Catholics are as much to blame for clergy abuse as you are to blame for the WARS

[BainsBane]

90. I have a few theories

Firstly, there is no excusing the pedophile scandal. It's horrific and they should all be prosecuted. The best thing Pope Francis could do is be firm on this issue and insist any not yet prosecuted priests turn themselves over to police authorities.

So as for why they've been so complicit in this and haven't dealt with it effectively.
I think the cause of child molestation in the church relates to secrecy about sex and celibacy rules that tend to attract some uncomfortable with their sexuality. While there have been celibacy rules for centuries, it was generally understood as marriage rather than complete abstinence. Priests had mistresses and partners, even children. Historical documentation provides evidence of this. The relatively recent (150 years or so) insistence on abstinence among priests is unhealthy. Ordination of women would also help with these problems.

As for failing to act against pedophile priests. Part of this, I think, gets back to centuries in which the church was immune from prosecution by state authorities. In many countries, ecclesiastical courts had jurisdiction over any crime a priest committed, as well as many by ordinary citizens. I suspect the church, as an extremely old institution, has yet to fully come to terms with the fact it is not sovereign outside of the Vatican and must submit to state authority.

Then I suppose they thought the priests' sins could be forgiven and they could be redeemed. Forgiveness and redemption is one positive aspect of Catholicism in that the religion holds that a person can turn his or her life around at any point and that no one is beyond God's grace. But pedophiles don't get better. They continue to rape and molest children. The Church covered it up in order to protect itself, and appears it has yet to fully come to terms with the dimensions of that atrocity. Lawyers giving them advice on how to protect themselves from civil damages only prompt archdiocese to behave in ways that hurt the credibility of the church. The damage is obviously tremendous to the lives of those molested as children. In my view, there is no worse sin than harming a child. The scandal has also hurt ordinary Catholics who feel betrayed by the church. Today 2/3 of self-identified Catholics in the US don't attend mass regularly. The Pope and the church hierarchy needs to think about the damage their actions have caused to the souls those they are entrusted with looking after.