# The Catholic Church and Criminal Prosecution **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 27, 2004, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473 "2004-02-27T14:55:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/1 "2004-02-27T14:55:18Z")
[ABCNEWS.com](http://ABCNEWS.com) has an article discussing the numbers of priests who have been involved in child abuse in the Catholic church. In part, it says: > [@](#): > > In Boston, where the national crisis began with the case of rogue priest John Geoghan, officials said Thursday that 162 archdiocesan priests about 7 percent of those who served over the last half-century had been accused of abuse. > > But plaintiffs’ attorney Mitchell Garabedian scoffed at the count. > > “We have an entity here that has allowed the wholesale sexual abuse of children by clergy, and to allow them to count the numbers just doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “There is a huge credibility problem here.” No shit. Why haven’t the authorities gone in and dealt with this? What is it with the catholic church that makes them immune from the process? You can damn well bet that if it was anyone else, the authorities would be crawling all over them. Why haven’t their offices been torn apart and why aren’t armies of personnel marching out of there with boxes of paperwork and computers? ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/2 "2004-02-27T16:16:32Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > Why haven’t the authorities gone in and dealt with this? What is it with the catholic church that makes them immune from the process? You can damn well bet that if it was anyone else, the authorities would be crawling all over them. Why haven’t their offices been torn apart and why aren’t armies of personnel marching out of there with boxes of paperwork and computers? A credibility gap doesn’t seem like enough for justifiable search and seizure, to me. I’ve been perplexed from the start by the whole thing. Lots of people rail against the church for not doing more to punish the perpetrators, but why was the church in the position to punish the perps in the first place? It’s not church law the pederasts are defying, but criminal law. So, wouldn’t the state need to be looking for specific instances of abuse before getting the right to search, rather than doing a trawl through papers for any random abuses? Julie ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/3 "2004-02-27T18:41:14Z")
I’m not suggesting the church is responsible to punish them; obviously they don’t feel the need to either ☹ . But teachers, doctors, and daycare people are required to report suspected or reported sexual abuse; I cannot believe clergy wouldn’t also fall into this category. But even if they don’t, now that we know the extent of the cover-up, why do we trust these people anymore? The church knew the priests were doing this, and frequently moved the perpetrators to another parish where they could molest more kids. I don’t recall any of these priests being turned over to the police. Now that the story is out in the open, and we see how much of this was covered up, I think it’s time we quit relying on the good word of the clergy and look through the records ourselves. These are criminals who are out in the open; most of who have never even been questioned by the police. No way in hell would this play out this way in any other sector of society. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/4 "2004-02-27T18:56:08Z")
Well, I’m not a Catholic, and so have no special insight into that religion other than what I have read; but might it not have something to do with the sacrament of confession? Stuff discovered through the process of confession is supposed to be forever confidential [at least, so I have heard.] A molesting priest may easily have “confessed his sins”, and thus put the church in the position of knowing he is a molester, and yet unable to reveal this to the authorities due to the nature of confession. Just guessing here. Any persons more knowlegable about Catholicism wish to comment? ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/5 "2004-02-27T18:59:05Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > Now that the story is out in the open, and we see how much of this was covered up, I think it’s time we quit relying on the good word of the clergy and look through the records ourselves. These are criminals who are out in the open; most of who have never even been questioned by the police. No way in hell would this play out this way in any other sector of society. It depends. Are you looking for evidence about a coverup of an abusive situation that you know exists? Or are you looking for evidence about about abuse that you do not know exists? If it’s that you don’t trust the church (which is reasonable) and think they may be hiding evidence about other abuses, I don’t see how it’s any more legitimate that not trusting, say, a felon who has served his time. You can’t just say, “Oh, I bet Jimmy H. is into crime again, let’s go search his house!” At least, I don’t think that would be allowed. As should be obvious, I am not a lawyer. Julie ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2004, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/6 "2004-02-28T00:06:20Z")
I’m not sure what exact story the OP refers to since I did not find it at ABC News, but the report that was issued this week regarding abuse by clergy was not conducted by the bishops, but by a goup of Catholics who are, themselves, hopping mad about the situation. This hardly precludes a cover up, but the group did more than simply mail letters to bishops asking “Have you seen any pedophiles lately?” And while I sympathize with the victims rights groups, I have to wonder why we should believe that abuse is more prevalent among Catholic clergy when the numbers reported by non-Cathoilic studies in the past have projected that the numbers for Catholic priests is actually about the same percentage as for ministers of other denominations (and sports coaches and others with access to kids). The absolute horror of the Catholic Church situation has been the willingness of some of the hierarchy to ignore it long after the church, itself, began to issue guidelines to deal with it. However, no one has proposed a realistic reason why the number of _perpetrators_ should be higher among Catholic clergy. (Celibacy doesn’t seem to cut it–all those non-Catholic ministers and sport coaches tend to be married and they are still preying on kids.) ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2004, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/7 "2004-02-28T23:19:50Z")
There have also been huge media flaps over the statute of limitations in several states, including California. Prosecutors here were screaming bloody murder when a couple of accused priests weren’t prosecuted because the statute of limitations had run out on their alleged crimes. It is a difficult thing to prosecute under the best of circumstances, let alone years (or decades) later. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2004, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/8 "2004-02-28T23:21:04Z")
