# Pope Admits Clerical Abuse Of Nuns **trigger Warning**



## spacetygrss (Feb 5, 2019)

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-47134033
*Pope admits clerical abuse of nuns including sexual slavery*
Pope Francis has admitted that clerics have sexually abused nuns, and in one case they were kept as sex slaves.

He said in that case his predecessor, Pope Benedict, was forced to shut down an entire congregation of nuns who were being abused by priests.

It is thought to be the first time that Pope Francis has acknowledged the sexual abuse of nuns by the clergy.

He said the Church was attempting to address the problem but said it was "still going on".


Sex abuse and the Catholic Church
Pope Francis made the comments on Tuesday to reporters while on a historic tour of the Middle East.

He admitted that priests and bishops had abused nuns, but said the Church was aware of the issue and "working on it".

"It's a path that we've been on," he said.

"Pope Benedict had the courage to dissolve a female congregation which was at a certain level, because this slavery of women had entered it - slavery, even to the point of sexual slavery - on the part of clerics or the founder."

Alessandro Gisotti of the Vatican press office later told CBS News that the order in question had been based in France.

Pope Francis said sexual abuse of nuns was an ongoing problem but happened largely in "certain congregations, predominantly new ones".

Last November, the Catholic Church's global organisation for nuns denounced the "culture of silence and secrecy" that prevented them from speaking out.

Just days ago the Vatican's women's magazine, Women Church World, condemned the abuse, saying in some cases nuns were forced to abort priests' children - something Catholicism forbids.

The magazine said the #MeToo movement meant more women were now coming forward with their stories.


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## spacetygrss (Feb 5, 2019)

Seriously...This stuff is out of control. Ridiculous.


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## Evolving78 (Feb 5, 2019)

those poor nuns and children of the church... I pray for healing.


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## SoopremeBeing (Feb 5, 2019)




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## Everything Zen (Feb 5, 2019)

Let me leave this thread before I make the banned and find a way to make sure I don’t come up here and do a drunk post.


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## fluffyforever (Feb 5, 2019)

So the abused nuns had to dissolve their congregation because the men clerics couldn't control themselves. Am I understanding this right? The women are being punished and disbanded while the men stay to lead?


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## intellectualuva (Feb 5, 2019)

fluffyforever said:


> So the abused nuns had to dissolve their congregation because the men clerics couldn't control themselves. Am I understanding this right? The women are being punished and disbanded while the men stay to lead?



This seems to be it to me too.


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## Atthatday (Feb 6, 2019)

So, a man becomes a priest and is told he can’t have a wife and can’t have sex? Then, children and women are placed around the priest. He’s forbidden to have sex and a wife, but it’s “ok” to sexually abuse women and children, and it’s ok to punish the women and children, as if it’s their fault?

Now, I see why this world is jacked up!


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## LaFaraona (Feb 6, 2019)

spacetygrss said:


> https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-47134033
> Pope admits clerical abuse of nuns including sexual slavery
> Pope Francis has admitted that clerics have sexually abused nuns, and in one case they were kept as sex slaves.
> 
> ...



what happened that he is talking about it now? 
As if their issue with child abuse was not bad enough.


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## awhyley (Feb 6, 2019)

spacetygrss said:


> Seriously...This stuff is out of control. Ridiculous.



Not surprised.  This is common knowledge.  At least there was talk of it quite some time ago.  Ages ago.



LaFaraona said:


> what happened that he is talking about it now?



Definitely the #MeToo.  Woman aren't going to be silenced anymore.  This annoucement means that they're probably getting in front of some news article.  I'm wondering what location/locations they're referring to and what "they're working on it" really means.


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## RoundEyedGirl504 (Feb 6, 2019)

awhyley said:


> Not surprised.  This is common knowledge.  At least there was talk of it quite some time ago.  Ages ago.
> 
> 
> 
> Definitely the #MeToo.  Woman aren't going to be silenced anymore.  This annoucement means that they're probably getting in front of some news article.  I'm wondering what location/locations they're referring to and what "they're working on it" really means.



Newer congregations is generally code word for these developing areas in Latin America and Africa, some parts of Asian Pacific. The corruption within the catholic church is extensive and targets vulnerable populations globally.


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## LaFaraona (Feb 7, 2019)

awhyley said:


> Not surprised.  This is common knowledge.  At least there was talk of it quite some time ago.  Ages ago.
> 
> 
> 
> Definitely the #MeToo.  Woman aren't going to be silenced anymore.  This annoucement means that they're probably getting in front of some news article.  I'm wondering what location/locations they're referring to and what "they're working on it" really means.





