By Evridiki Fatolia,
My interest in the crises that have occasionally plagued the Catholic Church was sparked by the recent film Conclave. The movie refers to the procedure in which important cardinals from all over the world convene in Rome to choose the Pope’s successor following his passing. Extreme secrecy is maintained throughout this time since everyone is confined and kept isolated from the outside world until they come to an agreement and white smoke actually appears. The story of the movie starts at this point and revolves around Ralph Fiennes’s character, a fair and spiritually austere priest who is called to conduct the conclave while also making sure that the church’s future is in capable hands.
Which are the biggest scandals in the Catholic Church’s history, that are still widely known today?
Theodore McCarrick, the Archbishop of Washington, USA, was the first cardinal to be removed from office in the modern history of the Catholic Church because of a sexual scandal. In particular, the 88-year-old McCarrick was charged for sexually abusing adults and adolescents as well as abusing his position of authority. According to reports, he even tricked a lot of his victims into doing inappropriate things when they were confessing. Pope Francis also excommunicated him from the Church body, shortly after he was removed from the archdiocese.
According to local media, 148 allegations of possible sexual assault are being looked into by Chile’s judiciary. It is estimated that about 250 people were harmed. Ricardo Ezzati, the 77-year-old Archbishop of Santiago, is charged with knowing everything but choosing not to take action. In addition to refuting the accusations, he asks that the legal inquiry be stopped. In response, the judges stated that the probe is still ongoing. In one instance, the abuse’s traces even make their way to Germany: former Archbishop Francisco Fox, 85, is charged with harassing a 17-year-old in 2004, while he was staying at a monastery in Senstadt-Patres, Rhineland. Pope Francis dismissed him from his position in the church in October, but the case never made it to the court.
Following the 2010 disclosures by Jesuit priest Klaus Mertes, which exposed decades of scandals at the esteemed Canisius College in Berlin, the substantive investigation in Germany got underway. A investigation released by the German Catholic Church’s Holy Synod in 2018 documented at least 3,600 instances of abuse by 1,670 priests between 1946 and 2014. A former priest was recently found guilty by a German court of sexually abusing five kids.
The first rumors of sexual scandals in the Catholic Church in Ireland surfaced in the middle of the 1990s. According to the so-called “Ryan Report,” a 2009 examination by an Irish government investigative commission, young children were made to live like slaves in church groups. Pope Francis begged for forgiveness from the victims’ families when he visited Ireland in 2018. Lastly, the sexual scandals in France began in the 1970s. The court’s ruling regarding Archbishop Philippe Barbarin, who is accused of sexual harassment along with six other priests, is anticipated in March.
Reference
- Βατικανό: Η λίστα των σκανδάλων. DW. Available here
