A widening child sexual abuse inquiry in Europe has landed at the doorstep of Pope Benedict XVI, as a senior church official acknowledged Friday that a German archdiocese made “serious mistakes” in handling an abuse case while the pope served as its archbishop.
The archdiocese said that a priest accused of molesting boys was given therapy in 1980 and later allowed to resume pastoral duties, before committing further abuses and being prosecuted. Pope Benedict, who at the time headed the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising, approved the priest’s transfer for therapy. A subordinate took full responsibility for allowing the priest to later resume pastoral work, the archdiocese said in a statement….
In Munich case, a priest from Essen, “despite allegations of sexual abuse, and in spite of a conviction – was repeatedly assigned work in the sphere of pastoral care by the then-Vicar General Gerhard Gruber,” who worked under Benedict when he was the archbishop. The priest, identified only with the initial “H,” was moved to Munich in January 1980, where he was supposed to undergo therapy, a decision that was taken “with the approval of the archbishop,” according to the archdiocese’s statement. Benedict was archbishop of Munich from 1977 to 1982. In June 1986, the priest was convicted of sexually abusing minors and given an 18-month suspended sentence with five years of probation, fined 4,000 marks and ordered to undergo therapy.
The former vicar general took full responsibility for the decision to reinstate the priest to pastoral work. “I deeply regret that this decision resulted in offenses against youths and apologize to all who were harmed by it,” he said, according to a statement posted on the archdiocese’s Web site.
And this is not ex-Cardinal Ratzinger’s first encounter with the sex abuse scandal.
Experts said the scandals could undermine Benedict’s moral authority, especially because they cut particularly close to the pope himself. As head of the Vatican’s main doctrinal arm, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he led Vatican investigations into abuse for four years before assuming the papacy in 2005…. When a sex abuse scandal broke in Boston church in 2002, Pope Benedict – then Cardinal Ratzinger – was among the Vatican officials who made statements that minimized the problem and accused the news media of blowing it out of proportion.But as the abuse case files landed on his desk at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, his colleagues said he was deeply disturbed by what he learned. On his first visit to the United States as pope, Benedict met with abuse victims from Boston and said he was “deeply ashamed” by priests who had harmed children.
But victims’ advocates accuse the pope of doing little to discipline the bishops who permitted abusers to continue serving in ministry.
It looks to me as though this will quickly devolve into “what did he know, and when did he know it” territory. From the same article:
There was immediate skepticism that Benedict, as archbishop, would not have known of the details of the [Munich] case. The Rev. Thomas P. Doyle, who once worked at the Vatican Embassy in Washington and became an early and well-known whistle-blower on sexual abuse in the church, said the vicar general’s claim was not credible.“Nonsense,” said Father Doyle, who has served as an expert witness in sexual abuse lawsuits. “Pope Benedict is a micromanager. He’s the old style. Anything like that would necessarily have been brought to his attention. Tell the vicar general to find a better line. What he’s trying to do, obviously, is protect the pope.”
Finally, there is an interesting wrinkle that may affect the financial aspect of how this all plays out.
The scandal is not limited to Germany. This week, two dioceses in Austria suspended five priests pending investigations into allegations they had molested students. The church in the Netherlands has said it would open an investigation after more than 200 people came forward in recent weeks.To many observers, the situation in Europe looked unsettlingly similar to that in the United States a decade ago, when a trickle of isolated abuse cases steadily grew into a widespread phenomenon that upended – and bankrupted – many American dioceses.
But in Europe, unlike in common-law countries like the United States, Canada and Australia, defendants cannot sue the church for negligence.
Discuss
217 Comments . Comments are closed.I hope so
It would be about fucking time.
Hmm
If you reject papal supremacy why are you bothering being a Catholic? No offense but if you don't believe that you are essentially denying an essential truth of the Church: the apostolic succession.
Who said Apricot was Catholic?
That being said, adhering to a church should never mean checking your own opinion at the door.
also
The problem is that if all of the Americans who aren't Catholic enough for you were to leave the Church, there wouldn't be much of a church left.
I don't understand this Democratic Pope Hatred
Or maybe I do. Historically there has always been a battle between Protestants and Catholics. Intil the middle of the 19th century Boston still had Pope's Day when protestant mobs would hold a riot in Boston to see which rioting mob would get to burn the effigy of the pope. Of course they would beat up any few stray Catholics.
Anti Catholic bigotry is nothing new in Boston. Interesting that it still continues today.
Christ on a bicycle.
How many fucking times do we have to say this? Criticism of the political positions and actions of the Catholic church hierarchy and individuals in positions of authority within that hierarchy - indeed, even harsh language about the Pope! - does not imply condemnation of Catholics generally or of Catholicism, let alone "anti-Catholic bigotry."
RESPOND TO WHAT PEOPLE SAID, NOT THINGS THEY DIDN'T SAY.
So you're good with clergy sex abuse?
We are discussing a conspiracy to shield and enable thousands of clergy sex abusers with tens of thousands of adolescent victims. You call discussion "anti-Catholic bigotry".
I'll bear your complaint in mind the next time I accompany an adolescent non-Catholic woman to the newly-opened women's health clinic in Brookline, where your peers create a gauntlet of vile abuse that terrifies an already-distraught young woman.
I'm beginning to understand this "Democratic Pope Hatred" myself.
Missed these replies
My hatred of the INSTITUTION of the Catholic Church's hierarchy has to do with the fact that it routinely and systematically covered up and indeed AIDED AND ABETTED the sexual ABUSE of children, by moving priests around w/o warnings and without reporting.
I am all in favor of Catholic principles and religion or whatever if that's what floats your boat. As long as you don't try to legislate your religious principles on me.
But the INSTITUTIONAL way in which the Catholic Hierarchy HELPED PRIESTS RAPE CHILDREN--I am sorry, that shit deserves my vitriol.
Apologies if I seemed like I was hating on Catholics, when I'm just hating on the Catholic Institution and its disgusting, despicable and criminal relationship to RAPING CHILDREN and DESTROYING LIVES under the cloak of God's love.
I also really dislike the Church's homophobia and anti-choice positions, especially when it tries to influence legislation.
The good news is
even if the king can't be dethroned, his feudal underlings aren't bound to the land anymore.
BTW: I don't even think you picked the best Vatican scandal to hit the news. Check out this one.
The Catholic church's obsession with sex -- and trying to control it -- seriously undermines that institution and brings it to its knees. The hypocritical, morally-bankrupt corruption that's so pervasive within the leadership and institution (not the lay people) perhaps wouldn't be able to fester so badly if the Church decided to stop worrying so much about whether or not consenting adults were having sex and who those consenting adults were having sex with. Then, maybe, they could get to issues that are actually important and which could make the church relevant again, like advocating for peace and an end to poverty, the two things the Catholic church should be best at, but is utterly failing at because of its obsession with sex (is there any example more clear on this matter than the Church closing down its child adoption agencies for fear of having to allow gay couples in Massachusetts adopt special needs children who may not even otherwise be able to be fitted in a home? The same thing, as I understand it, is happening in DC, too).
The Church's positon on health care reform is deplorable
They claim to be "pro-life" yet by their exclusive focus on abortion and health care reform they effectively support the status quo in which thousands of people die each year either because they are uninsured or because insurance companies deny needed care.
What hypocrisy!!
Lest I be misconstrued, I do not consider myself a Christian, but have two good friends who are Catholic priests. I have participated in trips they have led to explore Christian history. I am a great admirer of James Carroll, an ex-priest who is still an observant Catholic despite his differences with the Church. His latest book "Practicing Catholic" gives fascinating details.
I feel that Christianity has a vital message, that includes the repudiation of vengeance. The two most important sayings of Jesus, IMHO, are "Let he who is without sin among you cast the first stone," and "Inasmuch as you have done it unto the least of my children, you have done it unto me."
These teachings, of course, have been totally ignored by self-styled "Christians" throughout history, and most recently by the conservative "Christians" today. Nothing Christian about them.
Please do not imply that 'Christian' is exclusively Roman Catholic - MANY Christians have nothing to do with that denomination.
Untrue
They are all derived from that denomination and are still apart of it in the eyes of the Church. We'd love to have y'all back ;)
A true Christian would want to have something to do with the Church Christ started don't ya think?
;)
You really want to go there?
As I recall there was quite the schism between Rome and Constantinople in 1054 which has yet to be reconciled. We Protestants decided a few centuries ago that Church teachings weren't necessarily what Christ had in mind. There are of course Christian churches in the east, such as Coptic and Armenian, that were never part of the Roman orbit.
It was a joke
Did you not see the emoticons?
Jesus Christ did not start the Catholic Church
please read some history as to the formation of the church. Early Christianity was a very different kind of thing, with many different, wide-spread beliefs, that weren't squished together and codified for well over a hundred years after the crucifixion. I sometimes think the people who know the least about the Christian religion are people who practice it most often.
Further evidence to support this claim
The New Testament was written after all in Latin not Greek. Thus, clearly the Roman Catholic Church is the original denomination, no?
Sarcasm alert
I enjoy it, but there are, sadly, likely to be some readers who don't know the history of the amalgamation of texts we now call "the New Testament" and therefore don't understand that you're being sarcastic (or "ironic" or "sardonic").
I'm somehow reminded of the apocryphal one-liner attributed to a fundamentalist literalist Protestant: "If the King James Version was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me."
Foiled!
I don't read MichaelBate's comment as implying any such thing.
He certainly relies on the assumption that all Catholics are Christians, but not the converse.
I certainly didn't intend to imply that 'Christian' is exclusively Roman Catholic
Not sure how you got that impression from my posting. Of course the original article is about the Catholic Church, and I have many Catholic friends. FWIW, I was brought up as a Quaker and attended an Episcopal elementary school and a Quaker high school. I never joined the Quaker church, but contribute regularly to the American Friends Service Committee. I have sometimes attended Unitarian services.
But the thrust of my posting was the relevance of the original Christian teachings, which are vitally important today, regardless of whether Jesus performed miracles, or had a virgin birth, and regardless of whether Jesus actually existed.
To put it bluntly, it's hard to think of anything more diametrically opposed to the teachings of Jesus than the policies of the Republican party today.
You probably meant to reply to Peter Porcupine above, not me.
You're right
My reply was misplaced, but I stand by what it said.
And I appreciate your correction of Peter Porcupine's misreading of my posting.
Pro-Life Catholics Speak Out FOR Reform
From the National Catholic Reporter: http://ncronline.org/print/17396
really?
The Church has always supported universal health care, since the 1890s in fact, with the encyclical Rerum Novarum. The Church has also always held that life begins at conception and thus cannot support the wholesale slaughter of innocent life sponsored by a government entity, which would have been the case had Health Care Reform destroyed the Hyde Amendment and allowed tax payer dollars to fund what the Church considers to be a most heinous and horrible act. Thanks to courageous Democrats like Bart Stupak the push to do that has stopped. While I disagree with his attempt to prevent private insurers from funding abortion, I am glad that his amendment forced the leadership to stop its crusade to gut the Hyde Amendment and backtrack to keeping it.
I think you have the Hyde Amendment issue wrong.
People were always saying that the language left the Hyde Amendment in place and that it was never a question that it would stay in place. My understanding is that Stupak goes beyond that.
Can you please cut out the ratings abuse?
Stop handing out zeros just because you disagree. It is violates the spirit and intention of the ratings and is a childish response.
Another explanation
Its not ratings abuse when people are saying incredibly hurtful and ignorant comments about my faith. Had anyone said anything similar about Jews theyd be banned no questions asked.
Oh please
That analogy is beyond absurd.
Your comments on this thread so far don't give me much hope that you'll understand why it's absurd, though, so let me try to explain.
1) The Roman Catholic Church is a single, specific, very large and wealthy organization with a clear hierarchy of authority and a single leader, which has exerted enormous political influence around the world for (give or take) sixteen hundred years. Judaism is not.
