Roger the Dodger rides again

Roger Mahony, unlike Bernard Law, is seen by the media as an admirably liberal Churchman, which means he gets a free pass for his sins. Apparently, if you support illegal aliens, attack American foreign policy, and wink at abortion, you're less culpable for allowing pedophiles free rein in your churches.

"This while the credibility of the Church hangs by a thread. I have a serious problem not letting myself hate the man who represents every despicable development that, like a cancer from hell, has been eating away at my beloved Church for 40 years. Our Catholic politicians, music, architecture, liturgy and catachresis have deteriorated to the point that the Church is no longer recognizable, and that's just fine with Mahony and his motley crew of dissidents."

In a nuthsell, Mahony was far worse than Law. Law was a dim boob who thought he could cover it up. Mahony is a snake, not merely covering things up,but planting flowers over the coverup. He lied to JPII about it, full well knowing what he was doing. And as noted in every way, in every negative development in the CC in the last 40 years, Mahony has trumpeted the wrong side.

At some point some real leader would've stood up and threw all of these vipers out on their collective posteriors. But Mahony and his ilk were never going to do that, because they themselves would've been thrown out.

I don't know how anyone in the LA diocese could put a dime in the collection plate. Better the LAD go broke and Catholic hear mass in a storfront or a parking lot than have one penny be taken in by the likes of Mahony.

Rod,

Why'd you delete the other comments? That looks suspicious.

In friendship,

Irenaeus

I wish it was just a matter of one bad man. Or several bad men.

Something is deeply, structurally wrong with any organization which so systematically places such men in positions of leadership. Law, Mahony and the rest have had long, successful careers in the Catholic Church; apparently this is the kind of man who advances. The message is, this is how you rise to the top: you become an organization man, who cares more about the organization than about the ideals which it allegedly serves.

Bureaucracies all tend in this direction, but most of them have corrective mechanisms, some kind of accountability, which cuts this kind of thing off before it gets this far. This one doesn't. The only corrective, apparently, is that a totally corrupt secular society is itself finally offended by the moral transgressions involved.

Daniel,

I don't think JPII was involved in any cover-up, or B16 for that matter. I think liberal Catholic bishops were in CYA-mode and effectively lied to him about the gravity and scope of the situation.

Irenaeus, with all due respect, if you're investigating the conduct and leadership of any individual, the first thing you >i>don't do is just take his word for what's going on.

JPII didn't care what had happened to American children.

All I can think is that this kind of thing has been going on in the priestly subculture for so long that even the good ones accept it unthinkingly as part of the situation, so what.

I have a very close friend who is a priest. My age, which means, 60 ish. This guy said to me, "Well, having a pedophile in the group, it's like having an uncle in the family who's a little off. You say, well, that's Uncle Bob, that's the way he is." I can't get it through to my friend, who is himself a very good man, that that response just isn't good enough while children are being hurt.

Sometimes dysfunctional families are like that. Behavior which outsiders regard with horror are accepted as, well, maybe not optimal, but nothing to get excited about. Someone with more sociology in their background could probably describe it better.

I have a very close friend who is a priest. My age, which means, 60 ish. This guy said to me, "Well, having a pedophile in the group, it's like having an uncle in the family who's a little off. You say, well, that's Uncle Bob, that's the way he is." I can't get it through to my friend, who is himself a very good man, that that response just isn't good enough while children are being hurt.

1 Corinthians 5

1 It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father's wife. 2 You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst. 3 For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. 4 In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, 5 I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

6 Your boasting is not good Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? 7 Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. 8 Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

9 I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people; 10 I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers, or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world. 11 But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler--not even to eat with such a one. 12 For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Do you not judge those who are within the church? 13 But those who are outside, God judges. REMOVE THE WICKED MAN FROM AMONG YOURSELVES.

Susan - it's a tilda. If you look to the left of your "1" key on your keyboard in the standard American QWERTY layout, it should be there.

By the by, this statement...

Law, Mahony and the rest have had long, successful careers in the Catholic Church; apparently this is the kind of man who advances. The message is, this is how you rise to the top: you become an organization man, who cares more about the organization than about the ideals which it allegedly serves.

