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jamesqThe Roman Catholic church has a problem that's not going away. The solution is simple, but they cannot implement it because it means accepting a fundamental shift in how the church is viewed and operates.
Lets be clear that I'm not talking about the molesting of children itself. We all agree that this is a horrible thing, but it's not going to go away. At best we can minimize it. Any organization that size, that deals with vulnerable people, will unwittingly harbor some predators.
No, the church's problem is that they covered it up, and now that the cover-ups are being revealed, they're not coming clean about it and they're not doing what they should to prevent it from happening again.
so far they're blaming the Jews, the gays or "anti-catholic hate", trying to deflect the focus of the media, say "everyone else is doing it too", and minimize the extent of the problem.
I don't really expect anyone to read all those links, mostly I just wanted to demonstrate something: This is an organization that clearly doesn't know what the hell they're doing and is thrashing like a drowning man. Now I don't think the RC church is any danger of drowning to death, but this is going to bite them in the ass no matter what they do.
And what should they do? The very first thing they should do is stop moving pedophile priests around. Next, they need to give any evidence of molestation (or other crimes - including conspiracy) to the authorities. Following a proper investigation/trial/conviction, the criminals should be ejected from the church.
If they want to subsequently forgive these criminals, they can (they're in the forgiveness business after all), but the civil authorities still get to punish them. Render unto Caesar and all that.
After that they need to put oversight into the system so that incidents of molestation are minimized (I doubt it could be 100% prevented simply because of the church's size) and when they do occur there's a transparent way of dealing with it (starting with turning over evidence to the authorities) and getting the victim help.
The Pope could make this all go away by announcing that they're going to do all of the above, and then actually doing it, including giving up conspirators. That includes himself.
It'll never happen for a bunch of reasons. First of all, the church is hidebound. They're not going to change because organizations that are 2000 years old don't change easily.
It might mean violating the confessional, which is pretty much a do-not-touch area for the church.
Self-preservation comes into it. A lot of the church hierarchy would be exposed to the wrath of civil authorities, so that gives them an incentive to stonewall. But self-preservation isn't just for individuals, it's also for institutions. The coverup is seen as being good for the church, not good for anyone else, least of all the victims.
I think it mostly comes down to a low-level contempt for the rest of us. They don't really get that they've done anything wrong. They've set themselves up as the final authority for morality, and they truly believe that these things should be handled by themselves. Since (to them) there is no higher authority then themselves, why expose their personnel to the lesser civilian authorities. They've still think it's the middle ages when the church was an authority unto itself. "We've forgiven Father Pedobear. That should be good enough for you hoi polloi."
To submit to civil authorities would require that they admit, on some level, that they should submit to civil authorities - and they simply don't believe that. They can't allow themselves to admit that, so instead they stonewall, and they cover up, and they try to deflect the blame elsewhere. What else can they do really, when they say that they have a direct line to the almighty.
How is this going to play out? My prediction is that the church will eventually try to fix itself in some face-saving way. The remaining known pedophiles will mostly be transferred to positions that either don't interact with children, or exiled to developing-world hell-holes far from the media. This has the double-effect of getting rid of them and punishing them (for risking the church, not for actual molestation) at the same time. A few of the more notorious abusers will be given to the authorities. Key officials who attempted coverups will be shuffled around, or asked to retire. Benedict XVI himself will retire, citing health reasons. The College of Cardinals will elect a new Pope who wasn't part of the conspiracy.
If done quickly enough, this plan might stem the loss of church-goers. I'm already hearing a lot of tales of people switching churches. This might even be the last nail in the coffin for people who are mostly areligious moving to full-on atheism. This also explains why Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens are proposing that the Pope be arrested on his next visit to England. As an aside, I don't think they have a hope in hell of succeeding (governments give out diplomatic immunity to whomever they please and that includes a lot of people who are not the leaders of a recognized country). However, the point is not to arrest the Pope (though that would be an epic win for them), it's to show that the Pope is not special and not above the law.
Good luck tilting at that windmill boys.
If the church does not face-save soon though, the exodus of church members will accelerate. This won't mean the end of the Roman Catholic church of course, but it will focus more on the developing world, which has higher amounts of church-going. It will mean an over-all poorer church though as those developed-world donations dry up. Less money means less influence on geopolitics, so this could be a silver-lining.
This whole affair is going to change the church one way or another. I don't think the Pope and his hierarchy can influence these changes in a way satisfactory to themselves.
Some other points I wanted to make about this, though they don't really fit into the rest of the post:
Priestly Celibacy and Priestesses. While I think these are a good idea (or at least a better idea then an all-male celibate priesthood), I don't think it's really going to affect molestation rates any. Remember that rape is about power. It wasn't the lack of sex that caused this, it was the power that the priesthood could wield over a vulnerable population. If it has any effect at all it's indirect - young men are reluctant to become celibate, so there's a shortage of priests. If you're short of priests, you're more likely to shift around the bad ones (fingers crossed) then jettison them. Celibacy doesn't cause molestation - but it just might cause your superiors to overlook it when it happens.
Altar Boys. My cynical nature tells me that this would have been ignored longer if we had Altar Girls and they were the preferred victim.
Lets be clear that I'm not talking about the molesting of children itself. We all agree that this is a horrible thing, but it's not going to go away. At best we can minimize it. Any organization that size, that deals with vulnerable people, will unwittingly harbor some predators.
