In an interview with YLE on Palm Sunday, the start of Holy Week, Tervaportti urges the media to take a broader outlook now that the Catholic Church has served as a “trailblazer” in the paedophilia controversy.
“We in Finland hope that the Catholic Church would not be the only institution to be turned inside-out, and that the involvement of other institutions in similar cases would also be examined.”
Tervaportti is also the editor of Fides, the publication of the Catholic Diocese in Finland. The latest edition, which appeared on Friday, focuses on the abuse scandal. Fides includes among its readers Finland’s approximately 10,800 Roman Catholics.
Superfluous Repetition Criticised
Tervaportti emphasised in the interview with YLE that in the opinion of the Church, the sexual abuse of children and young people is a horrifying act, which cannot be forgiven on the human level. He also says that it is important to bring the cases out into the public, and to investigate them. However, he thinks that there has been some overreach.
“We are talking about less than one percent of all cases of abuse worldwide. Why is no attention paid to the other 99 percent?”
He also says that the image put forward in the media that the Pope has been sweeping these matters under the rug is inaccurate.
“I belong to a group of Catholics that feels that excessive harping on these matters by the media does not advance anything. It is not good for these victims, and in general, it brings nothing more than unnecessary repetition.”
Teravaportti feels that the media has been roped into an effort to hurt the Church. The same applies to the statements given to the media by former and present victims of abuse.
“Certainly there can be some good in their motivation, but unfortunately, part of it involves economic benefit.
“Not All Abuse Is Paedophilia”
Marko Tervaportti emphasises that the Catholic Church does not have any actual obligation to make any public statements on the matter. He notes that good and trustworthy priests also suffer from the constant attention to the subject. The Catholic Diocese in Finland has not learned of any cases of abuse in this country.
Based on his close examination of Vatican statistics, Tervaportti concludes that not all cases of abuse in the church involve paedophilia; the Vatican says that only 10 percent of cases of abuse have targeted children.
“Sixty percent of all of these abuse cases are, in the view of the Church, and according to statistics, based more on homosexuality than paedophilia, in the sense that they do not target little children, but young men.”