The joy of wounded freedom. The crossroads of freedom in the Church

Paedophilia has been a catastrophe and a failure for the Church. A catastrophe: it has generated a crisis comparable to that of the earthquake of the Reformation in the 16th century. A failure: it has made evident the deficiencies in managing the corruption and sin that lurks within its members (especially when they occupy a high ecclesiastical rank). To adequately confront this catastrophe and this failure, we must not focus our gaze on the (so terrible) fact of sexual abuse, but we must discover and identify what lies behind and beneath: the logic of abuse and its concealment as an annulment of the freedom of the victims and of the People of God; even more deeply, because the mechanism of power acts in a hidden way: it uses subtle ways to justify itself, to disguise itself, to manipulate others. There is something in power that awakens archaic passions, that brings to the surface the darkest depths of the human mystery. In the face of power, when it tends to be cloaked in corruption and abuse, can there be any other antidote than freedom? In the Church too, so as not to take refuge in an idealised escapism. In the distant 1970, F. Sebastian recalled affirmations from the New Testament such as “where the Spirit is, there is freedom”, “truth sets free”, “the whole of creation awaits its liberation”, and was surprised that they had been little used to develop a conception of life and Christian values. In short, it is a theological reflection which, springing from the heart of the salvific event, does not ignore the murmur of the street. And all this, from the joy of a freedom wounded also at the current crossroads of the Church.

CARLOS CHANA, ELOY BUE

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