Those Popes are something else

[donsu]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1020400,00.html

Vatican told bishops to cover up sex abuse

Expulsion threat in secret documents

Read the 1962 Vatican document (PDF file)

Antony Barnett, public affairs editor
Sunday August 17, 2003
The Observer

-snip-

The Observer has obtained a 40-year-old confidential document from the secret Vatican archive which lawyers are calling a 'blueprint for deception and concealment'. One British lawyer acting for Church child abuse victims has described it as 'explosive'.

The 69-page Latin document bearing the seal of Pope John XXIII was sent to every bishop in the world. The instructions outline a policy of 'strictest' secrecy in dealing with allegations of sexual abuse and threatens those who speak out with excommunication.

They also call for the victim to take an oath of secrecy at the time of making a complaint to Church officials. It states that the instructions are to 'be diligently stored in the secret archives of the Curia as strictly confidential. Nor is it to be published nor added to with any commentaries.'

-snip-

Lawyers point to a letter the Vatican sent to bishops in May 2001 clearly stating the 1962 instruction was in force until then. The letter is signed by Cardinal Ratzinger, the most powerful man in Rome beside the Pope and who heads the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith - the office which ran the Inquisition in the Middle Ages.
-snip-
---------------------------

what is wrong with these so-called religious men and their congregations?

[hippywife]

1. Same thing

that is wrong with some of the religious leaders of nearly every faith and denomination:

Power corrupts.

(Raised as Catholic, currently in personal relationship with God, no intermediaries required)

[WilliamPitt]

2. Is there a reason

"what is wrong with these so-called religious men and their congregations?"

Is there a reason why you would lump the congregations in with the pedophiles? Here in Boston, it is the congregations that are kicking the hell out of these bastards, marching every day in front of the Cardinal's residence, suing the bastards for all they are worth, and basically leading the fight. Were it not for the congregations, these terrible crimes would still be a secret.

Is there a reason you did this? As a member of the congregation, I demand an answer. Now.

[donsu]

5. I don't see the congregations doing much about it

but talk. the lawyers for the abused seem to be the only ones raising cain.

it's like christians not speaking out very loudly and letting the fundamentalists run the show.

[WilliamPitt]

6. Then I suggest you pay A LOT more attention

because it is the congregations that are leading this fight, and quite successfully. How do you think it is that you came in posession of this damning letter above? Magic? God?

No. Catholics.

Your outrage is justified. But be careful whom you tar it with.

[donsu]

11. did not appreciate your - "I demand an answer. Now."

who are you to 'demand' anything from me?

[WilliamPitt]

12. I am

a member of the congregation you lumped in with the pedophiles. I don't give a wet turd for what you appreciate, therefore.

[donsu]

14. what a lovely person you are

I'm underwhelmed

[WilliamPitt]

16. Ditto

[Blue_Chill]

17. did not appreciate your lumping me in with pedophiles

who are you to make such an accusation?

[DemLikr]

3. U, my friend, will now be toasted as an "Anti-Catholic Bigot."

The usual--not so original--response here to this sort of uncomfortable-making post.

May the asbestos be with you.

See post #2...and so it begins.

[WilliamPitt]

4. I wouldn't call him an anti-Catholic bigot

He is spot-on about the Popes and the priests who did this filth. I'd just like to know how the victimized parishoners wound up getting denounced as well.

[donsu]

7. If there is a large outcry and action from catholic congregations

it's not making the news. Yes, Boston is, but Boston is one city in the world of catholics.

[Blue_Chill]

19. You trust the media?

The media may not be reporting it but congregations have been attacking the Catholic leadership for some time now.

[WilliamPitt]

23. That's pretty funny

Cardinal Law called down the wrath of God upon the media because of their reporting on this. You must have missed the two-year stretch where some aspect of this story was in the news every single day. Not just in Boston, but internationally.

[DemLikr]

9. Will, I would love a reasoned discussion with you on this topic.

But I have in the past seen that this is one area of give and take in which you tend to lose the ability to separate your personal issues from the topic at hand.

A person very close to me was seduced and sexually assaulted several times by his parish priest at about the age of 13. The priest was kind enough to share a 12-pack or two with him before hitting the kneepads, at least. The priest later died of AIDS.

Now, my dear friend continued to support and participate in the Catholic Church until just recently, at the age of 45. Until then he remained absolutely silent about the sexual flim-flam. To this day he has shared the experience with no one but me.

Much of his pain and guilt comes from the knowledge that for these thirty years he has supported and enabled this church financially and socially, while it and its clergy have done the same thing to thousands of other youngsters.

It always takes two to tango, in the case of the Catholic Church, the dancing duo is the clergy and the congregations who have enabled them.

[WilliamPitt]

10. I hope you don't hold that silence against your friend

I can't imagine the torment it brought him, to have been so foully betrayed by a teacher of his faith. That silence, and the silence of other victims for so long, has nothing to do with protecting the Church. It was psychological in nature; do some research on what rape and sexual abuse does to people. They don't condone if, for God's sake. The act is so incredibly destructive that it simply shuts people down.

I am not defending the Church here. It is not worthy of defense in this matter. But I do defend the people who are in the congregations. Again, simply, we would not know about this stuff, and the Church would not be under so much pressure, were it not for the congregations that have gone on the attack. I'm in Boston. I see it every day on the streets and in the newspapers. The Cardinal's residence is a block away from where I grew up.

Rip the Church to shreds. They deserve it. But take caution with your handling of the congregation.

