Get It Straight -- The hypocrisy of blaming gays for sexual abuse by priests.

Get It Straight
The hypocrisy of blaming gays for sexual abuse by priests.
By William Saletan
Posted Wednesday, April 24, 2002, at 2:01 PM PT

The one thing everybody knows about the Roman Catholic Church is that you're supposed to confess your sins. Everybody, that is, except the church's leaders. First they failed to come clean about sexual abuse by priests. Then they failed to come clean about having covered up the abuse. Every time they assured the public that nothing else would come out, something else came out.

Now the bishops, the cardinals, and conservative interest groups have a new story. The problem, they say, is homosexuality. If the church gets rid of gay priests, everything will be fine. But the more questions you ask about this story, the more contradictions you find. The cardinals' problem isn't that they can't keep the priesthood straight. The problem is that once again, they can't keep their story straight. Here are four key points on which their new alibi doesn't add up.

1. Profiling. The Family Research Council, the Traditional Values Coalition, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, Roman Catholic Faithful, and numerous priests and bishops suggest that the church should weed out gay priests because a disproportionate share of sexual abuse cases involving priests are male-on-male. Credible reports say 90 percent of the victims are boys. Conservatives don't care that most gay priests don't molest kids. Their view is that it's fair to presume that an individual is dangerous if he's part of a high-risk group.

Unless, of course, we're talking about priests as a whole. In that case, conservatives point out the unfairness of judging the group on the basis of a few bad apples. Consider the FRC's April 5 statement, "Media Hides Homosexuality Connection in Sex Abuse Scandal." According to the FRC, the "connection" is that "most cases" of abuse by priests are male-on-male. The standard for blaming a crime on a group, in other words, is what percentage of the crime is committed by the group. But in the same statement, FRC scolds the media for besmirching the Catholic clergy, when in fact the abusers are "a very small number of priests." Suddenly, FRC's standard for blaming a crime on a group isn't what percentage of the crime is committed by the group—that would be inconvenient, since 100 percent of sex abuse by priests is committed by priests—but what percentage of the group commits the crime.

How do gays measure up to that standard? What percentage of gay priests have sexually abused children? The FRC doesn't say. Why not? Well, according to last Friday's New York Times, there are 46,000 Catholic priests in the United States; 30 percent to 50 percent of Catholic seminarians are gay; and lawyers for victims "claim to have lists of more than 1,000 priests accused of abuse in the United States." If you assume the worst—that only 30 percent of priests are gay, that 2,000 priests will end up accused, and that all the accused priests are guilty, gay, and current rather than former priests—fewer than 15 percent of gay priests have committed sexual abuse. If the 2,000 cases are spread over a period of 80 percent turnover in the priesthood, or if the number of guilty priests is more like 1,100, or if the percentage of priests who are gay is more like 50 percent, then only about 8 percent of gay priests have committed sexual abuse. According to the Catholic League, that's the rate of pedophilia "in the general adult population."

If you want to use profiling to weed out pedophiles, there's a far more effective way. One hundred percent of sexual abuse by priests is committed by men. So is nearly all sexual abuse of children. While it's hard to tell who's gay, it's easy to tell who's male. The ideal solution would be to ban men from the priesthood. The modest alternative would be to admit women. If conservatives were serious about protecting kids, they'd begin with that step. Instead, they've rejected it.

2. Deviance. When pedophiles such as the notorious Rev. Paul Shanley dissent from the Catholic hierarchy, conservatives dismiss them as twisted heretics. When these same pedophiles dissent from gay rights groups, conservatives infer that the pedophiles, not the gay rights groups, represent gay thinking. Connie Marshner, the director of the Free Congress Foundation's Center for Governance, argues that sexual liberalism has infected Catholicism and that the church must return to its roots. Meanwhile, she quotes a "pederast theoretician" who recently denounced the gay rights movement for preaching "assimilation" and trying to "demonize cross-generational love." So the gay rights movement, like the Catholic Church, rejects pederasty, right? Well, no. According to Marshner, the church's rejection is genuine, while the movement's rejection is tactical.

