by Steve Adubato, PhD

The Catholic Church’s brand is in big trouble. It’s no secret that serious communication and reputation problems for the church revolve around its consistent mishandling of a decades-old pedophilia scandal involving an alarming number of current and former priests.

The latest version of this scandal revolves around Pope Benedict XVI and the allegations that when he was the Archbishop of Munich (as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger) he approved the transfer of a German priest and sex offender for therapy, who later returned to the ministry and molested more children. Further, there is a case in which a Vatican office headed by Ratzinger in the 1990s failed to defrock an American priest accused of molesting 200 deaf boys in Wisconsin.

A couple of critical communication and branding points need to be put on the table. The issue here is about leadership and having a smart and credible strategy that addresses a complex and serious set of problems involving the molesting of young boys by priests who often times were transferred from one parish to another. (Without any acknowledgment or apology until it was way too late.)

The Catholic Church’s communication strategy for years was to say nothing to the media or its parishioners, to deal with this scandal privately and try to settle cases out of court, which often involved “gag orders” with pedophilia victims and their families. Another part of the strategy involved challenging those who criticized the church on this issue, blaming the media or saying that the situation had been exaggerated.

Curiously, no matter how many times this ill-conceived communication approach has failed, church leaders have decided once again to use the same approach in dealing with the latest accusations against the Pope. In churches across the country, recent homilies have attacked the media and the Pope’s accusers. For the Pope’s part, at St. Peter’s in Rome, he offered a prayer “for the young and for those charged with educating them and protecting them.” He also said he would not be intimidated by “the petty gossip of dominant opinion.” The Pope later said; “Jesus did not react when insulted.” Comparing yourself to Jesus (even for the Pope) is not a smart media strategy.

This column is not about religion or politics. But it IS about a powerful institution making the same egregious communication mistake again and again and seemingly expecting a different outcome. If the church leadership had proactively acknowledged decades ago not only that a small yet sick group of priests were molesting young boys, the damage to its brand might have been minimized.

If the church hierarchy hadn’t opted for a strictly legal strategy of reaching out of court settlements, instead of taking the PR hit early on (and the embarrassment that went with it) and then taking decisive action and communicating clearly what it intended to do to address this situation, things would have been different.

I’m not saying the Church’s image problem would have gone away, but it had a much better chance of getting some benefit of the doubt if it had immediately apologized, acted and communicated that there was no excuse for what happened and made sure that the victims and their families were treated with empathy and compassion.

People who say this is a private matter involving a private institution don’t understand that we are talking about a very public BRAND, with the need to attract and retain customers. We are talking about the need to raise money/capital to sustain and grow. Whether it’s the Catholic Church or any corporation or business, these principals are the same. Communicate well or die, particularly in a crisis. The church’s brand is in serious trouble, not only for the pedophilia scandal, but more so because of its flawed response in terms of leadership and communication that has been consistently repeated. It didn’t have to be this way.