Pope has immunity in abuse trials: Vatican

[Monte_RCMS]

Comments continued I assembled/ “collaged” / prepared a lengthy collection of comments, but they were 33000 characters. Somewhat longer than the 6000 allowed.

Anyway, here are a few more.

Spare me your hypocrisy. Porn and filth, directed at my children, comes pouring in to my home through my television, in their schools through their sex ed classes, in the stores, on the magazine shelves next to the candy where it is impossible to stay away from it. It’s on the streets where our girls walk around like prostitutes, the internet, a literal mine field of every manner of filth, blasphemy, profanity and porn. No one bats an eyelash.

And then you have the NERVE to feign indignation that a few men succumb to what is encouraged and promoted as perfectly normal and healthy by the rest of “society”. I give up. I would like to be a fly on the wall of this writer’s bedroom/bathroom and plaster a web-cam of it all over youtube so he gets a feel for what it’s like. Seems any two-bit “journalist” can post, these days, so long as it attacks a: the Church b: marriage and family, c: politics not left of center.

"We should be held to a MUCH higher standard than schools, dysfunctional families, and other religions. "

What’s this “we” stuff, Kimosabe? We, the Church, didn’t molest anyone. Individuals who were members of the Church molested people. Their individual sinful conduct does not negate the Truth Claim of the Catholic Church, any more than Peter’s cowardice or the immorality of members of the Corinthian Church affected the Church’s Truth Claim in apostolic times. The Church had sinners in it from Day One. Christ knew that when He chose to found His Church, which He did after recruiting whom He did. He full well knew that priests of His Church would commit sins throughout the next centuries down to the End of the Age, yet He promised to remain with the Church until the End of the Age nevertheless.

Is it appropriate for the Catholic Church to point out that there are similar abuses going on in other churches and the public schools? Of course. The Media repeatedly emphasizes the pedophilia that has gone on in Catholic dioceses across the World, yet similar conduct by rabbis, ministers, boy and girl scout leaders, sports coaches and public school teachers of all sexes rarely receives more than episodic coverage. Pope Benedict should no more go to jail (as some purple editorialists have suggested), than should the Governors of many states whose teachers have been raping kids since the public schools were first formed. It is irresponsible to suggest those governors should go to jail and it is equally irresponsible to suggest that the Pope should.

Why is this FACT never part of the discussion?:

Male pedophiles (including priests) who abuse young boys are homosexuals — or, in the vernacular, “gay.”

Homosexuals flocked to the Church in the 1960’s, some desiring to avoid the Army draft during the Vietnam War, demanding tolerance and that they not be judged. Within a few years, their numbers increased as their fellow behaviorists worked their ways into “gatekeeper” positions at seminaries. The original criteria that homosexuals not be admitted to the priesthood was quickly vindicated and the Church corrected and restored its procedures. Now, critics like the New York Times refuse to recognize that they were wrong before and are wrong now.

Since Archbishop Weakland was mentioned, it is worth noting who replaced him. It was Father Dolan, now the archbishop of New York. Bishop Dolan had previously been so dilligent in rooting out clergy who abused minors as auxiliary bishop of St. Louis that he was accused of running a “witch hunt”.

Archbishop Dolan is also about as far different from Weakland as possible. Archbishop Dolan is a theological conservative, Weakland was an advocate of theological relativity.

I would join with others in asking why the Catholic Church has defrocked if not excommunicated Weakland. Coming from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints where excommunication is done at a more local level and more commonly than in the Catholic Church, and probably over half of all excommunications are for adultery, although apostasy, other sexual crimes, serious criminal offenses and many other things will also lead to it, I always wonder why the Catholic Church does not excommunicate more people.

Still, it seems odd that only in cases where there are attempts to destroy an institution is sex with a 17-year-old, be they a male or a female, a relationship with a “young boy” or “young girl” or even an “innocent child”.

The fact of the matter is in the 1980s a Democrat Representative from Massachusetts admitted having sexual relations with his 17-year-old page. Since he did this in Morocco he did not break statutory rape laws (but somehow I suspect homosexual relations of anykind are illegal in Morocco). This representative did not apologize, he boldly claimed that what he did was OK, and the people of Massachusetts returned him several times to the US house.