3. Alternate causality. According to conservatives, sexual abuse by priests can't be blamed on celibacy, since many clergymen who molest minors are married. "The best evidence suggests that the rate of priest pedophilia is about the same as found among the clergy of other religions," Catholic League President Bill Donohue pointed out four weeks ago. "Indeed, the Anglican dioceses in British Columbia are going bankrupt because so many ministers can't keep their hands to themselves. And these men are married." Donohue's logic sounds pretty solid: Some sexual abusers in the clergy are married; married clergymen aren't subject to the celibacy rule; therefore, some sexual abusers in the clergy aren't subject to the celibacy rule; therefore, sexual abuse in the clergy can't be blamed on the celibacy rule.

Let's try the same logic on homosexuality. Some sexual abusers in the clergy are married; married clergymen generally aren't gay; therefore, some sexual abusers in the clergy aren't gay; therefore, sexual abuse in the clergy can't be blamed on homosexuality—right? Uh, not exactly. "It is intellectually outrageous and deceitful to pretend that we don't know what's going on here," Donohue said on Fox News this week. "Too many sexually active gays have been in the priesthood, and it's about time they were routed out."

4. Gray area. The old school of sexuality held that deviance was continuous: Stray from the path of righteousness, and pretty soon you'll be lying with other men, children, and dogs. The new school separates these practices into distinct orientations or disorders. The old school had coherence; the new school has cachet. The gay-blamers can't figure out which way to go. If they say homosexuality is distinct from pedophilia, they can't blame the latter on the former. On the other hand, if they say homosexuality is just one manifestation of waywardness, they can't assure the public that getting rid of the former will get rid of the latter.

The result is precisely the kind of moral confusion conservatives claim to oppose. To project coherence, they attribute abuse by priests to "sexual anarchy" and "moral chaos." At the same time, to make the blame-gays theory look scientific, they draw convenient distinctions. According to Traditional Values Coalition Chairman Lou Sheldon, "To describe these priests as 'pedophiles' is clearly inaccurate—unless their victims are under the age of 13. The truth is that these are homosexuals who are engaging in pederasty or so-called consensual 'boy-love.' " Similarly, Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit said this week that "the behavioral scientists are telling us, the sociologists, it's not truly a pedophilia-type problem but a homosexual problem."

Maida, Sheldon, and other clerics and activists think they're safeguarding morality. But by describing a sexual relationship with a child between the ages of 13 and 17, unlike sex with a younger child, as a matter of hetero- or homosexual orientation, they are, in a strange way, normalizing such relationships. They're framing sex with teen-agers more like sex with adults and less like sex with children. They still believe it's wrong, but they're undermining the basis of that belief. And by insisting that the church has a gay problem, not a pedophile problem, they're letting pedophiles off the hook.

They're also letting men who have sex with teen-age girls off the hook. Last Sunday, National Review editor Rich Lowry said of priestly abuse, "A lot of these cases don't involve the molestation of little boys, pedophilia. [They] involve having sex with teen-age boys, which is more sort of homosexual behavior. … I'm not justifying it. It's just not something heterosexual men do." Yesterday, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago added that the church should allow "wiggle room" in punishing abusive priests. "There is a difference between a moral monster like [homosexual molester Father John] Geoghan, who preys upon little children, and does so in a serial fashion, and someone who perhaps under the influence of alcohol engages in an action with a 17- or 16-year-old young woman who returns his affection," said George.

"Not something heterosexual men do"? "Wiggle room" for sex with a 16-year-old "young woman"? Look who's liberal now.

If the church gets rid of gay priests, everything will be fine.

Well, it's a start.

And a fine one, at that!

I am missing something with this 'hypocrisy' post. What IS hypocritical is that, while preaching about the immorality of homosexual behaviour, the catholic church allowed itself to become a haven for ACTIVE homosexuals. As more of the story comes out, it will be known that the majority of US priests and seminarians are active homosexuals and that ALL priests were well aware of what went on all these years. Homosexuality may well turn out to be the cancer that destroyed the church from within.

