Sure, humanity needs a spiritual and moral conversion, but would it have killed Benedict to have mentioned that the church needs a little fixing up too?
Avoiding the big issue like that erodes his moral authority.
What moral authority? Seems to me he has none left to erode.
Further evidence, if such is needed, that compulsory celilbacy is not healthy, and an organizational structure commanded by celibate men is a Very Bad Idea. The Goddess, in Her wisdom, has decided to make male humans as testosterone-addled sex maniacs. Powerful cellibates are not an improvement over powerful eunuchs.
Heeeyyy!
People!
<insert greasy smile here>
Ignore it all!
After all, it’s just gossip!, Nothing more.
[pet peeve] Of course they condoned it. Condone doesn’t mean officially sanction, it means to ignore, turn a blind eye to, let pass without punishment, etc…
[/PP]
Even if you don’t agree that celibacy does anything to people who practice it, you must see that celibacy makes the priesthood a less attractive career choice to a lot of people. And when you don’t have a lot of people lining up for available jobs, you can’t be as choosy about who gets those jobs as you could be if they were more appealing to more people. These scandals show (among other things) that the Catholic Church hasn’t been choosy enough about who they ordain or keep on as a priest. They need to look at what about the priesthood might be making it unattractive as a career choice.
This falls into the category of something everyone knows, and yet which has never been proven. How do we know supposedly celibate men are more likely to abuse children than a control group? I would maintain we do not know, and we ought to err on the side of caution.
I suspect (and I cannot prove) that child abuse is and was common in a huge number of
institutions. We need to compare the Catholic Church against (say) the French Boy Scouts and the Tulsa School District.
Further, I wonder if the Church behaved much differently than other groups in (say) 1965. I suspect (and I cannot prove) that most organizations behaved in much the same way. Faced with such a messy problem, they tried to hush it up and ship the molester out of town, with a stern warning not to return and a letter of recommendation.
If we presume the Catholic Church was uniquely a den of molesters, we are in danger of overlooking other sources of abuse. Are we giving the adult leadership of the Young Pioneers a free pass? If so, why?
The issue here is abuse. Until we have more information, we ought not to let it become a singleminded attack on this or that institution.
On the other hand, this pope seems up to his neck in this.
You’re looking at it backwards.
If the entire leadership structure of the Boy Scouts was found to be actively engaged in molesting children or facilitating those who do, there would be no more Boy Scouts. No one thinks that the intercession of the Boy Scouts is necessary to avoid going to hell, and no one has been taught from birth that the Boy Scouts have demigod-like levels of moral credibility. The unspoken issue here is what happens when an unsavory institution acquires the power of religious authority over a lot of people. Because Catholics refuse to treat the Church like any other organization, it won’t be disbanded and jailed for engaging in a massive criminal conspiracy the way that any other organization would.
None of which should be able to ensure that a child molester gets away unpunished.
Yes, but were other institutions still doing that in 1998? That’s when the Vatican office halted a US church investigation of a priest who had been accused of molesting children, because the priest said he was in poor health and had repented of what he had done.
Also, doesn’t the Catholic Church teach that “everybody else was doing it” isn’t a good excuse for immoral behavior? Or do people who confess to having premarital sex or using birth control get a pass on those, because “everybody’s doing it”?
Power to the people.
If only the people would leave the church in droves (or Hondas). What would happen then?
The church doors would have to be widened. If they were leaving in Hondas, that is.
If they were leaving in Hummers, would the priests be driving?
You’re a bad, BAD woman… 
And as if on cue…
Thank god you are here to lecture us on how we have to be even-minded so that we don’t inadvertently treat one set of admitted child molesters differently than hypothetical child molesters. :rolleyes: You are a disgusting individual.
I’m a lapsed Catholic from decades ago, but really, can the Catholic church get any more disgusting? There should be a youtube video like the one that guy made a couple years ago “leeeeavvveee Britney (Spears) allloooonnnee!” only with some bishop whining “leeeeavvee Ratso alllooooonnne!” Childish and pointless, changing nothing, but damn, I would laugh.
I agree. We should err on the side of caution. Although I’m not sure we are thinking about the same side here. Hmmm… Curious.
Once again I find myself in agreement. A pass like that shouldn’t be given out nilly willy to just anyone. And certainly not the Young Pioneers. No, they can join the back of queue with the rest of the molesters at the ticket office.
Yeah, stop attacking, people! We need More Information! There’s got to be some other institution like say the French Boy Scouts (you know what the French are like) who was also doing it. Heck they were all doing it, it’s the 70’s! Anyway look, it doesn’t matter. Let’s all focus on the real issue here. “Abuse = Bad”. We can all agree to that and move on.
What? I showered this morning,
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.
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.
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.
I’m glad they exclude homosexuals. I’m sure that does a lot to cut down on molestation!
So why do so many people say somehow abuse is caused by the (much ignored) requirement of chaste priests? If this is so, there ought to be proof. If there is no proof, we are being distracted by a red herring.