By the same token, absolutely anyone who uses the New York Times (NYT) as their source of information on this issue must also be held accountable and punished.

Sadly, issue manipulation and distortion and falsification of the facts is standard and accepted practice at the NYT. Its own scandals in this regard have been widely reported.
The NYT is an embarrassment to the Media and should be condemned for its total disregard for the truth and its lack of ethical principles and journalistic integrity in its reporting and commenting of the news. How can any one who even remotely respects themselves use the NYT as a credible source of information on practically anything any more?

 

[Hiskid1973]

"We should be held to a MUCH higher standard than schools, dysfunctional families, and other religions. "

Yes…The scriptures don’t tell the school system to above reproach in a wicked and perverse generation…The words to the Corinth church weren’t meant for those in the world but to the church to purge itself from those who did ungodly things…We’re even told not to keep company with those who call themselves “brother” but are immoral, drunken, liars ect…

 

[NEWCATHOLICJEFF]

I ask though that apologists not try to blame the victims, or the press, or the enemies of the Church, or the Atheists, or the Jews, or the gays, or the Illuminati any more.

I am no apologist and I do not blame individuals, but motives. I ask why? If any of these people work in a large organization they would understand that it is not about being lazy or incompetent but the shear size of some organizations means you must depend on subordinates to perform their functions.

Convicting someone, even more so a Senior religious person, you would think that a trial would occur. That being if a crime existed.

Lets go back to the time. In those times sexual disorders were treated through counseling. If you can allow that laws change over time and that often times lenses of the past are EXTREMELY hard to wear then it is highly likely that anyone not alive and old enough to remember a particular period of time will have very little understanding of decisions being made.

For example, being in the Navy I use many Navy examples, during the Cold war when ships went to general quarters a ship was drilled to get to a condition of water-tight integrity in under 5 minutes. Failure to do so, during an event called REFTRA was terrible. The ship would drill until it was accomplished. To do this each individual had to close certain doors, or seal up piping and ventilation systems. Some of the hatches were pretty large and very heavy. In those days you would be chastised if your doors were not dropped down and dogged into place in time. The issue is that in order to do this each man would run to the doors and drop them often one man per door. Although it was not kind, on almost every REFTRA someone would lose fingers when the knife edge of door took them off.

Today it requires two to three people to do these hatches, and the time is not longer 5 minutes. It could be that the risk of war is not as great and we have become more lacked or possibly because the stature of many sailors is no longer the same and it is just physically impossible to avoid even more injuries. In any event the rules have been changed and for younger sailors they cannot fathom having so little respect for fingers the need or desire not to be Safe. Safety is now one of the pre-imminent mission for every military event. This is a good think but the young also need to understand that sometimes safety MUST be thrown out the window in war time, and since we do not train that way eventually they must learn this under wartime conditions.

My whole point is that even if 10 treatment letters went across his desk and he was technically aware of these events during those days that was likely the end of his involvement because the medical community said so.

Were is the outrage for the AMA? What about the doctors that treated these people that committed more crimes? I believe their is no outrage because the average person understands that their knowledge was limited. I wonder why can they not make a simple keep of faith and understand that the Pope had even less understanding of the treatment process then these health care providers?

I do not blame the victims or accuse them of not being subjected to pain. My issue is that it is not the fault of the Pope so why go after him? Now it is just as wrong for me to judge their motives as it is for them to judge the Popes or you to judge others defending the Church.

In other words, at least for sin and the involvement of Satan, I always follow the money or a personal motive. I understand that you can have many types and styles of motives, money is pretty easy. That being said what could the motives be.

1. Prevention (Honorable)
2. Justice (Acceptable)
3. Financial Gain (Possibly Selfish)
4. Hurting the Church to promoting a position on a different agenda (Wrong)
5. False witness or distortion for amusement (Evil)

I am sure you can find many more, but when I hear arguments from anybody I ask myself what is “In it for them”. In the case of the Holy Father I do not believe that anyone in the Church has been more proactive to prevent these kind of abuses in the modern times, given what we now know of recidivism rates for sexual offenders. So how does attacking him, or making demands of him benefit individuals?

