The Catholic Church, showing Christlike compassion, plays hardball with its victims

The BBQ Pit
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I honestly can’t believe this thread. What the fuck is wrong with you people? There is strong evidence that the organization of the church has known about multiple counts of child molestation, and moved only to protect the priests and itself, at the expense of the members of the congregation who were abused. In light of this evidence, rather than working to bring those who allowed this to happen to justice, and repairing the system that allowed for such horrendous abuses of power and trust in the first place, the organization appears to be working only to protect itself. Not the Catholic church as a whole, just the people who run it.

The alleged victims? They weren’t outsiders. They weren’t strangers, trying to hurt the church with their lies. They were Catholics, who trusted their priest and their bishop and their cardinal. And they were betrayed by their church, in the single worst possible way. The church owes them an unpayable debt. To ask them for details and evidence, so that the facts can be ascertained is fine. To treat even a single victim like a liar to avoid trouble or punitive damages is reprehensible.

This is a horrible situation, and I think it has hurt all catholics. As most of them are good, moral people, this is highly unfair to them, especially since their money supports the catholic church, and will be used to pay for the church’s mistakes. But the only people who should be blamed for that injustice are the people in the organization who allowed the molestation to happen again and again for years, before the alarm was finally sounded. Not the victims.

Even if every victim was given 10 million dollars, that’s still not justice. Justice can’t be given to the victims – it’s too late for that. All the church can do is offer what it can, and make sure it nevers happens again.

But it’s not doing that. It’s now trying to offer the least it has to, and protecting as many of its shepards as it can, at the expense of the flock. Of course it has the legal right to do this. No one can argue that. But it’s wrong. Paying compensation to some fraction of people who present false claims is unfair, but not nearly as unfair as mistreating further the many victims who were actually molested. There is no perfect solution here. All we can do is try to minimize the injustice, and that does not mean wringing the victims through the most aggressive legal battles possible.

Oh, and Scylla? Throughout this thread, you have come across as an absolute scumbag. I recognize that this is a difficult issue for you, but that doesn’t excuse how disgusting your behavior was. You obviously don’t care how you come across here, which is your perogative. But that doesn’t change what an asshole it makes you look like.

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IANAC, but if you let them drive you away they’ve won- your faith is not in the bulding or the beaurocracy. Hell, they are the ones who should be ashamed to call themselves Catholic.

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pld - that was indeed the antecedent of my intemperate remark. Thanks.

Guin - This has to be a tough time for you, and for any Catholic who takes her faith seriously. I can’t tell you whether to stay or go, but the bigger the change, the more thought, consideration, and prayer should precede it, IMHO. My WAG is you don’t want to leave the Church unless and until you’re absolutely sure there’s no other honest path for you. But that’s from this guy you’ve never met who’s absorbed some, but far from all, of what you’ve said on this MB, so take it with the appropriate grain of salt.

Giraffe - as strongly as I’ve disagreed with Scylla in this thread, he’s not a scumbag by any stretch of the imagination.

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and furthermore Zoff from the Labor Bureau,here Priests must have 8 years post high school (puts 'em about 26 years minimum, ) and like I said, specifically educated and trained, we can presume that they know sexual contact w/a minor is illegal, and generally considered to be heinous, *even if the minor ‘consents’ * :rolleyes: THeir education and training includes

(emphasis mine) which of course, would also emphasize that they should be celibate, and not merely ‘celebate unless there’s a willing minor available’.

additionally

where they’d presumably learn how harmful it can be to a child/young adolescent to be sexaully assaulted by some one in a position of trust and/or authority over them.

I’ll have to admit defeat in that I didn’t find the specific wording “they should do no harm” but I guess it’s kinda implied by

and sadly lacking in this

is any reference to servicing the sexual needs of the minors in their parish.

For the record, I believe that you also were pretty damned sure that Illinois, like other jurisdictions would have statutes specifically addressing the exacerbating circumstances of ‘position of trust’ relative to sexual assaults. And you probably also knew that a priest would indeed, have a position of trust, and isn’t supposed to be having sex with any minors, let alone those in their parish, even if they ‘consent’. So, the snide crap you gave me when I gave examples from my own state, and demanded relative Illinois statute with the “real facts being sadly lacking” was, I suspect, posturing.