...is spot on correct. It needs to be stated again and again that these men rose high in the ranks because they embodied qualities the heirarchy encouraged. This whole "scandal" is not something that magically appeared overnight in the days post-Vatican II.

Finally, to hmmmm - I'm afraid I don't grok the reference. What is the OCA?

OCA = Orthodox Church of America

Actually, OCA is "Orthodox Church IN America", not "OF" America.

Rod,

Why'd you delete the other comments? That looks suspicious.

Because they were made by Diane and other trolls who have been banned from the blog for their past bad behavior.

Daniel posits that I deleted them because "Thou shalt not criticize the Orthodox." Which is absurd. I've written here critically of the financial scandal in the OCA, and let me say here once again that I hope justice is done, no matter who has to answer for it.

Irenaeus: I don't think JPII was involved in any cover-up

I wish I could agree with you. John Paul II averted his eyes from the various manifestations of this scandal. In Austria, for example, he protected Cardinal Groer, who was himself a sex abuser, so fiercely that it took Groer's sucessor, Cardinal Schoenborn -- who is, please note, a theological conservative -- to intervene personally to get the Holy See to act against Groer.

I think John Paul was an old-style churchman who thought protecting the good name of the Church was enormously important. On the other hand, he had no problem admitting and publicly apologizing for the Church's many sins. I also think he was a saintly man. I can't account for his behavior in this scandal. But I can't deny it either.

~tv: Also, it must be said that this kind of nonsense wouldn't have happened in the first place if women were allowed to hold positions of authority in the RCC. It seems that while so many Fathers were abusing their positions, one rarely if ever hears about Mothers doing so.

Boy, is that ever a false hope. Ever hear of the Magdalene Homes in Ireland? Besides, the Episcopal Church has allowed women priests for a generation, and it has these scandals. The real scandal in the RCC was not that priests molested children, as hideous as that was. The real scandal was that bishops and others in the hierarchy who were not themselves abusers, looked the other way and allowed more Catholic children to be molested. It is a function of power, and an institutional mindset -- and women are not immune from that. Some Catholic women in positions of power helped cover it up; others helped blow the whistle. Same with Catholic men. Gender had nothing to do with it.

Jerry Hutchinson:

Unfortunately, neither of the statements you make is correct.

The document "crimen sollicitationis", issued in 1962, dealt principally with instances of a priest using the sacrament of confession to solicit sex (the "solicitation" of the title). Hence the need to keep secrecy, in order to protect the seal of the confessional. Moreover, the document did not include any kind of instruction or indication that information about child abuse should be withheld from the civil authorities. This document was widely misrepresented in the press a couple of years ago. I don't know of a translation that is available online, but a fair assessment of the contents, along with the opinions of people that actually understand Canon Law (something the mainstream press seems not to have bothered with) can be found in the article written by John Allen here:

http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/update/bn080703.htm

Secondly, the letter you refer to by then-Cardinal Ratzinger (entitled "De delictis gravioribus", written in 2001), actually superceded the previous instruction "Crimen Sollicitationis" - it was not a re-issuing of the same document, but contains a number of revised, and rather more severe, norms regarding the handling of these cases (among which is the requirement that all credible claims of abuse be reported to Rome, rather than just handled by the local bishop, as was the previous practice). For more information on this letter (and on the generally bad coverage it received in the press), you might consult the articles by Dr. (of Canon Law) Edward Peters:

http://www.canonlaw.info/blogarch05.htm (see the entry for 27/4/2005)
http://www.canonlaw.info/2006/10/does-bbc-enjoy-being-so-far-behind.html

I largely agree with the idea that the bureaucratic mentality of most of the bishops has been an immensely bad thing (though I don't think I agree with the solutions that some of the other commentators would propose). But these documents don't really support the claim - pace the Western press - that any of the popes, including the current one, were involved in any kind of cover-up.

hrh;

Usually to prosecute you have to have more on the accused than the accused has on you.

And RICO is not really constitutional anyway and should be done away with along with other statists crap.

