Recently, the critically acclaimed film "Spotlight," about the Boston Globe's investigation of clergy sexual abuse of children, won an Oscar for "Best Picture." While accepting the award, producer Michael Sugar urged "Pope Francis, it is time to protect the children and restore the faith."
Predictably there are a million reactions and responses ranging from supportive to defensive to angry regarding the very existence of the film, its award, and producer Sugar's remark. Some call the film "Catholic bashing, anti-Catholic." Others call it the film that no Catholic wants to see but that every Catholic should see.
Since this is a film about Catholic Clergy, many ask, "What does the Pope think of the film?" We can get a clue about Pope Francis' attitude by reading a review of the film in "L'Osservatore Romano," the official Vatican newspaper. The review says in part
"'Spotlight,' the Oscar-winning film, has a compelling plot. The film is not anti-Catholic, as has been written, because it manages to voice the shock and profound pain of the faithful confronting the discovery of these horrendous realities....It has become clear that in the Church some are more preoccupied with the image of the institution than of the seriousness of the act.... The fact that a call arose from the Oscar ceremony - that Pope Francis fight this scourge - should be seen as a positive sign that there is still trust in the institution, there is trust in a Pope who is continuing the cleaning begun by his predecessor, then still a Cardinal. There is still trust in a faith that has as its heart the defense of victims, the protection of the innocent."
How refreshing that the official Vatican Press should not feel threatened by a film critical of the clergy and the institution, but instead is transparent and humble and honest about human and institutional failures and sinfulness. How refreshing that Sugar's comment is seen as a positive belief in the faith, the institution and the Pope!
But - is the Pope doing anything? Yes, there have been massive changes in the Church's response to this crisis. The Pope has established a Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, and some members experienced sexual abuse themselves when minors. The Pope has directed Bishops across the globe to promptly report allegations of clergy sexual abuse.
In the United States, parishes and schools across the nation have been instructed to perform background checks on hired personnel, job applicants, and volunteers who work with children and youth. All clergy and any personnel who work with children and youth are mandated to take part in ongoing Safe Environment Training, which educates them about sexual predators and how and when to become suspicious of individuals working with youth, and which also includes orders to always report suspicious behavior to authorities and to never be alone with a child or youth. Students are trained on how to resist sexual predators and how to spot those who "groom" their prey. Re. Seminary training, there is a drastically improved screening process for Seminary admissions. The National Catholic Register reports
"Catholic Dioceses across the nation adhere to strict guidelines that require prompt reporting of credible allegations of clergy sexual abuse. Dioceses now have offices where victims can make allegations, and the report is assessed by lay review boards composed of experts who know a great deal about sexual predators who prey on children....In many countries where child sexual abuse is not a criminal offense, the Church will be leading the way for important changes."
One cannot think about or discuss the topic of adults' sexually abusive relationships with minors without wondering, "What goes on inside the head of an abuser of children or youth?" The first thing that's apparent is that this is not a sexual relationship between equals. It's a sexual relationship engaged in by an adult who is exerting power to reduce minors to objects for his/her pleasure. These are sexual relationships that pervert the meaning of human sexuality. They are not acts that take place between equals. They are without emotional intimacy. Children and youths may THINK that they are emotionally intimate with the adult, may even think that love exists between them, because the predator constantly manipulates them by telling them how much he/she loves them, and how wonderful, how beautiful they are. Children often end up heart-broken and emotionally scarred when they discover that they haven't been loved, only used. Others have been forced and coerced into the sexual acts to begin with. These devastating experiences affect the victim for a lifetime; blessedly healing can come from supportive adults and counselors.
One of the sinful and distressing facets of child/youth sexual abuse is the ongoing proliferation of child/youth pornography. Most of us are appalled that this further use and abuse of children even exists. We'd agree that child pornography harms those minors who participate in it as performers because it reduces them to objects used for others' pleasure and profit. It spiritually harms those who create it, and those who watch it. Watching such pornographic images often incites viewers to sexually abuse children themselves.
Yet, while many or most of us feel comfortably superior to those who sexually abuse children and youth because we could never do that, we can be blind to another scourge in our society that many people consider to be only recreational entertainment and quite normal: Internet pornography involving adults and its usage. Pornography involving adult performers also harms those who participate in its production as performers because, willing or not, they lose their dignity because they are being reduced to objects for others' pleasure and profit. Pornographic films pervert the meaning of sexuality by removing the love, trust, relationship,and emotional intimacy that should exist between two people having intercourse: what should be "making love" is reduced to and depicted as "having impersonal, only physical sex." Viewers of pornography develop attitudes of using others rather than unselfishly loving others.
Many people, including the American Bishops, believe that America has been so dramatically shaped by pornography that hypersexualization has become normal; we have become a porn culture. Porn affects how we view sexuality and how women, in particular, view themselves. Women today often reduce their worth to their status as a sexual object. Male viewers of pornographic material which depicts women as mere objects for the use of others tend to live this attitude out in their own relationships with women.
