Vatican 'sense of humor failure'

[Walsingham]

A leaked memo jokingly refers to the Pope having to apologise for things like sex abuse, condom use, and so on.

 

I thought I'd mention it so we can see how level headed RC is after all that hoo-hah with Mohammed pictures.

 

My own feeling is that - as much as I love my RC friends - the Church has some serious ****ing issues. Most of which stem from the lack of accountability and transparency. It's been downright evasive and dismissive over sex abuse issue, which I find as crazy as I do repulsive. I also think that the Church could do a great deal to save lives by permitting condom use in countries with a high incidence of HIV.

[WorstUsernameEver]

He should. The problem is, I don't think they'll ever admit there's a problem.

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

Then again, for Tarcisio Bertone, the problem is homosexuality so..

[Darth InSidious]

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/id/236096

 

Will attempt to respond more fully later.

[Walsingham]

Apparently the Vatican are appalled because the email hasn't resulted ina sacking from the FO. Obviously they consider this email much more serious, than say serial child abuse.

[Gorth]

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/id/236096

 

Will attempt to respond more fully later.

That is both good and bad, isn't it? Those guys are supposed to be better than other people.

[Rostere]

Apparently the Vatican are appalled because the email hasn't resulted ina sacking from the FO. Obviously they consider this email much more serious, than say serial child abuse.

 

That is indeed a very good point.

[WorstUsernameEver]

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/id/236096

 

Will attempt to respond more fully later.

 

Reliable datas. Good. They don't exactly paint a rosy picture though.

[Walsingham]

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/id/236096

 

Will attempt to respond more fully later.

 

 

I had not looked at it in those terms [priests abuse at the same rate as the population as a whole]. I'd be hypocritical if I did, since I've argued many times that incidents of violent abuse in the Army are not higher than those in the general population. So, I concede the point.

 

However, this is not just about incidents of abuse, it is about the way the Church has handled abusers. Specifically it has concealed their crimes both actively and passively, to a degree which suggests an institutional policy. That is, in the technical vernacular, totally ****ing mental.

[Pidesco]

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/id/236096

 

Will attempt to respond more fully later.

 

 

I had not looked at it in those terms [priests abuse at the same rate as the population as a whole]. I'd be hypocritical if I did, since I've argued many times that incidents of violent abuse in the Army are not higher than those in the general population. So, I concede the point.

 

However, this is not just about incidents of abuse, it is about the way the Church has handled abusers. Specifically it has concealed their crimes both actively and passively, to a degree which suggests an institutional policy. That is, in the technical vernacular, totally ****ing mental.

 

It's what everyone does, though. Basically, everyone reasons that concealment and denial is the best policy until they get caught. There was a paedophilia case here in Portugal involving a charity organization where it was basically the same deal. Only over 20 years after the fact did the victims come forward.

[Orogun01]

You know, I understand that there are pedophiles in every category, but when there are so much pedophiles well.. maybe there's a structural problem.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/id/236096

 

Will attempt to respond more fully later.

 

 

I had not looked at it in those terms [priests abuse at the same rate as the population as a whole]. I'd be hypocritical if I did, since I've argued many times that incidents of violent abuse in the Army are not higher than those in the general population. So, I concede the point.

 

However, this is not just about incidents of abuse, it is about the way the Church has handled abusers. Specifically it has concealed their crimes both actively and passively, to a degree which suggests an institutional policy. That is, in the technical vernacular, totally ****ing mental.

 

It's what everyone does, though. Basically, everyone reasons that concealment and denial is the best policy until they get caught. There was a paedophilia case here in Portugal involving a charity organization where it was basically the same deal. Only over 20 years after the fact did the victims come forward.

Although, in the case you present it may have been because the victims were ashamed to come forward. Did they were prosecuted? Where there allegations during the years before the declaration?

[Walsingham]

It's fair enough to argue that all institutions have a tendency to try to cover up their failures. The Army tries to avoid things becoming public because it tarnishes the uniform. But

 

1. I don't know of the Army covering up child sex abuse.

2. For lesser crimes, such as GBH, the Army will lock you up in the Glasshouse (which is actual punishment rather than simple incarceration), dock you rank and pay or fire you, THEN you get handed over to the civil authorities to serve an additional normal tariff.

[Darth InSidious]

That is both good and bad, isn't it? Those guys are supposed to be better than other people.

Err, no, they aren't meant to be better than other people.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donatism

 

Apparently the Vatican are appalled because the email hasn't resulted ina sacking from the FO. Obviously they consider this email much more serious, than say serial child abuse.

