Because that is where some of them should be headed:
A newly disclosed document reveals that Vatican officials instructed the bishops of Ireland in 1997 that they must not adopt a policy of reporting priests suspected of child abuse to the police or civil authorities.
The document appears to contradict Vatican claims that the hierarchy in Rome never determined the actions of local bishops in abuse cases, and that the church did not impede criminal investigations of accused child abusers.
Abuse victims in Ireland and the United States quickly proclaimed the document to be a “smoking gun” that would serve as important evidence in lawsuits against the Vatican.
But a spokesman for the Vatican said that the document, while authentic, only serves as further proof that past missteps on handling sexual abuse allegations were reformed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who was a top official in the Vatican even before he became the current pope, Benedict XVI.
Name any other organization in the world who could get away with decades of child rape and a systematic cover-up. And the kicker is when concrete, undeniable proof is unearthed, you have the GIANT BRASS BALLS to say “That’s just proof we’re getting better at handling these issues!”
Fucking unreal.
tim serbo
and don’t forget that the man in charge of the church in 1997 is now on the fast track to sainthood. jesus wept.
shortstop
This thread is just an excuse for hating on Catholics!
Sincerely,
burnsspesq (I think I got some letters wrong)
There, we got that over with.
Mark S.
That looks really fucking bad. But they cleared it all up in 2001, so it’s all water under the bridge!
Emma
Honey, they invented brass balls. Canonizing JPII this soon, and in the middle of this mess…. gag. (ok, I know it’s not a done deal, but… it’s a done deal)
Brachiator
Their theme song should be, “If There’s a Hell Below, We’re All Going to Go.”
Sing it, Curtis Mayfield!
Alex S.
I’d like to see some Wikileaks action on the Catholic Church.
Brachiator
@Alex S.:
Oh hell, yes.
Bubblegum Tate
@Brachiator:
Thirded!
tim serbo
@Brachiator: hot creep-on-creep action. i can dig it.
and tomorrow, with any luck, we’ll be treated to ross douthat wringing his hands about how unfair it all is.
Gin & Tonic
Fixed. You think the Catholic hierarchy is self-dealing and corrupt now? In the 20-th/21-st centuries? Ever been to the Vatican museum? How’d they get all that loot?
scav
@Alex S. et al: Oddly enough, The Guardian text says that RTE claims it was given the letter by an Irish Bishop.
tim serbo
general question: is there anything even somewhat analogous to RICO in international law? is there any good reason to think the Holy Roman Church isn’t an ongoing criminal enterprise?
Delia
Au contraire. It’s a damn good thing they do believe in hell. And they should all be thinking long and hard about it.
Quaker in a Basement
a spokesman for the Vatican said that the document, while authentic, only serves as further proof that past missteps on handling sexual abuse allegations were reformed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger
Yes indeed. Time to stop dwelling on the past and look forward. Nothing to be gained by pointing fingers. Let bygones be bygones, eh?
Delia
BTW, just got here. The comments section looks a lot nicer today.
Mark-NC
SO, you are saying that they are Republicans?
Mr. Furious
Halliburton? Exxon? Backwater? RNC? WalMart? Just spitballing…
Stefan
This thread is just an excuse for hating on Catholics!
I’m sure Joe from Lowell will be along any second to tell me that my criticizing the Church for its active criminal conspiracy to abet the rape of Catholic children results solely from my Uncle Tom like desire to ingratiate myself with non-Catholics…
aimai
i can’t even feel outraged, anymore. In the article the various victim/survivor groups talk about the “smoking gun” and I know the document comes as a relief to those who still need more legal proof. But to me the slow trickling out of these stories have stripped them of their surprise. We’ve known–we’ve known for a really long time that the hierarchy was totally complicit in what was going on. When Cardinal Law got on a plane for Rome and never came back that pretty much told you just how high up this all went.
aimai
Alex S.
@scav:
Interesting! So the whistleblower did not go to Wikileaks itself but to one of the newspapers that covered the State Department leaks pretty extensively.
stormhit
@Delia:
Except they don’t, not in the way that you mean it.
alwhite
WHY OH WHY DO YOU DAMN LIBERALS INSIST ON DEFAMING CHRISTIANS? Just because a few thousand bad apples want to screw children (there is nothing in the Bible prohibiting it) and generations of church leadership has worked to hide and protect child rapists is irrelevant; you just want to hurt Christians!
Or if that lie does not work they will try to blame this on “modern, liberal, society” completely ignoring over 1700 years of documented problems with sexual abusers in the priesthood.
Hell is too good for these people.
bleh
It’s the standard mechanism of belief-based organizations.
One reasons from axiomatic belief — in this case that the Church is basically good — to the facts — in this case that their actions demonstrate their inherent goodness.
It’s all quite clear.
Reasoning in the OTHER direction — from facts to beliefs — is what unbelievers, heretics, apostates, and blasphemers — oh, and scientists — do.
tim serbo
@aimai: Law is livin’ large in Rome, too. he’s well-known at the Ceceilia Metella restaurant, where the staff “know his Eminence Law’s favorite dishes by heart,” according to Barbie Latza Nadeau’s rather good piece last May in the Daily Beast (yeah, i know, i know, you have to take it where you find it). i can’t even muster up a good imprecation at this point. just, just…fuck.
quaint irene
How long till Donohue of the Catholic League pops up on Fox News, claiming most of these victims were adolescents and therefore not straighfoward pedophilia.
shortstop
Reminds me of every time somebody on death row is proven innocent shortly before being executed (in one Illinois case, it once came down to hours, and in another case, the evidence of innocence was provided by a bunch of hard-researching college students), and the wingers shout, “This is proof the system WORKS!”
alwhite
a short video on the history of sex abuse and the Catholic Church using Vatican douments:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJ1_aQz6IuU
Ija
Isn’t there some bishop or other who said that it is the loosening of the sexual mores in the 60s that causes all this epidemic of child rape? That and gay people infiltrating the priesthood. Or was that from a Ross Douthat column?