I've dealt with this type first hand. (I think I've told this story before.)

I had a client, may he never return, and I sort of got roped into representing him before I fully understood what was going on. He's a priest, and for various political reasons he's headed for a red hat one day. In the course of our transaction I realized that he had information vital to the (criminal) prosecution of Catholic priests who had sexually abused children some years ago, in a foreign jurisdiction. There was no question whatever in my client's mind about their guilt: the children had complained to him at the time. (And he had shushed the matter up.) Now he wanted to know whether he was legally bound to tell the foreign authorities (to whom he had sort of lied on the phone) the true state of affairs. The Provincial of his (former) Order (he'd changed horses) pleaded with him to keep his mouth shut. So did the bishop.

I have written evidence of all this.

Because he was out of the jurisdiction of the foreign authorities, I had to answer that he had no LEGAL obligation to come clean. I emphasized his moral obligations in vain.

The perpetrators went free for lack of evidence.

This is a man of the organization. He's sort of famous for his seminars on, of all things, contemplative prayer (!!). He really thinks he did the right thing, because if the truth came out it would hurt the organization. Which it undoubtedly would, in the short run. (If you think truth is ultimately harmful I'm afraid you've stated that you are not a follower of the man who said, "I am the truth.") As I said, he's headed for a bishopric, and probably a red hat.

I told him never to speak to me again. I phrased my contempt as strongly as possible. I told him the truth, that he's a fraud. Nevertheless, the next time we were in proximity, he had the nerve to attempt a greeting. This is a man without a moral bone in his body. This is who gets promoted.

This creep was not especially important in the formation of my present opinion. There's lots of evidence from elsewhere. But it's startlingly appalling to have to deal with someone like this first-hand. The kind of client that makes you want to take a shower after a telephone conversation.

As for JPII, who protected scads of these types? Rod says, "I also think he was a saintly man." I don't know what that means. JPII doesn't correspond to any definition of "saintly" known to me.

Boy, is that ever a false hope. Ever hear of the Magdalene Homes in Ireland? Besides, the Episcopal Church has allowed women priests for a generation, and it has these scandals. The real scandal in the RCC was not that priests molested children, as hideous as that was. The real scandal was that bishops and others in the hierarchy who were not themselves abusers, looked the other way and allowed more Catholic children to be molested. It is a function of power, and an institutional mindset -- and women are not immune from that. Some Catholic women in positions of power helped cover it up; others helped blow the whistle. Same with Catholic men. Gender had nothing to do with it.

Patriarchists have this really twisted tendency to project what *they* would do onto the women who would replace them if the tables were turned.

Sadly, the RCC will never know, as there will be no female bishops or other members of the heirarchy to prove the point. I do not see women standing idly by protecting abusers while children are being hurt. I sure do see a lot of men doing so. You are free, of course, to state that gender has *nothing* to do with it, but they'll simply never be allowed to find out just how different things could be with women in charge.

tv;

Sexual abuse of youth is almost epidemic in some sections of society and women have a part, directly or indirectly with it. Public schools are probably the worst, including "cover-ups" but there are many other groups. The Catholic church is just a big target and is not liked by the MSM. That is no excuse, and the attention to this and the cleaning of the seminaries will clear things up here.

The Catholic priesthood is male and will remain so. So if there is sexual abuse by priests it will be sexual abuse by males, plain and simple. The solution is to have men who are better quality in the priesthood and in positions of authority. That will not end sexual abuse, because the perps have to be SOMEWHERE.

I am a traditional (Eastern-Rite) Catholic, and I am grateful that Rod is still writing about the abuse scandal in the RCC. We need all the help we can get ... including from the Orthodox.

There won't be a change in bishops' behavior till either (1) there is a successful RICO prosecution, or (2) some bishop begins wearing a jumpsuit, and celebrates Ordinary Time in liturgical orange.

Lee

Alicia, it's not the "power of the Catholic Church" but the limitations of the law that make that sort of thing unlikely.

