As my heading indicates,
my contention is that the Seal of the Confessional is Unworthy - of Eternal Life - is, in fact, immoral when it comes to enabling serious crime and/or when it comes to punishing the
victims of such crimes. I stand with those calling for the inviolability of the
Confessional to be done away with in cases of serious crimes. However, many do
not understand the complexity. Only a Catholic or someone once a Catholic,
which I am, can understand. I attempt to grapple with that complexity here and
demonstrate why I believe the Confessional should not be inviolable.
Many,
including Bishops and politicians, are calling for change when it comes
to the Seal of the Confessional and paedophiles. Like them, I too believe it is medieval,
out-of-step, against the common good and the law. I go further and suggest that, perhaps, it is a sin. There is no morality that allows for the
ongoing abuse of anyone, especially children, whether by clergy or laity.
However, changing both the ethos and the actions of priests when it comes to
the Seal of the Confessional is vexed. On one hand, there is the priest's own
religious belief. There are the edicts from the powers that be. The Pope, in
particular, has the mark of infallibility when speaking on God's behalf. I
don't pretend to understand just where and when this infallibility 'clause'
applies to the rules of the church, but from what I remember from a childhood
steeped in Catholic training, it applies to Sacraments, Canon Law. The Confession is a
Sacrament and the Confessional Seal is part of that Sacrament. Importantly,
within the Confessional, during confession, the priest also wears that
infallibility. In fact, they are a conduit to God and it is to God that the
confessor speaks.
According to the
Macquarie Dictionary, the definition of sacrament is:
(noun) 1. Ecclesiastical
- a visible sign divinely instituted to confer grace or Divine Life on those
who worthily receive it. In the various Christian Denominations, the sacraments
include some or all of the following: baptism; confirmation; the Eucharist or
Lord's Supper; matrimony; penance; and the holy orders.
4. something regarded as
possessing a sacred character or a mysterious significance
5. a sign, token, or
symbol
6. an oath; solemn
pledge
[ME, from L sacramentum
oath, solemn engagement]
To explain myself a
little. I've been called a lapsed Catholic, including by the woman who takes
the Philosophy discussion group I used to attend. To many, there are no
Catholics who escape beyond lapsing. Not true. I am not a lapsed Catholic. I am
not a Catholic. I was a Catholic. It took me many years of deliberate undoing,
but I threw over the training, brainwashing. I have no automatic guilt response
to the ingrained Pavlovian training that means so many 'ex Catholics' remain (only)
lapsed.
I am also an atheist. I
despise the term atheism because it puts non-belief into the realms of
religious fervour. I read Dawkins, but I abhor his arrogance and dogmatism. I
am not an atheist because I am no longer a Catholic. I am an atheist despite
having been a Catholic. I wanted it to be true, the teachings. I wanted it the
same way I wanted Cinderella to be true. I wanted a fix to my life. And the
idea that there would be heaven and all its attendant glory; its inclusion,
happiness and safety was a longing I clung to for many years.
Others are free to
believe or not believe. I respect that 100% and I expect them to respect my
non-belief equally. Many don't, but that's not what I'm addressing here. I
raise this because my position on the Confessional Seal is not part of that respect,
at least not when it comes to serious crime going unpunished or worse, it not
being stopped. I understand, probably because I was trained Catholic, but I
neither agree nor approve and support the idea that it should be abolished.
If you read my previous
piece on the Confessional, you will understand further my point of view. It is
as a victim of sexual abuse; not by clergy directly, but I hold them
responsible indirectly. I confessed what I believed was my serious sin,
Immorality. I was a child and I was being abused. I was a victim and had no
power. Multiple priests punished me. Only one ever told me he didn't want to
punish me but he had no choice. He gave me something like three Hail Marys as penance, what you might be given for a couple of venial (minor) sins, and he
tried to seek help for me outside the Confessional. He was a good man, popular
during his brief stay at the presbytery, an Irishman with a fun sense of humour
the children loved.
Yet, even this priest
could not, would not break the Seal of Confession. He could not, would not come
right out and tell anyone what was happening to me. He could not, would not,
did not approach my primary abuser to deal with the issue. He definitely did
not go to the police or assist me in going to the police. I cannot know if that
thought even occurred to him. Probably not. Now, this was the 1950s, they were
different times. Still, that priest knew what was happening to me, and no doubt
to many others, he knew it was wrong, he knew it was not my fault, and that I
should be helped.