Ija
Ah found it. It was a Douthat column. He refrained from blaming the gays, though, probably because he wants to keep his NYT gig. Money quote:
bleh
Ija — no, silly, it was that Martin Luther who started it all.
And hello — MARTIN LUTHER King?! Coincidence? I SO don’t think so…
JPL
How shameful. At the time of the letter there was also a scandal involving the orphanages in Ireland. We read about Russian orphanages and lack of care but the Irish orphanages were equal in their abuse.
Ija
I must have missed the memo Douthat got that “permissive sexual culture” encourages you to rape a child. Here I was stupidly thinking sexual revolution is about, you know, having sex, not rape. Where are all the leftwing bloggers praising NYT for choosing Douthat now?
Brachiator
By the way, you can read or print out the actual letter at the NY Times story reference. Straightforward. And chilling.
JPL
@Brachiator: Sounds like the Vatican hired Sarah’s speech writers.
geg6
How anyone with a conscience can continue to support (financially and morally) and defend those evil, evil people is beyond me. It’s not bad enough that they’ve spent a couple of millenia murdering everyone who doesn’t buy their fantasies and fables and demonizing an entire gender, but now raping children is not only a-ok but they get to decide when and if their rapists can be prosecuted for crimes committed in sovreign countries that aren’t the pissant state, Vatican City. A few drones sent into the middle of St. Peter’s Basilica would not be out if place since they are little different than the other religious fanatic terrorists in the rest of the world. I’m sure the millions of victims all over the world and all through their history would attest to the destruction and terror the Church brought to their lives. Disgusting. A viscious criminal child rape syndicate defended by it’s adherents tooth and nail and some people call me a hater.
Stillwater
@Alex S.: I’d like to see some Wikileaks action on the Catholic Church.
Oh yeah? Some hot, raw, uncensored Wiki on Catholic action?
Me too.
Jay C
@quaint irene:
Naaah, Bill Donahue would probably deal with this crap in his usual manner; IOW, make the argument:
except that he would be completely and unselfconsciously serious about it: and then segue immediately into a rant about “anti-Catholic prejudice”. Buffoon.
Nate
I always wonder at what point do Catholics say, “You know, that’s too many raped children. I’m out.”
100? 1000? 10,000?
How many raped children are individual Catholics willing to accept?
Warren Terra
Re canonizing John Paul II
They’re canonizing Pius IX and Pius XII. The only real question between those two is which one was more of a monster.
I think JPII was a truly awful human being who utterly crushed Liberation Theology and crushed with it a beautiful socially liberal American Catholic tradition (see Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, spent the last 30 years confined to a monastery in Montana for the crime of Not Hating Gays; see also the long-forgotten Sanctuary movement of the early 80’s) but who was a useful anti-communist symbol. But the modern Church has already made it clear that canonization is now to be a badge of shame, so it’s hard to get upset they’re canonizing JPII.
P.S. I’m an outsider in this – an Atheist Jew from a line of Atheist Jews – but an interested one. As an Atheist Jew, I thought it was especially nifty when JPII “apologized” for the the Spanish Inquisition, an act for which he got an enormous amount of credit in the press (FSM, how the press loved JPII) even though his apology took the form of “if anyone was offended by the occasional excesses of zeal in a good cause during the Spanish Inquisition, I’m sorry they were offended”.
freelancer
Uh, wouldn’t a better title be “Too Bad the Hell These Guys Believe in Doesn’t Exist”?
JPL
I grew up Catholic and my values and sense of giving back was developed from my earlier years. The church that my parents belonged to had a strong Monsignor who weeded out priests that did not fit in with his view. As a child I always thought they were sent to some type of retirement homes.
Bishops protect their image. Just like a corporation, the higher you rise, the more likely you are going to lose some core principals and promote your self.
JPL
@Brachiator: It’s sickening to see the lengths the unHoly See went to protect their image. Criminal charges should be filed.
srv
What The Editors said.
Until Bishops are rotting in jail, and enjoying being on the receiving end, the church cannot be taken seriously.
Sasha
@Nate:
How many dead Iraqis are Americans willing to accept before they say “I’m out.”
Nothing will improve if Catholics who want the Church to return to its true roots leave.
Sasha
@geg6:
Should one denounce the local mayor because Bush is responsible for the deaths of thousands?
Midnight Marauder
@JPL:
And, you know, facilitating the rape of countless children.
Just another core principle falling by the wayside, of course. That whole “not being an enabler of systemic child rape” thing. Very easy to shake off that core principle over time, so I’ve been told.
By people who are guilty of facilitating the systemic rape of innumerable children. Naturally.
Mr Stagger Lee
In The Divine Comedy worst Popes were sent to the lowest form of Hell for Simony, I guess hell has an even lower section for these Bastards! Need the hook up with
Virgil
Annamal
The only sane response to this is Tim Minchin’s pope song (NSFW and insanely catchy)
victory
http://i.imgur.com/XHEba.jpg
D. Mason
HAHAHAHA you think the “leadership” in the Catholic church believes in hell. How quaint. One doesn’t do the things they do in the world if one believes in eternal consequences, sorry.
SteveinSC
As an atheist/agnostic in a religion-obsessed state, the hypocrisy of the whole crowd is staggering, until you realize that their religion is simply a herd mentality of mostly ignorant people looking for a social piety outlet. I don’t care for doctors who go to church (i.e. they might try to cure me with a miracle) and am skeptical of anything scientists come up with who are religious (again “and now a miracle happens”.) I think science (reality) and faith are incompatible. That said, I cannot for the life of me understand why the Catholic Church continues with the proximate cause of the pedophilia disease: The insistence on a celibate (sic) priesthood. The Greek and Eastern Orthodox Churches and the Episcopal/Anglican Churches have married priests and are not plagued with this problem. I understand that the rule of celibacy is not very old and surely one of these Saintly “Holy Fathers” could conjure up a message from the Almighty giving them an opportunity to let the priests fuck legally. At least then they wouldn’t be much worse than the Protestants.