2) Comparing criticism of the Catholic Church to bigotry against and oppression of Jewish people is pretty shocking, to be honest, and this point I really shouldn't have to explain any further.
3) NO ONE on this thread has said anything worse about Catholics in general than that they support a corrupt institution and hopefully after these revelations about that institution's corruption some of them will stop.
4) Moreover, no one has said anything negative about the Catholic faith specifically on this thread, although way down at the bottom I did argue that all religious faith is harmful. (And you didn't even zero that, though perhaps you just haven't gotten around to it yet.)
Every criticism on this thread has been directed at the Catholic organization, not the faith: the specific history and documented actions of the specific people who constitute the hierarchy, and the policies they've put in place. Nothing about being Catholic obliges you to insist that the church hierarchy is, always has been, and always will be incapable of doing anything wrong (and I somehow doubt you're planning to start defending the Borgias or the Inquisition).
You haven't been defending your faith against vicious anti-Catholic bigotry; you've just been trying to stifle any criticism of an institution you're not personally capable of questioning. That is absolutely an abuse of the rating system.
My wife and I have followed this rather closely
My wife, having grown up in Bavaria, has been reading German-language coverage of this as it has developed.
In addition to the issues raised in the piece you cite, serious and well-documented allegations are surfacing about Goerg Ratzinger, brother of the former Cardinal Ratzinger:
A related issue is surfacing in Germany that is not, so far, widely reported here: the question of why secular German authorities have been and are now so reluctant to aggressively pursue these apparent crimes. Sound familiar?
It would seem that the US sex-abuse scandals were not, as claimed, an "aberration".
It is becoming increasingly clear that they were known about, covered up, and enabled by the very highest levels of Vatican authority — including the current Pope. It leads to a new (at least for me) vein of speculation about the cushy treatment given Bernard Law by Vatican authorities — perhaps Bernard Law knew a great deal more about Vatican involvement than he has publicly said. It seems increasingly clear that the Vatican has strong and self-serving motivation to ensure that Bernard Law is "protected" from secular authorities in the US. Bernard Law's handling of the clergy sex abuse cases during his tenure now looks like an obedient middle-manager faithfully executing policy directives from his superiors.
Tell me again why this institution should not be prosecuted as an international criminal organization?
How about....
...we prosecute the actual abusers and those who actively served as accessories? The Church is not a criminal organization, but this is hardly the first time you've demonstrated what frankly strikes me as anti-Catholic bigotry. I remember when you wanted to hold the Church responsible for the lone nutcase who murdered Dr. Tiller. In the case of the Pope, the only country he's operated in as far as I know is Germany. He has not committed any crimes in any other country. I'm all for prosecuting perpretators in this country and am certainly glad that "benefit of clergy" is no longer a part of most legal systems. Even the Bishops who moved priests around I'm not sure they are prosecutable if they did that before mandatory reporting requirements took effect.
Accessories
Anyone who failed to report criminals to the police, and who actively concealed crimes, and who enabled the commission of repetitions of those crimes, are accessories to those crimes.
Like for example,
this guy.
Note the date of the article.
I know that is now the case.
What I'm not sure of is how long it has been legally required for persons such as teachers, priests, etc. to report suspected abuse. I'm also refering to voluntarily initiating contact with authorities, as opposed to stonewalling or otherwise obstructing justice when the authorities themselves come calling.
Is THAT your standard for those who claim moral authority?
Let me see if I correctly understand your argument.
We are talking about priests, bishops, cardinals ... all the way up the line, apparently to the Pope himself. Each of these, from the lowliest priest to the Pope, claims moral authority — such authority is the very essence and foundation of their relationship with young men and women.
You seem to be saying that when these authority figures learn that one of their peers or subordinates is abusing his relationship with the children in his charge, they have no legal obligation to disclose that knowledge to secular authorities.
While I grant that you may be literally correct, I hope you realize exactly how devastating this particular defense is to the very fabric of the institution they represent.
I thought we were talking legally.
Of course I agree with you that these actions, and the coverups thereof, are morally repugnant. People (largely you) have been talking about such things as arrest and prosecution, which can only happen according to the statute law in the jurisdiction in which the crime was allegedly committed. No bills of attainder or ex post facto laws need apply.
He was talking legally.
Please note
the construction of my comment. I did not say "anyone who failed to go to the police OR who actively concealed crimes OR who enabled the commission of repetitions of those crimes..." Also, I'm no lawyer, but I'm pretty sure anyone who does either of those last two things is an accessory to the crime, whether they are priests or not. That may be different in other countries, but I doubt it.
More than just accessories...
... but conspirators after the fact. You're supposed to report crimes you know about - not hide them behind a global organization dedicated to, among other things, hiding them. That this protectionism has been systemic of the church through among its highest leadership is on the record. That means the term 'criminal organization' does apply. Sorry to be the bearer of unwanted news. If the leadership within Microsoft came to official corporate actions that conspired to violate law, the organization would be held liable as well as the individuals involved.
No
The Pope is answerable to God, not the millions of people who fund his lavish lifestyle, not the beliefs that the Church says it promotes. He's like the Ayatollah without the attitude problem.
Give unto Caeser that which is Caesar's
I appreciate that your comment is intended to be satirical (or perhaps ironic), but far too many people actually believe this to be true.
The Pope may be answerable to God, but a great many members of his organization live in, and are therefore answerable to, secular US authorities. The same is true in Germany, Austria, and each other sovereign nation that has secular authorities.
I don't know what God exacts as punishment, but "Caesar" tends to demand large amounts of money and extended periods of incarceration. Both seem highly appropriate.
The Pope is sovereign...
...as is the Vatican. No other nation's laws can touch him now. I'm not even aware of any kind of impeachment process within Canon Law. Bishops operating in other nations are certainly bound by the laws of those nations, but the Pope basically IS Caesar.
Agreed
My point is that anyone who wants to can arrest him (or anyone else) once he leaves the geographical boundaries of the Vatican. It is becoming more and more clear that this abuse was not an isolated aberration here and there; it is endemic in the institution, and its cover-up is endemic in the institution.
Society enacts laws to protect minors from risk, and especially from sex predators. Minors are not permitted to view certain movies, enter certain establishments, or consume certain beverages. If the Catholic church shows itself to be an active participant in conspiring to protect those who sexually abuse minors, how long will it be before it is forbidden from offering activities for minors?
This is sex abuse of minors we're talking about here, in staggering numbers. The prosecution by secular authorities is the best outcome that can happen here — if the Vatican isn't careful, they may well find themselves facing the outcome that John Geoghan encountered.
This is dangerously inflammatory and provocative behavior we're talking about now, and I strongly suspect that secular authorities will, one way or another, find a way to contain and punish it. I can think of few things more likely to incite fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters to violence than sexually abusing their children and siblings.
Anyone can arrest?
Don't you have to commit a crime in that jurisdiction first? Germany, maybe, but keep in mind the laws and protections are not universal.
Not endemic to the institution
So far we have had individual dioceses and individual bishops and cardinals covering up abuse, NOT the entire Church. Cardinal George in Chicago for one has been especially vigorous of course the media doesn't like to follow the good guys since they don't sell papers.
The Church is not corrupt since it is the Body of Christ on Earth. While all the members are sinners those sins cannot overshadow the overwhelming grace and majesty of Christ on Earth which is untainted and free from sin.
Oh my
We are talking about an institution whose politics, practices, and policies make it a magnet for conflicted homosexual men who hate women and fear sex. The abuse of adolescent boys by Catholic clergy is endemic because the culture disproportionally selects from a population predisposed to such behavior. The cover up of this abuse is endemic because the causal connection between fundamental aspects of the institution and this behavior is readily demonstrated. Vatican authorities choose now, as they have chosen for at least decades, to disparage the victims, stonewall secular authorities, and loudly complain of "anti-Catholic prejudice" rather than address the root causes of this abuse.
Your attempted piety is better-suited for Sunday Mass than this forum. We are not discussing "grace" and "majesty".
Instead, we are discussing adult male authority figures who coerce boys — some as young as eleven — into performing oral sex on them, accepting anal intercourse from them, and passing them from one to another when they grow bored with them. We are talking about authorities who, when told of this behavior, transferred the men in question to new assignments where they did the same thing to more children, while paying hush money to the families of the known victims to silence them. Not by the ones and twos, or by the dozens, but by the thousands and tens of thousands. Tens of thousands of victims, thousands of perpetrators, over a span of decades. I'm not sure I can imagine anything more "endemic" than this. We are talking about elevating the man who crafted and led this defense strategy (as Prefect of the "Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith") to Pope, and then claiming sovereign immunity from prosecution based on that office.
This behavior is the very definition of "corrupt institution".
Systemic
Irish archbishops protected reputation at expense of victims, report says
Victims Blast Catholic Officials for Not Releasing Secret Records
A history of secrecy, coverups in Boston Archdiocese
Okay
So you have proven that a few bishops in some dioceses decided to cover their asses rather than deal with the proper authorities. I can also provide you with evidence showing that Cardinal Egan and Cardinal George fully cooperated with authorities in their diocese. Additionally Benedict now implemented an intensive screening process to stop pedophiles from entering the church and a zero tolerance policy to take any sexually active priest out of the priesthood.
I think it's pretty clear...
...that institutions cannot do these things - people do. At least I'm assuming that no general council of the Church enacted a policy saying it will knowingly and willingly harbor abusers.
Finally
A voice of reason, an oasis in the desert, and from a Protestant no less!
Just call 'em as I see 'em
I could never be Catholic myself, but I've been fascinated by the Roman Catholic Church for sometime, both the good and the bad.
Institutions can absolutely...
... be culpable in a cover-up, as has been shown many many times in legal history.
It's still people within the institutions though.
Yes, but there is no 'though'.
The existence of people in the chain does not speak one way or the other on any institutional culpability.
How many do you need?
I could link to many more diocese where the exact same thing happened. Or you could do the search yourself. This is not an aberration; it appears to be extremely widespread. To turn your comment around, I could say "OK, you have shown* that two cardinals cooperated with authorities." Two. What is that supposed to tell us? Did anyone claim that ALL cardinals covered up pedophile priests?
Also, it was not just their asses that the bishops were covering, but the asses of criminal priests who could not keep their hands off the asses of children in their care.
* Actually, you have only alleged that those two cardinals behaved properly, since you didn't actually provide the evidence.
Hmmm
From this comment I can infer that you think homosexuality and pedophilia are one in the same, and that you think the Dali Lama hates women and fears sex because he is celibate.
Similarly I guess rabbis hate women and fear sex too, and maybe Laurel thinks that the Jews are a bunch of child rapists.
All religious organizations have had pedophile issues, the evangelicals had Haggard engaging with underage male hookers and Baker committing acts of statutory rape, Elijah Muhammed the late head of the Nation of Islam was engaged in several pedophilic acts of statutory rape with subordinates, Mohammed was probably a pedophile by today's standards since the Koran says he took several wives under our modern age of consent without their consent, and the New York Jewish congregation has had an extensive pedophile crisis and an extensive cover up as well but for some reason I don't see you and Laurel going around calling for the Jews to be arrested the same way you are going after priests. Additionally none of those denominations have clerical celibacy so the patterns of abuse in the Catholic church are completely unrelated to clerical celibacy. Clerical abuse occurs because like any figure of power, some lesser men with power get corrupted and think they can do whatever they want and unleash any of the toxic desires lurking within them. The Catholic church is not unique in having a pedophile problem or even in its response to that problem, what is unique is that there are more cases simply because the Church is so much larger than those other organizations.
