Continuing Official Catholic Confusion on the Morality of Child Molestation, Rape and Pedophilia

A new Pope has just been elected and immediately, one of the very cardinals that took part in the election-process (the so-called Conclave) is on the news making a massive fool of himself, as well as illustrating that the complete confusion and ethical morass within the official Catholic institutional establishment has not become any less than before. I have from time to time commented just a little bit on the amazing stupidity and deepest immorality of central official institutions and representatives of the Catholic Church when it comes to its dealing with allegations of systematic sexual child abuse against their own clergy. I am therefore not very surprised at this latest piece of folly that is reported in my country's leading daily this morning (here):

In a BBC interview, the Arch Bishop of Durban, one Wilfrid Fox Napier, states that child molesters and rapists are not properly to be held criminally responsible for their actions. While I'm not at all surprised that a Catholic Cardinal and Arch Bishop holds and expresses such an opinion – even less so since he represents the South African wing of the Church, known since before for airing massively confused official statements on sexual morality – I do have a few things to say about the way in which he tries to support it.

Here is what he says on the matter, quoting from the BBC interview:

'Cardinal Napier referred to paedophilia as "a psychological condition, a disorder".
"What do you do with disorders? You've got to try and put them right.
"If I - as a normal being - choose to break the law, knowing that I'm breaking the law, then I think I need to be punished."
He said he knew at least two priests, who became paedophiles after themselves being abused as children.

"Now don't tell me that those people are criminally responsible like somebody who chooses to do something like that. I don't think you can really take the position and say that person deserves to be punished. He was himself damaged."'

 Let us break down the argument in steps. Adding some hidden premises that are apparently assumed by the good Arch Bishop, the most likely (and potential least faulty) version would look something like this. It is rather complicated and partly sophisticated, and therefore needs to be presented in separate bundles of deductions, where I have put the important conclusions in bold type:

1. Pedophilia is a psychological disorder
2. Psychological disorders are conditions and not actions
3. People cannot be properly held criminally responsible for anything else than those of their actions that break the law
4. People cannot be properly held criminally responsible for being pedophiles

5. Sexual child abuse is caused by pedophilia

6. If an action that breaks the law is caused by a psychological disorder for which he/she cannot properly be held criminally responsible, then the person who performs it does not know that he/she is thereby breaking the law
7. If a person performs an unlawful action without knowing that it is against the law, then he/she cannot properly be held criminally responsible for performing that action.
8. If a person performs an action as a result of pedophilia, then he/she cannot properly be held criminally responsible for performing that action
9. No one can properly be held criminally responsible for sexual child abuse.

10. If an action that breaks the law is caused by a psychological disorder for which he/she cannot properly be held criminally responsible, then the person who performs it has not chosen to perform it
11. If a person performs an unlawful action without choosing to do so, then he/she cannot properly be held criminally responsible for performing that action.
12. Same as 8
13 Same as 9

14. Therefore (by 4, 5, 9 and 13): No one can properly be held criminally responsible for sexual child abuse

It is quite easy to spot the gaps, as well as the sinister rhetorical tricks employed, in this argument. To begin with the latter, the basis of Mr. Napier's argument is the completely plausible claim that pedophilia is a psychological disorder and that the criminal law system should not punish people for  having disorders. On this, I presume, we may all agree – pedophilia is in this respect no different from, e.g. psychopathy or kleptomania or, for that matter, the flu, being taller than 2 metres or shortsightedness. The law holds people people responsible for what they do – possibly in combination with why they did it – not for what they are. This is trivia, which the dear Bishop tries to create an impression having bearing on whether or not we should be held responsible for our actions.

However, as soon as the first step in that direction is taken (premise 5), trouble begins. For, as a matter of fact, it is by no means obviously true that sexual child abuse is caused by pedophilia. The thing is, you see, that it is rather the case that to the extent that someone is a pedophile in the sense that makes it into a disorder this simply means that they are prone to sexually abuse children, and the only indicator of that is that they in fact do so. That is, if someone is a pedophile in the sense of a disorder, then this is partly constituted by having on at least some occasion sexually abused a child. Similar things hold for many other psychological conditions that may be held out as disorders, such as sadism. Now, you might object that we may imagine someone who harbours sexual desires directed at children, but does not act on them – at least not in the form of actual abuse (but, e.g. fantasy only) and that such a person should be called a pedophile. Sure, I'd say, we may very well do so, but in that case, premise 1 of the argument becomes implausible, since what makes it sensible to say that a pedophile suffers from a psychological disorder is that this person does not direct his/her actions properly on the basis of prudence or social, moral or legal norms. It may further be observed, that if we thus would weaken the concept of pedophilia, premises 6 and 10 would be severely weakened as well. So, if this argument is to work, we need to hold on to a strong concept of pedophilia, where it means simply tendency to sexually abuse children and that, of course, does not tell us that pedophilia causes sexual child abuse, merely that acts sexual child abuse is an indicator of the mentioned tendency – i.e. pedophilia. The cause of the actions of sexual child abuse is not revealed.

