Posted on 07/18/2007 1:48:09 PM PDT by topcat54
Cardinal Roger Mahony has announced that the Church will pay out $660 million to more than 500 victims of sexual abuse by priests. It’s the Catholic Church’s failure to act swiftly and decisively on the matter that has disillusioned and enraged church members and victims. No one likes a cover-up, especially religious devotees who believe the church is a means of salvation and priests are mediators between the people and God. But there remains a more sinister cover-up.
The Church must come to grips with reality and admit that the priesthood is so dominated by homosexuals that Paul Wilkes, who studied 600 parishes for his book Excellent Catholic Parishes: A Guide to Best Places and Practices, makes this telling observation, “If we drove all the gay priests out of the priesthood, our Masses would be on videotape.”1
I find it interesting that all the sexual abuse is done exclusively by pedophiles, seemingly a heterosexual malady. Are we to believe that not one case of sexual misconduct can be attributed to a single homosexual priest? There are anywhere from 8,000 to 22,000 homosexual priests. If the priesthood is made up of such a high percentage of homosexuals, then it stands to reason that at least a high percentage of the church’s so-called pedophile problem is really a homosexual problem.
The church’s unbiblical, illogical, and irrational policy that priests must not marry and remain celibate is being blamed for the sexual scandal. Such an argument is off the mark. Has anyone noticed that the priests aren’t, in 95 percent of reported cases, having sex with teenage girls? The male priests are having sex with young male parishioners. The problem of sex abuse is not because of celibacy; it’s homosexuality. Homosexual men are becoming priests because that’s where young, impressionable, and vulnerable boys are found. Of course, the idea that priests should remain unmarried is a religious fiction given that priests in the Old Testament were married and had children (Ex. 6:23), and Peter, the supposed first pope, was also married (Matt. 8:14; 1 Cor. 9:5; cf. 1 Tim. 3:4–5).
The Roman Catholic Church has had a difficult time recruiting men to the priesthood. Homosexuals see this as an opportunity. Why not go where there’s an almost unlimited supply of young boys whose parents consider priests to be god-like? Are we surprised that the Boy Scouts have also become a target of homosexuals? Once again, it’s where boys can be found for recruitment purposes. Liberals attack the Scouts for not opening its leadership ranks to admitted homosexuals, while these same critics attack the Catholic Church for giving “pedophile priests” easy access to children of the same age.
Catholics are taught that priests and nuns are spiritually special and set apart for God’s work. I can still remember sitting in my fifth grade class at St. Germaine’s Catholic School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, when Father Hugo would enter the class. Sister Mary Josephine would always ask, “Who wants to be a priest when he grows up?” Only one boy, my best friend at the time, Salvatore LaMarca, refused to raise his hand. Of course we wanted to be a priest. Being a priest was a one-way ticket to heaven. It was like getting a “Get out of Hell Free” card.
Devout families—and predator priests frequently chose their victims from the most ardent parishioners—had been taught for generations to exalt, respect and trust priests. Who could imagine dear Father Tim—who came to dinner, played with the kids, counseled mom, acted like a dad—would do something so sinful? Doubting the priest would cost you your spiritual security.2
It’s no accident that early Hollywood designated the priest as the most trusted of film characters. Spencer Tracy, Bing Crosby, and Pat O’Brien made their careers with movies like Angels with Dirty Faces, Boys Town, Going My Way, and The Bells of St. Mary’s. Every parish dreamed of having a Father Flanagan for its priest or a priest who just looked like Pat O’Brien. Notice that almost in every case the priest was a friend and confidant to young boys. It came with the territory. Parents always knew their children were safe with a priest.
