When Is Enough Enough?

[johnnycakes]

I find the lengths to which some will go in apologizing for the injury to humanity perpetrated by the existence of the Roman Catholic Church just breathtaking and more shocking is the number who still remain loyal churchgoers

I just can't understand that attachment to something so widespread, so powerful so controlling of young minds through the use of fear and for so long now so saturated with child molesters from top to bottom who are shifted around from parish to parish by their superiors to hide their crimes..


Of course the celibacy to which they are sworn is the greatest of sexual perversions and totally unnatural so you have to expect a great deal of perversion amongst those who swear to it.

Another question is how can any parent send their children to things like catechism or Sunday school unattended given the nature of so many of the clergy? Is that not criminal negligence?

This is especially so of women who are usually the fiercest defenders of their children.
The Church denigrates women by not allowing them to become priests or Pope as if women are somehow not as moral or spiritual as men. It is passing strange to me that
the church wants women to be forever pregnant and face death through AIDS by enforcing the no condom law yet women make up most of the church goers.

Like women who go back to the men who abuse them, you can maybe sympathize with them .

BUT... when they then force their children to attend services and to face the bestiality of the clergy, face lifelong trauma and mental distress and illness, that goes beyond anything I can accept.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2011/03/201132613036537725.html

[quodlibet]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

Are you suggesting that the person's faith should be defined by the behavior of others?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I find the lengths to which some will go in apologizing for the injury to humanity perpetrated by the existence of the Roman Catholic Church just breathtaking and more shocking is the number who still remain loyal churchgoers

I just can't understand that attachment to something so widespread, so powerful so controlling of young minds through the use of fear and for so long now so saturated with child molesters from top to bottom who are shifted around from parish to parish by their superiors to hide their crimes..


Of course the celibacy to which they are sworn is the greatest of sexual perversions and totally unnatural so you have to expect a great deal of perversion amongst those who swear to it.

Another question is how can any parent send their children to things like catechism or Sunday school unattended given the nature of so many of the clergy? Is that not criminal negligence?

This is especially so of women who are usually the fiercest defenders of their children.
The Church denigrates women by not allowing them to become priests or Pope as if women are somehow not as moral or spiritual as men. It is passing strange to me that
the church wants women to be forever pregnant and face death through AIDS by enforcing the no condom law yet women make up most of the church goers.

Like women who go back to the men who abuse them, you can maybe sympathize with them .

BUT... when they then force their children to attend services and to face the bestiality of the clergy, face lifelong trauma and mental distress and illness, that goes beyond anything I can accept.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2011/03/201132613036537725.html

</div></div>

[johnnycakes]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

[quote=Quodlibet]Are you suggesting that the person's faith should be defined by the behavior of others?



Quodlibet,
In a word, yes. If I understand you to mean that any self respecting moral person would leave the Roman Catholic Church because of its deep rooted corruption and misogyny.
That is not to say that they have to drop the religion but I think Catholics have to eat the wafers and do confession and other things which requires them to go to a church and have to deal with the (quite possible) pedophiles.
From the get go, the way women were and are treated by the Bible and especially the Roman Catholic Church, I can't understand how any woman can affiliate herself with the Church. They don't really like the women but they do like their young sons.

But I digress....The various religions make attending a church, synagogue, mosque more or less mandatory to be in good standing or to get your head in a spiritual setting and be more receptive to what they are selling.
Does a believer NEED a church ?
I don't know.
I'm neither a believer nor a church goer.

I would imagine you can be spiritual and relate to God in a whorehouse or a prison but again, I'm not the one to ask.

Last point:
Would you send your cute young son off to any church activities unescorted ?
How would that affect your faith? Wouldn't the behaviour of others in this case then impinge upon your faith or the practice of it?

[rudemonk]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
BUT... when they then force their children to attend services and to face the bestiality of the clergy, face lifelong trauma and mental distress and illness, that goes beyond anything I can accept.


</div></div>

this seems to make some large assumptions which I don't think are born out by facts. obviously not ALL clergy are sexual predators, I have not looked at any data regarding the issue but I would wager that the numbers of actual priests guilty of abuse do not actually reflect any majority of the priesthood at all, and that the vast majority of women who do bring their children to attend mass are not placing their kids in any jeopardy any more so than they do if they send their kids to school, on chaperoned school trips, boy scouts, little league or any other activity which predators infiltrate.

The argument being made strikes me as a conflation and a slippery slope, similar to how sometimes homosexuality is conflated with pedophilia.

I would wager that the number of sexual predators who are priests would probably be in alignment with many other institutions where children and adults are in close proximity.