In my perspective the only people that have a right to ask for Justice are the men that were abused. They deserve Justice or revenge unfortunately based on the laws of the time, but rightly only against those individuals that actively abused them or purposefully endangering them. What seems to be alluded to in many attackers is that the Pope would purposefully put these men back with kids so that they could continue to abuse children.

Even if one were to say that the Pope knew these men were going near the flock I refuse to believe that he would endanger children so IF, and this is a big IF, he actually personally made the decision to allow these men back near the flocks it would have been done so by the direction of health care providers or at worst through an administrative error that he would not have noticed. To believe that he would do this intentionally is far worse then accusing others of their motives for taking this position.

 

[NEWCATHOLICJEFF]

Why would other organizations want to destroy the Church? Would Planned Parenthood have a reason? What about the Rainbow coalition? How about other individual announcers or shows to increase ratings? Do you think that money or some other motive could be present?

If a statement will not provide a redress from the persons responsible, or help to prevent a recurrence then I find them suspect. The Holy Father has made many, Many, MANY statements condemning this behavior. Without punishing the Pope for something he could not have prevented at that time in history is wrong.

I guess we on the sidelines are all making judgments and we probably should not do so as NONE of us has all the information. In the end what will help the Church and the victims to heal?

On a side note if anyone things that this will NEVER happen again they are wrong. Satan will work even harder to either find a Priest that is weak, or put a dishonest person into becoming a Priest just to hurt the Church. He gets so much from these failures of man. Look at what a few bad men can do? The percentages of Priests that are bad are extremely low as professions go. Far, FAR, below 12% so at least God has been working positively on his Church to make it more pure, either that or the example might be that regardless that the Church will have bad Priests in it the mission of the Church is so important that one should not condemn the Church because of the sins of a few.

Some find pleasure in tearing down the Church or causing derision, some do it from a misguided premises that they can prevent evil in the future. For me I will pray for everyone, that are doing things that could hurt the church without knowing better. I refuse to believe the Pope intentionally hurt anyone and I will at least point out that the nature of man, when corrupted by evil, seems to tend to do things for selfish reasons. I try to follow the motives, or the money to figure out what side of Christ they stand on the problem with doing this is that it means I am judging and so I become that which I should not and I must reflect on my own conscience to ensure my motives for pointing things out are not selfish in nature.

God Bless You

 

[Monte_RCMS]

Part of the problem here is that there are two stories and the readers are getting confused. The one story was about the German priest who was sent to Munich for therapy while Cardinal Ratzinger was the Archbishop. The message from the other bishop was that the priest was going to Munich for therapy because of sexual impropriety. Being an older person I know that this is the way that we talked in those days. People did not ask for specifics when they heard that someone had committed a sexual impropriety. It was considered indiscrete to do so. Later the same priest is reassigned to a parish, even though his therapist had written a report that the man was an uncooperative patient and should not be allowed to work with children. But the Vicar General at that time, admits that he did the assigning, not the Archbishop. Those of us who have worked in chanceries, are religious or priests know that this is true. Bishops assign pastors. They don’t deal with associates. That’s done by the Vicar General or an auxiliary bishop who serves as personnel director. Bishops of large dioceses do not deal with these details. That’s why they have a staff.

Now story has sort of fizzled out. Then comes the story of the American, Fr. Murphy. That case was referred to the Sacred Congregation of the Faith when Cardinal Ratzinger was the Prefect. But Cardinal Bertone dealt with it. This too is also believable. These Congregations are really departments. There is a head and there is a staff. When these reports come in they are assigned to a particular member of the staff to deal with it and do what has to be done. That’s typical of any large infrastructure. Fr. Murphy writes a letter to Cardinal Ratzinger asking that the case be dropped, because he has confessed his sin; the years have passed and he’s dying. The letter was answered by Cardinal Bertone, which makes sense because he’s the one in charge of this case. The fact is that the man did die a few days after Cardinal Bertone’s letter reaches the USA. Some people want to see the priest’s letter. That is something that cannot be done without breaking all kinds of laws. If the man is speaking about matters of the confessional and conscience in his letter, the letter becomes confidential and is shown on a need to know basis. You cannot put someone’s conscience on display, no matter what sin he has committed.