One of the frustrations felt by so many who prosecute child sex abuse cases, whether the perpetrator is a Catholic priest, a female public school teacher, a sports coach, or (from a local case) a married father/Boy Scout leader is that so much of the evidence in the case as it relates to people other than the victim and perpetrator is hearsay evidence. In other words, unless you have proof that those in higher authority actually did know about the abuse and took no action to stop it you don't have a case. Saying they should have known or most probably did know isn't enough to take to court, in most circumstances.

The reality is that the recent $660 million dollar settlement in the State of California was completely and totally AVOIDABLE!

At any point in time, the Holy Roman Catholic Church could have said, "ENOUGH!"

Why didn't that happen?

Do you remember a little document which came out of the Office of the Inquisitions in Rome. Today, it's called something else, but Crimen Solicitationes was an Office of the Inquisitions Document, which was quite appropriate, given the nature of the document!

It was designed to stop SCANDAL from coming to the Church's doorstep, because too many incidences of Pederast Priest Pedophilia were happening to ignor! Damage Control had to be done! The Church couldn't risk getting a bad reputation for sheltering Pederast priests, so a system was devised to SILENCE those who were accusing the Church of allowing Her Pederast priests to abuse innocent kids!

What happened? Threats of Excommunication came against those accusing Pederast Priests of Abuse! Under pain again of Excommunication, they had to swear to "silence," if the Church were to investigate the allegations!

Now, in retrospect, wasn't Crimen Solicitationes a Bad Move? Wouldn't it have been $660,000,000 cheaper to have honestly addressed the problem?

Wouldn't the lives of countless innocent children and teens been saved?

Jeannie

This touches on another topic raised above, namely, celibacy. The fact of the matter is that some of these men are celibate some of the time - but hey, that could be said of any group of people. The reality is, they are NOT celibate as they would have us understand that term. And that means that every man, or very nearly every man, has skeletons in his closet. Almost no one of any age at all is completely clean (as you would expect from a general understanding of male human nature). So they all have the goods on each other, which mandates against anyone - certainly anyone creepy enough to be made a bishop - blowing the whistle on the whole thing, even if they were otherwise inclined to do that.

Sounds like how THE FIRM thought they could control Tom Cruise by having that woman seduce him on the beach and capture it on film, in case he ever found out how corrupt The Firm was and they needed a way to keep him silent. :)

I agree with Rod's post (immediately above) 100%. Women are just as subject to corruption and sin as men. To believe anything else is to put women on a pedastal.

don't lie to yourself by saying that there would be any less corruption by virtue of the fact that women would be in positions of authority.

Rod, I believe the specific problem we're talking about here is willingness to hurt children for one's own sexual gratification, and to conceal and cover up such activity rather than risk one's own personal status and power. Do you really believe that if all priests were women, there would be just as many cases of child rape by priests as there are now? I'm not sure where you get any foundation for that idea in observable reality.

But I'm totally willing to take up your challenge here. Let's make the next Pope a woman. Let's allow only women in the priesthood, only women as canon lawyers, women bishops, women cardinals. Now let's give it a couple of thousand years. Heck, I'll be magnanimous and shorten the trial period to just a couple of hundred years. Then let's examine the Church and see if it's become a safer place for everyone, but especially for women and children. If that turns out not to be true, I'll not only apologize graciously, but I'll give you a shiny new dollar.

What's that you say? This can never, never happen because God would never allow it? Dang. Well, I guess no one can call your bluff, then, so assert away.

There are none so blind as those who refuse to see.

What's that you say? This can never, never happen because God would never allow it? Dang. Well, I guess no one can call your bluff, then, so assert away.

And I believe *that* calls for a snap.

*SNAP*

Every time I hear someone trot out the idea that if more women got involved in politics, things would be different, I have to laugh.

Of course you do - putting more women in places of power in a patriarchal system just means replacing men who have penises with men who don't. They'd still have to act like "men" to participate.

You'll never know what a church *truly* run by women would be like, because you'd fight tooth and nail to stop it from happening.

Of course, journalists need the patriarchy - without it, where would they get all the greed, crime, violence, and sexual scandal to write about?

