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Sex runs rampant in the Catholic Church
Capitol Hill Blue ^ | January 9, 2003 | DOUG THOMPSON

Posted on 01/09/2003 7:54:21 AM PST by arj

Recent revelations that at least 40 percent of Catholic nuns in the United States are victims of sexual abuse are just part of a growing sex scandal in the Church that goes far beyond the abuse of young boys by priests.

Capitol Hill Blue has learned that internal investigations by the Church have uncovered massive evidence of frequent sexual activity by both nuns and priests (often with each other), use of Church money to pay for abortions for pregnant nuns and a “casual and tolerant attitude towards sexual activity among Church leaders.”

Details of the investigations are a closely guarded secret of the Church hierarchy, but sources tell CHB that the results are being closely studied by Vatican officials who express “shock and outrage” at the high levels of sex involving priests and nuns.

“For God’s sake, this is the Church. It is not a bordello,” exclaimed one priest involved in the investigation. “This is a crime against God.”

In interviews with current nuns and priests, as well as with a number of clergy who have left the church, a disturbing portrait of immoral activity within Church walls emerges, including:

--Priests who regularly have sex with female parishioners. According to two sources, as many as 5,000 priests in the U.S. have been discovered to have had affairs with parishioners.

--At least 34,000 nuns who admit sexual abuse or activity.

--Frequent sexual contact between priests and nuns. The investigations are said to have found “dozens” of cases where nuns who became pregnant from these affairs had abortions paid for out of Church funds (even though the Church opposes abortions).

--Hundreds of confirmed reports of lesbian sexual encounters among nuns as well as homosexual contact between priests.

--Hundreds of cases where priests and nuns leave the Church and marry shortly afterwards, many having children conceived while they were still Church clergy.

“You are dealing with human beings with human failings,” admits Jonathan, an ex-priest who left the Church years ago and married a former nun. Their oldest child was conceived during an affair when both were still in the Church. Jonathan agreed to be interviewed only on condition that neither his last name nor his wife’s name be used for this article.

“Yes, we both took vows of chastity but we broke those vows,” he says. “We weren’t the only ones. I knew several priests in my diocese who broke their vows as well. My wife knew many nuns who violated their vows.”

Jonathan says stories about rampant sexual activity among priests and nuns circulated in the Church for years but that Catholic leaders looked the other way.

“There were two hypocrisies at work,” he says. “One because some of the Church leaders were, themselves, unfaithful to their vows and the other because everyone knew the damage to the church if this ever became public.”

Only when confronted with the revelations last year of widespread abuse of children and the subsequent cover up has the church taken a closer look at the sexual activity.

"The bishops appear to be only looking at the issue of child sexual abuse, but the problem is bigger than that," says St. Louis University researcher Ann Wolf, one of those who authored the study on widespread sexual abuse of nuns. "Catholic sisters are being violated, in their ministries, at work, in pastoral counseling."

St. Louis University conducted a national survey of nuns in 1996 but the Church-affiliated school never publicly released the results. The study, paid for by several of the nun orders, was turned over to the Church. Wolf and the other researchers found 34,000 nuns who had been either sexually abused or engaged in sexual activity.

“What they found were those who admitted it,” says Jonathan. “There were, and are, many others.”

Jonathan admits his wife was not his first sexual partner while he wore the robes of priesthood. He had affairs with female parishioners and other nuns.

“It was all done with a wink and a nod,” he says. “Just about everybody knew what was happening but nobody wanted to do anything about it.”

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops claims to know nothing of the studies and refuses to comment on the specifics of this article. Phone calls to various Catholic officials and Vatican offices were not returned.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: anticatholichatred; bs; catholicbashing; catholicchurch; catholiclist; priests; religion; scandal; sex
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To: LiteKeeper
Pauls instructions to Timothy were not absolute in that bishops, priests and deacons had to be married. The instruction was regarding divorcés and polygamists. Those selected could not be married more than once. Celibacy is a higher calling, re Jesus Christ, Melchizedek, John the Baptist, the Apostles and several others.

. the Roman Catholic Church has not done anyone a favor by insisting on an unnatural state for its clergy!

A specious argument at best. No one has a right to be ordained and a vow of celibacy is one that is made freely. Anyone who thinks that celibacy is the problem is ignorant.

