The Vatican has said the report of Australia’s Royal Commission into Child Sex Abuse “deserves to be studied seriously”. The Vatican “reaffirmed” that the Church is committed “to safe environments for the protection of all children and vulnerable adults”.
The comments follow the final report of the five-year Commission which called for celibacy to be voluntary for Catholic clergy and religious, for priests to be required to report admissions or suspicions of child abuse heard in Confession and for a more transparent process to appoint bishops.
However, Melbourne's Archbishop Denis Hart, the President of Australia’s Bishops’ Conference, said voluntary celibacy could be considered by the Church, but he ruled out any change to breaking the seal of confession to report allegations of abuse. He added that he would do anything in his power to ensure any reports of abuse made in the confessional were followed up outside of that forum, but said he could not defy canon law and break the seal of confession, and did not expect the Holy See would ever consider changing that sacrament.
His comments were echoed by Archbishop Anthony Fisher of Sydney who said changing mandatory reporting to include abuse that came to light through confession was "a distraction".
He was also cool on the proposal for celibacy to be made voluntary, saying: "We know very well that institutions who have celibate clergy and institutions that don't have celibate clergy both face these problems."
The report was delivered to Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove in Canberra on Friday and made public online less than an hour later. The six Royal Commissioners said: "We have concluded that there were catastrophic failures of leadership of Catholic Church authorities over many decades, particularly before the 1990s. Those failures led to the suffering of a great number of children, their families and wider communities. For many, the harm was irreparable. In numerous cases, that harm could have been avoided had Catholic Church authorities acted in the interests of children rather than in their own interests."
They said that while not a direct cause of child sexual abuse, "we are satisfied that compulsory celibacy (for clergy) and vowed chastity (for members of religious institutes) have contributed to the occurrence of child sexual abuse, especially when combined with other risk factors".
"We acknowledge that only a minority of Catholic clergy and religious have sexually abused children.
"However, based on research we conclude that there is an elevated risk of child sexual abuse where compulsorily celibate male clergy or religious have privileged access to children in certain types of Catholic institutions, including schools, residential institutions and parishes.
"For many Catholic clergy and religious, celibacy is implicated in emotional isolation, loneliness, depression and mental illness. Compulsory celibacy may also have contributed to various forms of psychosexual dysfunction, including psychosexual immaturity, which pose an ongoing risk to the safety of children. For many clergy and religious, celibacy is an unattainable ideal that leads to clergy and religious living double lives, and contributes to a culture of secrecy and hypocrisy."
The report, which made 189 recommendations to bring the total to 409 made by the Royal Commission, urged the Australian bishops to ask the Holy See to consider introducing voluntary celibacy for diocesan clergy and that Catholic religious institutes implement measures to address the risks of harm to children and the potential psychological and sexual dysfunction associated with celibacy.
It said the bishops and religious orders should establish a national protocol for screening candidates before and during seminary or religious formation, as well as before ordination or the profession of religious vows. In the interests of child safety and improved institutional responses to child sexual abuse, the report called on the bishops to ask the Vatican to publish criteria for the selection of bishops, "including relating to the promotion of child safety", and establish a transparent process for appointing bishops that included the direct participation of lay people.
Following the widespread history of cover-up of abuse by the Church, the commission recommends the creation of a new criminal offence for failing to protect children within an institution. Given that bishops in the past have failed to report abuse to the police, this would bring bishops themselves into the firing line if they do not observe reporting guidelines introduced after the numerous scandals of the past two decades.
The report says Australian Catholic bishops should request the Holy See to amend canon law so that all bishops across Australia are required to report child sex allegations to authorities including police, and not just bishops in New South Wales and Victoria where bishops can already be charged with an offence for not reporting
On Confession, the Royal Commissioners said the practice of the Sacrament of Reconciliation contributed to both the occurrence of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church and to inadequate institutional responses to abuse.
"In case studies and private sessions we heard that disclosures of child sexual abuse by perpetrators or victims during confession were not reported to civil authorities or otherwise acted on. We heard that the sacrament is based on a theology of sin and forgiveness, and that some Catholic Church leaders have viewed child sexual abuse as a sin to be dealt with through private absolution and penance rather than as a crime to be reported to police. The sacrament of reconciliation enabled perpetrators to resolve their sense of guilt without fear of being reported. Also, the sacrament created a situation where children were alone with a priest. In some cases we heard that children experienced sexual abuse perpetrated by Catholic priests in confessionals."
They recommended that religious organisations with a rite of religious confession implement a policy that confession for children be conducted in an open space and in a clear line of sight of another adult and that laws concerning mandatory reporting to child protection authorities be amended to ensure that religious ministers are included as a mandatory reporter group.
"We also recommend that there should be no exemption from obligations to report under mandatory reporting laws or the proposed ‘failure to report’ offence in circumstances where knowledge or suspicions of child sexual abuse are formed on the basis of information received in or in connection with religious confession."
The report attacked clericalism, saying that it was linked to a sense of entitlement, superiority and exclusion, and abuse of power.
Clericalism nurtured ideas that the Catholic Church was autonomous and self-sufficient, and promoted the idea that child sexual abuse by clergy and religious was a matter to be dealt with internally and in secret.
"The theological notion that the priest undergoes an 'ontological change' at ordination, so that he is different to ordinary human beings and permanently a priest, is a dangerous component of the culture of clericalism. The notion that the priest is a sacred person contributed to exaggerated levels of unregulated power and trust, which perpetrators of child sexual abuse were able to exploit."
Archbishop Hart and Sr Ruth Durick, President of Catholic Religious Australia (which represents the country's Catholic religious orders), said the Church would continue to push for the introduction of a national redress scheme for the survivors of child sexual abuse in which the Church will participate and urged the cooperation of Australia’s six state governments.
“Without their involvement, national coverage will be impossible,” they said. “It is now time for state governments to act.”
Francis Sullivan, CEO of the Truth, Justice and Healing Council, said: “An initial reading of the Commission’s recommendations, specifically those relating to the Catholic Church, seem to be very sensible and practical. Many of the recommendations are consistent with recommendations made by the TJHC throughout the Commission’s issues papers process.
“What now needs to be made clear by the Church leadership is that they take these recommendations and findings seriously and that they are willing to act swiftly in implementing the findings," he said. “This process will start with the TJHC doing a comprehensive analysis of the report and in particular the recommendations that relate either generally or specifically to the Catholic Church. We expect to have this report finalised and provided to the Church leadership early in 2018.”
The Australian Government is yet to give a detailed response to the recommendations. But Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten both attended the Royal Commission's last public hearing in Sydney on 14 December at which it presented to the National Library of Australia an enormous book, Message to Australia, containing brief, anonymous written messages from more than 1000 survivors who attended private sessions with the Commissioners.
(Archbishop Denis Hart of Melbourne, Australia (L) pictured here with Archbishop Stephen Brislin of Cape Town, South Africa at the extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the family at the Vatican in 2014. File pic by CNS photo/Paul Haring)
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