Warren Terra
@Annamal:
OMFSM, that song is amazing.
Here is a link to it at Minchin’s own site. There is a YouTube that worked for me, but you may have to log in to YouTube and assert your adulthood. The song and animation aren’t extraordinarily graphic, but it’s fast-paced and a certain word starting with “F” is used every other word or so.
jrg
@Sasha:
Yes, anyone who doesn’t like Bush, but is interested in local politics should move to a different country before pursuing such a career.
Priests don’t have such an easy solution… They might have to walk across the fucking street do a different church.
tkogrumpy
It’s ironic that in the church of the confessional, the church is unable to confess this existential sin.If they do they’re toast. So they fight. They have no other choice.
Sasha
@jrg:
Are you seriously suggesting that a priest should simply abandon his flock?
geg6 was wondering how “anyone with a conscience can continue to support (financially and morally) and defend those evil, evil people is beyond me.”
The thing is, for most Catholics, the priests (and nuns) at the local parish aren’t “evil, evil people” — they are good folk who have to suffer ignominy because of the acts of their superiors.
Anne Laurie
To anybody who’s curious about “how such things could have been permitted” even here in semi-modern America, I recommend the film Doubt, available through Netflix (although no longer via instant streaming, alas). I was literally attending a parochial school at the other end of the Grand Concourse at the time, and can attest that Shanley has gotten all the details, small as well as large, very much right. As with all great evils, it was the result of ten million small choices, individually understandable (even forgiveable) and collectively monsterous.
burnspbesq
@shortstop:
“This thread is just an excuse for hating on Catholics!
Sincerely,
burnsspesq (I think I got some letters wrong)
There, we got that over with.”
I’m honored (I think) that you have chosen me to be your designated strawman. However, I regret to inform you that I do not now hold, and have never held, the views that you falsely attribute to me.
Who among the regular commanders on this blog has been more consistent than me in advocating that criminals should be punished?
Where is Balthazar Garzon when the world really needs him to trot out his extreme views on universal jurisdiction? These guys are worse than Pinochet, Mr. Prosecutor. Get your ass moving.
jrg
@Sasha:
I’m suggesting that if I found out that I was working to promote the interests of an organization that had been raping children for decades, if not centuries, and covering it up, I’d quit, “flock” or not.
Anyone that would remain in that “flock” is probably lost enough to follow just about anyone, anyway.
Stefan
I must have missed the memo Douthat got that “permissive sexual culture” encourages you to rape a child. Here I was stupidly thinking sexual revolution is about, you know, having sex, not rape.
Many conservatives have trouble with that whole “consent” notion….
Anne Laurie
@SteveinSC:
Celibacy was initiated as a requirement when the men at the head of the hierarchy decided that supporting priestly dependents — and, worse, permitting them to inherit property that would otherwise revert to Mother Church — was no longer cost effective. Celibacy will remain a requirement as long as the men at the top of the modern hierarchy are the ones who rose under the post-WWII “understanding” that anything could be forgiven a priest who supported the Church Institutional in its battle against “modernity”.
Visualize the early-medieval equivalent of a modern global corporation deciding to enact a restructuring that would provide a huge short-term bump in quarterly profits, even if it promised to cause potentially corporation-destroying problems further down the timeline. Then compare the post-war Vatican hierarchy to Russia (or J. Edgar Hoover’s America) during the Cold War — blatantly rotting under the weight of its own corruption, but still hugely powerful & very rewarding for the cadre at the top of the pyramid.
Choosing Ratzinger, an actual former Nazi, as their corporate representative (‘of Christ on Earth’) was a blatant declaration by the College of Cardinals that they would never budge on such “modern” concepts. He has rewarded his ex-collegians’ faith by rolling back Vatican II improvements, rewarding paleoconservatives and other fascists both inside & outside the Church hierarchy, and generally giving the Twentieth Century a heartfelt F.U. In other words, he’s doubled down on the crazy and explicitly rallied for “a smaller but purer church”… of theological 27 Percenters.
Sasha
@jrg:
The interests of the Catholic Church is not the same as the interests of the Church hierarchy (anymore than the values of America are the same as the values of the previous administration). It’s absolutely disgusting what the Vatican has done, but local parishes that do good work should not suffer for it.
And dismissing members of a congregation as simply feebleminded is lazy.
Mnemosyne
@Sasha:
Well, he could take them with him.
Sasha
@Mnemosyne:
Not terribly practical I’m afraid.
jrg
@Sasha:
Don’t think I haven’t tried to understand it. I’ve never been religious, for as far back as I can remember.
I can accept the rights of the religious, but I simply cannot understand how anyone could remain a Catholic… Which is fine, because it’s not my cross to bear, so to speak.
Sasha
Speaking as a practicing (because I’m still no good at it :) )Catholic, it is a pain.
It’s akin to being an American during the worst of the Bush administration. Part of managing is refusing to give in to despair and realizing that the leaders are what is corrupt and not the institution or the values it champions. Part of it is faith and hope that “this to will pass”. Part of it is also pure bullheadedness.
Warren Terra
@Sasha:
Surely it must be worse, in some ways – after all, it was possible even during the worst of Bush to hope for and work for change. But the Church hierarchy is self-selecting and self-sustaining. The signal was clear when the cardinals John Paul II appointed selected his chief enforcer as his successor, and there’s no reason to think they’ll change course.
