Posted on 03/16/2013 7:44:17 AM PDT by DogByte6RER
(Cardinal Napier, third from left)
Paedophilia is an illness NOT a crime, says cardinal just days after papal conclave
• Claimed people abused as youngsters who then become paedophiles 'not criminally responsible'
• Says paedophilia 'is an illness, not a criminal condition'
• Says those people do not deserve to be punished because they are damaged
• Pope Francis said that he wants a 'church for the poor'
A South African cardinal who helped elect Pope Francis has described paedophilia as a psychological illness and not 'a criminal condition'.
The Catholic Archbishop of Durban, Wilfrid Fox Napier, told BBC Radio 5 live that people who were abused as children and became paedophiles were not criminally responsible for their actions in the same way as somebody 'who chooses to do something like that'.
Cardinal Napier, who was among the 115 cardinals in the conclave at the Vatican that elected Pope Francis earlier this week, called paedophilia a 'psychological disorder.
And just three days into the new role, the pope and the Catholic Church are now faced with fresh child abuse controversy after the cardinal's remarks.
He said: 'What do you do with disorders? You have got to try and put them right.
'If I as a normal being choose to break the law knowing that I am breaking the law, then I think I need to be punished...
'From my experience paedophilia is actually an illness, it is not a criminal condition, it is an illness.'
The cardinal spoke of two priests he knew who were abused as children and went on to become paedophiles.
He told the BBC: 'Don't tell me that those people are criminally responsible like somebody who chooses to do something like that.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
With all due respect one could argue there are other Christian denominations that blatently accept homosexuality and “gay marriage” which is strongly rebuked in the Bible as an abomination. As Christians we should unite forces against evil not attack each other which btw the devil loves.
We haven't heard his thoughts on drilling for oil, or on making a lot of money.
IF it’s ‘anti-Catholic’ to call out the disease that is infecting the Church what is NOT calling it out? I AM a Roman Catholic-and homosexuality has NO place in the Church except as an abomination. There can be NO reason for a priest to excuse and protect a practicing homosexual/pedophile unless that priest identifies in some way with the lifestyle and thinks it is more important to protect and defend the crime than his vows or the Church teachings. You do not defend something if you are not OF it. Would taking a whip to the Vatican and driving out homosexual clergy be ‘Catholic bashing’? Jesus cleaned the temple that way- we need it done again.
I remember having a similar argument with a professor in a college psychology class. He stated that pedophilia (like most sexual urges) is irresistible. I argued that it was resistible and that psychologists and psychiatrists suffered from a bias because of the (rightful) disgust pedophilia is seen, that very few pedophiles go for treatment because of resisted urges. Instead only those who have been criminally caught are medically treated. Thus since psychologists only see those who did not resist they assume that no one can resist. Neither one of us convinced the other, but hopefully some of my classmates reconsidered their blindly nodding approval of the professor.
He is WRONG (using my Marisa Tomei voice)......as mom used to say, you might not be able to stop a bird from flying over your head but you can stop it from building a nest on it!
What you said is exactly right, FR_addict. Everybody has an inborn inclination to do one sort of evil or another; that's called "concupiscence," as this Cardinal Napier should know, and it is an innate feature of our fallen human nature.
We are all born ith these characer flaws, and it is our responsibility --- with the grace of God --- to overcome them.
If one accepted Cardinal Napier's account of human action, one would have to say nobody is responsible for anything, because we are neither responsible for our genetic inheritance nor our early childhood development and environment.
It was wrong for Napier to say this. It was in violaion of what the Catholic Church teaches about human freedom and responsibility. I shows a failure to protect children from the predations of others.
And it was just plain stupid.
Bible is clear on homosexuality being an abomination to God. I do believe many people in the catholic church are Christians, but the church itself is not. Too many church teachings are in direct violation of God’s word. Time will tell. I know Jesus commands me to love my neighbor, I do admit I struggle with that and maybe I come across poorly but that’s not my intent. I do care about people and hope and pray many eyes are opened.
Well how bout this one that happened in Syracuse, NY. A child molester carjacked an auto with mother and her 10 year old daughter. Kills the mother and rapes the 10 year old. Just sick.
And if you do not want to be suspected of perversion yourself do not defend or excuse perversion. Defend it or excuse it- be identified with/by it.
A confession?
As a practicing Catholic I was taught to focus on the sin and not so much on the sinner. If the Cardinal does not believe paedophilia is a sin he shouldn’t represent the Church. Let us pray on that.
Good for you! Did you pass the class?
This is the problem. The church invited all these homosexuals in as clergy and a good number of them began raping little boys. It wasn't shocking to much of the Church clergy because of the high number of priests participating in deviant behavior with one another.
I remember a coworker of mine many years ago told me that he had joined Catholic seminary to become a priest. He didn't last very long. He told me it become clear that a lot of the people there were homosexuals, and he was given council that he should leave and go find a girlfriend. He simply didn't fit in with the culture.
Perhaps the one good thing, if such a thing can be said, about homosexuality becoming so mainstream in society is that fewer of them will seek refuge in the Catholic church as clergy. I really do hope the church is now booting these people out as soon as they are discovered and not allowing them to go on to become priests.
It shows a culpable failure to protect children from the predations of others.
Please do not generalize from the asinine Napier to the whole Catholic Church, when he is in fact trashing its teachings.
He is making the mistake of accepting the secular humanist abstract conceptual framework and language. This is a victory for atheism, and more instances of this will lead to the destruction of Christianity. Secular humanists blame the environment for human evil, and they believe that if the environment could be perfected by means of secular humanist principles and secular humanist education, then mankind could learn to consistently to choose what is morally correct.And, punishment is unnecessary, since misdeeds are simply caused by an imperfect environment.What is needed is restorative justice rather than the Biblical idea of justice where people get what they deserve.
Uh ... sorry, Cardinal ... it’s BOTH!
Yeah. He wasn't vindictive, merely dismissive.
Talk about a viper in His Holiness' bosom. The Cardinal either has a tin ear as to what's going on around him.....or he's an extreme egotist taking advantage of the the temporary world-wide audience engendered by the Conclave to make a statement sure to be seized upon by Catholic-bashers everywhere....and applauded by religious progressives.
The Cardinal should be made to do penance, not alone for the subject matter of his statement, but for the asinity and self-aggrandizement of opening his trap at the wrong time and in the wrong place.
Leni
Good. With tenure that’s the best we can hope for.
You done good, perhaps some of those other heads full of mush were jolted out of blindly accepting everything the professor says as gospel, well, better than Gospel...
What you say fits right in to what Michael Rose describes in his book—the real Catholics were booted out of the seminaries.
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