Bp Bosco Puthur, Melbourne

How is the situation in Australia? How is the Church after the Pell affair in which he has come out? What was the reaction of the general public?

In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians are Christians, including 22.6% Catholics and 13.3% as Anglicans; 30.1% of the population reported having “no religion;” 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions. Out of the 25 Million population, about 5 Million are Catholics. Vast majority of them belong to the Latin Church, However, due to the recent migration, there is a growing number of Catholics belonging to the Oriental Churches, with five eparchies: Maronite, Melkite, Ukrainian, Chaldean and Syro-Malabar.
Sexual abuse conviction of Cardinal George Pell was a deeply humiliating experience for the Catholic Church in Australia. This is to be seen and evaluated against the background of so many historical cases of clerical sexual abuses in the country. These events and the eventual conviction of some of the accused clergy have greatly tarnished the image of the Church. The question of the exercise of the ecclesial authority, and its misuse is widely recognized as being central to the sexual abuse crisis in the Church. There is a profound sense of shame that the Church, which the people have loved and supported, looked up to and relied on, is found to have failed so badly. Now there is an insistence and resolve that everything should be done to ensure that no child or young person ever suffers again in this way, in any context connected to the Church and society.
It is with a sigh of relief that the Catholic community received the news that, after spending 405 days in prison, the conviction against Cardinal Pell was overturned in a unanimous 7-0 judgement of the Australian High Court (Supreme Court). Cardinal Pell, who always denied the allegations against him, said after his release from prison: “My Catholic faith sustained me, especially the understanding that my suffering need not be pointless but could be united with Christ Our Lord’s. I never felt abandoned, knowing that the Lord was with me – even as I didn’t understand what he was doing for most of the 13 months.”
Cardinal Pell added that, in his opinion, the temptation of the clergy when it comes to money is ‘far greater and stronger’ than temptations of sexuality. He further said that “the Church is not a business; the Church is supernatural,” provides no justification to be inefficient or much less to be corrupt.

How do you understand the public perception of the Covid-19 phenomenon in Australian cultural and religious life? How does it affect their Christian consciousness?

The Catholic Church in Australia through its various networks across the country played its part in providing facilities to support national efforts to halt the spread of COVID-19. Catholic hospitals and aged care network is at the forefront of the Church’s response to the pandemic. Priests, religious, pastoral workers and social service agencies were also working on the spiritual, emotional and psychological needs of people affected by the virus.
The Pastoral Letter of the Catholic Bishops of Australia, A Word of Encouragement to the Catholic People of Australia said: “No locked door can keep the Risen Lord out; He is everywhere, even in this time of distress. In the hope born of faith we look forward to the time when the crisis will pass and we will be able to resume fully the Church’s worship and mission, even in a landscape, which may be quite changed.”
As a believer in Jesus, as a priest and as a bishop, I am still struggling to understand the present situation. Pope Francis compared the COVID-19 affected world to the boat journey of the disciples with Jesus (Mk 4:35-40). My thoughts rather go to the wandering of the people of Israel of the Old Testament in the wilderness. It was long and trying beyond their wild imagination. They ran out of provisions. They fought against each other. They rebelled against Moses and even turned against God.

“As the ark of Noah, today’s lockdown gives us
a very clear and simple message:
Lead a God-centred life,
regaining the lost harmony with God.”

The lockdown, and the consequent isolation, and deprivation of the sacraments and Sunday Church gatherings all make a great negative impact on the ordinary believers and the Church leaders. A positive aspect of this situation for me is that I find more time for personal prayer and reading of the Word of God and other spiritual books. Unburdened from the usual hectic activism, I am forced by the circumstances to be more like Mary than Martha. Yes, COVID-19 compels us to be simple in our celebrations of feasts, marriages, jubilees, anniversaries and even funerals.

This problem of plague is a problem of science, how does the world of science give men hope and a cure?

