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After the abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church, resistance is forming. But what does the uprising of the believers bring? Many church members no longer believe that anything can be changed in the institution and are leaving.
“I seriously considered leaving the church,” says Matthias Wenk, a Catholic city pastor in St. Gallen. He loves his job, but the last few weeks have been hard. He said in the “Rundschau” that he struggled with himself and the church system.
The reason is the results of the University of Zurich study commissioned by the Bishops’ Conference on abuse in the Catholic Church. What makes Matthias Wenk particularly angry is that church officials have concealed, covered up or trivialized numerous cases. Since then he has been asking himself: “Can you still work for this institution?”
Legend:
The Roman Catholic Church is in crisis. Many believers have doubts about the institution.
Keystone/Archive/ENNIO LEANZA
But whoever leaves now can no longer change anything. That’s why he stays. His wife, on the other hand, is still struggling with an answer. She wanted to show her protest against the church system. How else, if not with an exit?
The conversations with her husband also showed her that people at the grassroots level are fighting for change. She would like to support the constructive protest: “That is the reason that prevents me from actually leaving.”
It is wrong to leave now, preaches the Catholic priest Josip Knezevic in his service. This does not weaken the church’s power apparatus, but rather its community. He is convinced that something will happen, but it will take patience: “It won’t happen that quickly, but I think we’re on the right track.”
Lucerne parishes stop paying the diocese
The parishes in the Willisau region no longer transfer money to their diocese. It’s only about one percent of the church tax that they withhold, but almost 50,000 francs are now in a blocked account. Not a lot of money, as the president of the Willisau Catholic parish, Evelyne Huber-Affentranger, also knows. “It’s the only leverage we have.”
The parishes want to set an example and show their members that they do not agree. “This disobedience doesn’t feel good, but we simply didn’t see any other step and we felt the pressure from the population,” says Huber-Affentranger.
Faced with a wave of exits
The many resignations in the last few weeks have motivated the parish to take action. Normally there are one or two departures per week, in the last 14 days there have been over thirty. They want to withhold the diocese’s money until there is an independent reporting agency and a ban on document destruction. In the long term, the bishops should work for the abolition of compulsory celibacy and for equality between men and women.
The regional church, as the higher authority, declared that the parishes could not independently dispose of the diocese’s money. “We are aware that we are doing something that is not legal, but it is really the only means of pressure we have,” says Evelyne Huber-Affentranger. It remains to be seen whether this gentle pressure can actually make a difference. So far, only a few communities have announced that they will also stop diocese payments.
More on the topic in the «Rundschau” at 8:05 p.m. on SRF 1.