Sex abuse rife in other religions, says Vatican

[closeupready]

Source: Guardian

The Vatican has lashed out at criticism over its handling of its paedophilia crisis by saying the Catholic church was "busy cleaning its own house" and that the problems with clerical sex abuse in other churches were as big, if not bigger.

In a defiant and provocative statement, issued following a meeting of the UN human rights council in Geneva, the Holy See said the majority of Catholic clergy who committed such acts were not paedophiles but homosexuals attracted to sex with adolescent males.

The statement, read out by Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Vatican's permanent observer to the UN, defended its record by claiming that "available research" showed that only 1.5%-5% of Catholic clergy were involved in child sex abuse.

He also quoted statistics from the Christian Scientist Monitor newspaper to show that most US churches being hit by child sex abuse allegations were Protestant and that sexual abuse within Jewish communities was common.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/28/sex-abuse-religion-vatican

---

There goes that interdenominational rapprochement JPII worked so hard at.

[derby378]

1. I never heard of sexual abuse in a Friends meetinghouse

Of course, if anyone knows of such a thing happening, please let me know...

[Ignis]

21. It happens, they just keep quiet about it.

:rofl:

Awful joke from a friend of Friends--don't kill me! :)

[undeterred]

2. The first time the Catholic Church acknowledges

the existence of homosexuals, and they link it with pedophilia. Brilliant. :sarcasm:

[brendan120678]

3. Well, true...there are just as many...

sex abuse scandals in other denominations as there are in the Catholic church.

That doesn't excuse the apparent cover-ups that have been exposed, however.

[SpiralHawk]

4. "Republicons, for instance, are into diaper sex with hookers." - The Vatican

"So our kinks at least, are, um, more traditional than Republicon Family Values Kinks."

- The Vatican

[Lone_Star_Dem]

5. Ahh, the old "they're doing it too" defense.

How pathetic.

[sasquatch]

9. "If the Hindus jumped off a bridge would you do it too?"

[AlbertCat]

18. Jumping.... without desire....

[Lone_Star_Dem]

25. That's it in a nutshell

If you don't buy that one then they're offering up the "If family members, babysitters, friends, relatives or neighbors are molesting children in greater amounts. Then how is it so bad that the Catholic priests have been molesting children," defense.

If you still don't buy that one then they're willing to broach redefining most of the acts of pedophilia within the church as ephebophilia. I still haven't decided how that's supposed to be better, unless it's so they can blame it on gay people.

Conspicuously absent is all mention of the cover-ups they committed of these crimes. Give them time and I'm sure they'll find some other group to attempt to blame that on as well.

[laconicsax]

6. What a load!

They're redefining pedophilia so that priests don't qualify! Now, if you're a "homosexual attracted to sex with adolescent males," you're not a pedophile and it doesn't count as sex abuse.

[closeupready]

8. Maybe they're talking about terms as defined for purposes of 'canon law'?

:puke:

[laconicsax]

31. Or they're playing semantic games to look better on paper.

If you rename something, you can invent a vacuous truth about the old naming convention:

If you re-classify "auto accidents" as "collisions," you've managed to significantly reduce the number of "auto accidents." If you re-classify 90% of "pedophile priests" as "ephebophile priests," you suddenly have 90% fewer "pedophile priests."

[Burma Jones]

7. It's not the Pedophile Priests as much as it is the Church's protection of these criminals

This fish rots from the head.......

[Bennyboy]

13. Exactly...

The cover up. the moving priests that were accused to other parishes. The leaders of the church knew all about this and DID NOTHING except move their molesting brethern around. And the people that supplied them money are also to blame in this...

[Doc Martin]

19. YES!!!

[arikara]

10. That's their defense?

cripes, I thought it was an onion report.

Only 1.5%-5% of priests molest children and most of those who do are actually "ephebophiles" not pedophiles.

[Bennyboy]

11. Fuck Catholicism

These fucking fucks should all BE IN FUCKING PRISON. All of them from the Pope to the parishoners that continue to drop money in the collection plate.

What the catholic church has become is the LARGEST CHILD MOLESTATION RING in the world. And if you belong to the church you are part of the largest CHILD MOLESTATION CONSPIRACY IN THE WORLD. And you too should be arrested.

Think about it for a second. if the name were hippies with dreadlocks and they were conspiring to molest children in the way that the Catholic church has, everyone that was a hippie with dreadlocks would be under investigation. ESPECIALLY THOSE THAT GAVE THEM MONEY TO CONTINUE, even after the allegations became so widely known.

Change the name to any other organization and we are talking conspiracy.

PUT EVERY FUCKING ONE OF THEM IN FUCKING JAIL FOR THE REST OF THEIR FUCKING LIVES.

[brendan120678]

20. I believe there are more Protestant sexual abuse cases...

than there are Catholic sexual abuse cases.

The attempted cover-up just isn't as widespread.

[AlbertCat]

22. hippies with dreadlocks

Rastafarian's are pedophiles??????








:sarcasm:

[truebrit71]

12. Soooo, what? That makes it okay that you covered up the buggery for DECADES???!!!

FUCK YOU!!!!

[LiberalFighter]

14. That is not a good justification for allowing illegal sex.

And regardless of whether it was man on boy or man on girl it is immoral and illegal to have sex of any type with minors.

And to suggest that it was only homosexuals is a blatant abuse on the Vatican's part. Heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual doesn't matter.

