Ongoing Scourge Of Rape Scandals Rock The Australian Catholic Church

[hansard]

Linda Marie: you might find the 1985 timeframe to be irrelevant when a royal commission starts. Such an inquisition has the full authority of the state. It's powers are likely to be far-reaching. Also, the claim that no one has done more for kids, and that other organizations were involved in no way excuse the church in this matter. Is it any wonder that the pews are emptying out in this part of the world. This is complete and utter sinfulness--immorality condoned quietly by the church of Jesus. It is the most disgraceful behaviour by (so-called) men in authority, and represents a complete breach of trust.
The octogenarian Pope, and his predecessor, did virtually nothing to address this. Yet they'll both be declared saints, no doubt.

[centurionguard]

Originally Posted by hansard

Linda Marie: you might find the 1985 timeframe to be irrelevant when a royal commission starts. Such an inquisition has the full authority of the state. It's powers are likely to be far-reaching. Also, the claim that no one has done more for kids, and that other organizations were involved in no way excuse the church in this matter. Is it any wonder that the pews are emptying out in this part of the world. This is complete and utter sinfulness--immorality condoned quietly by the church of Jesus. It is the most disgraceful behaviour by (so-called) men in authority, and represents a complete breach of trust.
The octogenarian Pope, and his predecessor, did virtually nothing to address this. Yet they'll both be declared saints, no doubt.

Originally Posted by hansard

The octogenarian Pope, and his predecessor, did virtually nothing to address this. Yet they'll both be declared saints, no doubt

Obviously; there's alot of emotionality in what your saying, but don't you think your words concerning the Pope are somewhat harsh? The Pope's hands are virtually tied without the collective assistance of all his clergy. The laity too share a certain acquiscence of responsibility in some of the burdens and deep wounds in these heart wrenching circumstances. My thoughts and prayers go for the victims and their families for the most part.

[chris62]

The John Jay report, I find, is good for statistics on these matters, especially if going to a barbecue where I think the topic will come up.

Worth a google.

[Linda Marie]

Originally Posted by hansard

Linda Marie: you might find the 1985 timeframe to be irrelevant when a royal commission starts. Such an inquisition has the full authority of the state. It's powers are likely to be far-reaching. Also, the claim that no one has done more for kids, and that other organizations were involved in no way excuse the church in this matter. Is it any wonder that the pews are emptying out in this part of the world. This is complete and utter sinfulness--immorality condoned quietly by the church of Jesus. It is the most disgraceful behaviour by (so-called) men in authority, and represents a complete breach of trust.
The octogenarian Pope, and his predecessor, did virtually nothing to address this. Yet they'll both be declared saints, no doubt.

The Royal Commission will be looking at more than the Church, but the media reserves its vilification for priests and the Church, even down to misrepresenting Church teaching to condemn Her. They give Anglican clergy who abuse less of a hard time. As the previously quoted article said, the abuse was endemic in the entire child welfare system no matter who ran it. Everyone, Anglicans, government employees included , covered it up and enabled it to continue, yet only the Church is raked over the coals.

I did not say "no one has done more for kids." I said the Church is addressing the problem and is taking steps to prevent it occurring any more. Raking up more 30 year old cases is not going to make the Church any more aware, or more determined to eradicate the abuse.

All it does is make it seem like the Church is doing nothing and is still covering up and enabling child abuse. The other misrepresentation is that priests were abusing small children when the problem in the Church has been mostly ephebophilia, abuse of teenagers.

Consider that schools today assume that teenagers will be having sex, and not only do not condemn it, but enable them to have so-called 'safe sex'. What is condemned for priests, is celebrated by schools. It should be condemned for both. I submit that ephebophiles have taken over and are running schools' sex education programs. By far, children are much more likely to be abused by a teacher than by a priest. And that is today, not 30 years ago.

This should not be about 'getting' the priests and 'sticking it' to the Church but about protecting our children.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard announces royal commission into child sexual abuse

Bravehearts founder Hetty Johnston welcomed the announcement of a wide-ranging powerful inquiry into institutional responses to allegations of child abuse.

She says the issues are endemic, and sweeping powers are critical if the inquiry is to succeed.

"The Royal Commission needs to include not only the churches," Ms Johnston told AAP.

"It needs to include family and other courts, government organisations and other institutions, anybody who who has a duty of care."

Royal commission to consider confessional seal

The royal commission into child sex abuse is likely to consider whether Catholic priests should be forced to tell police about crimes against children told to them in the confessional.

There are growing calls for priests to be subject to the same mandatory reporting rules that other professions are, despite church rules that the confessional should remain secret.

Expert: 'Priests believe child abuse forgivable'

SOME priests think pedophilia does not "break celibacy" and that sins can be confessed away, one of the nation's top child protection experts says.

Emeritus Professor Freda Briggs, who has just published a seminal text on child protection, says sexual abuse by a priest is “the most damaging of all" for children and that the Catholic Church is guilty of forgiving priests instead of punishing them.
<...>
UniSA Associate Professor Dale Bagshaw, an adjunct professor in the School of Psychology, Social Work and Social Policy, says <...>, “It's the patriarchal nature of the system. They don't have women priests, I think they really think they're a cut above, that they're beyond the state."

yes, the old 'Catholics believe they can continue to sin, because they have Confession' accusation.

