Religion
In reply to the discussion: Report on PA abuse confirms: It's time to quit the Catholic Church [View all]thucythucy
(8,048 posts)and that is to institute a series of sweeping, radical reforms. Such as--
First--eliminate the requirement that priests can't marry or have sex. The chastity requirement is about as effective as Prohibition, and has the same corrupting effect, in that many priests ignore it, and even when those relationships are between consenting adults the need to conceal them fosters a culture of secrecy and duplicity that provides a fertile environment for abusers of adults and children to conceal their crimes. This was brought out in the movie "Spotlight" about the investigative reporting by the Boston Globe that began the unraveling of the web of lies that covered up these sordid crimes.
Second--women have to be allowed into the priesthood, and also made bishops, cardinals, and even someday a woman Pope. The elevation of men as only those worthy of wielding ecclesiastical authority (in other words keeping the Church an all-boys' club) means it will never be possible to deal with the root of this problem--the assertion of male power and male privilege over those less powerful and less privileged.
Third--allowing complete access into all Church records by law enforcement, to investigate and if possible bring to justice those who committed these crimes and those whose complicity enabled the crimes to happen. In other words, a complete purging of those who countenanced these crimes, and then covered them up, with criminal and civil punishments wherever possible.
Even this might not do it--but without these steps I find it hard to see how any sort of redemption is possible.