Science, governments and world leaders were unprepared for such an unknown virus like COVID-19. As one doctor wrote: “It seems that nobody wants to learn from the human tragedy that happened in Italy, China, Spain … This is really sad … Doctors and scientists who are not able to learn from one another.” Modern science has invented everything to destroy the world within a few minutes. But it does not know how to save it. Even after almost a year, science is yet to produce a secure and effective vaccine against COVID-19. It has revealed the astonishing fragility of our societies. It has exposed our inability to cooperate, to coordinate, nationally and internationally. There is the fear of the selfishness of some countries regarding the rights of monopoly of sale and distribution of the vaccine when it is ready. While rich nations have already paid for the advance booking, the vast majority of the population of the poor countries will be left to the mercy of fate.
The unexpected eruption of COVID-19 and subsequent lockdown revealed both the selfishness and the generosity of man. At the beginning of the lockdown, people were frantically stocking up essential commodities. Ironically, the most sought after, I would say, even fought after item was toilet paper. On the other hand one could witness the generous, daring, risk-taking service of the frontline healthcare workers.
The Post COVID world will be significantly different in social, religious, economic and cultural spheres. This is especially true of the digital culture, with the rise of digital behaviour, such as remote working and learning, telemedicine, remote schooling and delivery services. Some religious leaders, including Pope Francis, expressed their concern about remote religious practices becoming the ‘new normal.’ Digital and virtual world becomes the ordinary ‘real world’!

Literature generally looks at the phenomenon of plague as a moral and political issue of our living, for example Jose Sranaogo’s Blindness deals with a plague of white blindness which clearly the blindness of moral degradation, Camus’ The Plague deals with plague as violence which is Nazism and Marquez Love in the time of Cholera where the cholera is simply the Western version of progress and development, how will you see this corona virus problem?

When lockdown started the first thing I did was to purchase on line a copy of Albert Camus’ The Plague for it’s re-reading. Camus wanted to tell us how absurd life could be, especially at the time of an epidemic; how fragile are the individual characters, when confronted with an epidemic, to affect their destinies.
Dr Bernard Rieux, the main character of the novel, does an exemplary dedicated work during the plague. But he, an agnostic, does not do it for any religious purpose, or as part of a high-minded moral code. He is a practical man, doing what needs to be done without any fuss, but he knows that the struggle against death is something that he can never win. Camus correctly sized up human nature and knew about a fundamental and absurd vulnerability in us that we cannot usually bear to remember. In the words of one of his characters, ‘everyone has inside it himself this plague, because no one in the world, no one, can ever be immune.’ We can observe that most of the things narrated in The Plague is happening now.
In Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov dreamt that during a terrible new strange plague, human interaction breaks down, and the entire society gradually collapses. All were to be destroyed except a very few chosen, destined to found a new race and a new life, to renew and purify the earth.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn in The Gulag Archipelago gives a prophetic insight: “The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either — but right through every human heart — and through all human hearts.”
I consider that Cancer and the virus that affect the human heart are more dangerous than those that affect the human body.
As the Director General of WHO said, corona virus discriminates nobody and does not respect international borders. International bodies designed to safeguard public health appear weak and unable to contain the crisis, mainly due to the non-cooperation of powerful countries.

At least in Kerala during this tragic situation the Church was a silent spectator without any voice in public? Has Church lost its moral authority? You must have seen the reports that came out after the transfer of the Nuncio from here. “Vatican envoy’s removal from India brings relief for some Catholics.” The implication is there was no one to intervene in the Church affairs when a scandal breaks out. Is there no one in the Church to monitor and correct when there is real need of it? Why cannot the Church regain its lost moral authority?

