The Cardinal McCarrick Syndrome

In 1990 when I published my book A Secret World: Sexuality and the Search for Celibacy a good part of the clerical world rejected the claim that a large proportion of the clerical community was not practicing celibacy and that 6 percent of priests had sexual contact with minors. Some bishops wrote to tell me that my conclusions were similar to their experience “but I should not have said it.” I was criticized as being disloyal; my research method also came under criticism.

But in spite of it all, the conclusions have been tested and found reliable. It is now an accepted fact that many priests in the United States at any one time are not practicing celibacy. This was Step One to the beginning of understanding the problem of clerical celibacy in general and the crisis of sexual abuse specifically. (Cf. Squabbling About Numbers) Specifically it was the beginning of spelling out the systemic construct of the celibate/sexual dynamic in the Catholic Church.

Step Two: With the hospitalization of priests in the proliferation of mental hospitals established since 1946 for sexual acting out clergy another insight became obvious: bishops and superiors knew what was going on. In fact, as the crisis of abuse took shape it became increasingly apparent that bishops not only knew what priests were doing to minors, but they were covering up what they knew and participating in the abuse by transferring the abusers from one parish or locale to another without informing or warning anyone of the previous assaults. They blamed psychiatrists and lawyers for giving them bad advice. (Pope Benedict XVI recently still used this excuse.) But no bishop needed to be told that the behavior under question was not celibate. And oversight of priests’ celibacy is the job of the bishop. This basic neglect and undervaluation of celibacy is a major factor in allowing the abuse of minors. Bishops dismissed the criminal behavior as being within their province because it is a “sin.”

Step Three: As the documentation from civil and criminal cases erupted from every corner of the States a further element in the dynamic of celibate violation and sexual abuse revealed itself. That is: The pattern and practice of superiors, confessors, spiritual directors, novice masters, and faculty members having sexual exchanges and friendships with seminarians and young priests. Its prevalence in the United States is unquestionable. The legal cases that have been filed against priests who have abused minors are but one source of reliable documentation. Mental health records are another. Most of all the testimony of the abused is substantial, painful, pitiful, and disheartening.

A great deal about this element in the system is well known and also undeniable. The trouble is that it is sealed within the system. Few of the seminarian/priest victims will talk on record. They have everything to loose. Sexually active priests who have no intention of being celibate do everything to cover their tracks.

But the reality goes to the top. And the pattern is not exclusively homosexual. Bishops and even cardinals who have more or less long term relationships with women are known about and there is as-of-yet unpublished documentation. (This practice used to be called concubinage, was most common and quasi tolerated. Most the time now these relationships are carried on under some more dignified word.)

More ominous are the relationships of sexual sponsorship in which an older priest or superior takes an attractive and responsive younger priest into his affectionate embrace. Yes, some of these associations do become sexual. As the senior man rises in stature, position, and power he brings his protégé along with him up the scale of the organization. Sometimes the younger man eventually equals his mentor’s stature; he too can repeat the pattern so well learned and practiced. This pattern is well exercised in Rome.

There are scores of reliable documents that demonstrate this practice and people involved.

The main point is that the dynamic is in operation and affects even good, observant clergy who cannot speak openly because the secret system will not tolerate them. Where are they to go? The press will not touch malfeasance on this level of the power system without impossible vetting that will expose the whistler blower to potential or certain destruction. Who of the many-in-the-know within the secret clerical system have that kind of courage?

What I have written to Pope Benedict (Cf. home page) is but a simple example of the systemic dynamic of celibate violation within the priesthood and some of the dire consequences for the church, the clergy, and our youth.

I have expressed my awareness of how difficult it is even for him to address this dimension of the problem that I have named the Cardinal McCarrick Syndrome. Great Saints like Pope Gregory I, Peter Damian, the patron of church reform, and the other saints illustrated in C. Colt Anderson’s Great Catholic Reformers have tried, some with more success than others. (Cf. Books of Note) There is a need for such saints today. The problem is present, operative, and of major magnitude.

Now Read "Statement for Pope Benedict XVI"