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Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report Details Decades of Clerical Abuse Allegations
Catholic News Agency ^ | 8/14/18 | Christine Rousselle

Posted on 08/14/2018 4:01:30 PM PDT by marshmallow

Pittsburgh, Pa., Aug 14, 2018 / 02:27 pm (CNA).- A redacted grand jury report on clerical sexual abuse in six of Pennsylvania’s Catholic dioceses was released Tuesday, following an 18-month investigation into thousands of alleged instances of abuse spanning several decades.

The report, detailing allegations made in the dioceses of Allentown, Erie, Greensburg, Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, and Scranton, was released Aug.14. It reported on evidence of systematic abuse and cover-ups going back seven decades within these dioceses.

About half of Pennsylvania’s nearly 3 million Catholics live within these six dioceses.

The 884-page report was written by 23 grand jurors, who spent some 18 months investigating the six dioceses, examining half a million pages of documents in the process. The FBI assisted with the investigative process.

The report claims to have identified more than 1,000 victims of 300 credibly accused priests and presents a devastating portrait of efforts by Church authorities to, ignore, obscure, or cover up allegations - either to protect accused priests or to spare the Church scandal.

The report also identified a series of practices present in different ways across the dioceses which together amounted to a “playbook for concealing the truth.”

These include use of phrases like “boundary issues” or ”inappropriate contact” instead of explicitly referring to rape and sexual abuse, assigning priests to investigate their peers, instead of using qualified and objective personnel, and a reliance on psychological assessments and diagnoses based upon the self-reporting of clerics.

Due to laws regarding the statute of limitations, nearly every abuse allegation cannot be criminally prosecuted, although two indictments have been filed. So far, one priest, Fr. John Sweeney, has been convicted of sexually assaulting a student in the early 1990s.

(Excerpt) Read more at catholicnewsagency.com ...


TOPICS: Catholic; Current Events; Ministry/Outreach; Moral Issues
KEYWORDS: blessedvirginmary; catholic
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To: metmom

Percentage wise there are just as many, and insurance companies say more, Protestants that are sex abusers.


81 posted on 08/15/2018 12:52:51 PM PDT by NKP_Vet ("Man without God descends into madness")
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To: metmom
They are up in arms about someone who is divorced and remarried receiving communion, but have no problem with someone who have been molesting kids SERVING them communion, going as far as putting in their mouths with those very hands that molested those kids.

Now just stop. You know very well that we "have a problem" with it. You're just slandering people when you say that we "have no problem with someone who have been molesting kids SERVING them communion".

But tarring everyone with the same brush is not Christian, either. Some priests are evil. Some priests are good, and are appalled and disgusted by the evil. Yet you lump them, and all Catholic laypeople, all up together.

I hope you're not judged the way you judge others.

82 posted on 08/15/2018 12:57:26 PM PDT by Campion
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To: metmom

Enjoy.

https://www.catholicconvert.com/blog/2016/11/25/sex-abuse-scandals-catholic-protestant-and-secular-you-may-be-surprised/


83 posted on 08/15/2018 1:01:12 PM PDT by NKP_Vet ("Man without God descends into madness")
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To: NKP_Vet; metmom

Percentage wise there are just as many, and insurance companies say more, Protestants that are sex abusers.

***

Because the vast majority of Protestants don’t cover up the crimes for DECADES like Rome has done. Protestants actually report it when it happens and throw the offenders out and right into the arms of the police.

The Catholic hierarchy, on the other hand, move the child molesters into different parishes and expose them to other victims.

The fact that the Vatican engaged in a coverup at ALL is what is truly damning to the organization, not that pedo priests exist.


84 posted on 08/15/2018 1:03:12 PM PDT by Luircin
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To: Campion

I’m sure the laity has a problem with it, or would have if they knew.

But those who knew were the church hierarchy and clearly THEY didn’t have a problem with it.


85 posted on 08/15/2018 2:10:24 PM PDT by metmom ( ...fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith......)
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To: Luircin

But wait, there’s more.

http://thewartburgwatch.com/2017/07/05/is-child-sex-abuse-more-prevalent-among-protestants-than-among-catholics/


86 posted on 08/15/2018 3:11:30 PM PDT by NKP_Vet ("Man without God descends into madness")
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To: NKP_Vet; metmom
Riiiight, because an article claiming 'they did it too' totally excuses Catholicism for DECADES of COVERING FOR THE ABUSERS.
87 posted on 08/15/2018 3:41:04 PM PDT by Luircin
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To: NKP_Vet

I also can’t believe that you’re citing an article from The New Republic as indisputable fact.


