gnjsdad, I take it, then, that you won’t be conceding my point too soon, since I don’t expect to see anything like what you want to see reported by the media anytime soon. I could be wrong, but I doubt it.
This is not to concede that the claims of anti-Catholic bias are not exaggerated. That’s what I meant by the use of “shtick”, not a routine or gimmick, but an exaggeration. Now, I suppose I could be wrong, but then again I don’t travel in the same circles as Karl Keating or William Donohue. Some, probably most, of the things Karl Keating does are wonderful by actually helping to explain our own faith to us so that we can explain it to others and, thereby, evangelize properly. To my mind, William Donohue is a “cry-baby”, and, when I have seen him on TV, he does himself, and indirectly, the faith he so staunchly attempts to defend, a disservice by his loud, intolerant tone. But that’s me.
My only evidence (or non-evidence as the case may be) is anecdotal. I, personally, have never experienced anti-Catholic bias. I am 48 years old, and am a cradle Catholic. No one I know who is a Catholic has ever mentioned to me that they have seen or experienced anti-Catholic bias. However, I don’t doubt that it exists. The only times I’ve heard anti-Catholic bias raised have to do with the clergy sexual abuse issue. And I personally don’t think it’s a strong case because: (1) when you hold yourself up as the moral standard-bearer for the world, some people are going to be gunning for you, and (2) Christ, Himself, told us that this was going to happen, i.e., that we may be persecuted for His sake. Yet I don’t recall His instructions in this regard to be something like, “Well, just make sure everybody else gets a taste of it, too.” My recollection is that He told us to react somewhat differently.
Finally, with regard to the clergy sexual abuse cases in the Catholic Church, the argument has been put forth that it’s only a small percentage of the priests involved, no more than in any other faith or segment of the population. Well, I have not investigated this claim specifically, but I’ll stipulate to that point that it’s only a small percentage. But, (and a big but), I’ll also stipulate that the percentage of the Church hierarchy that knew about the claims of clergy sexual abuse and either (1) looked the other way, (2) did not speak out, or (3) merely sent the abuser packing to another unsuspecting parish was fairly large. In fact, within an Archdiocese, for the top man, either an Archbishop or a Cardinal, the percentage was 100%! Also, for those who worked for the Archbishop is the capacity of dealing with such cases, the percentage was fairly large. Also, for the Catholic priestly community within an Archdiocese, which is fairly tight-knit community that shares that rare kind of seminary and pastoral experience, I’d be hard pressed to believe most did not suspect something terrible was going on for decades (as they may have heard rumors or noted the multiple transfers), and knew it was not being addressed properly, but just being continually swept under the rug. But it’s difficult to blame parish priests for not blowing the whistle or to expect them to abandon their calling if their “boss” is irresponsible on such a major problem.
That being said, the Church will survive this, we just need to get it out in the open and talk about it.
