The World Holds Pope Francis Accountable for Clerical Sex Abuse

Pres. Donald J. Trump is more admired than Pope Francis in a worldwide poll.

Trump is ranked at No. 14, Pope Francis at No. 15 as the world’s most admired man in 2019, according to YouGov’s annual study “of which public figures the people of our planet look up to.” The study “covers the views of people in 41 countries with more than 42,000 people being interviewed to compile the list.”

Contributions made by individual Catholics around the world for Pope Francis' charities  have “plunged amid the sex abuse crisis” according to author, Gianluigi Nuzzi. While the collection totaled  €378 million in 2013, the first year of this pope's reign, as reported by Emiliano Fittipaldi, the donations have “plummeted to €70 million in 2016 and may now be less than €60 million,” according to Nuzzi.

Pope Francis has "lost credibility in opposing the plague of sexual abuse and in demanding from the bishops that accountability - that readiness in rendering an account for one’s actions - from which he exempts himself,” the experienced Vatican reporter, Sandro Magister, stated.

After the pope’s disastrous 2018 trips to Chile where, after calling sex abuse survivors “fools” and “lefties,” he then called them liars; and Ireland, where “roughly only a quarter of the amount people expected” arrived for a papal mass; Pope Francis is now traveling only to countries untouched by clerical sex abuse.

In 2019, his schedule included United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Romania, Mozambique, Madagascar, Mauritius and, in November, Japan and Thailand, nations in which Catholics are a tiny fraction of the overall population - just about 0.5 percent in each.”

The following are countries in which Pope Francis has failed to properly address these horrendous crimes in just 2019 alone - countries he will not be visiting.

ARGENTINA

Even in his native Argentina, Pope Francis ranks as No. 13 in the YouGov study, well behind the Dalai Lama at No. 5.

Pope Francis has visited the South American countries of Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru – but not Argentina.

The trial for Fr. Nicola Corradi and Fr. Horacio Corbacho began on Aug. 5, 2019. They are accused of sexual abuse, corruption of children and mistreatment at the Provolo Institute for deaf children in Mendoza. They face up to 50 years in prison.

The trial is being attended by “dozens of survivors and their supporters demanding transparency and justice for the ‘abominable crimes’ committed at the Institute.”

Former students at the notorious Provolo Institute for the Deaf in Verona, Italy, where more than one hundred deaf and mute children had been sexually abused, “wrote to Pope Francis in late 2013, giving a broad timeline of their case. They said they didn't hear anything back.” 

So, by open letter and video message “handed to Pope Francis” in May 2014, they begged the pope for justice. They told him that three of the accused Italian perpetrators – including Fr. Corradi – held current positions at the Provolo Institute in Argentina. The pope took no action to stop Corradi or the other criminals.

Corradi and four others were arrested in November 2016 and charged with raping  and molesting at least 22 children. More reports poured in and “it’s now thought that as many as 60 children fell victim to abuse.”

The crimes alleged in court “took place between 2004 and 2016, and the case gained world attention when it emerged that Corradi had faced similar accusations at the Próvolo Institute in Italy and Pope Francis had been notified the Italian priest was running a similar center in Argentina.”

Prosecutors said the alleged anal and vaginal rapes, fondling and oral sex took place in the bathrooms, dorms, garden, basement and chapel. Victims said they were  "forced to perform sexual acts on one another and made to watch other students being abused.”

“One of the alleged victims said she witnessed how a girl was raped by one priest while the other one forced her to give him oral sex.” Another accused a nun “of making her wear a diaper to cover up a hemorrhage after she was raped by a priest” when she was five years old.

“The tormentors” knew “the other children wouldn’t hear the screams as they were deaf.”

In July 2017, Pope Francis appointed Bishop Alberto Germán Bochatey to lead the Church's investigation of the alleged crimes at the school in Mendoza.

