Free Republic

A new law being considered in Iraq could lead to girls as young as eight getting married and wives having to submit to sex at their husband's every request. The controversial proposals have provoked outrage from activists both within Iraq and around the globe, who see it as a huge step backwards for women's rights. The measure, aimed at creating different laws for Iraq's majority Shiite population, could further fray the country's divisions amid some of the worst sectarian bloodshed since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

In an article which may be found here, Dr. William Oddie notes that, "Pope Francis has now once again (though to judge by the so far sparse coverage, you’d think he’d never said or done anything before) expressed his abhorrence of clerical sex abuse. Previous popes—indeed most senior clergy—are normally too reticent, however, to do what he has now done as well, that is to say, he has defended the Catholic Church’s record on tackling the sexual abuse of children by priests, by declaring what is now the simple truth: that “no one else has done more” than the Church...

Manifestly the Pentagon never received the memo that Islam is at war with Western Civilization. Or, that Islam is a brutally misogynistic ideology bent on the wholesale murder of women who dare show a little ankle. Oh, and did I forget to mention that its founder, Mohammed–had an unquenchable penchant for little girls? In short: Islam is evil. With that established–allow me to enlighten you as to what insanity our Pentagon is currently engaged in. The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) just announced that it will be providing our military with chaplains for active-duty service. That’s right–our Pentagon is...

Now that our society has officially lowered us all to the level of rutting rabbits, the Coalition for Positive Sexuality (positive.org) is specifically targeting and encouraging promiscuous sex, abortion, and homosexuality to young teenagers. The Younger the Better should be their slogan. Funded by the homosexual lobby (and perhaps finally putting the myth that there is no homosexual agenda to rest) CPS is aggressively pushing its agenda of more sex/no guilt/no consequences to young and impressionable children at public schools nationwide. The greatest concession to personal responsibility and self-restraint that they attempt is to urge you to try and not...

On the website of the liberal Catholic outlet, Commonweal, Mollie Wilson O’Reilly accuses Pope Francis of ignoring the problem of priestly sexual abuse. According to her, “he [the pope] has said and done little about the scandal itself,” maintaining that “things haven’t been fixed.” Similarly, Father Thomas P. Doyle says the pope “has done almost nothing” about this issue,” calling one of the pontiff’s efforts “so meaningless it is almost comical.” An editorial in the National Catholic Reporter also expresses its chagrin with the pope on this issue, imploring him “to meet with victims of clergy sex abuse.” Here are...

EVIDENCE has emerged that the views of the Paedophile Information Exchange influenced policy-making at the National Council for Civil Liberties when it was run by former Labour Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt. PIE members were lobbying NCCL officials for the age of consent to be reduced and campaigning for “paedophile love”. Their view that children were not harmed by having sex with adults appears to have been adopted by those at the top of the civil liberties group. Today we publish extracts from an NCCL report written for the Criminal Law Revision Committee in 1976 when Mrs Hewitt was general secretary....

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis reportedly pays the salary, health insurance premiums and living expenses for Reverend Gil Gustafson who was convicted for child sex abuse back in 1983. According to the Star Tribune, in addition to all these payments by the church, Rev. Gustafson is also paid disability by the state. The church says that in July 2006 Rev. Gustafson was declared “disabled� based on his pedophilia. He collects disability checks on top of his salary from the church as a "consultant." After Rev. Gustafson admitted he molested Brian Herrity for five years, he was fined...

The back-and-forth volleys among the Woody Allen and Mia Farrow families continue as Allen’s adopted daughter Dylan Farrow has released a statement responding to Allen’s piece published Friday online in the New York Times Sunday review section according to Variety. In the Woody Allen Speaks Out article, he defended himself against Dylan Farrow’s post published last Saturday in the New York Times alleging that Allen had molested her at the age of 7. Dylan Farrow’s response sent Friday night read as follows: Once again, Woody Allen is attacking me and my family in an effort to discredit and silence me...

As the Winter Games get underway in Sochi, Google Inc. is quietly but vibrantly adding its voice to the chorus of U.S. companies speaking out against Russia’s law that restricts gay-rights activities. The California-based Internet search company transformed its home page into a show of support for gay rights Thursday with a Google Doodle depicting athletes against a rainbow-colored backdrop. …

The Vatican blasted back at a UN-authored Rights of Children report, saying its criticism of the church's stand on homosexuality is driven by critics of the church's "non-negotiable" teachings. The U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child, whose members have included such nations as Saudi Arabia, Syria, Uganda and Thailand,accused the Vatican Wednesday of "systematically" adopting policies that allowed priests to rape and molest tens of thousands of children over decades, and urged it to open its files on pedophiles and bishops who concealed their crimes. Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the head of the Holy See's delegation to the United...

