NYT, TWO STUDIES CITE CHILD SEX ABUSE BY 4% OF PRIESTS, By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
WASHINGTON, Feb. 26— Two long-awaited studies have found that the Roman Catholic Church suffered an epidemic of child sexual abuse that involved at least 4 percent of priests over 52 years and peaked with the ordination class of 1970, in which one of every 10 priests was eventually accused of abuse.
The human toll amounted to 10,667 children allegedly victimized by 4,392 priests from 1950 to 2002, but the studies caution that even these numbers represent an undercount. The totals depend on self-reporting by American bishops, the studies note, and many victims have never come forward out of fear or shame.
Even the authors of the two reports do not agree on the meaning of the findings. The review board's report mentions that more than 80 percent of the abuse at issue was of a homosexual nature. The report theorizes that the problem reflects a cohort of gay priests, based on their figures that the percentage of male victims rose from 64 percent in the 1950's, to 76 percent in the 1960's and 86 percent in the 1980's.
Yes, the Catholic Church must scrutinize candidates entering the priesthood and make sure they are not homosexual. In any religion, it is a beautiful calling to spread the word of God, but not as a homosexual.
You have a choice, either protect little boys from homosexuals, or protect homosexuals and let them do as they wish.
If you visualize these serial sexual predators wearing cargo shorts, T-shirts, flip-flops, and ball caps, you’d be able to better see their depravity.
They have long hidden behind pristine silks, large silly hats, and rosary beads.
They are dangerous animals among us. The idea that one of these men was confirmed as a cardinal (or bishop?) notwithstanding knowledge that he was sexually abusing children is — well, it is actually Satanic.
These men belong in jail.
And I am formerly a devout Catholic.
2
Boy, there's a shocker, more cover up by clergy in the sex abuse scandal. The entire fraternal order of pedophiles needs to be excommunicated, top to bottom..... criminal proceedings need to proceed, the Church's tax-exempt status needs to be removed, and the Church needs to be court-ordered to pay restitution to all of their victims - enough is enough!!!
2
The church is a Secret Society, and like all secret societies, has secrets that it cannot share. There is something strange about a group of men who parade about in cloaks and towering headdresses, who call themselves cardinals and dress in red. What strange pomposity in people who claim to serve the creator. And his son.
3
Not only do we need to take a close look at the Catholic Church; we need to examine all churches and then look at the belief system itself. In the near future, we will program the human mind in the computer, and this program will be based on a "survival" algorithm. When we do this, we will have irrefutable proof as to how we have tricked our minds with ridiculous beliefs about just exactly what is supposed to survive. We will finally see the harm in all beliefs and begin the long road back to reason. This won't be easy or quick, but necessary if the human species is to survive.
See RevolutionOfReason.com
2
Despite what a lot of people, Catholics among them, believe, celibacy and not allowing clergy to marry are not the root causes of sexual predation in the Roman Catholic church. At issue is the fact that Church leaders, starting in Rome, have been chronically lax in identifying predators in their midst and, worse still, have refused to take action against those they have identified. Move them around has been their policy. Make them some other parish's problem. When what they should have done was notify the police immediately and welcome the imprisonment of the criminals in their midst. Here, they failed miserably and, in doing so, have driven tens of thousands of the faithful from the Church, myself included.
It is long past time to investigate every single instance of abuse in the church. Obviously the church is not the appropriate institution to do so. Kudos to Pennsylvania for conducting a grand jury and inditing the perpetrators. Each and every state needs to do the same. (NY and NJ have announced plans to do so) This horrific stain needs to be aired for all to see. All the victims need to be heard and comforted. The perpetrators and those who covered up the abuse need to be punished. Only then can the church move forward. The church abandoned its people and preyed on its very own innocent believers. Shameful and sinful.
1
All these matters need to be dealt with by civil authorities.
The church proved long ago that it prefers to cover up instead.
There is twisted churchy rationalization for such despicable behaviour - which the rest of us have no need to understand.
Bring in the cops!
2
Men to whom vows mean nothing.
My thoughts are that there are two possible solutions to this global infestation of Catholic church pedo priests. 1) International Criminal Court in the Hague. Vatican goes on trial for crimes against humanity. We are at how many countries now? How many tens of thousands of people have become the victims of sex abuse now? And two) people drop out of the catholic church. At this point, anyone who still goes is complicit in the crimes against humanity and an enabler of child abuse. I don’t care if it’s “your local church and none of that abuse stuff happened there”. Doesnt matter. It’s still a part of the larger whole organization. Either one has an unshakeable set of morals and ethics that include do no harm or they do not. If one stays, you have just sacrificed your moral and ethics for the greater good of the parasitic abusive catholic church - so that organization can keep “living”, as it needs followers in order to survive.
