Rick Hertzberg comments on the sex-abuse scandal:
To the extent that the Church manages to purge itself of its shameits sins, its crimesit will owe a debt of gratitude to the lawyers, the journalists, and, above all, the victims and families who have had the courage to persevere, against formidable resistance, in holding it to account. Without their efforts, the suffering of tens of thousands of children would still be a secret. Our largely democratic, secularist, liberal, pluralist modern world, against which the Church has so often set its face, turns out to be its best teacherand the savior, you might say, of its most vulnerable, most trusting communicants.