It is sad to consider there is little of the new in the news that a cardinal turns out to be may be a rapist.* That the cardinal is a Frenchman – Jean-Pierre Cardinal Ricard, inexplicably emeritus of Bordeaux – is something of a novelty, but really doesn’t change much. That Ricard’s victim was a girl may raise eyebrows in some quarters – mostly Western and primarily American, where clerics’ victims have been mostly boys – but the fact is mere detail these days.
The silence of the Vatican in the face of the news is nothing new. It took them nearly three days to respond to the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report.
Then again, when news broke of multiple sex abuse allegations against a prelate who had quietly retired nearly a quarter-century ago – while he was still a very young man and just two years after he became a Nobel peace laureate – the Vatican admitted that Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo has in fact been under “certain disciplinary restrictions” since 2020, but fudged on whether anyone in the Vatican knew the real story when he resigned for “health reasons” in 2002.
When news broke of Bishop Oscar Zanchetta’s depraved extra-curriculars in 2019, the Vatican issued a statement to make Messalina blush.
The one practical upshot of the disgraceful business with Cardinal Ricard is that the figure of 330 thousand victims of abuse at the hands of French abusers over 70 years got more believable.
“I think we have to thank the French bishops,” said the Church’s leading expert on the canonical investigation of sex crimes, Archbishop Charles J. Scicluna of Malta, when the French CIASE report came out just a little over a year ago, “for [having] the courage to confront themselves with reality.”
That didn’t age well.
Cardinal Ricard was one of eleven French bishops accused of either abusing people or failing to denounce abuse of which they had heard, but it seems every Churchman in France and in the Vatican is shocked – shocked! – at the news, which came mere weeks after other news that Bishop Michel Santier of Créteil in France, who had retired “for health reasons” in 2021, had really been credibly accused of sexually abusing two adult men and ordered to a life of prayer and penance after a report prepared by none other than Michel Aupetit, olim Archbishop of Paris.
In short, Captain Renault is not impressed.
None of that should be surprising. Whether in Buffalo, NY or Cincinnati, OH, or Nashville and Knoxville, TN, or Lyon in France – Pope Francis rejected the resignation of that primatial see’s cardinal-archbishop, Philippe Barbarin, even though Barbarin had admitted to disastrous failures of oversight – Francis has been conspicuously selective in the application of his own laws. Francis flatly refused the resignation of Munich’s Reinhard Cardinal Marx, who also admitted to egregious mistakes in his own handling of allegations.
Donald Cardinal Wuerl fudged egregiously à propos of what he knew about Uncle Ted McCarrick and when he knew it, and got a papal encomium for his efforts. Lyonnais Cardinal Barbarin – who admitted to gross mismanagement of gruesome abuse allegations that amounted to coverup, but was eventually acquitted of criminal wrongdoing – got his own praise-song from Pope Francis while leading poor pilgrims in Assisi. “I would like to thank … His Eminence Cardinal [Barbarin] for his presence,” Pope Francis said in Assisi. “[Barbarin] is among the poor,” Francis said. “He, too, has suffered with dignity the experience of poverty, abandonment, distrust – and he defended himself with silence and prayer.”
Cardinal Barbarin had a different take, which he shared with Le Point. “I always be the one who did not denounce heinous acts,” he told the French magazine, “but [the French] justice [system] has said it was not for me to denounce.” Barbarin objected to the “coverup” charge, saying: “What revolts me the most is the word ‘covered’, he said. “Covering up means that you know and you let it happen – and that’s abominable – whereas here we are talking about facts dating back to twenty or thirty years.”
He noted that his predecessors had dealt with the business, and that the abuser – then-Fr. Bernard Preynat – pinky-swore to Barbarin that he’d never diddle another kid, ever again.
“The case of Bernard Preynat had been analyzed and dealt with by my three predecessors,” Barbarin explained to Le Point. “The question for me, when I learned of these assaults, was whether or not they had stopped,” he said. “When I spoke precisely about this with him in 2010, Bernard Preynat swore to me that, since September 1990, no child had been affected. ‘And you believed him?’ I have been asked, reproachfully.” Indeed.
“Preynat said he had never acted out again,” Cardinal Barbarin went on to say, “because he had been ‘scalded’ by [Barbarin’s predecessor] Cardinal [Albert] Decourtray’s decision to dismiss him from his parish.”
