De Vaticanus GodwiniiFollow

To paraphrase, a host of Irish (and some lolAmerican) Roman Catholic priests took an unusual approach to the pastoral care of ickle boys. (They may have mixed up the call for "more boys to enter the priesthood" and done it the other way round).

It then emerged that bishops and other senior catholic clergy knew about it and either turned a blind eye or helped cover up tracks for 10 or 20 years.

A damning (and rather disturbing) report by the Irish gubb'mint catalogued the true, appalling extent of the abuse, and even then, many of the priests involved were reluctant to resign. Eventually, the pope issued an apology that, to me, was the equivalent of a child gazing at his shoes and mumbling a barely-inaudible 'sry'.

Now some people felt this might have been a smidgen under-played, and the media have expressed serious concerns that the Vatican has under-reacted. Criticism of the pontiff's weak response has been growing, until yesterday, the Pope's preacher, Raniero Cantalamessa, claimed that media behavioUr was comparable to "the collective violence suffered by the Jews".

He even went on to say "The use of stereotypes and the passing from personal responsibility and guilt to a collective guilt remind me of the more shameful aspects of anti-Semitism"

So the church's response to widespread allegations of complacency and failure to take collegiate ownership of systematic child-rape is to whinge that they're being picked on by teh nasty journalists?

Reaction is now growing from abuse victims:



. . . and from teh Jews:



The facts are now undisputed, right up to the Vatican. Many priests systematically raped little boys for years, and their bishops simply moved them to fresh parishes to cover their tracks so they could spend another decade abusing their wards.


Talk about "Suffer the little children"

What a fUcking disgrace.

Because comparing it to something the Church really cares about would be offensive.

Question of the day can anyone find a complete transcript of what Cantalamessa said, best I could see was a partial direct quote followed by some paraphrasing.



Edited, Apr 3rd 2010 2:38pm by bodhisattva

Christopher Hitchens has been beating this drum for a solid month now.

Not that he ever needs a reason to bash on organized religion.

I thought Peggy Noonan had a sensible take on it. People in large, powerful organizations don't realize how much harm they can do.

Corporations understand that, generally, Why don't governments and churches?

We're Catholic. I sent Jr. to Sunday school and took him to church for his communion. Anything he decides to do past that would be up to him. I wouldn't send him anywhere alone with a priest, nor would he have cause to be. This might happen more to kids who are acolytes, as they do have cause to be alone with the priest quite often. I liked and trusted my priest, but here's the thing: I know a man who was abused as a child, and the abuse came from a friend who was 4 years older than he. For this reason, I trust NO ONE alone with my kid, no matter how stellar I think they are.

Abuse can happen anywhere and does. To think that keeping your kid out of Micheal Jackson's house, Boy Scouts and Catholic churches doesn't mean your son won't be raped. Repeatedly. People just need to talk to their children about this and teach them what to do in cases where an adult wants to be alone with them, tell them often that if they are ever hurt you are always on their side, in short: parent and prepare them as best you can for whatever defensive action they can take. These people are predators, and even if you prepare you can't always wrap your mind around the sh*t they'd do.

As for the church as an institution, I've often said it saddens me when people think of it as the Vatican as opposed to the the people who compose its membership, and it's even sadder when the Vatican does it. It's my personal feeling that all abuse should be reported to and dealt with by the police, but it's certainly a failure of all Catholics who don't think for themselves and demand the Church impose stricter penalties on these crimes.

I continue to be Catholic, American, democrat, married-it's the closest thing to representing what I believe to be true, and what I care to teach my children. No entity is free of fault, but I also don't think becoming a member silences my individual opinions or mindlessly endorses the party line.

Edited, Apr 3rd 2010 10:29pm by Atomicflea

I've always had a mistrust of religion and this just reinforces it. Yes, I won't leave my son with anyone, especially alone. I don't trust anyone, TBH.



This string of random sentences brought to you by lack of sleep and not enough coffee. I might get back to this thread later.

He managed to stir up a fuss with some of his comments, so I quoted him.