Ain't it a riot how this post was on a corrupt cardinal who wishes for more lay control, more involvement by women in decision making--and now it turns into a post on how these things never would have happened were there women in charge.

This is hours late, but I read Susan's comments above that her priest friend said

I certainly hope that somehow it is getting through to him now. However -- I have a good friend who is not Catholic, but has counseled sex offenders over the years. She is still not horrified by this scandal -- she says you see that same dynamic play out in every situation where abuse happens -- ""well, Grandpa has a problem, but don't talk about it or let anyone know about it." That dynamic is changing, thank God, but she is not the only therapist I know who says that is the way a lot of people think (or thought). That was the way many people thought when today's 6o year old priests were young.

There was a story last year about a popular North Texas soccer coach who had molested teenage boys, and it was eerie how similar they were to those made by people involved in the Church scandal. Basically swap out "youth soccer" for "church" and they were the same. Which leads me to believe my counselor friend may be right. FWIW.

This is the fastest 62 (or more) comment thread read I've ever seen... :-)

How weird -- I just noticed that there are 61 comments on this thread listed, but I can only read four. Something really is wrong with the comments function -- I'm not deleting y'all's stuff.

oh yeh

A few final comments on this subject:

m_s , Yes you have a big point. The dynamics of this are similar in all groups. No group was Johnny-on-the-spot about this youth sex abuse in the past.

Rod, susan; I am a bit more circumspect about the pope's responsibility on all this. JPII inherited the problem in 1978 and by 1998 the situation in seminaries was much better. The scandal storm in 2002 happened late, after much had been done. The pope can not micromanage the church, and by 2002 JPII was a very old weak man.

Also, I live and work and am posting this message from Abu Dhabi, UAE. In most of the world this abuse scandal is not front page news, and people are baffled about the American civil system and 660 million dollar awards. Most people in the world do not call straight or gay sex between an adult and a 14 year old "baby rape". The Church issues here are about dealing with the Muslims and the government and keeping car suicide bombers from blowing up the inconspicuous St Josephy Church filled with worshippers. Abuse scandal issue is a million miles away.

And the pope has many things to deal with.

And about Mahony and others. The National Catholic Reporter has nothing on about this issue. Something wierd is going on. Seems like some types of bishops are more blameworthy than others.

Well sigaliris;

Seems like you are saying this whole thing is really not about sex abuse at all; and you are treating this abuse thing as some kind of political or cultural football for doing something else.

That kind of attitude makes many wonder whether all the hype is just a sham for something else.

Not to minimize the gravity of the problem of the leadership of Mahony but let us look at the figures;

OK, roughly 5 million Catholics coming of age in LA in the past 50 years or at least passing through. And we have 500 claims of abuse or maybe a total of 1000. That is 1 Catholic in 5000 who claims to have been abused as a youth or child by a priest in LA in the past 5 decades. Yes, that is far too many. 1 in 5 million is too many.

But there are other groups of private and public orgs that would be happy to have this 1 in 5000 ratio.

Sigaliris;

Sorry you over dramatized or actually missed everything I said. In the end, if you are a Catholic, you will have two options; go or stay. It is what it is. The only real problem with the Church today is the same problem in any past century; a lack of saints. Church politics is ultimately not the answer.

Go perhaps you should find one more to your liking; Anglicans, Lutherans, Congregationalists, etc. Or as Rod did, Eastern Orthodoxy, the other lung. (That is where I hope you go because if I "jumped ship" that is where I would go.)

Trust me--people are flawed

Well, that clears *that* up. Don has pronounced it. We should trust him. End of story.

So never mind about the man behind that curtain...

...or what he's doing to that little boy.

it was teenager in most cases, which normal people call homosexuality

Huh? Uh . . . no. Not on my planet. On my planet, "normal" people call consensual sex between two adults of the same gender "homosexuality." They call forced sex between a priest and a junior high school kid "molestation," "child abuse," or "rape."

Don't bother, Sig...

