Female Priests - News story

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21

Jack put it best. Any organization that systematically protects people who abuse children is responsible for that abuse.

"If the church simply tossed
out these errant individuals, they would be freeing them unsupervised on an
unsuspecting society and going against the forgiveness that they teach. "


Um, NO. Those ‘errant individuals’ belong in JAIL with other criminals. Instead, they live comfortably in the church rectory waiting to prey on another child. I don’t think anyone said ‘kick them out and let them go’ more like, call the cops and deliver them. Yes, God may forgive them, but the Church should not. When a MORAL leader commits a henious crime, he should not be given the chance to do it again. Sex offenders are one of the worst recurring crimes, according to the statistics.

What the Catholic church did for MANY years was SICK, I am sorry if that offends any of you. A zero tolerance policy does not help all of the children who were abused by priests who were moved from parish to parish to PROTECT THE PRIEST. Who was protecting the children?

22

I agree with you that anyone who protected or transferred child molesters should be prosecuted if it’s found that they were negligent. But just because some members of the hierarchy have committed grievous errors doesn’t mean we should lose faith in the Church. Those that have lost their faith over this issue must not have had a strong faith to begin with. As for the police not protecting a child molesting cop, I think you’re highly mistaken. Any organization, even the government, is going to protect its own as long as they can, no matter what. As for the Church’s money, it no more is the Church’s money than the government’s money is the government’s. That money comes from my wallet and the wallets of hard-working people throughout the country and is given to aid Catholic schools, Catholic hospitals, and Catholic missions throughout the world. I object to its misuse in any case, be it through embezzlement, blackmail, or lawsuit settlement.

23

I really don’t think that anybody disagrees with the fact that the bastards who molested and/or covered up deserve jail and perhaps the deepest recesses of hell for ruining some peoples lives.

What I keep hearing it the phrase "the church" did this and that. The church is 1 billion people. Thee are millions of preists and thousands of bishops. There weren't all "in on it". As a matter of fact that kind of shit seems to only happen in the USA, I know of no cases of abuse outside the USA, though I am sure it has, you bound to have some bad apples. The church did not cover anything up, the bishop of Boston sure as hell did, which makes him as guilty as the priests who did it, which means he should go to jail and I hope he does. But we are talking about 5 or so people out of millions, which certainly does not make it "the church's" fault or common practice.

24

Hey pat I looked at your link and what it said was the Zero Tolerance policy is a RECOMMENDATION in Atlanta. Hardly represents the Catholic Church in the U.S. About a month ago I WATCHED the report on TV about the Catholic Church NOT adopting the policy. This was voted on by representatives from ACROSS the U.S. One fucking diocese does not represent the whole church you stupid fuck. Perhaps YOU should learn to read, ASSHOLE.

25

I agree that the government would try and protect their own, but the difference is that once the story got out, the head of the government agency would be firing people left and right and raising holy hell. The pope’s response has been less than powerful, shall we say.

26

I too viewed the link Pat kindly provided and, just in case the title “No Second Chances: Bishops Set Zero Tolerance Policy” wasn’t clear enough, I read it three times through. Nowhere does it mention anything about the policy being a recommendation, and no amount of cussing or television watching will change that, nor will it change the results of the bishops’ vote. However, the charter as it stands is imperfect at best. It’s far too vague as to how it will implement these policies or as to how the implementation will be overseen. Nor does it even begin to attempt to get at the root of the problem, the large number of homosexuals priests and seminarians in this country.

27

“What I keep hearing it the phrase “the church” did this and that. The church is 1 billion people. Thee are millions of preists and thousands of bishops…The church did not cover anything up, the bishop of Boston sure as hell did, which makes him as guilty as the priests who did it, which means he should go to jail and I hope he does. But we are talking about 5 or so people out of millions, which certainly does not make it ‘the church’s’ fault or common practice.”

Here are the facts:

1. The Church (through the actions of its officials) has consistently failed over the last 30 years to address the issue of priests who enter into inappropriate sexual activity with children. Instead of listening to the victims who bravely came forward at a time when it was even less acceptable to do so than today, official representatives of the Church (i.e. clergy in positions of authority over those accused of abuse) chose to turn a blind eye. It simply is not acceptable to slap a priest on the wrist behind closed doors and move him into an area where no one knows him so that he can get a “fresh start”. This has happened numerous times.

2. Beyond failing to respond to the problem appropriately, The Church (again through the actions of its officials) took an active role in covering up abuses that it had every reason to believe were going on.

3. It is not “5 or so people” out of a million. It takes one hell of a support network (either active or passive) to hide the kinds of abuses that have gone on. In other words, a LOT of clergy looked the other way when they should have called their corrupt brethren out and demanded that they be terminated. And LOT of Church superiors tried to cover up and nullify what happened.

Yes, the Church is one billion people (not sure on the exact number). How many of those are parishioners and how many are clergy? And how many members of the clergy knew or suspected what was going on and did nothing? No one is saying that the abuses are the fault of the parishioners (that would be asinine). But Church administration must be held accountable, as certain members of said administration are certainly at fault here.