I think you are motivated by a particular brand of hatred and contempt for the Church, I suspect you might be a lapsed Catholic yourself and you have deep aversions to the faith of your father. I do hope and pray that this relationship can be healed, and even if I am mistaken I at least ask that you treat other religious beliefs besides your own lack of belief with respect and quit making generalized statements about priests. Every priest I have ever interacted with has been a decent and loving human being who respects women and men alike. One noted homosexual priest died while administering last rites at the World Trade Center site and was not a pedophile in any sense. The vast majority of priests serve their parishes with dignity, humility, and respect. The celibacy which you so mock and vilify is an important sacred trust that keeps the priest focused on loving God and serving his fellow man. It is not because they fear sex or find it disgusting and immoral, in fact Scripture and the Church encourages sex (between married adults) as a natural loving act that brings two people together within the grace and love of God. The priests are celibate because celibacy is part of a broader ascetic ethos of rejecting all material concerns including money, power, as well as the flesh of others.
I have maybe interacted with over 30 priests during my lifetime, most of those interactions occurring when I was a more vulnerable minor, and never did I feel unsafe. This is the case for the majority of Catholics who love their priests and have a special bond with them. In the less than .01% of cases where a priest is a deviant pedophile, than this relationship is torn asunder and abused, and for this reason the Church has finally been vigilant in standing up to abusers, bringing them to the civil authorities, and compensating the victims. It is not just because they are fearful of losing money, they are fearful that this bond and sense of trust will be permanently broken, and that ignorant people like yourself along with true enemies of the Church will use the exception to define the rule regarding priests. Your statements are shameful but I suspect they are born out of ignorance not hatred.
Yes, yes and yes.
There is an unfathomable depth and breadth to my hatred and contempt I feel for an organization that takes such a cavalier attitude towards such vicious treatment of women and children. Do you dispute this? Do you say these things did not occur? Do you say my hate is not justified? Do you contend that I have no reason for contempt? Ratzinger, if he had any sense of true christianity would resign the papacy and go live in a cave for the remainder of his earthly existence, fasting and praying for absolution for his sins.
The very idea of 'lapsed catholic' puts the church on a pedestal, as though it is an ideal to be achieved. I'm a better Catholic, without having stepped into a church in years, than Joseph Ratzinger and the Vatican pretty boys. They are the ones who have lapsed... as have you in your defense of them. This very conversation, so strenuous in it's attempts to shift the focus AWAY from the victims, so numerous and so injured, towards some sense of victimization for the abusers and their enablers, is, frankly, disgusting. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.
I do not make generalized statements. I know priests who have abused boys. I know priests who have commited adultery (often with women who came to them with marital problems...) I know drunks and enablers and bullies and feckless thugs, all priests. You know them too... but you refuse to see.
.
An excellent example of why discussions of religion on this site are so utterly devoid of utility. They provide much heat, no light, and are thoroughly counterproductive. They function more as an opportunity for the expression of hatred toward Catholics.
jconway, I suspect the problem is greater than you let on, but it accomplishes nothing to discuss it with people such as these.
Given his experiences...
... I don't think anyone could blame his hatred here. I'd also point out that he hasn't expressed hatred for Catholics, but rather the Catholic church. There is a difference.
There is indeed.
For the most part, however, I don't see it here.
Show me where...
... he has called out Catholics other than those priests that have offended? (as opposed to calling out the Church).
Much of this thread
is devoted to "debate" of the proposition of whether the entire church--not the bishops, not the clergy, but the entire church--is a criminal enterprise.
BMG discussions of this nature are mostly performance art: posters need to perform their opinions in the most heated terms possible. It isn't intended to be a discussion, but a generalized denunciation.
And it is not worth the emotional or physical energy to respond. It was foolish to become engaged in this thread at all.
Performance art? Only because you
aren't interested in the debate, it seems. There may have been a time when you felt strongly about other issues and posted here accordingly. Clearly that time has passed for you, but your lack of interest doesn't automatically devalue the contributions of others who feel sincerely and strongly about serious issues you'd rather not debate.
This has been a discussion, albeit one you don't happen to like. Has it been a heated one? Yes. Does one side outnumber the other? Yes. I'm fairly certain, however, that if the tone and tenor had been more favorable towards the efforts of the Catholic church, you'd be much happier with the content and more likely to value the exchange.
Let's be clear: it's not worth your emotional or physical energy to respond. Indeed, while you may claim that you are "engaged" in this thread, a quick glance at the names of the participants will reveal that's not the case. Consequently, your lament over any genuine engagement on your part appears to be more than a little bit like performance art you mock.
Many extended debates occur on this blog that don't resonate with some or many of the usual contributors. Their lack of participation, however, does not render the heartfelt debate that does occur worthless, empirical declarations about its character or value by disengaged bystanders notwithstanding.
Indeed...
Some of the bravest persons I've ever met have been ordinary Catholics who've had to soldier on, in their lives, in their faith, in their relationships with God... after searing betrayal. Bernard Law tried very hard to bind people to silence by calling their accusations 'confession'... a binding that many Catholics have taken seriously, even those who ultimately rejected it and went public with accusations of abuse. Something like that takes a great deal of courage, both moral and intellectual.
My scorn, contempt and, yes, hatred is directed most at those who know all... the College of Cardinals and the Pope. They could show as much bravery as those ordinary Catholics and reveal all. Indeed, their doctrine demands exactly that. But the horror is real: the scope of conspirators and their silence, long and exquisitely cruel, and in service to nothing but their self-interest and in direct opposition to Gods commands to be both just and merciful, is a fact. It is to be perfectly blunt, an abomination. They are craven and cowardly and not worthy of the defense of honest Catholics.
What gets me most upset, if you couldn't tell already, is that honest Catholics defend these bozos when they ought to be the most upset...
As if there were no such...
... thing as INTERPOL?
If he committed crimes, they were crimes in a German jurisdiction as a German citizen. I think if Germany wanted to press the issue they could apply for an international warrant through INTERPOL. If he ever left the Vatican into an INTERPOL jurisdiction, I don't think he would be untouchable. Don't forget that the warrant served to Pinochet while in Britain was a Spanish warrant.
Hmm
You seem very eager to make sure the people who were responsible for molesting and raping literally thousands and thousands of children across the Globe get away with it.
Not quite
First I'm not buying that the Pope is directly responsible for molesting thousands of children. Second I'm just commenting on what it seems his status would be under international law. As a current head of state he would enjoy diplomatic immunity.
Were Jeff Skilling and Ken Lay responsible
for illegal accounting practices at Enron, even if they didn't personally cook the books or even order them cooked, given that they did know about the practices and didn't put a stop to them? That's how hierarchical organizations work: the buck stops at the top.
Depends
My understanding of American corporate law is that such people are ultimately responsible, though I'd be tempted to ask what did they know and when did they know it. A recurrent problem on this thread seems to be that people are trying to apply American jurisprudence to the Pontiff, along with assumptions such as consent of the governed, etc. If a Bishop in the USA molested a child or failed to report such, then the state in which such happened should absolutely prosecute, but the Pope is really beyond our reach.
Beyond reach, unless...
.. the evidence actually points to him, as it does in the German case. Moreover, he was a German citizen living under German law at the time, further expanding his legal vulnerability. It's not like there are no such things as international criminal, international warrants, extraditions, and INTERPOL. I don't know how the story is playing legally in Germany, but if they are pissed off enough, I'd worry about travel plans. I'd be interested to see what his travel schedule was before the story broke and what it was after.
Nope.
Though I think state officials were far too lenient in who they went after for criminal misconduct, I haven't seen anyone suggest trying to extricate the Pope or something. What I've specifically said in this thread is that practicing Catholics ought to force changes in the church that would prevent something like the child molestation scandal from ever happening again. Clearly, the Church has not learned its ways and its efforts at secrecy are as strong as ever, given the fact that the scandal just keeps growing wider over time. It's well past time for lay people to be put in charge of running the actual church and for the Pope to be a largely ceremonial position -- no more than a spiritual leader. Well, at least that's the opinion of this former Catholic.
I'll rephrase myself,
responsible for shuffling those who were directly responsible for the act, therefore propagating it.
Cardinal Law, then-Cardinal Ratzinger and many, many more of them didn't molest children themselves, but they shuffled around those who did, or sent them to retreats for prayer and 'therapy,' sending them back for more. You've had a lot of good to say in this thread, but over all I think you come down way too easy on the church leadership. It was their acts of cover-ups which allowed what could have been a few, local cases into a major, systemic and macro problem that transcends continents.
That isn't the accusation, Christopher
The accusation is that Joseph Ratzinger knowingly and intentionally concealed the abuse of thousands of adolescents, mostly boys, by clergy. The accusation is that he conspired with Bernard Law and many other high-ranking church officials to take whatever steps (both legal and illegal) were necessary to conceal these crimes. The accusation is that Joseph Ratzinger ordered the payment of hush money, orchestrated (directly or indirectly) the transfer of known abusers from one parish to another — across state (in the US) and national borders.
Even as head of state, the enormity of this coverup is (or should be) enough to trump legalistic objections like the one that the Church (and you) offer.
Disagree
We're not talking about war crimes here, but even Nuremburg had rules and didn't railroad people. Only the Church itself can bring down a Pope, and I don't know what statute of limitations Germany might have. The Pope has been in the Vatican for awhile; it's been several years since he has been a German Archbishop. Bishops accused of these acts and being accessories thereof can and should be prosecuted according to the laws of the respective jurisdictions. This is the first I'm hearing of paying hush money or any other Vatican involvement beyond giving people like Cardinal Law a soft landing. You're making it sound like a lot more of a deliberate and centrally organized conspiracy than I've ever understood this to be. I suppose if there are any crimes Law committed such as failure to report, for which the statute of limitations has not expired, Massachusetts could try to get the US to extridite, but I don't know if we have such a treaty with the Vatican. Regardless of the outrage there's still nothing we can do about the Pope.
Who said $quot;we$quot;?
Joseph Ratzinger accepted Bernard Law's resignation in 2002, only eight years ago. It was Bernard Law who paid hush money, and evidence is mounting that he did so under the orders of Joseph Ratzinger; the similar tactics in Ireland, other dioceses in the US (I've lost track there's been so many), and now Germany suggest an orchestrated strategy. Joseph Ratzinger was, after all, the Vatican official who handled the church's responses to clergy sex abuse. If there was an orchestrated strategy (and it's difficult to imagine otherwise, given the nature of the institution and the officials involved), Joseph Ratzinger is the official most likely to have crafted it. All of this was surely known when he was elevated to Pope.
I'm making it sound like a deliberate and centrally organized conspiracy because events in Germany are leading in precisely that direction; that's what this thread is about.
I agree that extraditing Joseph Ratzinger, or anybody else, from the Vatican is highly unlikely. On the other hand, as has been noted elsewhere in the thread, the international community is increasingly likely to make these individuals (including the Pope) subject to arrest, prosecution, and imprisonment (if convicted ) if they leave the physical confines of the Vatican.
It may not be the US who ultimately pursues these men; I think it is increasingly likely, however, that they will be pursued.
I just want to note...
...that you're so outraged by the bad acts of the Church and its Bishops that you want to find something, anything, to nail the Pope with. Selecting the target first then finding the crime (and yes, this is what many of your comments have sounded like on this thread) sounds like the Ken Starr version of justice.
He didn't go looking...
..., the story broke on its own.
I know...
...but there just seems to be a bit too much glee in his tone, again kind of like Clinton's enemies who found Lewinski and though (cue evil laugh), "We finally have him!"
Inconsistent
You claim to want to have a discussion based on "a cool analysis of the facts, evidence, and applicability rather than an emotional response," and yet you admit here to not really responding to the facts, evidence, etc., presented because you don't care for the author's tone. Seems to me that you would focus on the facts and evidence and ignore the tone if that were the case. It appears, on this thread, at least, that you have assiduously ignored the facts, evidence, and applicability in favor of comments that address tone and emotion. This is part of why I think some are frustrated with you. Many here are justifiably angry with the behavior of the Catholic church and are horrified by the continued exploitation of children and coddling of pedophiles, but you seem to view this anger as an inappropriate ingredient of discussion. Then, ironically enough, you bring your emotional distrust and impatience with atheists and church critics to the table as an appropriate defense for your comments. So your emotional reactions to commenters who are critical of the church are justifiable in the context of your comments, but the emotional reactions of commenters who are crticial of the church are not?