Maybe I am wrong.

The issue seems to be more about how the Church has dealt with the victims and abusers, and their apparent sheltering of the abusers as opposed to allowing them to be prosecuted and stopped, purged from their ranks and sent to the clink.

one would have hoped the millstone teaching would have been of greater influence.

[johnnycakes]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

Monk,
10,000 pedophile priests in the United States seems to be a number several sources agree upon. If evenly distributed that would be 200 per state.
Of course there are many more in states with larger Catholic populations than there are in say Wyoming but certainly enough to go around and to make sending your child to Catholic Church dangerous.



New Stats On Pedophile Priests

From our friends @ City Of Angels

The number of pedophile priests found so far in the U.S. Catholic Church is &quot;extrapolated&quot; to be as high as 10,969 according to Bishop Accountability.org, and they are still counting.

The numbers get higher internationally as courts order release of documents in American and European dioceses. &quot;The percentage of paedophile priests is 20 to 200 times higher than the incidence found in the secular population,&quot; according to a report by Vania Lucia Gaito.

The U.S. bishops have reported receiving allegations of abuse by 5,768 priests in 1950-2009, or 5.3% of the 109,694 U.S. priests active since 1950.

Read the updated numbers at Bishop Accountability.
Posted by Joe Smith at 10:39 AM

[johnnycakes]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

Catholic Pedophile Priests:
The Effect on US Society

The many flaws and omissions in the official report
still cannot hide that this is a crisis of historical proportions.

The National Review Board for the Protection of Children and Young People established by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has not had an easy time of determining the extent of the sexual abuse of minors within the American Roman Catholic Church. Not surprisingly, there has been considerable internal opposition. This resistance was so bad that long before its work was finished, its chairman, Frank Keating, was forced to resign after he compared the Church's actions to the Cosa Nostra, which rather proved his point.

Unfortunately, however, these initial numbers are likely to be the only official accounting ever done by the Roman Catholic Church. As soon as the report was published, the UCCB acted swiftly to cut the National Review Board's feet out from under it. For this was to be the preliminary report; the audits were to be completed and a larger report issued. Furthermore, the Board had planned further follow-up reports to follow the implementation of their proposals.

That will not happen now. And so the Church has squandered its last, best chance of ever coming clean.

Certainly the fact that the report was reluctantly commissioned by the bishops who have been responsible for the crisis does not reflect well on its credibility. Nor does the fact that they only reason they ever did so was due to the constant and unrelenting pressure since the early 1990s by victims and advocacy groups, and later, the news media — not to mention the drain on their treasuries from huge settlements and dwindling contributions.

Many dioceses with much to hide did not want to co-operate. Religious orders, the report acknowleges, were even worse. The results are still missing from some groups, and the rest are spinning their denials and minimalizations as fast at their highly paid PR firms can turn. And as it's all self-reported, there is no guarantee of any kind of completeness nor accuracy.

The focus was criticized as too narrow, being concerned solely with child sexual abuse. Other situations where clerics have sexually acted out with adult women and men, nuns and seminarians, have not been looked at; nor the effect on any offspring they may have sired in the process. For that matter, the personal cost to victims and their families remains uncounted. How many lives destroyed through alcohol, drugs, unsafe sex or violence have there been? How much abuse has been repeated by its victims? How many suicides and ruined families? How can the total cost ever be calculated?

There has been much complaining by victims, also, that only a handful were asked to testify, that there was too little time and too many restrictions. Many, too, point out that not all victims have yet come forward by any means. Indeed, even if there are no new cases, just the repressed memories alone of the still-unrecognized victims will guarantee that these numbers will only increase over the next twenty years.

And nothing has been said about multiple abusers and rings who swapped victims around like trading cards...

Nonetheless, A Report on the Crisis in the Catholic Church in the United States has generated a fog of figures, which cannot obscure the extent of this massive failure of institutional religion. It is indeed a crisis. Though this is a step forward, it is not the solution by any means, but a half-hearted admission that there is a problem.

Here are a few of the highlights.

