Continuing the era of Church apologies

A few years ago, as he looked ahead to the coming of 2000, Pope John Paul II launched an effort to reflect on and apologize for the Church's historical failures. He invited others to join him in this effort at making up for the sins of the past.

So far, the Pope has ably showed the way with notable examples: offering apologies to Galileo for how he was treated by Church authorities, to native peoples for the misdeeds of missionaries, to women for the secondary role they have often been subjected to, and, most recently, to Jews for two millennia of anti-Semitism.

That outstanding example has been taken up by others. Most recently, two groups of bishops have issued mea culpas:

* France's bishops have distributed a paper on slavery written by the heads of the Church in French-held territories in Africa and the Caribbean. As reported by Catholic News Service, the bishops of Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guyana and Reunion called slavery "an immense collective sin" conducted "in all legality and impunity." They noted that the Catholic Church "was implicated in the system." The document calls on people descended from slaves, as well as descendants of those who maintained slaves and who perpetuated slavery, to seek reconciliation.

* Italian bishops have acknowledged their nation's history of state-sanctioned anti-Semitism, as well as the Church's anti-Jewish teachings. They made their comments in a letter to Rome's Jewish community. Archbishop Giuseppe Chiaretti, president of the bishops' commission for ecumenism and dialogue, wrote: "We recall the 60 years of racist, anti-Jewish laws in Italy -- a painful and disquieting record." He added that the Church had promoted "erroneous and unjust interpretations of the Scriptures" that did not encourage people to renounce anti-Semitism.

Such apologies are not always accepted, as witness the recent reaction to the Vatican statement on the Holocaust. But that doesn't diminish the effort made to apologize. Indeed, the Church has promised to do more to set right its dismal attitude toward the people whom Pope John Paul has called "our elder brothers in faith."

Such actions on the part of the Vatican and groups of bishops are certainly admirable, but they should be something more: imitable. Unless individual Catholics recognize their own failures and apologize, the Pope's wishes for a fresh start in 2000 will be weakened.

Individuals are not necessarily called to say "I'm sorry" for centuries of slavery or millennia of anti-Semitism, but they are called to something which may be more difficult: saying "I'm sorry" to the Black neighbor they have ignored because of his skin or to the Jewish co-worker they have ridiculed because of her religion.

Holy Week is a perfect time for Catholics to reflect on sorrow and penance -- on a very intimate and personal level.

(04-09-98)
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