[gokenin]

Or, rather, properties in Allston-Brighton which'd been vacant and had for sale signs on them since the early Nineties got blamed on abuse victims for speaking up....









that's the guiding star, right, 'Normal?'
Blame the victims when no one goes to those churches anymore.
Just when did I blame the victim of the abuse here? if you are going to put words in my mouth get them correct I am simply taking about multiple parishes that are considated into one church and the meshing of the people and the priests into the parish as getting back to normal thats all I wasnt saying anything about driving the homosexuals out like you were implying so once again dont put words in my mouth

But a few old folks who may or may not get a hand getting there from 'evil' infidels like myself, of course.


Again stop putting words in my mouth I was never making that arguement so stop reading everything written through your filters if you don't mind

You achieve this, regardless
if you think i blame the victim them again thats you reading things through your own view of the world

Interesting standard, there.







This is not alien abductions under hypnosis, though, this is just... How people justify having been in denial so long. These things are coroborated by the very documents that the Vatican still considers a media 'conspiracy' while saying anyone queer is 'objectively-disordered,' thus, not in any curia a 'real witness,' and continuing to reinforce the same things that brought it about by 'purging homosexuals' even if a third of the victims are female....


so you think then that the arrest of a priest who happens to be preying on members of the same sex is being purged because he is homosexual now who is blaming the victim there?


Infallibility is not a criterion when they *fricking write it down,* dude.

IF you want my opinion about sexual predators there Ratlady I think that they should all be punished to the fullest extent of the law and they should be thrown in prison forever, you cant deny that many sexual predators are repeat offenders. these people should be removed from society for good.

[Ratmagiclady]

IF you want my opinion about sexual predators there Ratlady I think that they should all be punished to the fullest extent of the law and they should be thrown in prison forever, you cant deny that many sexual predators are repeat offenders. these people should be removed from society for good.

True, perhaps, but irrelevant to cause, as well as who they blame for 'being forced' to sell off properties they'd been trying to sell for years all along.

So, yeah. ..If an atheist can cause change in the RCC, well, someone's gotta do it. Ain't like they ever listened to an eyewitness.

Also, by the way, we call this *anger.*


It's not 'hate.'


Anger passes. Even if it recurs.


A lot.



When I'm done feeling this, it will be done. For now.

But.


It doesn't mean it isn't now, or never was real.

This seems to be something lost on some who demand '100 percent certainty' from minors both past and present.

[Rupert]

While there is little doubt that some stories are convenienly "remembered" when a cash settlement is at stake, there is less doubt that these abuses have been common and widespread in the Catholic Church. One case is one too many, but we have evidence of a worldwide epidemic.
I would never convict a child molester without overwhelming evidence, but there is ample evidence here to convict the "Church". Someone needs to do it, and now is a good time.
Regards!

[Ratmagiclady]

There isn't that much 'cash' ....for the victims you call liars, Rupert.




As for selling off neighborhood chuirches they were trying to sell anyway, and blaming gays or victims who speak up?


Yes, there's money there.

[gokenin]

While there is little doubt that some stories are convenienly "remembered" when a cash settlement is at stake, there is less doubt that these abuses have been common and widespread in the Catholic Church. One case is one too many, but we have evidence of a worldwide epidemic.
I would never convict a child molester without overwhelming evidence, but there is ample evidence here to convict the "Church". Someone needs to do it, and now is a good time.
Regards!

OMG we actually agree on something there is clear proof of an organizational coverup when it comes to shuffling priests to avoid allowing them to be prosecuted by the law. I don't think you can convict the organization for the crimes of the past. I do think that any priest that is accused of a crime should be immediately reported to the civil authorities and if convicted he should be excommunicated from the church.

---------- Post added 04-12-2010 at 07:30 PM ----------

There isn't that much 'cash' ....for the victims you call liars, Rupert.




As for selling off neighborhood chuirches they were trying to sell anyway, and blaming gays or victims who speak up?


Yes, there's money there.

Under the agreement, victims will receive awards ranging from $80,000 to $300,000. Award amounts will be decided by a mediator, based on the type of molestation, the duration of the abuse, and the injury suffered.

Parents who filed lawsuits claiming their children were abused will receive $20,000

settlement from the 85million dollar settlement from the Boston archdioses

many of the churches that were closed were never on the block to be sold as for the Bishops residence that you refered to earlier that the diocese had been trying to sell for a while thats true. Again where is anyone blaming gays for the church crisis ?

[Peter Zack]

I'm not going to address every point raised since the OP. But I remember reading that (it was a researcher that published this in I think the New York Times) the average number of pedophiles in the church was about the same as average society. He also qualified it by saying that it was impossible to put a definitive percentage due to the cover ups.