28

I thought the origional post was funny, but the rest of you take life way too serious!

29

How can you say ‘the church’ is not responsible? Have you ever worked with someone who was stealing from their job? If they do it consistantly for a few months everyone in the office knows. It is the same in every job everywhere. When a bishop transfers a priest for ‘inappropriate interaction with a minor’ you can BET most of the church officials in that parish know why.

Priests were moved all over the place, including to 'respite' homes, to get them away from their victims. You can't tell me the cover up doesn't involved hundreds of people. I am aware that a few hundred people are a VERY small portion of the total clergy in the Catholic church, but those few hundred sure make the church look like fools.

Unfortunately, the Pope is not taking this seriously at all. Why on earth did he have to have a meeting of the bishops to discuss a zero tonelerance policy? What was there to debate?

"We have priests who have sexually abused children, do you think we should punish them?"

How about "we have priests who broke the law, kick them out and lock the door behind them."

Here's a better question, if the cover up was not very wide spread, then why is there a 'policy' needed? Why would there EVER be any sort of cover up for a MORAL LEADER who sexually abuses children?

Each and every person involved in each and every cover up should be removed. Period, end of story.

30

And I’m sure that there has never been anyone of any other religion that has ever molested their church-goers. I’m sure there has been a few Baptist or Methodist ministers or whatever the hell they call themselves who’ve indulged in sick behavior with their congregations.

31

Garret, I’m sure there have too, but at this point if anyone wanted to come forward they probably would have. The current environment is primed for people to face their abusers. What I dont think happened was a wide scale cover up by the other Churches. In most other Christian religions the clergy are allowed to be married, and I think the ability to have ‘normal’ sexual relations would drive the number of sexual deviants down (pedofilia is not exactly normal behavior). Think about it, in prison, straight men have gay sex because it’s the only option. When they are out they are back to women-only. When you have no outlet for your sexuality, you look for prey to give you an outlet. Unfortunately, some of the priests chose children, and they should never have been protected for making that choice.

32

Allowing priests to marry would not solve anything. When men join the seminary they are aware that they must take a vow of chastity and must live a celibate life. If they’re not prepared to live a chaste and celibate life then they should not join the priesthood. For those priests who truly struggle with their attraction to women, they either carry on affairs with women or leave the priesthood to get married. The ones who commit acts of pedophilia and ephebophilia are truly disordered and allowing them to marry will not solve the problem.

33

Paul is this; “Yes they have put in a zero tolerance plan, assholes. I have the article discussing the enitre plan in detail. Please do your fucking research before you talk out of your collective asses”, your idea of kindly providing a link. I know he supplied the link in his next post, but I’m not going to take shit form this guy because he thinks I am wrong. That’s why I used words this guy might understand. Get it? As for watching TV, I SAW the report and although the National Concil of Bishops( name may be wrong) was expected to a adopt a Zero Tolerance policy they did not. You read the report and said it was unclear, yet pat seems to think it’s clear as glass. Who’s really the asshole here?

34

Your assertion that the cover up was wide spread has abosolutely no basis in fact. Your reasoning that because it was such a horrific act that many people must have known, or that the kids who experienced it were shouting at the top of thier lungs and nobody chose to hear them are simply false. There is no evidence that this was the case. The idea that hundreds of people knew about this and turned a blind eye is wrong; if hundreds of people knew about it, somebody would have said something. The problem lies with the priests that did this and Cardinal Law who was the archbishop of Boston at the time. Those are the guilty parties.

I don't recall using the term 'responsible' ever. The church has to be responsible for it's clergy. Accepting resonsibility and being the cause of something are two completely different things. I was making the point that the church as a rule does not condone, encourage, create the environment for, nor suggest child molestation as a ritual, or a form for sexual outlet. As a matter of fact it is condemned by the church and is not defended. Cardinal Law, chose to take matters in to his own hands and he should be made to pay.

The Pope turn a blind eye to this? And you know this how? He called all the bishops of the US to and emergency meeting and told them to, and I believe this a quote, 'fix the fucking problem and fix it fast'. They do not debate like congress, that is not how it works in Rome. Such emergency meetings at the Vatican are a rare occurence.I am not sure what you would expect the pope to do, stand up and bang his dick on the alter and call for blood. He is in charge of the whole world, the US is but a small part of that. So it is not like he doesn't have anything to do but worry about the United States.

The truth of what I hear is this. The Cathlic church allowed sexual preditors to be preists (like they knew from the begining). The Catholic church is wrong on most things because some (very, very few) priests are child molestors. Therefore, Priests, by nature, are child fuckers and Catholicism is a faulty and incorrect religion. Where the fact of the matter is that you didn't like Catholicism to begin with, more than likely because you do not like it's policies regarding the use of dicks and pussies. You don't like it's stance on abortion, you don't like it's stance on homosexuality, females preists, etc. If you are not a Catholic, I connot fathom why this would bother anybody. I hear a broad generalization on a group of people based on the actions of a few, where as if you did that to any other group, you would be a racist, biggoted, asshole. But its fine to do that to the church, like the original post said "Men who fuck 10 year old boys? Fine..." Yea, that's fine, it is a requirement that if you are a preist you must prove you are a gay pedeophile(sp?) first.