He apologised to me when
he could do no more. And he could do no more because his training, his beliefs, the saving of his Eternal Soul was bound to the inviolability of the Seal of the Confessional.
I have read in this past
week, since the Royal Commission was announced by (Australian) Prime Minister Julia Gillard,
that many victims were in the position of confessing to their abusers who then
punished them. I don't know what to say to that. It is too shocking to
contemplate. It fills me with rage. It sickens me. It hurts. It will do that to any decent human being. How could it not? I also understand how damaging the
punishment for being a victim is. It damaged me far more than the actual abuse,
damaging as that was. It reinforced all the things I was told by my abusers and
by my mother who knew and tried to use it to her financial advantage.
The common theme from
them all was: It was my fault. I caused it. I deserved it. I had to pay for it.
Children always believe
bad things happen because of them. It is inherent in childhood. If a parent
falls sick, or worse, dies, they think it is something they did or didn't do,
or something they said or the way they said it. If parents argue, the child
thinks it is because of them. If the parents divorce, the children think they
are to blame. It comes from the egocentric view of the world that is a
necessary developmental stage; and is reinforced by their general lack of
knowledge. Predators know this innately and they use it against their victims.
It is part of the grooming process.
The primary things
predators tell their victims are:
No-one will believe you.
No-one will want you.
Everyone will know it's
your fault.
Everyone will know you
made me do it.
Who do you think they'll
believe, you a child or me a grown up?
This is part of the
insidious and long term damage that abuse of children, especially sexual abuse
does to their life. Their entire life. It is why so many become alcoholics,
drug addicts, and suicides. Physical pain falls away, is only a memory, rarely
a sensory one, thank goodness. Besides, most victims play a mind trick of not
being in the moment when the abuse is happening. It helps them survive,
literally. It is the emotional damage that causes the long term harm. Guilt.
Shame. Fear. Believing you are dirty, unworthy. You live in fear of being
exposed, of vilification, of being cast out. It damages your ability to form
relationships; to be yourself; to trust others, to trust yourself. Sometimes,
so sure are you that this casting out will happen, that you set out to do it on
others’ behalf by becoming an abuser, a bastard, a criminal. Or you go to the
other extreme and act out as dependent, nice, willing, sacrificial. These can
apply to either gender, but most commonly the first applies to men - it is why
so many inmates have no time for paedophiles in jail; and the latter belongs to
women, many of whom go on from one abusive relationship to another and/or to
psychiatric units.
To bring all this back
to the Seal of the Confessional, it is important to recognise that it is yet
another layer at best and another abuse at worst. It harms, long term, the
victim who is already so harmed and powerless.
Why is there a Seal in
the first place? It is meant to foster and protect the soul. The fear is that
without it, sinners won’t confess which then endangers, risks damnation their eternal
soul. It is not about the physical
finite life. It is about Eternal Life. I can appreciate this. Eternal Life is
fundamental to religions everywhere. In some it is taken to an extreme. Without
going into past crimes or current ones of the two dominant religions of
Christianity and Islam, and without failing to recognise the much good done by
and within both, and especially by the laity of both, it is also a great
failing because it dismisses crimes in the finite world, it dismisses suffering
and harm done in the finite world.
I don't know enough
about the teachings of Islam, so I will stick with what I do know a little
about, Catholicism. It was drummed into us as children that the purpose of this
life was to prepare for the next life. It was to learn about sacrifice,
suffering, goodness and about spreading the word so as many souls as possible
would be saved. We were even taught and encouraged to perform lay baptisms on
people, especially babies, wherever we went just in case they died without
finding the true path to God. At one stage, we were expected to do this at
least once a day. If we saw an accident especially, even if a person had died,
we were to perform a quick baptism in order to help save their soul.
This baptism wasn't an
obvious rite. We didn't carry water or sacramental robes. We were given the
words: 'I baptise thee in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.'
Yes, back then we still said ghost not spirit. We were told to make the sign of
the cross as we did it, not openly but on our palm with our thumb. Faith was
all about the soul, eternal life. And secrecy.
