Safeguarding Children in the Church

Interesting to see the Detroit archdiocese taking measures to help prevent child molestation in its ranks.

"This is our highest priority ... helping kids be safe," Archbishop Allen Vigneron, head of the archdiocese, told the Free Press.

I don't need to rehash the many scandals involving pedophile priests for you to know that the local arm of the Catholic Church, in doing this, is also taking steps to ensure the church's viability in the future. And while I'm apt to applaud any attempt to prevent further assaults on children, I think that, in trying to prevent more abuse, the Detroit archdiocese leaders (and the church as a whole) also need to think much deeper about why the church has been such a magnet for predators.

A religious institution that has spent centuries advocating against sex, excoriating homosexuality and preventing its clergy from marrying shouldn't be shocked to find that it has become a sanctuary for the sexually awkward, sexually underdeveloped or sexually confused--to say nothing of the sexually violent. I'm stunned, in fact, that anyone could think it'd turn out any other way. (I'm also amazed by those who think this problem persists only among Catholics.)

And while I certainly do not mean to suggest that all priests are child molesters, I do mean to suggest that any institution that portrays human sexuality as the church has historically—as so much evil baggage to be shed through strict adherence to religious rite—should realize that it's basically offering up an open invitation to men and women who, for whatever reason, want to erase or flee their own sexual psychodrama. (The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan has written very compellingly about this.)

You know I'm nobody's believer, but still, I'm pleased to see that an institution as powerful as the Detroit archdiocese is at least owning up to the reality that there's a serious problem among the church's clergy that is destroying countless innocent children. (Of course, I'm also struck by the unbelievably tragic irony of a church having to go to such lengths to protect children from its own preachers.)

Even so, establishing the safeguards needs to be only the first step. The challenge isn't just try to make sure priests are following the church's teachings. The church, I think, needs to also begin re-examining some of the lessons themselves.