RoundEyedGirl504 said:


> Newer congregations is generally code word for these developing areas in Latin America and Africa, some parts of Asian Pacific. The corruption within the catholic church is extensive and targets vulnerable populations globally.



I read an article in the NYTimes and they wrote that the place they closed was in France.
https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2019/02/06/world/middleeast/06reuters-pope-emirates-plane-women.html


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## RoundEyedGirl504 (Feb 7, 2019)

LaFaraona said:


> I read an article in the NYTimes and they wrote that the place they closed was in France.
> https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2019/02/06/world/middleeast/06reuters-pope-emirates-plane-women.html


Interesting - I'd bet money there's quite a few more out there


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## LaFaraona (Feb 7, 2019)

RoundEyedGirl504 said:


> Interesting - I'd bet money there's quite a few more out there



yes, there are more. In the NYTimes articles they mention that from their own reporting and investigation, in years past, they uncovered abuse of nuns in India, Africa and few other places. They talked about nuns having abortions,  aborting the children of clergymen.
In the comments sections of the NYTimes articles people are commenting that this has been going on for many, many years and their own experiences. There was even a comment that some catholic orphanage was started to keep these children.
The whole thing is disgusting.

The pope said they are working on the issue. They have been "working" on it for literally decades. What is the difference this time? No, details have been given about any change in policies or procedures.
The pope is being duplicitous by saying that this is a Societal issue that women are considered 2nd class citizens. Now that is rich coming from an organization where the highest rang a woman can reach is nun. Add to it that the nuns are pressured in keeping quiet and secrecy.


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## LaFaraona (Feb 7, 2019)

I do not know what to highlight in the article, there is so much ****ery . To sum up: the whole thing is a shitshow

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/06/world/europe/pope-francis-sexual-abuse-nuns.html
*Sexual Abuse of Nuns: Longstanding Church Scandal Emerges From Shadows*




Pope Francis meeting with nuns last year at the Vatican.

ROME — The sexual abuse of nuns and religious women by Catholic priests and bishops — and the abortions that have sometimes resulted — has for years been overshadowed by other scandals in the Roman Catholic Church.

That seemed to change this week when Pope Francis  publicly acknowledged the problem for the first time.

“I was so happy,” said Lucetta Scaraffia, the author of an article denouncing the abuse of nuns and religious lay women by priests that was published this month in a magazine, Women Church World, which is distributed alongside the Vatican’s newspaper.

Speaking from her Rome apartment, which she said had essentially been converted into a television studio full of international reporters, Ms. Scaraffia said, “Finally, now many women will have the courage to come forward and denounce their abusers.”

The pope’s remarks on Tuesday, in response to a question posed on the papal plane about Ms. Scaraffia’s article, came after decades of persistent allegations of such abuses, and seeming Vatican inaction, which has now collided with the heightened awareness of the #MeToo era. They also came just ahead of an extraordinary conference of bishops on sexual abuse scheduled this month at the Vatican.

But it was the pope’s dramatic, and according to the Vatican on Wednesday, inaccurate, description of one example of such abuse as “sexual slavery” that most caught the world’s attention.

“When the Holy Father, referring to the dissolving of a congregation, spoke of ‘sexual slavery’ he meant ‘manipulation,’ ” the pope’s spokesman, Alessandro Gisotti, clarified in a statement to reporters on Wednesday.

Advocates of abused nuns were relieved the pope had at last put the issue on the church’s radar. But they also noted that it was a long time coming and that the pope’s other remarks Tuesday did not inspire confidence in a speedy solution.

In his typically free-associating riff, Francis acknowledged “there have been priests and bishops” who have committed sexual abuse against nuns, and that “it’s continuing because it’s not like once you realize it that it stops.” He said the church needed to do more.

But while attempting to show that his predecessor, Benedict XVI, took tough action on the issue of sexual abuse against nuns, he recalled a separate case of a religious order marred with sexual and economic corruption, but apparently was not one involving nuns.

Francis recounted that Benedict, then known as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the church’s doctrinal watchdog, marshaled all his evidence against the complicit order in a meeting with Pope John Paul II. Francis said Benedict returned defeated and told his secretary, “The other side won.” Francis added in an aside, “We should not be scandalized by this — it’s part of a process.”




Advocates of abused nuns were relieved that Pope Francis had put the issue on the church’s radar.

