Cri De Coeur

That passionate cry of anguished pain emanating from the Archbishop of Halifax, whereby he attests to the intolerable burden of suspicion from the parishioners of the Catholic parishes in the Archdiocese of Halifax might soften the heart of the most hardened non-believer. Or, he might hope, the most incredulous, violated men, once boys, who suffered sexually-depraved overtures at the hands of Bishop Lahey, now charged with possession and distribution of child pornography.

"My heart is broken, my mind is confused and my body hurts, bleats Archbishop Anthony Mancini. Likening the pain he is now experiencing to the suffering of Christ during his crucifixion. His trusted brothers in the holy Catholic faith, those whom the Vatican has elevated from the faithful priesthood to the engaged Bishopric have once again spewed the vitriolic acid of pederasty over the already sufficiently-soiled reputation of the Catholic Church.

"In the past days, I have been asked over and over again: What do you say to the parishioners, to the priests, the people and to the faithful communities that make up our Church in Nova Scotia?" Archbishop Mancini wrote in a painful pastoral letter to his flock. What, indeed, do you say, Archbishop? Well you say "We are personally going through the passion and the death which Christ experienced, but we have not yet gone beyond death to the resurrection.

"It is as if we are presently sealed up in a dark tomb waiting for the power of the Spirit of God to overtake us and raise us up to a new day and a new future." Um, don't think so. You've right royally screwed up. When the opportunity presented itself, right from the beginning, with the original revelations of abuse, to put a stop to it, you chose instead to protect the violators of youth.

Many years ago the predatory harm inflicted on young boys by then-priest Raymond Lahey and other of his ilk, was reported, and action assumed to have been taken. Reality, however is that nothing was done about it. Complaints ignored, he was left free to resume his light-hearted and well-meaning past-time of introducing trusting boys to adult molestation of the innocent.

For in fact that was the case with Bishop Lahey; his violations of trust were reported by boys who had suffered his unwanted attentions, and his superior had taken note, and reported the abuse upward in the echelons of church administration in the trust that something would be done to remove the violator from their midst. And, amazingly, nothing was done.

The sexually abusive priest went on to greater heights of shepherding his faithful flock. And the compassion demonstrated by Bishop Lahey when he was the point man in dealing with those sexual abuse victims was noted for its kind-heartedness. His delicacy of demeanour demonstrated his desire to protect the former victims from further indignities. Himself absolved of any wrong-doing.

And he was much lauded. His prestige in his community, the esteem in which he was held was unparalleled, a true and great man of God. As is the good Archbishop, obviously who asserts his powerless rage: "I have cried and I have silently screamed, and perhaps that was my prayer to God: Why Lord? What does this all mean? What are you asking of me and my priests?

"What do you want to see happen among your people? Is this a time of purification or is it nothing more than devastation? Are people going to stop believing, will faithful people stop being people of faith? Lord, what are you asking of us and how can we make it happen?" Well, for starters, pay attention, it has been the poverty of attention to the plaints of children that has enabled predators like Lahey to thrive and survive.

Do not ask the Lord, and in so doing leave the impression that the putrefaction of the church is His doing, not that of fallible mankind. You and the other elevated clerics in the church are responsible for what has occurred, by the level of your disinterest in the cries from the hearts of wounded children, in your dedication to protecting those of your clerics who visit misery on the helpless.

Yours is not the self-flagellation of the innocent, but that of the guilty, unwilling to admit complicity in the injuries visited on the vulnerable.