Posted on 11/16/2006 9:54:57 AM PST by presidio9
The US Roman Catholic Church has asked a criminology school to delve into the darkest pages of its history by probing the causes of a priest sex abuse scandal.
At a meeting due to end Thursday in the eastern city of Baltimore, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops voted to disburse 335,000 dollars to fund the first three phases of a study by New York's John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
"It will be a groundbreaking study, never done before in the US, nor in the world," Bishop Gregory Aymond, who chairs the Committee for the Protection of Children and Young People, told AFP.
"We don't know what would come out of it, but we are going to tell the truth," said Aymond, of Austin, Texas.
In 2002, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice had made a list of complaints and pedophilia cases in the US Catholic Church since 1985, when one of the first scandals came to light with the case of a Louisiana priest.
The university will now look into the "social and historical context" of sex abuse to see if such cases are more frequent in the Church than in the rest of society, notably in schools and youth clubs, Aymond said.
The Church wants to "look at what is unique" in the priest sex abuse crisis, he said.
The first part of the study would be completed in 2008 and made public, although the names of suspected priests would be omitted.
In the second part, the university will evaluate the Church leadership's response to sex abuse cases.
"We want to see where we failed and made some mistakes, and learn from those who handled it well," Aymond said.
The study will also paint a psychological profile of pedophiliac priests by reviewing cases in treatment centers.
The review will aim to show "to what extent is a priest sexual abuser profile the same as the psychological profile of the non-priests who are sex offenders," Aymond said.
The university will also interview abuse victims and examine education at seminaries over the decades.
The majority of priests accused of sex abuse were trained in the 1960s and 1970s in seminaries where psychological tests and sexuality education have since been introduced.
A final phase of the study will make proposals on how to prevent sex abuse and help victims.
"Our goal is to ascertain the causes of the clergy sexual abuse crisis and if we need to change any method we have now," said Teresa Kettlekamp, the executive director of the bishops conference's Office of Child and Youth Protection, which was created in 2002, in the wake of the sex abuse scandal.
But the study would also be useful to schools and youth groups, Church officials said.
"The pathology of abusing children isn't unique; it's a societal problem," Kettlekamp said.
"We are hoping it will be a big, big help to the society in general," she said.
What an absurd idea. Have you ever considered that God chose the time and place where he would reveal himself, and perhaps he had reasons NOT to choose the 21st Century?
So many straight lines; so little time!
Before the Resurrection, there weas one Apostle in particular whom Jesus the celibate especially favored - John, the celibate among the Twelve.
He appointed only one Apostle after His Resurrection.
Saint Paul.
Saint Paul was also a celibate and a strong advocate of celibacy, sanctioning marriage only as a last resort.
As the testimony of the early Church attests, after their ordination married bishops customarily lived with their wives without intercourse just as Saint Paul advocated.
I will point out that the teaching of Saint Paul is also the teaching of Jesus Christ.
Jesus "requires" celibacy of no one. He asks those who embrace the ministry to embrace it.
LOLOL. By george, I think he's got it!
It's even sooner....
"It's not GOOD for man to be alone."
I do believe that a priest can validly exercise the Sacrament of Reconciliation, even if he himself is in a state of mortal sin, so you needn't worry if that's the case.
Read my posts I'm not against celibacy for priests or individuals. I believe it shoud be optional and women also should be allowed. As information most priests prior to 1000AD were married. Why is it required today?
You're absolutely spot on.
I have been a Catholic for six years. Prior to becoming a Catholic I had no experience with Catholic Priests. I became a Catholic because after studying Roman Catholic theology, I concluded that if one is going to be a Christian, one must be Roman Catholic (or, perhaps, Orthodox) -- but that's a discussion for a different thread.
The point that I want to make here is that since becoming a Catholic, I have observed that on the whole Catholic Priests are the biggest group of weirdos and oddballs I have every encountered. In school, they were the guys who were picked last when choosing sides. They tend to display feminine characteristics and other unusual behaviors. They were the guys who no girl would date. You get the idea.
Protestant ministers on the other hand tend to be normal, regular guys. They typically have lovely wives who make positive contributions to their ministry.
Celibacy is a major sacrifice for a normal, regular guy. However, if you are an oddball who can't get a date anyway or a homosexual, celibacy is not such a big deal. In fact, if you are looking for a way to hide your homosexuality or to try to contain your homosexuality, celibacy might look like an attractive solution to your problems.
