THE VATICAN'S REAL CONCERNS

The difficult questions raised by the operation of so-called shooting
galleries have been hotly debated in NSW for some time. Though still a
divisive issue, it had been resolved some time ago in favour of permitting a
trial of a shooting gallery, under strict controls, in Kings Cross. The
injecting room would be supervised by the Sisters of Charity. And it was
their commitment to the pilot program which weighed very heavily in
persuading many people who might otherwise have opposed it. The legislation
necessary for the pilot project is before the NSW Parliament. Now the
Vatican's unexpected intervention has suddenly complicated matters.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has directed that the Sisters
of Charity take no part in the trial.

The nuns, plainly dismayed, but bound to obey, have withdrawn.

This should not prevent the trial going ahead, after the necessary
legislation has been passed.

But it does mean another suitable body must be found to supervise the trial.

That will not be easy. The Sisters of Charity were uniquely fitted for the
task. They have a long tradition of serving the poor, a wealth of experience
in the field of community health and the undoubted capacity to supervise a
shooting gallery safely and to the highest professional standards.

They are trusted.

Their deep experience in the field of community care meant their commitment
to emphasise rehabilitation as much as rescue and harm minimisation was
highly credible.

It is to be lamented that the nuns' knowledge and direct experience of the
problems they were about to tackle has not weighed more with the theologians
and church officials in Rome who have ordered them to abandon the project.
Moral and theological wrangling over the edict of the Congregation of the
Doctrine of the Faith will no doubt rage, long and hard. No-one will
disagree with Cardinal Clancy - through whom the Vatican's edict was
delivered - that "co-operation in wrongdoing" is a difficult and complex
area. But a great many people who accept that that is so also believe that
the nuns knew what they were doing.

They knew, not just in the sense that they were not being duped by addicts,
but also because their direct experience gave them exceptional insight into
what practical strategies might be adopted to help addicts break the bonds
of addiction.

The practical arguments which persuaded the NSW Government to go ahead with
the trial in co-operation with this uniquely placed non-government body were
twofold. The trial would save lives in the immediate sense by allowing
addicts to inject in a safe and hygienic place.

And it might show how new approaches might divert more addicts to courses of
rehabilitation. With the nuns in charge of the trial, these arguments were
credible and even compelling. Now, a distant authority on the other side of
the world has spoken, threatening a delicate consensus in favour of a brave
venture in a fraught area of public health, an area that has had far too
many defeats and all too few victories.

The Vatican's primary concern, it seems, has not been the lives of the
people the trial is intended to help but the church's reputation and
authority. A practical concern, it has been said, was that the trial might
not be effective.

That is something the Sisters of Charity were far better placed to judge
than the men in Rome, but the nuns were not consulted. Another concern was
that if the trial went ahead it might be misinterpreted as a sign that the
church was soft on drugs.

If that was the case, it is a cruel elevation by the church hierarchy of
concern for corporate image over the real ministry of its most devoted and
effective members.