Posted on 04/23/2002 1:36:56 AM PDT by kattracks
Edited on 05/26/2004 5:05:54 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
A St. Patrick's Cathedral priest who is under fire for a sermon bashing homosexuality as the prime cause of priest child-molestation said yesterday he did not clear Sunday's homily with his boss, Edward Cardinal Egan, even as the archdiocese distanced itself from his remarks.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
It was a "gay bash" because it was an attempt to lay the blame for this scandal on gays and on Americas' increasing acceptance of homosexuality. And that is a smoke screen to conceal the culpability of the Church.
The blame for this outrage properly belongs on two parties: (1) The adult priests who sexually molested minors (boys or girls), and (2) the chruch authorities who, although they had grounds to be at least suspicious that such activity had occurred, failed to take effective action to prevent its recurrance.
"Homosexuals," as a group, did not cause this problem -- any more than "men" as a group did. After all, no matter how you look at it, not all the perpetrators were homosexuals -- yet, to my knowledge, all of them were male. Where are the calls to exclude men from the priesthood? There are none, because it is abhorrent to punish innocent persons for the actions of the guilty (unless, apparently, those innocent persons are gay).
Nor did popular acceptance of homosexuality cause this problem. If you don't think this kind of thing went on, and commonly, before the gay rights movement, you are naive. No increased tolerance of homosexuality was required. Whatever it is that motivates adults to have sex with minors, it is not popular approval. It was the Church's failure to stop those acts, not society's tolerance of them, that allowed them to continue.
The gay rights movement is diametrically opposed to everything that went into creating the Church's crisis. The gay rights movement is all about openness, gay people proclaiming, and living lives true to, their sexual orientation. I have never heard of a single openly gay religious figure who has been accused of molesting children. These acts were committed by men who sought to have sex and at the same time deny that they were sexually active. They were committed by men who wanted to have sex in secret. (I don't know, but I'd be willing to wager, that's why many of these men had sex with minors -- because they thought they could intimidate their victims into silence.) If the gay rights movement has been about anything, it has been about the message that it is unhealthy to force sexuality into the shadows. Perhaps the Church should learn from, rather than blame its own troubles on, the gay rights movement.
Here is the exact text from their series today, in Italian. I Babelfish/translated it just now, so it is a bit awkward.
Please pay special attention to the bolded words below, a journalistic approach I think few mainline, P.C.-ridden USA media outlets have the damned intellectual guts to likewise do:
"A scandal, that it has crossed the dioceses of many of the United States, and exploded in recent months also thanks to the denunciations sended to the judicial authorities by the families of the boys been involved Americans. A scandal that has ended unavoidablly in order to directly invest also the Vatican, called in cause."
And further,
" But for rafforzarlo - it has cleared - not for metterlo in issue ". I point out in the argument has been made also to the problem of the homosexuality inside of the seminaries. They have been cases of young people that meant farces priest, has told Gregory, but they have been scared from "the homosexual atmosphere that was breathed in some institutions".
Nope. No American media honesty nor objectivity on this. Just "sex scandal" and "abuse scandal", and "current scandal", and then tying it to celebacy and marraige. Just liberal smoke and taboo cover up.
"The diocese of Boston, in particular, has already paid 40 million dollars, and the sum of the indemnifications could touch 100 million. The crisis has all the ingredients of the great American scandals: it churns puritic moral issues (pedophila, homosexuality), is lend to great collective confessions, it is eminently "mediatica", it has implications lawyers who provoke the ambitions of the district proxies and l.ingordigia of the lawyers. Many judicial actions have been concentrated in California where the times of prescription of a crime are longer than how much they are not habitually in the other States of the federation. A Californian proxy has declared that he means to give an answer to the popular indignation and has been said implicitly available, in such a way, to receive new denunciations.
And further:
"He seems that in 1978 the "priest of road" takes part with a speech to one conference promoted from a group of spregiudicati pedofiles, supporters of "Greek" loves between adults and adolescents. And he seems that some year after, in California, becomes owner, with an other priest, of a motel attended above all from one customers "gay". All.arcidiocesi di Boston, in the meantime, continues to arrive lamentele, denunciations and threats of judicial actions. But its advanced ones, and above all l.attuale archbishop, Bernard Law, the proteggono. They know that it has "psychological problems", but they transfer it from a assignment all.altro and they accompany it, if necessary, with one letter commendatizia and a certificate of "good conduct". Until to the day in which l.arcivescovo of New York, where Shanley would have had to assume the direction of a ostello juvenile, it abruptly refuses to accept its designation.
I do not want homosexual priests or homosexual scout masters involved or instructing my grandsons, or any other young boys.
If they CAN change, which is doubtful, at best, they are welcome to do so far, far away..........on the other side of the moon!
Why is the political left trying to portray this notion? My priest doesn't call his Bishop everytime he gives a sermon?
Seems the Diocese does not want to let the truth out--homosexuality is against God's laws. They should be backing up the priest instead of giving in to the press. sounds like a typical republican office holder--afraid of the press and polls.
About on par at last count with your average liberal-arts college!
Now if those wonderfully Good Men who are among the HUGE majority of Catholic Clergy who are not, for the purpose of perversion, poofters posing as priests, can just sling the tiny tiny few out who are using the Church for cover, all will be well with that wonderfully Good Institution!
The gay rights movement is diametrically opposed to everything that went into creating the Church's crisis.Oh, really? Is the gay rights movement diametrically opposed to adult men having sex with boys who are minors (under 18)?
After all, no matter how you look at it, not all the perpetrators were homosexuals.You conveniently fail to distinguish between pedophilia -- sex with pre-pubescent children of either sex -- and ephebophilia -- sex with minor pubescent boys. No matter how you look at it, the predator priests who sexually abused boys from 12-18 were indeed homosexuals.
I knew one of us was a mathematician.
The stats, I am told, compare quite favorably with your average lawyer-producing liberal-arts college!
Amen--and very poignant. Look everybody, it is a scary thought--that Christ will tell those who thought they were with Him, "Away from me--I never knew you!" But, He said it will happen.
The church "leaders" better start thinking about who their Boss is. Now.
Oh, really? Is the gay rights movement diametrically opposed to adult men having sex with boys who are minors (under 18)?
Yes, the gay movement opposes sex between adult men and minor boys. Can you demonstrate that any responsible gay organization has taken any position favoring the legalization of sex between adults and minors? And don't refer me to that scary boogie man, NAMBLA.
After all, no matter how you look at it, not all the perpetrators were homosexuals.
You conveniently fail to distinguish between pedophilia -- sex with pre-pubescent children of either sex -- and ephebophilia -- sex with minor pubescent boys. No matter how you look at it, the predator priests who sexually abused boys from 12-18 were indeed homosexuals.
What's this "conveniently fail to distinguish" crap? What I said was that not all (clerical) perpetrators of sex with minors were homosexual. Am I incorrect in saying that? Were those priests who abused girls homosexuals?
But all the priests who abused minors were men. So if you want to aim wide, and still hit all the targets, you should be aiming at clearing men, not just homosexuals, from the priesthood.
But that would be crazy, wouldn't it? Because it's crazy to punish people for crimes they did not commit. Unless they're gay.
In those years, parish priests taught religion classes and had plenty of opportunities to insinuate themselves with young girls also. Whether any priests at my parish did this, I am not aware of. I do know that we had one pretty good-looking priest who the girls liked to hang around and talk to. But that alone doesn't prove anything. I do know that the homosexual priest at my parish liked to hang around boys. But I disliked him because was frequently nasty if you didn't know the answers to his questions in religion class. I'm not sorry to say I'm glad he's now dead.
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