# Archbishop Compares Criticisms Of Pope To Jesus' Sufferings **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 30, 2010, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289 "2010-03-30T02:02:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/101 "2010-04-06T03:11:58Z")
> [@Paul in Qatar](#): > > So why do so many people say somehow abuse is caused by the (much ignored) requirement of chaste priests? Because they’re talking out their asses (sorry **'luci** , you know I love you, but this is the Straight Dope). [Research findings indicate](http://www.psychwww.com/psyrelig/plante.html) that celibate priests are no more likely than the general male population to commit molestation: > [@](#): > > First, the available research (which is quite good now) suggests that approximately 4% of priests during the past half century (and mostly in the 1960s and 1970s) have had a sexual experience with a minor (i.e., anyone under the age of 18). There are approximately 60,000 active and inactive priests and brothers in the United States and thus we estimate that between 1,000 and 3,000 priests have sexually engaged with minors. That’s a lot. In fact, that is 3,000 people too many. Any sexual abuse of minors whether perpetrated by priests, other clergy, parents, school teachers, boy-scout leaders or anyone else in whom we entrust our children is horrific. However, although good data is hard to acquire, it appears that this 4% figure is consistent with male clergy from other religious traditions and is significantly lower than the general adult male population that is best estimated to be closer to 8%. Therefore, the odds that any random Catholic priest would sexually abuse a minor are not likely to be significantly higher than other males in or out of the clergy. So no, the Catholic church does not have an abnormally large percentage of molesters among its clergy, nor do the sexual constraints it imposes on its clergy somehow make them abnormally prone to molest. Where the Church, IMHO, is uniquely reprehensible is in using so much of its massive institutional power and prestige as a lever to protect and shield the molesters among its ranks, even at the cost of denying justice to the victims and putting other children in peril. ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/102 "2010-04-06T04:15:00Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > If you want to go at the Catholic Church (or the Young Pioneers), have at it. But if that is your goal just say it. If your goal is rooting out child abuse, you ought not to go after one (really creepy) institution only. This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. Because there might be other people out there doing the same thing, we shouldn’t go after the ones we know about? Oh, wait, I see. We shouldn’t only go after them. Well, thanks for clearing that up. There are of course, tons of people in this thread clamoring that we ignore abuse everywhere, except at this one institution. Oh, wait. There aren’t any. What you are trying to do is derail the topic so that nobody can discuss the disgusting behavior of various players in the Catholic church. It’s behavior that’s almost as disgusting as what the church itself did. But no matter how much you desire to derail any discussion about the church, hopefully, people with good sense aren’t going to play along. I hope they’re building a special place in hell for these molesters, and I hope you get to spend a few moments of eternity joining them. > [@](#): > > My old scoutmaster was a molester. (Me? Nah, he never touched me.) He was eventually sued by one of his victims and the Scouts, the local troop’s sponsor, the police, everyone was shocked, shocked I tell you. Now how could that be? > > The Scouts frankly admit they were infiltrated. They are making headway in tracking down abusers. But it does show you that other groups behaved much as the Catholics did. Riiight. I’m no fan of the BSA, but here’s their [current policy](http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/HealthandSafety/GSS/gss01.aspx) on dealing with abuse issues. Please point me to the section on the page where it says to deal with abuse accusations by comparing such accusations to the Holocaust. Please point me to the part where it says to reassign accused volunteers to work with other troops. The BSA has a long list of things which everyone has to do now to prevent molestation. For example, under their policy, a scoutmaster shouldn’t be alone with a child. Does the church have the same policy with priests? Do you even know? > [@](#): > > Although the 1998 comment is spot on. Other groups (seem to have) cleaned up their acts earlier. > > I maintain that if you looked in your local community you would find other abuse rings not related to the Catholic Church. It is easy to go after the targets already identified, but it would be more useful to find those who are still hidden. When the Catholic church stops making themselves by business, I’ll stop paying attention to what goes on over there. But as long as they are institutionally incapable of dealing with molestation, we should criticize them, no matter how much sickening people like you try and derail the conversation.:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/103 "2010-04-06T04:32:30Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > Although the 1998 comment is spot on. Other groups (seem to have) cleaned up their acts earlier. I almost forgot this gem. “Spot on”? It’s like we’re discussing what the Vatican served for afternoon tea. Since you are such the expert on where we should look for molesters, why weren’t you aware of what happened in '98?:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/104 "2010-04-06T06:14:31Z")
