Are you saying that the medical community recommended that known pedophiles be placed in assignments which either required or allowed for them to be alone with children?
I would argue that it’d be more difficult to feel up an adult woman and get away with it than to feel up a child and get away with it. And let’s not forget that not all these priests are handsome studs who have ways with the ladies. I’ll suspect the ones that are, do, as you suggested. The ones who can’t, don’t and go for the children.
You’re right, there are altar girls. And they get molested too.
In one of my previous lives, I kept statistics on cases alleged against non-Catholic religious workers. There were hundreds of cases, involving Christian, Jewish and Muslim clerics, from conservative, moderate and liberal churches. It didn’t matter whether clergy could be married, or had taken a vow of celibacy. It didn’t matter whether the alleged perpetrators were white, black, or whatever. There were cases involving young boys and young girls, as well as adolescents of both sexes.
That doesn’t even begin to include cases involving teachers, coaches, youth group leaders, etc.
The only difference with the RCC is that it’s more hierarchical than other churches, so it’s somewhat easier to find out about multiple abusers than from a decentralized denomination that calls and dismisses its employees on a local level. The sad truth is, wherever you have an occupation that provides access to children, there will be a certain percentage of people in that occupation who use that access to take advantage of children.
Actually, I suspect that the vast majority of them, handsome studs or not, honor their vows and go neither for children nor adult women. Or adult men, for that matter.
We’re exclusively talking about the ones who would be inclined to break their vows. I thought that was understood. I would be willing to think that most don’t, yes.
More a response to the OP, which said “What is it about the Catholic Priesthood that seems to attract pedophiles like flies to honey?”
This still seems to assume that there is some special pressure driving priests to molest children. There are plenty of ugly men who can’t attract women and we don’t assume they will go and molest children. I think that there has to be some other flaw in a person before they look to children to satisfy their urges.
So the selection pressure criteria for the priesthood or being a nun was either that you were terminally homely, socially dysfunctional, or potentially gay?
Saying the Catholic church attracts pedophiles is like saying hospital attracts doctors.
Of course it would. A pedophile needs, respectablity, access to kids, (young adults, what-have-you) and a legit reason no to marry.
The church gives this, so they go where there is an opportunity.
There are lots of priests who aren’t pedophiles but it’s easy to see WHY a pedophile would choose the priesthood. It’s a very good job allowing them to ply their trade, so to speak
How do you know that many more basket-weavers than priests are not molesting children? Your contention makes some sense, but it has not been proven. Further, and perhaps mistakenly, you are especially condemning the Catholic church as opposed to (say) Judaism.* As a result, your broad brush comes across as simple bigotry.
*In New York State, efforts to extend the Statute of Limitations on child molestation has been opposed by most religious groups of every stripe.
I’m straight, and not a pedo. But, if I were somehow in a position which prevented me from having any public sexual or romantic relationship with a woman, and at the same time I had access to a lot of teenage girls who regarded me as a semi-divine moral authority, I’m sure I would at least be tempted to take advantage of the situation.
Now, suppose you’re a Catholic teenage boy and you gradually become aware you have a same-sex orientation. There will be a lot of social pressure for you marry and have kids – if you don’t you’ll be talked about, perhaps even shunned by your family and community. But you can avoid that by studying for the priesthood – then nobody will even expect you to have anything to do with girls. But once you become a priest, you have access to all these altar boys, who, as good Catholics, are indoctrinated to see a priest as standing, literally, in the place of God. Are you beginning to see how some would yield to temptation?
My cite says that most child molesters aren’t predators nor are they pedophiles. A predator is someone who has a target in mind, finds a way to get into an area where such a target is easily available, and proceeds to hunt. Only pedophiles could ever act in a predatory manner since no one else has “having sex with children” as a clear course for living their life in mind.
Saying that anyone who seeks out sex with a child is acting predatory is perhaps true, but it’s not really the meaning that is intended when someone talks about predatory crime. There’s a vast difference between someone who just got a divorce, is stressed out and angry at the world, and the next day when he finds himself in a room with a student and no one else around suddenly gropes her; and between someone who fantasizes about having sex with children when he’s age 18, studies to be a teacher in college so that he’ll enter a profession where child targets abound, specifically seeks a job working with children of a preferred age, actively studies which children will be susceptible, and plots out methods of seducing them. Neither of these is good, but only one of them is what we would call “predatory behavior”.