US clerics (priests, deacons, bishops, etc.) accused of abuse from 1950-2002: 4,392.
About 4% of the 109,694 serving during those 52 years.
Individuals making accusations: 10,667.
Victims' ages: 5.8% under 7; 16% ages 8-10; 50.9% ages 11-14; 27.3% ages 15-17.
Victims' gender: 81% male, 19% female
Duration of abuse: Among victims, 38.4% said all incidents occurred within one year; 21.8% said one to two years; 28%, two to four years; 11.8% longer.
Victims per priest: 55.7% with one alleged victim; 26.9% with two or three; 13.9% with four to nine; 3.5% with 10 or more (these 149 priests caused 27% of allegations).
Abuse locations: 40.9% at priest's residence; 16.3% in church; 42.8% elsewhere.
Known cost to dioceses and religious orders: $572,507,094 (does not include the $85 million Boston settlement and other expenses after research was concluded). (Hartford Courant, 2/27/04)
It should be noted that 30% of all accusations included in these figures were not investigated as they were deemed unsubstantiated (10%) or because the accused priest was dead or inactive (20%). They do not include allegations that were &quot;unfounded&quot; or later recanted.

In any case, all these figures are widely suspected to be grossly underestimated. For example, the late Fr. Tom Economus, former President of the Linkup, a national survivors' advocacy group, said back in the mid-90s that he knew of &quot;1,400 insurance claims on the books and that the Church has paid out over $1 billion in liability with an estimated $500 million pending.&quot; (Emphasis added.)

He also said that over 800 priests had been removed from ministry and that there might be as many as 5,000 with allegations against them, which is not that far off. He often claimed that by far the most calls he received from all victims of any kind of clergy abuse were those from males who suffered abuse in their youth in the Catholic Church. Certainly the numbers, which show that the highest number of victims were 12 year old boys and that 80% of the abuse was homosexual in nature, validate that anecodotal evidence, too. In fact, while the numbers of young children and girls did not vary much, the report shows an astounding six-fold increase in the abuse of boys aged 11-17 between the 1950s and 70s. And the figures for males stayed high through the 1980s.

Could it be that once the exits were opened by Vatican II, the good priests who could departed to marry, and the maladjusted ones who remained were left to their own devices?

In any case, Fr. Tom Doyle, a canon lawyer with more experience than any in these cases, has raised many questions over the validity and methodology of the study. He has said that he thought many cases were still hidden, pointing out the low numbers for the 1950s.

'&quot;It's not over with,&quot; Doyle said. &quot;The heart of the matter is: Why was there this massive betrayal? Why did they move [abusers] around for years, when they knew what they were doing? Why have they continued to re-victimize the victims by stonewalling, and why they have never turned in any of these known pedophiles?&quot;'(Hartford Courant, 2/26/04)


Additional Information from other sources

Four in 10 US Catholic nuns report having experienced sexual abuse, (a rate equivalent to that reported by American women in general), a study by Catholic researchers supported by major religious orders, has found. The study found that sisters have known sexual abuse less in childhood, dispelling what the authors call an &quot;anti-Catholic&quot; canard that girls fled to convents to escape sexual advances. During religious life, close to 30% of the nation's 85,000 nuns experienced &quot;sexual trauma,&quot; ranging from rape to exploitation to harassment. A total of 40% reported a least one experience of that kind. NCR, 1/15/99 See The Nuns' Stories for details.
The Wisconsin Psychological Association's survey found offenders distributed among the following professions: Psychiatrists 34%, Psychologists 19%, Social Workers 13%, Clergy 11%, Physicians 6%, Marriage Counselors 4%, and Others 14%.
The Center for Domestic Violence found that 12.6% of clergy said they had sex with church members. 47% of clergy women were harassed by clergy colleagues.
The Presbyterian Church stated that 10-23% of clergy have &quot;inappropriate sexual behavior or contact&quot; with clergy and employees.
The United Methodist research (1990) showed 38.6% of Ministers had sexual contact with church members and that 77% of church workers experienced some type of sexual harassment.
The United Church of Christ found that 48% of the women in the work place have been sexually harassed by male clergy.
The Southern Baptists claim 14.1% of their clergy have sexually abused members.
At least the Roman Catholic Bishops can take heart: they're not alone...

http://www.weirdload.com/stats.html

[rudemonk]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Monk,
10,000 pedophile priests in the United States seems to be a number several sources agree upon. If evenly distributed that would be 200 per state.
Of course there are many more in states with larger Catholic populations than there are in say Wyoming but certainly enough to go around and to make sending your child to Catholic Church dangerous.
</div></div>

well i am wary of engaging this only because i am not defending pedophilia priests I think they should be strung with a millstone and sent overboard and the church needs to do a lot, i mean A LOT, to fix this.

but what are the figures of pedophiles/sexual offenders (because I believe it is more than just kids) as pertains to the normal population of any given area? In the US it is something like 700,000 sex offenders. I mean if you watch To Catch a Predator, the vast majority of the perps captured are Doctors, Lawyers, Army, Construction Workers, etc. I have never seen a Priest. But it would be extremely interesting if they set up a sting for Priests!!!!!!

do parents get charged with neglect if they send their kid to a park or playground? school? family member's house for a sleepover? Because that is where most predators work.

what about if they let their kids use the internet, which is where the vast majority of sex crimes today against kids are initiated?