It's not the heirarchy's fault, it's the dirty homos. It's not the fault of the bishops who covered it up and moved molesters around the country so they could keep victimizing, it's the fault of "pink palaces." It's not the Magisterium and its insistence on "obey or burn," it's the sexual revolution (never mind that men have used religion as an excuse to fulfill their sick power fantasies for millenia).

It's good to know that with apologists like these on the case that the RCC has absolutely nothing to fear.

Your speculations are no more inherently valid than those you condemn.

By the by, this is pure, unadulterated BS. We have 10000 years or so of evidence that the patriarchy doesn't work. Where is the evidence that matriarchy doesn't work? By that token alone, my speculations are way more valid than the idea if we just continue doing MORE of what we're doing now, if we just force MORE controls on people, if we just fight HARDER against enemies, the results will be different.

~tv >>>>We have 10000 years or so of evidence that the patriarchy doesn't work.

Anything that has been in business that long works.

Anything that has been in business that long works.

Funny - we have a couple million years of humans surviving, nay - THRIVING without the global patriarchal mode in play. You know, that's the one that says "There's only one right way to live, *this* way, and if you disagree, I have a sword here that will show you the error of your ways."

A couple million years vs. 10,000 that have brought us to the brink of global civilizational collapse? I would say you can keep your paltry 10k.

Rod,

And saying that anybody who disputes you can't be right because they can't see beyond the philosophical strictures imposed by patriarchy is stealing all the bases.

It may be stealing the bases, but that doesn't make it any less true. I'm really not talking through my hat here, Rod. I'm talking about a philosophy that to someone who believes that men have God-given authority over the world and everything (and everyone) in it seems completely alien.

Thank you for the recommendation. May I recommend the following for you?

Watch the NFB production "The Gods of our Fathers," Read Gerda Lerner's "The Creation of Patriarchy," Derrick Jensen's "A Language Older than Words," and Marija Gimbutas and Joseph Campbell's "The Language of the Goddess."

Perhaps after perusing those works, you'll have a better understanding of the feminist critique of the patriarchy instead of what you *think* the feminist critique of the patriarchy is.

I love you so much right now, Sigaliris.

Wish I had a way to correspond directly, but I don't *dare* put my live e-mail addy on this forum.

I've created an evanescent address that is not my real one and isn't connected to anything. People who want to can write to me at secretsig999@gmail.com. For anyone who does, I will respect your address and not pass it on or reveal it without your prior permission. Anyone who wants to be rude to me at this address should save themselves the trouble, because I'll just delete them. Compassionately, of course. : )

learn something new everyday. Maybe it's not actually nature, rather could it be predatory patriarchal pedophiles who are guilty?

Are priests considered patriarchs?

"Yes, Cleveland, pederast predators raped and sodomized your kids (not just homosexual ones). The patriarchy just enabled it, protected the perpetrators and encouraged and rewarded those who covered it up.
Just like you're doing right now."
Posted by: ~tv

"Not just homosexual ones"!? What percent of the pederasty was perpetrated by heterosexuals? 0% is the answer, by definition. The scandal was a homosexual problem, no matter how you slice it.

Moreover, the "patriarchy" did not enable and protect perps; a small percent of the "patriarchy" (bishops) protected themselves, with the aid and instruction of homosexual shrinks. That's what enabled the perps to do more damage--self protection by a few cowardly bishops-- not a patriarchal system.

And how the "patriarchy" encouraged itself and then rewarded itself for the cover up is beyond me.

Patriarchy never raped a single boy. Nor was pedophilia (a pathology which causes lust for OPPOSITE sex, prepubescent children) the cause of the scandal. Nor was celibacy, as the Anglicans know full well. It was plain, old-fashioned homosexual predation.

It's obvious that some people feel shame for that fact of life, but blathering around the fact, like an attendee at a Phoney Mahony "religious education" conference, gets us nowhere, and makes it appear that yet another cover up is being attempted.

Forgive the mis-type, then, Cleveland Or don't. Pedophiliac instead of pederast, if that satisfies. Hell, even if it doesn't.

Unless you can show me that no female was ever abused, then your 100% homo number is something you pulled out of your... confessional.

