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Posted on 04/18/2010 9:49:35 PM PDT by Judith Anne
I seriously wonder about some FReepers, sometimes. Any other person accused of a crime would be defended by every FReeper as being innocent until proven guilty by a court of law. I've seen whole threads written by men who have been accused of child abuse by ex-wives out to deny them their visitation rights or to wrest more money out of them. These men are rightly indignant, and furious about the unjust accusations that cannot be proven but are never withdrawn.
Yet where are those FReepers when a PRIEST is accused? Where is the presumption of innocence? Suddenly, every accusation becomes a verdict, and not only the accused but his entire organization and all its adherents are held responsible.
I can only wonder what some of these so-called conservatives (who so faithfully defend the Constitution) would do, if THEY were the ones accused! It is a nightmare for any man -- all of you know how even the accusation stains the man forever, even if it is proven false!
Not only that, many here assert that the problems of 30, 40 and even 50 years ago must be tried in the media TODAY!
Remember the Duke rape case? There are more similarities than differences here. The priests are accused, nifonged, and instead of being defended, they are vilified!
What other man of you could stand under the weight of such an accusation trumpeted by the press, and come out whole? None! And such accusations made, LONG after the statute of limitations has passed, sometimes even after the accused is dead and buried for YEARS -- are YOU one of those who automatically, reflexively, spitefully, and gleefully act as judge, jury, and executioner?
Women! What if it were YOUR HUSBAND, YOUR BROTHER, YOUR FATHER, YOUR UNCLE, YOUR SON who was accused? Wouldn't you want the best defense possible? Wouldn't YOU believe in their innocence? Wouldn't YOU help protect your loved ones as much as possible? And yet, YOU JUDGE THE CHURCH FOR DOING WHAT YOU WOULD DO?
Shame! Vast shame! On all who have sinned against the innocent!
But you won’t see jail time. It’s not about punishment or justice. It’s about financial gain. It’s about taking down an entity that is reviled by the MSM and others. It’s not even about truth of the accusations. Sure there were some who committed crimes against children. There were some victims. Happens everywhere, in all organizations. We just don’t hear about it much because it doesn’t fit the agenda. And then there’s that little thing about what percentage of the population has been abused/victimized in any way by anyone. And by whom. It’s so much easier to rant against some Institution, especially when that Institution is hated by just about everyone.
Easy targets and all that.
Maybe instead of suing, for financial gain, the victim goes after the person/human, who committed the crime against them.
Excellent, excellent story. I’m going to tell it to my granddaughters, tomorrow!
Thank you very much for taking the time to post it.
I don’t think anyone seeks to defend the cover-ups. Former Boston Cardinal Law and Cardinal Roger Mahony are among them. Of course there are others as well. Indeed much of this may have been due to the false hopes of psychotherapy as a cure for priestly pederasty. This is deplorable.
Even the Risen Christ had the scars of his wounds like a wounded warrior returning home to earth from a triumphant battle of good over evil. What is troubling is how some with a sinister agenda are attempting to tarnish the “One, True, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic” Church because of the sins of a few priests overlooking the thousands of other priests and monks and sisters of religious orders, saints and martyrs included, who keep and have kept their sacred vows. The Church as the Body of Christ will always have its scars and indeed it is recognizable by these wounds.
The hidden agenda is to advance the gay and rabid feminist agendas which has corrupted other Christian denominations and have accelerated their demise. Benedict XVI is their bete noir because of his strict orthodoxy, his implacable opposition to homosexuality, and his brilliant theological and philosophical mind that make his adversaries look like latter-day Lilliputians.
He contacted the Michigan Catholic (state catholic paper) and they came out to interview us both for a human interest story...He sat and interviewed us both on the farm for quite a while and then went to the barn to take pictures of the goats...Father and I and one of the kids were in the final choice to run in the paper....We made the front page with a picture...But this reporter took lots of notes as we talked and had no axe to grind, but still make lots of mistakes in the article...
Father called me when the paper came out (about 3 weeks later) and was laughing...He said it was a great story, but I might not recognize the article...it had lots of errors in the story...Don't believe anything you read and 1/2 of what you see...,p. In cleaning out my basement I recently came across the Michigan Catholic with the article. Dated September 28, l990.