I’ve never really had much empathy for those who find themselves voluntarily belonging to a top-down organization that in theory offers no power and only limited volition to its members. Still, despite my lack of empathy, I can at least offer my sympathy. I understand how tradition, belief, and family ties can keep you within the Church despite its flaws, and I can hope against hope for reform, for a Church worthy of its members.
Nate
@Sasha: I don’t get the Iraq analogy, as I’m not ok with any Iraqi children dying. But I’m legally obligated to keep paying my taxes and working to change the system from the inside. If I stop giving the US gov’t money, I can go to jail.
But Catholics can stop paying the Vatican anytime they want. So why make the free choice to tithe to an organization that uses a portion of your money to cover-up child rapists when you can just walk away and give that money to secular organizations doing the same good works without the baggage?
The way I see it, good Catholics leaving is exactly what needs to happen.
Sasha
@Warren Terra:
The hierarchy is self-appointing but the “foot soldiers” do have influence and can push things in the right direction, sometimes against the wishes of the hierarchy. (For instance, nuns vs. bishops in the HCR kerfluffle.) And you can bitch up the chain of command.
One thing that the current crisis has going for it is that the Church cannot pretend that what it did was anything but wrong (as opposed to the modern political Right, which now believes that not only is torture no longer is an absolute evil, it is often affirmative good). There is actual shame along with the embarrassment and I hope that it will trigger necessary change.
Religion is very much like having a nationality that you choose, and just how I love America too much to simply write it off at its worst, the same goes for the Church.
Sasha
@Nate:
Like I posted to Warren Terra, religion is very much like having a nationality that you choose, and just how I love America too much to simply write it off at its worst, the same goes for the Church.
The donations that go into the weekly collections do not simply go into Vatican coffers, they also fund worthwhile charities and organizations such as the St. Vincent DePaul Society, Catholic hospitals, and local initiatives like food pantries for the poor. “Punishing” the Vatican by withholding donations punishes would punish many innocent people as well. (And I don’t believe that the simply giving an equal amount to secular organizations would be as efficient since the Church already has a very well established infrastructure).
What good Catholics need to do is not leave, but bitch to their pastors and bishops about the abuse as much and as often as needed.
Jebediah
@geg6:
This lapsed Catholic says keep on hatin’.
geg6
@Sasha:
You have not been a victim of the Catholic Church (at least not directly; you’re still being rolled by it but you’re volunteering so I guess you’re fine with that). I am a victim of the criminals that run your church. It was local priests and nuns who perpetrated the abuse I was subjected to. Happily, their evil and the fact that that evil and many worse ones are institutionalized led me to the journey away from the Church and eventually from all superstition to a rational life where I don’t need invisible sky wizards, fallible and often psychopathic men to absolve my “sins”, and the need to make excuses for incredible crimes committed from top to bottom by pointing to charity they provide only if you meet their requirements such as in DC where they refuse to provide community services unless they hate on gays who aren’t even members if their criminal institution.
Of myself and five siblings who grew up in a devout Catholic family, not a single one of us remain Catholic. And the only remaining believer left the Church in disgust fir the Episcopal Church where they actually don’t need the criminal syndicate in order to worship in almost exactly the same way without the institutionalized abuse and demonization of others. You have a choice. You choose not to take it even after knowing what is done in your name and with your financial backing. I hold not only the hierarchy responsible but also the dioceses, parishes, and congregants responsible. You know and you still support and defend it completely of your own volition. I don’t believe in hell any more, but you obviously do. According to your own religion’s teachings, do you really believe that you are innocent of sin when you knowingly support and perpetuate it?
valdemar
Catholicism is a global outfit so one would expect its immoral conduct to have a Halliburton/Blackwater vibe, and it does. Catholicism has the financial, political and media muscle to defy governments, lawyers and mere citizenry – not unlike Wall St bankers, I suppose.
As for those who are happy to remain in the Catholic Church – well, you are much like those Western Marxists who played down Stalin’s crimes (or contrived simply not to hear about them in the first place). You put your own emotional need to keep the faith ahead of simple human decency. Shame on you.
aimai
You can’t take over a top down hierarchy from the bottom. If you could the Catholic Church would be promoting contraception right now since the majority of modern American Catholics are using it. Exhorting people to stick with the program because some of their charitable donations support St. Vincent DePaul is absurd. You can give to good organizations without belonging to the church and there are many good organizations which are not church controlled. The whole point of this unfolding scandal is that there is no way that any person who contributes to the Catholic Church’s coffers–through Peter’s Pence or any other way–can be sure that his or her money isn’t going to pay salaries for pedophile priests, money for canon lawyers to cover up abuse, and money that is paid to repair the harm to individuals (lawsuits). This was made very clear to people in the pews when the church started abandoning the very communities (in this country) that built the Church and trying to reposses and sell off the physical property.
The tie is already broken between people and pastor. Its just going to take the people in the pews a little more time to figure that out. Meanwhile its absurd to continue to exhort people/parishioners to fight for a church which rejects their right to have any input at all other than cash.
aimai
daveNYC
It’s a pretty corrupt institution, and even those parts that are doing good work are still providing support for the corrupt portions of the structure. With the current Pope and crop of Cardinals, is there any reason to think that the church will really make a fundimental change in some of its policies?
shortstop
@Sasha:
That might be more effective if all the pastors and bishops were also consistently bitching up the chain of command. Why do you suppose they aren’t? Is it possible that they understand the hierarchy and how it works better than you do?
I think you wildly underestimate the number, scope and reach of non-Catholic charities, but in any case, your efforts might be better spent helping to further build up the secular infrastructure. As it is, your argument boils down to holding poor people hostage to an abusive church.
vheidi
@Delia: hell yes. unreadable yesterday
Sasha
@geg6:
My sympathies for whatever you suffered. That simply is terrible.
Just as your experiences with the Church have colored your view of it, so have mine and my experience with it tells me that the institution is worth saving.