[Matt Guitar Man]

Originally Posted by hansard

Linda Marie: you might find the 1985 timeframe to be irrelevant when a royal commission starts. Such an inquisition has the full authority of the state. It's powers are likely to be far-reaching. Also, the claim that no one has done more for kids, and that other organizations were involved in no way excuse the church in this matter. Is it any wonder that the pews are emptying out in this part of the world. This is complete and utter sinfulness--immorality condoned quietly by the church of Jesus. It is the most disgraceful behaviour by (so-called) men in authority, and represents a complete breach of trust.
The octogenarian Pope, and his predecessor, did virtually nothing to address this. Yet they'll both be declared saints, no doubt.

The Catholic Church is recieving a lot of negative press here in Australia. A lot of uninformed people are even suggesting that the Royal Commision of inquiry should be restricted to the Catholic Church, this sort of sentiment is running so high that those with an open anti Catholic agenda seem to be getting almost unrestricted air time.
One thing to consider in all of this is that first and formost the victems of sexual abuse should be given priority during the process, and that this should be kept in mind when setting the terms of refrence for the inquiry.
It is a well documented fact that the vast majority of sexual abuse victems are abused in thier own homes by members of thier own extended family's or close and trusted friends, these victems will not be given a voice in the upcoming Royal commission.
The Royal commission will only be dealing with institutional offences to restrict it to the Catholic Church alone would deny a voice to those people who have been abused in state run institutions, state run schools, police run orginisations etc. To deny these people a voice in my opinion would be crimminal.
Also the tipping point here in Australia to give this Royal commission some momentum was the alligation that the police have been involved in retarding the investigation into some crimes so for the inquiry to go forward all reporting proccess including the actions of our police force have to be included in the terms of refrence.

When looking at the inquiry in Ireland, those responsable for setting the terms of refference soon realised that although the inquiry was primarily focused on the Church it could not do its job without including the state and the state's pariticipation in the entire proccess.

Our proccess of justice is more often than not a proccess of vengence and a lot of the strident voices in the press in Australia at the moment are looking for some one or some entity to hang, draw and quarter. With repeated calls for Cardinal Pell to resign etc.

My hope is that the Commission will actualy do it's primary job responsably and that is to pin point how corruption of this nature a) gets into the system b) stays in the system and worst of all c) in some circumstances is allowed to florish in the system. and d) make recomendations so that the systems in our institutions wether religious or secular can be made robust enough to identify and extingiush this sort of evil before it gets hold.

[mercytruth]

The early church deprived clergy of their positions for crimes such as these. The same should be true today. If certain marriages can be declared null and void for a variety of reasons. It would seem especially true to declare the ordinations of clergy for such deplorable crimes as these to be null and void.

God have mercy on us all

[Matt Guitar Man]

Originally Posted by mercytruth

The early church deprived clergy of their positions for crimes such as these. The same should be true today. If certain marriages can be declared null and void for a variety of reasons. It would seem especially true to declare the ordinations of clergy for such deplorable crimes as these to be null and void.

God have mercy on us all

I could not agree with you more.

[Linda Marie]

My dh has advanced the notion that Ms. Gillard announced the Royal Commission to take the heat off of herself in this scandal. It is the timing, you see. The abuse allegations have been known for some time. The story about the 26 institutions in WA was published in May, updated early June.
Questions of judgment

When it was revealed that one of the biggest trade union rorts in Australian history had been perpetrated by her boyfriend using her legal advice in the early 1990s, her response was the consternation of innocence. She had been naive, she had been deceived, she had been betrayed.

Gillard insisted that while she, as a salaried partner at Slater & Gordon, had helped establish the slush fund from which her boyfriend and senior Australian Workers Union official Bruce Wilson had filched more than $400,000, and while she had helped his crony buy a Fitzroy unit with some of those funds, she knew nothing about the racket until it was exposed by others in the AWU.

Gillard's account of union slush fund rejected

A KEY former union accountant has undermined Julia Gillard's depiction of a slush fund she helped set up in 1992 as being a legitimate association needed to help finance union election campaigns.
After it was revealed in 1995 that the association had been corrupted by Ms Gillard's boyfriend and senior AWU official Bruce Wilson, she told senior partners at Slater & Gordon: ''Every union has what it refers to as an election fund, a slush fund … so that they can finance their next election campaign.''

Mr Frearson - an ally of Bruce Wilson who joined the state administrative team when he took control of the branch in 1991 - said the union already had a dedicated election fund in operation when the Workplace Reform Association was incorporated in June 1992.

[Matt Guitar Man]

Originally Posted by Linda Marie

My dh has advanced the notion that Ms. Gillard announced the Royal Commission to take the heat off of herself in this scandal. It is the timing, you see. The abuse allegations have been known for some time. The story about the 26 institutions in WA was published in May, updated early June.
Questions of judgment

Gillard's account of union slush fund rejected

I could not agree with you more!!!
All that has come out to prompt this Royal commission to date is Peter Fox's revelation wich amounted to, that in a case that he was investigating about a crime committed in 1985 he was thwarted by his superiors and the Church from running his full investigation. And that the independent overseer of the Victorian Catholic Churches sexual abuse protocol revealed that since 1995 there has been 3 incidents in wich the protocol has not been correctly followed.
Thats it! not exactly ground shattering stuff. Yet the media has seen fit to report this by comparing the Church to an organised crime syndicate running pedaphile rings!!
One can't help but think that some of this is polliticaly motivated considering the opposition leadrer makes no secret of the fact that he is a committed Catholic.

[chris62]

Originally Posted by Matt Guitar Man

One can't help but think that some of this is polliticaly motivated considering the opposition leadrer makes no secret of the fact that he is a committed Catholic.

I think that is the point.
Well made.