Bochatey called the allegations an ‘urban myth’ in a May 2018 interview with an Argentine news outlet "We think the Masonic order was behind it," Bochatey said. "The fraternal order has long viewed as antagonists by the Catholic Church."

In May 2019, the Argentine group Church Without Abuses and the international organizations Ending Clergy Abuse and BishopAccountability.org met with alleged victims in Mendoza “to show solidarity with the Provolo victims and echo their cry for justice,” said Anne Barrett Doyle of the online resource Bishop Accountability.  “Pope Francis owes them a personal apology for his complicity and silence. The Italian victims warned him for years that Corradi and others were working with children in Argentina. The pope did nothing,” stated Doyle.

Doyle also said that the pope should investigate Mendoza Archbishop Marcelo Colombo who, she said, “is refusing to provide information about the Provolo abusers to prosecutors and defense attorneys.”

According to a survey conducted by the Télam news agency in 2018, 66 priests, nuns, bishops and other religious officials have been accused of sex abuse offences since 2002 in Argentina. “The news agency’s tally takes 2002 as its starting point, a reference to the so-called ‘Grassi case,’ which had a domino effect, bringing more allegations to light.”

Fr. Julio César Grassi was arrested and charged with 17 counts of sexual abuse of three boys. He was eventually convicted in 2009. After Grassi was found guilty, Pope Francis – then Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio - “secretly authorized an extensive critical examination of Grassi’s prosecution and of the three original plaintiffs. [T]he resulting study vigorously asserted Grassi’s innocence [and] was circulated to judges who had yet to make determinations in the case.”

The pope was also involved in four other cases. “There is evidence that Bergoglio knowingly or unwittingly slowed victims in their fight to expose and prosecute their assailants. Victims of all four offenders say that they sought the cardinal’s help. None of them received it.” According to Bergoglio’s former spokesman, the cardinal   “declined to meet with any victims.”

In the book On Heaven and Earth by Jorge Mario Bergoglio and Rabbi Abraham Skorka, Pope Francis wrote, “In my diocese [child sex abuse by priests] never happened to me, but a bishop called me once by phone to ask me what to do in a situation like this.”

Ricardo Benedetti, a clerical sex abuse survivor, “called on Pope Francis to back a push in the country’s senate to eliminate a statute of limitations on sexual crimes against children in Argentine law.” The pope did not.

FRANCE

In March 2019, French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Archbishop of Lyon, “was found guilty of failing to report facts of abuse to judicial authorities in a case involving Fr. Bernard Preynat who has been accused of sexually abusing dozens of minors in the 1980s and early ’90s.” Barbarin was given a six-month suspended prison sentence.

The Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), Cardinal Luis Francisco Ladaria Ferrer was accused of complicity in the cover-up. “In correspondence with Barbarin about the priest, [Ladaria] had advised the cardinal to take ‘necessary disciplinary measures while avoiding public scandal’ - seen as a warning to keep the abuse quiet.”

Pope Francis had promoted Ladaria to head of the CDF in 2017 and elevated him to cardinal in 2018.

“The Vatican invoked diplomatic immunity in refusing to deliver a French court summons to Ladaria because, as a minister of Vatican City State, he is protected under international law”

The attorney for the victims of Fr. Preynat, argued that "given the precise motivation of the ruling, there was no doubt that, 'in line with this [March 2019] ruling,’ Ladaria ‘is fully liable for a conviction in France,’ for complicity with the crime of non-denunciation of sex abuse.”

After his conviction, Cardinal Barbarin immediately resigned, but Pope Francis rejected the resignation. The pope had said that "senior clerics who shield pedophile priests should resign, but he has stood by Barbarin [who he referred to as ‘my friend’] insisting the cardinal had taken ‘the necessary measures in the Preynat case.’”

Pope Francis met with Barbarin in October 2018 while he was awaiting trial, in March 2019 eleven days after his conviction, and again, in October 2019.