Documents
This PDF purports to be a translation of the 1962 Office of the Sacred Congregation directive for dealing with priests and their accusers. In addition to repeated and comprehensive instructions that the accusations against a priest, the investigations, and the order itself must be kept completely secret, it includes the following language:
So the Church judge is not even allowed to attempt to make the accused priest tell the truth. Great for discovering the truth.
Here is a 2001 order in Latin on the Vatican Website that sources say restates the 1962 order. My Latin is not adequate to translating it, and none of the online translators do much better. (Google and Babelfish don't do Latin.) It has Ratzinger's name at the bottom.
Are you just studiously ignoring all facts you don't like?
The whole point here is that the newly revealed evidence out of Germany specifically implicates Cardinal Ratzinger in devising and enacting the church's strategy of denying that abuse was a problem, covering it up, paying off the victims, hiding and protecting the abusers, and letting them return to work, where they then abused more children.
And you're claiming that BrooklineTom's being angry about this invalidates his criticisms? I mean, wow.
In fairness
Christopher may just not have read the discussion. He does that a lot.
Not called for
I've been following this very carefully and stand by my comments.
then I'm baffled
You really do appear to be responding to some other conversation.
It does seem to go back and forth a bit...
...and I admit I might lose track somewhat when the thread starts getting long. The initial diary and the first few comments seemed to be discussing the Pope's legal status both within the Church and with regards to international status. The question seemed to be, the Pope royally goofed in his previous positions, possibly criminally - is there anything anyone can do about it? I have argued that I'm not sure there really is much anybody can do about the Pope, but for those Bishops operating within various jurisdictions they can and should be prosecuted in accordance with the laws of those jurisdictions. I did get the sense that a few commenters used this discussion as an opportunity to unload their frustrations and anger on the church in a way that got us away from the initial question. These are frustrations that I largely share, but not completely relevant, regarding doctrinal issues such as opposition to abortion or birth control.
I don't understand how I earned this reputation with you, especially since we do often agree on many things. I'm not going to claim I never misunderstand someone's comment, but I would appreciate it if something were re-explained rather than being dismissed as not paying attention.
$quot;Royally GOOFED$quot;?
I find your attitude, as expressed here, insulting, contemptuous, and despicable.
You are responding to my comments, which you claim to have read. As I noted earlier, the topic of the conversation is Joseph Ratzinger's increasingly probable role as the organizer and leader of an international conspiracy to cover up, deny, and shield sex abuse on the part of thousands of priests and tens of thousands of adolescents. A topic that I did not raise, written and front-paged by one the three site co-owners, and posted in response to world-wide attention in the public mainstream press. You falsely compare me to Ken Starr, and then follow that with a comment that characterizes Joseph Ratzinger's behavior a "goof" ("possibly criminal")?
A possibly criminal "goof" is when a busy administrator forgets to withhold and pay the employer's share of payroll taxes on his or her household help.
These are major crimes. These are crimes that men and women kill each other about, that nations go to war about. Am I angry? You bet I am. I want to see secular authorities aggressively acting to protect adolescents from these predators — since it is so imminently clear that this institution is not only incapable of doing so, but instead has a long history of actively protecting and enabling them.
You have clearly chosen where your sympathies lie in this discussion. The insulting vocabulary you employ betrays your true feeling, and your attempts to feign "objectivity" or "neutrality" come across to me as outright intellectual dishonesty.
"Royally goofed"? What an appalling thing to say.
I get the moral outrage, I really do...
...but I cannot discuss very well if I have to look over my shoulder to see if someone is going to object to my precise vocabulary. I suspect I mean "royal goof" as a weightier term than you are taking it to be. At very least save your anger for the Church and it's leadership and kindly not take it out on me (e. g. the first and last lines of your above comment). You want aggressive prosecutions? Fine, I'm right there with you as long as we don't make it up as we go along and we get our individuals, the facts, and the law right. That's all I'm asking and I was just trying to convey that I'm not sure even Germany can touch the Pope now that he is sovereign. I also in no way want any of my comments construed to suggest that I am defending the sins of either commission or omission on the part of the Church. I admit I do find it difficult and frustrating to discuss with you when you get yourself wound up.
Spare me
You write "At very least save your anger for the Church and it's leadership and kindly not take it out on me."
Christopher, here are your words directed at me:
Those are incendiary, aggressive, "fighting" words. I'm not objecting to your "precise vocabulary", I'm responding to the inflammatory and insulting attitude that a great many of your comments on this thread convey. You join jconway in your astonishing practice of throwing angry invective and then whining when it is answered in kind.
Several more pieces have been published in the mainstream press today that strengthen the perception that those of us calling for the aggressive prosecution of this criminal enterprise have, in fact, got our individuals, facts and law exactly right.
If you sincerely don't want your comments to be construed to suggest that you are defending the criminal acts (I could give a flying f**k about "sins") of the Catholic Church, then I strongly encourage you to pay a LOT more attention to your "precise vocabulary."
it's not about agreeing or disagreeing
It's a fundamental expectation that responses should match up to arguments. Frequently yours don't. When they do, I enjoy reading you. When they don't it's frustrating. I know I'm not the only one who's chided you for this.
In this discussion, you're clearly not following the thread you're replying on. Your replies come across as ill-considered and more than a little condescending. I'm almost certain you don't intend that.
No I certainly didn't intend it.
Maybe the problem is I look at my comment page and click on the ones that have responses and respond directly to those without having the rest of the context in front of me - sorry. I really have tried to keep my comments germane.
Perhaps you skimmed this part?
I'll condense it a little for you:
Of course not
I just like to:
A) Hear/read the other side of the story before passing judgement, and
B) Follow the law regarding consequences, criminality of the acts, jurisdiction, etc.
well...
After nearly thirty years, and stretching over more than thirty countries, it's clear that, as an institution the church is complicit and the pope, as the head of that church is likewise complicit. The most generous view is that the pope(s) set the tone of secrecy and obfuscation, not to mention setting an adversarial stance with investigators, because they sincerely believed (against overwhelming evidence) that the problem was A) treatable and 2) contained to a small number of priests. Their actions, however earnest they themselves took them to be, could not have been calculated better to maximize hurt had they actually set out to do so...
So, yes, the pope is not responsible for molesting thousands of boys (i.e., he did not molest them himself), but he is responsible for the molestation of thousands of children... Simple organizational competence would, I daresay, have saved a good deal of crimes from occurring...
I'm being straightforward
The pope is like a supreme court justice...only the person in question can compel a resignation. And since the pope's justification of power is his current interpretation of God's will, that means that he's not going anywhere.
There are legal mechanisms to harass world organizations such as you mention. However, nothing any government could do the Catholic Church could be so damaging as what it's been doing to itself for the past decade-plus.
His current interpretation
It doesn't work exactly like that, though I appreciate your tone. I think the issue to which you allude is that the pope is the sovereign, much as QEII is with respect to the UK, and arrest and prosecution are therefore complicated from a purely legal perspective.
Not really
Arrest and prosecution are legally complex, not because he's a sovereign (Omar Bashir is subject to arrest in several countries). However, I don't think Belgium or Spain will declare "universal jurisdiction" on him, a designation typically used for genocide. For the same reason, I don't think The Hague is going to get involved.
As for the Pope's "current interpretation of God's will", the pope can speak without restriction ex cathedra ("from the chair") during which he is infallible. So if Benedict XVI declares that God has forgiven him ex cathedra, there is legally nothing that the membership of the Catholic Church can do.
QEII is an interesting case. She has lots of potential power (royal assent), and would probably lose it if she ever actually exercised it. If the pope exercises his power, the Catholic hierarchy is not going to restrict him, since he's appointed all its members of note.
$quot;Take down$quot; implies that the papacy is accountable to someone
Which, unfortunately, I'm not sure is the case. Who would prosecute the pope? We'd have to invade the Vatican to arrest him.
I think $quot;consent of the governed$quot;
starts to apply. If he has lost the confidence of too much of his following and, perhaps more importantly, if other heads of state stop taking his calls, then he will be forced to step aside. I doubt he'll ever be tried in any legal court, but as all of us in the blogosphere know, the court of public opinion can be powerful in its own way.
The Vatican prides itself...
...in NOT being swayed by public opinion. I also doubt other heads of state will stop taking the calls of a fellow head of state.
It can pride itself all it wants,
but if it wants to keep people coming through the doors and dropping $$$ in the basket, it may have to "lead by following" at some point. I don't know if we've reached that point, but I suspect we're getting mighty close.
Countries pressure each other or cut off direct contact all the time. The Vatican is notorious for butting into the legislative process of other countries, USA included. I don't know why the United States would put heavy pressure on Uganda to trash their gay genocide bill but not put pressure on the Vatican to stop harboring the ringleader of a child rapist ring.
People withholding offerings is fine...
...though I think most stays within the diocese or archdiocese. For the US to intervene in a church's choice of leadership gets quite dicey, though part of the church's role is to be a prophetic voice on policy, something my own denomination does all the time. I've never been comfortable with our manipulating who gets chosen leader of other countries either.
Evidence?
There is enough evidence to connect you to heading a child rapist ring as there is to connecting the Holy Father to one. By the one the College of Cardinals and the clergy and laity are all part of the Body of Christ on Earth. To those that believe we would not want to be called a 'ring of child rapists' thank you.
your blind defense of child rapists
does make me wonder about your own history.
When have I defended child rapists?
And how dare you imply I'm one!
Ah, so you don't like it either?
You did the same to me above. There is mounting evidence that the pope enabled child rapists and abusers. You said there was as much evidence about me as about him, therefore you accused me of being a child rapist. Glad to hear you don't care for that accusation any more than I do.
$$$
if the $$$ stops pouring in, you better believe the Vatican will be swayed by public opinion.
Hmm
I don't think I want other countries bullying my religion, I would argue that in a rational, liberal, intelligent person like yourself would find this a bit extreme dont you think?
Also there is no consent of the governed since the Catholic church is a wonderfully un-democratic organization, which is why it has been able to maintain its orthodoxy unlike our Protestant brothers and sisters.
A lesson for us in power.
Certainly the Roman Church isn't alone in this. History gives examples from at least Biblical and Roman times. Power over people leads to the most base corruptions. Our own elected have shown us many times.
"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." - Abraham Lincoln
Oh, please
You've spammed us with a site hawking a sensationalist treatment of allegations that were investigated nearly two decades ago and found to be utterly without foundation ("elaborate hoax" is the phrase that investigators used). Are you aware that this appears to be more LaRouchian nonsense? Your attempt to compare this to the clergy sex scandal insultingly trivializes the latter — especially its victims.
In Massachusetts alone, hundreds of priests abused "probably more than a thousand" teenagers over a span of decades (source). Massachusetts was just one state, and more recently we learn that similar institutional coverups appear to have been orchestrated in Ireland, Germany, Austria, and elsewhere.
Now it seems increasingly evident that the conspiracy to shield, protect, and enable ordained sex abusers extends to the Pope himself (not to mention his brother). Joseph Ratzinger was in charge of the Vatican's handling of the unfolding clergy sex abuse scandal when Bernard Law resigned in 2002. It seems clear enough to me that Joseph Ratzinger was protecting himself and his brother when he rescued Bernard Law from US authorities. Are we to believe that the College of Cardinals was unaware of all this when Joseph Ratzinger was elevated to Pope?
I hope that these men find themselves exiled in the Vatican — unable to travel outside its boundaries because they face certain prosecution and (probably) imprisonment for the staggering number of young lives they conspired to destroy.
