Posted on 08/19/2024 2:19:16 PM PDT by ConservativeMind
Around 87,000 Australians have been sexually abused in faith-based organizations during their childhood, with nearly three-quarters of those taking place in Catholic settings, according to new research.
Yet the new study from the Australian Catholic University’s Institute of Child Protection Studies showed a significant decline in the prevalence of abuse in the last five decades, falling from 2.2% of men aged 65 and older, down to 0.2% of men now aged 16-24.
One in every 250 Australians, or 0.4% of the population, reported being abused by a pastor, a member of the clergy or other adult in a religious organization.
As boys, men now aged 65 years or older were more likely than girls to be abused in this way, and the most common perpetrator was also male.
The analysis, led by PhD candidate Gabrielle Hunt, confirmed that the Catholic Church carries a proportionally higher burden of institutional child sexual abuse in Australia, but also leads efforts to prevent and address such crimes.
The findings, published in "Child Abuse & Neglect," were drawn from a major child maltreatment study of 8,503 people age 16 and above by Australian Catholic University in 2023, which found that 28.5% of people had experienced sexual abuse as a child.
The report attributed the decline to lower levels of religious observance and engagement, rising secularization, dilution of deference to organizational and religious authorities, robust preventative and response policies, and work by organizations to prevent the admission of high-risk individuals to leadership positions.
Hunt said efforts to adopt background checks for those working with children, mandatory reporting policies, and screening and training programs had contributed to the reduction in prevalence but that "more needs to be done."
"I think we need to get to a point where we don’t accept abuse of any child," she said.
(Excerpt) Read more at ncronline.org ...
Thanks Morgana!
Honest folks want these perverts exposed, expelled, prosecuted and imprisoned ... and we don’t give a rip which church, civic group, government agency, or other organization they might possibly be members of. And honest folks don’t whine when the perverts are found in groups of which the honest folks might otherwise approve.
Government school teachers have a far higher rate of abuse.
The Catholic Church does not have a pedophile problem.
It has a homosexual predator problem.
Sorry but the damage that homosexual clergy have done to the Church and the people is severe and ongoing. If there are fewer molestations its only because even faithful parents simply do not trust their children to today’s clergy.
Does that excuse it? Then, why bring it up.
Because we still have free speech and I felt like bringing it up.
Sounds like you have an agenda.
So...
This raises some questions.
Is attendance at Roman Catholic churches in Austrailia declining over this period?
Is the sharp drop in absolute numbers or relative numbers?
For the record, I’m against all child abuse everywhere and hoping this is legitimate good news.
I wonder if the people who were abused would find comfort in this distinction?
It mirrors the homosexual supremacist battle the entire country faces.
Parents who trust their children to be alone with priests may not be legally complicit when the predictable abuse happens, but it might be worth considering.
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