My mother grew up in Ireland. She often told me that it was predicted, "The Catholic Church would go down and it would be the priests who would drag it down". Some prophecies do come true!
4
"Nothing concrete emerged from the meeting."
A bunch of old men sitting around talking and doing nothing, as they have for decades (when they aren't engaging in criminal behavior or covering it up). That's the Roman Catholic Church. Why anybody continues to support this morally bankrupt institution beggars belief.
3
Had any of this happened in any other institution - a multi-national company, a world-class university - it would have been shut down so fast it would make your head spin. And the perps would be locked up for good.
I hate to think what the reaction of the public would be if this had happened in the ranks of other world religions with representatives in the US.
But at least the Vatican sees the urgency - only five months to go before they gather to pray for the victims and exonerate themselves. Again.
p.
4
Papal inquiry? Sorry, not interested in reading about that. Only federal and local law enforcement inquiries are acceptable at this point and time. 30 years of the church controlling the narrative, and it still continues. No more.
47
@Scott-Agreed. Accepting the resignations of cardinals and bishops who have covered up criminal activity and defrocking abusive priests not only doesn't serve justice--but potentially casts these people onto unsuspecting communities. This leaves untreated people free to continue their patterns of abuse and denial and the sickness to go on. Past time for law enforcement to step in and those victimized to pursue both criminal and civil charges
3
The Catholic Church has been doing this shuffle and dance for hundreds of years- "We're going to have a meeting!" "We are forming a Papal Commission!", they have no intention of changing. The only way to force change is to threaten their God - Money. Cut off all funding for the Church, Catholic Charities, Catholic Universities, Catholic Hospitals, everything. Kill their tax exempt status, no more government grants, no more foundation funding, no more private donations, all the way down to the collection plate. When this really begins to hurt, then, maybe, they will begin to change.
10
This problem has been an issue ever since the rule of celibacy became a requirement for all priests about the 12th century, creating a group of sexually deprived and frustrated priests, who, under the cloak of their “pastoral care” began the abuse of the innocents, children and women.
In spite of their own deviance and disregard for their own vows, these priests essentially treated women as second class citizens within their own marriages, requiring submission to abusive husbands’ demands for sex. Womens’ health issues became secondary as they bore child after child, forbidden to use any form of birth control. Young girls who became pregnant outside of marriage were harshly condemned for their behavior and condition while the role of the impregnators was virtually disregarded.
Yet the church for well over 800 years has continually failed to exert appropriate action and discipline over their perverted priests, hiding the problem, denying the problem, shifting the miscreants to other venues where they simply continued their abominable practices. The hierarchy of the church was well aware of the problem and, in their failure to act, they basically became enablers of these heinous practices.
Time has come that these practices, the perpetrators and those who covered it, up must be exposed, disciplined, and imprisoned through the civil court of law as would any other secular sexual violators.
37
@Gillian-Sexual abuse of others isn't a natural consequence of being sexually frustrated and frustrated. There are many causes, but a significant one may be that those who enter the priesthood are emotionally arrested. They are vaulted in their roles into spokesmen for God by the Catholic Church and given enormous power and access. At the same time, they are shamed and forced into denial around their sexual deviancy and psychological stuntedness and forced to go underground. This is a sickness in the Catholic Church.
8
@Gillian
One could blame the celibacy rule but it is a chicken-or-egg problem.
While there were also scandals of yore (Indian) nuns were recruited before they knew what they were doing, these men know full well what they are getting into.
I don't know what is the requisites now but I had a friend who was studying at Boston College for priesthood. That alone would take 6 years. He eventually opted out because he wanted to get married.
Instead, I used to work with an Italian American who grew up in Italy before emigrating to America. He told me an interesting theory: he said some priests had problems, that they fled to the priesthood because they were afraid of women. I thought my former colleague's theory was a bit weird.
I agree with you though, God's to God and Caesar's to Caesar. No church, catholic or otherwise, can be a shield for abuses and assaults. If priests and nuns, in whatever religion, want to have consensual relationships with each other, under their doctrinal covers or not, it is their business. However, they mustn't allow to be a shelter for deviants harming society at large.
