With Easter coming and continued news of Catholic priests botting small boys, I wonder what peoples views are on this. All I can say is that the Catholic Church is one big f***ed up organization. If Jesus knew what some of his followers would get up to 2000 or so years later, after being crucified on the Friday, he wouldn’t have bothered getting up on the Sunday.
And that old Polish ex-goalkeeper isn’t saying much either…
Broonale, you will probably get floundered for this thread, given the timing and all, but there is a good point to it too: Jesus never once said priests (or rabbis then) had to or should be celibate. This celibacy thing is what has screwed up the church for centuries. And there is no scriptural reason for it, nothing. So these men have been wasting their lives, in times of following the Gospel. It was the Church bureaucracy that instituted this insanity, which has led to so much tragedy and stunted lives…
And not only that, Broonale, but by denying priests the chance to marry and procreate, it meant that for the last 2000 years, some very very good DNA has been deleted from the Catholic genepool. Their best and the brightest minds, literate and full of passion for life and grace and redemption and preaching, and their DNA goes out the window each time. What a monumental waste of DNA and human resources! Imagine the bright kids the popes and priests of yesteryear would have produced! I am not joking here. It is one of the natural tragedies of the celibacy thing.
Why should I get floundered for this? It’s in the news. It is a pertinent topic. That I bring this up at Easter means that at least i am thinking about Easter which is far closer to practising religion* than the state of mind of a priest partaking in a little bit of paedophile abuse of a choirboy. If this post is removed, I will have no choice than to regard it as a form of censorship and (maybe religious) intolerance of a legitimate issue of concern. Given the vitriol directed at Muslims** elsewhere in this forum I do not see why we have to ‘flounder’ this thread simply to pander to the (over) sensitivity of Catholics and/or other Christians.
I could only accept the removal of the oblique reference to the pope but it is an oblique reference; hardly inflammatory.
*I don’t
**I am not a Muslim.
Well, then, I pray that I am wrong and that you don’t get floundered. Time will tell.
ADDED LATER: Time has told: “Answered prayers! Halleluyah!”
Don’t worry Broonale - lane119/winter/formosa/nonentity is usually on the receiving end of Forumosa policy, not on the implementation side.
I think the church is a flawed institution, but then again, as a human institution, how could it not be? Remember too, that organized religion, in addition to fucking up regularly, also plays an important and meaningful part in many people’s lives.
Happy to oblige Brune Ale:
But you must remember that Christianity is a religion of peace, Catholicism is a religion of peace, and priests are men of peace. It is unfair to judge a whole religion by the actions of a few people. Besides, there must be an equal number of similar abuses among Buddhist priests, Jewish rabbis and Protestant ministers as well as, ahem, of course among Muslim imams. Just because a few people choose to hide behind the robes of religion to engage in their sick acts does not mean that you should criticize or judge the whole religion. That would not be fair. It would not be nice. You do want to be nice now don’t you?
[quote=“fred smith”]Happy to oblige Brune Ale:
But you must remember that Christianity is a religion of peace, Catholicism is a religion of peace, and priests are men of peace. It is unfair to judge a whole religion by the actions of a few people. Besides, there must be an equal number of similar abuses among Buddhist priests, Jewish rabbis and Protestant ministers as well as, ahem, of course among Muslim imams. Just because a few people choose to hide behind the robes of religion to engage in their sick acts does not mean that you should criticize or judge the whole religion. That would not be fair. It would not be nice. You do want to be nice now don’t you?[/quote]
Father Fred:
I agree with most of what you say above except that maybe it should read “priests are men of piece”. If others want to start threads that mention the foibles of another religion’s ‘priests’ / whatever, then I suppose they are at liberty to do so. It’s just that ‘Jewish Rabbi Fondles Boy Rehearsing For Bar Mitzvah’ for example, wasn’t in the news 30 minutes ago.
And: your being nice or my wanting you to be nice was not / is not a reason for agreeing with you. I have used 100% influence-free independence of thought in my view.
What is “pedophilia”? Approximately what age? Because a whole lot of normal red-blooded males would be attracted to, say, Brooke Shields in Blue Lagoon but not, say, Drew Barrymore in E.T…
As a factual matter, most of the priestly offenses have involved teenagers and were not pedophilia according to the strict sense. Which is to say, illegal but not necessarily indicative of a mental illness.
If the leaders of a religion are allowed to marry and procreate, then what if anything distinguishes them from the rank-and-file? Everybody would like to be in charge, and to have other people listen to their opinion more; but not everybody is willing to make sacrifices for others. That’s why it’s easier for me to respect the leadership of celibate religious. (Of course there are upteen practical issues too involving money and so on.)
As an aside, why have we not heard more about “pedophile rabbis” or “pedophile imams”? Is it because they commit fewer sexual offenses, or because their offenses are less publicized?