[rudemonk]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The numbers get higher internationally as courts order release of documents in American and European dioceses. &quot;The percentage of paedophile priests is 20 to 200 times higher than the incidence found in the secular population,&quot; according to a report by Vania Lucia Gaito.
</div></div>

that's particularly damning, but sounds misleading and inaccurate- 20 to 200 is a very large spread to cover!

[johnnycakes]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: monk</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Monk,
10,000 pedophile priests in the United States seems to be a number several sources agree upon. If evenly distributed that would be 200 per state.
Of course there are many more in states with larger Catholic populations than there are in say Wyoming but certainly enough to go around and to make sending your child to Catholic Church dangerous.
</div></div>

well i am wary of engaging this only because i am not defending pedophilia priests I think they should be strung with a millstone and sent overboard and the church needs to do a lot, i mean A LOT, to fix this.

but what are the figures of pedophiles/sexual offenders (because I believe it is more than just kids) as pertains to the normal population of any given area? In the US it is something like 700,000 sex offenders. I mean if you watch To Catch a Predator, the vast majority of the perps captured are Doctors, Lawyers, Army, Construction Workers, etc. I have never seen a Priest. But it would be extremely interesting if they set up a sting for Priests!!!!!!

do parents get charged with neglect if they send their kid to a park or playground? school? family member's house for a sleepover? Because that is where most predators work.

what about if they let their kids use the internet, which is where the vast majority of sex crimes today against kids are initiated?

</div></div>


Monk,

The Church has been hiding the priests who get caught in sexual situations for ages.
The number of 10,000 in the United States is deemed accurate.

I did the math earlier and it means that some heavily Catholic states will have as many as 300 sexually active priests. The odds of your kid running into one ( or vice versa) is fairly high.
I would make a serious differentiation between a playground, a park and a church.

The church is inside a building and the priest holds enormous power over children which I'm sure the child understands as life and eternal hell.
They are in a unique position of trust.

You don't send your kid to a playground or a park unattended and I would have to think that a Roman Catholic Church is inordinately more likely to be the scene of child rape than any park or playground. IMO


Likewise children have to be limited in their use of the internet. That's a more common practice than is keeping your kids away from priests.

This is easy for me because as an atheist I have a disliking for all religions and especially the RCC with its incredibly bloody and immoral history.

[rudemonk]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">[quote=monk][quote=johnnycakes]Monk,

This is easy for me because as an atheist I have a disliking for all religions and especially the RCC with its incredibly <span style="font-style: italic">bloody and immoral history.</span>
</div></div>

I'll grant you that without a second thought.

I don't know enough about the subject to really add anything more, several things seem clear- organizations such as the church have without doubt aided if not abetted and sheltered criminals whom they have a moral and ethical duty to turn over to authorities and protect the innocents and in this they have failed rather dramatically.

These cases need to be vigorously pursued and those responsible brought to the light of justice, and further steps need to be taken to purge the ranks of the clergy of these criminals.

[johnnycakes]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: monk</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">[quote=monk][quote=johnnycakes]Monk,

This is easy for me because as an atheist I have a disliking for all religions and especially the RCC with its incredibly <span style="font-style: italic">bloody and immoral history.</span>
</div></div>

I'll grant you that without a second thought.

I don't know enough about the subject to really add anything more, several things seem clear- organizations such as the church have without doubt aided if not abetted and sheltered criminals whom they have a moral and ethical duty to turn over to authorities and protect the innocents and in this they have failed rather dramatically.

These cases need to be vigorously pursued and those responsible brought to the light of justice, and further steps need to be taken to purge the ranks of the clergy of these criminals. </div></div>



Monk,
It would be good if the clergy and the Church were treated as regular people but they are not.
They have a privileged position in the world and are rarely jailed or taken to court.

They are PRESUMED to be moral people.

Before, during and after WWII the Church made deals with the Nazis which allowed the killing of the Jews with no comment from the Church, support of the Nazi cause, and after the war the hiding and protection of Nazi war criminals.


You do not hear much talk of this because the Church is untouchable politically.

So too today do the legions of pedophile priests do their dirty deeds virtually unmolested (no pun intended).

[freedom-man]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

Catholic priests dying in America's hidden Aids epidemic

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/...mic-724664.html

[rudemonk]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

They are PRESUMED to be moral people.