To prevent that, The Catholic Church, in this case, will need to screen their candidates for priesthood. Prevention is better than intervention. Alas, even now, the so-called whisper blower didn't attack the current Pope because of abuses and coverups but because of doctrinal dispute. The conservative wing is using this as a pretext to attack the liberal wing, that's all
2
Today the news comes that in Germany a report done with the hesitant cooperation of The Church shows 3,677 people were abused from 1946 -2014.
Spiegel Online and Die Zeit said the report they obtained — commissioned by the German Bishops Conference and researched by three universities — concludes that more than half of the victims were 13 or younger and most were boys. Every sixth case involved rape and at least 1,670 clergy were involved, both weeklies reported. Die Zeit wrote that 969 abuse victims were altar boys.
They add that this is just a drop in the bucket of what actually happened and is currently going on.
So what will the pious do?
Will they continue to support The Church?
Will they circle the wagons and claim that this is Catholic bashing?
A few elderly clergy being let go?
Some statements of regret and let's call it a day?
The world is watching.
14
Why are these crimes not being investigated by secular authorities?
What other crimes and allegations are they allowed to deal with "in house"?
Can baptists do that? Quakers? Sikhs? Unitarians?
8
We’re supposed to applaud the Pope for this?
According to the note under the photo, this guy is
resigning due to his alleged harassment of adults.
Geez, is this the best that the Pope can do?
6
More of the same.
The church needs to make a public vow that it will no longer transfer pederast priests, but will report them to the police immediately. Until this happens, all their public excuses and apologies are hollow lies.
Protecting predatory clergy at the cost of children's lives is true moral perversion.
5
The relentless drumbeat of abuse and cover-up by the bureaucrats of the Catholic Church. Nothing short of a call to action for the laity to take back their Church.
3
Well if Kavanaugh is outed, Bransfield could throw his silly looking hat in the ring.
3
Where do these church leaders get the $$$ for houses on the Jersey Shore? Not cheap.
5
The Catholic hierarchy will aggressively assert that it isn’t rife with rapists and child molesters, just a few bad apples.
Unfortunately the REST of the Catholic hierarchy, starting with the Pope and the Cardinals and the Bishops have at a minimum succored and protected these monsters.
In some cases, the Cardinals and the Bishops ARE the monsters.
10
Every single one of these priests, bishops, archbishops, cardinals and the pope himself absolutely, steadfastly refuse to acknowledge for one minute the fact that is so obvious to every other person on this planet (and probably the ones in Heaven, too, if in fact there is one):
They are the problem. They have proven that they cannot and will not be part of the solution.
Religion is not a rationale for rape. Priestly piety cannot excuse predators.
They've had too many chances to open their secret societies and cabals of interest, to stop throwing the robes of the many who serve and believe faithfully to cover over the twisted few.
The Catholic hierarchy is like ISIS, hiding their assassins among the innocent civilians so allow them to 'pass' until ready to strike.
No further "discussions" should include priests, bishops or cardinals. In allowing the vicious to hide among them, they are all complicit. Any meeting the pope has - and there should be many - must be limited to civil authorities, victims, and the mental and physical health professionals who can advise on helping them to heal.
The longer Francis allows the clergy to limit their discussions to those who are responsible, the more credibility he himself loses. The Catholic Church doesn't have that much more to spare.
5
In all religious organizations it's the women who do the heavy lifting and keep the organization together. The Sisterhoods in all faiths are the basis of the community.
It's past time they were in charge.
There is room and need for an Archbishop Magdalene.
4
As a kid, I was educated by the Jesuits, dedicated teachers and high intellectuals. But hen I grew up, it started to strike me that the requirement of celibacy was an inherently ridiculous proposition that denies one of the fundamentals of human existence.
Consider this: official dogma says that the purpose of sex is procreation and the making of more souls for god; that woman kind created 'original sin' so therefore women can't be priests. Is it surprising there is so much sexual abuse revealed by people who are supposed to be the paragons of virtue?
Then consider this: people like Cardinal DiNardo wear funny hats and ornate robes) left over from the medieval ages as symbols of their authority (so does the Pope.
When I became a young man, I found myself discovering that priests regularly had affairs with local lonely women and there were always whispers about closed-door stuff with the altar-boys.
Now I ask the fundamental question: why is it left to the Roman Catholic Church to investigate criminal allegations against people like Mr. DiNardo? I emphasize the title "Mister".
4
Bishop Lori is the last person to be investigating Bishop Bransfield. When a young priest in his Diocese reported financial irregularities by his pastor, he was ignored. When the priest brought in an outside investigator to document the pastor's finagaling, the priest himself was criticized by the Diocese for making the situation public. The criticism was so intense that the man left the priesthood.
