In a nation that saw Bishop Roger Vangheluwe, bishop of Bruges, reduced from the clerical state precisely in the days in which the Pontiff announced his trip to Brussels, after having already confessed his sins in 2010, in the castle of Laeken (in photo of the Pope’s arrival), we return to talking about that «unspeakable tragedy of sexual abuse in the Church». The king does it, despite admitting that the Church has “undertaken concrete actions to combat this vile violence” and asks us to continue “efforts with determination and without stopping: it is imperative”. Report delays, Philip Leopold Lodewijk Maria, clearly saying that «it took so long for their cries for help to be heard and acknowledged. It took so long to look for the way, to “repair” the irreparable.” The Pope does so by speaking of the “holy and sinful Church” and of “painful counter-witness” and assuring that “the Church is facing this “plague with decision and firmness”. He talks about «shame, the shame that we all must take into our own hands today, ask for forgiveness and solve the problem. The shame of abuse, of child abuse. We think of the time of the holy innocents, we say what a tragedy, what did Herod do?. But today in the same Church there is this crime and the Church must be ashamed and ask for forgiveness and try to resolve this situation with Christian humility”. The Pope explains that someone brings him the statistics that say that the majority of abuse occurs in the family, in the sports field, etc. But Francis firmly says that, in the Church «only one is enough to be ashamed, in the Church we must ask forgiveness for this, the others ask forgiveness for their part. But This is our shame and our humiliation.”. In the evening the Pope met 15 victims of abuse while another 65 wrote him personal letters. Among those present was also the writer Jean-Marc Turin, 78 years old, who recounted in a book the abuse he suffered at the hands of the clergy when he was a child.
And, along with the abuse, they both talk about another great tragedy, that of forced adoptions, of those separated mothers who give them newborn babies because they are “guilty” of not having a husband. Some of them were not even told that their children were adopted, but were made to believe that their children were stillborn. «I was saddened by the phenomenon of forced adoptions that occurred here in Belgium in the 1950s and 1970s», says Francis. «In those thorny stories the bitter fruit of a crime was mixed with what was unfortunately the result of a mentality widespread in all strata of society so much so that those who acted on it believed in conscience that they were doing good, both for the child and for the mother. Often the family and other social actors, including the Church, thought that, to remove the negative stigma that unfortunately affected the unmarried mother in those times, it was preferable, for the good of both mother and child, for the latter to be adopted”.
Wounds that have distanced the faithful from the Church so much so that, almost as had happened in Ireland, Francis’ journey goes almost unnoticed. There are no crowds that usually accompany the Pontiff’s travels. Here people want to see concrete steps before returning to trusting ecclesiastical institutions.
“The Church must resolve the wounds of the past”, Alexander De Croo, Belgian Prime Minister, added, changing language and speaking in Dutch. In welcoming the Pope, in the language of the Flemish people who feel the drama of abuse more strongly than others, he said: «Faith gives support to many, but we cannot ignore the painful wounds that exist in the Catholic community and in civil society. Numerous cases of sexual abuse and forced adoptions have undermined trust. She is committed to a fair and equitable approach, but there is still a long way to go. The ministers of the Church work with conviction and charity, but if something goes wrong, a cover-up cannot be accepted. It harms the precious work done by everyone. And this is why words are not enough today. Concrete steps would need to be taken. The victims must be heard. They must occupy a central place. They have the right to the truth.
Injustices must be recognized. Justice must happen. It is not only a moral obligation, but also a fundamental step to regain trust.
Human dignity is a priority and not the interests of the Institution. In order to look forward, the Church must clarify its past.”
«As successor of Peter», the Pope tells them, «I pray to the Lord that the Church will always find within itself the strength to clarify and not conform to the dominant culture, even when this culture uses – manipulating them – values that derive from the Gospelbut to draw undue conclusions, with their heavy consequences of suffering and exclusion”.
In the heart of Europe the Pope returns to speak, however, also of conflicts and wars, remembering that “concord and peace are not an achievement that can be achieved once and for all, but rather a task and an incessant mission to be cultivated and cared for with tenacity and patience”. And from Belgium, the bridge between the European area of Germanic origin and that of French origin, where the European Parliament is based, Francis calls «Europe to resume its path, to rediscover its true face, to invest again in the future by opening up to life, to hope, to defeat the demographic winter and the hell of war». Europe, he insists, «it needs Belgium to carry forward the path of peace and brotherhood between the peoples that compose it. This country reminds everyone else that, When – on the basis of the most varied and unsustainable excuses – we begin to no longer respect borders and treaties and we leave the right to create law to weapons, subverting the existing law, Pandora’s box is opened and all the winds begin to blow violentlyshaking the house and threatening to destroy it. In this historical moment I believe that Belgium has a very important role. We are close to an almost world war”.