Then Archbishop Ladaria had also been accused of covering-up for Fr. Gianni Trotta. As the No. 2 official in the CDF, Ladaria defrocked Trotta in 2012, but failed to inform the Italian authorities. Trotta, already convicted of sexual violence against an 11-year-old by a civil court, went on to “rape five and abuse other children individually or in groups” in 2014.

“If Ladaria had informed the police, these children would have been safe,” Vatican expert Emiliano Fittipaldi noted.

GUAM

“Nearly 280 of Guam’s children were raped and molested by priests and others associated with the Catholic Church from the 1950s to as late as 2013,” according to an October 2019 report. “Per capita, Guam has about 171 claims of clergy sex abuse per 100,000 people - well beyond the about 12 clergy sex abuse lawsuits per 100,000 people in Boston, whose clergy sex abuse scandal was portrayed in the movie, ‘Spotlight.’"

Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron – head of the Guam diocese from 1984 until he was removed in April 2019 – “knew about and covered up sexual abuse by priests, based on abuse claims filed in court.”

Although publicly accused by seven men for “sexual assaults they endured as children, including his own nephew,” a secret CDF tribunal under Ladaria found Apuron guilty only of “certain accusations” in 2018.  And the “sentence remained subject to possible appeal.”

Apuron appealed the conviction, even appearing as a VIP at a papal event in 2018.

In February 2019, the CDF tribunal found Apuron guilty of “delicts against the Sixth Commandment with minors,” but “never specified the number of charges, how many of them he was found guilty of or even the nature of the offenses for which he was convicted.” The penalties imposed included removal from office and “the perpetual prohibition from dwelling, even temporarily” in Guam, with no suggestion of enforcing the latter.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests [SNAP], “the world's largest and oldest survivors group for abuse victims" and BishopAccountability.org, “called on Pope Francis to defrock [expel] Apuron from the priesthood.”

Instead, Apuron remains an archbishop with the title Emeritus, “a status that confers continued prestige and power” and “receives a monthly stipend from the Church.”

UK

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) investigation into the bishops’ conference’s response to the sex abuse crisis took place Oct. 28 - Nov. 8, 2019.

“The Vatican’s repeated refusal to cooperate with official investigations into pedophile priests and its delay in stripping convicted offenders of their clerical status has been condemned by the IICSA."

“The inquiry is keen, in particular, to discover more about the role of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, which is supposed to discipline priests who commit offences." The Vatican sent some documentation but, Altman noted, “the Holy See has not provided any evidence about the role of the CDF and/or laicisation [the process of defrocking] and declined to provide the inquiry with a witness statement.”

Pope Francis "has acknowledged the ‘physical, psychological and spiritual damage’ done to the victims of child sexual abuse, and added that ‘a continuous and profound conversion of hearts is needed, attested by concrete and effective actions that involve everyone in the Church,” lead counsel to the inquiry, Brian Altman QC, said. So “The Holy See’s refusal to provide the Inquiry with all the evidence it has sought is very disappointing,” he noted.

Pope Francis' officials have also refused to turn over Vatican documents on clerical sex abuse to a Chilean court in 2016 and in 2019,  Italian prosecutors in 2017, and an Argentine court in 2019.

AUSTRALIA

The conviction of Cardinal George Pell on one charge of sexual penetration of a child under 16, and four charges of indecent act with a child under 16 by an Australian court was upheld in August 2019. Pell was returned to prison to continue to serve his sentence of six years.

Australia’s High Court agreed on Nov. 12, 2019, to consider an appeal. This is Pell’s “last chance” to overturn his conviction and prison sentence. “The appeal is expected to be heard by a panel of Australia's most senior judges sometime after March next year.”

Even before his trial, the Royal Commission – the highest form of investigation in Australia – had found in February 2015 that Pell “placed the Church’s financial interests above his obligation to victims of clerical sex abuse as part of an aggressive legal strategy to protect the assets of the Sydney archdiocese.”

