Priests having access to children in the first place

[DarkLight]

I definitely sympathize. There were a lot of problems for me as a kid, and I feel like a good relationship with another adult would have really helped. Parents aren’t always good either, and keeping other adults out runs a risk there.

It’s unfortunate that I can’t tell if the person who promoted him was either incredibly stupid or incredibly evil.

There are unfortunately many institutions from the time frame who figured it was more likely that kids were lying or someone was just trying to smear a good man.

 

[Joey12]

It is worth keeping in mind that changed policies and procedures aren’t necessarily enough to prevent things like this happening now. We have to look to see if the Catholic Culture as it is now enables behaviour like this to occur and remain hidden.

One thing that alarms me about the Catholic School my children go to is their insistence on discipline over things like wearing the right socks. They are told that they will be on detention if their uniform isn’t perfect. Now, if school kids are taught to fear school authority over something as minor as wearing the wrong socks, IMO they are being trained to not question school authority over something major.

In fact, as a parent, I’ve found that the principal of this school will not have his decision making questioned, even by parents. I contend that if someone is not willing to admit an obvious fault, or receive and act on differing opinions from others, then they are hiding something. I don’t know what it is, but it’s something. Maybe it is simply that it is the only way they think they can survive in a position of authority (by stomping on everything they see as a threat). But, it is again a question of what you can do. You can’t unseat them. You can only remove your kids, which is what I’m doing.

 

[ZMystiCat]

Most men want a wife and family. Celibacy precludes marriage and children. That’s a huge percentage of candidates eliminated from the priesthood. Very, very few people have the gift of celibacy. It’s a charism. It cannot be taught.

It is, of course, possible that men and women called to celibacy find greater joy, beauty, and/or purpose living celibately for God, as Jesus Himself mentions in Matthew 19:12, than they do in marriage. I’m not sure a total lack of desire for marriage is required, just that they desire something else more.

I know that I have my own desires that, should I pursue them, would be sinful, but I choose not to because I desire the Church and Christ more. There’s a beauty there that those desires would take away from if I pursue them.

The men that don’t want to marry traditionally would be asexuals (very small percentage of the human population), homosexuals, and those with psychosexual disorders, like pedophiles. By demanding celibacy the Church opened the door to many men entering the priesthood for reasons not related to serving God. The abuse crisis is intrinsically linked to the celibacy requirement.

If that were that simple, we’d see a higher, potentially considerably higher, rate of child sex predators among the priesthood than we would in the general population. That, of course, is not the case. Besides, it isn’t like lifting the requirement of priestly celibacy would stop many of those men from seeking the priesthood, especially since one of those groups is forbidden from marrying.

And I’m not denying that some men entered the priesthood for poor reasons, such as suffering from same sex attraction and thinking that priesthood was their only option. In those cases, though, we don’t have to remove the beauty of priestly celibacy. We need to do better at helping these men find their own beautiful role within the Church.

 

[godisgood77]

Starting in August of last year, there was someone who started collecting a compendium of sexual abuse cases that came from Eastern Orthodox churches

I was speaking of the Eastern Catholic Church’s, not the Orthodox

 

[babochka]

Celibacy is a discipline. If it cannot be taught, all women should fear stepping outside of the house. All men have to be celibate some or most of the time.

Just to clarify, celibate, in the way that the Church uses the term, means “the state of being unmarried”. In informal, secular speech, the meaning of the word has expanded to mean “not having sex”, but this is not the original and technical definition of the word.

This article does a great job of explaining the difference between celibacy, continence, and chastity, in the way that the words are used and understood by the Church.

What Are Celibacy, Chastity, and Continence? 9 Things to Know and Share| National Catholic Register

 

[babochka]

I was speaking of the Eastern Catholic Church’s, not the Orthodox

I think the point here is that it can happen with or without a celibate priesthood.

 

[godisgood77]

I think the point here is that it can happen with or without a celibate priesthood.

Okay, but I think that it is clear that a bunch of young men confined together creates an envionment where it is more likely.