“Thank you, Cardinal Barbarin, for your witness that builds up the Church,” Pope Francis said in Assisi.
Just shy of a year ago, Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Paris’s archbishop, Michel Aupetit, with great alacrity. Aupetit was only accused of an untoward relationship with a grown woman. Why is Ricard’s first name still “Cardinal” and why is he still wearing that silly hat?
Oh.
That’s why.
At the end of the day, it’s not that there isn’t much new in the story of Cardinal Ricard. It’s that the story of Cardinal Ricard is barely even news at this point.
(*Note: An earlier version of this piece appeared to claim a certainty regarding the precise nature and extent of Cardinal Ricard’s “reprehensible” behavior, which the publicly know facts do not support at this time. We have edited the piece for the sake of clarity and precision.)
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We are learning that far too many of our bishops are quite comfortable with lying. And, make no mistake about it, silence and double-speak can also represent lying minds and hearts.
I continue to wonder how many bishops today regularly avail themselves of a Spiritual Director and how many of them go to Confession on a regular basis. Anyone want to venture a guess?
What we need in the Church is a new genre of epistolary: “Open Letter to Our Bishops” penned by Churchmen who have reputations for Truth-telling.
You ask: “I continue to wonder how many bishops […] go to Confession on a regular basis. Anyone want to venture a guess?” Maybe the wrong question—
I wonder instead if the layers of Evil include McCarrick confessing to, say, another bishop …such that the targeted bishop is bound to silence by the seal of confession? How much of this hypothetical intrigue might account for at least part of the presumed ineptness within the hierarchy? St. John Paul II prohibited and invalidated homosexual pairs from absolving each other, but then why not just make a visit with some unsuspecting confessor of high rank? Maybe even piously face-to-face?
Maybe the answer to such complexity is to watch the Father Brown fictional (?) mysteries, where he’s behind the screen and suddenly intuits what’s coming and bolts from the confessional into the safety outside.
While a priest is prohibited to disclose what’s revealed during confession, he is not bound to disclose what’s revealed outside the sacrament.
Correction: he is not bound to withhold what’s revealed outside the sacrament.
I always had an area of confusion on the matter of the seal of confession. Using Hitchcock’s famous film as an example, doesn’t a confessor have a power to make a penitential requirement that a murderer turn himself over to authorities. If he fails to do so, would it not invalidate the confession? Would the confessor then have the freedom to break a seal and make the matter public?
Edward, a confessor may not require a penitent to surrender himself to authorities for a [any] crime or crimes. He does have a moral obligation to seek [at least request] to counsel him outside of the confessional if the crime is serial [the penitent must during the confession give some assurance that he/she will make every effort to desist].
There have been instances when government[s] have sought to elicit confessional information from a confessor. He is bound to remain silent.
After reading Altieri’s sardonic summary of grotesque perversion and hypocrisy at the highest levels of the Church — and, yes, I’m talking about you Ricard, Barbarin, Aupetit, and Bergoglio –, ask yourself if this does not look like the synodal Pachamama anti-Church that, in the words of Fr. Linus Clovis, “currently co-exist[s] in the same sacramental, liturgical and juridical space” as the holy, Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic Church that is the Immaculate Bride of Christ.
The common practice of public virtue-signaling is nauseating.
When to it is added mea-culpa(ing) the combination becomes lethal, infecting those immediately around it.
Now the practice has gained a new ingredient – silent approval from the very highest level.
And that is terrifying.
If only one person can see the truth I’m grateful.
This sounds weepy.
This is the kind of scandal that is used by many non-Catholics, including non-Catholic Christians (Protestants, etc.) as a reason to reject Catholicism, even when fully informed of church history and steeped in apologetics proving that the Catholic Church is the Church of the New Testament, the Church that Jesus Christ founded, and the Holy Spirit filled on Pentecost Sunday. It’s not so much the sin itself that repels, it’s the cover-up. However, many Protestant denominations, communities, fellowships, and parachurch organizations have also been involved with sex scandals and cover-ups involving their leaders. I fear that sadly, many non-Catholic Christians are wandering the world seeking a church, or church-hopping from church to church, and many eventually fall away from their faith because of their lack of communion with other Christians and with the Lord Jesus Christ through the Eucharist offered only by the Catholic Church. And as long as this is happening, many non-Christians have no human witness of the love of Jesus and the salvation that He offers humans. As Jesus told us, we need to pray that “we might be ONE!”
