The Pope Covered Up Pedophile Priests

[TheGame]

@Xantar: Maybe other religions are better at covering it up? I don't think many other religions have an equivelant to the pope... and I don't see it making national news every day that any other religion's 'leaders' are making an active effort to sell out each and every person who is in a high position molesting children.

Men kill, men cheat on their wives, men lie, men steal, men rape, men become preists, men become pastors, men take high positions in any given religion's structure... Just because they're preists, doesn't make them exempt from being human.

With that said, I'm sure that there's plenty of other religions that have perverted people in positions of power... either by their own standards, ot by the standards set in by law. And I'm sure there's plenty of stories about it.

So... to answer your 'point' about how the Catholic church seems to be the only corrupt one...

Here's what I think the real issue is.. The religion has too large of a power stucture, and they became too large of a group among western/free nations. They managed to make themselves into political tools, and in the effort to appear "perfect" they decided to go the route of privacy whenever something happened that would make the church look bad. (Much like many do in politics)

So when someone would report to the Pope that a guy was raping children, he thought that banning this person from the church or making them answer to the law would actually make the church look bad.. so he decided to cover it up instead. And as most political figures find out.. trying to cover things up usually ends up hurting your cause more in the end once the truth comes out.

The celibacy thing is irrelevant in my opinion.. The problem is that it's a large political secret society that doesn't want to answer to anyone, and wants to appear to be "perfect".

[Xantar]

Game, I think you're contradicting yourself a little bit. As you pointed out, at least part of the problem here is that the Catholic Church has a huge (international) power structure. And that's also the reason why it's better at covering up scandals than any other religion. In my own Buddhist practice, if the monk that my family works with abuses children, no elder monk will come by to hide him away in a monastery or swap him out with another monk because there is no elder monk at all. I'm not not going to claim to have a comprehensive knowledge of religions, but of the ones I know of, none has a central command authority whom everybody is supposed to answer to. Religious practice is generally very local.

If you look through the news, you can actually find plenty of cases of priests or monks of various religions being caught going to strip clubs, driving while drunk, having affairs and all kinds of other things. I repeat: they are caught. Because there is nobody to hide them away. And when something like that happens, it's considered notable but not a huge scandal because there has been no conspiracy to cover up the crime.

[TheGame]

Originally Posted by Xantar

Game, I think you're contradicting yourself a little bit. As you pointed out, at least part of the problem here is that the Catholic Church has a huge (international) power structure. And that's also the reason why it's better at covering up scandals than any other religion. In my own Buddhist practice, if the monk that my family works with abuses children, no elder monk will come by to hide him away in a monastery or swap him out with another monk because there is no elder monk at all. I'm not not going to claim to have a comprehensive knowledge of religions, but of the ones I know of, none has a central command authority whom everybody is supposed to answer to. Religious practice is generally very local.

If you look through the news, you can actually find plenty of cases of priests or monks of various religions being caught going to strip clubs, driving while drunk, having affairs and all kinds of other things. I repeat: they are caught. Because there is nobody to hide them away. And when something like that happens, it's considered notable but not a huge scandal because there has been no conspiracy to cover up the crime.

I understand these facts, and I don't really disagree with you.. I guess the point I was trying to make is that what's wrong with the religion isn't that it gives the priests the incentive to rape the little boys... the problem is that they're trying to uphold some impossible to reach reputation of being "perfect" by hiding the fact that there is immorality within their church.

The divide here seems to be that people believe the religion gives the priests the incentive to molest children because of celibacy, and because of the position of unquestioned power they hold over the children. I believe that the problem is that they're trying to hide the immorality opposed to addressing it with real punishment for political reasons... because god forbid there be a story about the Pope admitting to making a mistake and removing a preist from their position of power.

Maybe I should do a poll... if you were forced to be celibate and your only option for sex was 10-12 year old boys, would you do it? Pretty sure everyone would vote no.

[Xantar]

Originally Posted by TheGame

The divide here seems to be that people believe the religion gives the priests the incentive to molest children because of celibacy, and because of the position of unquestioned power they hold over the children.