What we as Catholics must remember is that bishops and major religious superiors deal with matters of conscience every day, specifically of the men or women under their command. They have to tread very carefully in answering questions. Moral law does not allow you to reveal what is a secret of conscience, even if you’re not a priest. Certain things can only be revealed to those who have the need to know. If you know a matter of conscience that your neighbor has told you in confidence, you are not allowed to reveal it except to those who need to know. Obviously that does not include the entire world. What people are asking is for two things: 1) people want Benedict to reveal to the press matters of conscience, which is unfathomable that we ask that. The world does not need to know that. I certainly don’t want to know every confidential detail about someone else’s conscience. Do you?

1. They want Pope Benedict do what is not usual and customary, meaning that he take responsibility for the work done by others who worked for him. That’s not the way the system works. You assign someone to a job so you can do other things. That becomes his department and he has to deal with it. If I’m the superior of my religious house, I don’t have to tell my superior everything that happens in my house. I have to make sure that things run smoothly and that the brothers have what they need. If they need fraternal correction, it is my problem as the superior of the house. If someone does something that is so big that it needs to be reported, then I report. But it’s a judgment call that you make when you’re in charge of people and organisms. Sometimes you make the wrong judgment call, but you can’t blame your superior for that. Maybe I should have told my superior that I had a brother under me that never goes to mass. But I figured I could handle it. It was a bad judgment call on my part, because the brother got worse and stopped going to prayers too. But I can’t pass the buck to my superior nor should he be asked to pick it up. He does not have a crystal ball. He only knows what I report. By the way, this is a hypothetical situation. Everyone in my house goes to mass. Once in a while, the major superior may ask how things are going. I may say something like, “We’re dealing with a few issues, but they’re coming along OK.” And he’ll say, “Let me know if you need help.” In an organization as large as the Church, those in authority depend on those who manage different areas to do their job well and to ask for help if they need it.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

Good post!

 

[seekerz]

This post, might shed some light here.

If the historical context given there can be borne out, I think it changes the context of a number of the defenses being made of the Church - I know it deeply affects my perspective.

People running about giving different defenses for how things were handled (ignorance, custom, influx of homosexuals…) doesn’t help the Church one bit. We need an authoritative voice from the top (not necessarily raised in a court of law) and a bigger mea culpa if necessary - not just for what happened but for why the Church seemingly abandoned its tradition of severe, public punishment in favor of ‘counseling’.

 

[chevalier]

There’s nothing unusual about sovereign immunity. You don’t go to France to get a decree against the Queen of England, you don’t go to Italy to bind the King of Spain to testify. I wonder if it was ignorance or some other motivation which made someone publicise this as if it were an extraordinary thing. Heads of states generally have always had immunity in other states.

Accusations against the Pope are weak in terms of evidence (or logic), while it does look like wishful thinking goes in the sensational direction.

At the same time, abuse of children is horribly wrong and denial of justice is also wrong. I am not convinced that abusers should necessarily be reported to civil authorities (but I’m not saying they shouldn’t), but they should be removed from positions in which they could do more harm, especially after already reoffending.

In such situations it is important to remember that people have the right to have charges against them sufficiently proven and substantiated.

 

[BenjaminLumen]

**why doesn’t the holy father call a council of all the cardinals and bishops to deal with this worldwide crisis??!! It is past time to address this scandal! All priests and nuns involved with physical or sexual abuse should be removed from ministry and prosecuted by the legal system. This is horrible! I don’t think the vatican realizes the seriousness of the crisis. It is not simply an american problem, but a world wide problem!! It undermines any authority the church has on moral issues. No one takes the church seriously! The church cannot effectively lead or preach the gospel without a thorough cleansing. Even if it means losing hundreds or thousands of cardinals, bishops, priests and nuns; it must be done, now! Roman catholics should withhold all tithes, until a council is convened and the guilty removed and prosecuted **

because the courts in truth have not proven that abuse has occurred, everything that you are seeing play out is media generated, this story is a non story, if rome pays , then the media is spinning that rome paying out as guilt, and it most certainly is not, rome is paying on the ambiguity, and in the plaintiffs favor.

