More Headaches for the Vatican: Priests and Child Porn

[...] #2: Amy Sullivan at Swampland in [...]

AS-You have found a use for Hatch’s abstinence money. Why don’t you pass that on.

Pervs are prevalent in many religions, including mine: a Baptist minister at the private school my boys attend fondled kids dating back to the ’60s. Everyone looked the other way, even after the creep died. But for the Catholic Church to demand that their faith leaders are to be married to the church and stay celibate – ostensibly forgoing all natural urges – and then for decades to practically ignore having so many predators disguised as priests, well, that’s pretty blasphemous.

Meanwhile, back in the states, the Education Minister (er, Secretary) Arne Duncan releases a statement defending a guy who, um, neglected to report adult-child homosexual sex.
.
You know, while we’re on the subject of “tin-eared”.

Headaches, huh? You know cnn has a story about what some women do to get rid of headaches (http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/09/30/why.women.have.sex/index.html) …maybe the priest should give it a try…

These are the moral people that tell us condoms are evil and women are second-class citizens.

[...] am by LeisureGuy The problem the Vatican faces is that it has centuries of attitude to live down. Amy Sullivan in Time’s Swampland blog: Does anyone at the Vatican talk to each other? Or are these guys just really really awful at [...]

The problem the Vatican faces is that it has *centuries* of attitude to live down.

http://mediamatters.org/research/200910010008
.
And now the defense of Jenkins–it’s anti-gay to suggest that he screwed the pooch not reporting adult-child homosexual sex.

I forgot to link to the story:

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/09/head-of-office-of-safe-and-drug-free-schools-expresses-regret-for-controversial-incident.html

What the Vatican should do is start having it’s priests direct movies. Apparently as long as you are considered an “artist” it is okay to diddle a young child.

Maybe Mark Foley should look into career opportunities working for Joey Rats. He has experience with cover-ups by higher-ups.

Foley could pursue a career with the Department of Education, where adult-child sex is apparently not so bad.

I hear that the intestines of priests are useful for strangling kings. Otherwise, who needs ‘em?

Score!

In a call from a friend in Nova Scotia, Canada I was told that the Bishop of Antigonish had announced a settlement worth millions of dollars for abuse by Catholic priests in the province last week. Today that same bishop was arrested in Ottawa for importing child porn from the US into Canada and elsewhere on his computer. He has just been bailed. The Archbishop of the Province of Nova Scotia is “shocked”. Where is that Catholic loudmouth from Boston?

Gotta love the anti-Catholic bigotry there . . . .

The US should use the RICO Act to seize all the Catholic Church’s holdings until it turns in all the pedophiles it has been shielding, as well as all church records related to sex crimes against children.

They’re taking that whole “Spare the rod and spoil the child” thing far too seriously. Or else they’ve just misinterpreted scripture again.

The statement itself wasn’t exactly a model of how to win supporters and influence public opinion.
.
I wasn’t aware that the Church was involved in any superficial public relations campaigns, Amy. What you fail to realize, what everyone fails to realize, is that we simply do not care what your perverse interpretations of Catholicism are. Surely, you’d love us to lower ourselves to the watered-down, morally flacid, hypersensitive minutia that is modern religion, however, as Cicero said, “My conscience means more to me than what the world thinks.”

First racism, then bigotry, eh? Italians. Catholics. Anyone else you’d like to purge from your puritanical society with that vile RICO Act?

If left to you, Sacred, there’d be no scripture.

You Brits should really let this whole “down with the Papists” schtick go. It’s unbecoming of such an otherwise tepid people.

You really should get out more. The priesthood is modeled after the Apostles, all of whom were male. This is the only facet of Catholicism that could, in any manner, be interpreted as taking an uneven approach towards gender. Contrary to the petulant whines of secularists, there is no controversy within the Church on this issue. Catholic women have no qualms with an all male priesthood. Why you raving anti-Catholics care how we conduct our own house is entirely beyond me.

…don’t forget the Irish.

“…we simply do not care what your perverse interpretations of Catholicism are.”
.
Actually I do care, but I digress. However, I wondered if you and sacredh could quit and stay away for good. The Temptations of Amy…and KT and Jay[tm], in theatres everywhere, are too strong to resist, and Amy did get you to reply, even if in protest. But that’s ok; I can’t leave either. Now if we can get pirate to return we’ll have full sanity restored here.

Um…maybe because YOU PEOPLE can’t stay out of MY politics, my rights, my freedom to reproductive technologies (including birth control, AIDS prevention and abortion), my government, and my children’s pants!