 

[babochka]

babochka:

I think the point here is that it can happen with or without a celibate priesthood.

Okay, but I think that it is clear that a bunch of young men confined together creates an envionment where it is more likely.

Makes child abuse more likely? I don’t see the correlation.

And celibate priests aren’t “confined together” as if in prison? Is such behavior more likely in fraternities? Or police academies? Marine Corps?

I guess I can see the argument that the celibate priesthood leaves open a worthwhile option for young Catholic men with same-sex-attraction, who desire to serve the Church. In that sense, the priesthood might legitimately attract a large number of homosexuals. If they enter the priesthood determined to live out the virtue of chastity and quickly discover in seminary that chastity is neither expected nor encouraged, that would certainly affect their behavior.

 

[glencor63]

You misunderstand me. Celibacy demands that you forsake marriage/family. Most people want to marry and have a family. That fact alone eliminates a huge swathe of eligible candidates for a celibate priesthood. Of those uninterested in marriage and family a significant number will be asexual or homosexual. Asexuality is rare, so the greater number will be homosexual. There are heterosexual priests, but canceling out married men as candidates leaves you with a significantly lower percentage of heterosexuals, since traditionally they tend to marry.

*I am single with no desire to marry. I am heterosexual. I am also rare.

 

[ZMystiCat]

Oh, sorry, I should I have realized that.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Yeah, it’s been my experience that those who claim such-and-such religion doesn’t have problems with child sexual abuse just haven’t done research. Where there are children, there are always some predators.

 

[pnewton]

I am wondering if abuse is declining in other professions and agencies that deal with children. The track of child abuse cases in the Catholic Church shows how most of the case occurred the last century, and have declined drastically this century. So when the question of access is asked, does this mean today, or back then. Not just priests, but teachers and youth leaders of all types simply weren’t seen as possible abusers. The stranger was seen as the threat. Now we know better. Today, I do not think priests have much access to children where they have opportunity for abuse, as it is in all of society.

 

[glencor63]

Richard Sipe argued from his research as a psychotherapist and years as a priest that many men hid their sexuality under the cloak of celibacy. No one would question a celibate, unmarried priest, like they would a lifelong bachelor. He also said that at any given time half of all priests were not celibate.

 

[kgmlg]

kgmlg:

When complaints started coming in, he got promoted to be the director of an orphanage. No parents to complain…kids had nowhere to go.

It’s unfortunate that I can’t tell if the person who promoted him was either incredibly stupid or incredibly evil.

Actually, this was the part that shook me the most. In part, I could understand that there were evil people in the world, and we had to fight them. This promoting him and endangering more children was where “I lost it”. But this was how they operated back then. I did not get it then, I sure as heck don’t get it now.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

He also said that at any given time half of all priests were not celibate.

That implies that half of them were celibate and doing okay with it.

I’m sure at any given time a lot of people are cheating on their spouses too. We don’t do away with faithfulness in marriage because sometimes people fail at it.

 

[Brendan_64]

I do not follow your logic…

I’m suggesting that we return to allowing married men of proven virtue as priests. As a way to weed out rapist, perverts and address the priest shortage crisis.

I have no idea where you came up with the idea that this assumes that “normal men” would start raping

How would this weed out abusers? It could potentially lead to a few more priests, but how will this weed out those entering the seminary who go on to abuse children? Are you going to say that only already married men of already proven good character over several decades of marriage (and nobody else) can become priests?

The notion that allowing priests to marry would be a solution to the child abuse crisis assumes a link between the crisis and priests not being allowed to marry. I don’t think that a man who is attracted to and willing to sexually assault children and young people is likely to be changed by allowing him to marry.

Whether or not married priests are routinely allowed is an issue worthy of discussion, but I don’t think it is an issue that is linked to the sexual abuse of children and young people. If the scandal was about lots of priests having affairs with adult women then there could be a link, but I don’t think that is what we are talking about here.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Whether or not married priests are routinely allowed is an issue worthy of discussion, but I don’t think it is an issue that is linked to the sexual abuse of children and young people.

Precisely. Admitting married men to the priesthood in order to address the priest shortage is a topic for discussion.

