Posted on 01/04/2011 1:06:16 PM PST by ADSUM
Letter from Archbishop Jerome Listecki, Milwaukee
. . . .
which . . . uhhhh . . . cheek you’r burping from.
Where has anyone excused anything. Didn't you try that lame argument about 100 posts ago?
>> OK, so how do you know what the *real* scope of the *problem* is in Calvinist churches is if there's no database.. Maybe there's no database because there's no one in the Calvinist churches to be on it.<<
Presbyterians Today: The Office of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) estimates that there are about 50 clergy sexual misconduct cases every year.
And that's without lawyers circling to make millionaires against anyone who makes a claim.
Oh, and for references, PCUSA is one TWENTIETH the size of the Catholic Church, so that would be the equivalent of ONE THOUSAND sexual misconduct cases PER YEAR in the Catholic Church. (This includes heterosexual abuse, however.)
While this doesn't give numbers, at least it acknowledges a PROBLEM:
DallasNews Religion, April 12, 2007. . . In recent weeks, Southern Baptists have scrambled to respond to a rising number of its ministers who have been arrested for abusing children.
How deep in denial could you possibly be?
Hey, we Catholics were in denial in the early 1990s. Several reports came out about pedophile priests, and pretty much all of us thought it was just the liberal news media out to attack Catholicism. Then they netted Cardinal Bernardin, accidentally, and buried the story for another decade. Then, in 2001, Cardinal Law in Boston was shown to be to be still covering up evidence, and Catholics got furious: Law should have learned his lesson that psychological "rehabilitation" and reassignment work, and Catholics across the nation went out for scalps.
But you're still living in the 1980s of "it can't happen, here," aren't you? You haven't learned a thing, and you're just throwing mud.
If you’re still in denial, let’s look at what’s been going on among those Baptists:
1/6/11: Sturdevant man gets seven years for sexual assault [of minor]. (Pleasant Street Baptist Church volunteer; pastor gushes about how nice he was. Note, nothing in headline links him to church.)
12/30/10: Rio Linda [First Baptist Church] pastor arrested for [six counts of] child molestation. UPDATE: 1/1/11: Rio Linda church stands behind pastor after arrest.
12/26/10: Dallas County [Greenville Baptist Church] pastor accused of sexual assault
12/20/10: [ANOTHER] Dallas County pastor accused of sexual assault.
12/17/10: Kimball pastor charged in possession of child porn. [Wave a few million dollars and I’m sure some victims will show up.]
12/11/10: Norfolk former Baptist pastor jailed for sex assaults.
That’s FIVE fresh arrests in the past month. (I won’t count the first article, since the arrest is older, and the man wasn’t pastor.) Still, that’d be an average of SIXTY arrests per year. Given that the Catholic Church is FOUR TIMES larger, that would be the equivalent of THREE HUNDRED in ONE YEAR, or six a week. Not 300 abuse cases, mind you, but arrests. And yes, all five of the ones I’m counting are sexual abuse of minors by pastors.
And yet, no database to track perpetrators. No policy for revoking credentials by the Baptist seminaries. No policy put forth by the SBC. (And don’t get claim that it’s just because they’re independent congregations; the SBC has policies for EVERYTHING.) No plan for reform of the seminaries. Just denial, obfuscation, and deliberate unaccountability.
Oops. I counted a child-porn case as a sex-abuse-on-minors case. Oh, well, here’s an article from Dec. 8 to make up for it:
[Son Rise Baptist Church] Pastor faces sex abuse charges [of sodomizing a minor.]
In this largely post-Christian America and sensual age, abuse does transcend the RCC, but restricting the priesthood (besides the fact that the N,.T. did not have a separate class of sacerdotal priests, but ordained bishops/elders) is not only Scripturally unwarranted but is conducive to homosexuality in the long term, while the typical liberal listing of Catholics in general also exists among their priests.
30% of Roman Catholic priests described themselves as Liberal, 28% as Conservative, and 37% as Moderate in their Religious ideology.
53 percent responded that they thought it always was a sin for unmarried people to have sexual relations; 32 percent that is often was, and 9 percent seldom/never.
71 percent responded that it always was wrong for a woman to get an abortion, 19 percent that it often was, and 4 percent seldom/never.
28 percent judged that is always was sin for married couples to use artificial birth control, 25 percent often, 40 percent never.
49 percent affirmed that it was always a sin to engage in homosexual behavior, often, 25 percent; and never, 19 percent.
To take one’s own life if suffering from a debilitating disease: always, 59 percent; often, 18 percent; never, 17 percent.
15 percent of the current clergy listed themselves as “gay or on the homosexual side.” Among younger priests 23 percent did so.
44 percent of the priests said “definitely” a homosexual subculture’—defined as a `definite group of persons that has its own friendships, social gatherings and vocabulary’—exists in their diocese or religious order.
Los Angeles Times (extensive) nationwide survey (2002). Arthur Jones, 2002 National Catholic Reporter. Gale Group. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1141/is_2_39/ai_94129129/pg_2
There is a significant difference between some Baptist pastors and priest guilty of similar crimes. Normally, if a Baptist pastor gets accused, revoking their “creditials” means nothing. Baptist pastors are hired by local congregations. They act independent of one another. And there are precious few (I won’t say completely) congregations that will take them on. Their careers are finished for the most part.
The Catholic Church looks upon priests as adminsters of God’s grace through the Eucharist. When a priest has been accused of such a sexual crime, history has shown that not only are they moved around into another post, but the Church has attempted to cover up their actions. These priests right to adminsters God’s grace are seldom, if ever, revoked-even for the most eggregious offenders.
Trying to minimize the Catholic Church problem by pointing to the Baptists is rather foolish. Juries have awarded billions of dollars of restitution to victims of the Catholic Church. You don’t see that sort of thing among the Baptists. And Catholics would do well to quit blaming everyone else and feeling sorry for themselves as if they were the victims. Instead they need to start cleaning up their Church. But as long as you believe that everything coming out of the Vatican is true and correct, that will never happen.
Details, details.....
Rome OUGHT to cover their expenses.
After all, it’s Rome which isn’t dealing with the issue properly in the first place and has bailed on the local congregations, leaving them to fend for themselves.
*sexual misconduct*?
Could you be more specific than that?
Or would you prefer to simply be vague about it and imply that the *sexual misconduct* that occurred in those churches was the same as the priests molesting kids?
>> Or would you prefer to simply be vague about it and imply that the *sexual misconduct* that occurred in those churches was the same as the priests molesting kids? <<
Vague? I was quoting the article. But then maybe you missed my subsequent posts, showing there had been SIX cases of Baptist pastors ARRESTED for sexual assault on children in just the past month. And not a one of them was some forty year old case, like the vast majority of Catholic cases.
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