I wrote a column a few weeks ago about the Vatican’s new policy on handling priestly pedophilia. Given the recent onslaught of media attention brought on by cases in Boston and elsewhere, I thought it was time to address the current issue more directly.

First of all, I have to say that it makes me sick, sick, sick to think about what has happened in our Church. A Catholic priest is a representative of Christ. For even one of these representatives to use that power and trust to violate a child is a travesty beyond comprehension. The damage such a man does – to the child, to his parish, and to the whole of the Church – is overwhelming. And that Church representatives would knowingly reassign such offenders to another parish is, at the very least, puzzling to me. What could they have been thinking? Didn’t they see the risk? Known pedophiles should not – ever – be placed in any kind of ministry where they will be in contact with children. They should be punished, isolated and probably defrocked. Why any Church official ever did otherwise is beyond me.

Of course, the media’s presentation has been anything but balanced. Many argue that this scandal has been caused by the Church’s "unreasonable" demand of priestly celibacy. I suspect that, for many, this was their agenda all along, and the scandal serves as a convenient vehicle to promote that agenda.

But their argument makes very little sense. First of all, virtually all churches struggle with this issue. One Anglican diocese in Canada is on the verge of bankruptcy over defending lawsuits brought on by decades of clerical sexual abuse. Their clergy, like virtually all non-Catholic clergy, are allowed to marry. School districts constantly erupt in controversy over these types of issues. Personally, throughout my entire childhood, I never encountered a single priest who fell under the slightest suspicion of improper sexual conduct with children. But I can think of at least three teachers at the public schools I attended who were later found to be engaging in such inappropriate conduct. And, as I recall, they were all married.

More important is the issue of judging credibility in these cases. Sometimes, as in the Geoghan case in Boston, the facts are clear. He abused young boys, and he was repeatedly reassigned. That was wrong.

But in other cases, the facts are not so clear. Sometimes a case boils down to the word of a priest against the word of an alleged victim, and diocesan officials are left to sort out the facts. Sometimes both the priest and the victim seem credible. Holy-seeming men can sometimes hide shameful secrets. But savvy people – children and adults -- have also learned that sexual abuse charges are the ultimate revenge against a man they dislike or a Church they resent.

Memories "recovered" by adults in therapy are notoriously unreliable. The late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin was sued for $10 million by a former seminarian, Stephen Cook, who "remembered" under hypnosis that the cardinal had molested him years earlier. Cook later recanted and apologized to Cardinal Bernardin.

How would you like to be in the position of having to discern the truth in situations like these? The stakes – either way – are far too high. To mistakenly convict a priest is to destroy his reputation – and his ministry – forever. To mistakenly acquit him would be to release a potentially dangerous man back into the company of children.

The most important point to remember is that priests are still priests, and the Church is still the Church. The vast, vast majority of Catholic priests are good, holy men who are dedicated to spreading the Gospel. This scandal – and the flurry of media attention it has engendered – has placed them under a very painful, unjustifiable cloud of suspicion. Many say they’re afraid to wear their collars in public, afraid of being seen as child molesters. Of course, we have Father Geoghan to thank for that. But the media has played a role as well.

Finally, we need to remember that the Church is still the Church founded by Christ, and still holds and protects His truths. It is run by fallible humans, yes, and sometimes they, like humans everywhere, do deplorable things. But remember that those deplorable things are contrary to the teachings of the Church. Our Church holds to an unchanging standard of respect for human dignity – Christ’s standard. Certain priests have violated that standard, and will be held accountable – in this life and in the next.

One friend of mine theorized that maybe the Holy Spirit is allowing these things to happen in order to purify Christ’s Church. Maybe God decided that the time had come to rid His Church – His Bride -- once and for all of these men who use their free will and their holy office for their own purposes. Maybe this is another step toward the "new springtime" John Paul II has been promising us.

We just may have to put up with a little more winter first.

Bonacci is a frequent lecturer on chastity.