Lori is one of the many men in the hierarchy who believe that the church must protect itself at all costs. God help the people of West Virginia if they expect justice from him.
7
@Joseph Thomas, I don't think many in West Virginia expect justice from much of anyone.
this criminal organization probably should be prosecuted and if found guilty, closed down. some of those old men in their fancy robes and hats have outlived their usefulness. the church has done a lot of good things over the years, but that does not excuse its criminal conduct by so many of their leaders.
3
When will local law enforcement step in and do a thorough, non-biased investigation? The Catholic Church hierarchy which enabled this abuse for so many years would not be my first pick to run the investigation.
5
We need secular Grand Juries to investigate each and every Bishop in the USA. We want to know what they knew and when they knew it!! Especially Dolan and Chaput. Even O'Malley knew what was going on perhaps only in hearsay. However, he knew and his leadership on this issue is pathetic. He is a bland, no leadership, lousy Pastor. He is my Bishop living blocks from me - yet we never hear from him other than holidays when he does the photo-ops.
18
The death of a religion by a thousand conspiracies.
6
For every one molestation disclosed there likely are 10 more. I was raised Catholic with 12 years of parochial education. I would not entrust my children to any Catholic clergy. Celibacy requirements have eaten the priesthood from within. Unfortunately, the Catholic Church has made itself into a sordid club of misfit priests.
26
My own little unscientific proof of how the corrupt leaders of the church are destroying churches is my hometown of Middletown, CT. We have five Catholic churches and all the weekly Bulletins are posted online by the churches. All the Bulletins list the weekly offertory collection. All five churches are struggling to bring in money and the rapid fall off in collections is mind numbing. One church that consistently brought in 18K a week is now bringing in maybe 10K a week. The other smaller churches are struggling to bring in 4K to 5K a week. All of them cannot survive. I don't mind supporting my church but I hate the fact that 10 percent of what I give, goes to the Diocese which in turn flows to the top church Bureaucrats. This money is being wasted on First Class trips to Rome for meetings that are all for show. Lots of good Priests but the "Uncle Ted" McCarrick story and this guy Bransfield make me question supporting these spoiled Princes. Change the leadership or more people will vote with their wallets.
31
Has anyone asked what role John Paul II played in the rise of some of these bishops and archbishops?
21
@jeanisobel1 why ask? the leadership has been hiding the criminal conduct for many many years and have no intention of opening their files in the USA and the Vatican. this is a criminal organization run by criminals and their associates.
4
The sexual abuse scandal is tragic, but what's up with a WV Bishop owning a beach house on the Jersey shore?
30
Refuse to put money in those Sunday envelopes, Catholics! Since so many Catholic parish schools have closed, the priests count on those envelopes, adding on "special" collections at every Mass they can. That money is nothing but a contribution to the pedophile lifestyle of the priests and their subsequent defense funds. And, if you still want to have your babies baptized Catholic, or Catholic marriage ceremonies, or burial Mass, and the pedophile mafia turns you down, use every possible means to expose that thuggery to the media - traditional and social media - and to local law enforcement.
23
“Pedophile mafia”? I’m not excusing the Church at all (and I join those who want law enforcement involved, but there are many good, sincere priests. Don’t lump them all together.
1
Damage control. Why is the church allowed to get away with pushing the scenario that this is a sudden, emergent problem nobody ever encountered before? A history of a few scattered apologies have done nothing to stem the child rapists among church employees. We've seen how the church deals with this: cover-ups and sheltering of rapists. It is high time for this to be handled by prosecutions and not by the offending organization itself.
https://emcphd.wordpress.com
37
Pedophiles associate themselves with institutions that provide access to children - schools, scouts and the church, among others. Strong, healthy institutions weed them out and turn them over to authorities for prosecution. The Catholic church is compromised and left vulnerable by the unsustainable vow of chastity that renders those who lapse vulnerable and compels them to ignore criminal behavior by potential blackmailers.
21
@garyb1101:I entirely agree with you
that predators choose organizations
which give them access to young
people.but there seems to be a
different standard between priests
and scout masters, for instance.
it has always puzzled me why a gay
man would want to be in a tent
overnight with a group of young boys
in their pjs.and yet the media does
not report in any significant way when
a scout master is accused of molesting
a young boy.as a man who has never
married,for whatever reason, I would
never put myself in any situation of
that sort.if this intense coverage of
priests is good and necessary, and it
is,then the same coverage and,and
in this section, commentary, should
apply across the board, rather than
simply calling priests ugly names.
1
@garyb1101 But you note yourself that schools and the scouts also have had pedophiles infiltrate their organizations and many of them are married.