In March 2016, Pell was questioned by the Royal Commission “over what he knew about sex abuse by priests in Australia.” He testified via videolink in Rome, after he was excused from returning home due to ill health.

“A number of abuse victims traveled to Rome to see him give evidence in person.” [Pell] “could have changed many things, he would have saved so many lives. Too many people have committed suicide for these abuses, and that’s why we are here today,” said one of the survivors. Pope Francis refused their request for a meeting

“Campaigners and victims’ supporters also gathered in Sydney, holding hands in prayer and carrying signs saying ‘Pope Sack Pell Now’ and ‘Pell go to hell.’”

In June 2017, “police charged Pell with multiple counts of historical sexual assault offenses, making him the most senior cleric to be charged in the Church’s abuse scandal. Pell denied the accusations and took an immediate leave of absence as Vatican finance czar to return to Australia to defend himself.”

His trial began in August 2018 and on Dec. 11, 2018, the jury unanimously convicted Pell on all charges.

The next day, the Vatican announced that “due to his advanced age” (77), Pope Francis notified Pell that he would no longer be a member of his hand-picked Council of Cardinals, along with two other members.

A month after his election, Pope Francis had formed a Council of Cardinals to advise him on Church governance. He chose Pell as a member even though the cardinal had been making headlines in his native country for years because of his cruelty to survivors of clerical sex abuse and their families.

In November 2012, the Australian state of Victoria's inquiry into child sex abuse “had been told that Cardinal George Pell showed a sociopathic lack of empathy for a family whose two daughters were raped by a Catholic priest.” The evidence was given by Chrissie and Anthony Foster, “whose two daughters were assaulted in the 1990s by a priest at their primary school in Melbourne's south east. Emma Foster eventually committed suicide. Her sister Katie was seriously disabled when she was struck by a car after binge drinking.”

Pope Francis named Pell to the powerful position of Prefect of the Secretariat of the Economy on Feb. 25, 2014.

Pell’s previous financial expertise was cheating victims out of an adequate compensation known as his “Melbourne response” and his “Ellis defense” where Pell “instructed his lawyers to crush this victim." A later study showed that “the controversial scheme set up by Pell to handle sex abuse claims against Melbourne’s Catholic Church” spent only “28 per cent to compensate 307 child sex abuse victims.” The “bulk of the money” went to pay attorneys and “general legal fees.”

Currently, Pell retains his title as “cardinal,” making him eligible for all benefits and pay that goes with it. That Pell remained Prefect of the Secretariat of the Economy “until the end of his five-year mandate” was a “sign of the pope’s trust,” noted Vatican reporter Andrea Gagliarducci.

CHILE

Pope Francis also appointed Chilean Cardinal Francisco Errázuriz Ossa to his Council of Cardinals. As Archbishop of Santiago from 1998-2010 Errázuriz had also made national headlines for years for "perpetrating a cover-up to protect abusive priests.”

Survivors cite, in particular, Errázuriz’ efforts to protect Fr. Fernando Karadima, Chile’s most infamous serial predator. In April 2010, a criminal complaint was filed against Karadima by four survivor's of his sexual assaults. According to court testimony, Errázuriz, tried to shame accusers into dropping claims and had failed to carry out formal investigations for years.

A judge dismissed the criminal case against Karadima in November 2011 because the statute of limitations had expired but determined that the allegations were “truthful and reliable.”

Before Pope Francis’ January 2018 visit, the Chilean Foreign Ministry noted:  “The arrival of the Holy Father will have a special significance for our country since he was born in the neighboring Republic of Argentina, he is the first Latin American pope, and also lived and studied in Chile so he knows our reality very closely.”

In an interview during his return flight to Rome, Pope Francis confirmed this in part. He said, “When the scandal with Karadima was discovered, we all know this scandal, we began to see many priests who were formed by Karadima who were either abused or who were abusers.”

