This isn’t a fucking courtroom-You will know that I am agreeing with you when I say, “I agree with you”, and not before then. I didn’t say or mean to say that “canon law” is correct.
Does cheap-ass wordplay like this ever work out for you in real life?
So being protected by secular law means that church law is meaningful? So if the secular law were changed, church law would not be meaningful?
Really?
The reason I invoked the statute of limitations, and the Fourth Amendment, was to your mind simply a Tourette’s-like verbal spasm relevant to nothing at all? Your reading didn’t immediately suggest that analogy?
Really?
OK. Then I apologize for not being clearer. I thought it was crystal clear, myself, but I certainly accept that it wasn’t for you.
So, now that you’re clear on what I’m saying…
I wouldn’t have replied that.
Your actual question was slightly different, of course.
That’s a gotcha question, which I again illustrated by analogy:
What American laws to do we have that are more important than protecting children from sexual predators? Or, to remind you of your actual question:
Why don’t you first explain to me what American secular laws you feel are more important than not fucking young children in the ass.
To explain explicitly why I am asking (and avoid another misunderstanding) the Fourth Amendment and the statute of limitations can both operate to shield child-ass-fuckers (be they Catholic, Jewish, Satanist, or atheist) from from prosecution. Yet you suport them, presumably for reasons that have to do with the greater social good they provide in other ways. So I’m suggesting that asking the question the way you did is deceptive, because you yourself favor laws that, in some circumstances, fail to protect children from sexual predators, and so do most people in our society. We don’t want such protections to fail, but we accept that negative outcome as a necessary cost of the value the Fourth Amendment and statute of limitations provide.
I notice you didn’t respond with a cite. If you continue to assert that the phrase “canon law” is incorrect, then what’s your cite?
If you simply insist your usage is correct but have no cite, you may be safely ignored; in debate, a gratuitous assertion may be equally gratuitously denied.
Dear Bricker,
Czar’s problem presumably isn’t with the word, “Law” it is with the implication, that you are disingenuously asserting, that since it is rightly called “Law” it is as important as secular government law.
But I’m not. I’m asserting there is an analogy between canon law and government, secular law.
And I’m pointing out that in secular law, canon law is held out as important enough that its exercise cannot be burdened unless that burden is in service of a compelling governmental interest and by the least restrictive means possible.
Bricker, Do you think the rules are sufficient and were prior to 2002?
Prior to 2002, no.
The current rules are sufficient, in my opinion, although I don’t claim they are perfect.
Cardinal Law’s actions were not moral. But our secular, American law, the important law, the one we valorize in this discussion, couldn’t touch him.
Thank you. Could Canon law similarly not touch him?
Global atheism can’t come fast enough.
Well, canon law has much broader categories, but ultimately it shares with our secular criminal law the basic proposition that you can’t retroactively punish someone for something that wasn’t illegal when they did it. Bernard Law’s major problematic acts were done at a time when they were not forbidden, and were brought to light after the statute of limitations had passed.
Can. 197 provides that canon law’s statute of limitations, called “extinctive prescription,” flows from the law of the country in which the conduct occurs.
So, broadly speaking, canon law labor sunder the same restriction as secualr criminal law does in this matter.
I had no fucking clue why you brought that up, which I stated more than once, and you refused to explain your point.
Sure, there are a number of laws that I support that sometimes have unfortunate consequences, such as letting the guilty go free. And the reason I support them is because I can articulate a specific harm that would occur if we did not have the law in question - from imprisoning the innocent, to allowing tyranny a free hand in our government, and so on.
When it comes to rules regarding religious institutions, I accept that people who belong to those institutions believe in certain harms that I don’t think actually exist - going to hell, for example. Which is why I tried to create a distinction between religious dogma - things you think you have to follow to keep out of hell/get into heaven - versus the largely secular administration of the church-as-organization. You have asserted that the degree of control bishops exert over their bishopric falls at least partially into the former category. Okay, fine. Now, I’m not a Catholic, but a large chunk of my immediate family is, so I’m not operating entirely out of ignorance, here. I can understand the theological implications for many Catholics behind things like abortion or gay marriage, and why their faith leads them to oppose those things, based on what they think will happen if they’re allowed. I’m not seeing that for apostolic succession. If a Catholic violates the rules against abortion, that’s bad because killing babies is a thing God is against. If a Catholic violates the apostolic succession… well, then what? Is that a sin? Mortal or venal? Would the Pope go to hell for taking the ability to place priests out of the hands of the bishops?