Film-making in the early years was nearly dominated by Jews, as Neal Gabler describes in his highly informative book An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood. Even so, Catholic clergy were almost universally depicted as decent and caring spiritual leaders. Louis B. Mayer “was a close friend and a great admirer of New York’s Cardinal Spellman, with whom he dined every time he visited New York, and a large portrait of Spellman in his red vestments was the first sight that greeted visitors to Mayer’s library.”3 It was the church’s “respectability” that impressed Mayer. “If a character appeared on screen wearing a clerical collar it served as a sure sign that the audience was supposed to like him.”4
Toby Westerman reports, “A gay culture is growing among clergy of the American Catholic Church that receives support from members of the hierarchy as well as from those directly involved in the training of priests, according to a Catholic priest-theologian.”5 The Vatican has found it nearly impossible to police its seminaries. Much of the problem is a lack of will and fear of a backlash from an already depleted clergy.
There has been a redirection of focus from a discussion of homosexuality to pedophilia, a nearly universally despised predatory behavior. The charge of pedophilia is being used as a smoke screen by homosexuals to fly under the sexual radar. While the general public excoriates the pedophiles among us, the homosexuals go merrily along debauching young men in the name of sexual tolerance.
In the April 1, 2002 issue of U.S. News & World Report, homosexuality was mentioned only once in the eight-page article on the Catholic sex crisis. Rev. Joel Garner, pastor of a Catholic church in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is quick to point out in the article that “the pedophilia problem has nothing to do with celibacy or homosexuality.”6 Throughout the article, the sex scandal is called a “sex-abuse scandal,” “youth-sex-abuse,” “sexual misconduct,” “predatory sexual behavior,” but never a homosexual problem. Author Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, confuses the readers of U.S. News even more (on purpose?) when she reports, “Despite the common image of a priest sodomizing a 9-year-old altar boy, most of the priest abusers are technically ‘ephebophiles’—that is, they abuse adolescents rather than children.”7 In any other dictionary, the description of an ephebophile would be a practicing predatory homosexual.
The article begs the question. It’s not just “adolescents” who the priests are abusing, it’s adolescent boys. If pedophilia is the problem, then why aren’t the priests having sex with young girls in the church? The church is covering up its crisis to save its reputation, and it’s no less true that thesereporters are covering up for the homosexual rights movement. John Leo, an editorial writer for U.S. News, touches on the real issue when he writes that true pedophiles are rare, and the super majority of the priests involved in this sex crisis are not pedophiles. “But the church is reluctant to mention the distinction,” Leo writes, “most likely because opening up the issue of sexually active gay priests is itself explosive, even apart from charges of abuse.”
The homosexual lobby is so powerful and intimidating that almost no one wants to suffer from its unbridled wrath. So for cover, the priests are charged with pedophilia in order to hide the fact that homosexuality is the real culprit.
2. Johanna McGeary, “Can the Church Be Saved?,” Time (April 1, 2002), 31.
3. Neal Gabler, An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood (New York: Crown Publishers, 1988), 285.
4. Michael Medved, Hollywood VS. America: Popular Culture and the War on Traditional Values (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992), 51. Roman Catholic and Episcopalian clergymen (e.g., Life with Father and The Bisho’s Wife) were most often chosen to represent the church because they were easily identified because of their clerical garb, most specifically a special collar. Most Protestant clergymen wear no special attire. They generally look like businessmen.
5. Toby Westerman, “Suffer the Children: ‘Gay’ culture in Catholic Church grows Priest says scandal really about homosexuality, not pedophilia,” World Net Daily (March 24, 2002).
6. Angie Cannon and Jeffery L. Sheler, “Catholicsin Crisis,” U.S. News & World Report (April 1, 2002), 57.
7. Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, AChastity and lust: Is there a psychological link between sexuality, celibacy, and predation?,” 55.
8. John Leo, “Of rage and revolution,” 12.
Thank you for that statement, confirming that I have not slandered nor made any personally derogatory remarks about any FReeper.
I wish I could say the same about you.
You’ve misunderstood my use of the language, so let me be remedial:
“You have not demonstrated that anyone has slandered you.”
You haven’t.
Do you claim that Jesuits take THAT oath? The one that was pulled, that can’t be posted?
Have you run away?
Nothing was "pulled," Petronski.
And since we've been told not to discuss this, why do you keep discussing it?
I missed the place where we were told not to discuss it. Do you have a link?
No, the catchesim very clearly states they worship the same God as Christians but they don't.
