Posted on 07/18/2007 1:48:09 PM PDT by topcat54
Cardinal Roger Mahony has announced that the Church will pay out $660 million to more than 500 victims of sexual abuse by priests. It’s the Catholic Church’s failure to act swiftly and decisively on the matter that has disillusioned and enraged church members and victims. No one likes a cover-up, especially religious devotees who believe the church is a means of salvation and priests are mediators between the people and God. But there remains a more sinister cover-up.
The Church must come to grips with reality and admit that the priesthood is so dominated by homosexuals that Paul Wilkes, who studied 600 parishes for his book Excellent Catholic Parishes: A Guide to Best Places and Practices, makes this telling observation, “If we drove all the gay priests out of the priesthood, our Masses would be on videotape.”1
I find it interesting that all the sexual abuse is done exclusively by pedophiles, seemingly a heterosexual malady. Are we to believe that not one case of sexual misconduct can be attributed to a single homosexual priest? There are anywhere from 8,000 to 22,000 homosexual priests. If the priesthood is made up of such a high percentage of homosexuals, then it stands to reason that at least a high percentage of the church’s so-called pedophile problem is really a homosexual problem.
The church’s unbiblical, illogical, and irrational policy that priests must not marry and remain celibate is being blamed for the sexual scandal. Such an argument is off the mark. Has anyone noticed that the priests aren’t, in 95 percent of reported cases, having sex with teenage girls? The male priests are having sex with young male parishioners. The problem of sex abuse is not because of celibacy; it’s homosexuality. Homosexual men are becoming priests because that’s where young, impressionable, and vulnerable boys are found. Of course, the idea that priests should remain unmarried is a religious fiction given that priests in the Old Testament were married and had children (Ex. 6:23), and Peter, the supposed first pope, was also married (Matt. 8:14; 1 Cor. 9:5; cf. 1 Tim. 3:4–5).
The Roman Catholic Church has had a difficult time recruiting men to the priesthood. Homosexuals see this as an opportunity. Why not go where there’s an almost unlimited supply of young boys whose parents consider priests to be god-like? Are we surprised that the Boy Scouts have also become a target of homosexuals? Once again, it’s where boys can be found for recruitment purposes. Liberals attack the Scouts for not opening its leadership ranks to admitted homosexuals, while these same critics attack the Catholic Church for giving “pedophile priests” easy access to children of the same age.
Catholics are taught that priests and nuns are spiritually special and set apart for God’s work. I can still remember sitting in my fifth grade class at St. Germaine’s Catholic School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, when Father Hugo would enter the class. Sister Mary Josephine would always ask, “Who wants to be a priest when he grows up?” Only one boy, my best friend at the time, Salvatore LaMarca, refused to raise his hand. Of course we wanted to be a priest. Being a priest was a one-way ticket to heaven. It was like getting a “Get out of Hell Free” card.
Devout families—and predator priests frequently chose their victims from the most ardent parishioners—had been taught for generations to exalt, respect and trust priests. Who could imagine dear Father Tim—who came to dinner, played with the kids, counseled mom, acted like a dad—would do something so sinful? Doubting the priest would cost you your spiritual security.2
It’s no accident that early Hollywood designated the priest as the most trusted of film characters. Spencer Tracy, Bing Crosby, and Pat O’Brien made their careers with movies like Angels with Dirty Faces, Boys Town, Going My Way, and The Bells of St. Mary’s. Every parish dreamed of having a Father Flanagan for its priest or a priest who just looked like Pat O’Brien. Notice that almost in every case the priest was a friend and confidant to young boys. It came with the territory. Parents always knew their children were safe with a priest.
Film-making in the early years was nearly dominated by Jews, as Neal Gabler describes in his highly informative book An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood. Even so, Catholic clergy were almost universally depicted as decent and caring spiritual leaders. Louis B. Mayer “was a close friend and a great admirer of New York’s Cardinal Spellman, with whom he dined every time he visited New York, and a large portrait of Spellman in his red vestments was the first sight that greeted visitors to Mayer’s library.”3 It was the church’s “respectability” that impressed Mayer. “If a character appeared on screen wearing a clerical collar it served as a sure sign that the audience was supposed to like him.”4
Toby Westerman reports, “A gay culture is growing among clergy of the American Catholic Church that receives support from members of the hierarchy as well as from those directly involved in the training of priests, according to a Catholic priest-theologian.”5 The Vatican has found it nearly impossible to police its seminaries. Much of the problem is a lack of will and fear of a backlash from an already depleted clergy.
There has been a redirection of focus from a discussion of homosexuality to pedophilia, a nearly universally despised predatory behavior. The charge of pedophilia is being used as a smoke screen by homosexuals to fly under the sexual radar. While the general public excoriates the pedophiles among us, the homosexuals go merrily along debauching young men in the name of sexual tolerance.