I don’t generally post something unless I’m pretty damned sure of my facts.

So , fess up - you would have been astonished had Illinois not had relevant laws regarding position of trust, right? And, you knew that priestly duties didn’t really include having sex with minors, that it would be considered to be, like, a bad thing, right?

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I actually don’t think he’s a scumbag. In fact, before this thread, I was usually impressed with his posts. His comments in this thread made me really mad, however, and made him look really bad, IMO.

I fully recognize that he likely couldn’t care less about my opinion of him. But I wanted to tell him how he was coming across to someone who started this thread thinking highly of him.

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Bubba Ray:

Ahhhh, shit! Why’d you have to go and be nice for?

And, Oh crap, you even apologized.

Damn, and I said all that mean shit about you.
What to do, what to do?
Hmmmm.

I guess all I gotta do is look hard enough and a solution will present itself:

Giraffe said this:

So what I’ll do is take back all that mean stuff about you, because being willing to apologize to somebody you’re in a heated argument with is a pretty damn nice thing to do, and I really can’t say anything bad about such a man even if he is doing his sister.
So I’m sorry Grendel I apologize. I thought you were a toad, but you have revealed Princely qualities beneath that warty exterior.

So I’ll just take all that shit I gave you and dump it right on ole Giraffe.

Enjoy!
quote]

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Much appreciated, and accepted, Scylla. Apart from the Giraffe thing that is.

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RTF:

Here’s your speech:

Somehow I don’t think it was routine. I remember when that Priest who started the Lighthouse was accused. I have no idea whether the accusation was accurate or not. I do know the guy had done a lot of good work, and helped a lot of kids. IIRC correctly he came out and said that the accusations were false but he was immediately stepping down, because the good names and works of the Lighthouse could not afford to be compromised by this scandal.

I have no idea what happened next. But, if he was innocent, as he says, then he did a remarkable thing. And, if he was guilty, there’s an instance when the reaction was swift and proper.

Somebody’s probably gonna post and tell me that the guy’s in jail for pushing kiddie porn in Oregon, but that’s what I remember. There’ve been several other instances in my recollection where a priest received swift and proper public punishment for actions unworthy of his station.

I know of a priest at Seton Hall Prep who was defrocked for fooling around with a student at Lacordaire academy.

The RCC has failed in several public instances to do the right thing, and the fault travels high. But, I don’t think you can fairly call it routine.

That’s a blanket statement. What you say has occured in some places, but it doesn’t occur everywhere. The RCC doesn’t run like that. The fact is that it’s organized like a corporation with different managers using different styles. What happened in Boston doesn’t necessarily cut muster in Louisiana.

I doubt that’s what occuring. You have some people trying to cover their ass, other people trying to do the right thing, and an organization in turmoil. The pontiff is in poor health, and possibly his dotage, and may not be up to the task before him. He’s certainly not the man he was 20 years ago.
"Now,

I don’t think anybody “encouraged” child abuse. There’s a difference between active encouragement and contemptible ass-covering and neglect of duty. I think there was rationalizing, poor prioritization, and negligence as to where the ultimate duty lay.

I’m not even gonna dignify that.

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look what I found! the relevant Diocese of Joliet paper on sexual abuse

with this

Note, once again the lack of the defense of ‘consent’, including with an adult. This would be the relevant Church position on the issue.
and this

makes clear the concept of ‘appropriate boundaries’ the characterisitcs of coercive/exploitive sexual behavior (again, note the absence of the word “consent” )

and, indeed according to that document, not only should the priest not molest the child, they have an affirmative duty to report it to the proper authorities should they become aware of it.

So, I think that actually goes beyond what I called the affirmative duty to do no harm, in addition they’ve got the ‘moral duty’ to report any suspicions as well.

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I had to do something. You wouldn’t want me to internalize all that stuff, would you?

Besides, he asked for it. Now he’s happy.

