SHOCKED
Are we really as shocked as we seem to want to be when we hear reports of gross scandal and mis-conduct in high places?
Or, are we, in a strange reversal of self-esteem, led to accept the view that, since life has always been so disturbed from time to time, that we can overlook much of it when it does occur.
Some of the abuses have been going on for many, many years. Notably among them, have been the various levels of the problem of rampant pedophilia among the all-male clergy of the Roman Catholic Church. This has come to light in recent years, oddly enough largely because our temporal laws concerning limitations have encouraged victims to set forth any claims they might have before the statue of limitations rulings clipped their chances of recompense entirely. Just this week a statement was issued declaring that investigations have been conducted and that the problem was now under control.
Just how much such a pronouncement of conclusion amounts to remains to be seen. That has been a convenient, and much used, way out of problems that religious body has met with before. I feel it really hurts the Roman Catholic Church, too, far more than is, generally realized for admitted. I recall the feelings of a good friend of mine when we were both taking medieval history course under that most able and truly great mentor Dr. Julian Bishko at the University of Virginia. My friend, serious and almost in tears, confided in me one evening that he was seriously considering resigning from the course ...quitting... because what we were learning about the depths to which the Church had, at that time, fallen, was “undermining his Faith”. Fortunately, he stayed with it ...saw it through, and today, I would judge, is probably a devoted parishioner because, through the pages of history he witnessed much of what the church has had to withstand in the past ...to live with and among - and strive to best. The solution is never complete. The continued skirmishing must be fought even though the battle itself seems to fade away at times. Segments of the Protestant churches have had to face like, or worse, charges as well during recent decades.
It is not only religious scandals we must face.
We have political problems perpetually, it seems. One accuses a State Governor of accepting millions of dollars worth of gifts. How familiar that one sounds? Graft, nepotism, white-collar crime now in the computer area, business manipulation, lying, cheating and stealing have all run wild at times.
Are we becoming too complacent? How far do we go in thinking of this as being natural or normal. When such occurrences begin to be questioned in your natural or normal common sense department it has become a problem which can do you personal harm as it affects our nation.
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Scandal ....shame in high places ...makes many of our other “great problems“ seem petty in a sense, because it involves and concerns the very substance of our being.
A.L.M., January 8, 2004 [c519wds]