It's time Catholics recognize that celibacy is filtering the set of Priest candidates to the social misfits and homosexuals. I've seen Priests on TV who appear to be normal guys, but I've yet to come across one Priest in my diocese who does not display some personality trait that would be considered odd by most people.
Perhaps, cradle Catholics have become so use to the kind of men who become Priests that they just don't see what a weird group these men are. Maybe it's much easier for someone like me who dealt with Protestant ministers most of my life to see what a strange group Catholic Priests are in comparison. I think my wife, who is a cradle Catholic, falls into that category. She seemed to expect Catholic Priests to be oddballs until I pointed it out.
Since becoming a Catholic, I have concluded that the biggest weakness of the Roman Catholic church is its clergy -- especially, the Bishops, who appear to be the Priests who are best at hiding or dealing with their social inadequacies. But then, one would expect the human component of any organization to be its weak point.
In any event, the fact that Catholic Priests tend to be weirdos will not discourage me from continuing as a Catholic. However, I would never allow one of my children to be alone with any one of them.
Here's what I meant to say:
Things are different now. If he chose the 21st century to reveal himself I can guarantee you that women would be chosen.
What an absurd idea. Have you ever considered that God chose the time and place where he would reveal himself, and perhaps he had reasons NOT to choose the 21st Century?
You need to meet some different priests.
Yep. Modus operandi.
That is some statement there.
Well, I don't think you've read my post. I've stated that I realize it wasn't around in the early Church. Neither was the Bible. Should we throw the Bible out simply because Jesus Himself didn't physically write it?
And also, you don't seem to be understanding the main point here: The vocation of the priesthood is VOLUNTARY, so no one is forcing them to be celibate.
If you do understand that point, then you are trying to mold the priesthood into what YOU want, and again, as a student of history, you should know that it's not the individual who decides what the Church should believe (or do), it's the other way around. At least historically speaking.
Only God can reconcile you. Forgiveness comes from God not the Priest. Christ said go and sin no more. Thats it. Even when he forgave sins he said your sins are forgiven without even asking the person to rattle them off in a stupid confessional box. You can have a direct relationship with God this very moment. You don't need a priest.
In the late 50's and 60's vocations to the priesthood began to drop drastically. Perhaps the cause was the new emphasis on sexuality that began to dominate popular culture. Up until then, seminary applicants who showed the "tendency" were rather preemptorily discouraged.
But, then, a very weird thought crept in. I.E., if priests were required to be celibate, it was thought by some, that
What they were celibate from didn't much matter!
"After all," they argued, "since all sex outside of marriage is sinful, all the homosexuals had to do to be good priests is not have sex!"
Common sense did not rule the day. Tough-talking Tony, Archbishop of Philly, put it best: "Giving up the normal, i.e., the wife and family, is a heroic sacrifice. Giving up the sinful, is not." (I paraphrase)
This stupid decision, contrary to years of Church tradition, let open the floodgates to the point that many homosexuals flocked (good word) to the seminaries. So many, in fact, that it discouraged normal men from applying!
Now it's a real problem, because many priests one meets nowadays are, IMHO, if not sexually active homosexuals, at least very very light in the loafers! The new namby-pamby liturgy in the hands of these simpering clymers is enough to gag a maggot. Sermons delivered by window dressers and hair stylists? I don't think so. IMHO, of course.
The quality of priests is very much dependant on the diocese they're in ... southern Virginia (Diocese of Richmond) is (not so) full of wierdos, northern Virginia (Diocese of Arlington) has a lot of really excellent priests. Richmond has a "priest shortage". Arlington does not. Richmond sends seminarians to notorious 'pink palaces' like St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore. Arlington sends its seminarians to Mt. St. Mary's in Emmitburg, and St. Charles Borromeo in Philadelphia, both known for orthodoxy.
Let's look in context:
11 In the Lord, however, woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. 12 For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God. 13 Judge for yourselves: Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? 14 Does not the very nature of things teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a disgrace to him, 15 but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For long hair is given to her as a covering. 16 If anyone wants to be contentious about this, we have no other practice—nor do the churches of God.
Thank you for stating Catholic Doctrine.
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