Change is a coming
My 0 was for the second half, the sensational accusation that Benedict and his brother both sheltered Cardinal Law and somehow covered up ALL of the abuses in the Church. Where are your links to back up this sensational charge? Suffice to say that needs work i.e research and corroboration to back it up.
That said I changed it to a 4 since I liked the first half condemning the LaRochian idiots that have infected this board. At least we can agree on that
What's going on, jconway?
What are so pissed about? These seem to be mostly valid criticisms of the Vatican vis a vis the child molestation scandal.
Reluctantly I reply
Well I gave up blogging for Lent but feel the Lord will forgive me for this one breach to defend his Church.
Up thread we have seen incredibly offensive calls for the Pope's head, comparing Catholics to feudal peasants, calling the Church 'un-Christian' because it opposes federal funds for abortion in health care reform (would Jesus really want the federal government to fund abortion? but I digress), and the worst one by the usually restrained sabutai comparing Benedict to the murderous thug the Ayatollah.
Had those derogatory comments been made about the Dali Lama or a Jewish leader, or even Billy Graham I am sure people would have been appalled and offended but since they were made about the Pope it is okay. One suspects by the comments that many Pope's were burned this past Nov. 5th by the majority of the commentators. I do not find anti-Catholic bigotry justified in response to the clergy sex abuse scandals. I hate Cardinal Law as much as anyone else does, in fact he was part of the reason I left the Church until college (some of you may remember I considered myself a Methodist as late as 2006). But after much soul searching I concluded that the Church still spoke to me and that much like the excesses of Alexander VI did not justify Luther's reformation, the evil's of one cardinal cannot taint the whole Church.
The Holy Father has been cooperating with all civil authorities in Germany, they have been turning over the names of corrupt priests and bishops who either abused or helped cover up the abuse of children. Additionally much like Benedict had the courage to meet with sex abuse advocacy groups in the US even though it was not scheduled and even though these groups have consistently attacked his papacy for a variety of unrelated reasons, he will also be meeting with similar groups in Germany and one can soon guess that the Church will have to make generous civil settlements which I am sure it will not fight. Yet in spite of all this Catholics who dislike Benedict over the completely unrelated issues of abortion and gay rights are calling for his head, non-Catholics are using this as an opportunity to take a few convenient swipes at the Church, and of course the so called Democrats on this board have decided to take up rhetorical arms against only the largest and most historically important constituency of the Democratic party.
I am not saying Benedict is entirely innocent either, I am simply saying that if people on this site afforded John Edwards and Elliot Spitzer the benefit of the doubt before all the evidence pointed to their corruption I do not see why they can't do the same to a public figure who has done so much more good for Catholics and non-Catholics alike all over the world. While JPII was more popular I would argue that Benedict has done far more in terms of ecumenical relations, especially with Jews and the Muslims, in establishing real relations. He has done far more to reunify Orthodox and Roman Catholics, far more to reunify Anlicans and Catholics, and far more to oppose the universal threat that unbridled materialism has to our values, our planet, and people around the world. Benedict is probably the strongest moral voice against free market capitalism and for that reason should be hailed by the left, but instead because the left abhors religion he is mocked and villified.
Let the evidence come forward. If Benedict was at all involved in covering up abuses, or even worse abusing himself, the College of Cardinals will surely implement the rarely invoked articles of papal impeachment. Benedict will surely abdicate rather than go through that indignity. So far the evidence points to him using poor judgment in just one case by allowing the housing of one priest accused of abuse undergoing therapy in his diocese. The accusations were never corroborated and the priest eventually left the church on his own accord. If hearsay cannot damn someone to civil authorities it certainly should not damn someone in ecclesiastical circles either. If Benedict can be accused of anything it was being too forgiving and exercising poor judgment, which he has admitted to and apologized for.
So until the evidence emerges that Benedict directly covered up abuses as either Bishop, Cardinal, or Pope I think we should end the sensationalistic headline of that David propagated, and certainly end the rhetoric of hatred and bigotry so many have espoused on this thread.
So far I praise the Pope, who unlike the American cardinals that dismissed the abuse scandal initially as an attack on the church, as stated unequivocally that the abuse of children has no place in Germany, in the Church, or around the world. That priests are called to serve and any priest who engages in this activity is violating that sacred trust and will be turned over to the civil authorities for prosecution. That is a clear call to cleansing the church of any abusers compared to the sounds of denials and contortions that Cardinal Law made on the witness stand so many years ago. And especially as a Boston cradle Catholic who was about the same age as many of the young men abused when the scandal emerged, it is a most welcome change.
0's are quite drastic
And I reserve them for truly bigoted comments. I didn't see anything like that above. But hey, do as thou wilst.
Hmm
You don't think calling the entire Catholic Church a gang of child rapists is bigoted? You don't think comparing the Holy Father to the Ayatollah is bigoted? You don't think saying all priests hate women, fear sex, and are pedophiles is bigoted?
Good for you for sticking up for your beliefs!
I've been around long enough to know that no religion, no political party or system, no ethnic group, even no two married people have a monopoly on evil or stupidity. You are right: some of the comments here have been a bit much.
Seriously?
Voting to delete every comment critical of the Catholic Church is "sticking up for his beliefs"? Really?
Where I come from, we figure any institution that can't stand up to some scrutiny doesn't deserve anyone's faith.
Note that I was responding to his written statement, not to his ratings.
Where the hell do you come from by the way?
His written statement was (purportedly, if not substantively) a defense of his ratings
In point of fact I'm originally from Cape Cod.
He may be that guy
who wrote a letter to the Globe accusing it of "Catholic bashing" every time there was anything in the paper that was remotely critical of anything having to do with the RCC. You know what I mean. That he still defends the institution in the face of evidence that child abuse is rampant in the Church is all you need to know. His abusing the ratings system is just more evidence that he has no objectivity on the subject.
Listen bud
I have never written to the Globe, although it does engage in Catholic bashing from time to time, and has done so since its early history bashing the 'hibernian hordes taking us to Rome'. it is incredibly sad that so many of you sound exactly as those same bigots that would deny my ancestors civil rights in this country and nearly prevented the first of my kind from ascending to the Presidency, a man many of you revere for his progressive policies. What I am arguing is two fold: first that the abuse scandal is horrible, and Catholics are arguably the most affected by it compared to the laity, and as a Catholic raised in Boston I have been more affected that most of you.
My grandfather was nearly molested back in the day, my brother had friends that were molested, and I left the Church for a time because of the way Cardinal Law responded to the scandals. In no way am I defending Cardinal Law, or any of the bishops that have covered up sex abuse. I am defending the Pope for two reasons. First because I believe in the American concept of innocence until guilt is proven. Thus far there has only been one incident where the Pope housed someone in his diocese who was accused of sexual impropriety. So far it has not been substantiated if that impropriety was against children, how long the priest was housed, and whether or not housing the priest violated German law at the time. Frankly at that time pedophilia was considered a treatable disorder in the psychiatric community, much like homosexuality was, and the Church at that time responded to sexual impropriety by counseling the priests. Now thanks to Benedict the Church has a zero tolerance policy, one that many have condemned Benedict for, but it screens potential priests to make sure they are not pedophiles, kicks pedophiles, homosexuals, and active heterosexuals out of the priesthood instead of counseling them. A policy some have condemned as un-compassionate but one that certainly ensures that no sexual impropriety of any sort can continue by priests. Secondly I am defending the Pope and the Church against broader anti-Catholic bigotry expressed on this site. Sentiments such as 'all priests fear sex, hate women, and engage in pedophilia' and accusations that the Church is a massive child rapist ring are completely bigoted statements that ought to be removed. Were such statements made about Jews I am sure the offenders would be permanently banned. But the Catholic church as the largest, oldest, and most orthodox Christian body is constantly under assault and is an easy target.
The second, solid tangible evidence emerges that Benedict engaged in systematic cover ups, criminal conspiracies, and other Cardinal Law esque acts of corruption and criminal complacency then I will be the first and loudest Catholic to call for a Papal Impeachment and a new College of Cardinals to elect an untainted Pope. I will also hope and pray that the Vatican allows the Pope to be extradicted to be prosecuted IF SUBSTANTIAL EVIDENCE EMERGES. Until that date I think calls for such drastic action are premature and are motivated by hatred of Benedict because he is religious, socially conservative, etc. and are unrelated to any genuine concern for the children abused. people on this thread have used this scandal as an excuse to make incredibly bold and unsubstantiated assaults against the Church.
It was systemic corruption, jconway
You treat this as if it was just all Cardinal Law's fault -- in this reply and even more so in others in this thread. It wasn't. This was a systemic, macro problem. It happened all across America and, indeed, at the very least on a systemic level through much of Europe. There's a whole bevy of cases of the Catholic church and police working to cover up tons of cases in Ireland. There's been scandals erupting in Germany, Austria. The thing's wide-spread and touches not only the Pope, but his brother.
The Church is not being persecuted, your victimhood is of a faux quality. The days of catholics being fed to the lions have been over for roughly 1500 years. Any anger directed at it is purely of its own doing. The damage done to it was also done by it, by protecting its priests instead of its children, and by driving so many of its members away through its hostile intolerance of others. If its members, who are not to blame, want this to stop, they have to force their church leaders to change.
And Nova Scotia, Canada
It is hard to keep track, I understand.
And Nova Scotia, Canada
It is hard to keep track, I understand.
He's never defended the actions being discussed here.
Of course you can defend an institution even in the face of bad acts. For example the US is my home and I am a proud patriotic American. There is plenty about this country I love and will defend for all the good we have done in the world. Doesn't mean I approve of African-American slavery, forced removal of our native population, or put Japanese-descended west coast residents in detention camps, or even more modern acts such as torture in the war on terror.
Thank you again
As to Kirth it is hard for me to be objective when it is MY church we are talking about and MY friends and family who have been subject to abuse or potential abuse. I remember when I was in the 7th grade and spent two hours after school with a priest learning how to be a lector and the motions of the liturgy and I, my parents, and my friends thought nothing of it. The next year when I was invited to a spiritual retreat out in the woods as part of confirmation that was to be headed by that same priest my parents warned me not to go and my friends mocked me for thinking about going. What changed?
The Boston sex abuse crisis burst onto the front pages, into the national conscious, and into stand up's punchlines all over the country. My mother lost her faith in the Church for a second time, and I continued my road to agnosticism, which later led me back to Christianity and eventually back to the Church. But it was a long journey, incidentally I still have yet to be confirmed. So believe me, this has been an incredibly sad and painful process for all Catholics, my heart goes out to the Catholics who lost the faith because of this and still have not been to Church. It goes out to all the parishes and churches that have had to close because the Church indebted itself by paying back the victims, it goes out to Cardinal Sean who had to clean up the horrible mess his corrupt predecessor lead behind, and to Benedict who had to do the same, since while everyone loved JPII, his sense of forgiveness and compassion extended to those that should not have been sheltered, especially Cardinal Law.
This scandal rocked the Church in America to the core, it has not recovered in Boston (it may never recover) and it has only begun to recover elsewhere in the country.
Sadly it has now struck Germany which was beginning to have a renaissance of Catholic faith due to the Pope's German heritage and outreach to the European faithful. Believe me those setbacks are tangible and real and I am not denying them. And frankly in many cases where dioceses engaged in whole sale cover-ups it is easy to see why some can say it is deserved. What I am in fact denying is the pretense that many on this site have that the Pope is somehow responsible for this behavior and condoned it, when all evidence has so far pointed to the contrary. I am denying the more outright statements of ignorance and bigotry, statements like 'all priests hate women and fear sex', 'most priests are closeted homosexuals thrust into pedophilia', 'the Pope is just as bad as the Ayatollah;, 'the Church is running a Child rapist ring'. Etc. That is what is so tragic, that a Church that has done so many good things for the world, that is in fact the main contributor and actor in the aid to Haiti, that runs the largest adoption agency in the country, that runs the largest system of charity hospitals, that is the only voice standing up for both universal health care and a culture that respects life, is to be vilified and demonized because of the actions of a few bad people. And there was a time when I had that same hatred in my heart, because the betrayal felt so personal, how could they do that to us their loyal laity? Yet one should judge the whole Church and not just the actions of a few corrupt members. The many faithful laity and clergy should not be punished for the acts of the cowardly few.