So following that logic I can argue than since some people commit murder… all people are murders else want to murder
Why not throw everyone in jail in that case? Prevention is…
Some people believe that (some) pedophiles became priests so that they have access to children. I also read years ago about a “network” of Catholic priests who were involved in a pedophile ring as well as satanism. No, I don’t believe everything I read, but enough to keep my guard up as a parent… I’m Catholic and also a victim of child rape although not by a priest, and I’ve always considered myself very sensitive to the wrong intentions of men (i.e., the “uncle” who always wants a hug and a kiss on the cheek, the family friend whose eyes lingered on my teenaged body, etc). I was very active in the parish as a kid/teen so there were times when I would be alone with our priest or a male seminarian, and I even recall being there as early as 5am, as late as 11pm if I was closing up and waiting for a parent to pick me up but not once do I recall ever feeling uneasy with any of these men.
Maybe I wasn’t cute enough?
I have a couple of other jumbled thoughts on the original post. I don’t know whether or not there is scripture that supports celibacy; I think it may have originated with the first Christian monastary. I personally believe that the Catholic church should allow priests to marry, but I can see how challenging it would be to be responsible for both a family and a congregation. Most of us struggle with just one of those families… 
All right Broon Ale:
Mix me a few bloody mary’s and we can consider the matter at an end, now which one is up to you! 
Love (lots of it) Father Fred
Google yielded the following :
Priest + Child + Abuse - about 224,000 results
Rabbi + Child + Abuse - about 41,200 results
Imam + Child + Abuse - about 11,700 results
Monk + Child + Abuse - about 34,600 results
(Buddhist Monk etc. - 20,100)
(Catholic Monk - 30,100)
(Taoist Monk - 1,570)
(Hindu Monk (?) - 7,780)
Minister+Child+Abuse won with about 572,000 but I suspect that this includes members of the The Conservative Party when it was last in power in the UK.
THis of course only shows the instances where all these words appear (more or less) in the same sentence or very close to each other.
Interesting though as me thinks there could be a more-than-tenuous link between frequency of results and instances of priests whipping it out on (or near) the altar.
So what you are implying is that what 50% of 224,000 priests are guilty of this? Or what precentage do you think?
what does the number of hits from Goggle mean? nothing… since you are recording the number of times they appear in the same sentence.
This information/correlation that has no relevance to the number of priests who are guilty of this.
If your arguement is that the church has done little to investigate this and find out what went wrong i.e allowing these guys to become priests, then you are right. However this does not mean the whole church is guilty of this
There is good and bad in everything and everyone… but the church or faith did not urge or preach these priests to do this, it was the priests themselves.
Celebacy goes against human male nature, but this is no excuse to do this.
Brune Ale:
Using the google method
Muslims + terrorism = 536,000 hits
Muslim + terrorism = 922,000 hits
Jews + terrorism = 397,000 (but before you get excited most of these sites describe Muslim terrorism against Jews).
Interestingly, Christian + terrorism = 1,010,0000 hits (first pages are applicable, later pages mostly describe Muslim terrorism)
Hindu + terrorism = 255,000 hits (later Muslims are involved)
Buddhist terrorism = 54,600
Catholic + terrorist = 261,000 (most sites discuss Muslim terrorism)
Irish terrorist 233,000
Palestinian terrorist 758,000
American terrorism (this was good) 2.34 million (zmag was busy)
So as anyone can see if you are flying or traveling your greatest fear should be Americans, Christians and then Muslims. Sound plausible? Watch out for those nuns with bombs haha. In the meantime, I will be nervous if Mohammad and Gibrail and Ali and Rahman fiddle with their shoes on my next flight. Wonder what else google can do?
I apologize for taking this thread further off topic, but Fred you are clearly wrong. A further google search yields the following results:
Fred + monk = 109,000 hits
Fred + terrorist = 169,000
Fred +child + abuse = 226,000
Fred + crazy = 554,00
Fred + wrong = 1,210,000
I don’t think anything more need be said about the credibility of your argument Mr. Fred.
Well MT:
If it was on google… I’ll have to live with the results but only if Broon Ale makes me my bloody mary’s.
Love (lots of it) father fred
Apologies in advance for going off-topic…
idiot+forumosa.com = 28
idiot+tealit.com = 56
So there are half as many idiots on forumosa than on tealit.
I have always wondered why teachers get fired and blacklisted when any question of sexual abuse comes up between them and their charges yet priests who are accused of such just get sent off to a different parish while the church sweeps it under the rug.
With all due respect to the posters, I don’t understand what is wrong with any organization, such as the Catholic Church, saying that its members should remain celibate.
I think that the problem is not that priests are not allowed to engage in sexual practices with others, it is that priests who have broken the law were protected by the leaders in the church for too long.
If those priests who first molested children would have been removed from their posts, then future children would not have been molested. However, by allowing the Catholic Church to become a haven for the priests who abused boys and girls, they sent a message to all the priests that such behaviour is not really that serious, and nothing would really happen to the molester.
I would bet that the real number of sex-offending priests in the Catholic Church is not so large but a few priests did molest a lot of children.
Thus, leaders in the Catholic Church, not celibacy, are the real culprits.
wow, that google thing is like, scientific proof of something.
Me + Sandwiches 498,000 results
Me + Crisps 68,300 results.
I guess I do like sandwiches more than crisps after all.
No. But while ye mocke, some wee lad is getting groped by a man of the cloth.
Man of Cloth: You seem to have lost the ability to reach your high notes, my son"
Choirboy: Would you like me to bend over again like last week, Father?
Mock as much as you want. Digress as much as you want but it is happening right now. Most likely near Boston.