</div></div>

you do see the slippery slope of this kind of argument though?

the presumption is there because the very vast majority of the clergy ARE relatively speaking, law abiding moral people.

this kind of argument is exactly what is behind racial profiling, anti semitism, bias against muslims, etc.

[johnnycakes]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: monk</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

They are PRESUMED to be moral people.

</div></div>

you do see the slippery slope of this kind of argument though?

the presumption is there because the very vast majority of the clergy ARE relatively speaking, law abiding moral people.

this kind of argument is exactly what is behind racial profiling, anti semitism, bias against muslims, etc.

</div></div>



Okay Monk,

Would you send your kid to a Catholic Church?
Yes the vast majority say 75% or 80% or 90% of priests and other supposedly celibate religious people do not rape young boys.

What level of perversion is acceptable and at what point is an organization a &quot;failed&quot; organization in the same sense as a nation like Haiti is a failed nation and needs to be rebuilt from its base?


I'd say the Roman Catholic Church reached the &quot;failed&quot; point long ago and has for too long a regressive social force in the world and shows only small interest in becoming other than the bloated perverted fraud it has become..

[rudemonk]

Re: When Is Enough Enough?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: johnnycakes</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Okay Monk,

Would you send your kid to a Catholic Church?
Yes the vast majority say 75% or 80% or 90% of priests and other supposedly celibate religious people do not rape young boys.
</div></div>

I think in this discussion we need to separate some facts from the headlines, so to speak. And again I want to be careful not to sound like I am defending the Church in this regard or it's pedophile priests. Just to say that they are by far and away NOT the vast majority of clergy and I think it is wrong to suggest that all priests are and should be avoided.

Look at any population of sex offenders and few are priests. I think we have covered some of the numbers in this thread.

So would you send your child to a public school? Allow them internet access? What about a sleep over at a friend's house? Statistically speaking, looking at the perversion map, just sending or going to a Mass is not likely to end with a result of abuse.

Anecdotally, many members of my family are Catholic, I have many friends in the clergy either priests or monks who are definitely not pedophiles, don't deserve to be labeled as such, and who are deeply troubled and upset about the issue, and I don't think although I don't know, that priests were abusing kids during Church services.

Something I just googled, from a medical report:
<span style="font-style: italic">Most sexual abuse offenders are acquainted with their victims; approximately 30% are relatives of the child, most often brothers, fathers, uncles or cousins; around 60% are other acquaintances such as 'friends' of the family, babysitters, or neighbors; strangers are the offenders in approximately 10% of child sexual abuse cases.</span>

Nothing there about priests. They are not even mentioned. Perhaps this info predates the scandals breaking, but since it is clinical I doubt that has any relevance. It would seem that there would be way more to fear from neighbors and baby sitters!

So one thing is clear, there ARE predators at large in our society and they use positions of trust in order to perpetrate their evils and so our children should be educated to understand the dangers and protect themselves.


<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
What level of perversion is acceptable and at what point is an organization a &quot;failed&quot; organization in the same sense as a nation like Haiti is a failed nation and needs to be rebuilt from its base?
</div></div>

I don't think perversion is acceptable at any level but I also don't feel that personnel necessarily represent the whole, especially in regards to large institutions, any more than I feel that the public school system is failed because some teachers abuse their students and so on. I don't think the entire US Army is made up of war criminals because of various atrocities committed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In its defense, the Church has made some major progress and is not as uniform of an institution as many of its detractors claim- for example its role in the Holocaust of WWII, I think abandoning literal interpretations of some scriptures in favor of factual scientific knowledge is pretty major- but like many other faiths it has a long way to go.In fact it is my personal belief that it mythologized a completely different message than its founder propagated. But personally I would go so far as to say it is clear that all three Abrahamic faiths need radical top down revision and recontextualization in light of modern scientific advances.

The Church fails miserably in several departments, but it does have some shine on it. A failure would be it's stance on birth control, womens roles, the dissonance between monastics and parish clergy, and homosexuality. However, it does remain a powerful voice for many downtrodden who do not otherwise have a voice or chance.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

I'd say the Roman Catholic Church reached the &quot;failed&quot; point long ago and has for too long a regressive social force in the world and shows only small interest in becoming other than the bloated perverted fraud it has become..
</div></div>

I think by that metric we don't have a lot of successful social or political models at any large scale, and there are bigger fish to throw under the bus first. If the Church can be thought of as a Nation- and in many ways it should- I wouldn't put it near Haiti, Somalia, or North Korea...