Pedophilia - and Worse!

May, 2002.

From time to time we non-Catholics have heard sexual inuendo whispered about, but always by those who were also whispering same things about the Protestants and the Democrats and all those other folks. We always assumed the very fact that such rumors were about were proof that they existed only as feckless charges in evil, and perhaps envious minds.
However now that the facts seem to reveal that at least 250 priests and 4 bishops actually were guilty enough of this seduction of members of their own flocks to be caught, we must wonder how deep the carnage actually went.
The immediate problem of pedophilia goes to the pedophile and the one attacked. That is a serious crime and problem that lasts a lifetime. Far more serious though is an act of coverup, and permission for the perpertrator to continue in another venu. Such action reveals a certanl level of gamesmanship between the prelates and the flock. It also reveals the presence of a casual contemptousness of those whose flocks are so facile that they should actually believe what their leaders say to them.
The Bishops who were aware of the allegations and did not report it to civil authorities were guilty of a far greater betrayal of their faith and their following than the pedophile. The fact that the Bishops would reassign a pedophilic priest even one time, much less again and again, is serious enough to require civil action.
This problem is not the church’s problem anyway, it belongs in the domain of the state. Not to treat it thusly is to repeat the same mistake the Navy women made when they tried to handle the groping and rapes they encountered at “Tailgate” through the Navy. That simply made a serious problem a matter of smirking contempt from the Navy. The Clark County (Nevada) Sheriff’s office would have treated this matter very differently. The Catholic church has treated these abused children with the same smirking contempt. They would have had to react diffferently if local authorities had prosecuted the issue and if priests and bishops had to testify under oath.