RITE AND REASON: In its mishandling of clerical child sex abuse, the church is protecting a theology of human nature whereby "body is bruised to pleasure soul", argues Marie Keenan
"Whose side are you on?", a male victim of clerical sexual abuse asked me one day. It is an important question when trying to establish the bona fides of one who works with both victims and perpetrators of sexual crime. For 27 years I have provided treatment for victims of sexual abuse and rape, for 19 years for sexual offenders and their families. My treatment model is simple yet robust.
It is based on the latest research into best practice and treatment efficacy, and on a respect for all. At its core is a belief that every time a man abuses a child he makes a decision to do so. The language of "impulse" and "urge" has little meaning in this approach.
I do not speak the language of "cure", neither do I speak the language of "sick". A medical approach has limited value in the area of sexual offending. For me sexual offending must always be set against a landscape of abuse of power and privilege. I believe that a man who has abused a child can resign from an abusive way of being - with the right kind of help, support and sometimes external nudging (as in mandatory treatment by the courts).
One does not need "pure" motivation to do well in treatment; all one needs is a partial admission of wrongdoing. The rest is up to the therapist, and the therapeutic relationship. When people feel supported sufficiently, they will choose the right thing.
Therapists with a postgraduate training in psychotherapy are thus best placed to do this work. Prison officers or indeed rehabilitated sex offenders working with trained therapists can provide other possibilities.
My authority to treat men who perpetrate abuse comes directly from my work with victims. I hold myself accountable to them. I believe that we all deserve the chance to redeem ourselves. Men and women who have survived sexual offences have taught me that you do not survive sexual abuse without learning a lot about human nature. It was thus heartening to note the response of Andrew Madden and Colm O'Gorman following their meeting with Michael McDowell recently.
I too have a lot of faith in our current Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform and I hope that in his hands the whole business of sexual offences, justice for victims and community, residential and prison treatment for offenders will get good attention.
I have learned a lot from men who have abused too. Significantly, I have learned that you learn how to shame by being on the receiving end of it oneself. This is not an excuse for their offending. I have never met a man who woke up from a contented, happy, fulfilled life and decided to become a sex offender. To this extent, further public shaming of men who have abused is not helpful. Public accountability by all means - but how about invitations to treatment?
In talking recently to a priest friend I asked what he thought the Catholic Church was trying to protect throughout this whole child abuse crisis. Apart from the obvious answer of a system of power relations and authority that is built on hierarchy, non-inclusion and secrecy, he suggested that it was trying to protect a way of life that for many has become impossible to live, i.e. an all-male celibate environment.
I also believe the church is trying to protect a view of human nature that is built on a theology of duality, a split between body and soul with a privileging of spirit over matter. Suspicion of human nature, a belief that body is bad and a fear of human sexuality are the inevitable consequences. It loops automatically back to a view of the celibate as the "higher order of being".
In my view there is an inbuilt arrogance in this theological position. Because of this suspicion of human nature, morality becomes externally defined, based on laws and rules rather than internally constituted, based on love and relationship. The child sexual abuse issues facing the Catholic Church could not be more perfectly designed to offer the system an opportunity to address all of these issues.
If there is a grand meaning behind the collective individual stories of abusing priests, perhaps this is it. Perhaps their individual behaviour speaks to a system fundamentally in need of overhaul.