Some of my dearest friends are Catholic.

[MrGuilty]

Cutting and Pasting

Vatican priest likens criticism of church on abuse to anti-Semitism

The statement stung Jewish groups -- with one spokesman calling it "repulsive" -- and prompted calls for the priest to retract it and for the pope to address it.

The statement also angered victims groups, which expressed outrage that the Church, some of whose priests preyed on generations of Catholic children, was portraying itself as a victim.

"The pope is not the victim here, nor is the Church hierarchy," said David Clohessy, who is an advocate for victims and who experienced alleged abuses by a priest as a boy. "The victims are the boys and girls being sexually assaulted by priests, nuns, seminarians."

He said, "When they play the victim, when they rally around those who were predators or try to cover up for them, it just intimidates those who were abused from speaking up."

The Vatican quickly said Cantalamessa, a member of the Capuchin Order whose title is preacher of the Pontifical Household, was speaking only for himself.


As Cantalamessa delivered his homily in Vatican City, the weary-looking, white-haired pope, 82, sat near the basilica's main altar

During an evening liturgy, Cantalamessa said he had received a letter from a Jewish friend who was upset by the attacks against Benedict and the Church and expressed his "solidarity" and "sentiments of brotherhood."

Quoting from the letter with the author's permission, the priest said his friend had been following " 'with indignation the violent and concentric attacks against the Church, the pope and all the faithful of the whole world.' "

" 'The use of stereotypes, the passing from personal responsibility and guilt to a collective guilt remind me of the more shameful aspects of anti-Semitism,' " Cantalamessa said his friend wrote.

Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of Simon Wiesenthal Center, in Los Angeles, called the comparison "bizarre."

"The fact that he's quoting [a] letter from a Jewish person doesn't excuse the ignorance," he said. "These priests were perpetrators. They abused their calling, betrayed their faith. And then were protected by the hierarchy. To say that is like the persecution of the Jews is a distortion of history and shameful."

"It's Good Friday," he added. The priest "knows his remarks are going all over the world. And that's the message you want to give? Ridiculous. Not only should the priest retract it, but the pope should address it . . . to say nothing condones it."

...others in the Catholic community said they have been struck by the Church's response to recent abuse allegations.

"If they hired someone to draw up the worst possible PR plan for the Church, they could not do any worse than these guys are doing right now," said the Rev. Thomas Reese, senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University.

"It's disastrous," he said. "They really need to get someone from the U.S. bishops conference who has been through this before to get over there and help guide the coverage. I mean, to invoke the persecution of the Jews? They are making every mistake in the book."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... id=topnews