[Elendur]

public schools have abuse at 100 times the church rate.
in the past 2 decades, the church rate, has been reduced to almost zero.
...public schools, also cover it up, at 100 times the church rate.
...once again, the liberal media, ignores the alligator, to swat mosquitos.
-
the liberal media also ignores, that the church scandal,
is a HOMOSEXUAL problem.
Catholic churches have had girls, for altar servers, since 1985 ! ... has there been a SINGLE case, of a Priest abusing a girl? ...this is a gay issue.
-
just as more males are raped in the military, than females!
-
and who is doing all of it? the less than 2% of gays.
-
and the same media, that ignores all of that,
condemns the boyscouts, for realizing the risk,
and NOT letting homosexuals be with young boys.
(as i admit, the Church should have done also.)

[old and tired]

public schools have abuse at 100 times the church rate. in the past 2 decades, the church rate, has been reduced to almost zero. ...public schools, also cover it up, at 100 times the church rate. ...once again, the liberal media, ignores the alligator, to swat mosquitos.

This response is not helpful. Yes, yes the public school are Godless, secular cess pools (well, some of them are anyway). Should teachers and administrators be dealt with harshly? Of course! If they haven't been, shame on the DA's in those districts. Show me the articles where the principal AND the head of the school district okayed the transfer of an abusive teacher. Because the coverup by the people in charge is far more scandalous than anything any individual sinner has done. That's what Catholics are dealing with. Maybe it's happening in the public schools and maybe it's not. I have no idea, but I don't believe it's relevent to the behavior of men of God.

[Alex Murphy]

public schools have abuse at 100 times the church rate

You mean to say that 400% of all public school teachers have been accused of abuse in the last 50 years, and that 6600% of all public school officials were complicit in covering up for the 400%?

[whattajoke]

Your response is disturbing. What kind of person would feel good about defending child abusers - even if you're "only" casting blame elsewhere. Your "public school" vs. "church" rates hold no water when the statistics are presented carefully. AND EVEN IF THEY DID, so what? Abuse is abuse is abuse.

has there been a SINGLE case, of a Priest abusing a girl?

Stop. You're embarrassing yourself and Free Republic. A better question would have been, "has there been a SINGLE case, of a Priest abusing a girl in the news in the last 24 hours?" Why yes, yes there was. And a fairly high profile case at that.

[Elendur]

enabling something much worse:

“Survey Shows 74% Increase In U.S. Mosques Over Past 11 Years…”
“First Presbyterian Church embarks on interfaith {Islam} education program for all”
“The major networks skipped the closing prayer of the DNC in Charlotte. Here is Cardinal Timothy Dolan delivering the prayer. “

[count-your-change]

In an article in Newsweek, April of last year, appeared this comment:

“Another study released in March found that just one in 15 men in the Air Force would report being sexually assaulted, compared with one in five women.”

Since women make up about 14 to 15% of the U.S. military your statement (”just as more males are raped in the military, than females!”) could be true but it’s misleading in its lack of qualification just like the other remarks made.

[hinckley buzzard]

Rightly or wrongly we expect more from the church than from a bunch of halfbaked government educrats. One reason the church has struggled to live down its contemptible malfeasance with offending priests is that the offensive stonewalling and coverup behavior continues. People with claims of abuse beyond a reasonable doubt are still being refused any compensation and in some cases even treatment offers.

If the Church wants to play legalistic hardball like a secular amoral organization, fine, then it can expect to be treated accordingly by the media and the law.

I know they carefully screen adults working with children now, and have cleaned up the seminaries that had degenerated into pigsties after the 60's. But they still try to dodge the question with past abuse victims calling out for redress.

Oh and yes for the record, there has been documented female molestation and rape by priests. Most of the perps have been homosexual, but not all.

[Sherman Logan]

has there been a SINGLE case, of a Priest abusing a girl?

According to the Church's report, 19% of cases were abuse of a female.

[heyheyhey]

See chart from John Jay report (pdf). By the time the "Catholic scandals" erupted in media the actual abuses were almost nonexistent. I asked a priest friend (smart man) what he thought about the "scandals" when they first erupted, and he said that in his opinion media were paving the road to war in Iraq, and Catholic Church could be the only obstacle to it. At that time Blessed John Paul II and good number of US Bishops strongly opposed the invasion of Iraq as lacking justification, in their opinion.

The "scandals" were huge success for the media. Boston Globe got a Pulitzer for it in 2002. And the war started while Bishops got themselves busy righting wrongs that were decades old.

And now the ball just keeps rolling with Bishops bending over and backwards under the continued pressure, and frantically trying to find a once-for-all remedy, with "cures" that are worse than the disease.

Their attempts to invent a system that would allow canonize Saints while they are still alive, are more than likely to be futile, given the simple fact from Catholic theology that each and every human being is prone to sin.

The only working solution, that I can see, is ignoring the pressure and using common sense (the Boy Scouts might offer a hint), and treating each criminal case individually instead of blaming the whole Church and the Pope for each perpetrator.