Oh, in the above post I probably should have said that it was the _investigators_ who were pissed about the lack of prosecutions. Sorry. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2004, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/9 "2004-02-29T05:42:44Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Well, I’m not a Catholic, and so have no special insight into that religion other than what I have read; but might it not have something to do with the sacrament of confession? > > Stuff discovered through the process of confession is supposed to be forever confidential [at least, so I have heard.] A molesting priest may easily have “confessed his sins”, and thus put the church in the position of knowing he is a molester, and yet unable to reveal this to the authorities due to the nature of confession. > > Just guessing here. Any persons more knowlegable about Catholicism wish to comment? Not a Roman Catholic, but I’ll take a stab at it. I don’t think that’s the source of the problem. Seal of confession is absolute. So if Priest A confesses a sexual crime to Priest B, under the seal of confession, Priest B cannot tell anyone, not even Priest A’s bishop. But Priest B can refuse absolution to Priest A until he takes the necessary steps to show he is genuinely penitent, which could include requiring Priest A to go to the police and confess, or requiring him to turn himself into his Bishop. If Priest A then goes to his bishop and tells him what he’s done, it’s not under the seal of confession. The bishop is free to take whatever discipline he thinks appropriate, within the boundaries of canon law and civil law. What seems to be the source of much of the outrage is that bishops in this situation wouldn’t alert the police, but would send Priest A off for counselling and then transfer him to another parish, thereby endangering children in that new parish. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2004, 7:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/10 "2004-02-29T07:54:11Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > What seems to be the source of much of the outrage is that bishops in this situation wouldn’t alert the police, but would send Priest A off for counselling and then transfer him to another parish, thereby endangering children in that new parish. Since the latest news stories revolve around the bishops’ and parishes’ reported figures from 1950 onwards, I think it’s fair to make another point here. The criminal justice system as a whole during the 1960s and 1970s tended to treat child molestors have having a psychological bent, something that could be cured. There was great stress laid upon aversion therapy, for example, and practitioners thereof were confident that their patients could be fixed up and rendered safe for release. We now know that those predictions were quite optimistic. But at the time, it wasn’t just the Catholic Church that bought into the idea of “curing” pedophiles. This doesn’t excuse everything, by a long shot. But just as it’s not fair to criticize President Coolidge’s administration for not having more women in the Cabinet, it’s not fair to ascribe to the hierarchy the expectation that they should have ALWAYS known what we know to be true today. - Rick ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2004, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/11 "2004-02-29T18:35:50Z")
**Bricker** - I certainly agree that the approaches to this issue have changed, and the farther back you go the harder it is to assume that the actions were unreasonable, judged by the standards of the time. But from what I’ve seen in the media, it wasn’t just episodes from the 50s and 60s - my impression is that the pattern of tranferring continued until quite recently, say the 80s. If I’m incorrect on that, I’d like to know - don’t want to spread ignorace and all that. By the way, did I accurately summarise the principles governing confession? ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 29, 2004, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/12 "2004-02-29T18:37:39Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > don’t want to spread ignora **n** ce and all that. Nor do I want to spread bad spelling. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2004, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/13 "2004-03-01T16:50:20Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > By the way, did I accurately summarise the principles governing confession? Yup. But you and Malthus are forgetting the other half of the equation - the alleging victims. If Victim A approaches a bishop regarding being molested by Priest A, then confession isn’t even involved. The point being, there isn’t much support for huge amounts of conviction-leading evidence and discovery being hidden under the protection of the confessional seal. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2004, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/14 "2004-03-01T17:07:35Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > **Bricker** - I certainly agree that the approaches to this issue have changed, and the farther back you go the harder it is to assume that the actions were unreasonable, judged by the standards of the time. But from what I’ve seen in the media, it wasn’t just episodes from the 50s and 60s - my impression is that the pattern of tranferring continued until quite recently, say the 80s. If I’m incorrect on that, I’d like to know - don’t want to spread ignorace and all that. That’s a fair statement - and it’s why I said that it didn’t excuse everything. The bishops, as a general rule, seem to have placed a lot more faith in the power of prayer and reassignment than was ever warrented by the facts. They held on to assumptions about the possibility of cures much longer than the scientific community did. And of course their fiath in the possibility of a cure doesn’t address the shameful way in which victims were treated – even if you credit the idea that curing a pedohile priest was possible by their methods, it doesn’t excuse the effort taken to sweep victims under the metaphorical rug. > [@](#): > > By the way, did I accurately summarise the principles governing confession? Right on the money. - Rick ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2004, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-catholic-church-and-criminal-prosecution/231473/15 "2004-03-01T20:13:06Z")
> [@Munch](#): > > Yup. But you and Malthus are forgetting the other half of the equation - the alleging victims. If Victim A approaches a bishop regarding being molested by Priest A, then confession isn’t even involved. The point being, there isn’t much support for huge amounts of conviction-leading evidence and discovery being hidden under the protection of the confessional seal. Well, that makes sense, assuming that victims came forward at the time.