I still support the institution of the Church, but you overreach when you say I support and defend it completely. I think I’ve made it clear that I believe what the hierarchy has done is shameful. I do not believe that the entirety of the faith (or any organization for that matter) should be damned because of the evils of some, or that peripheral contribution is morally identical to absolute approval of abominable acts. I know I’m not innocent of sin — no one is — but becoming aware of it and confronting it is the first step, and I believe that is where the Church is now.
Sasha
@valdemar:
The Catholic Church is guilty of many bad things, but equivalent to the crimes of Stalin? If you’re comparing it to the glory days of the Inquisition, maybe.
Sasha
@aimai:
Top-down hierarchies aren’t generally vulnerable to takeover but they are still susceptible to change and reform (case in point, Vatican II).
I’m not advocating that Catholics blindly support the Church no matter what. What I am suggesting is that they have faith, set a proper example of what a Catholic should be, and do what they can to change the institution from within. Selective donations (directly to Catholic charities or the Parish itself rather than to the diocese) may very well be one tool.
Sasha
Like I’ve said before, it’s rather like America and its corruption, but we still have faith and will to see it reform to what it should be.
Frankly, I believe that the Church will have to make changes in its policies out of necessity. These embarrassments aren’t going away and in the Wikileaks age, they aren’t going to stay hidden forever.
Among other reasons, Ratzinger was tapped because it’s generally accepted that his papacy will not be as long as JPII’s (the old expression of following a fat pope with a thin one), and I believe that it’s tacitly realized that in order to salvage the Church, the next pope will have to be a reformer.
Here’s to hope and faith.
shortstop
@Sasha:
Wouldn’t choosing a reformer have been a more efficient route to that end? It seems a little more straightforward than this 11th-dimensional chess explanation for your belief (wish?) that the college of cardinals didn’t choose exactly who it wanted with Ratzo.
Sasha
@shortstop:
I’m sure that pastors and bishops also complain up the chain but, like the military, its a formal thing not inclined to drama. Local clergy are on the “front lines” and I’d imagine they frequently report first-hand of how bad policy is damaging the Church.
Very possibly, but that Catholic charities also do good work is undeniable.
Perhaps direct donations to Catholic charities themselves, rather than to the diocese, is an idea.
geg6
@Sasha:
I don’t need your sympathy. I’ve gotten help and left my abusers and work to make sure they can’t do it to anyone else. I have yet to meet a Catholic, lay or clergy, who have done a damn thing other than lie, excuse, or cover up.
Do you still provide material support to the Church? I’m guessing you do as a practicing Catholic. Have you done anything at all to stop them from their vile practices? No, you haven’t because you can’t if you are still providing material support and attending their services and buying what they sell you.
As I said earlier, I hold you and people like you as responsible as the hierarchy. You are what allow them to continue to do what they do. Nothing, nothing they do or have done can blot out the stain of their evil actions and as long as you support them, you are stained by it, too.
Smurfhole
I can’t think of a secular organization that doesn’t have systemic abuses and corruption. In fact, I can think of one that I can confirm- from my personal experience dealing with it as an attorney- has systemic abuses involving turning a blind eye toward child abuse. That would be the Department of Children and Families in every state with which I have familiarity.
Your tax dollars at work.
Sasha
Some weeks I’m better than others. Like I said, I’m a practicing Catholic in that I’m still not very good at it. :)
Attending services is not the same as material support. (I also assume that when you refer to “buying what they sell you”, you aren’t referring to actual goods purchased and isn’t germane to the idea of material support.)
As I said earlier, I hold you and people like you as responsible as the hierarchy. You are what allow them to continue to do what they do. Nothing, nothing they do or have done can blot out the stain of their evil actions.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
And do you seriously support drone attacks on Rome? Do you think blowing up a bunch of Italians will somehow demonstrate your moral superiority?
shortstop
@Sasha: “I’m sure” and “I imagine” don’t cut it. The reason you have no idea is that there are extremely few public expressions of outrage coming from priests and bishops. Your comparison of church hierarchy with the military is apter than you apparently realize–particularly in the largely identical tactics of intimidation and punishment against those who publicly speak out against their superiors’ cover-up of abuse. What you describe as “drama” the rest of the world calls demanding accountability from those who are working damned hard to elude it.
aimai is correct; laypeople alone (even if you could get everybody on your side, instead of having so many lay individuals around the world who simply deny the abuse or excuse the abusers) will not succeed in reforming a top-down church headed by people whose every action screams resistance against reform.
@Smurfhole:
Can you think of one that struggles mightily to keep its multitude of criminals outside the reach of civil law?
Sasha
Some weeks I’m better than others. Like I said, I’m a practicing Catholic in that I’m still not very good at it. :)
I have aired grievances but I really should do more. Thank you for allowing me to realize that.
Attending services is not the same as material support. (I also assume that when you refer to “buying what they sell you”, you aren’t referring to actual goods purchased and, thus, isn’t germane to the discussion.)
It is your choice and right to hold that view, but to consider any random adherent identically morally culpable for the behavior of the hierarchy is, IMHO, almost dogmatic in its condemnation and unreasonableness.
The Church has a very dark stain on it, and it may never completely wash it away. But that does not mean that it is beyond salvation and oughtn’t bother trying to redeem itself.
Sasha
I’m glad you don’t need my sympathy, but you have it anyway.
And I’m very sorry that your experience with Catholics has been uniformly negative. Although I cannot say that all my experiences were uniformly positive, I can say that my positive experiences with Catholics far outweigh the negative.
Sasha
@shortstop:
You are aware of something called the Bush Administration, right?
shortstop
@Sasha: Another comparison I’m not sure you really meant to make. You’re batting 1000 here.
Sasha
No, I don’t have any idea what is really going on between the parishes, the dioceses, and the hierarchy. And nor do you.