His point seemed to be that pursuing justice in the church takes time and he said that when Benedict became pope he immediately told his secretary to get him the files “and he began.”

But his example confounded advocates of nuns abused by priests, who noted that the pope is the single person within the church with absolute authority to take action at any time.

“I was wondering when he said they were dealing with the problem for a long time, because we just don’t know what those actions are,” said Zuzanna Flisowska, the general manager of Voices of Faith, a group advocating for more participation by women in lay leadership positions inside the church.

“We feel a little disappointed that it has to be the media who has to press the church and the pope to comment,” she added.

Experts say there is no shortage of factors contributing to the abuse, its cover up and the lack of action inside the Vatican.

Karlijn Demasure, the former executive director of the church’s Center for Child Protection at the Pontifical Gregorian University, where she is a professor and expert in the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable adults, said there is no data on how widespread the problem is. But, she added, anecdotal evidence suggests “it’s not exceptional.”

Many members of the church, experts said, suffer from a medieval mind-set and consider the priests who commit abuse against nuns to be the victims of seductive temptresses. Since the victims in these cases are adults, the experts say, there is also a reflexive tendency to blame them. The reductive public image of the nun as existing to serve the priest and to pray quietly also undercuts those who speak up.

Often, the abuse occurs in a relationship of spiritual guidance, Professor Demasure said, with the priest grooming the victim over time, as is often the case in cases of child sexual abuse.

The apparent preponderance of such abuse in Africa and India has led some in the church to chalk the abuse up to cultural differences.

In many cases, sexual favors have been required of nuns who are financially dependent on priests, and traditions of subservience by women make them vulnerable to abuse.

Ms. Scaraffia said she subscribed to the pope’s critique of abuse, that it is rooted in a rot in clerical culture that leads priests to believe they are a higher authority, and thus entitled to do what they want with their parishioners. In developing countries, where the abuse of nuns seems more prevalent, priests tend to be put on even higher pedestals.

Professor Demasure said there is also the delicate issue that female superiors have covered up the abuse of their nuns to protect the reputation of the church, just as bishops have done with pedophile priests.

“I’m afraid that’s a similar thing,” she said.

So is the failure to heed alarm bells.

As far back as the 1990s, members of religious orders prepared private reports on the issue for top Vatican officials.


Nuns silhouetted in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican.CreditAndrew Medichini/Associated Press





In 1994, Sister Maura O’Donohue sent the Vatican the results of a multiyear, 23-nation survey about such abuse, which was especially rampant in Africa where nuns were considered safe sexual partners for priests who feared infection by H.I.V.

One 1998 report focused on Africa observed that “sexual harassment and even rape of sisters by priests and bishops is allegedly common.”

“When a sister becomes pregnant, the priest insists that she have an abortion,’’ the report added. ‘‘The sister is usually dismissed from her congregation while the priest is often only moved to another parish — or sent for studies.”

African bishops briefed at the time decried the reporting of abuse as “disloyal.”

Among the private reports by nuns in the 1990s, which were published in a cover story by The National Catholic Reporter in 2001, one asserted that 29 nuns had become pregnant in one order alone.

Professor Demasure said there are firsthand testimonies about such abortions, which would break one of the central tenets of church teaching and potentially violate local laws, but she said there was no data about how widespread they are.

But the problem has clearly not gone away.

In 2013, the Rev. Anthony Musaala, a priest in Kampala, Uganda, was suspended and forced to apologize for raising concerns about his fellow priests engaging in sexual relationships with women, including nuns.

In India, Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jalandhar currently faces charges for repeatedly raping a former mother superior of a congregation. While he has denied the charges, more than 80 nuns signed a July letter urging that he be removed from pastoral work.

Ms. Scaraffia said the abuse of nuns occurs “not only in the third world.’’

‘‘It’s all over,’’ she said. ‘‘It’s in Europe.”

An investigation this summer by Nicole Winfield, the Associated Press reporter who asked the pope the question about abuse on the papal plane, documented abuse on at least four different continents.

In November, the International Union of Superiors General, or U.I.S.G., the organization representing the world’s female Catholic religious orders, published an extraordinary statement that called on women religious who have suffered abuse to come forward and report it to church and state authorities.

“If the U.I.S.G. receives a report of abuse, we will be a listening presence,” the statement said.

“We condemn those who support the culture of silence and secrecy, often under the guise of ‘protection’ of an institution’s reputation or naming it ‘part of one’s culture,’ ” it added.

