Pedophilia Only a Catholic Sin?

nolanchart.com ^ | August 14th, 2009 | Kevin Roeten

[bronxville]

Pedophilia Only a Catholic Sin?

It turns out pedophilia is an incorrect term, and Catholics aren't responsible for most of it.

Shockingly, AP breaks out of their typical liberal mold and reports Insurance companies shed light on extent of sex abuse in Protestant churches, that sexual abuse of minors has been rampant. But in their statement, they indirectly say members of the Catholic Church are not the majority abusers.

AP discusses the raw numbers from three companies that insure the majority of protestant churches in America (Church Mutual, Guide One, and Brotherhood Mutual), and typically receive 260 reports/yr of people under 18 being sexually abused. Compare that with ~228 credible accusations/yr against Catholic clerics since 1950 (documented abuse records).

Together with that information, it is known that the Catholic Church greatly outnumbers any specific Protestant denomination, and the data for Protestant churches is available only for the last seven years. Ever since the first sexual abuse cases had been reported, Catholics have had requirements: 1) police background check done on all volunteers--including priests, 2) a second person be present at all religious functions, and 3) all personnel involved with minors must take routine checks with "Protecting God's Children".

Without a doubt, sexual abuse of a minor is one of the most despicable crimes and sins that man can perpetrate. But predators seem to thrive in an atmosphere where the base congregation is one of the most trusted organizations that exist.

Philip Jenkins, in his 1996 book Pedophiles and Priests, [[link edited for length]], looked at the problem objectively and dispassionately. Jenkins (who is not Catholic) found that true pedophilia is extremely rare, and perhaps more common among Protestant clergy, and is even more common among married laymen.

He found that in most sexual abuse cases (under the age of consent), the behavior is actually a variety of homosexuality. This sexual attraction with very young men that combine the charm of boyishness with sexual maturity is actually called ephebophilia. Pedophilia is really a psychiatric term meaning sexual interest in children below the age of puberty.

Even a book review by William A. Donahue [Review: Pedophiles and Priests] reveals how accurate Jenkins is in his observations over the years. Deal Hudson makes 10 valid points about priestly pedophilia [link edited for length] no one should overlook.

True pedophilia (Leon Podles/ Clergy Sexual Misconduct: Just a Catholic Problem?) occurs most often within families. Celibacy removes most Catholic priests from those types of temptations, and clergy in churches that do not require celibacy have the same (if not worse) problems.

But it has been a media target for any child abuse. More so because many enjoy 'shooting down' something they believe to be "holier than thou". But the Episcopal Church has a comparable problem, and some of the worst abuse cases have been in fundamentalist and Pentecostal churches [[link edited for length]].

Up until the AP report, comprehensive studies were only done on the Catholic Church. The rate for school teachers, residential home-counselors, social workers, or even scoutmasters, never existed because they had no method of accounting for sexual abuse. But the recent AP investigation found more than 2,500 cases over five years in which educators were punished for actions from bizarre to sadistic. (Jacoby/Townhall) rightly states the same sort of outcry that came with Catholic sexual abuse has not existed with public school teachers.

It seems obvious that the legit but skewed condemnation of the Catholic Church is likely coming from the devil, himself. It's only logical his first and sometimes only, victim would be the church with the correct answers.

The problem of sexual abuse seems much bigger than the public will admit. And abuse from church organizations seems to be the minority. Reported sexual abuse seems only the tip of the iceberg. As despicable as Catholic abuse is, it is no where near just a Catholic problem. And finally, it seems as though the public has the wrong impression of who's responsible for accusations of ephebophilia.

And they don't seem to be able to know the differences in phobias, either.

Kevin Roeten can be reached at roetenks@charter.net

[aMorePerfectUnion]

Pravda??? And you are arguing that Pravda is more “objective” than the NYTIMES, etc?

I’d put them both in the falsehood camp.

My concern isn’t protestant vs. orthodox vs. catholic to find out who sins less.

The Catholic Church has a PR nightmare on its hands. Some of it is true. You can quibble about how much. I am not interested in that. Unless you and I were privy to the internal records, we won’t know. We do know some of the claims are true. That is the point.

If you are unwilling to concede that point, you are not being any more objective than the news outlets you criticize. I’d prefer to stand apart from them and make a decision on my own. My understanding is that some of the claims are true.