The Vatican blasted back at a UN report that accused it of allowing children to be abused by priests and condemned its stances on homosexuality, contraception and abortion, saying the findings were "ideological" and likely driven by critics of the church's "non-negotiable" teachings. The U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child, whose members have included such nations as Saudi Arabia, Syria, Uganda and Thailand,accused the Vatican Wednesday of "systematically" adopting policies that allowed priests to rape and molest tens of thousands of children over decades, and urged it to open its files on pedophiles and bishops who concealed their...

The Catholic Church must be held to account by a UN human rights watchdog for doing too little to halt and expose paedophile priests, victims of abuse by the clergy said Tuesday. David Clohessy, director of the US-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), said he had few hopes of a massive shake up by Pope Francis, who since being elected in March has made several pronouncements urging action. "We're dealing with a well-established, longstanding, extraordinarily powerful global monarchy, that really has few or any checks and balances on its power," he told reporters.

A nasty Norwegian diplomat at the UN frequently badmouths the Holy See. He wonders why Holy See diplomats are allowed into the room during negotiations. He says outright that the Holy See ought to leave. This has happened more than once.It’s amusing a Norwegian would say such a thing. The development of Norway is rather murky and it is hard to figure when Norway really became Norway. Norwegians might claim it was when Harald Fairhair unified disparate tribes and clans in 872 after the Battle of Hafrsfjord. Even so, it is questionable when the people living there began to...

BRUSSELS, Belgium, (Zenit.org).- The European Parliament on Tuesday is poised to debate a report that condemns the Catholic Church for its moral principles and its position on women priests. The document, written by Spanish Socialist Mariacute;a Izquierdo Rojo, was approved last October by the Womenacute;s Rights Commission and analyzed subsequently by the Citizensacute; Liberties and Rights Commission. Among other things, the document condemns quot;the administrations of religious organizations and the leaders of extremist political movements who promote racial discrimination, xenophobia, fanaticism and the exclusion of women from leading positions in the political and religious hierarchy.quot; The report could be voted...

Numerous studies have found that children who do not live with both biological parents, irrespective of socioeconomic status, are far more likely to be sexually abused than their peers in intact families. In particular, girls living in non-traditional families are found to have been sexually abused by their ‘stepfathers,’ either the married, cohabiting or casual partner of a divorced or single mother, at many times the rate girls are sexually abused by their natural fathers in intact families. (Snip) Child sexual abuse is not fully and frankly discussed because the public discourse is self-censored by politicians, academics, social service organisations,...

Pope Benedict XVI defrocked nearly 400 priests for raping and molesting children in his final two years before stepping down as the head of the Catholic Church in 2013, documents obtained by The Associated Press reveal. According to the data, 260 priests were deprived of their ecclesiastical status in 2012 and 124 in 2012 – more than a twofold increase over the 171 priests defrocked in the preceding two years. The figures represent the first time the Vatican has provided statistics on the number of priests to be removed for sex abuse as a result of the Church’s in-house procedures....

An ex-scoutmaster who admitted to molesting his son’s teenage friends and fellow troop members for years at his Keswick home pleaded guilty to 36 felony sex crimes Wednesday in Albemarle County Circuit Court. David Brian Watkins, now 50, entered into an agreement with prosecutors that shields him from additional local or federal charges and calls for an active term of 30 years and five months in prison. The agreement “provides closure for … very promising young men who can now get on with their lives,” Assistant Albemarle Commonwealth’s Attorney Darby Lowe said after the hearing. “The young men would have...

COCOA, Fla. – A student who turned to porn to help pay the bills had been kicked out of school. Robert Marucci told WKMDG Local 6 that made the decision to because he considered the job just that – work that would help with his family’s financial issues. For his effort, Marucci says he’s been bullied by students and now, he says the school is bullying him. Local 6 says Marucci’s mother was aware of what her son was doing and that he did so to support her financially. “I think he’s the most awesome person in the world,” she...

