New scandals in the French Church: “Crisis of confidence” among Catholics, overwhelmed

Shaken by new sex scandals, Catholics in France are going through a serious “crisis of confidence” which risks causing some to decline in practice and commitment, believers and sociologists testify, a year after the publication of a report shock.

Thursday, a priest from the west of France, who had given an appointment at the beginning of November to a teenager, was charged with rape and imprisoned. He is also suspected of having administered drugs to her. This new case comes a few days after the Conference of Bishops of France (CEF) announced the “questioning” of 11 bishops or former bishops for reports, and a few days after new confessions from certain officials.

For a year, and the publication of the report Sauvé which estimated at some 330,000 the number of victims of priests, deacons, religious or people in connection with the Church of France since 1950, the cases do not cease to be revealed. “We are overwhelmed by suffering,” Sylvie de Kermadec, 69, a practicing Catholic at the parish of Saint-François-Xavier in Paris, told AFP. “It makes me angry,” laments Bérénice, 33, a practitioner in the diocese of Créteil, in the Paris suburbs, where a former bishop, Michel Santier, was sanctioned by Rome for “voyeurism” on young adults.

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Beyond the amazement and the words of compassion for the victims, the feelings are multiple. Even “if there are many good priests and good bishops”, “we may have had too blind a trust in the leaders of the Church”, and “that may have encouraged certain excesses”, judges Mme de Kermadec. However, if for her “there is a crisis of confidence”, “it does not alter (her) faith or the desire to practice”.

“No reforms”

“We are not at the end of our surprises and we must be ready to hear others”, warns for his part Alexis Beaufine-Ducrocq, 35, of the diocese of Nanterre (west of Paris ). “A practitioner since always”, he “wants to hold on, because he wants to help clean up (his) Church”.

Étienne Bernard, a 41-year-old Parisian, a former practicing Catholic, broke ties last year. “The contrast between the Church’s demands on private morality, its ‘lessongiver’ side, its fight against LGBT rights and the fact that it has long covered up the crimes of its clerics has distanced me from the practice “, he explains. Now, “I don’t believe anymore”.

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“Since 2019, there has been an accumulation of revelations which has caused great dejection”, summarizes Céline Béraud, director of studies at the School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS). She notes, with the case of Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard, “an even stronger crisis of confidence, at the top”. The cardinal, former archbishop of Bordeaux (west), who confessed to “reprehensible” acts committed 35 years ago on a 14-year-old girl, was president of the CEF. The Vatican announced Friday the opening of a preliminary investigation after these revelations.

Collectives or ostriches

Among the faithful, the crisis of confidence is reflected in three types of attitude: on the one hand, Catholics “who are mobilizing, through pluralist, young collectives, very present on social networks”. On the other “people who pretend to be an ostrich”. And finally “people who put themselves on the margins and no longer want to commit themselves”. “This can be seen in the pool of volunteers in the chaplaincies” in particular, she underlines.

Is the Church going “towards implosion”, named after a book of interviews between the sociologists of religions Jean-Louis Schlegel and Danièle Hervieu-Léger (published in Seuil in May)? “It’s an institution that hasn’t made any reforms,” ​​Schlegel told AFP. Rebuilding trust with the faithful will be “long and difficult”, CEF President Eric de Moulins-Beaufort agreed on Wednesday.

Shaken by new sex scandals, Catholics in France are going through a serious “crisis of confidence” which risks causing some to decline in practice and commitment, believers and sociologists testify, a year after the publication of a report shock.
Thursday, a priest from the west of France, who had given an appointment at the beginning of November to a teenager, was…

New scandals in the French Church: “Crisis of confidence” among Catholics, overwhelmed