JUST a coin toss from Rome's Trevi Fountain, earnest young theology students at the Pontifical Gregorian University march to classes, books under arm and confusion on the mind.
Many are future Roman Catholic priests, nuns, bishops and cardinals. There may even be a pope among them.
They have followed closely the talks in the Vatican about the child sex abuse scandals involving American priests.
And even as the eight American cardinals agreed on Wednesday [April 24] on stiff guidelines aimed at wiping out paedophilia from clerical ranks, some of the students said they felt unsure about both the nature of the problem and its eventual solution.
On a few things they seemed to agree: This issue is important, it's not just an American phenomenon and it must be discussed openly.
"We're talking about it a lot here, across all nationalities," Bernhard Maas, a theology student from Freiburg, Germany, said. "Some of us feel a sort of anger."
In contrast with their elders in the Vatican, students emphasised the responsibility of Church leaders. In many cases, they were as disturbed by the activities of those bishops suspected of covering up child sex abuse as by the crimes themselves.
"I don't really understand the behaviour of some of the bishops," said Mr Maas, 23. "Even if this behaviour occurs in the future, the key to the response will be the behaviour of the bishops. It's important that this issue be dealt with and talked about."
Kieran Flynn, a priest from Ireland, who is studying missionary theology, said the problem lay in the reticence of Church leaders. "This all should be a catalyst to bring the Church to more transparency, which is needed," he said.
The child abuse cases have created an earthquake in the Church that has rocked the confidence of congregations and stained the image of the priesthood. It has threatened finances as donors in the United States, the Church's wealthiest dominion, express unease with the use of their money to hush up past scandals.
As the Church considers what caused the problem and how to solve it, American cardinals and some other Catholic observers have begun to place the blame on the moral preparation of future clergy.
Bishop Wilton Gregory, head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, suggested that an inordinate number of homosexuals were entering seminaries, while some liberal commentators said that the requirements of celibacy were at the root of the problem.
Such comments fell heavily on aspiring priests here, who said they felt the public was getting a distorted idea of their motives.
"It's a concern for us that some people will prejudge us," said Christopher Singer, a third-year theology student from Erie, Pennsylvania, who is studying for the priesthood. "We need to do everything we can to prevent this from happening."
Mr Singer, 25, resisted putting blanket blame on the sexual orientation of priests. The Church, he said, was reflecting the complex sexual evolution in society. "There is a lot of confusion in our society about what is true and proper in matters of sexuality," he said.
Students generally dismissed the notion that celibacy was a problem.
"Obviously, we'll have people who will fail," said Greg Coan, 30, from Rochester, New York, and seminarian at the North American College, another of Rome's theology schools.
"There will then be the opportunity for people to jump on an aspect of the priesthood that has nothing to do with it.
"And it's too bad, because celibacy offers, yes, a sacrifice, but more than anything, a fruitful way to live."
Carter Griffin, 38, a seminarian at the North American College, said: "Celibacy is misunderstood in a world which often sets sexual relations on a pedestal.
"Paedophilia has nothing to do with celibacy. Celibacy is simply giving your life to God. When you're attracted to little children, you're talking about a grave sexual disorder."
The Catholic Church is not alone in finding it hard to define sex abuse, much less punish it. Institutions in all corners of American life have grappled with scandals that were once hidden beneath veils of fear and shame and now are the subject of open litigation and topics for televised talks shows: sexual harassment in the office, "date rape" at universities, child abuse in the family.
But what is to be done? Students at Gregorian and other institutes in Rome express the same difficulties as the American cardinals who were locked in discussion for days this week at the Vatican.
Everyone agrees that something must be done about child sex abuse, but few agree on the root of the scandals. For all the talk about zero tolerance, it seemed clear to young Catholics here that the issue was far from settled.
"A person who is really practising and believes in the Church is really suffering now," said Celeste Loccasino, 26, a lay student of philosophy from Canada. "The important thing now is that the Church resolve this in a concrete way that will produce results."
Thomas Reese, a Jesuit priest and the editor of America magazine, said the Church's moves so far had been encouraging.
"This week's meeting and the statements condemning paedophilia are a little late, but by Church standards, things have moved quickly," he said. "But there is still a long road to travel."
While the Rome meeting was generally described as a positive development, the U.S. cardinals were faulted widely on Thursday for failing to accept responsibility for the spread of sexual misconduct by the priests under their authority and, in many cases, for covering up incidents of sexual abuse.
"I thought the things mentioned were good, but besides writing a letter to priests they should have written to victims," said one Church expert. "I didn't see an apology in the text, an apology for the sins and abuse by priests, but also for the failure of the bishops to be on top of this, for allowing it to spread. Until they do that, the people in the pews are not going to be pleased at all. Certainly the victims' groups won't be."
The theme was echoed by the Rev. Richard McBrien, a liberal theologian.
"The fact is that most Catholic laity are angrier at the bishops than they are at the predatory priests," he said. "In this crisis, the people know that the bishops mishandled it badly and in some cases actually covered up criminal behaviour, put children in harm's way."
-- WASHINGTON POST