In the April 1, 2002 issue of U.S. News & World Report, homosexuality was mentioned only once in the eight-page article on the Catholic sex crisis. Rev. Joel Garner, pastor of a Catholic church in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is quick to point out in the article that “the pedophilia problem has nothing to do with celibacy or homosexuality.”6 Throughout the article, the sex scandal is called a “sex-abuse scandal,” “youth-sex-abuse,” “sexual misconduct,” “predatory sexual behavior,” but never a homosexual problem. Author Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, confuses the readers of U.S. News even more (on purpose?) when she reports, “Despite the common image of a priest sodomizing a 9-year-old altar boy, most of the priest abusers are technically ‘ephebophiles’—that is, they abuse adolescents rather than children.”7 In any other dictionary, the description of an ephebophile would be a practicing predatory homosexual.
The article begs the question. It’s not just “adolescents” who the priests are abusing, it’s adolescent boys. If pedophilia is the problem, then why aren’t the priests having sex with young girls in the church? The church is covering up its crisis to save its reputation, and it’s no less true that thesereporters are covering up for the homosexual rights movement. John Leo, an editorial writer for U.S. News, touches on the real issue when he writes that true pedophiles are rare, and the super majority of the priests involved in this sex crisis are not pedophiles. “But the church is reluctant to mention the distinction,” Leo writes, “most likely because opening up the issue of sexually active gay priests is itself explosive, even apart from charges of abuse.”
The homosexual lobby is so powerful and intimidating that almost no one wants to suffer from its unbridled wrath. So for cover, the priests are charged with pedophilia in order to hide the fact that homosexuality is the real culprit.
2. Johanna McGeary, “Can the Church Be Saved?,” Time (April 1, 2002), 31.
3. Neal Gabler, An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood (New York: Crown Publishers, 1988), 285.
4. Michael Medved, Hollywood VS. America: Popular Culture and the War on Traditional Values (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992), 51. Roman Catholic and Episcopalian clergymen (e.g., Life with Father and The Bisho’s Wife) were most often chosen to represent the church because they were easily identified because of their clerical garb, most specifically a special collar. Most Protestant clergymen wear no special attire. They generally look like businessmen.
5. Toby Westerman, “Suffer the Children: ‘Gay’ culture in Catholic Church grows Priest says scandal really about homosexuality, not pedophilia,” World Net Daily (March 24, 2002).
6. Angie Cannon and Jeffery L. Sheler, “Catholicsin Crisis,” U.S. News & World Report (April 1, 2002), 57.
7. Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, AChastity and lust: Is there a psychological link between sexuality, celibacy, and predation?,” 55.
8. John Leo, “Of rage and revolution,” 12.
Great Reformed Ping List
The most-often posted numbers of "Protestant" abuse are two Catholic-run websites. They provide a deeply biased, an apples vs oranges comparison using all manner of non-Catholic groups, as opposed to the Catholic church's own numbers as provided by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. If one isolates the cases actually committed by clergy out of the above "Protestant" articles, and then compares like-for-like with the numbers provided in the U.S. Catholic Bishops' "John Jay" study, it can be demonstrated that there are approximately four times as many Catholic priests and clergy who are sexually abusive, than the number of "Protestant" pastors guilty of the same. And if you isolate out the Reformed Protestant denominations from those other articles, the number of "Protestant" abuse cases statistically drops off the chart by comparison.
I'm not saying that either set of statistics are inaccurate or deliberately falsified. I'm just saying that the Catholic-provided numbers of "Protestant" cases, if accepted at face value and if I've understood them properly, paint a far worse picture on the Catholic side than most Catholics are probably aware of.
I just made some popcorn and I’m going to sit in the corner and watch you be ripped apart. Sorry. On another thread, I made a comment about apologizing for all the murders condoned by the church and only narrowly escaped with my life.
The post you linked to did not cite two "Catholic-run websites". One citation was to an article from the Christian Science Monitor, which is not remotely Catholic.
approximately four times as many Catholic priests and clergy who are sexually abusive, than the number of "Protestant" pastors guilty of the same
The relevant statistic would be the percentage, not the raw number.
Phillip Jenkins is not a "Catholic-run website"; he's a professor of comparative religion at Penn State. His book concluded that the percentage of abusers was essentially the same in every denomination.
Supposedly in the 60s the current Pope said “the smoke of Satan” has entered the Catholic Church - he was almost right - it was “the pole smokers of Stan” !!!
On that point you are correct, and I will correct the statement on future posts. It is, however, the CSM piece that paints the bleakest picture for the Catholic Church once you compare apples to apples with the John Jay study. The presentation is cooked with a bias towards the Catholic Church - I can't tell if it's the author, or the actual study that serves up the anti-Protestant bias. Getting perfect scores in my Masters-level Statistics courses taught me to spot statistical slight-of-hand, and they're all over the CSM piece. That's the reason I previously stated the CSM piece was Catholic propaganda, and if it's not, it's certainly being used as ammo.