Interesting side note. Someone had recently made a anonymous donation to the church and he said he didn't know what to do with the money until I contacted him....The vet, inoculations and trucking was paid for by the mysterious donation...I repaid almost all of it and it went on for someone else need...
The priest in the mountain parish needed a new bell for a mission church they had built, and he found a buyer for the flock but all the gentleman could afford was 1000 dollars for the goats...A thousand dollars was the amount needed for the bell. Somewhere is the mountains of W.Virginia is a little mission church with my husbands name on a plaque that says mission bell donated in memory of (my husband). I could tell you a few other stories about how God works in mysterious ways, but too much typing for tonight already.......
I don’t think it’s anti-Catholicism on FR.
Usually we do assume the accused are innocent until proven guilty.
But when it’s child abuse allegations, and there are many different children or former children all accusing the same guy, and even memos and letters about it from higher-ups. . .
we just don’t think they are innocent.
We usually seem to assume robbers and carjackers shot by their “alleged” victims are guilty, too, we don’t say “oh wait and see if they really were breaking and entering.”
Everyone on this board seems to think OJ and Roman Polanski are guilty, too. They aren’t Catholics! Who else? That freaky woman in Vallejo who apparently raped and murdered Sandra Cantu. Although she is not yet convicted.
When that guy in SoCal was picked up recently for raping/murdering a teenage girl - and then another long missing girl’s body turned up in the same location - everybody was assuming he did it. Turns out he is now charged, having confessed in a plea bargain deal.
So don’t assume anti-catholicism.
That makes me laugh..thank you...and the same to you. I have found you can have a nasty disagreement with a freeper on one subject and agree with them on another thread..:O)
I keep EWTN radio on in the kitchen/chore area.
It is awesome that some attack will pop up on FR via MSM articles ect and blam a FR Catholic will post.
I then go out to do kitchen/laundry and blam there on EWTN radio the discussion is often the same as posted here in Catholic answers/apologies/history/catechism ect.
Just confirms what I read here as in fact true to Church teachings.
Also helps that we have not turned tv news back on since having it off for 43 days.
Do not get confusing info that way.
I see you haven’t been around FR long...check the Religion Forum for the last month, and count the anti-Catholic articles.
I didn’t dream this up out of nowhere.
I listened to a Priest speak outright clear and concise against this crime and those who enabled it. He wants to see justice done and it was refreshing to here him speak as so. I also believe the pope is doing what he can to rid the church of this..and am sorry the people have to endure the whole affair.
Something like this hit a church I was attending several years ago. The assistant Pastor was having sex with a 12 yr. old girl. We knew the parents. Before the charges were filed the parents and Pastor together went to the assistant pastors home and confronted him. It was difficult to say the least for all. But nobody covered it up and of course the whole church was affected once they learned of it. Sad time to say the least....some families left the church as well. The parents of the church eventually left as well.
I don't think the gay/feminist agenda is hidden at all. It's in site ofor all to see now. It's that people aren't paying attention, as they are infiltrating every area of our life...from churches to school and what is being taught, to political offices etc. And there are more people unopposing than there are opposing. I sometimes feel like we are outnumbered and have become the minority as all these things come upon the church, family and life we have known. Evil is flourishing as if there is no constrait now...
That is an absolutely lovely story. Thanks, very much.
There’s no going back from accusations of this kind. Reputations are ruined.
I remember in high school and college the “banner” saying was that women don’t lie about being raped. Children don’t lie about being abused/molested. Sure they do. And, false accusations screw over real victims and ruin lives of innocent people.
And those who charge false claims don’t seem to suffer any public or court reprecussions. I don’t recall that Duke accuser being charged with anything or suffering in any way for trying to ruin the lives of 3 good guys, for costing them and their families millions of dollars in legal fees. She didn’t serve any jail time.
Last I checked, it was innocent until proven guilty. The prosecution has to prove guilt.
Yeah, he dodged a huge one there. Stood strong and threw it right back at her. All these years later, the kid is 17, almost 18, and has a good relationship with her Dad and her Mom.
Didn’t we all know that banner was a lie when we first saw it? I can’t remember what happened to Potipher’s wife, the one who accused Joseph in the OT, but it seems to me there was punishment of some kind...
My parents taught me the same thing.