They forget that the Vatican condoned the practice by moving the offenders from parish to parish without providing the proper punishment for such action. And for not owning up to the problem as they should. Other churches don't have the extensive network the Catholic church has to hide their offenders.

I also wonder how much the Catholic church bribed the right people in high offices to make the problem go away?

[mamaleah]

15. Of course there is! And there is sex abuse amongst the non-religious too!

Who, except a total moron, would ever think sexual abuse is a Catholics only thing?

[AlbertCat]

16. Oh well... if everybody's doing it, then....

Do Protestants and Jews (and even Hindus and Buddhists) take a vow to their god of celibacy? (Some Hindus maybe?)

Jess askin"....

[WeekendWarrior]

17. And this excuses the Catholic church's behavior how?

So other churches are worse and that somehow makes it okay that you not only failed to act, but ruined countless other lives by refusing to properly deal with the problem?

What a joke.

[G Gordon Libby]

23. Hey, they've acknowledged it and have acted retroactively,

that's something...something that will never ever happen in the case of a certain prominent religion that starts with "I" and ends with "M". You can bet your left nut on that.

[AlbertCat]

24. What a joke.

What do you expect from people who believe a wafer actually changes its molecular structure to become some part of the body (hair? skin? liver?) with the DNA of someone who may or may not have lived over 2000 years ago?

[harry_pothead]

26. Of course it is. Religion is inherently authoritarian and teaches children not to trust themselves

That creates a perfect environment for child sexual abuse.

I'll fix Tomasi's statement:

"The statement, read out by Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Vatican's permanent observer to the UN, defended its record by claiming that "available research" showed that only 1.5%-5% of Catholic clergy were CAUGHT in child sex abuse."

More accurate now.

[harry_pothead]

27. Proud to be an atheist!

:headbang:

[harry_pothead]

28. The Church of Satan has the best policy on the matter - you have to be 18 to join.

[struggle4progress]

29. Actual context and statements:

On 22 September, the IHEU made the following presentation before the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva:

Agenda Item 4: Matters requiring the attention of the Council
Child Abuse and the Holy See
In 1990 the Holy See acceded to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child ... The extent of child abuse within the Catholic Church is well known ... We urge the Holy See to recognise its responsibilities to children and the CRC, to bring its reporting up to date, and to instruct its dioceses and religious orders to report all cases of alleged child abuse to the civil authorities ... And we urge the international community to hold the Holy See to account.
http://www.iheu.org/iheu-calls-vatican-recognize-its-responsibilities-children-and-under-un-convention

The Vatican responded:

HOLY SEE, RIGHT OF REPLY – CHILD ABUSE
Let me clarify the issue raised by the International Humanist and Ethical Union in its intervention ... In the upcoming report of the Holy See to the Committee on the Rights of the Child, which is finalized as we speak, a paragraph will be dedicated to the problem of child abuse by catholic clergy ... From available research we now know that in the last fifty years somewhere between 1.5% and 5% of the catholic clergy has been involved in sexual abuse cases ... About 85% of the offenders of child sexual abuse are family members, babysitters, neighbors, family friends or relatives ... The Church is very conscious of the seriousness of the problem. The Code of Canon Law stipulates that priests involved in sexual abuse cases must be "punished with just punishments, not excluding expulsion from clerical state" ... As the Catholic Church has been busy cleaning its own house, it would be good if other institutions and authorities, where the major part of abuses are reported, could do the same and inform the media about it.
http://www.iheu.org/holy-see-responds-iheu-criticism

[JerseygirlCT]

30. You know, my mom would never fall for

the "but he does it too!" argument.

The Vatican's claims here are just as silly. I'm quite sure that sexual abuse if far wider than reported, and can be found in all sorts of segments of society. That doesn't in the least, let the RCC off the hook.

What silliness.

[gorbal]

32. They are right that it is overy skewed toward them.

But they had to go and cover it up and make it even more of an issue.

[IHEU]

33. IHEU responds to the Holy See

On 22 September, speaking in the plenary of the UN Human Rights Council, the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU), representing more that 100 humanist, secular and free-thought organisations in over 40 countries, criticised the Holy See over its role in covering up the scale of child abuse by its priests and religious orders, and for failing to honour its obligations under international law. The statement was based on a longer written statement submitted to the Council in August and published by the UN on 8 September (http://www.iheu.org/un-publishes-iheu-statement-child-abuse-and- holy-see).

The IHEU statement addressed specifically the role of the Holy See - which claims responsibility for the Catholic Church worldwide - in attempting to cover up the extent of child abuse perpetrated by its priests and religious orders. In exercising their right of reply to this criticism the representative of the Holy See ignored the main criticism contained in our statement.

The reply made on behalf of the Papal Nuncio Archbishop Thomasi argued that the Catholic Church was not unique in having clergy who sexually abused children and young people, but it made no mention of the physical and mental abuse meted out for generations to children under the care of its religious orders. No doubt there are abusers in all walks of life, but our point was not the abuse itself but the cover up in which some of the highest officials of the Church were implicated.

The Holy See is a sovereign state and its senior clergy, safely ensconced in the Vatican out of reach of civil law, are answerable to no earthly power other than themselves - and to the few international treaties to which they are party. One such is the International Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and, as shown in the IHEU report, the Holy See is in massive breach of its obligations under that convention.

Commenting on the Holy See’s response, IHEU Main Representative in Geneva, Roy Brown, said: “By failing to address this issue while seeking to point the finger of blame elsewhere, the Holy See’ has scored a spectacular own goal. One senior UN official described their reply as ‘a disgrace’. We agree.”