Cleveland, I don’t want to get into an argument with you. I know you take this subject very seriously and that it is painful to you to see this happening in your beloved Church, and I respect that. Please believe that it’s painful to me, too.

I think there are some things that you don’t understand about my position. But I’ve said my say and then some--I don’t want to take over Rod’s comboxes entirely. So I’ll confine myself to a few brief statistics.

According to the John Jay Report that you’ve cited--so I assume you find it a reliable source--19 percent of the reported victims were girls. That’s almost one in five. This is a statistically significant number.

According to the same report, 64 percent of the perpetrators molested boys only. 22.6 percent molested girls only, and 3.6 molested both boys and girls.

The greatest percentage of victims for both male and female fell into the age range of 11-14.

I don’t know how you would define anyone who molests little girls as being homosexual. Therefore, we know that at the very least, one in four of the perpetrators was definitely not homosexual.

Normal homosexual men are not attracted to little boys. One can try to re-define 11 year olds as “post-pubescent” or “teenagers”--but anyone who has ever spent time with children knows what a tremendous difference there is between an 11 or 12 year old and a 16 or 17 year old. It’s simply a slander against gay men to say that people who are attracted primarily to junior high school boys are “homosexuals” rather than “pedophiles.” A heterosexual man who is attracted to girls that age is not considered an ordinary, normal straight man. He’s classified as a pedophile. Given that pedophiles really do exist throughout our society, why is it so difficult to admit that they might be responsible for the abuse within the Catholic Church? Why is it so important to pin it on gay men, even when the facts must be twisted to do so?

"Patriarchy never raped a single boy...." Of course not -- just the same as "[Communism has never killed a single person.]"

It's the patriarch that does the raping, just as it is a communist (or capitalist for that matter) that does the act.

A person has to commit the act. But one does look to a system, environment, entity, or circumstance that created/and or enabled the perpetrator, no? --well, at least and as long as that system, idealogy, or entity has been designated as blameworthy by certain among us.

"Why is it so important to pin it on gay men, even when the facts must be twisted to do so?"

Ironically and especially when it is the same Catholic Church that condemns homosexuality, forbids homosexuality, and then shifts blame to homosexuality among the ranks of those who in their next breath will then again condemn homosexuality, forbid homosexuality, etc.

Mary Cambridge:

You delete comments from Diane that point out the sexual scandals in the Orthodox Church,

Diane was banned a long time ago because of her obnoxious behavior, and her refusal to straighten up despite repeated warnings. The content of her posts have nothing to do with why she's deleted now.

you delete a comment from fbc that stated that dumping 2000 years of tradition due to the sins of a few makes no sense,

I don't know which one you're talking about, but I bet that it was a personal attack. I have no interest in deleting any posts that question my decision to leave Rome for Orthodoxy. I will not put up with posts that are only about launching an unwarranted personal attack.

and you LEAVE a comment calling PBXVI (whom you profess to care for, and pray for) "Sieg Heil Ratzinger".

Where is this? I will delete it. That kind of talk makes conversation impossible. Running this blog is something I do on my free time, and I can't monitor everything constantly. If anyone sees something that they want to bring to my attention as a potential violation of the Rules of Conduct, write to me at rdreher(at)dallasnews.com.

Well, you'll probably delete this one, too. Shame on you!

Et tu, Mary?

I know you've suffered terribly from the sexual abuse scandal, but now you've turned your commentary blog into an execrable site for dissing the Catholic Church. It doesn't matter what anyone says, as long as he agrees with you and HATES the Catholic faith for any reason. I expected better from you. I have never agreed with Diane before, but now I think that you don't care what stick anyone uses to beat the Catholic Church. Be fair--either allow all commentary on this matter (which is not pornographic or indecent)-- or delete the thread entirely.

You're way off base here. I think much of the commentary on this thread that's critical of the RCC is silly, and borderline offensive. But I will only delete or amend posts that cross the line into personal attack or insult to such a degree that it makes discussion impossible. You should expect on this site that the Catholic Church, or Catholic churchmen, will be criticized. I don't believe any religious body or religious official should be immune from criticism. Again, I want to give people wide latitude to say what they'd like to say, within bounds of reason.

