Catholics: Priest victims willing gay participants

It stretches the imagination and boggles the mind to even think of priests and other clergy molesting trusting young children, but it is even more of a stretch to be asked to believe that these innocent souls were themselves homosexuals who not only welcomed the advances but invited them.

This latest outrage is being disseminated by the anti-gay Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. I have never heard of them, and I doubt many have so I did a little research and found the following from Wikipedia:

The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, often shortened to The Catholic League, is an American Catholic anti-defamation and civil rights organization. Describing itself as “the nation’s largest Catholic civil rights organization,” the Catholic League states that it “defends the right of Catholics – lay and clergy alike – to participate in American public life without defamation or discrimination.” The Catholic League states that it is “motivated by the letter and the spirit of the First Amendment … to safeguard both the religious freedom rights and the free speech rights of Catholics whenever and wherever they are threatened.”

The League is not part of the Archdiocese of New York, though it does rent an office on the same floor as the headquarters of the Archdiocese of New York. According to a New York Times interviewer, the organization “maintains close ties to the leadership. Several bishops make personal donations. Cardinal O’Connor spoke at the group’s 25th anniversary reception in 1998 and vacated part of his suite for its expanding operations, said Joseph Zwilling, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of New York.” The League includes on its website endorsements from such prominent clerics as the more conservative Cardinal Edward Egan, former Archbishop of New York, the liberal Cardinal Roger Mahony, former Archbishop of Los Angeles, Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver, and Archbishop Edwin O’Brien of Baltimore, as well as Father Benedict Groeschel, C.F.R., endorsing the League’s activities and exhorting Catholics to become members. So, given this history, it is difficult for mainstream Catholics, and the clergy, to divorce themselves from this group, which clearly claims that it speaks for the church itself.

The statistics themselves are frightening as they are reflective of the number of victims of priest abuse in the United States alone. Ironically the League cites the John Jay study in defense of and in support of their position.

The 2004 John Jay Report commissioned by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) was based on surveys completed by the Roman Catholic dioceses in the United States. The surveys filtered provided information from diocesan files on each priest accused of sexual abuse and on each of the priest’s victims to the research team, in a format which did not disclose the names of the accused priests or the dioceses where they worked. The dioceses were encouraged to issue reports of their own based on the surveys that they had completed.

The 2004 John Jay Report was based on a study of 10,667 allegations against 4,392 priests accused of engaging in sexual abuse of a minor between 1950 and 2002. Again it is important to remember that this study dealt only with incidents of abuse in the United States, can you imagine the scope of this perversion when applied globally? How can anyone rationalize and minimize these terrible crimes by claiming victim cooperation and willingness because they, the victims, were themselves homosexuals anyway?

The Catholic church has many flaws. It is an outdated institution that still lives in the 14th Century and their celibacy rule is partly to blame for this aberrant behavior. It is not natural for men to be prohibited from getting married and engaging in sex, gay or straight.

The faithful will claim the celibacy rule was based on the belief that Jesus wasn’t married so therefore his “representatives” here on earth, the priests should not be. That is nonsense. It is because centuries ago when priests were allowed to marry and have children they would leave their estates to their families when they died and not to the church. The church didn’t like that so the celibacy rule was instituted and the church became even more wealthy.

So enough background. Here is the Raw Story:

The anti-gay Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights is going on the attack against “those who are distorting the truth about priestly sexual abuse.” The group bought an expensive full-page ad in The New York Times Monday that places the blames for the church’s scandals on “homosexuality, not pedophilia.” And perhaps most shockingly, it also claimed that some children were active participants in the abuse. “The refrain that child rape is a reality in the Church is twice wrong: let’s get it straight — they weren’t children and they weren’t raped,” self-appointed Catholic League president Bill Donohue wrote in the ad. “We know from the John Jay study that most of the victims have been adolescents, and that the most common abuse has been inappropriate touching (inexcusable though this is, it is not rape),” he added, referencing a 2004 study by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, which was funded by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. “The Boston Globe correctly said of the John Jay report that ‘more than three-quarters of the victims were post pubescent, meaning the abuse did not meet the clinical definition of pedophilia.’ In other words, the issue is homosexuality, not pedophilia,” Donohue wrote. The John Jay report stated there were approximately 10,667 reported victims (younger than 18 years) of clergy sexual abuse during this period: Around 81 percent of these victims were male.

22.6% were age 10 or younger, 51% were between the ages of 11 and 14, and 27% were between the ages to 15 to 17 years.

A substantial number (almost 2000) of very young children were victimized by priests during this time period.

9,281 victim surveys had information about an investigation. In 6,696 (72%) cases, an investigation of the allegation was carried out. Of these, 4,570 (80%) were substantiated; 1,028 (18%) were unsubstantiated; 83 (1.5%) were found to be false. In 56 cases, priests were reported to deny the allegations.

More than 10 percent of these allegations were characterized as not substantiated. (This does not mean that the allegation was false; it means only that the diocese or order could not determine whether the alleged abuse actually took place.)

For approximately 20 percent of the allegations, the priest was deceased or inactive at the time of the receipt of the allegation and typically no investigation was conducted in these circumstances.

In 38.4% of allegations, the abuse is alleged to have occurred within a single year, in 21.8% the alleged abuse lasted more than a year but less than 2 years, in 28% between 2 and 4 years, in 10.2% between 5 and 9 years and, in under 1%, 10 or more years. “What accounts for the relentless attacks on the Church?” he asked in conclusion. “Let’s face it: if its teachings were pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage and pro-women clergy, the dogs would have been called off years ago.” Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of DignityUSA, a pro-gay Catholic group, told The Advocate that there were “so many problems with what Mr. Donohue is saying.” She pointed out that Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP) figures showed that half of those abused are female. “He avoids what is in many ways the larger sin — the cover-up and enabling of abuse,” she added. Phil Attey, executive director of Catholics for Equality, told The Advocate that “all of the arguments we see in this ad are scapegoating attempts.” “We’re disappointed that Bill Donahue refuses to look at the long-term well-being of the Catholic Church by joining the overwhelming majority of American Catholics who see the only path toward fixing the problem to be the establishment of permanent structures for the laity to be involved in the running of the church.” Allegations of sexual abuse involving the Roman Catholic clergy in the United States rose sharply last year to nearly 700 from around 400 in 2009, according to a church report Monday. The vast majority of the allegations, 653, involved alleged abuse that occurred decades ago but whose “victims/survivors are just now finding the courage to report” them, the study said.

I have no doubt there are some strong opinions out there and we want to hear them, so leave a comment and let us know what you think. The cartoon below is not meant to treat the subject in a light hearted manner but to demonstrate the level of hypocrisy that exists within the church.