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Brief Treatment and Crisis Intervention 2:341-372 (2002)
© 2002 Oxford University Press

Sin, Crime, Arrogance, Betrayal: A Psychodynamic Perspective on the Crisis in American Catholicism

   Nathaniel J. Pallone, PhD, FAPA, FAPS, ABPP

From the Center of Alcohol Studies at Rutgers University and New Jersey's Classification Review Board for Sex Offenders.

Contact author: Nathaniel J. Pallone, PhD, 215 Smithers Hall, Center of Alcohol Studies, Rutgers University, Busch Campus, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. E-mail: njp1800{at}aol.com.

This article analyzes discursively putative sources of trauma among members of the American Catholic community in the wake of revelations in early 2002 of (a) what has inaccurately and euphemistically been termed "sexual abuse of minors" (in most instances, in actuality homosexual statutory rape) by a relatively small number of priests, (b) consequent but unpublicized civil liability settlements reached between victims and the ecclesiastical superiors of the offending priests, typically in the absence of criminal prosecution, and (c) the pervasive aura of secretiveness within a context that includes (d) the requirements of the Code of Canon Law that governs the Catholic church and (e) the requirements of criminal law concerning both the notification of law enforcement authorities of alleged criminal violations and the subsequent "tracking" of pedophiles, both statutory and other rapists, and certain other sex offenders under the terms of Megan's Law. It is proposed that the victims of trauma radiate outward beyond primary victims and their families (secondary victims) to include the entire Catholic population (tertiary victims) and that the sources of trauma include an excessive theological emphasis on adolescent sexuality via the Virgin Birth as well as an unwillingness on the part of clerical leaders to abide by the dictates either of Canon or criminal law. An etiology to explain the psychodynamics of homosexual statutory rape (or even "ephebophilia") by priests, anchored in Fenichel's (1945) speculations about the genesis of psychosexual pathology among (sexually inexperienced but palpably) narcissistic adult males and incorporating the contribution of Catholic doctrine on the Virgin Birth, is presented. Varied roles for mental health professionals in the wake of the crisis are indicated. [Brief Treatment and Crisis Intervention 2:341–372 (2002)]

KEY WORDS: ephebophilia, pedophilia, statutory homosexual rape, adolescent sexuality, celibacy, Roman Catholic clergy






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