Campus "hook-up culture" is a dramatic example of how pornography affects people's attitudes. Hook-up culture involves college students engaging in a range of sexual activities without expecting any form of commitment. Many of the male students watch pornography, in which male sexual pleasure is taken for granted, and female pleasure is ignored because women are seen merely as sexually desirable objects. Typically, female college students describe their pursuit of college hook-ups as a way to affirm their desirability. Campus parties take their cue from pornography. Megan K. McCabe (in "Create in Me A Just Heart," "America" magazine, Feb. 8, 2016) describes how women are encouraged to come to campus parties dressed as porn stars.
But few people know or communicate about the connection between pornography and violence. McCabe notes, "There is a great deal of violence depicted in pornography, which can lead to an increased likelihood that a man will abuse his partner...The proliferation of pornography has led to the mainstreaming of increasingly violent material. DEPICTIONS OF PHYSICAL VIOLENCE OCCUR IN EIGHTY-EIGHT PERCENT OF THE SCENES IN THE TOP FIFTY MOST RENTED PORNOGRAPHIC FILMS. Additionally forty-eight percent of the scenes in these films depict verbal aggression...Much pornography is focused not only on arousal but largely on the debasement of women. But because this violence is presented as sexual material, it often goes unnamed. In this way, sexual violence can begin to be seen as a normal expression of sexuality."
The danger here is not that pornography will cause a normal man to become a rapist, because it won't. But exposure to pornography which connects violence, coercion, and sex is affecting society's view of what constitutes rape. McCabe explains
"Neil M. Malamuth has shown the influence of depictions of rape in pornography. In one study, he discovered that exposure to rape scenes in pornography increases the likelihood that a male viewer will believe rape myths. Rape myths are stereotypes or false beliefs about rape, rapists, and rape victims that are used to justify instances of sexual violence. For example, a common rape myth is that sexually flirtatious women are 'asking for it.'
"Malamuth specifically tested for agreement with rape myths that women find pleasure in being forced to have sex or being raped. Consequently he found that men who watch violent pornography that depicts rapes are likely to believe that women sexually enjoy rape.... Such views have real consequences. A recent study of college men found that as many as thirty-one percent would force a woman to have sexual intercourse, as long as such actions were not named 'rape.'"
Pornography is not a harmless, recreational game. As McCabe recounts, in their powerful pastoral statement on pornography, "Create in Me A Clean Heart," the American Bishops "express concern for the negative influence of pornography on individuals, married couples, and society as a whole. As they argue, pornography is both harmful and sinful. it is counter to the dignity of the human person and to the teaching of the church on the true purpose of sexuality as a bodily expression of relational love in marriage, which ought to be personal and private. Pornography harms those who participate in its production as performers, as these individuals are reduced to objects for others' pleasure and profit. As such, pornography is a perversion of chastity and an expression of sinful lust....It harms the common good by leading others to sin and damaging the community in the forms of adultery, domestic violence, child pornography and abuse, and sex trafficking. For this reason, the bishops powerfully identify pornography as a structure of sin...."
"Finally the Bishops are concerned that exposure to pornography can lead to desensitization....Pornography is first and foremost a business. Consequently, it is in the interest of the producers to keep viewers coming back again and again. In the face of boredom with the same kind of material, desensitized viewers require increasingly elaborate and violent depictions of sex to remain customers. This process of desensitization and subsequent search for a new thrill is one way that male viewers find themselves aroused by acts of violence and degradation that they previously would have found horrifying."
I have also read elsewhere that bored and desensitized males, eager for new thrills, find themselves watching pornography featuring younger and younger female actresses. Younger and younger. And so we come full circle. Back to the way that not only clergy but Boy Scout leaders, teachers, doctors, step-fathers, boy friends, and neighbors sexually abuse the youngest members of our society - often after watching lots of degrading pornography.
As a society, most of us admit that pornography and sexual abuse involving minors is destructively harmful for the victim and a criminal act for the perpetrator. These are actions that turn children into objects used for a predator's pleasure. When will we as a society admit that pornography involving adult actors and actresses also turns people into sexual objects to be used for another's pleasure? That we are destroying the fabric of our society by condoning it and turning a blind eye to the spiritual, physical, and emotional harm that it causes to those who act in it and those who watch it? That it's a cold-hearted business produced by predators?
Desensitization to others keeps us from understanding what love is: an unselfish relationship in which two people give themselves totally to each other as equals. Love is, quite simply, of God. Pornography destroys an individual's capacity for intimacy and love with another person and also with God. Once we've decided to use our power and control to use others, how can we discover Who God is? Because God is total, intimate Love, and our hearts are restless until they rest in His pure and giving heart.
It's wonderful that America has put the Spotlight on child sexual abuse and pornography. Let's see how long it will take before we admit that as adults, we're also sexually using and abusing each other.