Nevertheless, Pope Francis told the Chilean bishops: “I recognize and I want you to communicate this accurately, that I have made serious errors of judgment and perception of the situation, especially due to lack of truthful and balanced information.

In March 2019, the prosecutor Emiliano Arias, who heads the investigations of sexual abuse within the Chilean Catholic Church, said that there had been no cooperation - "nothing at all" - from the Vatican in providing necessary information in the various inquiries around these crimes.

The next month, Errázuriz faced charges for “alleged cover-up of sexual crimes committed by priests attributed to him …. The prosecutor asked Errázuriz about his participation in 11 cases in which priests are investigated for child sexual abuse and rape. He “responded 35 times ‘I do not remember’ and on two questions he remained silent on the recommendation of his lawyer.”

Nevertheless, Cardinals Errázuriz and Ricardo Ezzati, both subpoenaed by Chilean prosecutors for covering up cases of clerical sexual abuse, both given the title Emeritus Archbishops of Santiago, attended an episcopal ordination presided over by Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Basilica in June. “When the news broke that the two cardinals had traveled to Rome presumably just to participate in the ordination Mass, people went to Twitter to protest.”

Pope Francis had elevated Ezzati, who succeeded Errázuriz as Archbishop of Santiago, to cardinal in February 2014. Just before the pope promoted Ezzati, victims of Fr. Rimsky Rojas “accused Ezzati of obstruction of justice. One of Rojas’ reported victims was a young man who disappeared after making the accusations and has never been found.”

In March 2019, “hours after the eight judges in an appeals’ court unanimously rejected the request of Ezzati’s lawyers to dismiss the charges of cover-up in cases of sex abuse of minors,” Pope Francis accepted Ezzati’s resignation. “The Vatican failed to provide an official explanation for Ezzati’s departure.”

Pope Francis appointed Archbishop Ivo Scapolo as his ambassador to Portugal in August 2019. Scapolo had been his ambassador to Chile. “Laypeople and clerical sex abuse victims from Chile are warning Portuguese Catholics that the new papal ambassador in the country is a ‘demon’ and an ‘evildoer’ responsible for the cover-ups of priestly pedophilia."

IT'S ALWAYS ABOUT THE CHILDREN - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Many people think of clerical sex abuse only in the past – crimes committed long ago - because “most victims don’t come forward for many years due to the emotional trauma, health problems and social pressures,” explained Barbara Dorris, former outreach director for SNAP.

"It's very difficult for the victims of abuse in these religious settings to come to terms with how it was possible that God let this happen to them," said Marci Hamilton, who is CEO of CHILD USA and teaches law at the University of Pennsylvania. "Some call it soul murder. It's not just the destruction of a child's life, but in some ways it's the destruction of children's coping mechanisms through faith," she noted.

Yet, as we have seen with the pope's protection of Fr. Corradi, Ladaria’s protection of Fr. Trotta and articles such as these from New Zealand, Central African Republic and Washington D.C., clerical sex abuse of children is still a global scourge.

Pope Francis is very sensitive to American media coverage. The UN Committee for the Rights of the Child (CRC) asked him for a response to a list of concerns regarding child sex abuse. On Dec. 4, 2013, the Vatican responded by stating that it was not the practice of the government to “disclose information on specific cases unless requested to do so by another country as part of legal proceedings” and “that the Vatican can provide information only about known and alleged child sex crimes that have happened on Vatican property.” A rarity, the pope received negative coverage (here and here).

The next day, it was announced that Pope Francis would create a special Commission for the Protection of Minors to advise him on ways to address the subject.

Peter Saunders, a British survivor of clerical sex abuse, was dismissed from the commission in February 2016 for not “keeping my mouth shut” about the “lack of action on the abuse issue.”

In 2015, Saunders had  called on the pope to "sack" Cardinal Pell from his Vatican position "over his alleged involvement in covering up abuse."

"It’s incumbent on a commission appointed by Pope Francis to impress on him the need to do things now, not years down the line," Saunders said. "I don’t see movement, I don’t see action over an issue that they should be absolutely furious about,” he added.