It's not celibacy that is the problem. Some do very well with it. It's a twisted notion of power that is taught to seminarians that they have special powers due to ordination that make them so special they they don't have to be accountable to the people they lead or deal with the same experiences they do because they are the experts already. No 26 year old has the maturity to deal with that kind of head trip. Let mid career men, married or not, who have been tested in the workplace, raised their families (it would be horrible to foist a priest's life-in-a-fishbowl on growing children), and been proven to be decent human beings, be allowed to train for the priesthood, not high school or college graduates who are hardly old enough to have fully developed brains. There are a lot of laicized priests who honorably fled the corruption and proved themselves in society who could fill the bill.
3
Why does this corrupt (in any other context would be labeled disgusting) organization continue to exist?
22
"deck chairs, Titanic"?
18
Of the many shocking details to emerge, I have lingered over this small one: Bishop McCarrick, and evidently also Bransfield, owned beach houses where they enjoyed entertaining.
Are bishop salaries so generous that this is a luxury commonly afforded among that rank, or did their wealth to begin with allow them to buy their way to their rank?
62
@Stephanie
No families to provide for... no wives to notice, no children to make them feel ashamed of raping other people's children.
9
@Stephanie
Bought and paid for by side deals in the diocese to raise funds for the express purpose of a 'vacation home' for the beloved Father. Ostensibly the property of the Church but in the total control of the resident. The rich parishioners are feted and dined at special gatherings for ancillary funds, outside the collection box. As usual with corruption, follow the money.
3
@Stephanie
The Church allows priests to inherit family homes, funds, insurance proceeds, gifts from parishioners, etc. Many priests in my R.C. diocese live in the family home they inherited, not in the rectory. Some who served as military chaplains get pensions. Owning an inherited family beach house or camp could easily happen.
6
Without being too oppressive in saying this, the cohort from which new Church leaders are picked is getting pretty shoddy. Who - women excepted - wants to be a priest? And so the cohort from which the hierarchy selects leaders from now on is getting bare in talent.
The modern pastoral role is feminine, using the term in the old stereotype sense for want of a better term yet. Picture for yourself the various cross-currents and impulses and problems for seminarians inching into that role, given their inclination towards pastoral service.
It's all OK with me: too bad the Church isn't able to think this through and modernize as needed.
9
The Catholic parishioners who donate to the church remain complicit in these evil acts. Abolish the Catholic Church until the mess can be cleaned up.
24
One needs investigation from an outside force, the police, in order to conduct a credible investigation. Its seems the RCC isn't interested in a credible investigation thus perpetuating their secretive and insular culture.
47
Wow - Bishop Lori again? Another fox watching a henhouse again.
Please look at the attached article which is about one of the times Catholics were let down by this man. The Diocese of Bridgeport, CT, has had issues with this Bishop time and again. I hope people in Baltimore and West Virginia look out for their best interests.
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/ten-minute-activist/2003-12-05-Lori...
23
The pattern here seems to be that an all-male celibate clergy is complete unrealistic and is ground zero for criminality of an epic scale. It absolutely requires grown men to have an available supply of vulnerable people to coerce sexually and then lie about it as the very DNA of a fantasy system that cannot be sustained otherwise. After seeing that there are thousands and thousands of victims, it is beyond clear that it does not work at all.
These same men are instructing women on reproductive issues. To worship a fertilized egg and then prey upon children and adults alike points to a perverse hiding in plain sight - claiming a superior sense of "purity" while ruining lives. Unbelievable damage.
60
YES. Thank you for pointing that out. They are so arrogant they think they should control all women, not just their sheep. And obviously they don't care if there are more unwanted and abused children in the world because of their barbaric attitudes. They enjoy and promote child abuse every day.
4
@Kay Johnson-That Judge Kavanaugh, who claims to be a proud Catholic, defined birth control as "abortion-inducing drugs" says it all. If he's allowed to join the US Supreme Court, that will mean six of the nine justices have Roman Catholic backgrounds.
2
So why would we think that another bishop would be the appropriate choice to investigate another bishop? Pope Francis' credibility would be helped if he was willing to appoint a lay person or lay board to do an independent and objective investigation. Anything less would be suspect.
76
@anne Make sure that lay person is a former prosecutor.
18
@anne-More is needed. Just last month, Australia’s Catholic leaders rejected a call to report sex abuse heard in confessions. In the the U.S. that should make them mandated reporters. But clearly they still want to make the rules to protect their own above and beyond the people they are meant to serve in their churches.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/31/world/australia/catholic-church-sex-a...