So should people with homosexual attraction have their brains removed?

Do you understand the difference between an involuntary impulse and a conscious thought?

Do you?

We choose what we think about, just as we choose all behaviors. That's what separates us from the rest of the animals.

Well, some of us, anyway.

Ninety percent of the children abused are boys. Chicken hawk homosexuals preying on young boys is part of the homosexual lifestyle. Homosexual priests are the problem. Heterosexual priests are not interested in young boys and very few girls have been molested within the Catholic.

Those who make excuses or wish to add "protection under the law" for deviants are just as guilty. So, you do nothing but help the deviants become "main-stream" by treating them as if they are like 'everyone else'.

I'm curious, what is your definition of "deviant"?

?then only about 8 percent of gay priests have committed sexual abuse. According to the Catholic League, that's the rate of pedophilia "in the general adult population."

Is it too much to expect a slightly lower rate of pedophilia amoung the clergy ? If 1 out of every 12 clergy abuse a child, we should accept this rate ?

I have a better idea... outlaw homosexuality!

I hope you're joking here. Are you really prepared to have the government tell consenting adults what they can or can't do in the privacy of their own bedroom?

I'm finding more and more republicans willing to make this kind of demand even while calling for smaller, less intrusive gov't. Doesn't anyone else see a contradiction here? Is it hypocritical?

Do you understand the difference between an involuntary impulse and a conscious thought?

Do you?

We choose what we think about, just as we choose all behaviors. That's what separates us from the rest of the animals.

Well, some of us, anyway.

Hmmm..... I'm curious..... did you CHOOSE to be attracted to the opposite sex? Was it a conscious choice or did it just happen? Personally, I am extremely attracted to women and not men, but I never made that choice. In fact, under what conditions could I "choose" to be attracted to men? I just don't see it.

Northwest of Chicago in the town of Mundelein there's a large multi-diocesean major seminary under the purview, I believe, of Francis Cardinal George

Do any Freepers know whether that seminary is a sanctuary, so to speak, for gay seminarians and priests?

Doesn't anyone else see a contradiction here? Is it hypocritical?

As one who doesn't think homosexual behavior should be outlawed (although in many cases sodomy is against the law, please don't tell my wife what it means) there is no contradiction between the two. Its not hypocritical. Most conservatives want strong state level governments and are afraid of putting all the power in one central federal government.

This leaves the ability to maintain on one hand that federal government should be smaller and less intrusive while reserving the same to state and local government.

Personally, I am extremely attracted to women and not men, but I never made that choice

Do you have to act on every attraction ? I found Britany Spears to me sexually attractive but I would never chose to have sex with her.

Homosexuals and lesbians are deviants....pedifiles are deviants. Only brain-dead liberals can't seem to understand the similarities.

Hmm..... you didn't quite answer my question, and seemed to be getting hostile in response to my very polite and simple question. All you seem to be saying is that homosexuals are deviants and that deviants are homosexuals. That is circular logic. Do you have a definition of "deviant" that conveys some meaning? Or is it just an insult?

Do you have to act on every attraction ? I found Britany Spears to me sexually attractive but I would never chose to have sex with her.

Excellent point!! So, is a person homosexual if they are attracted to the same sex, or are they only homosexual if they act on it?

I stand in awe of this sort of piercing logic.

Let us go further. One hundred percent of sexual abuse by priests is committed by human beings. There is no record, ever, of an ordained houseplant committing any sort of sexual abuse. (In fact, there is no record of an ordained houseplant!) Hence, the ideal solution is to stop ordaining men, and start ordaining African violets.

As a side benefit, I'd imagine their sermons would be quite short.

What percentage of gay priests have sexually abused children?

In my opinion, all of them who admit to being 'gay'

The bible says that homosexual behavior is a sin (and not just a sin but an abomination worthy of death). Therefore a priest who admits that he performs homosexual behavior or who supports homosexual behavior or causes is guilty of molesting every child who learns about his behavior. He's supposed to be a Godly role model, not a deviant recruiter.

God Save America (Please)

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