[DemLikr]

20. Thanks, Will. Sorry; I could have been more clear here.

I totally relate to his silence, especially as a child; but the guilt and regret with which he wrestles now is for his OWN participation as an adult congregant who chose silence instead of candor.

And this relates to the participation of thousands of other congregants throughout the church as a whole who surely at times sensed SOMETHING amiss but chose the more comfortable state of denial. It seems clear that many folks chose NOT to see what was right in front of them the whole time.

I am just looking for an acknowledgement that there is an element of responsibility across the board, including the passive acquiescence of timid churchgoers. And I don't understand the refusal of so many to see that it is quite possible and liberating to simply leave the corporate church altogether and choose a much more direct, personal route to God.

Then, having left the institution that has so abused them, the victims can all the more freely address the legal, moral and financial restitution owed them by the church...from OUTSIDE of it. Sometimes, if sadly, some institutions are wrecked and beyond salvation.

I grew up steeped in Lutheranism, with grandfathers and uncles who were ministers, church and sunday school every week, and eight years of parochial school. In my upper grade school years I began to ask questions and request information and was told to be quiet. At puberty it became painfully, personally clear to me that this church taught that as a gay person I was vile and damned. When I finally accepted that the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, this much less powerful and monolithic version of watered-down Catholicism, this bureaucracy of pious blockheads, was only separating me from God and more painfully, from the actual teachings of Jesus Christ, I left it. It was one of the best actions I have ever taken for the good of my spirit.

In many ways, I loved my church, especially as a child. Accepting the reality of what it actually stands for and promotes, as opposed to my idealized child's image of the sweetness and beauty I felt at times within its doors and liturgy, has been a painful process which still continues. But I am learning that the sweetness and beauty are INSIDE ME already, put there by God, and I don't need any institutional corporate business entity to get in between He/Her/It and me.

Will, I hope you'll at least consider what I've written and give me your thoughts in return.

P.S. I STILL haven't been able to catch your reportedly most excellent speech on CSpan, but I'll keep trying.

[WilliamPitt]

22. It sounds to me

as if your feeliongs on this stem from a personal issue you faced, and successfully managed to come through, regarding institutional religion in general. You should feel free to correct me if I am wrong, but that is what I sense when I read, "But I am learning that the sweetness and beauty are INSIDE ME already, put there by God, and I don't need any institutional corporate business entity to get in between He/Her/It and me."

I have no complaint whatsoever with this. It sounds like you went through a lot to come to the righteous understanding you have, and I, for one, honor you for it. But I also think your feelings against institutional religion are coloring your opinion of those who still worship within the institutions.

The sweetness and light are indeed inside you, but also inside those who worship within these institutions. Blaming them for having been raped and abused and lied to, blaming them right along with the rapists and abusers and liars, does not scan with me. Furthermore, I say again that we would not know anything about these horrors if it were not for the bravery of those who have stood to fight within these institutions.

All respect to you in this.

[DemLikr]

26. And all respect to you as well, Will.

Doesn't everyone's perspective derive from personal experience?

My perspective definitely comes from my personal experience, as well as similar experiences with a variety of religious institutions as shared by many others I know. There is a great deal of strength here on the OUTSIDE. Perhaps by continuing to engage with you and others on this subject, I will come over time to an appreciation I don't currently have of the strength it takes to operate from the INSIDE, and of the value of that position.

Perhaps, too, I will come to see that we are operating toward the same basic goals.

That said, I should add that I struggle in particular with the role of gay clergy in the Catholic Church, many of whom seem to have made of the institution their own protected, private bordello of boys, all while performing service in the name of an instituion which teaches from the top that same-sex sexuality and relationships are inherently evil and to be condemened. I don't have a sufficient label for that brand of nasty hypocrisy.

These guys strike me sort of as the ultimate Log Cabin Republicans.

Thanks again for your thoughtful responses, Will.

[alcuno]

15. No more an Anti-Catholic Bigot than others are Anti-Southern

Bigots; it's not personal. I am a practicing Roman Catholic and have a responsibility to hold the Church accountable and work to change it.

[WilliamPitt]

18. Exactly right n/t

[mopaul]

8. & it's not just catholics....read this

http://www.ukar.org/levant/levant08.html
pedophelia knows no demonination as exclusive, southern baptist men of the cloth, mormons, any asshole of any religious persuasion can play this sick game, not just catholics. they are just the most spotlighted for reasons i'm not sure of. pedophelia between men of the cloth and their victims can effect any spectrum of life. evil is just evil. it's probably true that the catholic church is taking literally all the heat about this awful subject.

[donsu]

13. true - and it's world wide

In Jamaica the incidence of women with mental problems was way above the norm due to sexual abuse of priests, reverends, pastors and men with gov. powers. Joan Riley wrote a novel about it and they were so scared of the light shining on them they denounced her and put her out of her church. She is a hero for shining the light.

[flyingfish]

21. Here is what the document really meant

http://www.pittsburghcatholic.org/newsarticles_more.phtml?id=959

[JitterbugPerfume]

24. Thank you, mopaul

It is not JUST the Catholic church, they are just suffering the criticism

I wonder if someone has an agenda?

[Sinistrous]

25. Incredible! I actually agree with something William Donohue said.

The rebuttal cited by flyingfish agrees with the concepts I formed during my 16 years of Catholic education regarding the seal of confession and its vital importance to the Catholic Church. The report also meshes with the little I have learned in my "toe-dipping" study into the mechanics of Canon Law.

I agree. The Observer/CBS spin on this document is bunk.

(Edit to add Observer to the last sentence.)