Earlier this year the Command of CFB Trenton Col. Russell Williams (a military base here in Canuckistan) had his hobby outed, which mainly involved raping and murdering women in the surrounding communities. Pretty messed up stuff. But he was busted, the provincial police came in and investigated, and it was handled (so far apparently) in as regular and transparent a manner as any other case. There were fears of reprisal from the community on members of the Canadian forces from CFB Trenton, but us being the polite old Canucks that we are were able to distinguish between one messed up guy doing horrible things and if memory recalls correctly the community got together to support the troops so to speak, to let them know that there was no backlash of negative sentiment on the army itself but rather against the individual.

Then we have the RC Church, who were more concerned about the image of the institution and shuffled around @#%^philes rather than report and deal with the problem strikes. Dare I drop the word betrayal, a breaking of trust between the institution and its parishioners? Now I would never say that this is as abhorrent as the buggering of little children, but it sure as hell exacerbates the situation and makes any effort to regain trust exponentially more difficult.


There is definitely a lot of shoulda, coulda, woulda involved as to why didn't they handle it in another manner. But at this point its about addressing past mistakes, apologizing to those abused and then showing that as an institution that you are taking clear and credible steps to ensure that going forward you have processes to handle it and to hold individual accountable. Of course that being implemented by a bunch of old geezers who are viewing the very act of this issue being exposed and the Church being held to account as some form of persecution is probably going to hamper said reconciliation.


Edited, Apr 4th 2010 9:19am by bodhisattva

Richard Dawkins would say that you were abused as a child (who is open to learning from authority figures) by descriptions of going to hell for having sex. He views this as a psychological abuse as a horrific tradgedy that you and other children have been put through, which often leaves scars for life. Let alone being actually physically raped as a child by someone who was supposed to be guiding your growth into maturity, morality and awareness of the universe around you.

Edited, Apr 4th 2010 10:08am by Aripyanfar

I absolutely agree with this and won't even attempt to defend the way the Vatican has dealt with the situation or problem. However, I dare say that most Catholics don't really consider the church outside their own parish, much less across the oceans in Rome. Which, now that I type it, is probably a mindset that helped assist the Vatican in covering things up because you could move an offender from place to place and no one in the pews has any idea (or even interest) in the 'big picture'.

To be honest other than something to shoot the sh'it about on a forum about I don't really spend a lot of time thinking about it or expressing moral outrage about either.

It's odd to me that this is your perception. When I worked for Girl Scouts, it was a commonly held knowledge that troop leaders in the BSoA were such a precious commodity that most were not reported, but shuffled around to other troops and therefore tacitly protected. Maybe the Church thinks the same about their priest shortage, and both institutions have such a poor knowledge of this disorder that they think that the person in question can actually be cured of the behavior.

Well, I felt the weight of my own inaction. I'm not sure what I can truly do, but I googled the pope's email and sent him a letter.

The incidents in the Catholic church really only serve 1 purpose for me. They reinforce the idea that allowing a person, or persons, to get between you and your relationship with your god can never be a good idea. Catholicism is a great example of this, but other Christian sects (an individual congregations) and even other major religions demonstrate it equally well. When faithful people allow their faith to become intertwined with their personal relationships, both will suffer in the end.

The Catholic Church, at the organization level, is a model of the image conscious corporation, no different from any other multinational conglomerate. Rather than address their core mission in situations like this they do damage control. Rather than take the high road and responsibly deal with situations like this, they obfuscate, equivocate and misdirect. They worry about the "recall cost": the cost of settlements, the cost of lost donations and the cost of lower enrollment in seminary. Only when the cost becomes greater to deny than to admit do they come out with crumbs of truth, and eventually, over a long period of time, the majority of the story will come out.

My take? I don't care about the immortal soul of a priest or a parishioner, mandatory reporting should be enforced and priests should face charges in the court system. Anyone in the Church found to contravene those statutes or assist otherwise in avoiding trial/charges should be charged with conspiracy/aiding& abetting.