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" The Catholic bishops of England and Wales issued an apology today for their failings regarding the Catholic child-abuse scandal. As has come to be the pattern in the church&amp;#039;s official responses, the apology rings not only hollow, but completely off key. The core passage: The criminal offences committed by some priests and religious are a profound scandal. They bring deep shame to the whole church. But shame is not enough. The abuse of children is a grievous sin against God. Therefore we focus not on shame but on our sorrow for these sins. If there is a more backward understanding of what this scandal means and the response it demands, I can&amp;#039;t imagine what it would look like. No, the sex abuse did not bring shame on the whole church; it brought shame on the abusers and the bishops who covered for them. As for who this apologetic &amp;quot;we&amp;quot; is, I don&amp;#039;t see many Catholic laypeople scrambling to include themselves: they&amp;#039;re furious, not remorseful. No, &amp;quot;we,&amp;quot; of course, means the bishops, and they deploy the word just as the pope did in his letter on the Irish abuse scandal: in an attempt to paint the whole affair as a crisis of faith rather than a crisis of administration. Bad enough. But let&amp;#039;s get to the heart of the discord. The proper human response to shameful behavior is not sorrow. It&amp;#039;s shame. Deep, abiding, soul-killing, self-negating shame. That shame is what the bishops who covered up the abuse should be feeling now. It is the kind of shame that led the pagan generals of Rome to fall on their swords after battlefield defeats. To see a few bishops do so now, literally or, failing that, figuratively, would do much to improve the sense that justice is being served. But don&amp;#039;t expect much of that behavior. Pagan generals measured themselves against their unforgiving gods. Catholic bishops merely need repent, they believe, and all will be forgiven. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a7219/catholic-abuse-sorry-is-not-enough/>