A former female MP was involved in a paedophile network at the heart of government, police have been told. She is alleged to have forced a boy in care to perform a “vile� sex act at one of a series of drug-fuelled parties in Westminster in the Eighties where boys and girls as young as 13 were allegedly abused. Last night her alleged victim told the Sunday Express: “I want justice.� Andrew Ash, now 45, said he has given Scotland Yard the name of the former MP. We cannot name her for legal reasons. Mr Ash claims he was frequently...

Pulaski County authorities have dropped charges against two foreign military officers who were training at Fort Leonard Wood when they were arrested. The Rolla Daily News reports that Mohammed Mahmoud Omar Mefleh, of Jordan, and Antoine Chlela, of Lebanon, were charged in October with enticement of a child and harassment. Court records say the men allegedly approached a 12-year-old girl at a bus stop and asked her to enter their vehicle. Pulaski County prosecutor Kevin Hillman said Friday that the charges were dropped as part of an agreement that includes the men paying the cost of their incarceration. Hillman says...

NEW YORK – The underlying assumption that has led to the increasing legitimization of same-sex marriage is now fueling a growing effort in academic circles to mainstream pedophilia. Once considered taboo, psychologists are beginning to walk down the same path LGBT activists established more than 50 years ago, insisting that pedophilia is an inborn “sexual orientation,” not a learned sexual behavior. If people are born with a sexual attraction to minors, the argument goes, their “orientation” should be accepted as normative and not stigmatized. James Cantor, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist in the Law and Mental Health Program at the...

Mark Newton, right, with Peter Truong and their son outside their Cairns home. An Australian, who together with his domestic partner, bought a newborn boy in Russia and allowed men around the world to abuse him, has been sentenced in a US court to 30 years in jail. Peter Truong, 36, born in Vietnam, and his partner Mark Newton, 42, born in the US, both Australian citizens, bought a newborn boy in Russia for US$8,000, according to prosecutors. The boy’s birth papers were falsified to list Newton as his biological father. The fraud then allowed the boy to be adopted...

Italy's highest court has overturned the conviction of a 60-year-old man for having sex with an 11-year-old girl, because the verdict failed to take into account their "amorous relationship". Pietro Lamberti, a social services worker in Catanzaro in southern Italy, was convicted in February 2011 and sentenced to five years in prison for sexual acts with a minor. The verdict was later upheld by an appeals court. But Italy's supreme court ruled that the verdict did not sufficiently consider "the 'consensus', the existence of an amorous relationship, the absence of physical force, the girl's feelings of love"(continued)

Among the thousands of documents Connecticut police released December 27 related to the heinous crime at Sandy Hook Elementary, the contents and files of Adam Lanza's computer include files on mass shootings, mass murders, pedophiles' rights, and a man/boy love story. According to police reports contained within the documents, Lanza's laptop computer contained "hundreds of bookmarks," a number of which were for "mass murder killing spree" and "mass murders." His desktop had a "document written showing the prerequisites for mass murder spreadsheet." Lanza's desktop also had a "document written advocating pedophiles' rights" and a "screenplay or script describing a relationship...

Pedophilia has been widely viewed as a psychological disorder triggered by early childhood trauma. Now, many experts see it as a biologically rooted condition that does not change — like a sexual orientation — thanks largely to a decade of research by Dr. James Cantor at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. Cantor’s team has found that pedophiles share a number of physical characteristics, including differences in brain wiring. It’s now thought that about 1 to 5 per cent of men are pedophiles, meaning they are primarily attracted to children. These findings have been widely accepted among scientists, but...

FULL TITLE: Boy Scouts of America will officially welcome gay members on New Year's Day as they grapple with questions about group showers and tentmates The Boy Scouts of America will accept openly gay youths starting New Year's Day, marking a historic shift that spells major changes to policies on tentmates and showers. Yet despite their be-prepared approach, BSA leaders are rooting for the change to be a non-event, comparable to another New Year's Day in 2000 when widespread fears of digital-clock chaos to start the new millennium proved unfounded. ‘My hope is there will be the same effect this...

First, let me say that I don’t want to hear anything from the homosexuals, their supporters, supporters of polygamy or any other perversion of God ordained sexuality. We told you this was coming and it has arrived. Researchers with Canada’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health have concluded, after a decade of research, that pedophilia is a deep-rooted, unchangeable predisposition. The Toronto Star reports: Pedophilia has been widely viewed as a psychological disorder triggered by early childhood trauma. Now, many experts see it as a biologically rooted condition that does not change — like a sexual orientation — thanks largely...

