Institutional failure or individual perversity? Framing Church Abuse in the News in Four European Countries

Abstract

Focussing on the perpetrators, this paper investigatesnews media framing of clergy sexual abuse in the Netherlands, Belgium, the United Kingdom and Ireland. The results show that the four national presses vary in the way they construct the crime and its perpetrators, depending on cultural differences in the way the church is embedded in society. Every nation's media frame the crisis in a way that fits their own rhetorical goals. The Netherlands and the UK share a focus on the Catholic Church as an institution and, in the case of the UK, on ​​the Pope as holding ultimate responsibility. In Belgium and Ireland the offenders are portrayed as individuals. In all four countries the media need to come to terms with what we call the dual offender: the individual priest and / or the institute that failed to control its employees and show compassion to their victims.