Excommunication……..one of the weakest and almost non-existent practice of the “true church”. Only God knows how many thousands of lives have been effected by these “holy” men.
Why is no attention being given to the Bishop Belo situation?
The Vatican tells us that in 2019 they were given accusations that he had raped numerous impoverished boys, so instead of conducting a canonical investigation and trial, they put him under secret restrictions.
Any fool can see that secrecy allows the abuser continued access to children.
And this was done as the hierarchy had just promised us, following the Cardinal McCarrick scandal, that they had a new process that would hold bishops accountable. Now we see that, as they were promising us transparency, they were engaging in exactly the same cover-ups as before.
The only thing that has changed is that we’re no longer shocked.
Altieri, far from a Francis basher, admits fault in His Holiness’ skewed presumption of equal justice for all, “Francis has been conspicuously selective in the application of his own laws. Francis flatly refused the resignation of Munich’s Reinhard Cardinal Marx, who also admitted to egregious mistakes in his own handling of allegations”. This became crystal clear with the “great alacrity” in which he accepted Archbishop of Paris Aupetit’s resignation. How Frances refused out of hand that of arch apostate Card Reinhard Marx, coddled, memory selective fibber for McCarrick Card Wuerl.
We may add the pontiff’s acceptance with alacrity [alacrity often misused for simple brevity means with eagerness, with ardor which appears the case in these instances] that of Phoenix Archbishop Thomas Olmsted’s resignation offer at 75 and replaced him with progressive Aux bishop John Dolan. And similar alacrity. Should we be appalled? At least concerned?
Francis X Maier in assessing the Jesuits has said Pope Francis made a strange appointment of fellow Jesuit Card Jean-Claude Hollerich as relator to the Great Eternal [at least until the end of time] Synod. Maier and Altieri, both men of honest reserve, may consider whether there’s a pattern of intent. That equal justice is reserved for those who are thought by His Holiness more equal than others [which is obvious] because they manifest by their untoward behavior the envisioned Church of benevolent sinners, confession and repentance be damned that would typify that Church in practice [the apparent target of the Synod] amenable to everyone, every poor soul’s concrete circumstances. The anticipated blossoming of Amoris Laetitia.
“Bishop Michel Santier of Créteil in France, who had retired “for health reasons” in 2021, had really been credibly accused of sexually abusing two adult men”
Finally a news outlet is recognizing the fact that priests are sexually abusing and assaulting adult men (and women), including brother priests. As a priest who was sexually assaulted by a confrère this is validation, however small.
The sad reality is that it happens more than is reported. And when an adult, especially a man, finally works up the courage to come forward, they are patronized, laughed at and dismissed by superiors, other clergy and religious, civil authorities, psychologists, and even those closest to them. I know. I speak from personal experience. It happened to me and the fallout continues.
Thank you Christopher Altieri. You have given me a sliver of hope.
Francis is slow to act because there is little evidence that he really cares about misbehavior of “below the belt” matters, to use his phrase.
His disciplinary measures are more for show, like a politician who needs to prove to the masses that he’s doing something about a problem for which he doesn’t really care. He has never shown much ability to comprehend let alone find fault with the devastating consequences of the sex revolution. He only ridiclues those who do.
Pope Francis appears to be behaving no differently from his two (or more) predecessors. It took some insistence to sideline Cdl Law into a nice Roman semi-retired assignment. There might be some reasons for outraged lay people not to see the full array of penalties in place against our “betters.” We have the same practices in the secular sphere, no? Do companies reveal salaries? The reasons why people resign or are fired? It’s all a very litigious world now.
I notice Cdl Ricard is a JP2/B16 bishop/cardinal. That administration was careful to vet people for not wanting to listen to ordaining married men or women. Sexual morality, not so much, it seems.
The Catholic Church has been more open than any on this issue and celibacy seems to have little to do with the matter. Protestants, Jews, Buddhists and Hindus just don’t cut it for that special naughty frisson, similarly such activity in the so called secular sphere.
It is possible to be too contrite, to overindulge the penitence.
The True Church is for sinners.
The true Church is not for those who trivialize sin, nor is it a Church where high prelates have a right to be stupid, which they would be if they made it any less that their daily sense of personal awareness that there are and have been for decades massive forces throughout the Church intent on denying a proper sense of sin, against which they are obliged to do constant battle.
What’s really important is that Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard militates for open borders and the environment, right?