In short, I can defend things like letting rapist free under the Fourth Amendment by explaining what worse thing would happen if we didn’t have the Fourth Amendment. What worse thing would happen if we didn’t have the apostolic succession? And in this context, I’m completely willing to accept answers relating to things that don’t actually exist, such as the afterlife, or human souls, or what have you. As a Catholic, what bad thing would happen?
So the Church didn’t have any rules about covering up or enabling abuse? But they did have laws addressing the abuse itself? Though the bishops were (are? ) under no obligation to follow those rules or act upon the knowledge that the law are being broken? If something is legal in a given country, it is by default not illegal under Canon law? Do i have that right (broadly speaking)?
Nope.
It’s only the statute of limitations that is drawn from the national law of a country, not every possible act.
The Church had no specific rules about covering up abuse, although it had general laws that would certainly apply. But what Bernard Law did was never in violation of those, and even if he had been, by the time his acts came to light, he was outside the statute of limitations.
Finally, when you say, “The bishops were under no obligation…” let me draw yet another analogy. The Queen of the United Kingdom has the power to refuse to assent to a bill that Parliament has passed. We might then say that the Queen is under no obligation to assent to Parliament’s bills.
But she is. It’s not a written obligation, but the continued practice of the modern UK government makes it extraordinarily unlikely to imagine the Queen refusing assent.
An analogy to this concept is the bishop’s power to ignore church law. Technically, every bishop is subordinate only to the Pope, and even then has rights that the Pope cannot abrogate. But in modern times, bishops cannot meaningfully ignore the rules of the national conference of bishops without consequences. Take the example of Bishop Rogelio Ricardo Livieres, discussed upthread. The press widely reported his removal as “firing,” with even the Vatican press using those words. But in fact, he was asked – strongly – to resign. And he realized he had the choice of complying or living in his diocese as a loner, separated from the Holy See by his defiance.
But technically, he resigned.
Well, I would argue that there is a compelling governmental interest in locking up people who molest children. And I would further argue that creating a mandatory reporting requirement within the church would qualify as a least restrictive means of achieving that goal.
And I’d further argue that if the Catholic hierarchy would refuse to establish a means of complying with this, because they cannot or will not change their internal laws, that probably indicates there’s a pretty fucking huge fucking problem in the Church that they’d value child molesters over the well being of the children of their flock.
Finally, I’d just like to point out, Bricker, that I’ve seen your arguments on this in other threads over the years. And it’s really interesting to me that your first set of arguments, way back when, was that there wasn’t a problem in the Catholic Church. Then that maybe there’s a problem but that the problem isn’t any more prevalent than the population as a whole.
But you’re not arguing that today, are you? Your argument today is “so what if there’s a problem? The Church is under no obligation to fix it and US law can’t make them change.”
So I guess my conclusion isn’t an argument so much as a question. Bricker, do you realize just how fucked up you have to get where you’re reduced to arguing that?
In fairness, I’d suggest the Catholic Church’s primary concern is the continued existence of the Catholic Church, with embarrassment being viewed as having a more corrosive effect than aggressively expelling members who have committed crimes.
I’m not certain he can, or if he could, I’m not certain he could admit it to us or himself.
I’m not clear on what, specifically, you’re saying – are you arguing for a mandatory reporting requirement that would require a priest to breach to confessional seal?
What’s your position on whether a person can be locked up if the evidence against him – incontrovertible pictures and videos of his molesting children – was discovered by means of a warrantless search of his home?
I’m going to assume that you would reluctantly agree that, even though there is such a compelling interest in locking that person up, it must yield to a more compelling interest: the prophylactic rule suppressing illegally seized evidence that acts to protect all persons’ privacy in their homes and personal effects. Yes?
I argue that the interest in retaining legal protections for the confessional seal is as strong as the Fourth Amendment argument.
Perhaps you’re confusing me with someone else.
I did argue that, and I have never abandoned that position. Your phrasing seems to suggest that I have.
I’m not arguing that today because it’s not relevant to the particular point under discussion.
Do you believe you’re fucked up for arguing that the Fourth Amendment’s guarantees should be retained even when they let a molester go free?
See, here’s the problem, which I identified quite early in this thread: most of you believe that the Church has simply made up stuff, and while you’re willing to let them play pretend as a general rule, the moment that something like this happens, their concerns about souls and divine law go out the window as useless.
But the Church is made up of people that don’t accept that view. You’re quite comfortable weighing the social good that flows from the Fourth Amendment against the occasional guilty person going free and deciding the Fourth Amendment should be retained. But when it comes to weighing the spiritual good of confession, you simply dismiss it as of such picayune importance that the question is not in doubt.
Right?
I feel that I’ve gone out of my way in my posts to this thread to avoid that specific error.
I have made a determined effort to honestly understand.