If you doubt there's an unwritten code of honor among criminals -- governing certain behavior that's just not permitted -- consider this: Police say a burglar in southern Spain who stole an old Super 8 camera and tapes from a home discovered to his horror the graphic video content of a man sexually abusing boys. The burglar put three tapes in a brown envelope, hid them under a parked car, and then called police from a public phone, directing them to go find it. Inside the envelope, police found a note with the home address of the suspected pedophile and...

An inquiry into child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church has revealed a paedophile priest was allowed to continue teaching at a Sydney school, despite a number of complaints against him. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is examining the church's responses to Raymond Foster and his victims.

An Italian high court has dismissed the sentence in a case of pedophilia on the grounds that there was “romance” involved between the 60 year-old social services worker and the 11 year-old girl in his care. Pietro Lamberti, who works for the social services department of Catanzaro in Calabria in the south, was found in bed with the girl, described as “disadvantaged” in the press, by local police who raided his house in June 2011. The Court of Cassation overturned a five-year sentence for a conviction of sexual violence against a minor. Italy’s age of consent is 14 and rises...

A judge has reserved her decision on a further extradition hearing for former Catholic brother Bernard Kevin McGrath who faces hundreds of child sex abuse charges in Australia.

FULL TITLE: Father, 32, and his domestic partner 'kept son, 9, captive for 8 months and sexually tortured and abused him and used him for child porn' Two Alabama men have been charged with imprisoning and filming their sexual abuse of a minor for use in child pornography made with the son of one of the accused. Domestic partners Charles Dunnavant and Carl Herold face a litany of charges ranging from sexual torture and sodomy to exposing a person to an STD and child pornography production. Authorities are seeking a $1million cash bond for each of the accused, the boy...

http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20131210/LOCAL06/131219972

WARSAW, Poland — A Roman Catholic priest in central Poland was sentenced Monday to 8 ½ years in prison after being convicted of sexually abusing five boys. It was the toughest punishment given to a priest in Poland in a child sexual abuse case. Priests are considered to be top moral figures by most people in the predominantly Catholic nation, where the church has helped preserve national identity and supported independence efforts under decades of communism. Previously, priests were generally treated with leniency and handed small or suspended sentences.

A year after arriving in Los Angeles, the youngest archbishop in the U.S. Catholic Church had a schedule and an agenda befitting a presidential candidate. Roger Mahony raced around the city in a chauffeured sedan, exhorting labor leaders to support immigrant rights and rallying hundreds against a proposed prison in Boyle Heights.

Aside from being an essayist, novelist and screenwriter, Gore Vidal was a grade-one gossip, his published writings and private conversation stuffed with rumour and conspiratorial hints. But now, less than 18 months after Vidal passed into history, he is himself subject to the most reputation-destructive scuttlebutt there is: the suggestion that he may have been a paedophile. In connection with a new book about Vidal, his half-sister and a nephew have hinted that he may have had a secret passion for underage boys. And Vidal more or less admitted it himself, writing in his memoir Palimpsest that he was "attracted...

Senior Catholic Church leaders protected pedophiles, allowed them to keep offending and kept Victorians in the dark about the problem. A Victorian parliamentary report is scathing of the church's leadership prior to the 1990s, saying child abuse was trivialised and their protection of pedophiles meant abuse happened when it could have been avoided. Archbishop Denis Hart apologised to victims and said previous responses to abuse cases were inexcusable, calling it the worst betrayal of his lifetime in the church.

After certain press criticism and a productive online backlash in the blogosphere, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) is performing a gratifying volte-face in its use of the term sexual "orientation" for paedophilia. In its fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), the APA has distinguished between paedophilic disorder and paedophilic orientation. Paedophilia-advocacy groups, like B4U-ACT, a grassroots lobby group, have long seen the declassification of paedophilia to the status of an "orientation" for “minor-attracted persons" (MAPs) to be a necessary means to their ends. The North American Man-Boy Love Association (and numerous international affiliates advocating...

Twenty former residents of a Catholic boys home in Bedfordshire have now joined a legal action to seek compensation. Detectives are investigating claims of sexual and physical abuse at the St Francis Boys Home, in Shefford. But ex-residents are angry that police files from two previous enquiries have gone missing.

After a national backlash from social conservatives, the American Psychiatric Association (ASA) has dropped its designation of pedophilia as a “sexual orientation.” In May, the APA released the Fifth Edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). In this document, the first new edition in 10 years, the APA described pedophilia as a sexual “orientation.” The classification went largely unnoticed until last month, when the NeonTommy blog of the Annenberg Digital News at the University of Southern California published a blog post critical of the terminology. Social conservatives said calling pedophilia an “orientation” was a step towards...

