The Culture of Fear_ Why Americans Are Afraid of the Wrong Things - Barry Glassner [31]
Asks Dreese, “Is this responsible reporting, is it sensationalism, or is it Catholic bashing?” It is a question that warrants serious consideration by reporters and editors who have been much too accepting of evidence of “epidemics” of priestly pedophilia. The media paid considerable attention, for example, to pronouncements from Andrew M. Greeley, a priest best known as the author of best-selling potboilers, including FallfromGrace, a 1993 novel about a priest who rapes preadolescent boys. Although Greeley holds a professorship in the social sciences at the University of Chicago, his statements on pedophiles in the priesthood oddly conflict with one another and with principles of statistical reasoning to which he subscribes in other contexts. “If Catholic clerics feel that charges of pedophilia have created an open season on them,” he wrote in an op-ed piece in the New York Times, “they have only themselves to blame. By their own inaction and indif ference they have created an open season on children for the few sexual predators among them.” Yet in a Jesuit magazine Greeley declared that the number of pedophile priests is far more than just a “few”. There he estimated that 2,000 to 4,000 Roman Catholic clergy—between 4 and 8 percent of the total—had abused more than 100,000 young people.36
These shocking statistics, dutifully publicized in the press, were unreliable to say the least. Greeley extrapolated the number of pedophile priests based on rough estimates from the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, which based them on their own internal study, which may or may not have been accurate, and in any event, might not have generalized to clergy nationwide. As for the figure of 100,000 victims, Greeley came up with this estimate on the basis of studies of child molesters outside the priesthood that suggest that active pedophiles victimize dozens if not hundreds of children each. Yet these studies are themselves controversial because they rely on self-reports from men who were apprehended by the police—men who might molest more children than other pedophiles or exaggerate their exploits.37
Greeley’s critics suggest he exaggerated the number of pedophiles and victims by something like a factor of ten. But whatever the true incidence, the amount of ink and airtime devoted to pedophile priests clearly has created a climate in which, on the one hand, the church has reason to disavow true claims, and on the other, con artists have leverage to bring false claims. Attorneys who specialize in bringing suits against the church and have collected multimillion dollar settlements say they see large numbers of false claims.38
The political essayist Walter Russell Mead pointed out a more subtle disservice of the media’s focus. In reporting on perverted priests journalists presumably believe they are raising a larger issue about the moral collapse of one of humankind’s oldest and most influential spiritual institutions. As Mead points out, however, obsessive attention to pedophile priests obscures more far-reaching problems of the church. He cites in particular corruption in political parties the church has supported in Europe, and a loss of membership in various parts of the world. These trends are considerably more difficult for the press to cover, especially in a manner that audiences will find interesting. Yet they are far more pertinent indicators of the decline and corruption of the church than are pedophile priests. “After all, the church does not teach that its clergy are saints—just the opposite,” notes Mead. “Sin is with us every day, says the Catholic Church, and it deliberately teaches that the efficacy of its sacraments and the accuracy of its teachings are independent of the moral failings of its bishops and priests. From a certain point of view, the sex scandals don’t so much disprove the Christian faith as confirm our need for it.”39
Strange and Sinister Men
In my review of news stories about crimes against children I have been struck by the frequency with which journalists draw unsubstantiated conclusions