You demand justice , but the fact of the matter is, justice is impossible because the plaintiffs cannot prove thier cases, romes money is rome saying we can’t prove that it didn’t happen, that is what rome is saying, rome is bending over backwards to accept this accusation(and its only an accusation) they don’t have to do that, this story is a most damaging thing and the media’s position and their rhetoric is in every sense of the word ‘whole cloth’ , in its classical definition. Why does everyone rush to condemn rome with the media?? I don’t understand that, larry flint draws pictures of priests with erections in hustler magazine throughout the 70’s and 80’s, 90’s and everyone automatically takes the plaintiffs decisions as true. The popular culture automatically says rome is guilty, but, are they??? Not one case has been proven to the standards demanded of a united states federal judiciary, not in ireland, not in america… No where have i heard any talking of any convictions at all save in 1 or 2 cases , but we got 10’s of thousands of lawsuits… This garbage is completely bogus!!!

 

[irishpatrick]

I do not believe it is just about money. It seems like a lot of this is part of a focused attack by groups that wish to tear down the morale authority of the church to push thier own agenda. Many of which march to the beat of demon drummers. I am certain the Holy Father is greatly distressed by the conduct of some of the members of the Church, but as in the past thier will ALWAYS be bad men in every crowd of good men as long as we are speaking of earth and not heaven.

The faithful need to be just that Faithful to Christ and to his Church understanding that the evil one puts a LOT of effort in bringing down our Priests and even in Jesus time he did not turn his back on the 11 good men that were left standing after Judas betrayed him.

I agree.

I have zero doubt that there are forces trying to use this scandal to rip down the Church, and I believe they are the same forces who attacked the Church from the inside to begin with. So very many people (claiming to be Christians/Catholics) appear to be nearly completely ignorant of the nature of the spiritual war we are literally surrounded by every day. We humans like to place ourselves at the center of all things, yet there is a flurry of spiritual activity around us that we simply do not see.

The best way to address this is with complete faithfulness, not with rejection of truths. Some want to treat the RCC as if it were just another human institution, when in fact it was Divinely instituted and is Divinely directed. Of course, since humans make-up the Church, that leaves the door wide-open for attacks when weak cultural eras hit us with things like “peace, love, dope, sex, and tolerance for everything” clamor that emanated from the 60s and 70s. It is no accident that the worst decades in USA history (the 60s and 70s) lead to one of the worst scandals in Church history. It amazes me that we went from the greatest generation to the worst generation in one single generation.

Of course, the current generation running on the heels of the “I am everything” baby boomer generation might very eclipse the 60s and 70s for being the worst in USA history…yet in many ways it will hardly be their fault because it was the fools of the 60s and 70s that taught the young today how to be even more foolish (and I am a baby boomer, so I am blasting people of my own age).

The most significant thing to understand is that the peak of abuse happened 30 years ago, and abuse has been at very, very low levels since the early and mid-90s. The media focus and public outrage today is about grave acts and sins that happened a long time ago (15-40 years). There is little, if any, evidence for the abuse other than the victims account, and rarely ever a real eye witness account or anything substantial at all. Yet, when it comes to this sort of sin and crime, people do not care about proof or being fair, it is all about hang em’ high from the public square even if the evidence is amazingly thin.

I cannot think of any other situation in our culture that is even close. Priests and the Church are being forced into the gallows over charges that cannot even be proved, and the Church knows better than to fight them in court because then it becomes and even larger nightmare. Never before I have I seen so much money change hands, and so many attacks made, over such amazingly little real evidence. It is the perfect storm and the enemy knew exactly what he was doing when he attacked the Church from the inside, yet the gates of hades shall not prevail.