I know exactly how apt the military analogy is — I went to parochial school. :)
And when I refer to “drama”, I mean that, like the military, the norm isn’t for members to go out in public to air their grievances. I’m not trying to be dismissive.
I hope you recognize that I am neither denying nor excusing what the Vatican has done. But like I replied to Aimai, reform — even radical reform — is indeed possible in the Church. That’s what’s happened at Vatican II, and it is possible now.
geg6
@Smurfhole:
I think you need to check your snark meter. It seems to be faulty.
Sasha
@shortstop:
Good. It’s nice to know that I have a decent average somewhere.
And just like how the Bush administration isn’t America, the hierarchy isn’t the Catholic Church. Support of the institution and its values does not translate into automatic approval of its leaders.
Smurfhole
@shortstop:
Yes. That would also be DCF. I’ve seen DCF take children from decent parents and put them in the homes of child molesters. DCF receives federal grant money to adopt away as many children as possible. They cut corners, substantiate for abuse on the flimsiest of pretexts, and generally act like a ring of child kidnappers. Sometimes the homes they place the kids in are better; oftentimes, they’re much, much worse. And all of this is done without any effective oversight by any branch of the state or federal government whatsoever.
Depending on which state you live in (assuming you’re in America), your tax dollars finance what could, at best, be called a glorified adoption agency- and could also, easily be characterized as a ring of child abuse enablers.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
Sorry. It’s hard to tell when we cross the line from “every Catholic in the world is morally culpable of child molestation” to “every Catholic in the world should die, and America is fortunate in that it has the military hardware to make that happen.”
geg6
@Sasha:
Perhaps you should do some research into your church. Vatican II is dead and gone and, even when it was in force, the same shit was happening. All of this is nothing new, of course, in the Church. It’s been going on for two millenia. The Church that was based on Jesus only existed for less time than it took for all the books in the New Testament to be written. That Church was dead and gone by the time of the Epistles. Any resemblance it ever had to anything Jesus taught or lived was gone and has never returned. The Church, from that time on, has been nothing but an authoritarian institution, more interested in power, money, and control than in honoring Jesus. If you knew more of the history of your church, you’d see that as clearly as anyone who isn’t blinded by their bullshit can.
You obviously choose to stay in the cocoon of an immoral and criminal institution because it feels safe for you. That’s your choice. But if anyone should be feeling sorry for anyone, it’s people like me who should feel sorry for people like you. But I don’t, simply because you know the truth and yet you still prefer to look the other way.
geg6
@Smurfhole:
No, the line is that every Catholic who knows the truth of what crimes their Church has perpetrated and still provides support and excuses for it, is morally culpable. And the only thing I want to die is the Church itself, not any of the people in it. Not even the ones who tried to make me suffer within it.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
Maybe you should fucking kill her. Drop a bomb on her with a drone or something. It’s better than she deserves, for going to Mass and putting a dollar in the collection plate now and then.
shortstop
@Sasha:
Perhaps I’m not being clear. I don’t much care what goes on between parishes, dioceses and the top brass. I’m pointing out that there is no discernible public outcry from parish priests and bishops against the church’s longstanding practices and policies of covering up abuse, reassigning abusers to situations in which more children will be raped, and instructing those lower down the totem pole not to report rape of children.
You keep insisting that people not blame anyone but the guys at the top, but this monstrosity has reached such proportions, involved so many people at all levels of the church (including many, many parish priests) enabling others’ crimes, and included so much blatant resistance on the part of the church to actually addressing it, that the idea that this can or should remain a private matter has gone well beyond absurd. If you truly want reform, you have to demand that the clergy be partners with the laity in speaking out publicly. So far all I’m hearing from you is excuses for them not having done so as you blithely assume that it will all suddenly start being taken care of in private.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
So in other words every Catholic who’s ever read a newspaper is morally on par with child molesters. But the church should die, even though its hundreds of millions of adherents will go on living as morally culpable “phantom” child molesters. Thanks for clearing that up.
Smurfhole
@shortstop:
By your rationale, Osama bin Laden is fully justified in killing every American civilian who pays taxes. After all, those tax dollars finance bombing of Muslims, so every American – whatever his or her personal views- is morally culpable for every single thing the American government does. And if you didn’t support those things, you would’ve moved to some other country and renounced your US citizenship by now, right?
Smurfhole
FWIW, at the parish level some of the Churches have taken the protection of children seriously to the point where no priest, volunteer, or Church employee is even permitted to be alone in the same room as a child. That’s progress, whether you choose to concede it or not. At the parish and diocesan level- the levels you say don’t matter- progress is occurring.
shortstop
@Smurfhole: Smurf, may I ask the name of your fictional law school?
The voice in your head you’re arguing with bears no resemblance to anything that actually appears under my name here. Come back when you can pass a freshman logic course, pal. And see somebody about that creepy obsession with killing.
geg6
@Smurfhole:
Are you able to read? I wish the Church would die. Since that isn’t gonna happen, based on the evidence right here in this thread, I hold all parishioners who are aware of what the criminality of their Church is and who still attend, materially support, and make excuses instead of holding the hierarchy responsible to be as responsible as the perpetrators and the hierarchy themselves.
You are obviously an Catholic troll. Have fun with your child molesters. I can only hope your child isn’t the next victim.
Sasha
@shortstop:
I think I’ve been misunderstood. I didn’t mean to suggest that this is all one great stratagem. I was simply stating that, traditionally, older popes who aren’t expected to reign long usually follow popes who have (as in the case of JPII). Benedict probably isn’t going to see the next decade, and the cardinals will be inclined to install a reform-friendly pontiff to rehabilitate the Church.
geg6
@Sasha:
And are those pink unicorns flying out of my butt? Who the hell do you think appointed those cardinals, John XXIII? Newsflash…it was the criminals John Paul II and Benedict.
Your naivete would be touching if it wasn’t so dangerous.