In December, the Vatican began investigating the Institute of the Good Samaritan, a small Chilean religious order of nuns, after Chilean national television revealed that some sisters had been thrown out after reporting sexual abuse by priests and maltreatment by their superior.

Ms. Scaraffia, getting ready for her next interview in Rome, said she sensed momentum and was confident now that “the pope understands the problem.” She added, “This is surely the first step.”


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## kikigirl (Feb 7, 2019)

LaFaraona said:


> But it was the pope’s dramatic, and according to the Vatican on Wednesday, inaccurate, description of one example of such abuse as “sexual slavery” that most caught the world’s attention.
> 
> “When the Holy Father, referring to the dissolving of a congregation, spoke of ‘sexual slavery’ he meant ‘manipulation,’ ” the pope’s spokesman, Alessandro Gisotti, clarified in a statement to reporters on Wednesday.
> 
> ...



This hurts so much. Like even more than for the average woman who isn’t a nun. Abuse plus the insidious psychological  power of the clerical structure over you...

The thing about the priests raping the nuns because of fear of HIV reminded me of what was going on in SA for a bit with babies.

As usual, the cover up is in overdrive. Sexual “manipulation” not sexual “slavery.”

And of course, without fail, our African priests denounced a man who wanted to expose the truth. Just as evil as their head of state counterparts.


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## Leeda.the.Paladin (Feb 7, 2019)

I’m not saying that priests that abuse do so because they are celibate. However, the Catholic Church needs let their people get married. Nuns, priests, the pope, whoever. 

I’m glad this pope has not shied away from the tough issues facing the world but they still have a long way to go.


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## free2bme (Feb 7, 2019)

Leeda.the.Paladin said:


> I’m not saying that priests that abuse do so because they are celibate. However, the Catholic Church needs let their people get married. Nuns, priests, the pope, whoever.
> 
> I’m glad this pope has not shied away from the tough issues facing the world but they still have a long way to go.



Celibacy doesn't turn you into asexual  deviant. However, the strict celibacy rules discourages good people from considering joining the priesthood. If becoming a priest was open to all there would be no way that this child and sex abuse crisis would have gone on so long unchecked. The church attracted deviants because it was the one place in society they could carry out their deviant behavior unfettered and be above the law. If you were a pedophile or a serial rapist, the priesthood would be the place to be. Fresh supply of victims, the entire society considered you chosen by God there by trusting you explicitly, all your bosses covered for you if your dirty secrets saw the light of day. Really it was a dream job for all deviants. This has been going on for centuries. There have been secret burial grounds and catacombs unearthed in multiple places that contain the remains of newborn babies delivered by nuns fathered by priests.

The Pope just need s to stop with his double speak. If the church really valued women and children they would of championed the causes of women and children and society at large would have followed their lead because the church had that kind influence on society.


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## Leeda.the.Paladin (Feb 7, 2019)

free2bme said:


> Celibacy doesn't turn you into asexual deviant.


Nope it absolutely doesn’t.


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## Jas123 (Feb 8, 2019)

free2bme said:


> The Pope just need s to stop with his double speak. I*f the church really valued women and children* they would of championed the causes of women and children and society at large would have followed their lead because the church had that kind influence on society.


Just quoting for emphasis.


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## okange76 (Feb 14, 2019)

I was a student at Catholic University of East Africa in Nairobi for a year before I moved here.  We had an adequate library. For some reason so many nuns and female students preferred studying in the priests' rooms on campus. I ran into the Dean of Students drinking and dropping it like it's at the Carnivore a very famous entertainment spot.  This story does not surprise me one bit. The amount of bumping uglies that goes on in the Catholic Church is epic.

The Bishop of my mother's village was retired early by Pope John Paul because he was dying of Aids. Several priests had a gaggle of kids from poor girls needing scholarships.  To get those scholarships they had to give them some. Unfortunately once pregnant,  they were kicked out of school for conduct unbecoming of a church member. 

I belong to the Anglican/Episcopal. church which has its own horror stories for days. Vulnerable women are in trouble everywhere.


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## Ganjababy (Feb 17, 2019)

Everything Zen said:


> Let me leave this thread before I make the banned and find a way to make sure I don’t come up here and do a drunk post.


Right behind you....


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## LaFaraona (Feb 17, 2019)

OP i hope you don't mind me adding these here.  I thought it was better to keep the whole Catholic church nonsense in one thread instead of having multiple threads

*‘It Is Not a Closet. It Is a Cage.’ Gay Catholic Priests Speak Out*
The crisis over sexuality in the Catholic Church goes beyond abuse. It goes to the heart of the priesthood, into a closet that is trapping thousands of men.

