Pa. bishops hid sex abuse of hundreds of children, grand jury finds

[rose_kelly]

But which is no longer the kind of problem it once was–which is the point here.

It’s because the Church is a universal organization that it was so wide-spread, not because the Church is any more prone to this kind of abuse than any other institution run by man.

Quite true.
There is a British organisation with a website that helps and advises victims of clergy sexual abuse, Non-Catholic religions seem to be the most mentioned.

Of course I would rather there not be any victims of such appalling crimes in any institution whether religious or otherwise, but I have noticed that the British media rarely report scandals of this type if associated with another religion, yet if Catholic, they become a major news story.

 

[7_Sorrows]

We, as Catholics, have to do this for us. Because its the right thing to do. Statutes of limitations aside, we have to do whatever we can to lance this, expose it to the light, and make it right. We owe those victims and their families.

Because although teachers abuse, it’s much less of a deep, long-standing, systemic problem. It isn’t just that priests molest children, it’s the huge cover-up conspiracies that extend up the global hierarchy that’s the problem. I don’t think there is anything comparable to the Catholic abuse scandal. Not because of the abuse itself, but because of the sheer scope of how it was carried out, hidden, and enabled for decades.

which is what the movie Spotlight tried to shed some light on.

 

[Cider]

Oh my gosh, really people you are questioning the timing of a grand jury? BTW, this thread is about Philadelphia not Boston. And it hasn’t been 15 years since the Philly cases came to light it’s been 10 and on top of it, their have been ongoing trials, appeals and investigations as recently as last month in the case of appeal decision.

 

[Della]

Oh my gosh, really people you are questioning the timing of a grand jury? BTW, this thread is about Philadelphia not Boston. And it hasn’t been 15 years since the Philly cases came to light it’s been 10 and on top of it, their have been ongoing trials, appeals and investigations as recently as last month in the case of appeal decision.

But how old are the cased themselves? The statute of limitations would not have run out if all the cases are that new. How is it that some of the abusers have since died? So yes, it is suspicious timing for a grand jury indictment over a 50 year period.

 

[phil19034]

Oh my gosh, really people you are questioning the timing of a grand jury? BTW, this thread is about Philadelphia not Boston. And it hasn’t been 15 years since the Philly cases came to light it’s been 10 and on top of it, their have been ongoing trials, appeals and investigations as recently as last month in the case of appeal decision.

FYI - this isn’t Philadelphia. It’s the Diocese of Altoona, which is way closer to both Pittsburgh and Ohio than it is to Philly.

Yes, it’s part of the Province of Philadelphia, but that’s like saying something that happens in Northern Maine is happening in Boston (just because all of Maine is in the Province of Boston).

 

[otjm]

So let’s just dig up dirt on Catholics for the sake of it to make them all look bad. Typical.

Perhaps that is how you look at it.

I look at it a bit differently. I am not sure how many of these cases it will take until this is burned deep, deep into the DNA of any individual currently in the priesthood or coming into the priesthood, say, in the next few centuries.

Bishops are not ordained out of thin air; they come from the ranks of our priests. And it is not only the current bishops (who likely by know have received the message), but future ones who need to have this branded into them so deeply that we can say, “Never again!”

The damage to those who were abused goes much deeper than many, if not most people understand. People who are abused are not only violated in the act, but also carry the damage of that abuse through the rest of their lives. Many were abused so deeply they will never be able to live a normal life. And that says nothing to the numbers who have lost any scintilla of faith.

Not only did these bishops fail the children who were abused; they also failed each an every child who was subsequently abused by the perpetrators who were not removed from the priesthood, or at least from parish ministry. And that failure to sanction might possibly have been enough that a subsequent abuser might have given pause to amend his ways.

Bishops today, if they are listening, know that there is the potential for both civil and criminal penalties for failing to deal with abusers; and priests, if they are listening, know the same.

And we are not dealing with just one diocese; this has happened in just about every diocese out there; nor is it a problem isolated the to the US. If there is anyone out there - and by this, I include the bishops of the world, the Cardinals, and any dicasteries even remotely related to this type of problem, who thinks that this is just because of some strange laws in the US, they need a massive mind adjustment.

This is not just airing dirty laundry. This is about doing absolutely everything possible to try to prevent future abuse.

Dismissing this as just something done to make Catholics look bad is typical of those who do not want to know of the consequences of not only the damage to children, but the wall of silence - which is about the same thing as a wall of complicity - that surrounded these crimes. It was the attitude of not wanting to know about this, or allow anyone else to know about it, which allowed this to permeate a significant part of the priesthood - both that of the abusers and that of those involved in hiding or maintaining silence of the crimes.