However, just as the weaker concept of pedophilia would make trouble for premises 6 and 10, we can now see that also the stronger would – besides invalidating premise 5 that is. For the tendency to sexually molest children when provided with a (from the perpetrator's point of view) fitting opportunity would not, it seems to me, provide any reason to believe that a person having such a tendency is either unable to understand or know that sexual child abuse is against the law, or incapable of choosing to sexually abuse children. On the contrary, this tendency whereby the person selects certain occasions to perform acts of sexual child abuse, in fact supports the notion of them both knowing very well that it is against the law and performing acts of reasoning to make decisions about when to try to get away with the unlawful act and when not to. In short neither the fact that your actions result from an urge, or that they result from a tendency in virtue of past actions, invalidates that you may properly be held legally responsible for them. This is perfectly consistent with accepting the claim that such a person is not to be properly held criminally responsible for said urge or tendency, but for his/her actions.

So, why is the dear bishop making such a flawed argument? One explanation is, of course, the he is himself confused. However, a much more charitable and less insulting explanation is that he is doing his best to do what catholic officials always seem to be doing when the topic of sexual child abuse by clergy is raised – namely to protect his peers and defend the way in which the Catholic Church has been handling these things – that is, shielding hard criminals from the criminal justice system and on many occasions providing them with the opportunity to go on destroying the lives of children and youngsters in their care.

To see how this fits Mr. Napier's line of argument, we can inspect some possible corollaries (sub-conclusions) of its alleged conclusion (14). If 14 is true, it follows:

15. No Catholic clergy can properly be held criminally responsible for sexual child abuse

And if we for a moment forget that, legally and morally, we should all report suspected unlawful acts to the proper authorities, so that they can be investigated and decided on according to due process, thereby protecting legal security and rule of law, it would also follow:

16. The Catholic Church or its representatives are under no obligation to report suspected cases of sexual child abuse by clergy

So, as usual it comes down to the usual thing: trying to get away with it.

New Vatican Guidelines on Sexual Abuse: A Step On the Way but Still A Disgrace

The Vatican, CNN reports, has released a new set of guidelines on how to handle sexual abuse allegations against clergy. In light of the virtual storm of criticism against the established practice of the Catholic Church (except in some local branches, such as Sweden) to shield accused priests or congregation members from police investigation, this was expected. The new guidelines also do state that when required by the law in the jurisdiction in question, allegations and suspicions should be reported to the police. However, the guidelines leave a loophole for those jurisdictions where reporting is not a legal obligation.

In other words, what the Vatican here does is to make the most minimal adjustment possible in order to adapt to the criticism. It is – as I have been arguing in another post – apparently still all about minding the integrity of the institution of the church, rather than caring for justice and the victims of abuse. That is, the institution that habitually holds itself out as the moral beacon of over a billion people has not found reason to ponder the ethical implications of continuing to provide room for the practice of shielding suspected grave criminals from legal investigation and denying justice for victims of grave crimes. What has been added to the old policy merely seems to be the analysis that the global public outrage caused by it threatens to become a greater threat to the integrity and popularity of the church than legally required police investigations into reportable criminal abuses would. That is, as to ethics, the Roman Catholic Church reasons just as any amoral business corporation, whose "ethics" consists merely of the dictum to follow any legal rules of any jurisdiction where it operates.

Fine case of a moral beacon that is. Given the background story, while the adjustment of church policy is a step on the way, it is also a complete disgrace. I mean, how hard can it be to state the obvious: if you receive allegations about or suspect the occurrence of a grave crime, this shall be reported to the legal authorities. This is what citizens of all jurisdictions are expected to do – regardless of if, in that jurisdiction, this also happens to be a legal obligation.