$quot;all evidence points to the contrary.$quot;
Except the priest that molested children, who the Pope sent to therapy, who later went and molested more children.
If you want to make an argument, at least make one that isn't directly contradicted by the very diary David wrote to begin with.
BTW
That priest who Ratzinger let go, get therapy, return to duty and be a priest again, only to molest more children, is not -- as you've claimed on this thread -- out of the church. He's still a priest and in employ of the RCC. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/t...
You DO have the ability to change your ratings, you know
Are at all aware of Joseph Ratzinger's history before he was elevated to Pope? You write "If Benedict can be accused of anything it was being too forgiving and exercising poor judgment" — Joseph Ratzinger being "too forgiving"? I'll grant you the "exercising poor judgement", but there is zero evidence in his lengthy career as head of the Inquisition (that's original name of the office he held and aggressively executed) that he was ever "forgiving."
The evidence of the complicity of Joseph and Georg Ratzinger in shuffling accused and, in some cases convicted sex abusers from parish to parish is emerging every day. It is emerging from Ireland, from Austria, and from Germany. The pattern is the same as the pattern we saw in Massachusetts. Sadly, the knee-jerk accusations of anti-Catholic bias such as you make here are also quite familiar.
If you want to leave your "zeros" as they are, by all means do so. I don't know about anyone else here, but I interpret them as demonstrating that you know as well as I that (a) there is far more substance to these allegations than you admit, and (b) the fact that he has been elevated to Pope casts a very dark shadow on the entire institution.
I appreciate that you love the Church you have been raised with. I hope you appreciate that if damage is being done to that Church, it is being done by those who, like Joseph Ratzinger, committed and who cover up these horrific crimes — not by those who, like me, speak out against them.
Ratings and Brookline
I think comparing the Pope, a spiritual leader who has killed no one, supports democracy, and is fighting for social justice to a leader like the Ayatollah who opposes democracy and freedom and has ordered the mass detention and arrests of his opponents merits a 0. I think saying that the Pope and ALL clergy of the Vatican need to be restricted to that city or arrested if they leave it and be prosecuted merits a 0. I think saying the Catholic church is morally bankrupt because it opposes health care reform that funds abortions merits a 0. I think saying that Catholics are essentially feudal and peasant merits a 0. I think saying that the Pope is about to be taken down is a bit sensationalistic and is the kind of headline that encourages dumb comments rather than constructive ones. I'll concede most of these statements are from ignorance and not true bigotry, but ignorance can easily lead to and breed bigotry.
As for your specific comments Brookline, thus far I have seen only one instance of Benedict being complicit in 'covering up' for sex abuse, and that was simply allowing an accused priest to be housed and sheltered at a facility in his diocese that gave him therapy. Now understandably anyone accused of abusing children should be brought immediately to the civil authorities, but the Church, a body dedicated to saving souls, changing behavior, viewed it as simply a manner of restoring the priests chastity through spiritual therapy. A stance that has since been uniformly rejected by all the Church including the Pope who regretted his approval over 30 years ago. Certainly poor judgment but not Cardinal Law levels of cover up, conspiracy, and criminal complicity-intentional complicity at that. This is the only instance reported so far in the mainstream media, in fact if you have read biographies of Benedict both authorized and unauthorized he had a record as being a hardliner against abuse in 2002 and was very thorough in his investigations and always turned over people to the civil authorities. Thats the key. Benedict made a big change from JPII where these things were handled internally to recognizing child abuse is in fact a horrible and heinous civil crime that only police and not priests should be concerned with.
The fact that he headed what 'used to be the Inquisition' is further ignorance of Catholic history. The Congregation for Defense of the Faith was an office within the Church, kind of like a police departments internal affairs bureau, to ensure that all priests were acting in accordance with their vows and with the dogma of the Catholic church. So priests that were pedophiles to priests distributing pizza instead of wafers at communion fell under that jurisdiction. It was not like the Spanish Inquisition which was a government sponsored ethnic cleansing of Jews and Muslims from Spain that was condemned by both the contemporary Church at the time and the modern Church since. The Congregation for the Defense of the Faith is directly descended from the Italian inquisition which was mainly directed at the Cathars, Savignarola, and other heretics within Italy-in other words an internal effort to make sure priests conformed to Catholic doctrine.
Perhaps I was a bit far to call these statements bigoted, but they are certainly ignorant. Educated people like yourselves would not consider Jack Bauer an accurate authority on Islam so why is Dan Brown suddenly an authority on Catholicism?
Fixed that for you.
Also,
Way to trivialize sexual abuse of children!
(By the way, so far as I can tell you're the first one to cite Dan Brown in this discussion.)
my lord
I am not trivializing sex abuse!
BrooklineTom made claims that Ratzinger was head of the inquisition falsely linking it to the spanish inquisition, much like Dan Brown did when a character said the church killed 'millions' in the middle ages.
Instead I said Ratzinger was head of the Congregation for Defense of the Doctrine of the Faith which concerned itself BOTH with investigating sex abuse AND investigating abuses of the liturgy such as the pizza communion, since it investigated the wholesale disavowal of vows by priests. A priest that is nice, wholesome, and doesn't touch children is still in violation of his vows if he has a consenting relationship with an adult, if he engages in heresies like a pizza communion or denouncing aspects of the faith, or embezzling money, etc.. The organization Ratzinger headed investigates all claims against priests from the serious to what outsiders might consider trivial. In this way my analogy to an internal affairs department within a police department made sense. They investigate serious crimes like police engaging in drug trafficking to minor ones like police that sleep on the job.
I do think the zeros are a little extreme.
Why?
In every case a zero was made it was made in regard to a statement that was bigoted against Catholics, Catholic leaders, or the Holy Father. Replace the phrase 'priest/Catholic/pope' in any of those statements with the phrase 'black, gay, or jew' and they sound bigoted.
They are statements that rely on generalizations, sterotypes, and misconceptions and statements that were never backed up with fact. I am sorry comparing the Pope to the ayatollah, saying Catholics are part of a child rapist ring, and saying all priests, ALL priests, hate women and fear sex. Those are vitriolic statements that have no place on this thread and violate the terms of use and ground rules everyone is supposed to abide by. Frankly I am considering leaving Bluemassgroup if the editors do not take action, since I am incredibly offended and am made uncomfortable by those specific statements and were they made against a racial or religious minority action would have definitely been taken by now. They are hateful and I continue to be bullied for my faith. Something distinctly undemocratic and illiberal if you ask me. Not to mention un-american.
You'd better get used to it
If you think my reaction here is harsh, you're going to face a very difficult immediate future as the truth about what happened becomes more widely known.
Meanwhile, this statement of yours — "saying all priests, ALL priests, hate women and fear sex" — is an outright lie.
Here is the paragraph of mine that you are lying about:
The phrase "disproportionally selects" does not mean "all" in anybody's universe, except perhaps your own.
Parsing
"disproportionally selects" still means that in your view the majority of priests hate women and fear sex. This is complete and utter bullshit that goes unsubstantiated. Furthermore it is completely contradicted by the fact that the Vatican is now very publicly screening future priests to ensure that no homosexuals, pedophiles, or continually sexually active heterosexuals enter the priesthood. Outside psychologists have shown there is no link between celibacy and pedophilia and the mountain of sex abuse cases in Jewish, Protestant, and Muslim denominations should show you that celibacy alone is not a factor. Independent studies by outside groups have shown that the main factors behind the Catholic abuse scandal had nothing to do with celibacy. Additionally the Jewish community has had a massive abuse scandal as well and rabbis are not celibate, in fact most of the abusers were married rabbis. The Southern Baptists have had a predator problem as well.
Lastly a few important soundbites from another third party study
So those facts disprove several of the generalities and sterotypes you have perpetuated. Married clergy are just as likely to commit offenses. Non Catholic clergy are just as likely. Non clergy are MORE likely to commit offenses than Catholic clergy. Screening in the beginning before ordination as the Vatican is doing is the best defense. Most of the abusers were abused themselves thus, ending the cycle of abuse now is the best key to preventing it in the future, as well as treating the victims AND the perpetrators which the Church is incredibly active in doing. The biggest single mistake the Church hierarchy made was treating this as an insular problem and acting out of compassion to the priests who committed the abuse by being too forgiving and giving them second chances (which mostly resulted in them abusing again), and committing them to broad sex therapy groups that did not specifically address their disorders. Again just check the facts.
And as soon as you have proof that the Pope actively encouraged or covered up abuses himself then by all means attack him as a horrible monster, because he would be one. So far I have heard of one reported case where then Raztinger approved of a priest being housed in his diocese, the bishop that knew that priest was an abuser and allowed him to continue was a successor to Ratzinger and had nothing to do with the Holy Father. That Bishop is currently being punished by the Church and being handed over to civil authorities for questioning. A key difference between the reaction of Benedict and the reaction of Cardinal Law is that he immediately condemned the abuse, immediately promised to open up the books and cooperate with civil authorities and offered no shelter to priests that abused children while offering shelter, treatment, and settlements to those children that were abused. He considers this a great stain on the church even though these cases are remarkably isolated when compared to the church as a whole, and he wants to purify the church of this stain. That is a sea change from the reaction of Cardinal Law and even JPII. And it is a change advocates of children Catholic and non-Catholic alike should applaud rather than mock and condemn with innuendo and unsubstantiated generalizations.
What?
I can't say for certain what BrooklineTom's true views are, not being him, but in no way does "disproportionate" necessarily imply "majority."
Hmm
Does it not imply more often than not? Or far too often? In any case the data has shown that within the number of clergy who have engaged in sexual acts with a minor (consensual AND otherwise) is only around 2%, clearly a drop in the bucket when compared to the rest of the priesthood and with the rates of the non-clerical male population (at 8%). I mean that by the way without any insensitivity to the victims, certainly 2% is still far from desirable and considering the scope and size of the Catholic clergy still means hundreds if not thousands of victims. That is a tragedy I do not wish to downplay. That said the fact is that there is no proof that this trend is disproportionate to Catholic clergy, in fact the data seems to suggest otherwise-that Catholic clergy are less likely overall than the entire male population to engage in these actions.
So why does the Church get such a high profile? As Fr. James Martin has written, a lot of this attention is because outsiders find the Church mysterious and think the celibacy rule is a quaint feature that means these men have to be dysfunctional in some way-clearly this is what BrooklineTom implies. Yet I know plenty of celibate people in and outside of the priesthood that are completely happy and not inclined towards abuse whatsoever and a few of them are women and a few are not even religious. So BrooklineToms claims are quite bogus on a variety of fronts.
Strictly speaking...
... it means 'more often than would otherwise be', not 'more often than not', which would be more accurately expressed as 'usually' as opposed to 'disproportionately'.
I'm seeing a lot of claims without a lot of data or cites about what is or isn't disproportionate. Neither point is really relevant for the Church's institutional scandal, which was the cover-up.
Motivation for the coverup
I suggest that a significant motivation for the coverup is the recognition (probably implicit) on the part of Catholic authorities that deeply-rooted institutional policy (non-ordination of women, priestly celibacy, etc.) is likely to be causal. The implication is that it will be very hard to actually solve the problem without changing the institutional factors that cause it. Hence there is very strong motivation to cover up evidence of the symptoms.