To me, preparing in this life for the next had as much to do with how
we lived this life beyond praying and spreading the word. It was about choices
big and small made every minute of every day. Whilst I no longer believe in
eternal life, I still believe life is about choices, choices that affect not
only my life but others and with an aim to improve that life. Improve is an
interpretable word, obviously, but over all I mean by it that every person
knows they have much to learn and much to contribute and that it is fine to be
who they are, contributing in whatever way they can. It might be no more than
feeling like a good enough person to treat
others with respect while also respecting the self. Actually, that’s a
lot.
Therefore, preparing the
soul for eternal life should surely be as much about this life, if not more about
this life, than the next. Should not the Christian's Eternal Life be earned? Is
that earning done only by praying and following a set of rules without question
or deviation no matter what? Is it about being a good little red engine? Is it
selfish, self-centred, so tightly focused that it is about one linear path with
any branching off a travesty that must be corrected, however it can be
corrected?
Is that how Jesus Christ
lived? Would Jesus have punished a victim, forgiven an abuser who did not stop
abusing then turn away and move on? Or is he supposed to have stepped off the
main path, followed the many minor paths? Even gone where there were no paths?
I don't hear much about
Jesus any more. Probably because I am not involved in the Church any more. Perhaps
he is taught more to children anyway. I didn’t stay in the church long enough
to find out. However, I still hear about God. A funeral I attended a few years
back was all about the one true God - almost to the exclusion of the deceased -
nothing about Jesus. Aren't the Christian religions based on Jesus
Christ?
My meandering here
demonstrates the complexity of the Seal of the Confessional because I cannot
just leave it as a simple: Yes, it allows, even fosters immorality. It is important to understand beyond that.
It is yes, though, my view, because to abandon a victim, a child who is a victim, and worse to also punish that victim, that child, is immoral. It is equally as immoral as the Sin of Impurity which is only about having sex, or thoughts about sex and to some any non-procreational sex. I won't go into, here, if paedophilia is simply about sex or not.
The Eternal Life cannot
be so separated from the Finite Life that it allows ongoing serious
perpetration. It is not enough to agonise, to feel torn or doubt; it is not
enough to focus on the end of the road without looking at where to walk on that
road. It is not enough to feel concern about the victims souls. It is
definitely not enough to punish the victim in the vain hope they will stop
their behaviour - of being a victim to an abusive adult.
It is definitely not
enough to tell a perpetrator to stop and leave it at that, no matter how
sincerely felt. To do so is akin to letting an alcoholic go back to work in a
bottle shop, because to a paedophile, clergy or not, the world is a
smorgasbord, especially in this technological age. The rates of recidivism are well known.
I have said elsewhere
and will again here. Many, many paedophiles do not believe they are doing
anything terrible, harmful or even wrong. They know it is against the law. They
know they must be secretive. They know and resent they cannot let anyone other
than paedophiles, and victims, know of their predilections. Many of them are kind
and friendly to their victims. They give them money, treats, outings. They fill
an emotional gap in their victims lives. They use all this against their
victims. Why, some/many even drug their victims to save them from pain. They
'love' children. And they often blame children, genuinely foisting
responsibility onto the child. They believe they are the real victims because
society doesn't understand them, outlaws them, punishes them.
With these thoughts and
beliefs, which they reinforce amongst themselves, they are not readily going to
confess. My primary abuser, my eldest brother, so I know he was a Catholic, said
he never confessed. He swore black and blue to me that he wasn't doing anything
wrong nor doing any harm. I worried for his soul. Yes. I worried for his soul.
If he did actually confess at any time, I don't, can't really know. He went to
confession some times, but short confessions, none that would have involved
confessing such a heinous crime. I think he did it to 'prove' something to me.
All it did was make me worry even more for his soul. The complexity of victim
and abuser, especially an incestuous abuser, is tangled.
The church seriously
needs to reconsider the Seal of the Confessional for all these reasons and no
doubt for many more. To do secondary harm can only be interpreted as against true faith. To
seek Eternal Life despite that choice doing secondary harm can only do a
tertiary harm, to the seeker. To follow a faith, to follow a god that requires
it is not a faith worth following. At best it is arcane; at worst it is cruel.
At least it is illogical; at most it is unworthy.