Defending Your Good Reputation

How many of you have heard of  the girl who is "easy" in high school. Many people talk about that girl, and spread that reputation despite the truth.  This also applies to adults.

This was the case of Ray Donovan, the former Secretary of Labor who was charged with larceny and fraud in connection with a Government Contract case.  After acquitted, Donovan famously said:

"Which office do I go to get my reputation back?"

 A person's reputation includes his word, character and bond. A person with a good reputation has a right to sustain it under conditions of justice. Yet, within our legal framework, a public figure does not have a right to defend his reputation in the popular mind. We can say anything about a public figure, according to some people's behavior, because there is little such a figure can do when someone says something negative about him. This is not the Catholic standard.  St. Francis de Sales, bishop, doctor of the Church said this about a person's reputation:

 Humility might make us indifferent even to a good reputation, were it not for charity’s sake; but seeing that it is a groundwork of society, and without it we are not merely useless but positively harmful to the world, because of the scandal given by such a deficiency, therefore charity requires, and humility allows, us to desire and to maintain a good reputation with care.

 Recently, with the cases of Father Corapi and Father Pavone, certain bloggers have used the St. Pio standard and tried to apply it to all such cases. This advice, of course, runs counter to the "Doctor of the Laity and Secular Priests" St. Francis de Sales. Francis de Sales urges people, in view of the virtue of charity, to defend their good names.

Francis de Sales words go unheeded. He also states:

Of course certain crimes, so grievous that no one who can justify himself should remain silent, must be excepted; as, too, certain persons whose reputation closely affects the edification of others. In this case all theologians say that it is right quietly to seek reparation.

So he calls even for reparations. This chapter, Part III, Chapter VII is worth a read. Keep in mind, this applies to secular (diocesan) priests and the laity. Religious priests and contemplatives (like St. Pio) are held to a different standard, as this great doctor of the Church states in other chapters.

Be not too quick to counsel silence. It may work for a contemplative, but an active priest, or person in the public eye, requires a different discipline all together. Like St. Francis de Sales, we need to recognize a person's reputation counts for something. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

Respect for the reputation and honor of persons forbids all detraction and calumny in word or attitude (2507).

 Detraction and calumny destroy the reputation and honor of one's neighbor. Honor is the social witness given to human dignity, and everyone enjoys a natural right to the honor of his name and reputation and to respect. Thus, detraction and calumny offend against the virtues of justice and charity (2479).

...detraction who, without objectively valid reason, discloses another's faults and failings to persons who did not know them (2479b).

calumny who, by remarks contrary to the truth, harms the reputation of others and gives occasion for false judgments concerning them (2479c).

Perhaps, especially on the Internet, people should buy or dust off this book. There is timeless wisdom there.