Clergy sex abuse is, sadly, not unique to the Catholic church. The breath-taking extent, in both scope and authority, of the coverup is unique to the Catholic church. I suggest that the evidence points to causal and systemic factors, and will not easily go away.
You could just as easily have picked up a dictionary
but I'll help you out. "Disproportionate" means "out of proportion." Thus to say that a particular institution disproportionately attracts a particular kind of person is merely to claim that the percentage of members of the institution who are that kind of person is higher (perhaps much higher, perhaps only a little higher) than the percentage of the general population. So, BrooklineTom is saying that the percentage of the Catholic priesthood who hate women and fear sex is higher than the percentage of the general population who do. I don't know whether it's true or not - it seems plausible but hard to measure - but you do yourself no favors by pretending he made a claim he didn't.
A couple of other points.
This is a pretty disturbing thing to say. A minor by definition cannot consent to sexual acts with an adult. But by citing this 2% number (though you don't provide a source for it) you're again putting words in BrooklineTom's mouth: he said particular attitudes were disproportionately prevalent among the Catholic priesthood, not particular crimes.
I think the claim that child rapists in the Church get more news attention than child rapists who aren't priests "because outsiders find the Church mysterious" is patently absurd. These scandals have gotten a lot of attention because 1) the Church has always explicitly promoted itself and its clergy as being safe, trustworthy, loving people who would never harm anyone, especially children; 2) countless people believed that and trusted clergy with their children; 3) the Church is well document to have, after betraying that trust, covered up the scandals, tried to pay off the victims, and protected the rapists. No condescending, self-important nonsense about the poor simple plebs just not understanding the Church's grand complexity is necessary to explain the extent of the media coverage.
It also gets higher profile...
...because priests are and should be held to a higher standard of trust and morality. Also, the scandal aspect of it WAS exaserbated by prelates such as Cardinal Law who tried to sweep this under the rug.
You're out of control and irrational
You wrote:
The phrase "disproportionally selects" has a very specific meaning. Suppose a given trait has a certain frequency in a given population ("12% of college students wear plaid shirts") and is randomly distributed within that population. When a subset of that population is selected at random, then the given trait should also appear at the same rate in the subset. If the measured frequency in the subset is higher than the original population ("32% of engineering students wear plaid shirts"), then the process by which the subset was created "disproportionally selects" for the given trait.
I meant exactly what I wrote — if the frequency of misogynist men who fear sex is 1.2% of the general population and 6.0% of priests, then the discernment process disproportionally selects for misogyny and fear of sex. Given this data (I chose the numbers arbitrarily), it would be entirely accurate to say "priests are five times more likely to be misogynist and fearful of sex than the general population". Note that 6.0% is still a very small minority of priests.
Not the "majority". Not "all". Simply more than the general population. I suggest that there is an abundance of data to support this claim regarding the Catholic church.
I know you find this hard to believe, but I really do know more about what I mean than you, I am not generally shy about saying what I mean, and I'm reasonably able to put meanings into words.
You are filling this thread with harsh (and false) invective personally directed at me, and you have the audacity to suggest my comments should be suppressed (not to mention your simultaneous ratings abuse)?
I suggest you take a breather.
If jconway's 8%>2% claim is accurate
Then it seems like Catholic priests are 75% less likely to be child molesters than the average male, right?
Sir
Even speaking of disproportionately is a waste of time until you use anything resembling even a modicum of real evidence rather than the anecdotal evidence on which you rely. I have linked to several studies that have demonstrated the statistics on this phenomenon and have actual statistics backing me up. What do you have beyond your repeat insistence that disproportionate numbers of priests hate women and fear sex? Have you interviewed priests and come to this conclusion is there a secret memo only you have had access too from the Holy father himself instructing new priests to hate women and fear sex? Where does this ridiculous assertion come from besides your own imagination? Besides saying that they are celibate what other inference leads you to this conclusion?
8% of adult males
have had sex with a minor? I don't see where your study substantiates that - he just says it "is best estimated to be closer to 8%." Does that number include men who had such an experience when they were themselves minors? Does the number for priests include them? Without support, the 8% number is an assertion, not a fact.
Yeah, that's fishy.
Dr. David Lisak at UMass Boston studies the psychology of rape and sexual violence, and has published some excellent (both links to PDFs) material on the subject. In particular, a compilation of surveys where men were asked questions about behavior (in descriptive terms: "have you done X?" rather than "have you rpaed someone?") suggests that the number of men who repeatedly commit rape/sexual assault is between about 5% and 15% of the overall male US population. The 8% number would fit with that if Plante were talking about sexual assault in general, but without any support it's pretty questionable that that many have raped children.
I also note that the source jconway cites says "2 to 5%" of priests, yet jconway himself keeps only saying 2% - that's pretty intellectually dishonest, I think.
Oh, please
You are the only person on this thread who has failed to use facts.
Furthermore, by all means, don't let the lack of action by David, Bob and Charley prevent you from leaving. It was, after all, your mission for lent not to post. LOL.
the bill does not fund abortion
if you are going to come onto this blog and exercise your faith blindly, you will be called, continually, on your repeated falsehoods, by me and others. Brookline Tom's corrections, it should be noted, are indeed correct -- the Church's push for social justice has been limited not only by its push for rabid hotbotton issues, but just who the church thinks deserves that social justice. A social justice that is so limited in scope is faux-social justice.
A zero in kind -- and for completely distorting my metaphor
Actually, I said they weren't bound to the land. Either you have no grasp in the history of the feudal system... or you're completely and offensively distorting what I said. Catholics are not bound to their "king." I left the church as have millions of others over the past decade, many of whom are gone specifically because of their seemingly institution-wide decision to cover-up and therefore propagate child molestation and rape.
I was raised and confirmed Catholic. It was hard for me to get to this point, but the facts are the facts. It was more important to the Catholic Church to cover-up and keep their child-raping priests than to give them to the authorities so justice could prevail. Consequently, thousands and thousands of children have been molested and raped by priests since. This happened on a macro scale, all over the United States and Europe -- at the least. It is hard to understand that and accept that, so I completely understand why you've lashed out, distorted what others have said to suit your own opinions and zero-dropped in this thread -- but rest assured, the rest of the church is quickly catching onto the Catholic Church, no matter the bullying tactics of its last, few remaining members.
Fine
It is sad that one incident that did not directly affect you forced you to leave the Church but I know many who left because of far more trivial reasons so I will not question your judgment. I left myself for these reasons.
Yet currently the Vatican is fully cooperating with civil authorities, handing over all its records, and handing over any guilty priest to be judged by the civil authorities for criminal offenses. That is a sea change form the pattern of dissent, cover up, and conspiracy that occurred under Cardinal Law.
I would strongly urge everyone who has been criticizing the Pope to examine both his statements and his actions in the aftermath of this scandal and compare them to Cardinal Law. That attitude within the Church, that the scandal somehow demonstrated an assault on the Church which it ought to defend itself against with denials, distortions, and cover ups has finally ended and given way to real soul searching regarding this problem. A problem by the way that is not unique to the Church, to religious institutions, and is not caused by celibacy or the Church's stances on gay rights. Furthermore the vast majority of priests are completely innocent and working their best to serve their God. People can feel free to disagree with the Church, that is not what I am arguing against. For people to malign and assault the Church, those that work for it, and those that worship in it, is incredibly insensitive and nonsensical. The intensity and hurtfulness of some of this rhetoric is really quite shameful.
$quot;one incident?$quot;
No, there were thousands.
And, for the record, even after the scandal, I didn't leave. In true battered-spouse fashion, I lingered for a few years, deeply unhappy and hurt. It was the church closing schools when school was in session that helped me decide to go, it was the continued and worsening hostility the Church as an institution -- not laypeople -- treated gay people and women, that helped make the decision easier. When the Catholic Church decided to force the closure of all its adoption services because a few gay couples may have ended up with special needs children who otherwise probably wouldn't have had any home, I was starting to feel very, very confident in my decision. When an institution's bigotry starts to get in the way of its supposed mission work, there's something deeply wrong with it -- and it's only getting worse, over time.
addendums
Name me one person in this thread who's condemned those who worship in the RCC? Specifically, I've mentioned Church leadership, continually saying I wasn't referring to rank-and-file members. Certainly, that's what others have been speaking to, as well. --- You repeatedly claim this scandal is contained to Cardinal Law. It's not. Dozens of Cardinals across the world were just as guilty, while the Pope is at least not innocent. No matter how you try to rationalize his actions when he was a Cardinal in Germany, the fact of the matter is he had a pedophile priest under his jurisdiction at the time, sent that priest to therapy and never prevented him from returning to duty, where he went on to harm more children. To this day, that priest remains a priest and in the employ of the church. The Pope was wrong and his actions caused at least one more child to have to live through that nightmare. --- And people have every right to be angry and "malign" the church as an institution for being bigoted (among other reason). It is. That much is not up for debate. You, on the other hand, are not well served by trying to conflate that protestation against the institution with those who practice the faith. If people criticize "the church," that does not mean they're criticizing you. You are not a victim. Until the Church learns to stay out of other people's business, be prepared for the people who stand at the edge of their sword to fight back, but realize that they're not fighting back against you.
some people can't handle criticism of their church
their faith does not allow it, for how could their institution possibly be wrong?
It was a long and hard road for me to extricate myself from that institution, but I'm very glad I did it. People, in good conscience, should not support an institution that covers up and therefore propagates child molestation and rape. If enough people leave, the church will have no choice but to change drastically and become an institution where such deeds could no longer happen on a massive scale, but it would have to take something on the scale of the Magna Carta to do it. The church will not voluntarily change until it has to change or die.
I can handle criticism
The Church can be validly criticized for its handling of the past sex abuse crisis, criticized for elevating abortion over all other issues within the civil sphere, and criticized for playing politics with communion. I get that. I get those criticisms. What I do no understand is the deep hatred, name calling, stereotyping, and painting with broad brushes of generalization and anecdotal evidence that so many on this thread have engaged in. That is quite hurtful and again were it directed at a religious or racial minority group would have resulted in suspensions from posting for those guilty. But to say priests hate women and fear sex, to call the entire church a child rapist ring, to call me a child rapist, to compare the Pope to the Ayatollah, I am clearly not the only person who sees this as hurtful to me personally and to my church and completely destructive to any kind of civility on this thread.
We can feel free to disagree-just follow the ground rules that BMGers are supposed to follow-no name calling, no unsubstantiated allegations, innuendo or rumor without backing them up with facts and with links, no insulting peoples race, religion, or creed. Why is it so hard for adults not to act like children or worse hateful bigots when it comes to discussing the Catholic church?
Honor and recognition.
Michael Sandel speaks eloquently on matters of honor and recognition, and what he has to say on how and why we accord honor, respect, and recognition to institutions is relevant in this matter.
The framing of your question here is telling and reveals, I think, the truth of Sandel's observations. People expect an organization with institutional status to behave in accordance with its principles, especially an organization that holds itself up as the authority on matters related to moral principles. The public perception is that the Catholic church has not only failed in behaving in accordance with its mission and purpose, that's bad enough, but has actively established an elaborate process to hide, obfuscate, and justify its patently immoral behavior. So not only do we have the criminal and immoral sexual exploitation of children by individuals to contend with, but the perpetrators comprise an institution which derives its moral own authority by its own agency. Because the Catholic church has demanded its status and claims its privileged position with holy authority, people are inclined, due to the nature of people, to bestow honor and recognition upon it. When the church's behavior communicates to people that its vaunted status is fraudulent or dishonest or perhaps even manufactured out of pure self interest, people become angry at not only the individuals involved but the institution itself for its hypocrisy and exploitation of the natural human desire to honor and recognize institutions of value.
So, in short, the anger you detect results from people's natural desire to honor and recognize the vaunted institutions of our society, especially one they have been taught has the right to claim moral superiority and authority.