Sasha
@geg6:
You’re assuming I haven’t.
The Catholic Church has done some fucked up shit in the past and frequently fell prey to the temporal temptations it warned against. This is news?
Look at *any* organization with history and I doubt you could find one that could cast the first stone.
You definitively ascribe motives to me based not on what you actually know but what you assume must be true based out of a dogmatic belief. You then follow up by declaring yourself to be morally superior, looking down in mock-pity at those who do not conform to your worldview. You finish with energetic moral masturbation as you cast out of your grace those who you condemn as sinners because they do not believe as you do.
Hate to tell you this, chummer, but you’ve got religion too. What’s more, you’ve incorporated the very worst and most arrogant expressions of faith into it.
Tell you what, you avoid divining my motives, and I won’t try to divine yours.
Sasha
@geg6:
No kidding. However, considering that the Church has, to put it mildly, a PR problem and that the future of the Church would be at stake, a change in direction would be a good step.
geg6
@Smurfhole:
You’re not worthy of this reply, but since I didn’t see it before…
Ah, yes. Unmasked as the Catholic Church’s very own troll. Does Bill Donohue pay you for every post here? How much, exactly? Not as much as they do the dons who run your pedophilic and misogynist mafia while wearing women’s dresses, though, right?
Whatever. Your Church is already dying. Fewer and fewer people want anything to do with it. You couldn’t even hold onto Ireland, a country that was content to let the Church run it right up until the dirty laundry became too obvious and widespread to ignore and, to add insult to injury, the Church arrogantly ignored the people and government of Ireland. My only regret is that I don’t think stupid, gullible people like you will let it die in my lifetime. I would so love to see the whole rotten edifice crumble. I do, however, take comfort in the fact that it will be a weak and powerless and reviled cult in not too many years. And I’m doing my best to see that day come sooner rather than later.
geg6
@Sasha:
The fact that you seem to believe that Vatican II was some golden era and that you seem to think that the College of Cardinals appointed by JPII and Ratzinger will suddenly reform the church tells me you don’t know a thing about your church’s history (except, possibly, what they’ve taught you) and that you subscribe even more to magical thinking than I would have though possible.
I really do feel sorry for you. I know a number of people like you and I know you sincerely believe that the church means well. But it’s magical thinking and nothing good ever comes of that. I can only hope you don’t have children or that, if you do, they aren’t the next victims.
Sasha
@geg6:
If you would please point out where I claimed that Vatican II was a “golden era”, I’d appreciate it. And while you’re at it, also point out where I stated that the College of Cardinals will “suddenly reform” the Church.
What I did say was that Vatican II demonstrated that radical change is possible in a top-down organization like the Church. What I also said was that I believe the Cardinals will most likely choose a reform-minded pontiff after Benedict.
I never pretended to believe that any reform would be sudden. Institutions as old and ingrained as organized religion do not transform overnight. But a sympathetic pontiff might finally continue the progress portended by Vatican II. Unlike you, I do believe that progress is not only possible, it is inevitable.
Smurfhole
@shortstop:
Sure. Rutgers Law School.
Your rebuttal has all the erudition of a middle finger. Tell me how your ad hominem blanket condemnations of the entire Catholic Church AND the Catholic laity are any different than Bin Laden’s blanket condemnations of every single American, or concede that you’re incapable of responding like an intelligent adult.
As for the obsession with killing, I’m not the person who proposed drone runs on major Italian cities to cope with the problem of Catholicism. That would be geg6.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
You’re a wonderful human being, and a credit to your ideology.
I wish you all the best in life. At least until your fictional drone attacks vaporize me.
shortstop
@Sasha:
The church had a gigantic PR problem (one that was pretty clearly going to get a whole lot worse) and a future at risk before Ratzo. A change in direction “would have been a good step” before Ratzo. Again, there is no reason to think the college of cardinals didn’t select exactly the backwards-looking, disengaged non-reformer it wanted. Length of papacy has fuck-all to do with it, except in that it will enable the college to appoint another non-reformer that much sooner.
You have posted absolutely nothing in this thread that reflects reality–the church’s actual, concrete decisions and actions–rather than your own wishful thinking. We get what you wish the church were. What you don’t yet get, because you’re working so hard not to, is what it is.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
I was raised by people like you- abusive militant atheists. If it’s any consolation to you, it’s quite possible for people like you to raise children who, as adults, run for religion just as your abusive childhood experiences caused you to run away from it.
Sasha
The Church had a problem then, but someone expecting that anyone immediately succeeding JPII would be a radical departure from him would have been dreaming.
If your assertion were true, my posts would have been nothing but denials that anything was wrong and that the Church was absolutely perfect as it is. We both know that it is not.
The reality is that the Church is in dire straits. The hierarchy knows this and it follows that the next pope chosen will be one who can most help it. And that would most likely be a reform-minded one.
There’s hope in there, but it’s not without reason.
geg6
@Smurfhole:
You really are a hilariously bad troll. I’m no militant anything. An atheist? Well, yes. Militant? No, don’t care what you or anyone else believes at all. Believe whatever stupid shit you want. As for children, I don’t currently have any, other than the one the Catholic Church forced me to have and then stole from me and gave away. Yes, my parents were complicit in that episode. But unlike the Church, they regretted their complicity and apologized and spent years trying to make up for it. Unlike the Church, which covers up, excuses, and continues to repeat the same behavior over and over and over again. You don’t like being called complicit in their crimes? Stop trying to kill the messenger and do something about it. Yelling at me doesn’t change a thing. But then, you really don’t want anything to change, do you?
Smurfhole
@geg6:
If I valued your opinions, I might be hurt by your insults. I don’t, so they don’t bother me much. I think you’re a bully on this blog, and I can tell you’re a bully in real life. My father was like you, interspersing beating me with bitching about the same Church you bitch about.