1
This line in the second paragraph is all you need to read"The pope has assigned the Archbishop of Baltimore, William E. Lori, to handle the investigation"
One bishop is accused of sexual harassment and another bishop is appointed by the pope to conduct an investigation. It seems nothing has changed.
90
Sad when it seems the Church needs an Internal Affairs Division.
The pope still doesn't get it.
The hierarchy created this problem so why would you let them anywhere near the solution!
Create a commission of lay men and women to work with prosecutors to end this evil. End the statute of limitations for crimes of pedophilia and the sexual abuse of minors!
Until priests are allowed to marry and women are invited into the priesthood, this scourge will never end!
What rational, educated man would want to join this corrupt institution as a priest? Would you allow your 10 year old son OR daughter to be alone with a Catholic priest at this point in time?
It's all about the power and the church is loosing it's power and it's grip on the ignorant masses.
48
@Richard Marcley. 35 years ago, I didn't allow my son's to be alone with Priests.
56 years ago, I started Cathollic elementary school. I saw a nUn break a large wooden ruler over the back of a 5 year old boy. I saw another nun hoist a crying boy off the floor by his ears. These are God's people!
Boys received physical abuse, girls mental and emotional abuse.
I've known a few good priests and nuns...a few.
My kids were not involve with these people. If someone harmed one of mine, I would have killed them with no guilt.
5
No one knows how many bad apples there are in the barrel, but so far the bad ones who have been unmasked have spoiled them all. How can anyone - Catholic or otherwise - look at any priest today and not wonder if he has committed sexual abuse? The religion teaches faith, but faith in the priesthood has been lost.
23
@SkepticaL We wonder and the Priests know we wonder. I've personally heard a priest (Monsenior) express his wish that he could have married and have had children. Another say he was engaged to be married before he joined the priesthood. That was one confused guy, to be honest. But they told us this so we knew they were not interested in children.
The allusion to Bransfield belonging to a family full of Catholic clergy is singularly chilling.
Something very cultish about a clan who somehow manages to encourage respective members to enter a profession involving an anti-social and bizarre lifestyle requiring eternal celibacy.
Just another good reason for rational Catholics today to tear to shreds their 'sacramental' certificates and tell the Church to get lost with its psychopathic threats of eternal damnation for sinners. A factory for neurosis and deviant behaviour.
31
This firestorm is international in scope and it will keep burning.
10
On the positive side, there will be a lot of job openings for new priests. Maybe this time around centuries of acceptable misconduct will be rectified. Imagine the number of new names on the Sex Offenders database and all the relocation activity as these sickos move out of school neighborhoods.
Waiting for the Trump tweet that all the sex offenders are democrats.
7
@James C No they're not, they're Republicans! To a number every member of the hierarchy in the American Catholic church has been voting Republican since Ronald Reagan and the war on womens'rights began in full force. I am certain Bishop Bransfield is a registered Republican like most of his cohorts. BTW, prior to being named bishop of W-Charleston, he was Archbishop of the Military Archdiocese in Washington DC and was responsible for Catholic chaplains assigned to various branches of the United States military.
9
@J O'Brien Need to correct information previously submitted: Bishop Bransfield served as rector at the Basilica of the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington DC before bring named Bishop of W-Charleston. He was NOT involved w/the Military Archdiocese as stated.
@J O'Brien: Excellent point, and one not made anywhere near often enough! The corrupt-to-the-core GOP naturally attracts these sexually corrupt men, hypocrites obsessed with-- as another reader put it in these Comments-- "worshiping fetuses," while ignoring the the pain and suffering of women with unwanted pregnancies.
The first questions is, "What would jesus do?"
The majority of priest who are sex criminals need to write an open letter to the Pope saying they will all resign unless he, the Pope, does his job properly as Jesus would.
Solutions often are simple but require courage.
6
Just shut down the Catholic Church
41
It should be noted that this story is not about an accused pedophile, but a bishop accused of sexual activity with adult men. This isn't, apparently, criminal, but a spiritual abuse of vows of celibacy. No mention is made of whether the objects of his attention were male or female. There has been frequent mention of rampant homosexual activity among priests. Homosexuals are not necessarily pedophiles. Pedophiles are not necessarily homosexual. Young girls and boys may be molested by pedophiles.
9
@MimiB The article says the bishop has been accused of "sexually harrassing" adults. I don't know exactly what that means but I think it goes beyond a spiritual abuse of vows of celibacy.