21 posted on 01/09/2003 8:52:29 AM PST by SMEDLEYBUTLER
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To: CedarDave
I told CHB to remove me from the email list. The nuns, priests and dead baby in the basement story by town idiots
was something the little non Catholic kids used to learn decades ago and they whispered it to the Catholic kids.
The teachers in most Catholic schools are called lay teachers. Maybe this dimwit thought they mean lay teachers?
22 posted on 01/09/2003 8:53:14 AM PST by oldironsides
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To: *Catholic_list
http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list
23 posted on 01/09/2003 8:58:29 AM PST by Free the USA
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To: LiteKeeper
If you advertize for applicants to a certain job, saying that the rquirements are 1) male 19-25 years old, 2)not interested in getting married. Guess who you are going to attract? Fags!
24 posted on 01/09/2003 8:59:57 AM PST by philosofy123
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To: LiteKeeper
If you advertize for applicants to a certain job, saying that the rquirements are 1) male 19-25 years old, 2)not interested in getting married. Guess who you are going to attract? Fags!
25 posted on 01/09/2003 8:59:58 AM PST by philosofy123
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To: 2timothy3.16
I can see it as a crime against the church, but sex as a crime against God???
26 posted on 01/09/2003 9:02:16 AM PST by stuartcr
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To: philosofy123
The seminary in Cincinnati is full of the light in the loafers crowd. The church and its adherents are simply in denial.

27 posted on 01/09/2003 9:02:49 AM PST by Bluntpoint
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To: Steve_Seattle; Matchett-PI
The difference is, that as a Protestant, if I find that my pastor (or any member) is engaged in sexual immorality, I can assemble the church and invoke 1 Co 5 if needed to solve the problem. I don't have to endure it for years while friends of the predator protect him and then threaten me with excommunication if I try to either expose it or move to another church.
28 posted on 01/09/2003 9:05:30 AM PST by CCWoody
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To: oldironsides
They forgot the beatings of nuns to force them into prostitution. And the one who got walled up alive for refusing. CHB has just blown all their credibility with me - are they planning to report on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion next?
29 posted on 01/09/2003 9:07:48 AM PST by nina0113
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To: CCWoody
You seem to be suggesting that if a Protestant makes a charge againts the RCC, whether true or not, then he is filthy and hateful. Perhaps you should apply the filthy and hateful label to the predators of the RCC who are actually pederasts and/or rapists and/or fornicators.

Woody it was a spoof meant for older Catholics who would get it. Do I have to attach a </sarcasm tag to everything? -Tom

30 posted on 01/09/2003 9:47:05 AM PST by Capt. Tom
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To: stuartcr
I can see it as a crime against the church, but sex as a crime against God???

Sex is not a crime against God, but violation of their solemn oath before God is a crime against God.

31 posted on 01/09/2003 9:51:32 AM PST by Petronski (I'm not always cranky.)
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To: Petronski
Why would anyone make an oath to God, especially one that denies a biological function?
32 posted on 01/09/2003 9:53:50 AM PST by stuartcr
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To: stuartcr
It's a calling. And it is a voluntary oath.
33 posted on 01/09/2003 9:58:00 AM PST by Petronski (I'm not always cranky.)
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To: Petronski
From God? Why would God want someone to deny a function that He gave them?
34 posted on 01/09/2003 10:01:32 AM PST by stuartcr
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To: Petronski
Speaking about the Cincinnati seminary only, this oath means nothing today.

When you witness first hand what the church has to accept to keep up this fiction, it is very sad and delusional.
35 posted on 01/09/2003 10:02:41 AM PST by Bluntpoint
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To: stuartcr
Why would anyone make an oath to God, especially one that denies a biological function?
"For some are eunuchs because they were born that way; others were made that way by men; and others have made themselves eunuchs because of the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it." (Mt19:12 (NIV))
36 posted on 01/09/2003 10:03:50 AM PST by eastsider
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To: Cicero
It is interesting that Catholics think those verses mean their church.
37 posted on 01/09/2003 10:05:49 AM PST by ACAC
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To: eastsider
I never gave it any thought before, but not being a eunuch...now that's certainly another thing I'm thankful to God for.
38 posted on 01/09/2003 10:06:44 AM PST by stuartcr
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To: ex-snook
Every church I have ever been to teaches that sex outside of marriage is wrong. It is pretty hard to get that wrong.
39 posted on 01/09/2003 10:08:30 AM PST by ACAC
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To: arj; *Catholic_list; Polycarp; sinkspur; Campion
Bump
40 posted on 01/09/2003 10:09:37 AM PST by Incorrigible
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