The American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) decision to once again reclassify pedophilia has led to further concerns that the professional organization is attempting to legitimize the disorder, paving the way for its defense and the recommendation of removal of age-of-consent laws.In a press release Friday, Liberty Counsel, a nonprofit organization that promotes the causes of religious liberty, the sanctity of human life, and the family observed that in its newly published Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5), APA “changed the classification of pedophilia from a ‘disorder’ to a ‘sexual orientation,’ but, following the public outcry, APA released...

Washington, DC—The American Psychiatric Association (APA) has changed the definition of pedophilia again. In the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-V) of Mental Disorders, the APA changed the classification of pedophilia from a “disorder” to a “sexual orientation,” but following the public outcry, APA released a statement that it was a mistake. “‘Sexual orientation’ is not a term used in the diagnostic criteria for pedophilic disorder, and its use in the DSM-5 text discussion is an error and should read ‘sexual interest.’” When releasing the original DSM-V, APA said it “marked the end of more than a...

MONTREAL - A Roman Catholic priest says his attempt to raise the issue of sexual abuse with colleagues resulted in him being ostracized and eventually fired from a famous Montreal church. The story told by Rev. Andre Samson suggests that the Vatican's promises of a new, more open approach to dealing with sexual crimes has not necessarily translated through the church rank-and-file.

Two separate gang-rape crimes and one specific charge of sorcery within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are being reported in a single article by the Persian Gulf-centered news portal Emirates 24/7 on Oct. 29, 2013. Life's a Witch... With Islamic sharia law being at the core of the Kingdom's legal and penal system, a yet to be identified Filipina has been picked up by the Saudi Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (aka: "The Morality Police) on charges of being a sorceress. Identified only as being "a woman in her 40s," the accused practitioner of the...

3-year-old Saudi girl gang-raped • Girl still in intensive care unit Several men abducted a three-year-old Saudi girl and took turns in raping her before dumping the child near a hospital in a serious condition. Disclosing the crime on Monday, police said they had arrested three suspects and two women and that more could be arrested in connection with the rape. Doctors at the hospital in the Western Red Sea port of Jeddah said the child was found crying and in serious condition in front of the hospital on Ramadan 13, adding that she is still in the intensive care...

I have written more than once that a goal of homosexualists includes the elimination of the age of consent.  Goals like this are attained through creeping incrementalism.I just read this, from the University of Southern California: Pedophilia Now Classified As A Sexual OrientationPeople can classify themselves as heterosexual, homosexual, asexual, metrosexual. There are endless sexual orientations under the sun, and now, pedophilia can be added to the list. In the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM V), the American Psychological Association (APA) drew a very distinct line between pedophilia and pedophilic disorder. Pedophilia refers to...

So what does a man like Harvey Milk get for his apparent crimes? While most sexual predators get time in prison and a dishonorable mention on the registry of sex offenders, Harvey Milk got his own California state holiday ("Harvey Milk Day") and, more recently, his own commemorative postage stamp, awarded by the Obama administration's USPS.

The final criminal chapter in the child pornography case against a Northland Catholic priest concluded Friday when the Rev. Shawn F. Ratigan pleaded guilty in Clay County Circuit Court to three counts of possessing child pornography.

A jury found a Saudi Arabian air force sergeant guilty Wednesday of raping a 13-year-old boy at a Las Vegas Strip hotel last New Year's Eve. Defendant Mazen Alotaibi remained seated, clenching his jaw but showing no outward emotion as the verdict was read in Nevada state court. The 24-year-old Royal Saudi Air Force mechanic, who had been in the U.S. for military training, will face a minimum mandatory 35 years in state prison at sentencing Dec. 16. Clark County District Court Judge Stefany Miley could sentence him to prison for life. The jury of nine women and three men...

A FORMER child protection officer claimed last night a Special Branch detective held a gun to his head to stop him investigating a VIP paedophile ring. Chris Fay said he was pinned to a wall and throttled before being given a chilling warning to “back away” from allegations surrounding the notorious Elm Guest House in Barnes, south-west London. Young boys in care were allegedly taken there in the Eighties to be abused by high-profile MPs and other powerful establishment figures. Mr Fay, who worked for the now-defunct National Association of Young People In Care, accused the Metropolitan Police of acting...