At the very least, that's not what I'm saying. What I suggested earlier is that if the Cardinals had been fathers, they would not have been able to look the other way in cases of pedophilia. Never mind how bad it makes the Church look. Having children changes you, and if you have a bunch of old virgins gathered in a room disconnected from every day life, they are going to come to very different decisions about what to do with scandals like these compared with men (and women) who have families.

[TheGame]

Originally Posted by Xantar

At the very least, that's not what I'm saying. What I suggested earlier is that if the Cardinals had been fathers, they would not have been able to look the other way in cases of pedophilia. Never mind how bad it makes the Church look. Having children changes you, and if you have a bunch of old virgins gathered in a room disconnected from every day life, they are going to come to very different decisions about what to do with scandals like these compared with men (and women) who have families.

That's true, but when you say that, it implies that people with families and who aren't disconnected from every day life like preists do not molest children... but they still do. And I'm sure there are plenty of preists (if not the VAST majority) who are old virgins and who are disconnected who have never molested a child.

Children will get molested no matter what, regardless of environment..

The incentive to keep it under wraps for political/reputation reasons is the real problem. That's why they turn the other way.. Not because they're freaks who are disconnected from reality, and somehow rationalized why their brothers are touching on little kids.

[Xantar]

That's true, but when you say that, it implies that people with families and who aren't disconnected from every day life like preists do not molest children...

No. I'm saying people with families who aren't disconnected from every day life do not cover up pedophiles. Or at least they are much less likely to do so over the course of a hundred years. Come on, Game. I know you can follow this.

[TheGame]

Originally Posted by Xantar

No. I'm saying people with families who aren't disconnected from every day life do not cover up pedophiles. Or at least they are much less likely to do so over the course of a hundred years. Come on, Game. I know you can follow this.

Once again, the problem is you're making large generalizations. Yes, normal families do cover up pedophiles. There are MANY stories out there about dads/step-dads molesting children, and the mother knowing and doing nothing about it.

[Xantar]

Originally Posted by TheGame

Once again, the problem is you're making large generalizations. Yes, normal families do cover up pedophiles. There are MANY stories out there about dads/step-dads molesting children, and the mother knowing and doing nothing about it.

Look, instead of going back over everything step by baby step so that you get what I'm saying, let's just do this:

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict) was assigned the task of covering up pedophile priests, moving them to other jurisdictions, hiding evidence and so on. To do this, he had to think that it was ok for little boys to be traumatized for life with no possibility of justice.

Now, would he have been more likely to do this if he was a father or less likely? I know it's still possible he would have done it, but my question is do you think that makes him more likely or less likely?

Now consider that there are hundreds of Cardinals in the Catholic church. So go through each of them and ask the same question: is that man more or less likely to stay silent about pedophile priests if he is himself the father of children? Remember that all it takes is for a few of them to blow the whistle on the church.

I'm not saying that all fathers are saints. I'm saying that if Catholic priests had all been family men, they would have been less likely to try to hide pedophiles from justice. Yes, it's a generalization. That's why I use words like "more likely" or "less likely" instead of "will."

[Professor S]

Just to clarify MY opinion on this...

I don't think that the Cath Chirch incentivizes or recruits molesters. What I said was that the priesthood is attractive to people with sexual compulsions that are beyond the norm exactly because of celibacy and the promise of handing one's sexuality over to God.

They view it as a means to cure themselves of these desires that they hate and keep secret, but in the end many fail (many may succeed, but we don't hear about them). This is why I think we hear about so many instances of molestation in the Cath Church as opposed to other faiths.

They want to be good and godly, but in the end perhaps they are setting themselves up for failure.

[TheGame]

Originally Posted by Xantar

I'm not saying that all fathers are saints. I'm saying that if Catholic priests had all been family men, they would have been less likely to try to hide pedophiles from justice. Yes, it's a generalization. That's why I use words like "more likely" or "less likely" instead of "will."

I don't know if it is more or less likely... has a study been done on that?

I'm kidding by the way.. Though I don't think him having a family would have solved the problem, this is a top down problem caused by them chosing to keep immoral action secret opposed to openly punishing people for it.