 

[BenjaminLumen]

See this is dangerous, You do not want the Holy See Arguing this position is that of a Head of State, it could be so, it may not be so, but you do not want the Holy See to Argue that point… Because your diminishing your Status by doing that in a Legalistic sense.

Rome doesn’t want to argue any position it seems to me, from that stand point…

This assault against the Church is dangerous… If Rome has to argue that the Holy See, has a legal definition, then no matter what Rome has lost Ground, from a legalistic standpoint, Rome has ceded ground if they have to argue any position at all…

See the adversary’s of the Catholic Church, understand this innately, they understand that if Rome has to define it-self in any way shape matter or form in a legalistic sense , then Rome has given ground that it shouldn’t give…

These are some mean sons uh b)*($ against the Church, they are…

See the Media stories want you to champion Rome going to court, No matter what Rome Looses when they do that… The adversary’s of the Church know this.

The undefined is a stronger position then any position to hold, because no one can figure an angle on you if you are totally undefined… Rome looses no matter what, if they go to court.

Don’t automatically jump up support Rome going to Court, because they loose no matter what, the Enemy’s of this Church innately understand that.

Let look at this; THe Pope succeedes in defending himself as Head of State, so then Roman Catholicism is a product of a State legalistically, so , It can be taxed, extorted, etc, all at the whims of the lawyers and individual states…

The proper strategy out of Rome, is for the Opinion to be written where the See at the end of the Opinion by the Judicial is still undefined, You in NO WAY want the Pope Defined in any legalistic sense.

This is a Protestant Attack, this is where you will see the lawsuits dropped, because if the Head of a Church can be legally defined, then you will then see all heads of Church’s be legally defined, and you will see the destruction of all Church’s by the state at the end of the day. So the Protestants have to change their positions and lawsuits now, because their necks are in the STATE’S Guillotine as badly as the Protestants wanted to Shove the Holy See’s Head into the Guillotine, see the Protestants to win now, have to destroy themselves on some timeline also.

 

[irishpatrick]

See this is dangerous, You do not want the Holy See Arguing this position is that of a Head of State, it could be so, it may not be so, but you do not want the Holy See to Argue that point… Because your diminishing your Status by doing that in a Legalistic sense.

Rome doesn’t want to argue any position it seems to me, from that stand point…

This assault against the Church is dangerous… If Rome has to argue that the Holy See, has a legal definition, then no matter what Rome has lost Ground, from a legalistic standpoint, Rome has ceded ground if they have to argue any position at all…

See the adversary’s of the Catholic Church, understand this inately, they understand that if Rome has to define it-self in any way shape matter or form in a legalistic sense , then Rome has given ground that is should give…

These are some mean sons uh b)*($ against the Church, they are…

See the Media stories want you to champion Rome going to court, No matter what Rome Looses when they do that… The adversary’s of the Church know this.

The undefined is a stronger position then any position to hold, because no one can figure an angle on you if you are totally undefined… Rome looses no matter what, if they go to court.

Don’t automatically jump up support Rome going to Court, because they loose no matter what, the Enemy’s of this Church innately understand that…

I agree and the Church knows it cannot win even if it had conclusive proof of its innocence because people literally want to believe the Church is guilty. There are two forms of persecution acceptable in this world:

Anti-semitism

Anti-Catholicism

The interesting point is that Catholicism is the one Church/faith that is closest to Judaism and is the one faith that actually perfects and completes Judaism…so the fact that those are the two forms of persecution left is no spiritual accident. IMO

 

[pnewton]

The pope did not refer in his sermon to the crisis of confidence sweeping the Church as almost daily revelations surface of sexual abuse of children in the past, accompanied by allegations of a cover-up.

Reuters. Another British news agency. The reason that the Holy Father isn’t going into crisis mode is because it is another example of a manufacture crisis. These “daily revelations” are not new and their not revelations. In fact, the complaint by the victims closest associated with the Holy Father is that neither the Church or the police acted. In other words, there were many people that had knowledge of the events, not just some sort of secretive Catholic cadre. I guess since the victims didn’t call Reuters, they see this as a “scoop” and a “news” story.

Everything that has been coming out in the news latetly is (again) decades old. It is only being rehashed to make money.