriminate[s] so much against women …
polarises society’.2 The Catholic writer and professor, Garry Wills, writes
about ‘Papal Sin’ and ‘Structures of Deceit’.3 Whereas some Catholics
who are unhappy with their Church hope that she will indeed reform,
outsiders sometimes attack the Church with blind hostility that almost
nears religious fervour. The Church herself tries to reject writers who
attack her by attempting to de-legitimise them or their motives. Insiders
are described as ‘bitter “ex-priests”, or jaundiced “ex-seminarians”’ or
even worse as ‘fraudulent Catholics’.4 Outsiders are discarded as those
who do not understand the Church and simply wish to harm her.
This book deals with the Church as a power structure and not with
her beliefs. It is not about Catholicism. It does not question Catholic
theological dogma. Nor does it investigate spiritual aspects of the Catholic
religion. It does not doubt the many benefits which religious people
derive from their religion, nor does it doubt that many of the Catholic
clergy are honest, true and loving. I am definitely an outsider. My interest
in the potency of power, its use, abuse and manipulation have inspired
me in my research and writing. The trigger for this work, which covers
a range of issues from the Catholic Church’s history, was the revelations
concerning Church policy to cover up the sexual abuse of minors by her
clergy. My intention in writing this book is to reflect on whether there is
systemic fault inherent in the Church. Where and why is it going wrong?
What in her structure and her culture causes the Church to act as she does?
Is it possible to repair the defect? To this end, I set out with a wide angle
which enables me to take an across-the-board approach and consider a
fuller context of the Church’s history, dogma and strategies. It is based
on the assumption that abuse is not a single issue problem but systemic
and that in order to understand it her structures and decision-making
have to be examined. Unlike the faithful insiders who promote reform
within the Church – because they would not consider the dismantling of
the Church – I question the ability of the Church to change.
Recent fundamentalist politicians, US presidents Ronald Reagan and
George W. Bush, have introduced the religious faith-weighted term evil
into our political jargon. Ronald Reagan famously included the phrase
evil empire in the 1983 speech he gave before the National Association of
Evangelicals Convention. Here he sought to recruit religious leaders to
his campaign against the Soviet Union, to which the phrase referred.5
Right after suicide bombers attacked the Twin Towers in New York and
the Pentagon in Washington on 11 September 2001, President George
W. Bush adopted the evil terminology. At the time, the US and most of
the Western world, were still in shock from the attack by Al Quaeda, a
fundamentalist Muslim group, which with its successful missions had
managed to question the world’s general status quo. As an adjective, evil
is popularly synonymous with foul, nasty and malicious. However, Bush
has left us in no doubt that he was using the word as a noun, as he soon
defined three countries as an axis of evil and then proceeded to wage
war against Iraq, one of the three. As a noun, evil has definite religious
connotations. Indeed, in an off-the-cuff remark, Bush even referred to
his war as a crusade, reminding his public of Church-generated wars to
liberate the Holy Land from Muslim control.
As the notion of organisational structures encompassing evil was
introduced by politicians appealing to the religious voter, we might
attempt to turn the tables and ask ourselves whether what is normally
perceived to be the opposite of evil, a religious organisation such as the
Catholic Church, could, in actual fact, be institutionally evil. At first,
this would almost seem to be a contradiction in terms. How could the ...