MILWAUKEE — Gregory Greiten was 17 years old when the priests organized the game. It was 1982 and he was on a retreat with his classmates from St. Lawrence, a Roman Catholic seminary for teenage boys training to become priests. Leaders asked each boy to rank which he would rather be: burned over 90 percent of his body, paraplegic, or gay.

Each chose to be scorched or paralyzed. Not one uttered the word “gay.” They called the game the Game of Life.

The lesson stuck. Seven years later, he climbed up into his seminary dorm window and dangled one leg over the edge. “I really am gay,” Father Greiten, now a priest near Milwaukee, remembered telling himself for the first time. “It was like a death sentence.”

The closet of the Roman Catholic Church hinges on an impossible contradiction. For years, church leaders have driven gay congregants away in shame and insisted that “homosexual tendencies” are “disordered.” And yet, thousands of the church’s priests are gay.

The stories of gay priests are unspoken, veiled from the outside world, known only to one another, if they are known at all.

Fewer than about 10 priests in the United States have dared to come out publicly. But gay men likely make up at least 30 to 40 percent of the American Catholic clergy, according to dozens of estimates from gay priests themselves and researchers. Some priests say the number is closer to 75 percent. One priest in Wisconsin said he assumed every priest is gay unless he knows for a fact he is not. A priest in Florida put it this way: “A third are gay, a third are straight, and a third don’t know what the hell they are.”

Two dozen gay priests and seminarians from 13 states shared intimate details of their lives in the Catholic closet with The New York Times over the past two months. They were interviewed in their churches before Mass, from art museums on the weekend, in their apartments decorated with rainbow neon lights, and between classes at seminary. Some agreed to be photographed if their identities were concealed.

Almost all of them required strict confidentiality to speak without fear of retribution from their bishops or superiors. A few had been expressly forbidden to come out or even to speak about homosexuality. Most are in active ministry, and could lose more than their jobs if they are outed. The church almost always controls a priest’s housing, health insurance and retirement pension. He could lose all three if his bishop finds his sexuality disqualifying, even if he is faithful to his vows of celibacy.

The environment for gay priests has grown only more dangerous. The fall of Theodore McCarrick, the once-powerful cardinal who was defrocked last week for sexual abuse of boys and young men, has inflamed accusations that homosexuality is to blame for the church’s resurgent abuse crisis.
 Read further https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/17/us/it-is-not-a-closet-it-is-a-cage-gay-catholic-priests-speak-out.html?action=click&module=Top Stories&pgtype=Homepage

*Bombshell Book Alleges a Vatican Gay Subculture, Hypocrisy*
PARIS — A gay French writer has lifted the lid on what he calls one of the world's largest gay communities, the Vatican, estimating that most of its prelates are homosexually inclined and attributing much of the current crisis in the Catholic Church to an internal struggle.

In the explosive book, "In the Closet of the Vatican," author Frederic Martel describes a gay subculture at the Vatican and calls out the hypocrisy of Catholic bishops and cardinals who in public denounce homosexuality but in private lead double lives.

Aside from the subject matter, the book is astonishing for the access Martel had to the inner sanctum of the Holy See. Martel writes that he spent four years researching it in 30 countries, including weeks at a time living inside the Vatican walls. He says the doors were opened by a key Vatican gatekeeper and friend of Pope Francis who was the subject of the pontiff's famous remark about gay priests, "Who am I to judge?"

In an interview Friday in a Paris hotel, Martel said he didn't tell his subjects he was writing about homosexuality in the Vatican. But he said it should have been obvious to them since he is a gay man who was researching the inner world of the Vatican and has written about homosexuality before. He said it was easier for him, as a gay foreigner, to gain the trust of those inside the Vatican than it would have been for an Italian journalist or Vatican expert.

"If you're heterosexual it's even harder. You don't have the codes," he told The Associated Press. "If you're a woman, even more so."

Martel says he conducted nearly 1,500 in-person interviews with 41 cardinals, 52 bishops or monsignors, and 45 Vatican and foreign ambassadors, many of whom are quoted at length and in on-the-record interviews that he says were recorded. Martel said he was assisted by 80 researchers, translators, fixers and local journalists, as well as a team of 15 lawyers. The 555-page book is being published simultaneously in eight languages in 20 countries, many bearing the title "Sodom."