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Well, I won’t really be happy until I get a whimsical nickname…

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Hell, he gave you all the shit and didn’t even spare a single kernel of corn for me – and I worked for it.

maybe if I moved into a trailer…

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The Ryan:

Earlier you made a point about it being an attack on faith (and I’m sick of the quote button.) You said something along the lines that “I hope your faith is about more than priest’s molesting kids and the Church covering it up.”

Well, look at Gobear’s comment.

The Church does no good.

It put my father through school when his father died in WWII. It gave comfort to his widow, and helped her find a job to support herself and her son. When my father went a little wild as a teenager there was a particular priest in Parkchester, NYC that sat him down, told him he was fucking up and that he was a disgrace to his mother and dead father. That same priest also reccommended him to Fordham University. He drove to North Carolina to pick up my father when he got leave from training in the Marines to see his newborn son, and he baptized me.

He was my father’s confidant and friend and father figure, and the things he said, and the friendship he offered to my father helped him during his time as a Recon marine in Vietnam.

The only time I can ever recall seeing my father breakdown was when that man died.

I also attended Catholic school, and had nothing but positive experiences from the clergy there.

The Church and the clergy have been great friends to my family and to many others in this country and throughout the world. The RCC has preserved knowledge through the dark ages, and brought food and medicine to remote corners of the world. Dedicated men and women have died in the service of the God they believe in and people worldwide.

IIRC Catholic Charities is the single largest contributor to famine relief in Africa. There are things like the Lighthouse, and the works of Mother Theresa.

There is also the Crusades, The Inquisition, Corruption, and now this.

What the guilty priests have done is despicable. The cover-ups are disgraceful.

Those priests though are rare exceptions. It does not excuse what happened, but this kind of thing goes on anytime you have fallible people involved in a bureacracy. The same thing happens in schools throughout the country. Rare, despicable teachers do these things, and foolish shortsighted principles and administrators sometimes seek to avoid embarassment and cover it up. They transfer the offenders and let somebody else deal with the problem.

I don’t think it’s a problem that is unique or particular to the RCC.

I think it threatens the majority of good works that the RCC does and I think it undermines dedicated, committed and worthy people who are in the Church because of a love for their God, and a desire to dedicate themselves to doing good.

It’s easy to take something like this and paint the entire institution the color of this scandal. It’s easy to look at every scandal and every accusation in the context of this mess, and draw your conclusions.

I find the idea of people lining up to make an accusation and get their 20k for it to be vile. And yes, I think that anybody who does so is suspect for their motivations.

I read that article in the Op with it’s series of one-liners. One line is all that’s needed because everybody knows the drill and can fill in the blanks with the accepted assumptions.

I don’t know why the question was asked about enjoying it. It doesn’t seem proper to me, but to jump to conclusions without knowing the facts, circumstances, or context of it, and to immediately heap contemprt on the RCC for allowing it (and we don’t even know if the lawyer acted on his own, or if the action was endorsed,) seems to me much worse.

It also seems to confirm a sneaking suspicion that a ream job is going on.

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I rather like the Maryland model - shoot first, THEN let the lawyers in…

(another damn idiot who can’t use a gun…)

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As an athiest, I a neither gloating nor nauseated. The latter is a crime against people. The former is one against God.

wring: It seems to me that you aren’t willing to listen with an open mind. You keep repeating the same basic arguent, over and over again, apparently trying to dissuade people from a position that none have espoused, rather than listening to what they are saying.

It is not being used as a justification. It is not being used as a justification. It is not being used as a justification. It is not being used as a justification. How any times does that have to be said?

Scylla: gobear’s comment was that he had not seen the Church do any good. This was, I hope, either hyperbole or else due to ignorance rather than antipathy. While the RCC has done many good things, they don’t tend to be as newsworthy.

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Let me address what seems to be the core issue here.

And I have told you that I agree with the first statement and agree with the second statement in certain circumstances. However, you’re distinctions have not been so clear throughout this thread. You have also argued that consent can not be presented to mitigate damages in a civil case.

For example:

Then you cited several criminal statutes to bolster your argument against mitigation.