Wow. Just wow. So a discussion that points out that smearing the RCC does not help protect children is out of bounds because you like bashing the Church? At least you’re honest about your twisted priorities. But yes, I would suppose the Boy Scouts certainly passed molesters around. At least it needs to be looked into. Just because the TV tells you something is true does not mean it true. Think for yourself. ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/105 "2010-04-06T06:20:36Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > Wow. Just wow. > > So a discussion that points out that smearing the RCC does not help protect children is out of bounds because you like bashing the Church? At least you’re honest about your twisted priorities. > > But yes, I would suppose the Boy Scouts certainly passed molesters around. At least it needs to be looked into. > > Just because the TV tells you something is true does not mean it true. Think for yourself. Oh, please. You don’t give a rats-ass about abuse, or you wouldn’t be trying to cover for the church the way you are in this thread. I notice you have provided no suggestions for how to root out this hidden child abuse. You’ve not told of us anything you’ve done to root out this hidden child abuse. Your sole contribution to this thread has been to lecture the rest of us about how we can’t possibly be serious about abuse because we express disgust over the church’s behavior. If you actually cared about abuse, there is no way you would take this approach. And of course, you can ignore the criticism of your truly disgusting behavior by claiming that others aren’t thinking for themselves. As I said, you are sinful and morally disgusting. You are nothing more than a defender of child molesters. ETA: I’ll let you dig yourself out, if you can. List for me all the positive, pro-active steps you have taken to root out this hidden child molestation. And criticizing others for criticizing child molesters is not a pro-active step, as that does nothing to root out this hidden child molestation you claim to be so concerned for. Did you attempt to get laws changed? Did you investigate other molestation rings? Did you attempt to get institutional policies changes. Additionally, please provide the scientific studies or other information showing that criticism of the Catholic church actually is detrimental to the reduction of abuse. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble digging that up. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/106 "2010-04-06T07:05:44Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > If you want to go at the Catholic Church (or the Young Pioneers), have at it. But if that is your goal just say it. If your goal is rooting out child abuse, you ought not to go after one (really creepy) institution only. Going after _one_ den of child molesters is a lot better than going after _zero_ child molesters. And that’s about what your position amounts to, that until we have enough information to alpha strike every child molester in the world we should just leave them be. Going after the Catholic Church _first_ does nothing to stop anyone going after other child molesters later. Hell, it might be enough of a deterrent that we won’t have to go after a few of them. ---
**Author:** ![Mbossa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@Mbossa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mbossa)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/107 "2010-04-06T08:20:56Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Going after _one_ den of child molesters is a lot better than going after _zero_ child molesters. And that’s about what your position amounts to, that until we have enough information to alpha strike every child molester in the world we should just leave them be. > > Going after the Catholic Church _first_ does nothing to stop anyone going after other child molesters later. Hell, it might be enough of a deterrent that we won’t have to go after a few of them. Also, wouldn’t going after the Catholic Church in full force actually encourage other victims of child abuse to come forward? If it’s made clear that reporting the abuse will cause it to stop and justice to eventually be served, I can’t really see this as anything but positive for other victims. ---
**Author:** ![BrightNShiny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@BrightNShiny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrightNShiny)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/108 "2010-04-06T08:44:19Z")
I think what’s most sad here is the utterly dishonest attempt to conflate rightful outrage over child molestation with some sort of generalized Catholic bashing. I’m not Jack Chick. I have only a vague understanding of Catholic theology, and I don’t really care what Catholics believe. People are more-or-less entitled to worship or believe whatever they want to. My guess is the vast majority of people in the US have the same viewpoint. But when a child is abused, that crosses over from being the Catholic Church’s business to everyone else’s business. And if Catholics want to avoid tarnishing the entire Catholic belief system with the image of child molesters, they should not be running around comparing their critics to Nazis or telling their critics to stop criticizing them until all the other abuse in the world is uncovered and examined. It’s like anti-PR for the Catholic Church. What they should be doing is announcing definite, systematic guidelines to prevent molestation, the way any number of other organizations have already done (the BSA, schools and universities, medical licensing boards, bar associations, etc., etc.). And they should plan on doing thorough, public reviews of those guidelines every year until the problem seems to be fixed, the way every other institution already does or should start doing. Hell, in my last job, I got roped into interviewing potential college interns, and I was given clear instructions to interview them in a location where we were visible to other people in the office. But clearly, I should have told our HR department that by forcing me to interview in a public location, they could have been missing sexual harassment that might be occurring in some hidden, super-secret location on the planet. ---