88 posted on 08/15/2018 3:44:56 PM PDT by Luircin
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To: Intolerant in NJ

When the church started letting open homosexuals in they went from an organization where there were a few bad apples... to an organization where the bad apples ran the show


89 posted on 08/15/2018 3:52:41 PM PDT by HamiltonJay
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To: Luircin

But overall, here’s the issue. The claim that Catholics don’t have any problems with sexual abuse and then pointing fingers at other people tends to result in a lot of sour reactions.

I think people would be far more sympathetic if certain Catholics would just acknowledge that it’s a problem and condemn the responsible parties instead of trying to cover it up with a: moving the pedos around and b: finger pointing at the Prot boogeyman.

A lot more respect too.


90 posted on 08/15/2018 4:49:51 PM PDT by Luircin
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To: HamiltonJay
When the church started letting open homosexuals in they went from an organization where there were a few bad apples... to an organization where the bad apples ran the show

Let me Google that for you...

https://www.google.com/search?q=vatican+sex+parties&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

91 posted on 08/15/2018 4:49:56 PM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: aMorePerfectUnion
Vatican Gay Sex Parties

92 posted on 08/15/2018 4:50:32 PM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: aMorePerfectUnion

That still makes me sick.


93 posted on 08/15/2018 4:50:38 PM PDT by Luircin
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To: Luircin

That is because you are a Christian.


94 posted on 08/15/2018 4:52:08 PM PDT by aMorePerfectUnion
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To: Luircin; Salvation; metmom
Strange: Some Catholics seem angrier at the ‘bashing’ than the fact that priests have been molesting little boys and the Roman Catholic hierarchy has been covering it up and protecting the guilty parties for DECADES.

What's even stranger is that some of those same Catholics AREN'T bashing the molesting, abusing, covering up priests and bishops!

95 posted on 08/15/2018 5:28:15 PM PDT by boatbums (Not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to His mercy he saved us.)
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To: aMorePerfectUnion

From the article:

“Police raided the apartment in June after neighbors complained of unusual behavior among frequent nighttime visitors.

Police arrested the priest and hospitalized him to detox him from the drugs he had ingested, according to the newspaper.

He was taken in for questioning, presumably on drugs charges, as gay sex is legal in Vatican City.”


96 posted on 08/15/2018 6:07:08 PM PDT by metmom ( ...fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith......)
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To: metmom; caww; Luircin
I don’t know about those Catholics but not in the circles I run in. I don’t make it a habit of hanging out with homosexual pedos. Nor do I engage in that kind of heinous debauchery and sin. Maybe THEY do that they can excuse it so blithely, but not me.

The Apostle Paul strongly reprimanded the Corinthian church for allowing a member to remain who had/was having a sexual relationship with his "father's wife". Now, that could have been his own mother, but more than likely it was his stepmother. And THAT was a consensual HETERO-sexual act. Can you imagine his livid condemnation over what has gone on and continues to go on in the organization that claims it alone is the one, true church of Jesus Christ???

97 posted on 08/15/2018 6:14:47 PM PDT by boatbums (Not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to His mercy he saved us.)
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To: boatbums

You’d think that those who claim the high moral ground and the only way of salvation, and accuse non-Catholics of *cheap grace* and *easy believism* would be more outspoken against sin in THEIR midst, instead of sin in everyone else’s camp.


98 posted on 08/15/2018 6:24:12 PM PDT by metmom ( ...fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of our faith......)
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To: Biggirl
The very HARSH reality is that horrible sexual sins is NOT JUST A RCC PROBLEM. This is ACROSS THE BOARD in the Christian community.

I would guess - with good reason - "horrible sexual sin" is MORE a problem in the un-Christian, ungodly world than the actual Christian community. That it happens AT ALL in those who purport to be Christian, is truly terrible, and should not be so. God will deal harshly with those who refuse to repent and turn away from ungodliness.

99 posted on 08/15/2018 6:50:34 PM PDT by boatbums (Not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to His mercy he saved us.)
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To: Luircin

Sex predators deserve to burn hell. Catholics or Protestants or anyone else. I’m just tired of the Catholic bashers on FR reveling when a report comes out on Catholic clergy sex abuse while ignoring any and all stories about sex abuse in other religions.


100 posted on 08/15/2018 6:53:08 PM PDT by NKP_Vet ("Man without God descends into madness")
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