If your position is now that it is merely a bad tactic to raise consent to try to reduce damages, then I agree that it could be a bad idea. However, I still believe there are circumstances in which it wouldn’t backfire. Regardless, it was a question asked at a deposition. There’s no indication the consent argument will be used.

What I have taken issue with is your argument that the consent couldn’t be used to mitigate damages because the priest was in a position of trust. I’ve seen no evidence that this is true. Criminal statutes and Catholic policy papers do not define the rules of civil procedure.

As for “skirting” the issue of statutory rape vs. forcible rape, I never “skirted” anything. I argued that, in the context of awarding damages, it’s reasonable to believe that jurors could view statutory rape as less awful than forcible rape. Therefore, the issue of consent could be a valid area to explore in a deposition. I don’t understand how that’s “skirting” an issue.

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zoff - what the hell now?

LIke I said, the judge, when charging the jury will be obligated to mention the relevant law, which is of course, that the minor cannot consent.

Consider this:

YOu’ve got a signed contract promising payment for a car. However, the person who signed it is a minor. They cannot be held responsible for the contract. You go to court, claiming ‘but he consented’. IN that case, the judge would merely throw the case out, since consent cannot be made. In this case, it’s likely that other items will be addressed as well, but the judge will also cite the relevant law that consent cannot be given by a minor.

Would the judge disallow the question? I said probably not. Is it a legitimate defense? no, because the minor in question cannot legally consent. Would the judge so instruct the jury? They’re required to instruct on matters of law. The law says the minor cannot consent. It’s not a matter up for interpretation (as in does it appear that person A is telling the truth or not).

I called it a bad tactic ages ago. It’s not a **viable **defense (you like that phrasing better?), because the issue is moot as a matter of law. A 17 year old signing a contract is like no one signing it - since they’re not allowed to do so. A 15 year old consenting to sex is like non consent, since they’re not allowed legally to consent. would it make some people feel less badly toward the older person if the younger said ‘ok’? Maybe in some cases, but I assure you, not in the case of an adult in a position of trust. The issue of consent in this case is moot.

now, answer my questions, if you please - you did know that it was very fucking likely that Illinois law would also have specifics about persons in positions of trust, right? Also - given the data we absolutely fucking know is true (priest. minor. ), what possible ‘mitigating circumstances’ can you come up with that would diminish in any way at all the priest’s responsability if sexual contact happened?

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Bite me. Your experience of Catholicism differs from mine. My opinions are NOT subject to your approval, got it? I don’t expect you to agree with me, and that;s fine. But you better not expect me to change MY opinons on your say so.

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And you also called it a defense that was legally unavailable, such as when you say “The issue of consent in this case is moot.” That is wrong. As for whether it’s viable, I’ll again repeat that I’d like to know more about the specific facts of the case.

I’ve answered this before. There are criminal statutes involving positions of trust. Can you cite me a statute or Illinois Supreme Court decision that says a person in a position of trust can’t use consent to mitigate damages? Cite, please.

You are assuming that since consent can’t be used in a criminal case, it can’t be used in a civil case. That might be a good policy to argue, but it is not necessarily the law.

Jesus Christ. I’m not arguing it reduces responsibility, I’m saying it could reduce the amount of money awarded. Those are distinct issues. How many times do I have to write that? Damages are awarded to compensate and deter. The level of compensation and deterrence vary on a case-by-case basis. That is, the facts of a case dictate the money awarded. Since we don’t have the facts, grand pronouncements about the viability of the issue of consent are just silly.

This debate will go round and round unless you can cite a statue or decision barring consent as a presentable issue for damages in a civil case. Cite, please.

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I understand that you are arguing that the question could reduce damages in a civil case. Does that make it right to ask the question?
Do you honestly think it is morally ok to commit a further wrong against a victim to get out of punishment? Remind me to kill any witnesses next time I commit a crime.
What bothers me here is that you are giving the accused the benifit of the doubt at the same time you are making some pretty terrible assumptions about the accusors. Maybe, just maybe, the accusors are not lying- If there is any truth at all to the accusations these tactics are morally wrong.