And it was not just the stonewalling and hiding evidence. There are numerous stories from numerous jurisdictions of both the child victim and their families of being turned on by the very people who should have been their protectors, and treated as if they - the child and family - were out to “destroy a priest”. The victims were made to feel as if they were the evil ones.

How truly Christ-like.

Not.

He spoke of the use of a mill stone. These cases are the mill stone.

 

[otjm]

I’ll skip all the comments I could make about the atrociousness of it and say this instead:

I am increasingly frustrated when hearing phrases like, “Everyone is responsible for putting a stop to it,” or “We all share the responsibility,” etc,. which seems to be a theme in the child protection materials that CCD teachers and others have to watch.

We didn’t do it.

Not to make too fine a point of it, but the materials are there to make sure we don’t do it.

You are frustrated? Oh dear.

How frustrated to you think someone will be for the rest of their life after they are abused?

We are our brother’s and our sister’s keepers. The vast majority of people in parishes who deal with children are not abusers and are not going to become abusers.

It only takes one, and each of us has a responsibility to each and every child to be aware of the potential, and to make absolutely sure that those children are not going to be in a situation where abuse can happen.

Perhaps, if you ever have the opportunity to try and help someone who has been abused, you will find out how damaging that abuse was; your frustration seems to say “Hey, I am not abusing, so it is not my problem”.

 

[otjm]

Since all this came to light 15 years ago, the Church has made great strides in combating such abuse. So, dredging up cases long past does have the taste of getting even more than seeing justice done–for those of us who had nothing to do with any of it.

What we are continuing to see - and what many don’t want to really deal with - is that this seems to have occurred in so many dioceses that it looks like a massive conspiracy to obfuscate and hide multiple crimes. Christ spoke very succinctly about how those who harm children should be treated.

Besides this, many non-Catholics, be they secularists or other Christians like to throw it up in our faces as if it’s still an ongoing problem and the Church has done nothing about it. It’s just another stick with which to beat the Church for many. They don’t care about the details as long as they can revile the Church and relish doing it.

And? During the reign of Pope Benedict, there were those in Rome who were reported murmuring pretty much the same. They flat out didn’t get it. It isn’t like a bshop or two “made a mistake”. They covered up a multitude of crimes, and some treated the victims as if they were the criminals. This rot went right to the core; and those who just want it to go away are like the bishops who just wanted it to go away.

This smacks of persecution even if there are legal niceties that allow it.

Well put, but for a different reason - we need to prosecute this until the last vestige has been dug out, and until it is so thoroughly burned into the memories of future bishops for centuries that we can say “No more! Never again!”

And as Modern Revert points out, why do these seem to pop up in the press around major Church holidays? There are political motives here. Many politicians hate that the Church stands against moving society into even greater depths of depravity, so how better to pull the teeth of your opponent that to make sure all his past mistakes are rehashed again and again? Methinks I smell something bad, all right, but it isn’t in the current Church.

If you think there are still not priests abusing, then you need to pay more attention. We will never have a fool proof process of weeding out every last potential priest who might abuse children. That does not mean that we think we “have it handled, thank you very much, and the press needs to butt out now”.

Christ spoke about those who would hate Him; so people hating the Church is not exactly news after 2,000 years or so. But the evil which has been perpetrated on victims and their families by both the abusers and the bishops and those who worked for them has run so deep that it is those very “haters of the Church” who are the means of the Church being cleansed. Just because there have been exposures does not mean the cleansing process is completed.

 

[7_Sorrows]

Perhaps that is how you look at it.

I look at it a bit differently. I am not sure how many of these cases it will take until this is burned deep, deep into the DNA of any individual currently in the priesthood or coming into the priesthood, say, in the next few centuries.

Bishops are not ordained out of thin air; they come from the ranks of our priests. And it is not only the current bishops (who likely by know have received the message), but future ones who need to have this branded into them so deeply that we can say, “Never again!”

The damage to those who were abused goes much deeper than many, if not most people understand. People who are abused are not only violated in the act, but also carry the damage of that abuse through the rest of their lives. Many were abused so deeply they will never be able to live a normal life. And that says nothing to the numbers who have lost any scintilla of faith.

Not only did these bishops fail the children who were abused; they also failed each an every child who was subsequently abused by the perpetrators who were not removed from the priesthood, or at least from parish ministry. And that failure to sanction might possibly have been enough that a subsequent abuser might have given pause to amend his ways.