14
@MimiB You seem to suggest that it is not so bad if the sexual activity is limited to adults. Here we have to ask who the adults are and if an abuse of power is involved - this is not clear from the article. In addition, any such activity is rather hypocritical considering his role in the church and its beliefs.
11
@MimiB He is not accused of consensual sexual activity with adults. Rather, he is accused of sexual harassment. There is a difference.
10
Seriously, when will the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, (the RICO Act) -- the US federal law providing for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization -- going to be used to bring down the Catholic Church and all the predators and enablers that have turned it into an international pedophile ring masquerading as a religion. "Times Up!" We need to pierce through the illusion that what has been revealed repeatedly as "an ongoing criminal organization" in its current manifestation serves any possible positive purpose. Smash the organization divide the assets among the victims and have a yard sale to see if anyone will buy even one of those ridiculous outfits. As to the Catholic Church's chronically ineffectual -or worse - leadership -including the now implicated Pope- I borrow the words of Cromwell,"You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately... Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!"
26
@Belasco You seem to forget that "the Catholic Church" is not made up of just the priests. So what about all of us other folks--faithful priests, religious, and laity--who are the bulk of the members of the Church?
2
@meh um, you could join a different religion or spiritual group that isn't destroyed beyond all repair by the atrocities and hypocrisy of a religion created not by Jesus but by a bunch of misogynists a coupla centuries later?
Faithful to what meh? There is no religion. None. Zero. Never was.
I think it will be much easier for Pope Francis to congratulate the few Bishops in the world that did not participate in or turn a blind eye to sexual abuse in the church.
He could do that in a nano second.
23
The charge against McCarrick at issue here is claimed to be that "he had sexually molested adult seminary students."
That is not the charge.
It is children who are molested. It is a crime.
Adults are not molested. Consenting adults are satisfied, or upset, or angry, or hating themselves in the morning, or many other descriptives, none of which involves a crime. None of which involves molestation.
Consenting means consenting. If I pay you and you agree to sexual activity, you are consenting. If I threaten to fire you and you agree to sexual activity, you are consenting. If you have to sleep with me to become a famous movie star, and you do so, you are consenting.
If you are raped, you are not consenting.
Let's not mix up the two.
While the alleged sexual relationships with seminarians are not molestation, or crimes, they are violations of the rules of the Church.
Does the non-Catholic world really care about this? Is it upset that "predatory priests" escaped trials before ecclesiastical courts for breaking their vows?
Doesn't the outside world want to send alleged victimizers of adult seminarians to prison? Which cannot be done, because there are no crimes involved.
Much of the public, and some Post writers, are confused: the Church's alleged McCarrick coverup didn't involve hiding crimes from the police, but rather hiding church offenses from Church officials.
3
@alyosha What, in your book, constitutes sexual harassment? What do you call it when someone with employment power over another person extorts sex under penalty of retribution?
EEOC laws on the books apply to all, inside and outside religious employers.
16
It’s the norm for the Catholic Church to cover up for their perverted employees. Why don’t they try and discover why so many priests and bishops etc are twisted that way and put a stop to it.
21
Another man in a fancy robe...caught in the web of Child Molestation.
And from Rome?
We hear the deafening sound of.....NOTHING.
18
I can't imagine being part of a religion that demands tithes from the faithful even as the latter know a significant portion of their money goes to support rapists and child molesters.
I am not criticizing Catholic faith itself. By all means, believe in Jesus, the Trinity, the Eucharist, whatever else is important to you. Believe even that God has ordained for some reason to speak through a Pope. Believe whatever you want- but how does your conscience bear the idea of financially abetting the rape and molestation of children, more sexual misconduct against adults in a compromised position vis-a-vis religious authority figures, cover up after cover up, transfer after transfer, legal defenses and hush money to protect the church from its victims...
Wouldn't it be more Christ-like to donate ten percent of your income to charities that provide counseling or legal services to victims of sexual abuse, especially children?
And when the Church is the third biggest real estate owner in New York City (good job, NYU and Columbia!), a tycoon awash in centuries of blood money, isn't it fair to expect them to take the concrete step, both to repair the harm they've caused and as a gesture of penitence, to redirect all donations to such charities?
Anything less is phony repentance, crocodile tears that fool no parishioner, let alone God.
32
@Alex You are mistaken about tithes: the Catholic Church does not demand tithes of its members. But you bring up a significant point: the money that is used to settle lawsuits does not come out of the pockets of the guilty priests and bishops. Some of it comes from insurance, of course, but much of it comes, one way or another, out of the pockets of the people sitting in the pews on Sundays. The guilty don't pay or repay.