What I would like to know is when a position can't be refuted (except in the defenders mind), why does it always turn into personal attacks? And why would someone want to follow that god that drives that? Why do you seem to always want to make it personal?
That's not true. Not even rhetorically.
ping to 147
Entitled to what? What claim are you making now? Entitled to what?
interesting responce...
1) The RCC's embrace of the Muslims is well-documented in both the RCC catechism and in JPII's loving lips smooching the Koran.
Interesting again, however it has little relation to the position you took vis the catechism in regard to the salvation of Muslims. Nice try, but a seeing and a miss!
2) We were asked not to discuss the Jesuit Oath yet you keep bringing it up. You must be awfully familiar with it. Do you deny Jesuits take an oath?
OK, this is just sad, the RM asked that the oath not be posted, there was no prohibition on discussing the fraudulent product of a disturbed mind. Strike two.
3) "Fox's Book of Martyrs" is a Christian classic. It's read by Presbyterians, Methodists, Anglicans, Lutherans, Congregationalists, etc.
And the Al Franken's books are read by men, women, Socialists, environmentalists etc, doesn't make the information in the books any less defective now does it? That's three, grab some wood.
Granted, the RCC is made uncomfortable by a retelling of the Vatican's shameful, blood-soaked history. But that's not my problem. It's yours. Thank God.
Truth is nothing to fear, there have been some horrible popes, priests, bishops, laity, sisters, monks, friars and brothers, the Church is full of murderers, rapists, molesters, lier's, cheats and all manner of sinner, some of whom have done terrible things in the name of the Church and in the name of God, to their ruin I wold think. Thank God for the Church it's where we sinners belong, the hospital for sinners. I know the history of the Church, warts and all, and am able to differentiate between the all to human administration and the Divine treasure.
Keep posting Doc, yer doing just fine! If anyone wonders what the fruits of Calvinism are, they need look no further.
“But his retirement is mandatory on his 80th birthday, whether the Pope likes it or not.”
Actually, at 80, he’s just no longer eligible to vote in a papal conclave.
The pope still doesn’t have to accept his resignation.
sitetest
I gotta tell you, I've scoured this thread and found no such prohibition. Why won't you provide a link?
Let me state this as emphatically as possible: I want this thread to remain. I do not want it to be pulled.
I want it to stand as yet another monument to your horrible behavior.
That's not true. Not even rhetorically.
Technically, Petronski may be right. The phrase goes "where the bishop is, there is the Church." Mahony is a Cardinal, and depending on the function performed, Cardinals can be bishops, too.
So depending on Mahony's actual job description, technically, Dr E may be righter. And since His Eminence Roger Cardinal Mahony is listed among the "U.S. Bishops" on the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops member page, I think the point goes to Dr. E.
Of course you do. But you're wrong. The Roman Catholic Church is not any one man.
I don't see how pointing out obvious and demonstrable pathology that is invested in not a small number of a particular posters posts in "making it personal".
If your dishwasher has a problem and Sears sends a repairman to fix it and during the service call he creates a leak under the sink, who do you hold responsible. The repairman or Sears? If they refuse to repair it, or send out the same guy to fix your stove, who do you blame? Who is the repairman representing? What if you find out that he breaks more things than he fixes but Sears won't let him go? Who do you blame? Why? (Because he represents Sears) Would you buy another maintenance agreement from them?
What about a cab company that has a driver they employ that does not have a clue on how to get around your city and has a record of going many miles out of the way, charging the customer, yet the company does nothing about it?
Or what about a line worker at a car manufacturing plant on model X car who deliberatly does not fully tighten down the gas line which ends up causing many model X cars to catch on fire, which scars many people for life? When the company realizes this, they do not fire the worker, his manager just simply move him over to Model Y car. The same things happens and he is moved now to work on the gas line on Model Z car. Then, it happens again and they put him in a office somewhere. Upper management finds out what the mid manager did which he knew caused more people lifelong scarring. Does the line worker represent the car company? Does the manager who keeps moving him?
I did not expect that you would.
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