Bishops today, if they are listening, know that there is the potential for both civil and criminal penalties for failing to deal with abusers; and priests, if they are listening, know the same.

And we are not dealing with just one diocese; this has happened in just about every diocese out there; nor is it a problem isolated the to the US. If there is anyone out there - and by this, I include the bishops of the world, the Cardinals, and any dicasteries even remotely related to this type of problem, who thinks that this is just because of some strange laws in the US, they need a massive mind adjustment.

This is not just airing dirty laundry. This is about doing absolutely everything possible to try to prevent future abuse.

Dismissing this as just something done to make Catholics look bad is typical of those who do not want to know of the consequences of not only the damage to children, but the wall of silence - which is about the same thing as a wall of complicity - that surrounded these crimes. It was the attitude of not wanting to know about this, or allow anyone else to know about it, which allowed this to permeate a significant part of the priesthood - both that of the abusers and that of those involved in hiding or maintaining silence of the crimes.

And it was not just the stonewalling and hiding evidence. There are numerous stories from numerous jurisdictions of both the child victim and their families of being turned on by the very people who should have been their protectors, and treated as if they - the child and family - were out to “destroy a priest”. The victims were made to feel as if they were the evil ones.

How truly Christ-like.

Not.

He spoke of the use of a mill stone. These cases are the mill stone.

 

[Della]

What we are continuing to see - and what many don’t want to really deal with - is that this seems to have occurred in so many dioceses that it looks like a massive conspiracy to obfuscate and hide multiple crimes. Christ spoke very succinctly about how those who harm children should be treated.

There was no nationwide conspiracy to hide anything. You forget when these cases took place–at a time when the police didn’t even arrest people for incest, hardly ever for rape, and never for sex with children. It was looked upon as sin, not a crime by many, inside and outside the Church. A little historical perspective is needed.

And? During the reign of Pope Benedict, there were those in Rome who were reported murmuring pretty much the same. They flat out didn’t get it. It isn’t like a bshop or two “made a mistake”. They covered up a multitude of crimes, and some treated the victims as if they were the criminals. This rot went right to the core; and those who just want it to go away are like the bishops who just wanted it to go away.

Because it was viewed as sin, not as a crime. Those who complained were thought to be unforgiving and looking to gain something from it. That’s not the reality, of course, but that was then and this is now. The Church has awakened to it and as initiated programs to deal with it. You write as if none of that were true–as if nothing has been done.

Well put, but for a different reason - we need to prosecute this until the last vestige has been dug out, and until it is so thoroughly burned into the memories of future bishops for centuries that we can say “No more! Never again!”

And what good will that really do for the victims of say 20, 30 and farther back? Most of the people who did these things are dead. It’s opening old wounds or tearing the sutures off of healing ones and rubbing salt in them, not resolving anything.

If you think there are still not priests abusing, then you need to pay more attention. We will never have a fool proof process of weeding out every last potential priest who might abuse children. That does not mean that we think we “have it handled, thank you very much, and the press needs to butt out now”.

Not like before the Church recognized it and has been doing things to prevent it. You talk as if every parish has an abuser serving the people or something. Let’s not exaggerate when the topic is hot enough as it is.

Christ spoke about those who would hate Him; so people hating the Church is not exactly news after 2,000 years or so. But the evil which has been perpetrated on victims and their families by both the abusers and the bishops and those who worked for them has run so deep that it is those very “haters of the Church” who are the means of the Church being cleansed. Just because there have been exposures does not mean the cleansing process is completed.

Most of the cleansing is complete. There are those who don’t want it to be and are hanging onto this so they can, once again, hit the Church with past sins, as if, once again, the Church isn’t dealing with it better than other large institutions, religious, secular, and governmental. Victims’ hurts cannot be erased by prosecutions of old cases any more than simply telling them to get over it can. All we can do is work hard at preventing others from being abused as they were.

 

[otjm]

How many dioceses have been brought to bankruptcy over abuses? I lost count some time ago. I can understand people are tired of hearing about abuse.

People have short attention spans; they heard it, now they want to move on to something else. The Church has made changes, can’t we all move on now?

And then there is the issue of the secular world and its hatred for the Church.

And of course, there are all those other groups who haven’t been devasted, even though they share the same issues of abusers and of coverups.

So we get the old vineyard and its product: “It isn’t fair!”

All of which seems to miss a very key element.

The Church is the very presence of Christ on earth. Schools are not. Protestant congregations are not - although Christ may well be present among them. Islam is not.

