Clerical abuse!

[Main Street]

Yet another disgusting episode of child abuse by priests and cover up by the Bishops.

Pennsylvania Diocese Leaders Knew of Sex Abuse for Decades, Grand Jury Says

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/02/us/pennsylvania-diocese-leaders-knew-of-sex-abuse-for-decades-grand-jury-says.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0

Thanks for that Dixie.
The notorious Bishop John Hogan who is mentioned  in the NYT article as being a powerful figure.
a  quote from the NYT article
"The report offers a scathing picture of Bishop James Hogan, who led the diocese from 1966 to 1986, and died in 2005, as a leader who repeatedly persuaded the police and prosecutors to drop criminal cases against priests, failed to discipline people he knew were abusers, and responded to complaints about predatory priests by relocating them to jobs where they could molest again."

I take note of what powerful means in the case of Hogan.
All this abuse  happened in the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown
Reading through the grand jury report https://www.attorneygeneral.gov/uploadedFiles/MainSite/Content/Related_Content/PressReleases/GJ%20Diocese%20Report.pdf


Page 103
In Johnstown, the bishop selected the mayor, all community leaders were handpicked by the bishop.
Then the  mayor would send candidates for town sheriff to be interviewed by one of the bishop's underlings and who ever the underling selected, was appointed sheriff.


Under oath Monsignor Saylor was asked  by
Mr Dye: When these officers came to you tasked with enforcing the criminal law, investigating crimes, when they would come to you, the President Judge, this officer, the sheriff, are they saying hey, you guys need to get this lot under control? is that their message?

reply
Monsignor Saylor: That was their message, yeah, Now remember that included the President Judge of Blair County (Thomas Peoples)

[smelmoth]

1.Failure to implement procedures is incompetent and negligent,but not a sign of malice.

2.I agree that the church,in every part of the world should implement all statutory procedures and more of its own,to prevent child abuse and facilitate the identification of all potential child abusers and have them drummed out.

Will you campaign for point 2? Stand up in your church and condemn abusers? Stand up in your church and call out abusers? Call out the cover up artists? Call out those who had the opportunity to  stop the abuse and did nothing? Call out those who had the opportunity to stop the abuse and pushed it on to another parish and another victim? Call out these scum? End this anal rape? End this abuse?

This is critical. If anyone claims to be moral and does not fulfill this then they are a mere hyporcrite.

If anyone believes in an eternal life and did or does nothing to stop this abuse then presumably their eternal reward begins and ends with a shower of vomit from St peter?

[T Fearon]

I do not need to campaign.I believe compliance is now universal,and any persons not compliant or lax should be dealt with mercilessly

[smelmoth]

I do not need to campaign.I believe compliance is now universal,and any persons not compliant or lax should be dealt with mercilessly

If i asked you to stand up in your congregation, step forward to the alter or pulpit, take the microphone, and condemn those who had the chance to end abuse but passed it on to another victim you would have no difficulty in doing it. I live in your parish. I do not attend Mass but would gladly do so to confirm to this forum your actions,

[No wides]

I do not need to campaign.I believe compliance is now universal,and any persons not compliant or lax should be dealt with mercilessly

As should people who blame parents or kids for the abuse.

[T Fearon]

What is this all about? In the past the Church has drastically failed victims,as have victim's parents who negligently and unbelievably failed to ascertain the reasons why their young offspring were being summoned to meetings with clerics (I can find no rationale for this failure I'm afraid,I know if I was summoned to such a meeting,my parents,as devout Catholics as you could meet,would have made it their business to find out what the hell was going on).

But the past is the past,lessons have been learned on all sides,and I am confident robust child procedures are in place now,so this conversation is pointless,as would my grabbing microphones in any church,and I rarely attend the same church two weeks in succession.

[From the Bunker]

What is this all about? In the past the Church has drastically failed victims,as have victim's parents who negligently and unbelievably failed to ascertain the reasons why their young offspring were being summoned to meetings with clerics (I can find no rationale for this failure I'm afraid,I know if I was summoned to such a meeting,my parents,as devout Catholics as you could meet,would have made it their business to find out what the hell was going on).

But the past is the past,lessons have been learned on all sides,and I am confident robust child procedures are in place now,so this conversation is pointless,as would my grabbing microphones in any church,and I rarely attend the same church two weeks in succession.

You are beginning to sound like Michael Martin. Have you ever though of joining Fianna Fail?

[muppet]

What is this all about? In the past the Church has drastically failed victims,as have victim's parents who negligently and unbelievably failed to ascertain the reasons why their young offspring were being summoned to meetings with clerics (I can find no rationale for this failure I'm afraid,I know if I was summoned to such a meeting,my parents,as devout Catholics as you could meet,would have made it their business to find out what the hell was going on).