The point is that there should be none within the church and they should live and practice to a much higher standard. The issue is twofold to me, that any time these clergy are caught, the church should condemn them and immediately hand them over to the authorities. They should also assist in the prosecutions. Second that they have to rescind the no marriage rule and move into the modern world.

To the first point, I would say that if they condemned the clergy that are abusers, the church itself wouldn't be subject to as many of these lawsuits. Plus they would send a strong message of zero tolerance.

To the second point, it wouldn't solve the problem entirely but as a wedding photographer, I nearly gag at the advice a celibate priest offers a couple on marriage and having children. They know nothing of it. You can't offer much on either subject without at least some personal experiences. A married priest who has children is also not going to be as likely to see kids as a sexual object.

[Rupert]

There isn't that much 'cash' ....for the victims you call liars, Rupert.




As for selling off neighborhood chuirches they were trying to sell anyway, and blaming gays or victims who speak up?


Yes, there's money there.

If they a were a victim, I didn't refer to them as liars, did I? If you think no one screams bloody murder for money or for an agenda driven goal....just go back and read your own posts Ratlady for living proof, complete with the daughter that was but wasn't and the Fundies that did, but didn't.......then give me a lecture about liars.
Beast Regards!

[tomw]

I am a Catholic and am absolutely outraged by the coverup. When my diocese had to make restitution to victims, it was quickly followed by a request from the Bishop for the faithful to pony up cash. That's when my wife and I vowed not another penny for any general fund or a specified fund that we cannot support. Really, the only solution is to have civil authorities charge anyone, be it a priest, monsignor, bishop, or cardinal, who knowingly does not report child abuse, as a co-conspirator and throw them in jail. Preferably with the regular population.

[Parallax]

I am a Catholic and am absolutely outraged by the coverup. When my diocese had to make restitution to victims, it was quickly followed by a request from the Bishop for the faithful to pony up cash. That's when my wife and I vowed not another penny for any general fund or a specified fund that we cannot support. Really, the only solution is to have civil authorities charge anyone, be it a priest, monsignor, bishop, or cardinal, who knowingly does not report child abuse, as a co-conspirator and throw them in jail. Preferably with the regular population.

Now that's chutzpah! I don't donate to the general fund of my church, either. I've seen it misuse money in too many ways. I'm not saying in your example that victim compensation isn't appropriate, but that it shouldn't come out of the pockets of the parishioners.

[Rupert]

Now that's chutzpah! I don't donate to the general fund of my church, either. I've seen it misuse money in too many ways. I'm not saying in your example that victim compensation isn't appropriate, but that it shouldn't come out of the pockets of the parishioners.

Yes....the key is cutting off the cash flow. "Money talks....BS walks". That's why we have a lot of priests, bishops, popes, etc walking around in freedom when they should be in a cell block of prisoners that were convicted for beating the crap out of child molesting perverts.
regards!

[Parallax]

Yes....the key is cutting off the cash flow. .........

Sometimes the only thing some people (or organizations) understand is a good swift kick to the wallet. I can't help but think if the Catholic church were faced with the option of being flat broke or protecting scumbag, child molesting priests that they would opt to do the right thing. It would have been nice if they had done the right thing simply because it was the right thing, all along but..............

[GeneV]

The point is that there should be none within the church and they should live and practice to a much higher standard.

That is the point. If any church claimed it had no more bank robbers, drug dealers or contract killers in its clergy than the general population, what would we say?

[Rupert]

That is the point. If any church claimed it had no more bank robbers, drug dealers or contract killers in its clergy than the general population, what would we say?

Maybe the outrage would be greater than what we seem to have for our crooked politicians....of both parties. They seem even more bent on defending "their own" than the Catholic Church, and yet we keep sending them back. It is difficult to instill integrity in our youth when they are shown by example that the consequences, if any, of deceit and dishonesty are slim.
America needs a Revival....religious or otherwise,...... we need an awakening to the evils that have been responsible for our decline, and a promise from our leaders to do better in the future.....a promise with concequences.
Best Regards!

[Ratmagiclady]

Well, Rupert, I certainly see the whole thing really, not just in maybe some kids seeing those who are supposed to be 'holiest' and realizing that especially if you claim the same 'authority,' then lies and victim-blaming and coverups can *work* for one, ...or that 'Why try and live honestly when this is happening,' ...but there's the simple fact that the way this is played: Everyone in denial or on the side of the abusers, if not abusers themselves: the next stage is of course to blame the victims for 'causing trouble,' or 'tempting' said abusers, 'making them do it,' so to speak, ....And of course then they blame gay people:

(The Church's first response was to play the financial victim, acting as though the civil lawsuits that were the only way to try and get some justice represented greedy people making false accusations, ...and 'promising to purge homosexuals from the ranks,' while issuing Papal bull about how LGBT people are 'objectively disordered,' (ie, crazy and not reliable witnesses...) ....combine that with the commonly spread notions that being sexually abused makes one gay.... which is one of the things that silences the victims to begin with, gay or not: even, again, if sixty percent of the victims were females abused by males, then for the boys to come out and talk, well, that's tantamount to an admission they're queerified or un-manned. ...ironically, they live in fear of being treated as homophobes, and quite often the homophobia that those places are steeped in is in fact largely *because* the predators are labeled 'Gay...' and they're afraid of being treated like they treat gay people.)

