Pope Francis accepted the resignation of American Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. The former Washington Archbishop has been the subject of charges of sexual abuse of children and young men. He is the highest Catholic clergyman in the United States who resigned because of a sexual scandal. Testimonies of harassment by priests have been appearing more and more frequently in recent years, triggering a debate about the moral credentials of the Church, or whether it would be appropriate to abolish the duty of celibacy.
The Pope, according to a Saturday statement, received McCarrick's resignation letter Friday night. He accepted the resignation and instructed the eighty-eight-year-old spiritual to devote himself to prayer and repentance in the house he would be assigned to carry out the church process.
The scandal started when it was accused that McCarrick had sexually abused the young boy almost fifty years ago. He said he put his hand in his trousers while preparing for the Christmas worship. The Cardinal said he did not remember anything like that. In June, however, the Church acknowledged the accusation as plausible and suspended McCarrick.
Subsequently, there were other men who brought testimony of harassment over the course of many decades. They were mostly young priests who served with the Cardinal. One of them claims McCarrick has been abusing him for 20 years since he was only eleven years old.
Another said that McCarrick had invited young priests for weekend stays into the house to the sea, where there was always less beds than visitors. The Cardinal therefore always told one of them to sleep in bed with him, and there he was.
The hidden sexual life of the priests rises to the surface
The accusations of Catholic priests for sexual abuse are increasing. Victims, due to greater openness in social debate, cease to be ashamed and come to the public with crimes that have often taken place long and kept secret.
Cases of harassment have been reported in the past three decades in countries around the world, with tens of thousands affected. The Vatican, whose senior officials also feature in some cases, has deprived the office of over eight hundred clergy in the context of child abuse in ten years.
It turns out that the problem does not concern only a few exceptions, but is rather widespread in the Catholic Church. For example, in Australia, up to seven percent of the priests reported committing sexual assaults. This suggests that there is a systemic problem in the organization of the Catholic clergy.
There are, therefore, suggestions for changes to some rules related to celibacy. For example, the Australian Royal Commission has called for a reassessment of the requirement of celibacy of the clergy and proposed its volition. Pope Frantisek said in 2014 that "celibacy is not a dogma of faith" and that "the door is open". But he also warned that this question "is not on the agenda".
The Catholic Church, in many countries, is in the role of an arbiter of social morality. Her representatives often try to promote their views on family, partnership and maternity laws. These are, according to many critics, discriminatory primarily towards homosexuals, but also against women.