The Vatican didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

Martel appears to want to bolster Francis' efforts at reforming the Vatican by discrediting his biggest critics and removing the secrecy and scandal that surrounds homosexuality in the church. Church doctrine holds that gays are to be treated with respect and dignity, but that homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered."

"Francis knows that he has to move on the church's stance, and that he will only be able to do this at the cost of a ruthless battle against all those who use sexual morality and homophobia to conceal their own hypocrisies and double lives," Martel writes.

But the book's Feb. 21 publication date coincides with the start of Francis' summit of church leaders on preventing the sexual abuse of minors, a crisis that is undermining his papacy. The book isn't about abuse, but the timing of its release could fuel the narrative, embraced by conservatives and rejected by the gay community, that the abuse scandal has been caused by homosexuals in the priesthood.

Read further https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2019/02/15/world/europe/ap-eu-rel-vatican-gays.html

*More Than 100 Priests Accused of Sex Abuse Are Named by Brooklyn Catholic Diocese*
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn on Friday named more than 100 priests who have been credibly accused of sexually abusing a child. It was one of the largest disclosures yet in a torrent of lists recently published by the church as its handling of the problem has drawn the scrutiny of law enforcement officials.

The diocese is also one of the largest in the nation, its domain encompassing Brooklyn and Queens in New York City, an area with 1.5 million people who the church says identify as Catholic.

The disclosure covers decades of allegations involving priests who had served in the diocese’s many neighborhood parishes, as well as its schools, including Cathedral Preparatory, Christ the King, St. Francis Preparatory and Archbishop Molloy high schools. Advocates who track abuse cases said it also roughly doubled the number of suspected abusers they had been aware of in the diocese.

The list contributes to a growing sense of the vastness of a sex abuse epidemic that has plunged the Catholic Church into scandal and inflamed a crisis in confidence among its followers. Church officials have employed the disclosures as a way to acknowledge failures and mend ties with Catholics whose relationship with the church has been tested over its handling of sex abuse.

“We know this list will generate many emotions for victims who have suffered terribly,” the Most Rev. Nicholas DiMarzio, the bishop of Brooklyn, said in a statement accompanying the disclosure.

“For their suffering, I am truly sorry. I have met with many victims who have told me that more than anything, they want an acknowledgment of what was done to them. This list gives that recognition and I hope it will add another layer of healing for them on their journey toward wholeness.”

Bishop DiMarzio followed dozens of other bishops in the United States in publishing the names of suspected abusers after an explosive grand jury report in Pennsylvania last summer that worsened tensions in the church by documenting seven decades of accusations.

On Wednesday, the bishops of the five Catholic dioceses in New Jersey released the names of nearly 200 priests who had been credibly accused.

And last month, the Jesuit province covering the northeastern United States identified 50 accused priests, including many who had served in the order’s schools in New York City.
 Read further https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/15/nyregion/brooklyn-priests-sex-abuse.html


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## ThirdEyeBeauty (Feb 18, 2019)

I can't keep editing my post so I call it quits.


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## HappilyLiberal (Feb 19, 2019)

LaFaraona said:


> OP i hope you don't mind me adding these here.  I thought it was better to keep the whole Catholic church nonsense in one thread instead of having multiple threads
> 
> *‘It Is Not a Closet. It Is a Cage.’ Gay Catholic Priests Speak Out*
> The crisis over sexuality in the Catholic Church goes beyond abuse. It goes to the heart of the priesthood, into a closet that is trapping thousands of men.
> ...



Actually, Dioceses across the country have been doing this over the past few months.  I have been staying out of this discussion because I am Catholic.  However, I do not agree that the solution to this problem is to let priests get married.  The solution to this problem is better oversight and a zero-tolerance policy.  The problem here is that the Church actively covered up these abuses instead of shining the light of day on them.  Had they outed these creatures earlier, the number of abused women, men, and children would have been decreased exponentially!


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## Reinventing21 (Feb 19, 2019)

I honestly believed that the rule to not let priests/nuns get married was begun by gay men to hide their homosexuality. The fact that they have overdone gay bashing really demonstrates this point as in 'thou dost protest too much' or however that saying goes.

Unfortunately, it also gave predators a good hiding spot in plain view  as well. 

Then we have the complication of the entanglement/crossection between homosexuality and pediphilia because while many seem to have been born gay, too many seem to have chosen homosexuality in response to having been molested.

Merely letting priests get married will not solve this problem as the real problem has been the power given to the church that has allowed them to cover up this evil. Time for that end.


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