**Author:** ![DianaG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ab992/32.png) [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/109 "2010-04-06T10:47:03Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > I maintain that if you looked in your local community you would find other abuse rings not related to the Catholic Church. It is easy to go after the targets already identified, but it would be more useful to find those who are still hidden. The fact that someone, somewhere is still abusing children is not good reason to lay off the Catholic Church. Especially since identifying the problem isn’t remotely the same thing as solving it, which they clearly haven’t done, and certainly won’t if people stop paying attention. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/110 "2010-04-06T13:08:10Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > I think what’s most sad here is the utterly dishonest attempt to conflate rightful outrage over child molestation with some sort of generalized Catholic bashing. I’m not Jack Chick. I have only a vague understanding of Catholic theology, and I don’t really care what Catholics believe. People are more-or-less entitled to worship or believe whatever they want to. My guess is the vast majority of people in the US have the same viewpoint. Yes. There is a scandal now _because some people in the hierarchy of the Catholic Church did a very wrong thing_. Not just because some people (liberals, the media, whoever) hate the Catholic Church and like to bash it. I’d love to see them admit that. > [@Paul in Qatar](#): > > If you want to go at the Catholic Church (or the Young Pioneers), have at it. But if that is your goal just say it. If your goal is rooting out child abuse, you ought not to go after one (really creepy) institution only. But you have to start somewhere, if you’re going to prosecute child molesters. Prosecuting all child molesters simultaneously is just not realistic. Why not start with the Catholic Church, if there are child molesters there? ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/111 "2010-04-06T15:29:06Z")
> [@BrightNShiny](#): > > This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. Because there might be other people out there doing the same thing, we shouldn’t go after the ones we know about? Oh, wait, I see. We shouldn’t only go after them. Well, thanks for clearing that up. There are of course, tons of people in this thread clamoring that we ignore abuse everywhere, except at this one institution. Oh, wait. There aren’t any. > > What you are trying to do is derail the topic so that nobody can discuss the disgusting behavior of various players in the Catholic church. It’s behavior that’s almost as disgusting as what the church itself did. But no matter how much you desire to derail any discussion about the church, hopefully, people with good sense aren’t going to play along… Agree, in droves. I personally don’t give a damn if His Popeness is hurting like a mutha, I don’t give a damn about how much the bishops are feeling bad. Why don’t they just DO something to fix the problem, punish the bad ones, and TAKE ACTION? Until and unless they do, they have nothing worth listening to. There was a time when the chruch taught that we should do the right thing, even it it costs us. It had something to do with respect, honor, justice. I guess all that fine talk doesn’t apply to them. Hypocrites. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/112 "2010-04-06T15:49:45Z")
Please excuse me. My home internet is down and doing this on a French BlackBerry is no fun. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/113 "2010-04-06T16:00:20Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > If only the Pope would say something like this to the victims of sexual abuse - or to the abusers > > Regards, > Shodan Remember Sinead O’Connor ripped up that photo of JPII? That was in 1992. Why did she do it? Inprotest over this same shite. This was well known here even then. Reports have come out, priests, the state and a lot of citizens have been found to be wanting. He comes out with that shite in the same week that we found out that the leader of the Catholic Church was in a meeting in '76 as a record taker with 2 kids who where there with nobody else other than priests around them were they were made take an oath that they wouldn’t talk about the abuse to anyone. Fuck them, fuck them all. Bunch of child raping, beating and enslaving cunts. A lot of others enabled the raping, beating and enslaving at the very least. The Church is in a cesspit at the moment of it’s own creation. Centuries of power and influence put them into positions of favour in states like Ireland. They basically had free reign to do whatever the wanted. Some used it to rape children and others protected them and put them into situations were they got a fresh batch every few years when they had gone too far in their current area. Those words you quoted aren’t enough. They aren’t even the beginning. The Jesus I was taught about raged against money changers in his father’s house. If he was walking the planet now he’d be tearing the fucking Vatican down not asking for statements of sorrow. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/114 "2010-04-06T16:23:36Z")