AMEN SISTAH!

Exiled, I honestly concede the validity of the necessity of scripture. While I’m not religious myself and have no use or need for religion, there are many out there who reqiure the threat of eternal damnation hanging over their heads to force themselves to behave in a civilized manner. If belief in a Supreme Being gives a person comfort, solace or joy, then scripture and belief has served a useful purpose.
.
Most of my friends are believers and many get a sense of well being from it that I envy. Sadly, that has never stopped me from tossing the occassional verbal handgrenade to satisfy my own twisted sense of humor. Long live scripture.

I am a Catholic. The Church is wrong. That the Church does not provide full cooperation with the civil authorities is beyond my comprehension. These are heinous crimes ( rape) in many instances perpetrated by people in authority. Instead of begging forgiveness on their knees, they respond arrogantly. Long jail time for the offenders and a proper rebuke from the Vatican would go a long way.

deconstructiva, the TIME cover of Beck and the story p!ssed me off no end. The issues remaining in my subscription are going to go straight from my mailbox into the garbage can. I came back because I missed KT’s healthcare articles (plus the “1000 Words”) and the people here in the swamp.
.
I’m sure I’ll take breaks again but I don’t blog anywhere else. I hope PW comes back too even if only for driveby sniping. It was my wife that encouraged me to resume. Of course my painting a window on the wall above the computer desk that had Bush’s mom Barbara with her blouse pulled open and her sagging boobs pressed up against it may have had something to do with it.

wow Exiled, you’re pretty clueless about how bad the Church has it. As a former Catholic, and one of millions leaving the Church in droves, its that type of complete cluelessness that’s leading the Church to schism. It happened once, it can happen again, and I could careless because hypocrisy abounds in their pollution of Christ’s teachings.

again, wow, based on that comment, I’d say it’s time to take the tax-free status of the Church first and soon there after all religions.

hmm, considering that the Vatican is also treated as a nation, its tax-free status is just outright BS. They don’t deserve it, and if all their teachings result in fools like Exile, well, then we’re better off if they left.

This just the humble opinion of an ex-Catholic.

Indeed. And the Chinese. Now the Mexicans. Not my point though. I was referring to the morally reprehensible, agenda-driven, racist misapplication of RICO which hellslittleangel so thoughtfully recommended using against Catholics.

I have several points, aquinas. The first of which is this, the overwhelming majority of these cases stem from decades ago during a time when the psychology of pedophilia was not fully understood. It was a widely held assumption during the 60s, 70s, and 80s that pedophilia was a treatable mental-health disease. The Church subsequently, and erroneously, began a decentralized effort to begin treatment sessions of offending priests, while relocating them to different parishes. The US public school system engaged in the same exact efforts: treating teachers, while also moving them to new school districts so that they would not be in contact with any of their victims. This is not an indictment of the school boards, though. Naturally, this is simply written off as antiquated psychology. The reason that the Church has come under such public scrutiny is because we live in a largely prejudiced, bigoted society driven by Protestant power circles. It serves no purpose to malign the state governments’ initiatives in pursuing the same programs of relocation as the Church; however, there is much to be gained by espousing damning positions of the Church to a hostile US populace. Let it also be known that the Vatican was largely unaware of the extent to which this was going on in the US. As I said, these were decentralized efforts. The Vatican does not oversee the day-to-day activities of the various Dioceses.

Secondly, and possibly more importantly, is that individuals will always be susceptible to moral transgressions. No one is perfect. Therefore, to malign the entire Church because of the actions of .01% of priests is lunacy. There are currently approximately 500,000 Catholic priests worldwide. There have been nearly 5,000 allegations of abuse ranging from the 1950s to today. If you consider how many have been in the priesthood over that period of time, the percentage is actually far lower than .01%. The swirling whirlwind of accusation, condemnation, and broadly vicious denunciation of the Church and the priesthood based upon the morally perverse actions of far less than .o1% of all Catholic priests is damning proof that this whole charade is nothing more than prejudice-driven propaganda.

Nice to see Spob using homosexual as pejorative qualifier. And lamely saying “child” when the person in question was past the age of consent (16). And happened 20 years ago. And not by the person he’s attacking (Kevin Jennings).

I’m not quite sure who “Exiled” is talking to, but it certainly isn’t my daughters. They are each active in our church as alter servers and/or catechists. However, they could hardly be described as happy with the role that the church has in mind for them. At least one of mine would leap at the opportunity to lead a congregation. As it is, they feel like they get scraps from the table.