The homosexual lobby is so powerful and intimidating that almost no one wants to suffer from its unbridled wrath. So for cover, the priests are charged with pedophilia in order to hide the fact that homosexuality is the real culprit.
Yep. Just ask Mike Ovitz and Isaiah Washington.
if I've understood them properly
Therein lies the problem. You don't understand.
purple ping
Please stop making personal comments. Discuss the topic and not the poster.
Of course, DeMar wears his ignorance of both Scripture and the history of Christendom on his sleeve.
That's absurd. When the Presbyterians or the Lutherans or the Methodists in Los Angeles pay out $774 million to settle sexual molestation lawsuits, then you might have a point.
There are plenty of Roman Catholics on this forum rightly castigating these licentious, sociopathic priests who don't feel compelled to resort to the lame and fraudulent excuse that "everyone does it."
Everyone doesn't do it.
If you buy some official wafers and put them on top of your TV and played the video, would you get a real transubstantiation?
How would you know?
Stan who?
“The data on the Protestant clergy tend to focus on sexual abuse in general, not on sexual abuse of children. Thus, strict comparisons cannot always be made. But there are some comparative data available on the subject of child sexual molestation, and what has been reported is quite revealing.
In a 1984 survey, 38.6 percent of ministers reported sexual contact with a church member, and 76 percent knew of another minister who had had sexual intercourse with a parishioner.[xiii] In the same year, a Fuller Seminary survey of 1,200 ministers found that 20 percent of theologically “conservative” pastors admitted to some sexual contact outside of marriage with a church member. The figure jumped to over 40 percent for “moderates”; 50 percent of “liberal” pastors confessed to similar behavior.[xiv]
In 1990, in a study by the Park Ridge Center for the Study of Health, Faith and Ethics in Chicago, it was learned that 10 percent of ministers said they had had an affair with a parishioner and about 25 percent admitted some sexual contact with a parishioner.[xv] Two years later, a survey by Leadership magazine found that 37 percent of ministers confessed to having been involved in “inappropriate sexual behavior” with a parishioner.[xvi]
In a 1993 survey by the Journal of Pastoral Care, 14 percent of Southern Baptist ministers said they had engaged in “inappropriate sexual behavior,” and 70 percent said they knew a minister who had had such contact with a parishioner.[xvii] Joe E. Trull is co-author of the 1993 book, Ministerial Ethics, and he found that “from 30 to 35 percent of ministers of all denominations admit to having sexual relationships—from inappropriate touching to sexual intercourse—outside of marriage.”[xviii]
According to a 2000 report to the Baptist General Convention in Texas, “The incidence of sexual abuse by clergy has reached ‘horrific proportions.’” It noted that in studies done in the 1980s, 12 percent of ministers had “engaged in sexual intercourse with members” and nearly 40 percent had “acknowledged sexually inappropriate behavior.” The report concluded that “The disturbing aspect of all research is that the rate of incidence for clergy exceeds the client-professional rate for physicians and psychologists.”[xix] Regarding pornography and sexual addiction, a national survey disclosed that about 20 percent of all ministers are involved in the behavior.[xx]
In the spring of 2002, when the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church was receiving unprecedented attention, the Christian Science Monitor reported on the results of national surveys by Christian Ministry Resources. The conclusion: “Despite headlines focusing on the priest pedophile problem in the Roman Catholic Church, most American churches being hit with child sexual-abuse allegations are Protestant, and most of the alleged abusers are not clergy or staff, but church volunteers.”[xxi]
Finally, in the authoritative work by Penn State professor Philip Jenkins, Pedophiles and Priests, it was determined that between .2 and 1.7 percent of priests are pedophiles. The figure among the Protestant clergy ranges between 2 and 3 percent.[xxii]”
SEXUAL ABUSE IN SOCIAL CONTEXT:
CATHOLIC CLERGY AND OTHER PROFESSIONALS
Special Report
by
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights
February 2004
This is a stunning admission.
LOLOL. Those are the most absurd, unsubstantiated lies I've ever read on this forum.
The RCC can just keep telling themselves these lies and insisting "everybody does it" and the sexual molestation and homosexual activity within the RCC clergy will continue.
Nothing's stopped it so far.
ROTFLOL.
And 35% were abducted as children by Venusian spaceships.
it was determined that between .2 and 1.7 percent of priests are pedophiles. The figure among the Protestant clergy ranges between 2 and 3 percent.
We really have to remember this post because this ludicrous garbage is what the RCC is telling its members.
With lies like this which blithely dismiss the grave and specific sins of the RCC clergy, no children is safe under its roof.
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