It is not good, but I was expecting it to be much higher for it to be truly rampant. In any case, if a Protestant church covers up such cases, they get just as much blame from me as the Catholic Church. Apostates must be removed and I can't imagine a child abuser being anything but apostate.
It does seem that the Catholic church has become more closely associated with the homo-sexual act. I may be wrong, but that seems to be the jist of what we see every day in regard to the Catholic pedophiles.
I hope that we are all mature enough to realize that this should not be a fight between Catholics and non-Catholics.
Satan loves to divide us (as though we weren't already arguing, huh?).
If we continue to fight one another and keep score on this subject, we are forgetting the children and defenseless ladies.
It's kind of like saying "Thank you God that I am not like that sinner."
We must be very careful.
Please tell me which denomination stays within their denomination when the leaders of that denomination tell the laity that it is ok to keep pedophiles in the church without punishment of the law after they sodomize your little boys.
Tell me which denomination has told it's people that those who rape and sodomize your little boys are Godly men who need to be forgiven.
Tell me which denomination is fighting for the right to allow one molestation and to keep the priest in office, just behind the scenes, instead of behind bars? Tell me which denomination is hiding it's pedophiles like that?
Which denomination has to have meetings to discuss what to do with the pedophiles? Only the Catholic Church has had these meetings that I am aware of. Please tell me which other denommination has had to have meetings to define pedophilia among Priests/Pastors as reason to defrock/dis-fellowship/arrest pedophiles in the pulpits. Tell me also how the members of that denomination have staunchly defended their religion even though they knew that their leadership was allowing and hiding pedophiles by putting them in new churches where no one knew of them, and tell me how those members of that denomination have knowingly defended this perversion.
And, How many meetings do they have to have before they decide that it is wrong to bugger your children? Please tell me which other denommination has had to have meetings to discuss whether pedophilia among Priests/Pastors is a grevious sin. Tell me which denomination seems to be absolutely blind to the gross and despicable sin this is by actually haveing to have meetings to decide what to do about it, sounding totally like they aren't even sure it is wrong! Tell me, which denomination?
And, once they decide it is wrong to bugger your children, how many meetings do they have to have before they agree to keep the pedophile away from children? Please tell me which other denommination has had to have meetings to decide what to do when pedophilia among Priests/Pastors is rampant and covered up for several generations now, especially when we learn that some of these pedophile priests are in their 70's.
And, How many meetings does it take to arrest the pedophile? Please tell me which other denommination has had to have meetings to decide whether to arrest pedophile Priests/Pastors in the pulpits.
And, how many times is this pervert allowed to just transfer to another church within this denomination to continue in his perversion? Please tell me which other denommination has had to have meetings to discuss which church to transfer the pedophile Priests/Pastors to another church.
And, if this pervert is just transferred to another church within the denomination, how many of the leaders on the national level knew of this pervert and transferred him anyways? The Catholic Bishops have recently been reported on NEWSMAX.COM to have over 2/3 of the Bishops KNOWINGLY transfer perverts to other churches where they commited perverse acts against children. Please tell me which other denommination has 2/3 of it's leadership guilty of transferring for several generations pedophile Priests/Pastors to other churches. I would really like to kow which denomination has been known for doing this for the last 3 generations in this country.
And, if they, the laity, do have meetings amongst themselves to discuss the pedophilia in the denomination, how long does it take the parishoners to leave that denomination or immediately leave church?
Please tell me which denomination has had to have meetings over this, I would be interested to learn.
If someone tells you that a certain sect/religion/denomination is founded by Jesus, and that sect/religion/denomination is arguing over whether to oust people who are sodomizing your children, and has been covering up for this sodomy against your children for generations, do not be alarmed. That is NOT a religion founded by the Son of God, that is a cult.
There is little doubt that sexual abuse occurs all over the spectrum of religious faiths as well as in secular society since we read such stories frequently, so why the author of the "list" exagerates the "protestant" abusers numbers is beyond me.
The worst exageration is the first listing for "Baptist Ministers - 59 instances". The first article link takes you to this:
The Rev. James A. Forsythe was a Roman Catholic priest in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park, Kan., when he molested a 15-year-old boy.
Forsythe, who served three months in prison, is now a Protestant minister in South Dakota, where a newspaper found he has not registered as a sex offender as required by law.
Forsythe, 47, pleaded guilty in 1989 to attempted indecent liberties with a child. He admitted molesting the boy about 20 times while a pastor at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Overland Park.
Even ignoring the fact that this guy was a Catholic "priest" (he was a deceiver of course), nowhere in the story did I find that this now "Protestant" minister was a Baptist. In fact, the article states:
Since January 2000, Forsythe has been minister of the Metropolitan Community Church of the Black Hills in Rapid City, S.D. The church is part of a growing denomination that serves predominantly gay and lesbian worshippers.
That's no "Baptist", thats no "priest", its just another homosexual masquerading as a religous figure in order to manipulate young boys and young men for his own sick desires.
big'ol, the "list" you linked to is of poor quality and full of bias. It needs work. Why pump the numbers up falsely? Reality is bad enough! And I wonder, whats the authors intent in compiling this list?
all Jesus ever did against organized religion was to condemn its' hypocrisy.
and now, here we are again.
just something to think about.
Intelligent contributions to understand the problem of sexual abuse of children by clergy demands accuracy and context. With that information added, comparisons with other groups become useful.
These basic questions need answers to make such numbers valid and useful.
1. What is the source of the data? What is its reliability?
2. What is the instance of sexual abuse of minors? Over what time frame?
3. What are the total universes of people in each category? I.e., how many ministers, priests, etc., in each subgroup?
Only with this information in hand do the final, useful data emerge: How do the various groups compare to each other in instances of abuse per 1,000 members per year? Other, non-religious groups should be included to put this information in context in society: What are the rates per 1,000 among public school teachers? Private school teachers? Boy scout leaders? Social workers? Other groups where adults are in positions of trust with children? Homosexuals? Parents in general? Adults in general?
My educated guess from reading reports of arrests and convictions is the common-sense conclusion that the highest rate of abuse will be among the group which most tolerates (or even promotes) alternative lifestyles, including homosexuality -- that would be public school teachers. At the bottom of the list should be the group with the least tolerance of homosexuality -- that would be the Boy Scouts.
It would take some hard-slogging work by a handful of reporters to get the answers to these questions, but a major newspaper like the New York Times could easily assign a small group of reporters to get and state these answers. But the Times would never do that, because the results would undercut four of its editorial positions: opposition to the Boy Scouts, opposition to the Catholic Church, support for homosexuals generally, and support for the "teechurs" unions generally.
But there ought to be ONE major news organization, Fox perhaps, or the Wall Street Journal, that would assign the reporters for a couple weeks to get these basic facts, and stick the results in the eye of the "liberal" majority in the lamestream media.
Congressman Billybob
The church had a pristine community image with fine schools, buildings, sport fields, and service. So even I ,who was not a member of the church, was stunned when the scandal was revealed in the press. What it must have done to the congregation, I can only imagine.
Something tells me the homosexual/pedophilia lobby needs a smokescreen.
In every single one, the abuser was was having big time legal problems, in jail, defrocked, etc.
All men in all denominations are sinful.
The issue has been how that sin is dealt with by the church. Potestent denominations by and large do not attempt to buy silence from the victims and then protect the sinner. This is exactly what the RC church was doing and that is exactly where the problem lies.