PA Catholic Church child abuse

[StrangeSox]

Yikes

 

[StrangeSox]

 

[SoxFan2003]

2 minutes ago, StrangeSox said:

 

It's scary stuff.  I feel lucky that as an alter server growing up nothing like this ever took place near me (as far as I know).  Looking back on it, you can tell how easy it was for these monsters to get away with it.  If I had kids, I wouldn't let them anywhere near a Catholic priest without other adults around. 

[whitesoxfan99]

Is there anyone amongst the Catholic Church leadership that isn’t a criminal?  Shut down the entire church, it’s remarkably corrupt top to bottom. 

[Quin]

There really needs to be some sort of massive legal hammer brought down upon the Church in Pennsylvania. No slap on the wrist bulls***.

[StrangeSox]

2 hours ago, Quinarvy said:

There really needs to be some sort of massive legal hammer brought down upon the Church in Pennsylvania. No slap on the wrist bulls***.

You have to imagine that the same sort of investigation in other states would come up with similar results. And it's not just a US thing either.

[ptatc]

3 hours ago, SoxFan2003 said:

It's scary stuff.  I feel lucky that as an alter server growing up nothing like this ever took place near me (as far as I know).  Looking back on it, you can tell how easy it was for these monsters to get away with it.  If I had kids, I wouldn't let them anywhere near a Catholic priest without other adults around. 

Agreed. I as a server for 5 years and never heard any hints about issues. But if you look at it it's a small number of priests compared to the overall number.

No one should ever let kids be alone in these situations. 

[StrangeSox]

11 hours ago, ptatc said:

Agreed. I as a server for 5 years and never heard any hints about issues. But if you look at it it's a small number of priests compared to the overall number.

No one should ever let kids be alone in these situations. 

 It's 301 out of something like 1700 total in PA. That's a pretty substantial percentage.

 

e: this report also excluded Philly, which has been investigated separately.

Edited August 15, 2018 by StrangeSox

[Brian]

Let these guys f*** and get married and stuff already.

[GoSox05]

12 hours ago, ptatc said:

Agreed. I as a server for 5 years and never heard any hints about issues. But if you look at it it's a small number of priests compared to the overall number.

No one should ever let kids be alone in these situations. 

Seems like there might be something wrong with this religion if we cannot let kids alone with priests. 

Does the this kinda stuff occur with Catholic priests in other countries?

[StrangeSox]

Yes

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-44209971

[bmags]

9 minutes ago, GoSox05 said:

Seems like there might be something wrong with this religion if we cannot let kids alone with priests. 

Does the this kinda stuff occur with Catholic priests in other countries?

Yeah at the very least it seems every UK/european country had their own reckoning in the last 15 years. Was being managed at a global level.

The catholic church at the very least needs to open up to allow a 3rd party create a definitive account of all of the abuse, but it would almost certainly touch every part of their heirarchy.

I'm not sure US is even best positioned to force that, France or certainly Italy could apply more pressure.

[bmags]

The sheer magnitude of this abuse is just astounding. Considering the appalling nature of the abuse, we really need to understand how we can deter people from accepting the institutional cover ups. This has been easiest to occur in a closed institution such as the catholic church, but has popped up in lots of different institutions. It always ends up that so many more knew about it.

I've thought a lot about this douthat column, and about some of the rumors about teachers that ended up being true. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/23/opinion/sunday/cardinal-theodore-mccarrick-metoo-archbishop.html

[whitesoxfan99]

20 minutes ago, GoSox05 said:

Seems like there might be something wrong with this religion if we cannot let kids alone with priests. 

Does the this kinda stuff occur with Catholic priests in other countries?

Yes, just about anywhere where there is a Catholic church this is happening.  Chile is having major investigations into the church right now, a number of instances in Europe, Australia, etc.

[Balta1701]

16 hours ago, Quinarvy said:

There really needs to be some sort of massive legal hammer brought down upon the Church in Pennsylvania. No slap on the wrist bulls***.

For the most part there will be very little legal liability for those involved as most of these have passed the statute of limitations. The bishop or whatever who was in charge of the Diocese of Pittsburgh during some of that stuff above has moved on and is in a leadership position for the church in D.C. This is basically a summary document and a lobbying effort - trying to get the state of PA to update their statues. Also worth noting that when Pennsylvania has tried to update their statutes of limitation in the past, they run into lobbying from, well, the Catholic church. For example, in 2016 a bill passed the state senate doing some of the work, but any civil liability was stripped out, for obvious reasons. The Bill then died at the end of the session without a final vote in the state House. 

[LittleHurt05]

I'm going to steer my children as far away from organized religion as I can.

[Kyyle23]

This is exactly why I walked away from Catholicism 

[Brian]

I only go to church on Christmas to make my mom happy. It's literally the most uncomfortable hour of my year. 

[Jose Abreu]

46 minutes ago, LittleHurt05 said:

I'm going to steer my children as far away from organized religion as I can.

I don't get it- because of the issues with Catholicism? If you personally are agnostic/atheist then that's one thing, but the recurring issue here seems to be within one sect of one religion, not all organized religion. 

[Kyyle23]

17 minutes ago, Jose Abreu said:

I don't get it- because of the issues with Catholicism? If you personally are agnostic/atheist then that's one thing, but the recurring issue here seems to be within one sect of one religion, not all organized religion. 

Catholicism is far from the only sect of religion that has had horrific things happen under its watch.    It just so happens to be the worst

[Jose Abreu]

5 minutes ago, Kyyle23 said:

Catholicism is far from the only sect of religion that has had horrific things happen under its watch.    It just so happens to be the worst

I see. I tend to enjoy eastern religions. While they too have their issues, I feel like they aren't as rampant (in terms of child abuse) as they are with Catholicism, but the post I replied to seemed to lump every religion together. 

[Swingandalongonetoleft]

8 minutes ago, Kyyle23 said:

Catholicism is far from the only sect of religion that has had horrific things happen under its watch.    It just so happens to be the worst

The worst that we know of at the moment. 

[Kyyle23]

Just now, Jose Abreu said:

I see. I tend to enjoy eastern religions. While they too have their issues, I feel like they aren't as rampant (in terms of child abuse) as they are with Catholicism, but the post I replied to seemed to lump every religion together. 

honestly the older i get, the more I grow away from any sort of religion.   It doesnt resonate with me, at all.   I was born christened and confirmed catholic, and just never felt the connection.   If there is a god, im sure we can discuss it when it is my time

And just so it is clear, i dont look down on people for believing in it.

 

[Kyyle23]

1 minute ago, Swingandalongonetoleft said:

The worst that we know of at the moment. 

true

[Jenksismyhero]

My firm has/is litigating a number of child sex abuse cases here in Chicago. The shit is beyond disturbing once you get into the docs and the practices of the Church to protect these guys. And the way these guys prey on children is absolutely abhorrent. Brain washing young children to believe that the priest has a real connection to God, that he speaks to God, that God can tell them when he is upset, using the threat of sin, using the threat of telling parents about what the kid has done, etc. etc. These people need to be put away for life, but sadly the prison sentences for those that are criminally charged end up being pretty short and they're always at minimum security places.

Luckily the law is changing, albeit slowly, to address repressed memories and the courts are now accepting it as something real so that statute of limitations issues aren't blocking legitimate cases. But there have been far too many people out there who had the courage to make claims and then were utterly screwed. The Keepers is a good mini-series on Netflix that deals with this issue in Baltimore (and it's one of the more fucked up examples of priest-abuse).