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Thomas Reese, visiting scholar at Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, discussed the Pennsylvania grand jury report on sexual abuse during an on-campus talk. 

A prominent national religion columnist and Jesuit urged Catholics seeking information on local clergy implicated in sexual abuse to use the power of numbers: Form a group of fellow concerned parishioners and demand transparency from their local bishop.

鈥淚t is hard to do it by yourself,鈥� said Thomas J. Reese, S.J., a distinguished visiting scholar at Markkula Center for Applied Ethics and a prolific commentator on the topic of clerical abuse and Vatican history.

鈥淏ut if you get a dozen people who want to go in, and tell the bishop ... and then another dozen from another parish, and another dozen from another parish. Do that,鈥� he advised the 100-plus audience members at a talk he gave on campus Aug. 23. 鈥淚 think (it) would work.鈥�

Now a senior analyst for Religion News Service, Reese has been interviewed by numerous national media outlets in the wake of a scathing Pennsylvania grand jury report this month that chronicled decades of sexual abuse by hundreds of priests against more than 1,000 children.

Church Must Confess Its Sins 

A former editor of the Jesuit magazine America, Reese also has written several columns recently calling for the Church to 鈥攁nd detailing what it must do .

In his campus lecture, 鈥淐atholicism and the Moral Catastrophe of Sexual Abuse,鈥� Reese鈥攚ho advocates zero tolerance for abusive priests鈥攆ielded plenty of questions from frustrated audience members.

鈥淗ow can we, as the Church, demand that transparency?鈥欌�� one man asked Reese about abusive Catholic clergy. Should parishioners 鈥渄emand that list of priests who have been found guilty of abuse? Who have either been convicted in our local courts, or convicted within the hierarchy of the Church?鈥欌��

Reese advised that man to 鈥渟tart first with your parish.鈥�

鈥淕o see your pastor and ask him, 鈥楬as everyone who is anywhere near a child gone through a police background check?鈥欌�� Reese said. 鈥淚s he doing what he is supposed to be doing in your own parish? That鈥檚 first.鈥�

Church Fails at Self-Policing

黑料网 sociology Professor Alma Garcia asked what is being done in terms of priesthood training 鈥渢o say this is simply not acceptable, and to police priests?鈥�

Reese said seminarians are screened by experts, including 黑料网 psychology Professor Thomas Plante, who was in the audience. The problem, he noted, is that psychologists can detect many things, 鈥渂ut there鈥檚 no test to determine that this person is going to abuse children.鈥�

Yet another audience member insisted that the Catholic Church cannot be trusted to investigate these incidents of monstrous behavior, not only by priests, but bishops, archbishops, and cardinals who also were abusers, or knew about it and refused to hold their brethren accountable.

Many seemed to agree, including one man who asked Reese about the controversial decision by Pope Francis to canonize Pope John Paul II, long criticized for turning a blind eye to the problem of sexual abuse during his papacy.

Pope Benedict XVI Made Strides

Reese said the late pontiff鈥檚 childhood and early adulthood in Poland under the Nazis and the Communists might help explain鈥攖hough by no means excuse鈥擩ohn Paul II鈥檚 slowness to act.

During the Nazi era, 鈥淎 very common accusation that the police and the governments would make against priests was sexual impropriety,鈥� Reese explained. Coming out of that experience, and hearing those kinds of accusations, he believes, led to John Paul II鈥檚 denial of sexual abuse in the Church. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 what made it so impossible for him to get it through his head,鈥� Reese said.

He contends it was Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, who was the first to aggressively confront the issue. Benedict, he said, read the files related to abusive priests, and while canon law decreed they should be allowed trials, Benedict overruled them, knowing it would take years.

鈥淗e basically imposed martial law and said, 鈥楾hey鈥檙e out,鈥欌�� said Reese.

Sunshine, not secrecy, is the best antidote for preventing these crimes.

鈥淚t has to be clear that we get it,鈥� Reese said, 鈥渁nd that this should never have happened.鈥