Abuse by priests triggers celibacy row

The scandals raging in the Catholic Church have set off an unprecedentedly public debate among senior clergy on one of Roman Catholicism's strongest taboos - the issue of whether the paedophilia in its ranks is a consequence of priestly celibacy.

Last week, Pope Benedict vigorously defended an unmarried priesthood, telling an audience of priests that celibacy was not something to be given up for "passing cultural fashions".

But one of his own prelates, an auxiliary bishop of Hamburg, Hans-Jochen Jaschke, said in a radio interview: "The celibate lifestyle can attract people who have an abnormal sexuality and cannot integrate sexuality into their lives."

Priestly celibacy is a discipline, rather than a doctrine, and most of the Eastern rites of the Catholic church follow the practice of the Orthodox in allowing for married priests; the Pope could do away with celibacy at any time.

The Italian daily La Repubblica reported a Vatican working group had been set up secretly to consider reform, but no change was being considered for at least 50 years. The Vatican's own newspaper, meanwhile, had opened what could be an equally sensitive debate.

In an article in L'Osservatore Romano, a Catholic academic, Lucetta Scaraffia, linked the scandals to the shortage of women in pastoral and decision-making roles in the church.

Using the Italian term for mafia secrecy, she said a more significant female presence "could have ripped away the veil of male omerta" that had covered up abuse.

On Friday, the head of the German bishops' conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, briefed the Pope on measures being taken to deal with clerical sex abuse.

But, as a German lay group noted, the Pope did not take the opportunity to express sympathy with victims, and doubts remained as to how many of his pastors understand the gravity of the situation.

The day before, one of the bishops closest to Benedict, Gerhard Muller, declared the scandal was over and "cases from 40, 50 years ago" had been blown out of proportion.

He lashed out at Germany's Justice Minister, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, who had accused Catholic clerics of putting up a wall of secrecy.

Muller told journalists she belonged to a humanist association which he claimed was a kind of "masonry" that "considers paedophilia normal and wants to decriminalise it".

Bishop Muller is also the prelate charged with investigating abuses in the all-boys Domspatzen choir, once conducted by the Pope's brother, Georg Ratzinger.

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