But the past is the past,lessons have been learned on all sides,and I am confident robust child procedures are in place now,so this conversation is pointless,as would my grabbing microphones in any church,and I rarely attend the same church two weeks in succession.

This is beyond sick at this stage. You are now an abuser as far as I am concerned. Your continued abuse of the families of victims is hideous in the extreme.

Anyone with half a brain, or half a memory of their youth, knows that when your parents entrusted you to a school, you were under the duty of care of that school. Your parents couldn't possibly have been responsible for anything that went on in that school without their knowledge. The same applies to any activities whereby the Church was entrusted with the care of children AND THAT TRUST WAS ABUSED.

The children were scared into not telling their parents because:

a) the abusers like Smyth told the children that they would go to hell if they said anything;
b) cowards like Sean Brady made the children sign oaths of secrecy under the threat of excommunication of they opened their mouths;
c) there were many more gutless f*cks like Tony Fearon who would desperately try to mitigate the damage done to the Church by the likes of Smyth and Brady;

In conclusion the parents didn't know because these men of God waved Hell in front of their abused children, to terrify them into not telling.

[Main Street]

Though this is  not at all to imply a connection between gay clergy  and the catholic church pedophilia plague and their enablers.
I just find this type of research immensly amusing.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/07/29/catholic-priests-its-empirical-fact-that-many-clergy-are-gay

Some Catholic clergy say most priests are gay
According to Father James Bretzke, a professor of moral theology at Boston College,.
"It's an empirical fact that lots of men are gay who are priests. And they are very good priests," he says. "I would also observe that the numbers of gay men and women in the church ministry is probably larger than the general population, precisely because they are not seeking marriage."

The notion that many Catholic priests are quietly gay is not new. In the 2000 book "The Changing Face of the Priesthood," Rev. Donald B. Cozzens suggested that the priesthood was increasingly becoming a gay profession. Cozzens estimated that as much as 58 percent of priests were gay, and that percentages were even higher for younger priests. His numbers matched previous estimates by sociologists who put the numbers of gay priests between 10 and 60 percent.

Father Gary Meier, a gay, St. Louis-based Catholic clergymen, says there's a wide range of statistics out there on gay priests, but jokes that in his experience, "30 percent are gay, 30 percent are straight, and 30 percent are in denial."

[Oraisteach]

Hmmm, Fr. Cozzens officiated at my wedding.

[johnneycool]

Though this is  not at all to imply a connection between gay clergy  and the catholic church pedophilia plague and their enablers.
I just find this type of research immensly amusing.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/07/29/catholic-priests-its-empirical-fact-that-many-clergy-are-gay

Some Catholic clergy say most priests are gay
According to Father James Bretzke, a professor of moral theology at Boston College,.
"It's an empirical fact that lots of men are gay who are priests. And they are very good priests," he says. "I would also observe that the numbers of gay men and women in the church ministry is probably larger than the general population, precisely because they are not seeking marriage."

The notion that many Catholic priests are quietly gay is not new. In the 2000 book "The Changing Face of the Priesthood," Rev. Donald B. Cozzens suggested that the priesthood was increasingly becoming a gay profession. Cozzens estimated that as much as 58 percent of priests were gay, and that percentages were even higher for younger priests. His numbers matched previous estimates by sociologists who put the numbers of gay priests between 10 and 60 percent.

Father Gary Meier, a gay, St. Louis-based Catholic clergymen, says there's a wide range of statistics out there on gay priests, but jokes that in his experience, "30 percent are gay, 30 percent are straight, and 30 percent are in denial."

IMO 'vocations' to the clergy would always have had a high closet gay percentage, I don't find this surprising at all.

Young lad, growing up in rural Ireland, possibly of farming stock, a wee bit effeminate, he'd have been earmarked for the priesthood by his mother early days and dispatched to a seminary as soon as possible.

Its a big thing having a priest in the family in Ireland, well it was in our not too distant past.

And I'm not making a connection between homosexuality and pedophilia, they're two very different things.
 

[seafoid]

Paedophilia is more of a power thing

[Applesisapples]

Hmmm, Fr. Cozzens officiated at my wedding.

and what is wrong with that?

[Oraisteach]

Not a bit, apples.  He was terrific and very accommodating. Chaplain at the local university.

[Applesisapples]

Not a bit, apples.  He was terrific and very accommodating. Chaplain at the local university.

Good to hear. The introduction of articles about Gay priests though to a thread on abuse is wrong, I know you didn't introduce it.