Abusive priests fundamentally undermine trust – The International Cross

Dominican Father Gilles Berceville, who teaches spiritual theology at the Catholic Institute of Paris, says the current crisis must lead to more reflection on the issue of spiritual abuse. The crossof Céline Hoyeau interviewed the priest.

Céline Hoyeau: In her Letter to the people of God, Pope Francis links badual abuse, abuse of power and abuse of conscience. How can you explain that?

Father Gilles Berceville: Abuse should not be limited to badual badault. An badault by a priest is not simply badual. It's often a symptom of something deeper, namely spiritual abuse.

How do you define that and why is it so bad?

This is a very specific form of abuse of conscience because it is exercised by a person with moral or religious authority.

When the abuser is acting on behalf of an absolute principle that the abused person also considers to be absolute, eg. God, love, etc., this can lead to a collapse of the very foundations of a person's psyche.

The thing that structures the human spirit, gives it its consistency and allows it to have confidence is affected. Yet, without trust, we are dead, taught St. Francis de Sales.

Do you mean that trust is the very foundation of the human being and that this deep trust is affected by spiritual abuse?

Yes, the human being is born in a situation of dependence. Consent to life requires confidence. This badumes that we believe in the "promise of dawn".

But the abuses affect the most intimate place, that is to say, "the edge of the soul", which is the place of trust and faith, as St. Francis de Sales also wrote.

Father Stéphane Joulain reminded him in his recent testimony in the Senate. Believers are structured in such a way that they think that existence has meaning, that the world is good and that people are kind to them. In a word, it is people who create trust.

But the abusive priest diverts the foundations of trust for his own ends. It's the worst form of manipulation or spiritual dominance. It is like taking the place of God in the mind of another person and taking hold of one's faith.

When the person realizes it, it is a terrible shock because she does not know who to confide in anymore.

Yet it is the big question to which religions claim to have the answer, namely to explain to us what is worthy of our faith.

Suffering caused by spiritual abuse is one of the most important causes of atheism.

This is why the crisis of authority we are going through seems unprecedented, especially since it is a global crisis.

Even if one is not personally the victim of an abuser or subject to an abusive system, trust is put to the test when it is established that the religious authorities and religious have failed.

It is clear that each person must look beyond the persons exercising authority and refer to the ultimate instance – not even the pope or bishops, for example, but God.

But not everyone has the same ability to do it. In a crisis like this, how can people continue to live in trust?

Is this why the Church is so afraid of scandal, that it could destroy the faith of the faithful?

We must always look at what we mean when we use the term "church". Consider this as "the people of God," as the pope has asked us.

However, I do not think that when a superior covers an abusive priest, he really thinks of the faithful.

If their sufferings truly came first, there would be no scandals.

When I read Pope Francis Letter to the people of GodI sighed because his first words were directed at "the suffering endured by many minors because of badual abuse, abuse of power, and abuse of conscience committed by a significant number of clerics ". Finally, someone thought of them.

Is it spiritual abuse when the church wants to impose its truth on the conscience of others?

Yes, if we prevent the exercise of the consciousness of a person, that is to say, to question freely his right.

We must not confuse authority with power. Spiritual abuse is always an abuse of power. One can abuse power without having authority. A person who hacks an airplane has power over his hostages but no authority over them.

On the other hand, a person with moral or religious authority may have very little coercive power. And this is much better for the Church since the service of authority must respect the freedom of the other person.

The role of authority is to help people base their existence on what they recognize themselves as being good.

Certainly, it is necessary to enlighten the consciences. Religious freedom is not an absolute in the sense that I can believe in any matter. I have the duty to seek the truth and to respect it.

However, the service of authority is always a service of the other with the utmost respect for his conscience.

Are spiritual abuses not rooted precisely in the denial of otherness?

Yes, it's absolutely true. The Church speaks in the name of God and that is why she exists.

However, it is also the reason why we must preserve the meaning of the holiness of God, namely his otherness.

It is necessary to maintain our awareness that God is different, especially when we want to defend his cause or his commandments.

The temptation is great to monopolize God. Since we refer ourselves to Jesus who said "I am the truth," the Church is very much in the name of serving the absolute.

But if this absolute who is incarnated is not presented in humility and radical poverty, then we can become serious abusers.