I am a recent convert to the Catholic faith, from a largely Baptist upbringing. I am deeply sorrowed by the evil actions that certain individual priests and Bishops have committed by abusing their positions of respect and authority in the Church. Bishops who have enabled this behavior are no better. But this has not destroyed my faith in Christ or His church. Why? Because I have been grounded in enough history to know that scandals are not new in the Church and that this behavior is not isolated to the Catholic Church. Identical accusations can be (and should be) made against any institution which harbors criminal behavior, whether public or religious institutions. By exposing these felonies, and holding authorities accountable, we make clear that positions of authority do not grant privilege to protect the guilty.
But back to my point. Looking at the history of the Church, it is apparent to me that evil has been trying to destroy it from the inside since the very beginning. We have just entered the Easter season, marking the resurrection of our Lord. He himself was betrayed to his death by one of his closest friends, whom he had hand-chosen. He was abandoned by all of his closest friends, except for the youngest, John, and his mother and a few other women. Follow the history of the Church through the Bible (sometimes reading between the lines in books like the epistles of John exhorting the faithful to be careful whom to trust and watch out for the false prophets), and through the centuries. Scandals come and go, but the Church and the Faith persists.
The word of the Faith is a beautiful and spirit-filling thing. It is not the Faith itself that has committed these atrocities. It is the people who have failed to live up to the standards the faith demands. Not because of the Faith, in spite of it. This is SUCH a scandal, because it is clear each and every individual involved should have known better. They teach better. It is this hypocrisy that the media finds so sensationalistic.
In the last decades, great changes have been made from the top down in order to prevent these crimes in the future. That does not exonerate the guilty, but is a step in the search for forgiveness for the Church itself, as it comes to terms with these facts and repents. Intense screening measures have been implemented throughout the priestly formation process. Every person connected with the Church in any manner, volunteer or hire, is required to go through training for child-safety. Children are educated in self-reporting. It is clear that this behavior is not and will never be tolerated. Many of these reforms have been due to the work of the current Pope himself, beginning long before his papacy. I believe this is being taken extremely seriously and appropriate measures are being implemented to protect the flock for the present and the future.