Exiled,

I am also a Catholic, but how the Church has handled the abuse cases is plain wrong. No amount apologist writing can erase the shame I feel for my Church.

That said, if your figures are correct (5000 abuses cases, 500000 priests) that would be 1% of priests, not 0.01%. You forgot to multiply by 100% to convert a decimal to a percentage.

And saying what the Church did was excusable because the School System did it is morally bankrupt. We as Christians should hold ourselves, and our institutions, to higher standards. Your position is akin to saying Southern lunch counters should aren’t in the wrong for segregation because Southern schools were segregated.

I am also a Southern, so please no ad hominem attacks.

Exiled… Simply put, once another person is involved, a crime has been committed. Deviant thought is one thing. Rape and sexual molestation are another. The laws apply (ask Roman Polanski) and justice should be served.

Carlgrace-

My apologies. A slip of mathematical calculation. The point is nonetheless intact.
~
-500,000 current priests
-5000 allegations
—-Taken alone, this accounts for 1%—-
~
Then let’s account for the fact that in the last half century, the total number of priests well surpasses the current number. Over fifty years, the total number is in the millions. So, out of millions, there are 5,000 allegations. So, substantially less than 1% of the priesthood since the 1950s has been accused of sexual depravity. Yet, nearly 3% of the American population are felons. Disproportionate faux outrage at the Church? I’d say definitely so.
~
Let me remind those who would still denounce the Church for the actions of at most .25% of its clergy. The Church is not defined by the individuals within it, it is defined by its doctrine, by its tireless pursuit of humanity and social justice, by its relentless support of the disenfranchised, the impoverished, and the downtrodden. We are speaking of a religion which accounts for one-sixth of the world’s populations, which, despite vehement hyperbole waged against it, still refrains from demonizing its opponents. Walk into many Protestant churches and you will hear a fire-tongued condemnation of the world, and often direct denunciation of Catholicism, Islam, Judaism. In 24 years attending Mass, not once have heard any dialectic incitement against any of the world’s religions. We tend to our flock and we care for the world’s people. What we do not engage in, however, is arrogant, self-righteous campaigns of conversion which has become the modus operandi of so many Christian sects. The sanctimonious rhetoric of Sunday-only Christianity is what you should be outraged with. Not at a religion that, as a whole, exemplifies the virtues of moral continuity, despite the actions of an intolerable few.

Amy Sullivan-
“Priests and Child Porn”

…Please explain the plural implication of a singular incident.

Amy Sullivan-
Perhaps you could link directly to the text of Archbishop Silvano Tomasi’s address to the United Nations rather than a UK based summary with rampant grammatical errors, the implication of which is a lack of professionalism that subsequently calls into question the strength of its obviously biased position.

Amy Sullivan-
Anytime you have to resort to everybody-does-it and why-don’t-you-pick-on-the-Presbyterians-instead? arguments, you’ve lost the moral high ground.
.
Please indicate where Archbishop Tomasi suggested anything other than that the Catholic Church has been unduly targeted in comparison to other religions? Please direct us to where he suggested that the social prevalence of it is justification for ignoring it? Is it not a fact, Amy Sullivan, that the rampant publicity surrounding sexual abuse allegations has been almost unequivocally focused on the Catholic Church over the course of the last decade? Is it not also true, Amy Sullivan, that the rates of abuse among the general global population are far higher than that of the Catholic clergy? Is it not true, Amy, that the rates are higher among teachers? Foster care providers? Protestant denominations? Is it not subsequently true, Amy, that you and your media peers are driven by prejudice in your unwarranted and disproportional assault on the Catholic Church? Speak your mind, Amy. Tell us how you really feel. Do not hide behind the guise of hard-hitting journalism, when in fact, you merely engage in sensationalist, feeding-frenzy, career building propaganda.

I’m going for door #2 on this. Time for someone to get “reassigned”.

My mother didn’t accept “BUT MOMMMMMM … HE DID IT TOO” as a defense. Too bad this guy didn’t learn the same somewhere along the line. These guys sound a lot like some of Polanski’s more idiot defenders. Guess what, guys, even if “everyone” did it back then, it was WRONG.

But, holy cow, the VATICAN is saying that five percent of priests have these kinds of problems? Yipes, that’s a shocking percentage.

[...] The Catholic church and sex abuse by clergy Anytime you have to resort to everybody-does-it and why-don’t-you-pick-on-the-Presbyterians-instead? arguments, you’ve lost the moral high ground. [...]