More comments
Not to beat a dead horse but seriously folks, there has been a tidal wave of leaped to conclusions based on one incident.
Here are the facts:
The priest was never formally accused of abuse after the first accusation and continued in the priesthood until he left in the 2000s.
The priest was not under Benedict in his diocese
The priest was already at a facility in the diocese and Benedict allowed him to be treated for 'sexual impropriety' so its not even clear if Benedict knew that was with children.
Even if he did, pedophilia, much like homosexuality at the time, was deemed a curable psychological disorder, and so it was felt that with prayer and spiritual reflection a priest could return to his duties, it was just a way of restoring celibacy.
Now this was wrong, and today WOULD be criminal since we have clearly defined statutes on the subject, but please to call the Pope the leader of a criminal rapist ring, to compare him to the Ayatollah, to claim he and ALL the clergy should be prosecuted, to call for the US to pass sanctions against the Vatican, this is just as bigoted and irrational as the birthers, those that deny evolution or global warming, or people that hate on gays without any evidence. its truly shameful to see rational, reasonable, intelligent, and liberal people lambast the worlds largest and most prolific religion on almost no evidence what so ever.
Since I believe in backing up my facts here are some links:
http://www.ncregister.com/blog...
I would charge you who have accused my church and its Holy Father of criminal actions of backing this up with evidence.
No.
No, it isn't.
Okay
So you're just like the John Cleese character in the Argument sketch, simply saying 'no it isn't' does not constitute an argument.
So far we have had several claims that have gone completely unsubstantiated
1: By sabutai comparisons of the Pope, a humanitarian even if he disagrees with aspects of the platform of the Democratic Party, to the Ayatollah a figure that is anti-semitic, has arrested and murdered democratic activists, sanctions ethnic cleansing against Jewish and Zoastrian Persians, and that is stockpiling nuclear weapons in defiance of international law. No evidence to back this up.
2: By Laurel accusations that the Pope is the leader of a child rapist ring, that the Church is a child rapist ring, and that since the laity is part of said Church, ALL Catholics are part of a child rapist ring and are child rapists.
3: By BrooklineTom-that most priests hate women, fear sex, and are pedophilic as a result, and a church wide conspiracy to cover up sex abuse, and a church wide conspiracy to commit acts of child abuse and cover it up, all under church sanction
There have been other claims as well but those three are the most egregious and have been completely unsubstantiated by fact. Were such claims made be a newspaper the Church could and would sue for libel and win. Moreover were those claims to be made about another religious group I am sure the posters would be banned.
To test this I will post the following link regarding a recent sex abuse scandal amongst New York rabbis
And make the following claims:
Rabbis hate women and fear sex
Rabbis are just as bad as the Ayatollah
The Orthodox Jews are running a child rapist ring
You DO understand that ...
There is no widespread doctrine of rabbinical celibacy. Right?
To the contrary, there is rather strong cultural and religious pressure for a Rabbi to be married.
You mention an abuse case against a Brooklyn Rabbi. I invite you to offer a shred of evidence that any person in any encompassing Jewish organization shielded him, attempted to pay off the victim in exchange for silence, or took any of the other institutional acts that the Catholic Church did by the THOUSANDS for DECADES around the world.
Not surprisingly, you have put words in my mouth that I didn't write. I didn't say that "most priests hate women", I said instead that men who hate women are over-represented in the Catholic church because of the factors I describe. As the old adage goes, it takes only a spoonful of sewage to spoil a vat of wine. I do say, because in my view the facts point compellingly in this direction, that there has, in fact, been a church-wide conspiracy to cover up acts of sex abuse by clergy.
Finally, I have not made any claims about pedophilia. In fact, the more accurate term that describes the overwhelming majority of the reported cases is "Hebephilia" ("an adult's sexual preference for pubescent children"). Since the similarly overwhelming majority of victims is male (unless there are a truly huge number of unreported female abuse cases), and the perpetrators are male by construction, then stating that the perpetrators are homosexual is a matter of observation. I am under the impression that the general population is about 10% homosexual. Most gay men do not abuse adolescents — in society at large, adolescent women are far more at risk from the overwhelming majority of heterosexual male teachers who therefore create a similarly overwhelming majority of heterosexual Hebephiles. Since the overwhelming majority of clergy sex abuse victims were male, and the perpetrators were male, what conclusions do you draw about the observed facts of the clergy sex abuse scandal?
A few points
I refer you to my links above and well address a few more.
First here is a link to an NPR story showing that there was a massive abuse scandal within Brooklyn Jewish communities and an ongoing civil and criminal investigation into a systematic cover up by the schools and temples involved.
Secondly I refer you to the study I linked above which has shown that rates of pedophilia amongst non-Catholic clergy are in fact the same as rates within the Catholic clergy, and lower than rates among non-clergy within the general population.
Thirdly yes there is a rather strong cultural and religious pressure for a rabbi to marry, and there are also horrible cases of abuse and cover up in their community as well, so I think you just proved my point that there is no link to celibacy what-so-ever. The vast majority of rabbis that committed the abuses were married so it seems that allowing marriage does not solve pedophilia, in fact it has absolutely no change. The small fraction of clergy inclined to be pedophiles in any denomination will do so whether they are married or not. I don't hesitate to inform you that other statutory rapists throughout history, even recent history, were ostensibly happily married on the outside. Any organization that deals with children will attract pedophiles.
Lastly the rates within the Boy Scouts are equivalent to those within the Catholic Church and within the Chicago Public School System for that matter so an organizations religious bent also seems irrelevant.
And as to your last statement, overwhelmingly male teachers abuse female students, that seems to show me that even public schools have problems with abuse? Using your logic then they should be shut down by the state, and all of the teachers and principals should be prosecuted no matter what their connection to the abusers and victims is.
Also I was simply refuting the common trope amongst conservative Catholics that gay priests are automatically pedophiles. Many gay priests have served honorably by maintaining their celibacy and performing brave acts, including that priest on 9/11 so I was simply protecting gay priests from slander. Unlike some conservative Catholics, I have no problem with gay priests so long as they obey the same celibacy requirements straight priests do. I am glad we can at least agree that pedophilia and homosexuality are separate and unrelated things.
Also
While I appreciate you have now narrowed your conception of exactly how many priests hate women and fear sex I invite you to back up claims of how the organization instills this into them. I also don't like the double standard that I have to have a link to each fact I propose yet you can feel free to sputter anti-clerical nonsense without any shred of proof. But please share a link to the Protocols of Priests Hating Women and Fearing Sex that all Catholic clergy are supposedly indoctrinated in, if it is authentic I am sure it will cause quite a stir. Or did you find it on your shelf next to your books about Papists eating babies during Mass or the dangers of a Papist President. You know I think your right if we elect that damn Kennedy he'll make the College of Cardinals his cabinet now won't he?
Well said.
For an interesting exchange, you might watch this Intelligence Squared debate in which the proposition "The Catholic Church Is a Force For Good in the World" is debated, Oxford style. Hitchens and Fry clearly win the day--and the reasons why they win are so patently clear by the unwillingness of the proponents, an archbishop from Nigeria and a former MP, of the motion to acknowledge the church's history in any meaningful context. This two-hour debate is an excellent example of what NOT to do in a debate, Oxford style or otherwise.
Ah yes...
... I remember linking to this one a while back. Can't remember in regards to what though.
We must read the
same websites fairly often. IQ2 is a great site. Would that the American equivalent were half as lively and interesting.
Thanks
Well if I have the free time I will certainly watch it. I have seen partial transcripts, and while I have little respect for Hitchens, a war apologist among other faults, I have tremendous respect for Fry both on and off the small screen. That said the transcripts seem to show historical ignorance on the part of the non-believers and a tendency, a not too infrequent one sadly, to equate a lot of violence loosely associated with the Church with the Church itself.
For one none of the Crusades after the first were ever sanctioned by the Church, second the Pope narrowly was ordering the Christian nations to protect Pilgrims-not establish fiefdoms in the Middle East and not to slaughter Muslims or Jews. Third in regards to witch craft, those were local affairs that were not officially handled by the Roman church. A great example of this is Joan of Arc, a saint in the entire Church now but condemned as a witch by the English one, mainly because she was a political enemy of their state. Before the Reformation the Bishops actually had a lot of local autonomy and could be forced by Kings or local authorities to condone killings. Almost all of the killings related to heresies, related to the Spanish Inquisition, related to witchcraft, and related to ethnic cleansing of Jewish populations, were all directed by local authorities exercising temporal state powers rather than ecclesiastical ones. In some cases the Pope even condemned them for going too far, most notably the Spanish inquisition and the Spanish treatment of native peoples, were all condemned by the Holy Father.
Lastly the biggest flaw is anachronistically applying modern notions of human rights backward to a time that did not recognize them. The barbarism of the Crusades does not reveal the barbarity of religion, rather it reveals the barbarity of local cultures and customs and over several thousand years of military history where killing prisoners, associated civilians, enslaving enemies, burning down villages, etc. was an acceptable part of warfare. Clearly with Catholics slaughtering other Catholics throughout the middle ages in this same pattern one can see the violence was not due to the religion but due to the nature of feudal warfare itself.
Far more people were put to death in the service of atheist empires than at the direct bequest of Rome.
Furthermore
We can probably argue until the end of time about the Catholic church in the world, I would argue that right now it is doing a lot of good and that the current leadership of the church is doing a good job of handling the sex abuse cases. I do not see how the entire Papacy of Benedict can be discredited by the actions of a few priests and bishops of the Catholic church, by the same logic all of our soldiers are war criminals due to the actions of a few of their comrades at Abu Gharib, or Barack Obama is directly responsible for all the dead in Iraq even though his predecessor started that war, etc.
Benedict isn't and wouldn't be discredited...
... because of others' actions - the discredit stems from his own alleged actions. He had a duty to report.
Well, we could certainly argue until the end of time
and never agree on any single thing about the Catholic Church.
My view is simple, and I don't even need to dredge up the historical sins of the Church itself to justify my negative opinion. They're behavior in the present day is enough. Because:
1. the historical behavior of the Church surrounding it's pedophile priests is appallingly self-interested and an affront to all things decent, and
2. the Church actively campaigns against the use of condoms in third-world and other nations causing incalculable suffering and death, and
3. the Church continues by doctrine to deny women control over their reproductive destiny by forbidding the use of contraceptives and the practice of abortion
I do not view the Catholic church as a force for good in the world; indeed, I view it a misguided and dangerous force. I view the Catholic church as a bunch of hysterical virgins steeped in self-reverential dogma and arrogance with far too much influence on policy, both domestic and international.
So, in short, we won't argue about the Catholic church, and while I appreciate the time you took to correct the historical record according to your understanding, I reject your apologist stance regarding the wrongs that are plain to any unbiased eye regarding the laundry list of bad things you claim the Church did not do.
their they're its it's
preview is my friend.
Do you have an opinion on Judaism and Islam
in terms of whether they're "forces for good in the world"?
Actually,
I think faith-based belief systems are inherently counterproductive and, in some cases, destructive. I would prefer that people arrived at their beliefs through a reasoned process based on evidence that has been tested and verified as true.
Judaism and Islam
are not singular, specific (not to mention wealthy) organizations. The Roman Catholic Church is.
(I don't know lightiris's view on this, but personally, I think any institution or individual that encourages people to believe untestable, unfalsifiable claims for which there is no evidence, to reject science and reason as our best available tools for knowing about the world, or to regard some persons as having fewer rights than others because of their sex, gender, sexual orientation, race, beliefs, physical or mental ability, etc., is by definition, at least insofar as they promote those views, precisely the opposite of a force for good in the world. They might do other, good things, and IMO in most cases good and bad acts don't directly cancel each other out: you can't necessarily just tote them all up and come up with a single number that indicates how good or bad someone or something is. On the other hand, sometimes the bad is clearly of greater magnitude, with more widespread efects.)