How to answer questions about the sex scandal?

[jmcrae]

Funny I have never had anything to confess in the confessional that I wasn’t afraid to share in the public spotlight.

I should think that would be very unusual for most adults, and probably for a lot of kids, too. Are you really that sure that you would want your nearest and dearest to be privy to the content of your Confessions? How about your boss, or your supervisor, or the secretarial staff where you work? Think it through.

If those priests and bishops hide the sex abuse scandal behind the screen of confession maybe it is time to lift that threat of excommunication for breaking the seal of confession. Something should be done to make sure this never happens again and I don’t mean excluding a certain segment of otherwise qualified men for the priesthood.

Why on earth not? It does less harm to exclude homosexual pedophiles from the priesthood (in the hopes that they will remain celibate, of course!) than it does to violate the seal of the Confessional.

 

[mesquite_magic]

Why on earth not? It does less harm to exclude homosexual pedophiles from the priesthood (in the hopes that they will remain celibate, of course!) than it does to violate the seal of the Confessional.

I will happily debate you about that, jm. However, I think it deserves it’s own thread. For what it’s worth, I DISagree with you 100%

Kim

 

[AndyF]

catechumen:

You’ve got it right.!

Just say that the Church now has established a new screening policy and works closer with civil authorities in their hiring practices and that duties are now closely monitored.

If she presses the issue then her motives are for a debate or for some other reason. Just start coughing madly and excuse yourself, they’ll get the picture. Oh Yea, you can come back in the room in a minute.

AndyF

 

[Texas_Roofer]

Funny I have never had anything to confess in the confessional that I wasn’t afraid to share in the public spotlight. If those priests and bishops hide the sex abuse scandal behind the screen of confession maybe it is time to lift that threat of excommunication for breaking the seal of confession. Something should be done to make sure this never happens again and I don’t mean excluding a certain segment of otherwise qualified men for the priesthood.

Jim
The Bishops were not hiding the scandal. The Bishops were restricted in methods to deal with the issue. Remember for each incidence inside the Church about 20,000 incidents occur outside the Church (using FBI violent crime statistics). Additionally the Bishop’s, the Church, and I have God to answer to if we work to undermine God’s commandment to repent sins.

 

[Mike_Brick]

It does less harm to exclude homosexual pedophiles from the priesthood (in the hopes that they will remain celibate, of course!) than it does to violate the seal of the Confessional.

Two points: (1) We must stop using the term pedophile for anyone who is not one. Pedophiles in the priesthood were and are very, very rare and only prey on pre-pubescient children! If we keep out only the pedophiles, we haven’t properly protected the youth of the Church. The vast majority of abusers we had were not pedophiles! (2) How do you propose we identify the homomosexual pedophiles you wrote about above, so we can keep them out of the priesthood? Believe me it is very difficult, and intrusive to do that.

I love the discussion being had, but hope we can get the terms right and have a better perspective on the problem we had, and better avoid that in the future.

Peace to All

 

[dranzal]

Two points: (1) We must stop using the term pedophile for anyone who is not one. Pedophiles in the priesthood were and are very, very rare and only prey on pre-pubescient children! If we keep out only the pedophiles, we haven’t properly protected the youth of the Church. The vast majority of abusers we had were not pedophiles! (2) How do you propose we identify the homomosexual pedophiles you wrote about above, so we can keep them out of the priesthood? Believe me it is very difficult, and intrusive to do that.

I love the discussion being had, but hope we can get the terms right and have a better perspective on the problem we had, and better avoid that in the future.

Peace to All

This is the point I make to people who suggest that allowing priests to marry will curb the abuse.

I ask them if they (if male) or their husbands (if female) would suddenly prey upon teenage boys if they were not married. Of course NOT! they always reply. If simple normal sexuality was the issue, we’d have a priest/church secretary scandal, not a priest/youth boy scandal. Heterosexual men, by definition, do not work out their desires on teenage boys.

The perpetrators of these homosexual acts with minors sinned. They have a disordered view of sexuality and likely other problems as well. We need to pray for them and they need to endure their consequences.

The bishops who made serious mistakes in handling the issue should also suffer the consequences.

The Catholic Church did not molest anyone. The fact that sinful members of the Church SINNED does not make the Church less true. In fact, it makes it more true.

May God have mercy on us.