If the term confusing to you, I’m happy enough to use some other word that doesn’t give you that mental hickup. But it is the word that, I believe, is most commonly used. There are “predatory” offenders and there are “situational” offenders. 90%+ of offenders are situational.
Certainly, occupations with access to children will have a higher chance of having predatory offenders, since that’s where the hunting is good, but even there, I still suspect that most offenders are situational simply due to the extreme overshadowing of numbers.
One study from a professor does not a fact make. Unless every media outlet is deliberately withholding stories of non-catholic pedophile ministers I don’t accept the study as valid.
Studies and observations from this site:
**With the church’s current requirement of priestly chastity, seminaries are having difficulty recruiting heterosexuals to the priesthood.
- Father Donald Cozzens wrote that several studies have concluded that about 50% of priests and seminarians are gay. 5
- David France of Newsweek, referring to St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo, CA, wrote: “Depending on whom you ask, gay and bisexual men make up anywhere from 30 percent to 70 percent of the student body at the college and graduate levels.” 3
- Rt. Rev. Helmut Hefner, rector of St. Johns Seminary “accepts that his gay enrollment may be as high as 50 percent.” 3
- Gay journalist Rex Wockner commented: “When I was in the Catholic seminary in my early 20s (St. Meinrad College, St. Meinrad, Ind., 1982-1983; University of St. Mary of the Lake, Mundelein, Ill., 1983-1984), at least 50 percent of the students were gay…At St. Mary of the Lake, the straight students felt like a minority and felt excluded from some aspects of campus life to such an extent that the administration staged a seminar at which we discussed the problem of the straight students feeling left out of things…” 6
- Author and sociologist James G. Wolfe estimated that 55.1% of seminarians were gay. 7
- Bishop Jerome Listecki is an auxiliary bishop of Chicago, rejects some estimates that as many as 50% of seminarians have a homosexual orientation. 3
It would seem that about 50% of present-day seminary students may have a homosexual orientation.
**
Having personally attended a seminary in my youth for a couple of weekend orientations I believe it very possible that the Catholic Church attracts gay men.
Yeah, pretty much.
We’re not talking about gay men, though. We’re talking about pedophiles.
Dude . . . no . . . not cool at all. Enough damage has been done by equating homosexuality with pedophilia and molestation. I never expected to see that here.
I am not equating. Read for comprehension.
Ok, you’re juxtaposing :rolleyes:. Read your own damn post for comprehension.
Some good ideas here, I think. Many writing here seem to assume that all pedophiles early in their affliction enjoy it and want nothing more than to pursue it. Here’s another consideration -
Nearly all pedophiles have a history of being sexually molested as young people. There is a conditioning factor involved.
Combine that with a religious bent and you may have guilt involved. Victims of child molesters are often troubled by the mixed reactions to being molested. If a molester is very clever and seductive there can be a natural physical pleasure response from the victim.
He knows “something bad” has happened and that, in part, he liked some of it. A religious person may seek out a lifestyle where he thinks he can find answers to and healing of his confusion. The majority of sex abuse victims carry some sense that it’s their fault, remember. The idea that he will be sequestered and draw close to his God may give him hope that he can change.
But the sex drive and its bent is a powerful one. Sometimes what looked like a safe haven turns out to be the perfect venue for acting out the abuse. Instead of being “safe” he is tempted.
A priest is automatically afforded respect and privacy. Add opportunity and it’s a recipe for disaster.
I doubt that all molesting priests seek the priesthood to find victims. I’d imagine most are hoping to be freed of their obsession, given the nature of religion and it’s promise to bring people into alignment with their God.
With time a pattern of a predatory nature is established and I think that’s what most people think of when they think of molestor priests. But it starts with a frightened and wounded child.
It’s just kind of hard to imagine that “stress” is enough to make someone want to grope another person. I’ve been stressed and that’s never been a reaction. Plus, a lot of sexual predators are really good at twisting the truth to justify their actions. They can turn someone targeting a vulnerable young person into “It just sort of happened, really!”
I’d just be curious as to why someone who’s angry with the world would think to sexually molest someone. Just seems awfully convenient that they’d just so happen to find themselves with an unwilling victim is all.