Child abuse point-scoring - Tabula delenda

Recently, the Tablet's website carried an article a guest contributor, Melanie Lately, in which striking the breast during the Confiteor was equated with child abuse. Fr Zuhlsdorf said what needed to be said about this nasty attempt to attack the new, corrected ICEL translation of the Mass.

Liberals intend now to vilify what they don’t like by linking it to clerical sexual abuse of children. It doesn’t matter what it is that they don’t like, if they don’t like it, it must have something to do with child abuse. So, you sometimes have to look beyond the facile – though sometimes admittedly agile – introduction of their new blunt instrument, for their real points.

His article also contains a comprehensive fisk of the article itself.

If you follow the link given on Fr Z's blog, you will find that the article has now been removed from the Tablet website. Bless! Such touching naiveté concerning the interweb thingy.

I agree with Fr Z's analysis from the point of view of the Liturgy, but would add an observation from the point of view of our response to child abuse. The present tendency of liberal Catholics to play the child abuse card at every possible opportunity (attacking celibacy, promoting women priests, and ludicrously attacking the new translation etc.) is an insult to those who have suffered harm from priests or others.

The abuse of children is a serious matter which should be addressed with determination, objectivity, and real concern for those who have been harmed. To drag it in as a convenient, point-scoring jibe trivialises a tragedy for people who have been wounded by a real evil that should be recognised as such, not dragged up for the purposes of furthering an agenda in ecclesiastical politics.