[Norbert Denef](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8564378.stm) was sexually abused by a priest. When he reported his abuse to the Church, he was offered 25000 Euro by the Church in compensation, but only on condition that he never speak about the abuse again. That’s not compensation. That’s bribery. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/115 "2010-04-06T16:29:27Z")
> [@](#): > > He comes out with that shite in the same week that we found out that the leader of the Catholic Church was in a meeting in '76 as a record taker with 2 kids who where there with nobody else other than priests around them were they were made take an oath that they wouldn’t talk about the abuse to anyone. I should have said, “The current leader of the Irish Catholic Church” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/116 "2010-04-06T16:31:02Z")
> [@yojimbo](#): > > Remember Sinead O’Connor ripped up that photo of JPII? That was in 1992. Why did she do it? Inprotest over this same shite. This was well known here even then. Reports have come out, priests, the state and a lot of citizens have been found to be wanting. He comes out with that shite in the same week that we found out that the leader of the Catholic Church was in a meeting in '76 as a record taker with 2 kids who where there with nobody else other than priests around them were they were made take an oath that they wouldn’t talk about the abuse to anyone. Wonder if she ever got an apology for the years of shit she took for it. > [@Anne\_Neville](#): > > [Norbert Denef](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8564378.stm) was sexually abused by a priest. When he reported his abuse to the Church, he was offered 25000 Euro by the Church in compensation, but only on condition that he never speak about the abuse again. > > That’s not compensation. That’s bribery. No, that’s a settlement. In virtually all types of law, settlements are confidential. Even if the settling party hasn’t done anything wrong, they still don’t want people figuring out how much money they might be offered if they decide to make the same claim. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/117 "2010-04-06T16:37:17Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > No, that’s a settlement. In virtually all types of law, settlements are confidential. Even if the settling party hasn’t done anything wrong, they still don’t want people figuring out how much money they might be offered if they decide to make the same claim. IANAL, but isn’t it just the amount of money they received (and other terms of the settlement) that is confidential in a settlement? Or is the person really forbidden to say anything about the incident that led to the settlement? ---
**Author:** ![Pazu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pazu/32/15522_2.png) [@Pazu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pazu)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/118 "2010-04-06T17:48:17Z")
> [@vivalostwages](#): > > I’ve mentioned this before but will bring it up again: **Deliver us from Evil** \*\*, a documentary film, covers this mess, especially in regard to a CA priest whose actions were repeatedly protected and covered up by Mahoney, Ratzinger, et. al.; they just kept moving him from one parish to another. Then they carted him off to Ireland. > And that’s just one example. There was a rather harrowing [story from a little over a year ago](http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/the-pedophiles-paradise/Content?oid=1065017) about how the church’s policy of moving these priests around eventually led to sending the offenders off to remote places where their actions would hopefully stay off the radar. > [@Brendan Kiley](#): > > On the morning of January 14 in Seattle, Ken Roosa and a small group Alaska Natives stood on the sidewalk outside Seattle University to announce a new lawsuit against the Jesuits, claiming a widespread conspiracy to dump pedophile priests in isolated Native villages where they could abuse children off the radar. > > “They did it because there was no money there, no power, no police,” Roosa said to the assembled cameras and microphones. “It was a pedophile’s paradise.” He described a chain of poor Native villages where priests—many of them serial sex offenders—reigned supreme. “We are going to shine some light on a dark and dirty corner of the Jesuit order.” > > The suit, filed in the superior court of Bethel, Alaska, the day before, accuses several priests of being offenders and conspirators. Among the alleged conspirators is Father Stephen Sundborg, who is the current president of Seattle University and was Provincial of the Oregon Province of Jesuits from 1990 through 1996. (The Oregon Province includes Washington, Oregon, Montana, Idaho, and Alaska; as Provincial, Sundborg was head of the entire province.) The suit alleges that while Sundborg was head of the Northwest Jesuits, he had access to the personnel files of several pedophile priests, including one named Father Henry Hargreaves, whom he allowed to remain in the ministry. “As a direct result of Father Sundborg’s decision,” the suit alleges, “Father