57
You are wrong that the Catholic Church does not "demand" tithes! Absolutely they do! Just try and miss your tithe and see how fast you are excommunicated for lack of support. Yes, it happens, to so many Catholics who want to worship at a church yet do NOT want to donate to pedophiles!
6
It is time that lay Catholics and the faithful now become involved in investigating these accusations that keep propping up. They can no longer sit back and wait for Pope Francis and higher ups to take action. I heard this advice from a well-known Catholic priest on TV this morning. They want this to happen as much as practicing Catholics do as it also affects their ministry. People are beginning to look at the Church with a jaundiced eye and wondering if their beloved priest has any involvement in this evil.
The majority of the priests are faithful men to their vows and would never harm or sexually abuse a child ever. They are angry and furious that this scourge is occurring in the Church they love and want it to stop now. They are horrified that children and young adults have been harmed by these despicable clergy members. They welcome lay Catholics getting involved and actually welcome it. They will be more affective than the ones doing the investigations now and I mean Pope Francis, cardinals and bishops.
14
@WPLMMT
Your gullibility and naivety are staggering.
Do you seriously monitor 24/7 the lives of 'the majority of priests' ? A major ethical 'slip-up' only takes minutes....
4
@WPLMMT The advice to not sit back is good, but what is the action by laypeople that should be taken.What is the concrete actually action ?
1
Correction :
They (the priests) welcome lay Catholics getting involved and actually encourage it.
Please just make a list of clergy who have NEVER participated in, or covered up acts of pedophilia. It will same time and paper.
50
Metuchen, Newark, Milwaukee, now Wheeling-Charleston. How much diocesan hush money will come to light when these drip, drip, drip stories end? And these are just the Bishops!
32
@KAA Visit bishopaccountability (dot) org and you will see these stories for the most part have been around quite a long time (not sure if this specific bishop is included) but the media is just picking up more recently publicized cases.
6
When the PA grand jury report was released, our parish priest read a canned apology statement after Mass, and went back to business as usual, even as the crisis continued to snowball. At this point, all of these news stories of new allegations seem to be business as usual as well. I was raised in a devout Catholic household and until recently attended Mass every Sunday with my own family, but I can no longer justify being part of this mess. I am struggling to accept that my faith in this institution is gone.
81
@Your Mama
Your faith in this institution is gone and what is awaiting you is a God of more than 52 trillion galaxies who understands not only our Universe but fully understands and loves deeply each tiny, flawed human. And yes, humans have sexual organs to be used and enjoyed, not just for making babies, but for the pure, raw, heart pounding joy of sex. This God gave us brains. Find your passion and never cease studying. God is every where.
7
francis clean your house.. still i hold jesus in my heart but the roman catholic church never.. a total corrupt failure..
16
The very first step in any such investigation must be for Francis to have the police contacted, so the police can begin their own investigation, and make arrests where appropriate.
Francis must start NOW to turn these creeps over to police, not transfer them to new jobs, or have them moved to the Vatican. He must also use all his ;power to lobby to end statutes of limitations for these crimes.
Anything less, and he instantly becomes just another enabler, just another protector of rapists, and therefore a criminal himself.
65
@Jojojo-Pope Francis should also not accept resignations and the defrocking of priests as a substitute for criminal investigations.
1
Drip drip drip....
Serious question; how many bishops invited to the conference in February will be defrocked by then?
The church needs to be moving a lot faster if they hope to limit the damage of this continuing atrocity.
54
Oh great! Another enabler investigating the sex crimes of one of his cohorts. When will the investigation of the investigator happen? How about some charges and jail time for these hypocritical criminals? Why does government seem to have no jurisdiction here? If a layman molested a child, he'd be in jail pronto!
68
It’s not just a “sin”. It’s a felony.
13
When will the US Catholic parishioners realize that tens of millions of their donations are going to buy off the sexual crimes of their priests.
By donating, they themselves have become complicit.
86
@Greg Nowell
They do know it. But myopic faith and spiritual habituation prevent them from seeing beyond unexamined beliefs.
34
@Greg Nowell
Blame the parents. They are the ones who put children in harm's way by enrolling them in Catholic institutions allowing boys to still serve at altar for inexplicable reasons.... they are twisted, probably believing that whatever abuse their kids suffer is part of the 'Lord works in mysterious ways' farrago.
7
@Greg Nowell The lay people putting money in the basket on Sundays are complicit only in trying to make sure the victims have enough money to get help. They are absolutely NOT complicit in the acts of the guilty priests and bishops.
1