Celibacy is not the problem: the core of Catholic ideology on the family is

Following the avalanche of revelations regarding sexual child abuse within the Roman Catholic Church, the suggestion has been recurring recently that the root of the problem is to be found in the – by all means silly, dated and inhuman – prescription of celibacy for priests and members of congregations. See, e.g., this, this, this and this. I believe that this idea is a side-track of a serious kind – averting attention from what is really the source of what we have seen revealed during the last few years. The Roman catholic child abuse scandal is, I conjecture, the effects of certain key elements in the core of the Roman Catholic ideology with regard to human reproduction and the family.

First, to my knowledge, there is no credible evidence whatsoever that sexual child abuse is more common within the Roman Catholic social context than in other comparably large social or institutional settings. In particular, there is no such evidence with regard to settings where celibacy is not proscribed practice. But this is hardly the issue! What is the issue is what has been pressed by Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, among others recently: the fact that the institution of the Roman Catholic Church has (presumably for many centuries) embodied a conscious and organised cover-up of the cases of sexual child abuse occurring within the confines of this church, especially when perpetrated by priests. This may look as an analysis close to satire such as this one, but hang on a minute and you'll see it's more to it than that!

What is the issue is not that some Catholics, or even some professional Catholic representatives, are child abusers. Child abusers are to be found all around the human block! What is the issue is the way in which the Roman Catholic Church, condoned by their highest leaders, has systematically shielded the abusers to the detriment of the victims, and set the preservation of the institution before the interests of real human being. I've blogged before of what becomes of the Christian message of love when unchecked by secular rationality – this is another example. However, in this case, there is a sinister connection to some of the core ingredients of ideology on which the Roman Catholic Church builds its power over people, nations and ideas.

A recurring theme in Catholic teaching is the sanctity and impenetrable integrity of "the family" – a teaching that has been inherited from Judaism and preserved also in other versions of Christianity, as well as taken over within the Islamic faith. As a matter of fact, this dogma, as observed by feminist philosophers like Alison Jaggar and Susan Moller Okin, has been transported into sizable portions of secular liberal democratic societies, perhaps best evidenced on the theoretical side by the uncritical way in which John Rawls awarded  "the family" an unmotivated shielded position as an autonomous "sub-society" in his otherwise outstanding political thinking (said by a moral philosophical opponent, mind you).

A recurring theme in Catholic preaching is the notion of the dignified family, i.e. the heterosexual (properly) married couple who have sex only to glorify the master plan of the creator to have humans fill up the earth and who, accordingly, have hordes of children. This ideal reflects several central themes in catholic moral dogma: the sinfulness of all sorts of sex that lack procreative potential (hence, the alleged sinfulness of contraceptives, masturbation, oral sex, petting, homosexual sex....), the sinfulness of even potentially procreative sex outside the context of (Catholic) marriage, the sinfulness of procreation (even for a married couple) that is not the result of sex (hence the critical view on assisted reproductive technologies), the impossibility of dissolving marriage no matter what failures with regard to caring duties married partners engage in, etcetera. In this teaching, human beings are mere instruments for the institution allegedly installed merely for the sake of being obedient to a supposed supreme authority – what Catholic ethicists and propagandists usually refer to as human dignity. This is why, for the Roman Catholic Church, the family is not for society to meddle in, it is the business of the church. This is what explains what for non-Catholics like myself has always come out as the most superbly bizarre preoccupation with sex you might find among anti-sex extremists. Well, you know all about this, I reckon, so what's the connection to the child abuse you might ask?

Well, here you are. We already know that, regarding ordinary families, the official Roman Catholic attitude to sexual child abuse is to have the preservation of the family as the highest priority, not the well-being of the victim. Confession and atonement for the torturer is the prescribed medicine, not the rescue of victims of torture. This is not changed by the opaque rhetoric about children's best interest always being about not being separated from their family - this empty and cynical gesture is hardly believed by anyone nowadays besides the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith (if you have some time, please study the teachings of this virtual central committee of the Roman Catholic Church) and a few fanatical followers. Now: the institutional attitude towards sexual child abuse within the Roman Catholic Church itself perfectly reflects this very attitude at a grander level. For, in Catholic ideology, the Church is more or less a perfect analogue of a family - it is God's family. Thus, the family has to be preserved whatever the cost to its members. Thus, the institution goes before the well-being of people. Thus, shielding the abusers even at the cost of facilitating further abuse is perfectly in line with core Roman Catholic teaching, and so is lying your head off in the face of allegations you know to be perfectly true. So much for human dignity.