Hargreaves was able to continue molesting children, including but not limited to James Doe 94, who was raped by Father Hargreaves in 1992, when James Doe was approximately 6 years old.” > > Roosa and his associate Patrick Wall (a former Benedictine monk who once worked as a sex-abuse fixer for the Catholic Church) said they knew of 345 cases of molestation in Alaska by 28 perpetrators who came from at least four different countries. > > This concentration of abuses is orders of magnitude greater than Catholic sex-abuse cases in other parts of the United States. Today, Roosa said, there are 17,000 Catholics in the diocese of Fairbanks, though there was a much smaller number during the peak of the abuse. Roosa compared this lawsuit to the famous Los Angeles suits of 2001, which claimed 550 victims of abuse in a Catholic population of 3.4 million. > > These abusers in Alaska, Wall said, were specifically sent to Alaska “to get them off the grid, where they could do the least amount of damage” to the church’s public image. It’s a depressing, but unsurprising, article. ---
**Author:** ![eleanorigby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/119 "2010-04-06T18:21:13Z")
I have no doubt in my mind that there are pedophiles in every walk of clergy, youth counseling, summer camps etc. Every boarding school, every day care, every wherever there are kids. If I were a pedophile, I would go where kids are and I would learn what appeals to kids etc. That’s what successful predators do. So, yes, I think we can all agree that this is bigger than the Catholic church. However, we are discussing the Church and its infinite wisdom in this thread. It doesn’t matter if (for purposes of this discussion) that a Lutheran youth camp counselor diddled your cousin in 1974. It matters greatly in the bigger picture and should not be dismissed, _but that is not the conversation at hand_. Frankly, I’d be happy if the Church never recovered from this. It has as much to do with spirituality and faith as IBM has to do with advancing intelligence. It’s a massive bureaucracy with the sole ambition of maintaining its status quo and entrenched position of power. I have met too many nuns and priests in my time to see them as at all “holy” (that said, I am sure that there are those who are truly devout–I know of one. But she is more the exception than the rule)–and yes, this criticism could be leveled at any and all clergy. There is something so sanctimonious about the whole Catholic “meme”, though, that lends itself to easy mockery, but being an easy target with a dog collar doesn’t mean the evil isn’t real. All that aside, the anger and disgust is deep and real. People have been hurt and lives destroyed due to the evil policies of the Church. There needs to be a sea change, and that is not at all likely, given who is in charge-Benedict-what an irony for a name. I see he has just appointed an Opus Dei archbishop to the LA archbishopric (or is it See–I don’t know). And yes, the first thing that crossed my mind was, “and how many boys did Father Gomez diddle?” This IS the face of the Church right now–I hope there are enough Catholics out there that want that face changed. It’s up to them to change their church. It’s up to us to change laws and prosecute these assholes. And finally, it is up to us to figure out why pedophilia is so common and work to end it. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2010, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289/120 "2010-04-06T18:52:29Z")
And they’re still trying to shore up that rotten wood… [George Numayr, editor of Catholic World Report, in the Moonie Times](http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/apr/05/pope-benedicts-critics-dont-care-about-kids/): > [@](#): > > Here we had on display during Holy Week the spectacle of the Vicar of Christ receiving moral instruction from Barabbas. Who turns orphans over to homosexual couples at adoption agencies? Who sends Planned Parenthood propagandists into schools? Who clears the streets of major cities for “gay-pride” parades with the North American Man/Boy Love Association in tow? It is the liberal elite who champion these child-corrupting practices. And wasn’t it just last year that these enlightened protectors of children assembled at the golden coffin of Michael Jackson to pay their last respects? Where was the outrage about child corruption then? > > … > > So why is Benedict held to a higher standard than John Paul II? Is it because he’s seen as more conservative by the liberal elite? Perhaps. Their unstated and perversely ironic objection to Benedict in the wake of the abuse scandal is not that he has pursued too few reforms but too many. Recall that the New York Times and other liberal newspapers roundly denounced him for one of his first major reforms as pope: a directive issued to bishops that banned the ordination of homosexuals. That is not the liberal elite’s idea of reform, even though most of the abuse cases involve homosexual pederasty. Hence, they blame Benedict for a lax and dysfunctional priesthood while at the same time hectoring him for not letting homosexuals into it. They blame “celibacy” for the scandal (which rests on, among other inane assumptions, the idea the abusers were celibate in the first place) rather than acknowledge the role in it of the very low and aberrant seminary admission standards that they clamored for the church to embrace in the relativistic 1960s. Got that? It’s the gays’ and the DFHs’ fault. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/archbishop-compares-criticisms-of-pope-to-jesus-sufferings/534289.md?page=7)