I’m happy to be a member of the religion he despised. I think you’d be an even worse parent, though, so if you were my mother, I’d probably have run even further. I’d probably be a Mormon Republican instead of a Liberation Theology-believing Catholic.
Also, I live in Vermont, which is 46% non-believers; so be careful or some of your fellow militant atheists might be collateral damage when your drone strike hits. (Seriously, I’m not going to give up on that fucking comment. You actually said you want drone strikes on Rome. I can’t believe that. My father was a Vietnam vet who used to call in white phosphorus on NVAs, and even he’d think you were insane.)
geg6
@Smurfhole:
Go back to RedState where you belong, troll.
Peace out.
shortstop
@Sasha:
Sigh…
Correct. And expecting that anyone immediately succeeding Benedict would be a radical departure would be…what, Sasha? Come on. You can do it.
The entire foundation for what you believe will happen is that it would be “good” if it happened. Of course it would, if the church is to reverse its course of self-destruction. Do you have any evidence whatsoever that it will–other than your wishing for it? Anything that counters the available evidence of the church’s recent actions and the makeup of the current college of cardinals?
The problem with trying to be jesuitical in your arguments is that you’ve first gotta get the debate chops that come with a Jesuit’s rigorous formation. Let me clarify my previous remark: You have offered absolutely nothing in this thread that reflects the reality of
the church’s response to the breaking scandal
the inflexibly top-down nature of its power structure
the lack of moral courage on the part of priests and bishops to publicly shout for reform rather than enable the continued coverup and avoidance of justice by pretending the foxes will suddenly start guarding the henhouse
the full history of the top players’ almost uniformly negative response to lay attempts at reform
I’ll let you have the few surviving remnants of Vatican II (for sure, you’ll have trouble finding a Latin mass, and you rarely see a nun in traditional habit in the U.S. Other than that, you’ve got almost nothin’.). But an already largely reversed Vatican II does not begin to counteract the full modern history of top-down squelching of reform; nor does anything in Ratzo’s entire body of work nor that of other Vatican officials suggest that the Vatican has moved one iota toward meaningfully dealing with this crisis.
You are fantasizing about where the church is right now and what it is likely to do next. That wish has nothing to do with actual events or circumstances.
Smurfhole
@geg6:
I’ve been on this blog since 2005, I don’t need to take directions from you. And my political views on every issue are, if anything, to the left of yours- abortion, gay marriage, you name it.
You’re a boring bully, and an abusive person. You became what you despised. Have a nice life.
Smurfhole
@shortstop:
I seem to remember telling you that at the parish and diocesan level, the American church is taking steps to ensure the safety of children. That was shortly before you insulted my education and me personally without addressing anything I said with anything in the way of a substantive rebuttal, though, so maybe it doesn’t count. Why talk about a parish instituting reforms like not letting people be alone in the same room with children when it’s ever so much more satisfying to bitch about the Church like it’s an unchanging, monolithic edifice?
More Victims
Mentally handicapped children were abused along with my sister at St. Coletta’s school in Hanover, MA. The Church failed to respond with an investigation. The Boston Globe report, which cost millions, failed to review cases where girls were abused. The police have not responded. Both of the perpetrators are now dead; one of them was a priest.
The Catholic Church is a criminal organization only interested in spreading its memeplex and controlling others for power and profit. It should have been prosecuted years ago.
oy vey
Why talk about an institution that through threats, intimidation and bribery knowingly concealed tens of thousands of cases of rape and abuse of children over a century or so when we can think happy thoughts about a few unsubstantiated cases of parishes not letting priests be alone with children instead?
Wait, over there: is that a shiny object?
I have a followup question: why talk about the Mafia’s history of murder and violence and the fact that so few of its members that have committed felonies have been brought to justice when we can talk about how they’re really focusing on getting into legitimate business now?
Sasha
Do you really think coming after Benedict would be the same as coming after JPII?
Only circumstantial. I’ve mostly been theorizing what I believe will happen during the next papal conclave due to circumstances on the ground.
None of my comments or replies were about the recent response, but about the crimes themselves. If you want me to go on the record and say their current excuse is incredible, “Their current excuse is incredible.”
To which I demonstrated that it is not absolutely inflexible.
As smurfhole has mentioned, there are indeed efforts by the church to ensure the safety of children. And I do not believe that every single priest and bishop has been involved in a cover-up, as you seem to have suggested. I have said that Catholics (and by extension the clergy) need to do more, although I’m still struggling about what exactly that should be. For priests and bishops to, against all precedent and tradition, publicly air their concerns … who knows? It may come to that.
That topic never came up in the posts I responded to, although considering how long it’s gone so far, I wouldn’t be surprised if I missed it.
I do not like how the hierarchy has become more insular, but I believe that will change out of simple necessity. The Church is fading and unless it becomes more responsive to the needs expressed by the laity, it will continue to fade.
Is there dogma that was changed at Vatican II that has since been reversed back? If you would point out examples, I’d appreciate it.
Otherwise, you’ve missed my point that change is indeed possible in the Catholic Church – something that you have steadfastly insisted it is absolutely incapable of.
The Church is in a bad place. I’ve said that bunches of times. I do not believe that the hierarchy is utterly blind to it either and considering that, as I’ve said before, in the age of Wikileaks it will only get worse unless they allow change. I believe that the hierarchy knows it will *have* to change or else the Church will die. You believe that the hierarchy, faced with the possibility of change, would rather let the Church die. And you know what? You might be right.
I just don’t agree with you.
Cereative Anarchy
Honestly, if it’s your job to put a positive spin on generations of systematic child rape what else can you throw out there? Would yet another ‘sorry’ mean anything at all at this point? The poor guy they called for comments has probably never touched a child, likely as not he’s never touched anyone sexually. Vatican press secretary=Worst job in the world.
Smurfhole
DCF.