The reason why I've posted on Mahony's mess is because it has been front-page news this week. When I was a Catholic and saying the same exact things, conservative Catholics praised me for speaking out against a true villain in the Church. My message has not changed, and it won't change. When Orthodox (or Protestant, or Jewish, etc.) scandals like this come up, I'll probably blog about them.

Now, I've gone over this thread fully for the first time, and I've deleted or amended some posts that had leveled personal insults at fellow bloggers. If we're going to talk about this, let's be grown-ups, okay? This is a topic that draws out bad emotions in people. Try to restrain yourselves, and keep in mind that we're trying to exchange views here, not throw tantrums.

I believe comments about depravity of the priesthood have been around since Martin Luther. Therefore, I am bit confused about labeling this as some sort of "liberal" problem or even "new". Unfortunately, the heirarchy within the RCC is motivated by politics and ambition. Those qualities are not confined to either label of "liberal" or conservative". Protecting the mother church is the first priority even if the victims are its youngest members.

Paul,

If you put the age interval of 13-17 instead of 14-17 as homosexual than the balance would go to homosexual with over 50% being in this age group. In other words thirteen is a post-pubescent "teen". Of course, this is a bit arbitrary. {Nonetheless, I see today that some 13-14 year olds are as tall as I am (5' 9") so I am reluctant to call them "babies" even if they are emotionally immature.}

This is looking at the statistics on the victims.

If you look at the statistics on the perps, the big-time multiple offenders are the ones who abuse the 1-13 or 1-12 year group of offenders. In other words the pediphilia- true pediphilia is confined to a small number of the overall offenders, probabaly about 200, or about 2 priests in every 1000. Here we have the well publicized Gilbert Gauthier, Groegan, Porter, Kos, etc

But the offenders accused by only 1 or 2 youths make up the bulk of the total of perps (but not victims). These perps make up the core of the more clear cut homosexual group of offenders. This is about 3 priests out of 100 in the past 50 years.

That is why anyone can use the statistics to say whatever he wants them to say. It depends upon whether you focus on the statistics of the perps (1-2 vs multiple offenders) or of the victims (children or teens).

Beliefnetfan / Rod/others;

I have an idea; since we should all be sturdy adults with some fortitude perhaps we can all take "Roger the Dodger", "Big fat Liar" and "Squirmin Herman". And I suspect these nicknames are quite accurate.

However, name calling is not really civil.

Well, Rod, that post is still on this thread, calling PBXVI "Sieg Heil Ratzinger". Just so you know, it is about #24, and posted by "hrh". Seriously, just [edit], [find in this page] "sieg". Shouldn't take long.

"Et tu, Mary?" Well, yes, until you enforce the rules on those sort of ad hominem attacks against a man who TOOK ACTION against Fr. Maciel, and, I believe, was also instrumental in removing the truly horrible Bishop in Austria (name slips my mind, thank you, mind).

Believe me, Rod, I truly wish you and your family all the best in the OCA. I do not think that the answer to the Catholic scandal is "well, it happens in your churches and communities just as much, or more". This is simply not an adequate answer. As I have said before, Cardinal Mahony should resign and be invited to live out the rest of his life in fasting, prayer, and penance for the horror that he has allowed. I do not believe his repeated statements that he doesn't remember, or, it's not "MY FAULT". I also think that this would be best for all priests who have committed this egregious sin against the innocent (they could do this in prison, if the burden of criminal proof is met, and I also welcome that).

Frankly, I was afraid to return to this thread, for fear that there would be nasty comments that would break my heart. Thankfully, that has not happened. Go With God, Rod. (And you needn't remove that post-- actually, I would rather that you responded to it, and explained why it is not appropriate.)

No Lindas;

No one is going to be "burnt at the stake".

However, sexually active homosexuals, and possibly even chaste homosexuals will be having a more difficult time becoming Catholic priests from now on. In fact that started in quite a few places in the past 10 years or so.

That is alright; there are many other jobs that pay better.