However, admitting married men is not a way to address issues of priests sexually abusing minors or sexually harassing adults. Abusers and harassers and even rapists of adults are often married. As for “proven virtue”, these married men would have to be screened same as for single men. There are vast numbers of sex criminals who look very virtuous to the outside world for years and years until they are caught committing a crime. They are very good at hiding behind a respectable public image. In extreme cases you have people like John Wayne Gacy who was a prominent married local businessman for years while he was raping and killing teenage boys and burying them under his house.

 

[Phemie]

Things I heard at home growing up: “The teacher is right whether she’s right or wrong”, “don’t come home complaining you got the strap in school, you’ll get double at home”, and “we don’t say good things about a priest in fear of saying something bad” (IOW, the priest is never to be a topic of conversation).

My father’s best friend was the parish priest for whom he’d served Mass 30 years. They never would have thought twice about leaving us alone with him. And they never would have believed any accusations made against him.

Dad’s friend retired in 1958. The new pastor was rather stern and not someone the kids really warmed up to. The next pastor, appointed in the mid 60s, was just the opposite. He rode a snowmobile for fun and had a tractor and plough that he used to till his garden while wearing his cassock.

Years later it was learned that this man had first been accused of molesting kids back in the mid-30s, just a few years after he’d been ordained. The bishop had refused to believe the parents and the priest was moved around over the years. It was the talk of the school yard that he groped altar servers in the sacristy and that one of the boys in my class was his lover (that was in 8th and 9th grade). I still don’t know if our parents suspected but apparently a couple went to the bishop about what they saw happening and were pretty much called down to the lowest and told to leave.

By the time my kids came along some of the scandals had already started to surface. When my daughter was 8 we moved to a new parish. When we met the priest he wanted her to become an altar server, which she was thrilled about. But at one point he took her on his lap. That raised all kinds of red flags in me and from that day on I made sure that neither she or any of the other altar servers were ever alone with him. I made the altar servers my ministry and was there for every practice and every field trip. Had I even hinted to my parents that I had concerns about the priest I would have been roundly criticized for daring to think ill of a priest.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

I can totally see all that happening. Thank you for being there for the altar servers.

It’s interesting how much this can differ from family to family and parish to parish. There was never any rule in my family about priests being above reproach, and in fact I can remember my mother complaining about some priest or another just about every week. We never suspected any of them of being abusers, there were no rumors at my school, no priest from the parish where I grew up has ever appeared on bishop-accountability (two other parishes in my area had one accused priest each, but I did not know those priests growing up).

But my mom would usually find some fault with their homilies, or with what they said to her or some other middle-aged lady she knew, or with them slow-dancing with a religious sister at some gathering, or with their mannerisms in general, or some issue of parish governance, etc. To be fair, she also would praise a priest if she thought he had acted in a good way or said something she particularly liked or agreed with, but I definitely grew up with the idea that priests and nuns put their trousers on one leg at a time like everybody else and were nothing special.

 

[Joey12]

I think we are all waking up to the dangers around us. I remember back in 1996 I used to go on an internet forum for Catholics in Australia. There was a woman on there who said she had been abused by nuns in New Zealand and kept going on and on about it. I though it would help to talk to her about forgiveness. Can you believe it!! I had no idea how big this issue was back then. Then I went to work in my Diocese around 2004 and heard people whispering things about priests. Gossip. Still had no idea. After that, the scale of the issue in my Diocese started to be revealed. One priest after another. I bought a book by the mother of one victim. I wanted to get a deeper appreciation of what victims went through and how it could have happened. Someone I knew committed suicide. Priests I knew had accusations made against them. Still, when I suggested to youth ministers that we have someone talk to us on this issue they replied that “they didn’t want to bring a downer to the event”. Youth ministry! So I have come to the conclusion that we are all in a process of waking up and the people who face the truth willingly will be fully awake before others.

I love your “not on my watch” attitude. A priest I know kept referring to my daughter as “his”. Like hell she is! He will never get near her again. We need to be very vigilant.