Christ did not abuse these children; nor did He hide the abuse occurring. But his anointed did. It is bad enough when they sin. But this rot has run so deep and has been so pervasive for so long that it is going to be a long period of purification and penance.

And people most generally don’t like long periods of purification and penance. And having short attention spans does not make this any more likable.

I suspect that the sexual abuse crisis will not be “over”, if “over” means out of the news, within the life times of most of us. It is not like we invented this sine 50 or 60 years ago; we just don’t have any records, it appears, going back any farther than that.

God will cleanse His Church. And it will continue as long as necessary.

 

[Della]

No one is saying victims should be forgotten or that this can’t happened again. Sin, like the poor, will be with us always. Again, all we can do now is work to keep it from happening again on such a scale. That is how we keep it fresh in our minds, not by dredging up old cases, which get lots of press but do very little good for victims or the Church.

 

[Micosil]

How many dioceses have been brought to bankruptcy over abuses? I lost count some time ago. I can understand people are tired of hearing about abuse.

My understanding is that in many of these cases, even in the case of potentially innocent priests, to avoid drama and strife and lengthy hearings and trials, out-of-court settlements were agreed upon which ended up making the diocese file for bankruptcy.

The Church is the very presence of Christ on earth. Schools are not. Protestant congregations are not - although Christ may well be present among them. Islam is not.

Christ did not abuse these children; nor did He hide the abuse occurring. But his anointed did. It is bad enough when they sin. But this rot has run so deep and has been so pervasive for so long that it is going to be a long period of purification and penance.

Jesus never said his priests or bishops would be sinless. He even explicitly condemns those that were his priests and ministers but otherwise lead sinful lives:

Matthew 7:21-23:

“Not every one who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.’

Likewise, Paul acknowledges that the apostolate (which would lead way to bishops) is in fragile “earthen vessels”, " the instruments God uses are human and fragile; some imagine small terracotta lamps in which light is carried.", as the NABRE footnote tells us.

2 Corinthians 4:7:

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, to show that the transcendent power belongs to God and not to us.

I suspect that the sexual abuse crisis will not be “over”, if “over” means out of the news, within the life times of most of us. It is not like we invented this sine 50 or 60 years ago; we just don’t have any records, it appears, going back any farther than that.

God will cleanse His Church. And it will continue as long as necessary.

If you’re suggesting that the sexual abuse problem goes back to before the second half of the 20th century, the burden of proof is on you.

 

[Cider]

But how old are the cased themselves? The statute of limitations would not have run out if all the cases are that new. How is it that some of the abusers have since died? So yes, it is suspicious timing for a grand jury indictment over a 50 year period.

There wasn’t an indictment, and one of the reasons listed was victims that didn’t want to testify. It doesn’t matter how old the cases are when we didn’t even begin to know about them until 2005 and prosecutions were ongoing until just a couple years ago.

 

[otjm]

There was no nationwide conspiracy to hide anything. You forget when these cases took place–at a time when the police didn’t even arrest people for incest, hardly ever for rape, and never for sex with children. It was looked upon as sin, not a crime by many, inside and outside the Church. A little historical perspective is needed.

No nationwide conspiracy - okay; truly amazing that so many bishops in so many dioceses ended up on the same exact page. I think what you mean was that there has been no indictments for conspiracy.

And as a bit of historical perspective: yes, people were being sent to prison for sex with minors in the 70’s, as I was practicing in juvenile law then.

Oh - and a little bit more historical perspective. In 1960, several classmates and I would ride into Portland to high school with a priest who, in 1980 was sent to prison for sexual abuse of minors, for crimes committed over the previous decades. No, he didn’t abuse me, but even then as a naive freshman in high school I picked up on something being not quite right, and made other travel arrangements.

Because it was viewed as sin, not as a crime. Those who complained were thought to be unforgiving and looking to gain something from it. That’s not the reality, of course, but that was then and this is now. The Church has awakened to it and as initiated programs to deal with it. You write as if none of that were true–as if nothing has been done.

And what good will that really do for the victims of say 20, 30 and farther back? Most of the people who did these things are dead. It’s opening old wounds or tearing the sutures off of healing ones and rubbing salt in them, not resolving anything.

I think I have answered that in my posts.

Not like before the Church recognized it and has been doing things to prevent it. You talk as if every parish has an abuser serving the people or something. Let’s not exaggerate when the topic is hot enough as it is.