Saunders is a "brave, honest and tireless voice for kids and victims” stated David Clohessy, then director of SNAP.

“The commission has become the laughing stock of survivors. They’re trying to say that child abuse is behind us and now it’s recovery time. It’s in no way the case. [The southern hemisphere] is still a playground for pedophiles and with bishops that still cover up, ” Juan Carlos Cruz, one of Karadima’s victims, said.

“No matter what we do, we always hit a brick wall with Pope Francis,” observed Cruz.

In August 2018, a Pennsylvania grand jury report stated that “more than 300 ‘predator priests’ were found to have committed ‘the sexual abuse and torture' of 1.000 children" according to the Washington Post.

“The incidents described include a priest who impregnated a minor and helped her get an abortion, then was allowed to stay in the ministry; a priest who confessed to the oral and anal rape of at least 15 boys, including one as young as seven; and a priest who collected the urine, pubic hair and menstrual blood of girls he abused in his home.”

Another priest “was accused of beating a child with a cross.” Another “allegedly molested five sisters in the same family. One of his victims was only 18 months old.” “Fr. James Beeman allegedly forced a 7-year-old girl to give him oral sex in the hospital, after she had her tonsils removed. He continued raping her until she was 19, the report claims.”

“A sickening catalog of pure evil. The systemic nature of it. The sheer numbers,” was the response of a writer named Zeno.

Reacting to the negative American media response, Pope Francis announced he was holding a Vatican “summit” on child sex abuse to be held in February 2019. The summit should be viewed as "a publicity stunt, if we don't see concrete action," said Pennsylvania state Rep. Mark Rozzi, who was molested by a priest.

"What I would like to see personally - and I think all of these other victims as well - would be for Pope Francis to stop asking for these bishops or these predator priests for their resignations. Stop asking for their resignations and simply remove them." Rozzi added.

His words were echoed by  SNAP who said in a statement: "What we wanted to see from Rome was action, yet we have heard these words before. Formalizing these points into policy is meaningless ( and a toothless remark) without any willingness to back them up with punishment." SNAP also claimed that "in refusing to discipline those prelates in attendance who have had an active role in covering up and minimizing cases of child sex abuse, Pope Francis sends the message that Bishops and Cardinals are able to openly flout the very policies designed to hold them accountable."

If Pope Francis really wanted to protect children, from the first day of his reign he could have asked the experts what steps needed to be taken.

Those who have survived sex abuse (approximately 80% of those who attempt suicide have a history of child abuse), their advocates and the legal personnel who defended them in the courtrooms and prosecuted Church employees have been quite clear and vociferous about what  Pope Francis has refused to do.

The Chilean prosecutor, Emiliano Arias, found it necessary to raid Church premises after access to pertinent information was denied by the Vatican claiming it was protected by “pontifical secret.” “He compared the decision that the Church does not have to cooperate with civilian authorities to having unreported ‘dead bodies’ under a chapel.”

“Until they allow professional investigators inside the secret archives, there will be no real transparency,” said Jeff Anderson, a Minnesota lawyer who has handled many sex-abuse lawsuits.

The UN Committee on Torture “found that the widespread sexual violence within the Catholic Church amounted to torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.” The recommendations by the committee were communicated to Pope Francis in June 2014. The committee said he should:

“Immediately remove all known and suspected child sexual abusers from assignment and refer the matter to the relevant law enforcement authorities for investigation and prosecution purposes”

Impose ‘meaningful sanctions’ on any Church officials who fail to do so.”

Hand over files containing details of clerical sexual abuse allegations to police forces around the world.”

Pope Francis must instruct his bishops to support major statute of limitations (SOL) reforms - time limits on the prosecution of sex crimes. Until they do, “they are enemies of the victims and the public seeking to know the actual risk posed by their policies,” Marci Hamilton stated.