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict) was assigned the task of covering up pedophile priests, moving them to other jurisdictions, hiding evidence and so on. To do this, he had to think that it was ok for little boys to be traumatized for life with no possibility of justice.

I that he could have thought that way, but somehow I don't think he's that sick...I think that he probably thought that allowing that information to get out would do more to hurt the catholic church then it would to help their cause. Just because you're the one who hides the evidence doesn't mean you're that you agree with the crime. Some people just simply feel that letting things get out on the table, even if it's the right thing to do, can hurt their cause more then it can help it.

I'm sure the priests were slaped on the wrist, in a very secret way.. but they weren't about to let someone else handle it.

Just like the whole torture situation in the US. They didn't want to release certain pictures. certain information, and did not want to prosecute the people who gave the orders. Is that because they agree with the crime? No.. It's because some of those pictures, and some of that information can destroy america's reputation and anger our enemies/allies further, even if we do the right thing and put the people who allowed it in jail.

That's just how I see it.. yes little things could change up how much the molestation occurs, but the thing that needs to change the most is how they handle people who commit the crimes. Because as I pointed out a few times, the crimes will still happen no matter what incentive structure surrounds a person.

[manasecret]

There was a report on NPR maybe a year ago about Jewish rabbis molesting boys in some Jewish communal bathes I think in New York. -- Found it:

Abuse Scandal Plagues Hasidic Jews In Brooklyn

"See the Hebrew sign?" he says, pointing. "You go downstairs, and that's where the mikvah is."

The mikvah is a bathhouse usually used by women for ritual cleansing. But in some Hasidic communities, like this one, fathers bring their young sons on Friday afternoons before Shabbat begins. Twenty-one years ago, when he was 7, Diangelo recalls going to the mikvah with his father to find the place packed with naked men and boys.

"And I was in the tub, and I had my back turned, and somebody raped me while I was in the water," he says. He takes a shaky breath. "And I didn't know what happened. I couldn't make sense of it, really."

...

"He motioned for me to get on his lap, and as soon as I got on the chair, he would swivel the chair from right to left, continuously," Engelman says. "Then he would start touching me while talking to me. He would start at my shoulders and work his way down to my genitals."

Engelman says this occurred twice a week for two months. He told no one for more than a decade. Reichman was, after all, a revered rabbi. Four years ago, he told his parents. And a year ago, when he heard that Reichman had allegedly abused several other boys, they confronted Reichman. When the school heard about it, they gave the rabbi a polygraph.

"He failed miserably," Engelman says. "So they told me, 'This guy is gone. This guy has to go.' "

But a few weeks later, a religious leader from the school approached Engelman's mother, Pearl. He posed an astonishing question: On a scale of 1 to 10, how bad was the molestation?

She was speechless. Then she says, the man continued, " 'We found out there was no skin-to-skin contact, that it was through clothing.' So he's telling me, 'On a scale of 1 to 10, this was maybe a 2 or a 3, so what's the big fuss?' "

The school hired Reichman back. That was in July 2008 — one week after Joel Engelmen turned 23 and could no longer bring a criminal or civil case against the rabbi.

...

"If you're a pedophile, the best place for you to come to are some of the Jewish communities," he says. "Why? Because you can be a pedophile and no one's going to do anything. Even if they catch you, you'll get away with it."

Abuse and cover-up by the Hasidic Jewish community. It's amazing what power does to control people.

[Typhoid]

Hey, look at that.

[Vampyr]

Good old religion.

[Typhoid]

Originally Posted by Vampyr

Good old religion.

Religion: Creatin' pedophiles since the dawn of time.


The Pagans had it right.
No single God, no desire for molestation.

[Xantar]

Originally Posted by Typhoid

Hey, look at that.

Well, ya know, if you had just given me the story that manasecret just posted, then that would have been the end of it. But I understand it's easier to make fun of my penis size than it is to actually read my question. It's all good.

Anyway, not asking rhetorically and really looking to be enlightened: who is the highest authority of Hassidic Jews? The article says that Hassidism is broken up into a bunch of small groups spread around the world, but I don't know if each of those is considered autonomous or if they all answer to some (human) authority.