No, the church's problem is that they covered it up, and now that the cover-ups are being revealed, they're not coming clean about it and they're not doing what they should to prevent it from happening again.
so far they're blaming the Jews, the gays or "anti-catholic hate", trying to deflect the focus of the media, say "everyone else is doing it too", and minimize the extent of the problem.
I don't really expect anyone to read all those links, mostly I just wanted to demonstrate something: This is an organization that clearly doesn't know what the hell they're doing and is thrashing like a drowning man. Now I don't think the RC church is any danger of drowning to death, but this is going to bite them in the ass no matter what they do.
And what should they do? The very first thing they should do is stop moving pedophile priests around. Next, they need to give any evidence of molestation (or other crimes - including conspiracy) to the authorities. Following a proper investigation/trial/conviction, the criminals should be ejected from the church.
If they want to subsequently forgive these criminals, they can (they're in the forgiveness business after all), but the civil authorities still get to punish them. Render unto Caesar and all that.
After that they need to put oversight into the system so that incidents of molestation are minimized (I doubt it could be 100% prevented simply because of the church's size) and when they do occur there's a transparent way of dealing with it (starting with turning over evidence to the authorities) and getting the victim help.
The Pope could make this all go away by announcing that they're going to do all of the above, and then actually doing it, including giving up conspirators. That includes himself.
It'll never happen for a bunch of reasons. First of all, the church is hidebound. They're not going to change because organizations that are 2000 years old don't change easily.
It might mean violating the confessional, which is pretty much a do-not-touch area for the church.
Self-preservation comes into it. A lot of the church hierarchy would be exposed to the wrath of civil authorities, so that gives them an incentive to stonewall. But self-preservation isn't just for individuals, it's also for institutions. The coverup is seen as being good for the church, not good for anyone else, least of all the victims.
I think it mostly comes down to a low-level contempt for the rest of us. They don't really get that they've done anything wrong. They've set themselves up as the final authority for morality, and they truly believe that these things should be handled by themselves. Since (to them) there is no higher authority then themselves, why expose their personnel to the lesser civilian authorities. They've still think it's the middle ages when the church was an authority unto itself. "We've forgiven Father Pedobear. That should be good enough for you hoi polloi."
To submit to civil authorities would require that they admit, on some level, that they should submit to civil authorities - and they simply don't believe that. They can't allow themselves to admit that, so instead they stonewall, and they cover up, and they try to deflect the blame elsewhere. What else can they do really, when they say that they have a direct line to the almighty.
How is this going to play out? My prediction is that the church will eventually try to fix itself in some face-saving way. The remaining known pedophiles will mostly be transferred to positions that either don't interact with children, or exiled to developing-world hell-holes far from the media. This has the double-effect of getting rid of them and punishing them (for risking the church, not for actual molestation) at the same time. A few of the more notorious abusers will be given to the authorities. Key officials who attempted coverups will be shuffled around, or asked to retire. Benedict XVI himself will retire, citing health reasons. The College of Cardinals will elect a new Pope who wasn't part of the conspiracy.
If done quickly enough, this plan might stem the loss of church-goers. I'm already hearing a lot of tales of people switching churches. This might even be the last nail in the coffin for people who are mostly areligious moving to full-on atheism. This also explains why Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens are proposing that the Pope be arrested on his next visit to England. As an aside, I don't think they have a hope in hell of succeeding (governments give out diplomatic immunity to whomever they please and that includes a lot of people who are not the leaders of a recognized country). However, the point is not to arrest the Pope (though that would be an epic win for them), it's to show that the Pope is not special and not above the law.
Good luck tilting at that windmill boys.
If the church does not face-save soon though, the exodus of church members will accelerate. This won't mean the end of the Roman Catholic church of course, but it will focus more on the developing world, which has higher amounts of church-going. It will mean an over-all poorer church though as those developed-world donations dry up. Less money means less influence on geopolitics, so this could be a silver-lining.
This whole affair is going to change the church one way or another. I don't think the Pope and his hierarchy can influence these changes in a way satisfactory to themselves.
Some other points I wanted to make about this, though they don't really fit into the rest of the post:
Priestly Celibacy and Priestesses. While I think these are a good idea (or at least a better idea then an all-male celibate priesthood), I don't think it's really going to affect molestation rates any. Remember that rape is about power. It wasn't the lack of sex that caused this, it was the power that the priesthood could wield over a vulnerable population. If it has any effect at all it's indirect - young men are reluctant to become celibate, so there's a shortage of priests. If you're short of priests, you're more likely to shift around the bad ones (fingers crossed) then jettison them. Celibacy doesn't cause molestation - but it just might cause your superiors to overlook it when it happens.
Altar Boys. My cynical nature tells me that this would have been ignored longer if we had Altar Girls and they were the preferred victim.
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no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:13 am (UTC)What do you do with a pedi-preist?
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
Wheeeenn the church is changing?
Shift him to a new country
Shift him to a new country
Shift him to a new country
aaaaaannndd deeemote hiiiim
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
Wheeeenn the church is changing?
Absolve him and blaim the jews
Absolve him and blaim the jews
Absolve him and blaim the jews
with lots of finger pointing.
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
What do you do with a pedi-preist?
Wheeeenn the church is changing?
no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:17 am (UTC)Yeah, there's altar girls, and they've been the victim of priestly abuse. But there's still a lot more altar boys then altar girls, and I suspect it would have been minimized more if the victims hadn't been male.
no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 03:28 am (UTC)Bad church
No kibbles for you
no subject
Date: 2010-04-14 02:26 pm (UTC)