U.S. Catholic bishops issued a formal apology Friday morning (6/14/24) for the church’s role in inflicting a “history of trauma” on Native Americans, including at church-run Indian boarding schools where a Washington Post investigation published last month documented pervasive sexual abuse by priests.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2024/06/14/catholic-church-indian-boarding-schools/
The vote by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which
establishes policies and norms for the church in the United States, represents
the most direct expression of regret to date by church officials for past
participation in a systematic effort by the U.S. government to forcibly
assimilate Native Americans into White society. By a 181-2 vote, the bishops
approved a document called “Keeping
Christ’s Sacred Promise: A Pastoral Framework for Indigenous Ministry.” Three
bishops abstained.
The document does not specifically mention sexual abuse,
but says “we all must do our part to increase awareness and break the culture
of silence that surrounds all types of afflictions and past mistreatment and
neglect.”
https://tohell-andback.blogspot.com/2022/12/indian-boarding-schools.html
Another issue that the Catholic church has finally been dealing
with is the sexual abuse of minors by Catholic priests, which has cost the
church $3 billion. In some cases, the original crime occurred decades ago – and
one of the perpetrators was a man who was our parish priest when we moved to
Wisconsin in 1981.
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The LONGEST period of time before the church finally admitted it was wrong involved a man named Galileo, who taught that the Earth revolved around the sun, which was contrary to what the church was teaching at the time.
In 1632 Galileo
published his “Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems,” which
supposedly presented arguments for both sides of the heliocentrism debate. His
attempt at balance fooled no one, and it especially didn’t help that his
advocate for geocentrism was named “Simplicius.”
Galileo was summoned
before the Roman Inquisition in 1633. At first, he denied that he had advocated heliocentrism,
but later he said he had only done so unintentionally. Galileo was convicted of
“vehement suspicion of heresy” and under threat of torture forced to express
sorrow and curse his errors.
Nearly 70 at the time of
his trial, Galileo lived his last nine years under comfortable house arrest,
writing a summary of his early motion experiments that became his final great
scientific work. He died in Arcetri near Florence, Italy on January 8, 1642 at
age 77 after suffering from heart palpitations and a fever.
In his conflict with the
Church, Galileo was also largely vindicated. Enlightenment thinkers like Voltaire used tales of his trial
(often in simplified and exaggerated form) to portray Galileo as a martyr for
objectivity. Recent scholarship suggests Galileo’s actual trial and punishment
were as much a matter of courtly intrigue and philosophical minutiae as of
inherent tension between religion and science.
In 1744 Galileo’s “Dialogue” was removed from the
Church’s list of banned books, and in the 20th century Popes Pius XII and
John Paul II made official statements of regret for how the Church had treated
Galileo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolaus_Copernicus
The Catholic Church finally admitted that Galileo was right in
November of 1992, 359 years after the original inquisition.
You would think that any of the scandals listed above would
hurt church membership, and you would be correct – but not as much as you would
think.
In 2023, there were 1.376 billion Catholics in the world, an increase
of 14 million from the year before. In the United States, there are 336 million
baptized Catholics.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_by_country
Like any large organization, the Catholic church has its
flaws, even though its overall impact is positive. However, it IS encouraging
that its past sins are finally being addressed.
Better late than never.
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