[The Wide Shot] A sex abuse story told at Saint Peter’s Basilica

Saint Peter’s Basilica, built from 1506 to 1615, has witnessed thousands of celebrations led by Catholic popes. Countless statues from the Renaissance, including Michelangelo’s Pietà, have stood guard inside it. Underneath this holy ground, the bodies of around 90 pontiffs, including the first pope, Saint Peter, are buried as the foundation on which Catholicism stands.

Located in the power center of the Catholic Church, Saint Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City is the symbol of the strength of the 2,000-year-old institution now made up of nearly 1.4 billion people. 

But a move by Pope Francis on Tuesday, October 1, shook the basilica in a way we have never seen before.

On the eve of a historic Vatican summit, in this iconic basilica, the Pope led a penitential service in which he and a group of cardinals apologized for the sins of the Catholic Church. Before they issued their apologies, the Pope and other participants listened to testimonies of three people representing different sectors offended by the church in the past. 

One of those who spoke was opera singer Laurence Gien, a victim of sex abuse by a Catholic priest when he was 11 years old.

“I stand before you as a survivor,” Gien declared at the 500-year-old Saint Peter’s Basilica, in a ceremony broadcast live through Vatican Media. 

Gien narrated how, in a small South African town, “a predator honed in on me, an 11-year-old child.” The priest “used praise, physical punishment, psychological manipulation, and all the other tools in his arsenal to manipulate and groom me.”

“Finally, on a beautiful South African morning, he led me by the hand to a dark place where he closed the curtains, and in the screaming silence he took from me that which should never be taken from a child,” he said. “I have since been forced to walk with this perpetrator stamped onto my soul for the last 53 years.”

“The abuse of a child by a trusted figure — a priest, a mentor, a representative of God — inflicts wounds that can take a lifetime to heal if they ever fully do,” said Gien.

Gien attributed the sex abuse crisis to a lack of transparency within the Catholic Church, hiding both the abused and the abusers “behind a veil of secrecy.” Unfortunately, he said, “this anonymity serves to protect the perpetrators rather than the victims, making it harder for survivors to find justice and for communities to heal.”

Such abuses “have shaken the faith of millions, tarnished the reputation of an institution that many looked to for guidance, and caused a crisis of trust that reverberates through society.”

“When an institution as prominent as the Catholic Church fails to protect its most vulnerable members, it sends a message that justice and accountability are negotiable, when in reality we all know that they should be fundamental,” he said.

Two other victims of sin — war and indifference to migrants – came forward after Gien.

Then, a group of cardinals took turns in apologizing on behalf of the Catholic Church.

One of the cardinals who made an apology was Cardinal Seán Patrick O’Malley, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.

“I ask forgiveness, feeling shame, for all the times that we the faithful have been accomplices or have directly committed abuses of conscience, abuse of power, and sexual abuse,” O’Malley said at Saint Peter’s Basilica.

O’Malley said he feels much shame and pain “when considering especially the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable persons — abuses that have stolen innocence and profaned the sacredness of those who are weak and helpless.”

“I ask forgiveness, feeling shame, for all the times we have used the condition of ordained ministry and consecrated life to commit this terrible sin, feeling safe and protected while we were profiting diabolically from the little ones and the poor. Forgive us, O Lord,” O’Malley said.

The penitential service took place a day before the second session of the Synod on Synodality, where 365 delegates, including laywomen and young people for the first time in church history, gather to discuss the future of the Catholic Church. The Vatican summit began on Wednesday, October 2, and will continue on October 27.

The Synod on Synodality is a major undertaking that requires starting from a position of strength.

What the Pope did on the eve of the meeting, therefore, seemed counteruitive. Why enter the majestic Saint Peter’s Basilica and begin with an admission of weakness?

The Pope, in my view, wanted us to see the importance of accepting vulnerability in the process of fortifying institutions like the Catholic Church. The penitential service had traces of Saint Paul, in 2 Corinthians 12:10: “For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

The Pope, when it was his turn to speak, said it was he himself who wrote down the requests for forgiveness read by the cardinals, including O’Malley. He said it “is necessary to call our principal sins by first name and last name” — a nod to his religious order, the Jesuits, who always challenge people to “name your sins” to clear the way for proper discernment.

“How can we be credible in mission if we do not acknowledge our mistakes and bend down to heal the wounds we have caused by our sins?” said Francis. 

He recalled the parable in the Gospel of Luke about the Pharisee and the tax collector. The Phrarisee prayed to thank God that he is “not like the rest of humanity” in their sins. The tax collector, in contrast, stood at a distance and “would not even raise his eyes to heaven” as he prayed, “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

The Pharisee, said the Pope, “presumes to pray, but in reality, he’s really celebrating himself, masking his weaknesses and his fleeting confidence.”

“What does he expect from God? He expects a reward for his merits. And in this way, he deprives himself of the surprise of the gratuitousness of salvation, fabricating for himself a God who could do nothing more than sign off on a certificate of assumed perfection,” said the Pope.

The Pharisee, he added, “is all closed in on himself, closed to the great surprise of mercy.” 

“How many times in the church do we behave in this way? How many times have we taken up all the space ourselves with our words, our judgments, our titles, our belief that only we have merit?” said Francis.

By holding the penitential service at Saint Peter’s Basilica, “we today are all like the tax collector,” having their eyes downcast and feeling ashamed of their sins. Bishops, priests, and consecrated men and women should then free up “the space occupied by presumption, hypocrisy, and pride.”

“We could not invoke God’s name without asking for forgiveness from our brothers and sisters, from the earth, and from all creatures,” the Pope said. 

Despite symbols of majesty such as Saint Peter’s Basilica, the Catholic Church should not forget that it is not only divine but also human. And as a human institution, it needs to accept — and address — its many weaknesses. Or else it is living in a make-believe world where bishops and priests can do no evil, much like the Pharisees.

I remember the late Rappler senior investigative reporter Aries Rufo, whose ninth death anniversary we marked last September 19. Rufo, a longtime religion reporter, wrote the book Altar of Secrets, which exposed wrongdoings within the Philippine Catholic Church.

“Are we out to destroy the Church? Of course the answer is no,” Rufo said at his book launch on June 7, 2013, which I attended and covered.

“How can one book destroy a Church that has been in existence for more than 2,000 years? As my favorite archbishop, Oscar Cruz, said, the Church has been there for two millennia. There must be something divine in it to survive that long — which is true, actually,” he added.

“Instead, we try to portray a Church that is divine and human as well, a local Church trying its best to institute reforms, taking baby steps to respond to the changing times without compromising its principles and dogma,” Rufo said of his book.

Our news editor at that time, Miriam Grace Go (now Rappler’s managing editor), said of Rufo: “Let us assure you that Aries is somebody who loves his church, the Catholic Church. But it’s a tough love. How else can you fix it and make it stronger and more effective in serving and ministering to the flock, but by cleansing it? That is exactly what Aries is trying to do.” 

I believe this is also the wisdom behind the penitential service led by the Pope at the Vatican.

To acknowledge its weaknesses, after all — and to claim justice for victims and hold abusers accountable — is the first step to reform the Catholic Church.

In the mighty edifice of Saint Peter’s Basilica, the telling of a sex abuse story last Tuesday was one of the stones to rebuild a church in ruins. – Rappler.com