The last time I visited Kerala was to take part the Syro-Malabar Synod session in January 2020. Hence I am not in a position to comment upon the daily developments taking place in Kerala or other parts of India. During the online Synod of the Syro-Malabar Church held on 18-21 August 2020 there was a rather lengthy and fruitful discussion on the ecclesial and social situations in Kerala, especially on the spread of COVID-19 and it’s after-effects and the service involvement of the Church based social groups.
Regarding the transfer of the Nuncio, my reading of the Church matters is that the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Giambattista Diquattro was serving in India for three years and his transfer to Brazil is a normal routine, and in the worldly language a promotion, as the Brazilian Bishops Conference is the largest in the Catholic World with 400 Bishops. There is nothing surprising if any one group felt relief whereas some others felt frustration at Nuncio’s transfer. As far as my understanding goes, policing the activities of the local Church is not the task of the Nuncio. Of course, he is the link between the local Church and the state with the Apostolic See and is to report relevant matters. The Church in India has to come of age and be mature to be the faithful witness of the Gospel. Church is not place to practise Machiavellian diplomacy, which envisages “a good prince as the one who knows how and when to be cunning and utilize ‘astuteness’ to his own advantage.” On the other hand, any leader should follow the principle of St Thomas Aquinas: “the aim of any ruler should be directed so that he secures the welfare of those whose government he undertakes.” This should be the mode of governance in the Church. Jesus taught his disciples, by His own life example, what the servant leadership is. Unfortunately, as in the case of Judas, attraction to money, corruption and betrayal entered even into the college of Jesus’ apostles. How true is the observation of Francis Bacon: “Money is a good servant but a bad master.”

As bishop and believer how do you look at the Syro-Malabar Church as you live and are exposed to the Australian Church situation which is somewhat a type of Western Church? Moreover you are a senior Church leader who must speak when voices are no more forthcoming due to various reasons.

The Syro-Malabar Eparchy was inaugurated in 2014 for about sixty thousand Syro-Malabar migrants, scattered all around Australia. I would like to express my deep gratitude to the Catholic Church in Australia, its bishops, priests, and Lay faithful for the warm and generous welcome and support given to the migrants, especially of the Eastern Churches. The Australian Catholic Bishops Conference produced a beautiful document regarding the pastoral ministry of the Oriental Catholics in Australia (cf. Eastern Catholic Churches in Australia, ACBC 2016). This can be a model guideline for the pastoral care of the faithful of the Oriental Churches living in diaspora.
Syro-Malabar migrants to the Western world face a lot of existential challenges. Here I recall the description by Fr Placid Podipara CMI of the St Thomas Christians in India, as “Indian in Culture, Christian in Religion, Oriental in Worship.” But for the migrant Syro-Malabarians in Australia, all these three elements of their identity are being challenged in their daily life. Firstly, we live in a predominantly Western culture, which brings our families and children in great stress regarding the choice of cultural values and customs. Secondly, the Christian faith faces great challenges in places like Australia, where the largest single group of the population is of no religion, and where many of the Christian fundamental values are put into question, even by legislation. Thirdly, where there are Latin Churches in the neighbourhood and the facilities for the Syr-Malabar Qurbana and Catechesis are far distant, people are often tempted to go to the nearby Latin Church, which slowly causes alienation of the younger generation from their mother Church.
Some of the Australian states have already passed the law in 2020 that obliges priests to break confessional secrecy and report to the police if they learn of sexual violence against children in confession. The Catholic Bishops of Australia said very clearly that the priests are nevertheless obliged to keep the confessional secret. When asked for its mind on the subject, the Holy See has confirmed the constant tradition of the Church with regard to the seal of confession, recalling that: “The confessor is never allowed, for any reason whatsoever, ‘to betray in any way a penitent in words or in any manner’ (CIC. 983, §1), just as ‘a confessor is prohibited completely from using knowledge acquired from confession to the detriment of the penitent even when any danger of revelation is excluded’ (CIC. 984, §1).
Conflicts between the civil law and the Church teachings regarding the seal of confession and similar moral and religious issues, cause great stress to priests in the pastoral field.
However, I am fully conscious that my Mission is to “Accompany the Syro-Malabar communities in Oceania in their pilgrimage of faith following Jesus Christ, by helping them to acquire greater awareness of their Oriental Catholic Ecclesial Identity, leading them by the power of the Spirit to Christ-like maturity, and equipping them for their evangelizing ministry in the Church and in the world, for the greater glory of God.”
Ever since my episcopal ordination, though unworthy, I remind myself of the word of St Gregory Nazianzen: “First be purified and then purify others, first allow yourself to be instructed by wisdom and then instruct others, first become light and then enlighten others, first draw close to God and then guide others to him, first be holy yourself and then make others holy.”