SNAP leaders have called for statute of limitations reforms for decades. 

The Pennsylvania grand jury report also recommended “eliminating criminal statute of limitations for sexually abusing children and expanding the pool of people who can make civil claims against the Church.”

“Survivors of clergy sexual abuse are up against big money in politics as they push for criminal and justice reform. A recent report showed the Catholic Church spent $10.6 million lobbying [against SOL reform] in northeast states since 2011.”

Also, “We have victims who have gag orders who can’t talk about their own lives. Remove these gag orders,” said Barbara Dorris.

Clerical sex abuse of children is "continuing every day. Pope Francis could take actions. He could compel the bishops to open the books, but he has not done so. The pope could say to every bishop that you have to report all abuse to the police. He hasn’t done so. He’s just given us concerns. So even up until today we see this giant kind of cover up,” noted Tim Lennon, president of SNAP

"And I’m sorry, I don’t accept all the apologies. Apologies in absence of action are phony. It’s false. It’s a lie," Lennon stated.

“Victims were suffering from ‘apology fatigue’ and wanted action from the pope." U.S. survivor Peter Isely said.

“This pope is very, very slick on PR. He is very good at putting his thumbs up to the camera and kissing babies, but on the issue of the abuse of children, he has been strangely and tragically inactive,” Peter Saunders stated.

 

(Betty Clermont is author of The NeoCatholics - Implementing Christian Nationalism in America.)

 

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Who else was on the list. It was a disgusting regurgitation of "what rich or powerful name do you recognize?". Bill Gates? Modi? Michlelle Obama? Oprah? Hillary? Looks more like a police line up to mr.

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On to Biden since 1973

@doh1304 While Trump went up 2. The people who participated in this survey are idiots.

Which is unrelated to the issue of the Pope’s involvement in the culture of abuse in the church.

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Anja Geitz's picture

Protecting each other from the law against abominable crimes against children is sickening. May there be a Hell for these evil human beings that does not wait for the afterlife.

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There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

@Anja Geitz

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Betty Clermont

prior Popes.
I respect all Catholics on this site.
Believe what you are taught, what makes you happy, you should not be criticized. To each, his own.
I just do not respect the Catholic Church as an organization.
Same goes for Southern Baptist Church, and on and on.
My heart goes out to the deaf children to screamed to no avail.
I haven't prayed for a very long time, but intend to do so now.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

thanatokephaloides's picture

@on the cusp

I respect all Catholics on this site.
Believe what you are taught, what makes you happy, you should not be criticized. To each, his own.
I just do not respect the Catholic Church as an organization.
Same goes for Southern Baptist Church, and on and on.
My heart goes out to the deaf children to screamed to no avail.
I haven't prayed for a very long time, but intend to do so now.

These matters are part of the biggest single ongoing grief of my adult life.

I grew up Catholic. I am now Pagan. This means I still believe in God, but not in the human-made "Christian" organizations who claim to speak for God.

And yes, I'm pissed at the Catholic Church for all this garbage that Betty exposes so well.

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

snoopydawg's picture

@thanatokephaloides

I consider myself a spiritualist or a humanist. The Pope in my opinion is very fallible.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

thanatokephaloides's picture

@snoopydawg

I consider myself a spiritualist or a humanist. The Pope in my opinion is very fallible.

The Papal decree declaring the Pope infallible on matters of faith and morals -- Pastor Aeturnus -- is one of two such that I feel will cause the downfall of the Catholic Church. (The other one is Paul VI's Humanae Vitae, the decree which simultaneously forbids abortion and birth control.) Germane to today's Essay, Pastor Aeturnus effectively handcuffs current Pontiffs from any too aggressively attacking the real moral failures left by predecessors, as this would be an admission that a previous Pontiff made an error in morals. But some Pope is going to have to face that, or the Church will be destroyed.

