Monday, August 20, 2018

Outrage is Useless Against This Level Of Amoral Behaviour

The full report on the sexual abuse of children by 6 of the 8 Catholic dioceses in Pennsylvania paints an amoral picture of abuse by the Catholic Church that is probably repeated throughout the country, we know it is so in many places. (link)



It includes a playbook on how to protect priests who are accused of raping boys and girls.  Here are the details (LINK)...

First, they reported, the church employed euphemisms for sexual assault, referring to the crime not as rape, but as “inappropriate contact” or “boundary issues.” In one case, the grand jury reported, a priest’s repeated and violent sexual assaults of children were referred to as “his difficulties.” 
Then, the church did not conduct genuine investigations, often limited to just asking suspected abusers a few questions and accepting what they said as gospel. 
And if a priest had to be removed from his church, they were directed to announce it as “sick leave,” or to not say anything at all. For appearance sake, they were to send the priest for “evaluation” at a church-run psychiatric facility that, more often than not, concluded that the offender was not a pedophile and could return to ministering the faithful. 
If it became known in the community that a priest was a “problem,” they were to transfer him to another parish where nobody knew he was a child molester. That happened frequently, the grand jury reported. One priest was transferred from Allentown to New Mexico and west Texas after accusations of abuse came to light. He was later arrested in Briscoe County, Texas, for molesting a boy, one of his numerous victims he found in his new location. 
And, finally, church officials were told: don’t call the cops. “Handle it like a personnel matter, ‘in house,’” the grand jury reported. 
There were several instances reported by the grand jury in which sexual abuse was reported to local police or prosecutors by victims or their parents. Few of those cases wound up being prosecuted.
And when all else fails, lie. 

I don't have any reasonable response because this is not reasonable behavior. I technically understand it more in the really olden days, when the first son of rich families inherited the land and title, the second son went into the Military and the third son went into the Church. Those were privileged men of stature who probably sexually abused who they wanted in or out of the church. 

But I do not understand men doing this now. Someone thinking it is okay and having a church cover up for it. That does not speak to the Catholic Church as a center for the veneration of God or religion, but rather the Catholic Church as a center of power only. Power for power's sake.

There is nothing Godly about this.