“Infinite debt”

adminonNovember 9, 2021January 5, 2022Leave a Comment

The new interim leader of the Archdiocese of Santiago in Chile, Bishop Celestino Aos, met Friday with victims of sexual abuse by priests. He asked for apology for the violence suffered by the victims.

According to Chilean media reports, Bishop Celestino Aos visited the headquarters of the victims' initiative "Para la confianza" and asked for apologies for the violence suffered. According to the report, the founders of the initiative, James Hamilton, Juan Carlos Cruz and Jose Andres Murillo, praised the gesture, but reiterated the call for concrete steps to be taken.

Assault priests protected and clarification obstructed

The Archdiocese of Santiago is at the center of the nationwide abuse scandal in Chile. Both the head of the diocese, Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, who retired at the end of March, and his predecessor, Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz, are accused of having protected abusive priests for decades and of having obstructed the investigation.

Bishop Aos visited the center of "Para la confianza" immediately after his return from Rome, where he had spent a week discussing the situation of the Church in Santiago with members of the Curia and Pope Francis.

Concrete acts of reparation

The newspaper La Tercera quoted Hamilton, the victim's representative, as saying that Aos had asked for an apology and had spoken of an "infinite guilt". According to the bishop, it is a matter of starting a process of reparation. This is also the only way the Catholic Church can regain trust.

The initiative's co-founder, Cruz, told "La Tercera" that the time for words is over; the many victims expect "concrete action".

Compensation demanded

At the end of March, an appeals court in Santiago had ruled that a compensation claim by Cruz, Hamilton and Murillo for sexual abuse suffered was legal. According to the ruling, church leaders must pay the three plaintiffs the equivalent of 130 each.000 euros to be paid. The Archdiocese of Santiago said it would not oppose the decision.

Profound church reforms

Meanwhile, in an interview with the Spanish newspaper "El Pais", Aos again spoke out in favor of far-reaching church reforms. It is necessary to "understand the real dimension of the acts," the bishop said. "To recognize them and to face the truth, only this will set us free"."

It is also necessary to ask how this "unjustifiable" situation could have come about. Aos acknowledged that in the past, this self-examination had been done "with lies, in an attempt to preserve the good reputation of the church".

Religion usually plays an important role in U.S. election campaigns. Not so in the 2012 presidential election: while Christian organizations are campaigning, candidates Obama and Romney are trying to avoid religious endorsements.

In the US election campaign there is hardly any talk about God. Unlike in previous elections, the two candidates for president, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, hardly ever make their faith an ie. Much to the chagrin of white evangelicals in particular, who make up about a quarter of the electorate. They fear that abortion and gay marriage, as well as other ies of morality, could take a back seat.

Religion and politics are closely intertwined in the United States. A good three-quarters of U.S. Americans describe themselves as Christians, and about half say in surveys that religion is "very important" to them. And so it is hardly surprising that presidential candidates usually like to tell of "conversion experiences". Barack Obama affirmed during the election campaign four years ago that he was a professing Christian who believed "in the saving death of Jesus Christ and in the resurrection".

Different in 2012: in current campaign, Obama talks little about his piety. The confessions in 2008 did not bring him too much either. Only 26 percent of white evangelicals voted for Obama at the time. From the incumbent's perspective, evangelicals are "not reliable," religious scholar David Gushee told National Public Radio. Even under optimistic scenarios, Obama can probably count on only a small portion of the evangelical vote in November because of his endorsement of legal abortion and gay marriage.

Evangelicals view Romney critis
The Christian electorate in the USA is divided. Catholics vote predominantly for Obama, according to the Public Religion Research Institute; among black Protestants, the proportion of Obama voters is as high as 95 percent. White evangelicals, on the other hand, are reliable Republican voters. Along with the Mormons, they are considered the only religious group that clearly backs Romney. According to a Pew Research Center poll, Romney has the support of 74 percent of white evangelicals.

Romney also knows, however, that as a Mormon, he is viewed critically by many evangelicals. Campaign is a tightrope walk for him. He avoids details about his faith, but rather speaks vaguely of Judeo-Christian values. This signals to evangelicals that Romney shares their values, said public relations specialist Mark DeMoss on "Religion News Service". With that wording, he doesn't get caught up in "religious doctrine and theology".

Christian organizations campaign
Churches are not allowed to engage in partisan politics in the U.S. In the presidential election, however, neutrality is not always taken so seriously. Several Christian organizations mobilize voters. The Faith and Freedom Coalition, for example, says it has had 25 million election brochures printed and distributed in more than 100.000 churches are to be distributed. According to reports in The New York Times, the association has compiled data on 17 million "conservative religious voters" in 15 states. It wants to use phone calls, emails and letters to urge the association to vote. Two million home visits planned.

Evangelicals would have to go vote, evangelist Franklin Graham thinks. There are serious differences between the two parties, he writes on his website. The Republicans advocate the "sanctity of life" and the "biblical definition" of marriage. Democrats disrespected the right to life and drummed up support for same-sex marriage. It's clear that America is heading toward a divine judgment of punishment, the preacher said.

Cologne Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki has defended the Church's sociopolitical commitment to the protection of life. On ies where politics intervenes in life, the Church cannot remain silent.

Although the Church adheres to the separation between God and state, he said on Friday in the program "Church in WDR 2" on the "Week for Life" of the Protestant and Catholic Churches. "But here we are dealing with questions in which politics intervenes in life. And here I may, here I cannot be silent at all."

"Many left behind"

Woelki criticized the number of abortions, which increased again last year. However, he does not understand the "Week for Life" as a pure anti-abortion campaign. It is a week "for" and not "against" something. He is driven by the fact that "we are better off in Germany than ever before," but at the same time the fringes of society are fraying and there are many people left behind.

In concrete terms, Woelki mentioned precariously employed people, young people from problem neighborhoods who could not find an apprenticeship simply because of their address, sexually abused children and spouses who were beaten bloody. In addition, he referred to "the 60 people who die anonymously every month in Cologne alone because no one knew them or visited them anymore.".

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