My Dad was a firefighter and most males on my paternal side were firefighters or cops.
Back as early as the 70s, from what I recall, my Dad was yelling at the TV, saying the news media was going to get us all killed, screw over America, etc.
The alleged victims are Catholic
The alleged perpetrators are Catholic
The alleged cover-ups were allegedly done by Catholics
The alleged culture was Catholic
The alleged decisions to move the priests around was Catholic
The payouts (they’re not alleged) have been Catholic.
What is it- twenty some dioceses in bankruptcy over this? A billion plus dollars or some such figure. And that’s just in the US?
Oh, and the blind defense is by.....wait for it.... Catholics!
Those dastardly clever Protestants.
Nifonging?
Really?
More like Marion Berrying- “The B**** set me up. The B**** set me up.”
In any organization the size of the Catholic church, there are going to be rogue people. And in any larger society there are going to be others with an axe to grind.
I don’t doubt that many who are attacking Catholicism are doing so with malice aforethought.
The thing that concerns me is the number of Catholics who take the “Move along, nothing to see here”, attitude.
Having ears they would not hear, having eyes they would not see.
Protestants left the Catholic church for selling indulgences to its rank and file. Today, the rank and file give indulgences back to Her, in the form of denial and blind defense.
You said, “And how many anti-Catholic bigots here walk hand in glove with those Obama-worshipping toadies?”
I’m sure I’m identified as one of the anti-Catholic bigots. It’s not true, but that shouldn’t matter. I assure you I don’t walk hand in glove with Obama worshiping toadies, but I have been walking foot in BS from people who continue to defend the indefensible here on Free Republic.
Oh, and as I’ve said many times- I’m not one of those who believe priestly celibacy is the problem here- it’s priestly UNcelibacy that the church needs to be concerned with.
Will Wallace
You and I were blessed to have the wise fathers we had....
It's not drunken prostitutes that accused the priests, it's the victims, children at the time of rape and abuse, that accuse.
And many of the guilty priests were defended and protected by their bishops and confidentiality agreements when settlements were made.
And don't forget the victims that went public were not anti-Catholic bigots.
Yes indeed, vast shame on those who harmed the innocent!
“...children at the time of rape and abuse,”
Teens. If you call teens “children” then I guess so. Have you ever heard of ephebephilia?
You can hammer that all day long if you want. I cannot tell everything I know, but I can say there are teens who don’t care who they have sex with, who exploit sick, perverted adults for power, money, and drugs, just as they exploit others younger than they are for power and sex.
You likely have no familiarity with the ugly homosexual subculture. I have a fair amount of experience with these people as a nurse on psych and as AIDS patients. And talk to some people in law enforcement to get a fuller picture.
I am a Catholic parent, so was my husband. If any Church authority figure had EVER harmed one of my children, we’d be in jail for murder, not behind closed doors with a lawyer angling for his fee and a big payout. I absolutely do not trust most of the so-called victims.
And most of them are broke, druggie homosexuals who are looking for bucks, and who know which priests are vulnerable.
The alleged perpetrators are Catholic
Yes, part of the lavendar mafia, or gay men looking for a respectable sinecure where their lack of female companionship will enable them to hide their prediliction.
The alleged cover-ups were allegedly done by Catholics
The parents of the so-called "victims" who couldn't accept that their sons were homosexual, and who needed someone to blame for their sons' perversion besides themselves or "Uncle Bill"?
The alleged culture was Catholic
Yes, and people weren't stupid. They knew it was the gay subculture, and it made them sick, so they hushed it up.
The alleged decisions to move the priests around was Catholic
The medical authorities said the ephebephiles were cured.
Do you know how much money Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson have blackmailed businesses to get? Do you really think that because a person is guilty of something, they have to do more than pay the civil penalty? Payouts were a big mistake. The bastards who genuinely hurt actual children should have gone to jail. The Church should never have paid a dime.
And if you think this is a blind defense, then you are as ignorant as I think you are.
No, they were angling for money, and had dirty lawyers who cared more about getting a large fee than knowing the truth of the situation: that the victims mostly weren't.
You said, “And if you think this is a blind defense, then you are as ignorant as I think you are.”
For the record, I’m as ignorant as you think I am.
Will Wallace
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