One is too many.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“The point being the numbers. The Church did indeed protect priests, and in a way that forgot that the Church must be held to a much higher standard than
others and which in many cases sank to a CYA level.

my only point too. For that reason, it has become a PR problem - some based on truth. That is indeed the problem.

[Vaduz]

“Pedophilia Only a Catholic Sin? “No word from Roman polanski waits for court orders hopes bribes work hollywood snickers.

[bronxville]

“Pravda??? And you are arguing that Pravda is more “objective” than the NYTIMES, etc?”

Yes! Especially considering they’ve always hated the Pope.

“The Catholic Church has a PR nightmare on its hands.”

...which was the focus/body of the thread. Don’t you wonder why you’re not having a “PR nightmare” with so many Child Molesting Protestant Pastors?

[Mrs. Don-o]

Could you supply us with those edited-out links? If they’re real long, you can fix them up at tinyurl.com

I’m always interested in sourcing.

Thanks.

[Theo]

Two can play your game.

There is a very strong anti-Evangelical group on Freeper. There is nothing , not facts, not rational arguments, that will get through to them.

Hey, what do you say we exalt Christ rather than our particular denominations?

[bronxville]

“Well, assume that is true, how many of the SBC accusations that were credible were then followed up with criminal prosecutions? I do happen to keep an eye on media reports in my area and there have been 3 public accusations that were followed up with criminal prosecutions with the average sentence being 12 yrs in prison.”

Good point but that’s not the LSM agenda. I just did a google and there’s a number of links pointing to dozens of convicted child-molesting Pastors... My major question is why aren’t the LSM also targeting you? They’ve had plenty of opportunities over the past decade ...some say it’s because you’re all so disconnected from each other and the CC are one...perhaps they’re right or maybe it’s divide and conquer?

“To me, that is the key difference, an insurance claim can mean a number of things, including it is easier to settle the lawsuit than bankrupt the Congregation.”

Agree.

[bronxville]

I’ve checked the links and they all work. Is there a specific article I quoted from and didn’t link?

[driftless2]

"protect the church"

I remember when an ex-priest from my old parish was accused and convicted of molesting boys. I asked my mother if she knew that Father D..... was a homosexual. She looked at me and said, oh yes, we all knew he was probably a homosexual. I looked at her with amazement and asked why somebody didn't do something about it. She just shrugged and said nobody did much about those things in those days. I couldn't believe it.

But the attitude of parisioners in those days (fifties and sixties) was much more submissive than what people tolerate today. My parents (especially my father) attitude was the Church and priests could do no wrong. Even when they did wrong. I guess they just couldn't deal with the idea of a pedophile priest. If I found out some cleric had molested my child, he had better be hiding in an undisclosed location. I wouldn't be very tolerant or forgiving.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Maybe I'm confused. I can't click anything in the main article that says

[[link edited for length]]

But perhaps they are someplace other than the main article?

I'm very sorry if I overlooked something here. Where are the working links?

[ArrogantBustard]

What was that about beams and splinters in folks’ eyes?

[Mrs. Don-o]

You'd have to go to the John Jay report to get the breakdown of the percentages, but the abuse cases peaked in the mid-60's to the mid-80's at a time when the ruling paradigm (not just in the Catholic Church, but everywhere) was therapeutic.

As a rule, when these crime were committed, police didn't arrest, victims didn't/wouldn't testify, prosecutors didn't bring charges --it was an intricate system of evasions everywhere you turned, involving not just the churches, but every "helping" profession: counselors, youth workers, psychologists, judges, school administrators, therapists, public officials.

It was very much the muddled smooth-it-over "compassionate" thinking of the times: don't "re-traumatize" the victims by forcing them to provide courtroom testimony, what they need is counseling; don't "criminalize" the abusers, they need counseling as well; don't create a public spectable that envelops the church (the scouts, the sports program, the deaf school) because it destroys people's confidence in the helping institutions, etc. etc.

Now we can well say we're angry and disgusted with it all, and we know better: but for a long time this was not the way any institution, public or private, religious or secular, operated.

Now the thinking is more along these lines (paraphrase from my retired pastor): "First call the police, then the bishop--- and if nothing happens, the press."

There is plenty of shame, guilt, bad judgment and anger to go around. It's 20-20 hindsight. How we wish ALL the offenders were tried on criminal charges and locked away from the kids forever.

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to say that.

[RobbyS]

Well, the enemies of the Church, who including many liberal Catholics, have taken to PR —the clever use of half truths— to tar the Church. Men like Kueng are angry that Benedict has denied them power and is working to reverse their modernist agenda.