Statistically, about 3% of priests were abusers, according the John Jay report. Many were multiple abusers and inb multiple parishes. Minimize as you wish.

Most of the cleansing is complete. There are those who don’t want it to be and are hanging onto this so they can, once again, hit the Church with past sins, as if, once again, the Church isn’t dealing with it better than other large institutions, religious, secular, and governmental. Victims’ hurts cannot be erased by prosecutions of old cases any more than simply telling them to get over it can. All we can do is work hard at preventing others from being abused as they were.

I seriously doubt that the cleansing is complete, unless you mean that everything is out on the table; forgive me if I see more evidence coming out periodically. And if you mean cleansing in that everyone gets it, as I noted, there were murmurings during Benedict’s reign of individuals in Rome minimizing that much was going on except for rampant civil attorneys evoking enormous (and obviously out of context to any “real damage”) jury verdicts. It was, in short, seen as a minor offense causing an extreme over-reaction.

There are still plenty of people around, including within the Church, who really see this as nothing much more than a mortal sin but one causing no significant harm to the victim. Unreality is not the sole province of those we disagree with. That in large part appears to be due to having no contact with victims and no interest in how deep these wounds are.

 

[otjm]

No one is saying victims should be forgotten or that this can’t happened again. Sin, like the poor, will be with us always. Again, all we can do now is work to keep it from happening again on such a scale. That is how we keep it fresh in our minds, not by dredging up old cases, which get lots of press but do very little good for victims or the Church.

On that I seriously disagree with you; people want to sweep it under the rug with a “Never mind; move along now, nothing here to see” approach. People are sick and tired of it, and the frequency of comments indicating they don’t want to hear about it is astounding.

The Church has been brought to its knees, financially, emotionally, and morally. And that is as it needs to be; the damage was incalculable not only by the emotional, psychological and spiritual harm to the victims, but also to their families, who found themselves betrayed by their bishops and clergy - the very ones who were to care for, nurture, and shepherd them.

There is an old story of a woman going to the priest to confess, for the umpteenth time, the sin of gossip. The priest, seeking to make clear how damaging gossip can be, assigned her the penance of going to the local tower , tearing open a pillowcase, and scattering the feathers. She was then to go and collect all of them.

She protested that there was no way she could collect all the feathers; to which he replied that her gossiping was scattering information that she could never gather back.

If gossip could be so widespread in its potential damage, how widespread and how great the evil and damage of the bishops and their assistants in failing to stop the abusers?

Yes, we have to keep working to do everything in our power to minimize abuse and to rapidly address any charges of abuse.

However, given human nature and its tendency to “move on”, you and I are going to disagree as to how much we need to learn, and how many need to learn it.

Many clearly are “getting it”. But the farther we are from the penitence, the more human nature tends to minimize things.

 

[rose_kelly]

.

There are still plenty of people around, including within the Church, who really see this as nothing much more than a mortal sin but one causing no significant harm to the victim. Unreality is not the sole province of those we disagree with. That in large part appears to be due to having no contact with victims and no interest in how deep these wounds are.

I very much doubt there are many within the church who care any less about the victims than you do.

 

[otjm]

My understanding is that in many of these cases, even in the case of potentially innocent priests, to avoid drama and strife and lengthy hearings and trials, out-of-court settlements were agreed upon which ended up making the diocese file for bankruptcy.

Given how egregious the conduct of the bishops was to the charges, the number of charges (including repeat offenders), and the number of priests accused, the problems with insurance companies and the size of some of the verdicts, it was the only choice which dioceses had. The alternative could have completely wiped dioceses out of existence.

I don’t believe I have ever said anything about priests and bishops being sinless. It is one thing to commit a sin, repent, and make amends. The sexual abuse was epidemic.

If you’re suggesting that the sexual abuse problem goes back to before the second half of the 20th century, the burden of proof is on you.

Sexual abuse goes back to the Greeks before the time of Christ, and I suspect there is evidence of it before that.

Sorry, I don’t have to prove anything. Only the extremely naive would think that it suddenly started occurring around 1950 - 1960. Or someone who wanted to be argumentative.

 

[Micosil]

Sexual abuse goes back to the Greeks before the time of Christ, and I suspect there is evidence of it before that.

Sorry, I don’t have to prove anything. Only the extremely naive would think that it suddenly started occurring around 1950 - 1960. Or someone who wanted to be argumentative.

I mean specifically of priests abusing minors.

 

[otjm]

I very much doubt there are many within the church who care any less about the victims than you do.

I will give you 10 points for the most insulting comment that has ever been made to me.