Even being a victim can cause people to transfer the stigma *to* the victims: some people lose the distinction between the fact that most (at least sexual) abusers were abused themselves, and the fact that most people who were abused do not *become* sexual abusers. (If that were true, this stuff would be considered 'normal and appropriate' by now, I assure you. )

While, yes, there are no more *perps* by percentage in the Church institutions than the general population, each one often creates more *victims.* Indirectly, they victimize whole communities, ...cause people live in fear and hurt each other over it.

And as I've mentioned that if you're actually queer, you're really afraid.... Cause if you were honest about it (Un. Thinkable, often,) then you'd know it's open season from all quarters.

(For girls, of course, there's the whole virginity-as-commodity thing, the making you 'damaged goods,' ....which might well get the priests in more trouble if some parent with money decides to not-blame-the-victim, ..not being straight tends to mean all those bets are off anyway. Forget about it, you're a w-word. But girls do talk, at least if not-already ostracized in some way.)

What happens to honesty, in all this? The first casualty. Not only do the liars seem to be rewarded, telling the truth is actively feared. Not just by victims but by whole communities.

The *institutional* nature of it all does make what's terrible enough when it happens in families and smaller churches and other places, ...something that is even worse when you have essentially, this extragovernmental *government* that claims to represent 'higher law' *enforcing* all these lies and contradictions. A lot of kids just 'don't make it' and no one asks *why.*

As to what some atheists can do, well, there's that element: within the Church, ...and it's looking like the membership, rather than the authorities who claimed authority and don't want responsibility, that really have to push this, ...well, that's where the real changes will have to happen. The role of those outside, and all of us as citizens of our country, may be to say, "Wait a minute. You're *not* above the law. These are *crimes.*"

These scandals coming out isn't some media conspiracy: frankly, they came out as soon as they *could.* As soon as things like the Internet enabled a lot of victims and survivors to *not* be 'cut from the herd' and expected to face an unaccountable 'government' alone, is pretty much *exactly* when it happened.

It doesn't mean it hasn't been going on for a much longer time. These cases and reports go back as far as surviving victims can be expected report, and while the physical abuse is not much paid attention to these days, *that* component surely goes back generations. Our grandmothers thought that was just 'the way of things,' ...talked about it with a sort of backhanded pride like it meant they were in boot camp for the Marines or something. And there's,well, talking around things.

It's not something new some 'evil money-grubbing victims' invented. Or something that some 'gay agenda' or 'sexual revolution' invented, as implied. (The fact that there's less stigma *about* gays and women certainly can't have hurt. But in some ways that's another thing that was always there, as soon as people could start talking to each other despite all the attempts to isolate and alienate people from each other and the public eye.)

While it's important to ascertain the facts of any given case, the fact that it's institutional, that it's covered up, and that people have been cowed by all this temporal, political, and ideological influence for a *long time,*.... (Goddess, look at *Ireland,* ...even Malta is waking up about this, ) ....That can't be dismissed, anymore.

The Church may feel singled-out, but they claimed the special authority, and they've used it against victims.

As for the truth, well, they're using the same kind of lie-and-deny tactics as anyone, counting on the exact same patterns to confuse the issue...then having Catholic conservatives say, 'The Pope didn't actually *say* that in so many words...' Kind of like, strictly speaking, 'Papal Infallibility' doesn't claim what people think it does, but they aren't above letting that misconception work for them until it's time to play to the denial game.

This is an institution that learned the finer points of manipulation from the *Medicis.* They use it. No, they aren't the only abusers out there. But as an institution claiming to be a law unto itself, and usually allowed to get away with it, they can do a proportional lot of damage.

Where the truth goes in all this is, well, anywhere they can get people to put it.

[reeftool]

I'm not sure if the issue of Priests not being able to marry and the issue of pedophiles in the Catholic Church are the same. There are cases of pedophiles all over and many are married and also parents. There is also a scandal going on in the Boy Scouts currently. I'm not Catholic and I have always questioned why they have that rule. As mentioned, it certainly isn't biblical. One thing that is biblical is the way sex offenders should be treated in the Church. The entire fifth chapter of 1 Corinthians addresses this issue. The man was to be removed from fellowship and not be associated with.

Verse 2 "And you are proud and arrogant! And you ought rather to mourn, bow in sorrow and shame, until the person who has done this thing is removed from your fellowship and your midst!"

Perhaps the Catholic leaders missed that one.