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Sacred Silence: Denial and the Crisis in the Church

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I am a Roman Catholic priest, ordained 40 years, and I am more grateful than I can say, for Donald Cozzen's latest book. It is the most plain-spoken, insightful, exhaustive, profound, and above all, honest book on the Church and its current parlous state, than any of the many I've read. I hesitate to call it courageous, though it surely is that. For this book followed his earlier book on the priesthood, and he was pilloried by many for that. But, fatuously, I'm afraid, I would like to think that anyone, cleric or lay, would have been, if not able, at least willing to say what Cozzens has said here. Unhappily, this is far from the truth. Now, if a bishop would be willing.......

Beautifully written, this book is remarkable for its candor, its clarity, and its precision. Something terribly sad and completely unnecessary has fallen over the life of the Catholic community in the United States. It shows itself in many different ways. But its most characteristic feature is inhibited speech and an empty silence where a prayerful, well informed, discerning, and passionate conversation should be going on. For all concerned about the future of the Catholic Church this deeply thoughtful and humane book will explain the attitudes, decisions, and practices that are threatening it. If opening a way for God's Spirit to move freely in the desires and imaginations of human beings is part of what is meant by "prophecy," Donald Cozzens is a clear-eyed, soft-spoken prophet for Catholicism's present situation.

Father Cozzens writes with brutal honesty about the religious denomination that he loves and faithfully serves. Without flinching, he describes the dysfunctional system that has resulted in denial, avoidance, minimization, anger and a self-destructive religious culture.

Sadly, Father Cozzens' concerns are applicable to other religious denominations as well. All of the problems that he describes as existing among Latin Rite Roman Catholics exist, also, within the so-called Protestant denominations.

Father Cozzens' remedy is as appropriate for the rest of the Church catholic as it is for the Roman Catholic church. If the Church is to be saved from its own bureaucracy and episcopacy, the time has come for honest, direct, open, challenging, and painful dialogue. If the laity are to escape the heavy hand of the clergy, so that they too may minister, then the time has come to end clerical privilege.

Father Cozzens prescribes a painful remedy for that which currently ails Christ's Church. Nevertheless, it is a remedy.

Sacred Silence has much to say. The body as "playground" was a metaphor used by one priest in justifying his sexual interest in a young male. It is, he went on to say, the "soul" that counts. This is a chilling line of reasoning. Cozzens' thesis is the Church's first challenge is to breakthrough the "wall of denial and silence" that has surrounded the issue of sexual abuse. Sacred Silence, to use President Reagan's phrase, is trying to "tear down that wall." The first part of the book identifies the factors that have motivated "denial" on the part of the clergy (institutional dynamics play a key role here) and the ways that silence has manifested itself, including a brief, but fascinating discussion of the failed efforts of African nuns to generate a dialogue on abuse when they first raised it in 1995. The remainder of the book focuses on potential reforms. Much of the problem stems, in Cozzens' view, from the tradition of celibacy itself. This tradition, he thinks, merits serious re-examination, as do other factors, including an expanded role for women and a revised, more representative process for selecting Bishops.

What disturbed me about Cozzens was not his substantive thesis, but his timid style. Here he runs the risk of sending the wrong signal to church authorities. He recognizes that there is a systemic problem here; that priests, insofar as they have been involved in the abuse of minors, have overwhelmingly selected teenage boys as opposed to girls and; that, more often than not, far too little was done to protect the children themselves (as opposed to the offending priest, as William F. Buckley has observed). With all this, it would seem incumbent on the Church to study carefully the mental rationalizations used by abusing priests, and flat-out irresponsible not to do so. Cozzens is clear, but still stepping carefully when he states: "The results of such studies would be distrubing... yet [are] essential to any long-term resolution." And, "Now is the time for the church to address with compassion and sensitivity a reality it wants to deny.." And, "it is time to tell the truth in love." All this is, of course, correct; the problem is that it is obviously correct. As citizens, Catholics would respond as quickly and as decisvely as non-Catholics to child abuse at a local public school. Recurring abuse and heads would roll, including those on the school board. In this area, it seems, the law is more advanced the institution's moral sensibility. The problem of abuse that the Church faces in the U.S. has, by all indications, been significantly under-estimated in Rome. What's lacking in Cozzens is not so much anger, but a sense of urgency. This problem and accompanying perceptions will not be perceived as being resolved in the absence of significant change. Here, church authorities, who really are Cozzens principal audience, have much to learn from Father Cozzens. But they should not be deceived by his measured tone -- in the timeless institution, time is now of the essence.

Donald Cozzens has done the Church an enormous service by asking---with obvious love and Christ-centered courage---some of the hardest and most intractable questions facing anyone who loves the Lord and the Church and who is wary of the easy-answer, let's "whip 'em back into shape" solutions proffered by the fearful and reactionary. This is a man who loves the priesthood enough to bring its dysfunctional structures and patterns to the healing light of the Gospel, challenging with steady, humble candor the perennial falsehood that "things as they are should stay that way." He is right to start the book by asking the simple question, "What are we afraid of?", since fear lies deep at the heart of the denial and repression that have brought the Church to the critical place we now stand. The direction we take will be much enlightened by Cozzens' insightful
examination, leading us toward a greater apprehension of the truth---Jesus the Christ---who alone sets us free. Thank you, Fr. Cozzens. Yours is a bright light shining in a very dark place.

Deftly written by Donald Cozzens (a Catholic priest and teacher of religious studies at John Carroll University), Sacred Silence: Denial And The Crisis In The Church is an unflinching examination of the Catholic Church and its current troubles that even as this review is written has resulted in the removal of the American Archbishop Cardinal Bernard Law from his post. Addressing not only issues of sexual abuse allegations, Sacred Silence expands into the question of why the church is so controlling, and how it needs to change to become more responsive to the people it serves worldwide. Sacred Silence is very strongly recommended reading for both Catholic clergy and laity, as well as non-Catholics with an interest the administrative and public relations problems of clerical misconduct to wreak upon their own religious communities and institutions.

If the Roman Catholic Church manages to survive into the next century as anything other than a curious relic of less civilized times, it will be because of the efforts of brave reformers like Donald B. Cozzens. In SACRED SILENCE, Cozzens openly speaks about the problems that are killing the Church from the inside; brute ambition, blind protection of the institution (even in the face of priestly child rape, and the silencing of the voices of women, gay priests, and abused children. Cozzens' book is an important call for frank and open dialogue - a call which the Church had better listen to, before its whole 1900-year-old carcass ends up six feet under.

Perhaps other titles for this book could be, Unholy Silence or Sinful Silence. Cozzen's book truthfully sheds light and breaks the silence that has been hidden from the laity for far too long. This very important book is an excellent place to start seriously studying and investigating the systemic problems that caused the sexual rape and abuse of our children. These problems sadly are deeply rooted in our church and must br uprooted. Like an analizing sciencist every Catholic should read this book and others like it to help shed light as to why we have this problem! Only when the whole truth comes out can we start to rebuild and be the church that Jesus meant us to be.

I am also a Catholic priest. Here is a man who was rector of a seminary. Yet he takes no responsibility for the current problems. Instead he dares to offer advice. Penance would be more appropriate. I would ask him "why didn't you fix the problems when you had the chance as rector?" and "why if there is a problem with homosexuals in the priesthood did you not take action and expell them?". The answer to our problems is more fidelty not less. Fr. Cozzens is part of the problem not the answer. For the real answers we need only look to Pope John Paul II. If we had simply done what he has asked us to do for years we would not be in this situation.