[bronxville]

Mrs. Don-o - I didn’t abbreviate anything. Still not getting what you mean. Is there a specific link I didn’t post?

Padre35 - here are a few - in a hurry so got them in a few minutes...some older and some more recent...

Pastor’s legal troubles expand

Police seize videotape alleged to show sex with child
Keri Kirby / The Times
Posted on July 17, 2003
The Ringgold pastor arrested Tuesday for allegedly exposing himself to children in a Bossier City park over the past several months now also stands accused of having sex with a girl to whom he is related and recording the acts on videotape.
http://www.reformation.com/CSA/thomas4.htm

Sex Offender and Sex Crime News
Convicted sex offender removed as pastor of Newark church
2003-05-07 Newsday

NEWARK, N.J. — A convicted sex offender who was named pastor of a city church several weeks ago has been removed from the post.

Shiloh Baptist Church leaders had hired the Rev. Chavalis T. Williams in mid-March, even though they knew he had pleaded guilty in Florida to charges of child abuse and using children in a sexual performance.

Williams, who still lives in Florida, was not immediately available for comment. He was sentenced to six months in jail and 30 months probation after he admitted in 1999 that he had arranged for two teenagers to have sex in front of him and others while he worked at a facility for troubled youths in Jacksonville.

At the time of his arrest, Williams was on probation after pleading guilty to a wife beating charge.
http://www.reformation.com/CSA/williams2.htm

Minister again charged with molestation
Tuesday, February 11, 2003
By Chris Hack
Staff writer

For the second time in two weeks, a Baptist pastor from New Lenox has been charged with molesting a child — and prosecutors said they are looking for more victims.
Dennis Larry Shaw, 53, of the 2100 block of Sanford Drive, New Lenox, was charged Monday with aggravated criminal sexual abuse of a 16-year-old girl, according to the Will County state’s attorney’s office.

On Jan. 31, Shaw was arrested on similar charges after a parishioner’s 12-year-old daughter alleged she was fondled by the pastor inside the church between October and December, prosecutors said.
http://www.reformation.com/CSA/Shaw1.htm
Lots more here -
http://www.reformation.com/CSA/baptistsabuse.html
...and here
http://www.cin.org/users/msmith/reformation/baptistsabuse.html

Catholic Clergy Singled Out Says Historian -
...”The Catholics have gotten all the attention from the media, but this problem is even greater with the Protestant churches simply because of their far larger numbers,” he says....
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0405/p01s01-ussc.html

...more recent -
Georgia Pastor charged with sexually abusing 5 year old boy has long criminal record, including child molestation and child battery...
Saturday, January 9, 2010 at 12:40PM
http://www.perrybulwer.com/religion-and-child-abuse-news/2010/1/9/georgia-pastor-charged-with-sexually-abusing-5-year-old-boy.html

Former youth pastor arrested again
Updated: Monday, 24 Aug 2009, 6:09 PM EDT
Published : Monday, 24 Aug 2009, 4:45 PM EDT
Katie Collett
YORK COUNTY, Va. - Sergeant Dennis Ivey of the York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office tells WAVY.com Jack Duffer was arrested for the second time in two weeks.  Ivey says Duffer was arrested Friday after a second teenager in two weeks came forward saying the former youth pastor had sexual contact with her in two different areas of York County.

Ivey says Duffer faces 34 sex-related charges in connection with Friday’s arrest and two charges from his prior arrest.  While detectives work to find out if there are anymore alleged victims, the Seaford Baptist Church community prays for strength.
http://www.wavy.com/dpp/news/local_news/local_wavy_yorkcounty_youth_pastor_jailed_again_20090824

Lots within the link -
http://www.reformation.com/CSA/startPage.html

More -
http://www.wkbt.com/Global/story.asp?s=6013245

This one popped up - a long thread - no time to read it...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1850676/posts

“This little light of mine (by a Protestant Pastor)...
I’m gonna let it shine”

This “little light” shines for the many clergy abuse victims whose voices have been silenced. Silenced by shame. Silenced by the false instruction of religious leaders. Silenced by church shunning and bullying. Silenced by church contracts for secrecy. Silenced by suicide. The mission of StopBaptistPredators.org is to break the silence of Baptist clergy sex abuse.

Lots more within the link -
http://stopbaptistpredators.org/index.htm

More but don’t have time...just google. It appears to be a continuing theme, in that, it’s very difficult to trace Protestant Pastor Child Molestors...

