Vatican’s “Omerta” – Criminal Code of Silence

In the wake of child abuse disclosures unfolding across Europe, Archbishop Christoph Cardinal Schonborn of Vienna is quoted in writing and makes a link between the RC church’s practice of Celibacy and Pedophilia.

Archbishop links priestly celibacy and Catholic sex abuse scandals

The Archbishop of Vienna today said priestly celibacy could be one of the causes of the sex abuse scandals to hit the Catholic church.

In an article for Thema Kirche, his diocesan magazine, Christoph Schonborn became the most senior figure in the Catholic hierarchy to make the connection between the two and called for an "unflinching examination" of the possible reasons for paedophilia.

Another article by Italian journalist Lucetta Scaraffia in the "semi-official" Vatican’s L'Osservatore Romano newspaper is making comment on the lack of females in the Vatican as a social force to break down the predominately all male culture and the mafia like code of silence surrounding the ongoing and seemingly never ending abuse issue.

Writing in L'Osservatore Romano, Lucetta Scaraffia said women might have helped remove the "veil of secrecy" surrounding the abuse.

(He) used the word "omerta" – the Mafia code of silence – to describe the conspiracy involved in hiding the offences.

"We can hypothesise that a greater female presence, not at a subordinate level, would have been able to rip the veil of masculine secrecy that in the past often covered the denunciation of these misdeeds with silence," she said.

"Women, in fact, both religious and lay, by nature would have been more likely to defend young people in cases of sexual abuse, allowing the church to avoid the grave damage brought by these sinful acts."