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NOTES

(1) See, for example, L.L. Sample & T.M. Bray, “Are Sex Offenders Different? An Examination of Rearrest Patterns,” Criminal Justice Policy Review 17, no. 1 (2006): 83-102.

(2) See, for example, A.D. Perillo, A.O. Laake, & C. Calkins, “Understanding Sexually Abusive Clergy as a Unique Offender Subgroup: Risk-based Comparisons Across the Course of Offending,” International Journal of Forensic Mental Health 16, no. 1 (2017): 58-68. See also R. Langevin, S. Curnoe, & J. Bain, “A Study of Clerics Who Commit Sexual Offenses: Are They Different from Other Sex Offenders?” Child Abuse & Neglect 24, no. 4 (2000): 535-45.

(3) See, for example, Marie Keenan, Child Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church: Gender, Power, and Organizational Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).

6. The Southern Baptist Convention and the Boy Scouts of America have now had very public abuse scandals. Doesn’t this prove that abuse of minors isn’t a Catholic problem?


Not as alike as they seem

You’ve undoubtedly seen the news stories about problems with sexual abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention, in the Boy Scouts of America, in schools, churches, and other organizations. So it probably makes sense to presume that there’s nothing unique about the Catholic situation—abuse of minors exists just about everywhere groups of children are in the care of adults, even (in fact, especially) in families!

However, the mere fact that abuse exists in these different contexts does not mean it exists for the same reasons. Put simply,

Sex offenders are not all alike. (1)

Just because non-Catholic churches and other organizations also have sex offenders in their ranks does not mean that these people offend for the same reasons, or that their institutions enable and contribute to their offending in the same ways.

It is well documented that abusive Catholic clergy form a unique offender subgroup, with its own specific characteristics. (2)

By way of example, Catholic priests differ from offenders in general in terms of the high percentage of male victims, the specific nature of their offenses, and the general lack of violence in their crimes. If there are unique features to sexual offending by Catholic clergy, then there ought to be research efforts dedicated to understanding and responding to these specific features of sexual abuse and harassment in the Catholic Church.

A Complex Set of Factors

We know that the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable adults involves the convergence of three sets of factors:

  • Personal factors,

  • Situational factors, and

  • Environmental/Organizational factors.

In the literature dealing with sexual abuse and harassment in the Catholic Church, more attention has typically been paid to the personal factors—especially from a psychological perspective. However, individual psychological pathology is not always at play in sexual offending by Catholic clergy, and a smaller body of literature has begun exploring the situational and organizational factors that contribute to the abuse crisis. (3) If there are differences in the ways that the Catholic Church chooses, forms, directs, and supports its clergy when compared to other churches and organizations, then it stands to reason that there are different ways that the Catholic Church contributes to the environmental/organizational factors that play a role in sexual abuse and harassment by those clergy.

One of the unique contributions of the Dulles Research Institute is its multidisciplinary approach to the sexual abuse and harassment crisis. Without neglecting the psychological aspects of this problem, the DRI invites criminologists, sociologists, anthropologists, theologians, historians, legal and policy experts, and experts in organizational dynamics and leadership into the discussion. Coming at the issue of clergy sexual malfeasance from these different directions, the DRI is uniquely situated to explore how the personal, situational, and environmental/organizational factors specific to priests in the Catholic Church interact to contribute to abuse and harassment.