It also appears that there’s a cover-up within the Protestant Community.

[padre35]

Well assuming that all of the allegations are factual, there still are a number of problems:

-there is -0 doubt the Catholic Church’s Hierarchy knew of the abuse claims and yet continued to allow the Priests to serve, in those links there is not an allegation that the SBC knew of the abuse and just shuffled the accused around to a different church.

-the allegations against the Catholic Priests span decades, these were not cases of one time offenses, they tended to go on and on, and sadly were committed against those who were most deeply committed to the Catholic Faith.

-there are more allegations to follow, which is possibly the worst aspect of this behaviour, instead of cleaning house of God of this once and for all, and doing so quickly, it lingers.

As Christ told Judas “what you are going to do, do it quickly”

And finally, the dogma that was used to justify this, has it been altered?

I’ve looked into what was going through those Priest’s head and it boiled down to a twisted interpretation of sex not being a sin if it did not involve a woman.

[RobbyS]

One always had the problem and the people were usually less tolerant than your mother. A popular priest at a San Antonio church was "sent away" at the request of parishioners because he got too " friendly" with the baseball players he was coaching. One of the players "clocked the priest" and the pastor, after the complaint was delivered to him by the boy and his dad, got on the phone to his superior --these were Franciscans--and the guy was gone in a week. It was done "quietly," because that was how it was done on those days--by every institution. Many were the tales of young men who were flunked out of the seminary and sent home because they were too "nervous." The paradox of all this, IMHO, is that we are part of a society that easily tolerate homosexuals but is outraged when a homosexual is caught doing what homosexuals do every day. The myth has grown up that homosexuals were persecuted. The truth is that they were shunned. But shunned not for what they were--unless they happened to look like a girl--but after they got caught, or were dumb enough to hang out at a gay bar, where they were likely to get busted down and then by cops who really were "homophobes."

[bronxville]

The Southern Baptist Convention’s Unconvincing Claims as to Why It Cannot Effectively Report or Prevent Clergy Child Abuse – and How Insurance Companies Can Exert Pressure to Ensure Better Systems

By MARCI HAMILTON

Thursday, Jun. 12, 2008

The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) has recently proven why it is that children are at risk for sexual abuse in our society: It’s easier not to protect them, and especially easy to issue ineffectual platitudes while looking the other way.

According to the Associated Press, the SBC has concluded that its decentralized structure of independent churches makes it impossible for it to establish a website of pastors credibly accused of child sexual abuse, or even to require the reporting of such crimes to the police. Yes, you read that right: The SBC is citing these lame procedural reasons for not taking the most basic steps to protect children from devastating abuse that can have repercussions that leave victims suffering for a lifetime (and that severely taxes society in medical and other resources).

In this column, I’ll rebut the Convention’s claims that policing and reporting abuse is an impossible task to put on its shoulders, and also describe how change in this quarter needs to come from what may seem like an unlikely source: the insurance industry.
[...]
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/hamilton/20080612.html

I agree that Protestants are a lot more splintered and have millions more congregants but this professor isn’t buying it.

The Baptist Pastor (link above) believes they’re covering up the Child Molestations by Pastors.

[bronxville]

“Well assuming that all of the allegations are factual, there still are a number of problems:”

They were about Protestant Pastor Child Molestors and yet you go on to discuss priests. Padre, I know it’s easier to focus on priests especially since you have the LSM, daily kos, DU, media matters, salon, etc., supporting you but this thread is about Protestant Molestations by Pastors. Is there a cover-up? How can you all weed out these molestors and protect the vulnerable children?

[RobbyS]

As someone has said, the pope is not the CEO of a multinational corporation or a federal agency but something more like an extended family, or even a nation. So it is wrong to say that the “hierarchy knew” This is like saying that the “government” knew about this, that or the other. There is no such thing as “the government.” There are a billion things that go on that the government knows nothing abou (Thank God!). Forgive me but there is a large element of witch hunt going on here, yellow journalism. It ought to be enough to look at the wrong things that were done and evaluate the evidence. People are leaping to conclusions, led by bad reports such as the one in the NYT.

[RobbyS]

I’ll defend the SBC. The public schools suffer from the same disability. Decentralization means that the perp is allowed to escape scrutiny. because it IS a big,country—a country of 300 million people. Lots of places for anyone to hide. Identity change is always possible. Misdeeds are easy to cover.