I'm curious where you get this from - it's not in your link, and the only comment from the Vatican I've seen has been effectively that the paper is irrelevant: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics...ys-Vatican.html

 

To my knowledge, neither Damian Thompson nor Jack Valero, nor Tim Collard represent the Vatican.

 

I had not looked at it in those terms [priests abuse at the same rate as the population as a whole]. I'd be hypocritical if I did, since I've argued many times that incidents of violent abuse in the Army are not higher than those in the general population. So, I concede the point.

 

However, this is not just about incidents of abuse, it is about the way the Church has handled abusers. Specifically it has concealed their crimes both actively and passively, to a degree which suggests an institutional policy. That is, in the technical vernacular, totally ****ing mental.

I don't think an institutional policy is very likely, TBH, quite apart from the lack of evidence. As Pidesco says, people have a tendency to cover up **** like this regardless of the organisation, creed, etc. Besides which, it all begins to sound a bit conspiracy theory-esque, and to fall into the same traps.

 

Also, a lot of this was happening on the local level, in the diocesan offices. The Vatican is actually not in as much control as is often made out - the Pope is less like a CEO and more like a Prime Minister, around whom bishops are ministers, and dioceses function like departments of state. Sort of. It's an imperfect analogy, you get the idea of the organisational structure, and that does affect how things get done, and how much filters up toward the top, for better or worse. That's not to say it was all being quashed at a local level - some bishops were reporting cases further up the scale, but they were getting dragged out in the Roman Rota ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Rota ). That was until 2001, when the CDF took over the handling of abuse cases, and forced bishops to report them further up the chain (as well as, IIRC, re-issuing instructions for co-operation with the civil authorities, etc). Up until 2002-ish and the Boston case becoming widely known, decisions on cases like this were left to the local bishop. AFAIK that's no longer the case.

 

The cover-up was also actually against the Church's code of practice - both the Comission to Inquire into Child Abuse in Ireland and one of the reports in the US (I forget which one, sorry - it's been a 36-hour day, and I really don't feel like looking it up) found that the Church had in these instances not been following the code of canon law on the subject. Finally, I'd point out that in the Kiesle case, the civil authorities were involved and he got off with what was frankly a mickey-mouse sentence.

 

That's not intended to say the situation isn't horrifyingly awful, but it's differently awful from the way its been presented in some of the better-selling news-outlets.

 

Sorry if that's not very coherent/readable; it's been a very long day.

[Walsingham]

Insidious

 

1. You make a very good point about Vatican response. it does not appear from the link you've shown that the Vatican are that bothered officially.

 

2. I have to disagree, without citing anything, that the Vatican have not engaged in a deliberate policy of cover up. I seem to recall that the Irish government ran an enquiry which conluded that there had been deliberate obfuscation of offences, and that priests wwho were known to be offenders were transferred rather than handed over to civil authorities.

 

I too am tired, and a bit drunk, and full of the joys of Karen Gillan, so we'll call it even.

[Volourn]

"Overall, the John Jay study found that 149 priests were responsible for more than 25,000 cases of abuse over the 52-year period studied."

 

Game over.

 

Also, that article contradicts itself. It claims poriests are as likely to molest children as the 'general public'm yet the numbers it uses don't back it up. According to said article, priests do it at a rate of 4% while the the population does it at an official rate of 10% and they claim that number is low and should be 20%.

 

btw, I think those numbers are way too high. Really? 1 in 10 or 1 in 5? I don't buy that nonsense. That's claiming that I'm related to a solid of child molestors. K, whatever, Mr. Madeupstats.

[Raithe]

To jump back to the original story a moment.. Part of the issue is not that the "jokes" were there, but that the memo also contained serious aspects.

 

So it couldn't be dismissed just as a "joke memo" going around, it was a working memo that had a bunch of serious stuff, and then had the "jokey" stuff mixed in.... which blurs the edges of how it would have been taken.

 

Plus a lot of people are tending to get the perception that Catholics (and other forms of Christianity) are getting very short shrift on political correctness matters these days.. Such as the amount of jobs where people are not allowed to wear crosses or such as visible symbols of faith for the potential "offense" it might cause non-christians. Whereas plenty of non-christian religions have some very visible symbols that have staff are allowed to wear because it might offend their religion... So there's a certain level of "if it was x religion rather then the Catholic Church there would have been a bigger fuss and someone would have lost their job already...".

 

Personally I'm standing on the sidelines and playing devil's advocate from both sides. I'm cheerfully agnostic, and tend to feel that any organised religion has a tendency to shift personal faith into peer-pressure symbols where the belief is in the rote activities rather then in the faith.