They say that the existence of the Church is guaranteed by God. If so, God will need to raise up a Pope with near foolhardy courage, who will have the cojones to repeal Pastor Aeturnus and break out of the handcuffs -- and act once he has done so.

I do not expect to live to see any such thing.

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

- US, Ireland, Australia, Chile - have been done and reported; and dozens of groups of survivors and their advocates have made recommendations that Pope Francis has refused to heed. Not to mention that no other pope that we know of was directly informed about a predator priest and refused to take action. What is also worse is that certainly his predecessor never received the dishonest and fawning media coverage given to this pontiff.

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Betty Clermont

WaterLily's picture

@Betty Clermont I think practicing Catholics were so desperate for hopey-changey after Benedict that they believed -- many still do -- in Francis's slick marketing. He talks the talk, but doesn't feel compelled to walk the walk. And it doesn't matter, because his followers will see, hear, and believe what they want.

Even those who allow themselves glimpses into the darkness will argue that the Church needs changing "from within." Which, in my mind, gives the whole rotten, predatory patriarchy a pass, because those of us who have left it did so because we know for a fact that it will never change unless forced from without.

Count me among the non-religious spiritualists / humanists. No one needs an institution to get between them and their higher power / higher truth / beliefs / whatnot.

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thanatokephaloides's picture

@WaterLily

Even those who allow themselves glimpses into the darkness will argue that the Church needs changing "from within." Which, in my mind, gives the whole rotten, predatory patriarchy a pass, because those of us who have left it did so because we know for a fact that it will never change unless forced from without.

The way the hierarchy of the Catholic Church is set up, what little change is tolerable must come from within. And it's happened before when I've been alive to see: a courageous Pope is elected and rights many wrongs by wreaking massive change from within.

(Yes, right now I'm missing John XXIII something fierce!)

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

thanatokephaloides's picture

@Betty Clermont

Not to mention that no other pope that we know of was directly informed about a predator priest and refused to take action. What is also worse is that certainly his predecessor never received the dishonest and fawning media coverage given to this pontiff.

All Pontiffs in the mass-media age (since the times of Pius IX) have had the abundant media coverage afforded them. However, you're right about previous Popes. "No other pope we know of was directly informed about a predator priest and refused to take action." This is borne out by the relatively tiny number of incidences we know of in the Archdiocese of Rome and its suffragan Dioceses.

But again, Francis is no Leo XIII or Pius X. And, frankly, I think with the sex abuse crisis Francis is in over his head, by miles, and is screwing up royally because of it. He seems not to know what actions to take, and therefore sweeps the problem under the rug rather than act at all.

The worst possible of all worlds. Bad

edit: supplied a real Subject line

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

snoopydawg's picture

@thanatokephaloides

Maybe the Pope is just a figurehead like our presidents are and he is only given so much rope to change things. Rumors are that more than one Pope was ushered off the mortal coil earlier than he should have been.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

thanatokephaloides's picture

@snoopydawg

Does the Catholic Church have its own deep state?

Has the Pope ever heard of Jesus?

To paraphrase Pink Floyd's classic Dark Side of the Moon:

"There is no Deep State in the Catholic Church, really. Matter of fact, it's all deep!"

No claim is made for anything like democracy or transparency, and the Church has stated it prefers things that way.

And the Popes who threatened to upset that apple-cart, like John Paul I and John XXIII, seem to be the ones with the short Pontificates, don't they?

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

of non-believers in the US since 1960, I have hope for the eventual shift of the human mind and the total abandonment of religious ideas and claims about the nature of the universe... a total walk out from religious institutions would be like heaven.

As Betty knows, I am a full on atheist who is increasingly pushed towards anti-theism with every day that I observe what religion does to minds, thoughts and lives. When humans realize universally that they can live good, moral, deep, happy and full lives without gods, angels, saviors etc. etc., we might actually see a new and exciting direction for the human race.

Since religion has had its thousands of years of domination and failure, it sure can't hurt to try out the other road. Another kind of Great Awakening?

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"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin