Abuse scandal questions

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Rau said:
I wasn’t making an argument - certainly not one to lessen the heinous nature of the crime. I don’t see much difference between abusing a 12 year old or a 14 year old.
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Secular News peddles the false notion that any homosexual activity via clergy was Pedophilia,
as if, they’re avoiding saying “homosexuality” … of which they are known to almost always condone.

Regardless of where anyone draws the line of age between Adults and Children,
it’s the Homosexual Abuse which remains … and shouldn’t get blurred in endless definition-talk…

_
 
EndTimes said:
Secular News peddles the false notion that any homosexual activity via clergy was Pedophilia,
as if, they’re avoiding saying “homosexuality” … of which they are known to almost always condone.
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There have been a great many incidents of priests abusing young girls also. “The Keepers” for example had a bunch of female victims and only one male victim. The most recent case in my area, from about 2014, involved a priest soliciting 12-year-old girls. It’s not just about homosexuality.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
There have been a great many incidents of priests abusing young girls also.
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Yes I presume there has…
But that does not erase the well known UnderGround HomoSexual SubCulture
Homosexuality is not any sort of simple flip-flop of Heterosexuality.
 
EndTimes said:
Secular News peddles the false notion that any homosexual activity via clergy was Pedophilia,
as if, they’re avoiding saying “homosexuality” … of which they are known to almost always condone.

Regardless of where anyone draws the line of age between Adults and Children,
it’s the Homosexual Abuse which remains … and shouldn’t get blurred in endless definition-talk…
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Given (apparently) same sex, post-pubescent abuse is the major variety committed by clergy, we might reasonably conclude men inclined to same sex sexual relationships (“homosexuals”) are the largest group of perpetrators. However, to commit these crimes requires as prerequisite more than homosexuality. It requires a person who is willing to commit a heinous act (given the age of victims) for personal reward. This surely is independent of sexual orientation. It would be interesting to understand why these perpetrators joined the priesthood.
 
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You had/have bad shepherds purposely leading young men down evil paths.
in say… Some/Many of The Seminaries…

Some of them became Bishops…
 
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OurLadyofSorrows said:
Be honest, it happened, and due to protocols being put in place, it should never ever happen again. Evil happens everywhere, not just in the Church. That is not a good argument though, so avoid that one.

The guilty should be facing the full force of civil law, that is the law of the country, just as any other criminal would.
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I agree. And it will happen there will be a day of reckoning in civil, criminal courts, and in Heaven.
 
When I start seeing Cardinals, Bishops, Priest and Lay people that were involved going to jail. Then the cleansing has started.
 
Shakuhachi said:
In addition to the abuse was the cover up and failure to protect future victims or provide justice to prior victims. It is an institutional sin to protect power.
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Yes. This is fundamental. I would not say that institutional failure was unique to the Catholic Church, but certainly the Catholic Church took institutional failure to deal with sexual abuse to a level rarely seen in any other organization (except, perhaps, some other churches and religions, such as Anglicans and Jehovah’s Witnesses).
EndTimes said:
brought up in the atmosphere of an UnderGround Homosexual Milieu
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It’s really not helpful to suggest a link between the sexual abuse crisis in the Church and homosexuality. There is no correlation between being attracted to people of the same sex and having a propensity to sexually victimize others, whether adults or children. The only reliable predictor of somebody being a sexual abuser is that that person is a sexual abuser. Most sexual abuse is perpetrated by men against women and girls. Men can also abuse men and boys, and women can also abuse women and girls and men and boys. Children can also abuse other children. Most abusers are opportunists. Parents abuse their children, teachers abuse their students, coaches abuse their players. Guess what? Priests have more access to men and boys than they do to women and girls.
Tis_Bearself said:
While the term “pedophilia” has a specific meaning and age cutoff to those in certain fields like psychology, we need to remember that the general public often has a different and broader understanding of the term
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Thank you. I think this is a good point. The bottom line is that abuse is abuse. The terms “hebephile” and “ephebophile” may serve some purpose for some researchers, but when the terms are used in everyday discussion it’s not unreasonable to suspect some ulterior motive. If a 50-year-old guy is into 15-year-olds, something’s not right. It doesn’t really matter what label you stick on him, he’s still abusing kids. For all intents and purposes, he’s a pedophile. If someone wants to make the case that he is actually an ephebophile, I will wonder what their agenda is.
 
Pedophilia was only part of the issue. Abuse of teens (not considered pedophilia) was common as well as abuse of seminarians by priests, abuse of women going to priestd for counsel, etc.

My understanding from data I have read is that the abuse stats are equal, not lower than, the general population.

The greater issue is that the abusers also abused the church and the faith of the individual, and were really committing fraud in their vocations in order to commit sexual abuse. The institution increased this abuse by protecting the guilty in sacrifice of the victims, thus failing victims a second time. The institution continues even now to protect guilty priests and play word games. Improvements are occurring but way too little, way too late.

I do not think you should defend the situation at all. My position is that evil took over much power in the church and the faithful are standing up to purge it and restore the church to God. I unequivocally condemn every small action that permitted this abuse and protected abusers and view the church itself as a primary victim of sinful clergy including bishops and Cardinals who were involved. We should not excuse or forgive our own sins. That is up to God. As a community we can only do better moving forward but need to stop all excuses and parsing in defense of evil.

I am a devout Catholic and that includes being furious that my own beloved Church housed widespread evil and continues to handle it badly. We can and must do better. When others say it’s terrible, I agree with them and explain it was criminal abuse of God’s church, of which I am a member.
 
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MasterHaster said:
Protocols cannot stop abuse. Not sure what you mean.
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One example
The abuse happens in private, a protocol is put in place that children are not able to be one on one with a teacher or priest or coach. This stops that abuse occurring.
 
So allegedly 4-5% of priests were abusers during the “dark” period of the 1960s to 90s. It’s presumably much lower now as we have taken steps to better screen seminarians, enacted safe environment policies etc. Yet we are told these numbers are “better” than the general population.

Wait…what!!! 5% is 1 in 20. You’re telling me that MORE than 1 in 20 people in the general population are child abusers??? That would be beyond horrifying and terrifying… that would LITERALLY mean there are child abusers on every street, in every apartment building, in every school and in every extended family. What the heck am I missing?
 
timber501 said:
I’ve heard that priests have lower pedophilia rates that general population but don’t have any hard data to back it up.
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I apologize if this is repetitive, but there is ALOT of data. There were some 200-400 cases when this blew up, and now some 8 or so per year? Compare that to the 62,000+ cases of sex abuse of minors each year in the US (and that’s just what’s reported).
I have links to reports and data in this article. If some are old/don’t work, it can be easily Googled.
The Sex-Abuse Crisis: What are Christians Doing About It?

Also try this:

Child Sexual Abuse - Where Should Our Focus Be?

I once read a comment from a combox in a discussion about clerical abuse that read something very similar to this: “ When Catholics are att...
daves-ahumbleservant.blogspot.com daves-ahumbleservant.blogspot.com
 
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phil3 said:
When I start seeing Cardinals, Bishops, Priest and Lay people that were involved going to jail. Then the cleansing has started.
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Plenty of priests gone to jail. Bishops are harder to get because their offending (those that have offended) may be longer ago and if their role was in coverup, that’s a further step removed from the victims who initiate police action.
 
do_justly_love_mercy said:
Yes. This is fundamental. I would not say that institutional failure was unique to the Catholic Church, but certainly the Catholic Church took institutional failure to deal with sexual abuse to a level rarely seen in any other organization
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Yes… An Strong Anti-Christian spirit impacted upon all Christian Communities -
some in even a stronger impact than the Catholic Church -
such as as wrt Divorce, Abortion, Homosexuality - including allowing Lesbians as ministers.

Smaller Communities implode easier.

)_
 
Of course, many of the accusations are from decades past. It is not rare for the dead to be accused. There are also laws about the statute of limitations that makes this far more complex.
 
Not enough priest have gone to jail. Cover up is just as illegal as the act.
 
phil3 said:
Not enough priest have gone to jail. Cover up is just as illegal as the act.
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Earlier threads on CAF had a lot more links/information on this. From memory, a lot of known offenders have long since died so that may be part of the perception.

I was looking for online data, found this site interesting. Several good articles under menu item “Protection of Minors,” especially the first two:
Timeline (actions taken 1984 to June 2019)
Worldwide activities

https://www.pbc2019.org/home
 
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