Pedophiles will go where children are. It it impossible to prevent every single incidence of child molestation. Abuse is going to happen because those who want to abuse badly enough WILL find a way to do it. I don’t know of anyone who denies that.
The question then is not why abuse happened in the church, just like the question isn’t why abuse happens anywhere, but what it wasn’t dealt with appropriately, by the church. And the same question could be legitimately asked of ANY organization which didn’t deal with the problem appropriately.
The church, any church, of ALL organizations should be leading the way in setting an example of dealing with the problem. God has made it extremely clear in Scripture what is to be done in dealing with immorality in the church. The Catholic church, which claims authorship of said Scripture is doubly accountable for not following the advice that it not only claims responsibility for, but that should know better than anyone else. It condemns homosexuality as sin and yet doesn’t deal with it within its own midst.
That is NOT acceptable. And pointing that out does not make one a *anti-Catholic* or a *Catholic hater*. Expecting integrity in behavior from someone who is supposed to be setting an example is not unreasonable and if they fail in that, criticism of them is to be expected.
Read 1 Corinthians 5 concerning the subject of immorality in the church.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Corinthians+5&version=ESV
I agree, not just as a Conservative, but as a Catholic.
The problem is not as endemic as the media would have people believe, but any instance of hypocrisy--especially in issues involving sexual aberration--undermines the mission of the Church and should not be tolerated. In some cases, the criticism is justifiable.
Others on this thread have posted as if the problems were in every parish, that somehow the Catholic Church was in league with pedophiles and homosexuals on some widespread basis. The advice of the Apostle Paul in the verses you cited, had it been followed, would have prevented this, and the ranks of the clergy need to be purged of those who are guilty.
I'll grant there have been problems, as in every church, and that those were handled badly in some cases.
That needs to be rectified.
I also believe it is no accident that the media saturate the market with those stories when they occur, to undermine the thousands of forthright and upstanding members of the Catholic clergy, with the intent of Alinskying the Church--isolate, defame, and destroy--something which past policies in some dioceses have unwittingly played into.
That the Liberal media do this is no accident; the Church remains, with all its apparent flaws (those of humans) a major impediment to the goals of the Liberals.
Thank you for a reasonable and scriptural reply.