35

To ShitDisturber: Actually, the bishops’ policy is clear that it is a zero tolerance policy. It states: Where sexual abuse by a priest or a deacon is admitted or is established after an appropriate investigation in accord with canon law, the following will pertain: Diocesan/eparchial policy will provide that for even a single act of sexual abuse of a minor — past, present, or future — the offending priest or deacon will be permanently removed from ministry. That’s zero tolerance. The thing that isn’t clear is whether or not bishops convicted of sexual abuse will step down as well. The description of the oversight committees is also pretty vague and doesn’t really desribe how bishops will be punished if they don’t implement the new policies. But to say it’s not a zero tolerance policy is incorrect.

36

There was one priest in the news that was moved THREE times because of his relationships with children. Let’s see, someone had to find out about what he was doing, report that to an authority, that authority had to authorize a transfer, that transfer had to be accepted, you would THINK the destination parish would be informed that they are receiving a pedophile so that they can keep him out of children’s ministry. So far, I have 5 people who know what a slime this man is. 5 more for the next transfer, 5 more for the next. That totals 15 people who allowed a priest to continue preying on children. That is the lowest number I could come up with. You have to go a few steps up the food chain to move a priest to another part of the country… the cover up just gets bigger and bigger.

"I was making the point that the church as a rule does not condone, encourage, create the environment for, nor suggest child molestation as a ritual, or a form for sexual outlet. As a matter of fact it is condemned by the church and is not defended."

No, there is no policy encouraging it, but there sure was an unwritten policy to protect offenders. The Catholic church has settled MANY cases out of court, with gag orders intact, to keep abuse quiet. You don't think that is a cover-up? Millions of dollars in settlements, and the priest is not defrocked?

Out of court settlements usually happen when there is something to cover up. You would think that a priest that was innocent of the charges would want to prove he was innocent of the charges. Instead there were numerous cases of cover-ups, and you are fooling yourself if you think that one single church can authorize million dollar settlements. So, now we have high-level church officials protecting a child molester.

No, the church did not ALLOW sexual predators to be priests. They DID allow priests who were found to be sexual predators to remain in their jobs. Therein lies the problem.

Most priests are fine, upstanding, moral people. Everyone is aware of that. The church, as an establishment, protected the tiny percentage of criminals in the priesthood. Harboring criminals makes you culpable in the crime they commit. Deal with that simple fact.

What the church needs to do is kick out EVERY priest bishop and cardinal who was involved with EVERY cover-up. Right now, this minute. They are unwilling to purge themselves of their criminals, and that is what disgusts me.

"Your reasoning that because it was such a horrific act that many people must have known, or that the kids who experienced it were shouting at the top of their lungs and nobody chose to hear them are simply false. "

Most abused children tell no one, they are afraid and hurt. They are especially quiet when their abuser is an authority figure. My reasoning that people knew about what was going on is not based on it being a 'horrific act'. It is based on the FACT that many priests now found to be guilty of molesting children were moved from their original parish. That would mean that someone found out what he was doing, wouldn't it?

37

All bishops are priests. So if a bishop was proven guilty of abuse, then the same action that would be taken against a priest would be taken against him.

38

To Garrett: No action can be taken against a bishop. As he is sovereign within his own diocese, he will stay in power unless he decides to apply the rules to himself.

To Michelle: Any speculation as to the number of people knowledgeable of the accusations of pedophilia against pedophile priests is just that - speculation. Bishops are very controlling in the way they run their dioceses. If you’re outside the bishop’s inner circle, chances are you don’t really know what’s going on. The bishop can transfer whomever he wants, wherever he wants, whenever he wants. If he tells you to move, you move. Reassignments can take place at any time. I’m not sure how it is in other dioceses, but in our diocese most reassignments occur in the summer. All you would need to do to hide a pedophile is lump him in with these regularly scheduled reassignments and no mention would have to be made as to the reasons for the reassignment. You’re still confusing the Church with its bishops. Many of the bishops were guilty of attempting to cover up these crimes, but that still is only a problem among the American bishops, not within the Church itself. This problem won’t be resolved until two things occur: 1.) The bishops address the problem of homosexuals in the priesthood and in the seminaries, and 2.) The culpable bishops resign. I’m not holding my breath.

39

One more thing, where were all the naysayers years ago? This problem with priestly abuse has been going on for over a decade, why is it only now that everyone expresses their outrage? The pedophile priest has been a standard joke in comedy shows for years, why didn’t people take it more seriously? The diocese of Dallas went bankrupt several years ago after having to pay out over $100 million in an abuse settlement, shouldn’t that have set off alarm bells? Groups like Roman Catholic Faithful have been exposing corruption among the hierarchy for years, but they never got any mainstream media exposure. Why is it only now that the secular media seizes on the problem?