If this is what is going on in the 21st century, imagine what was going on in the Middle Ages... Some facts and realities behind the recent Catholic scandals about child sexual abuse. From Freedomain Radio References/Text: http://www.fdrurl.com/cathpriests.
| Time | Text |
|---|---|
| For decades, the pleas of deaf victims fell on deaf ears. | |
| Year after year, the victims of accused pedophile priest Lawrence Murphy went from official to official seeking justice for themselves and protection for other children. | |
| They told many priests, they told the three archbishops of Milwaukee, They told two police departments and the district attorney. | |
| They started begging for protection and justice in the mid-1950s and they still have not received it. | |
| They used sign language, written affidavits and graphic gestures to show exactly what Father Murphy had done to them. | |
| It was only when they filed a lawsuit that the Archdiocese removed Father Murphy from St. | |
| John's and sent him to Northern Wisconsin. | |
| The lawsuit was withdrawn. | |
| One of two of the plaintiffs whose cases were still within the statute of limitations received a settlement of $2,000. | |
| Father Murphy continued working in parishes and schools with deaf children and leading youth retreats in the Diocese of Superior for the next 24 years Where he is suspected and accused of continuing his abuses on other helpless and dependent children. | |
| Pope Benedict was aware of the suspected abuse of hundreds of deaf Wisconsin boys, yet the Vatican office he headed for decades halted the process to defrock the priest. | |
| He did find time to attack and defrock South American priests over doctrinal disputes, though, which might give us some sense of his priorities. | |
| Previously released court documents show then-Milwaukee Archbishop Rembrandt G. Weakland oversaw a 1993 evaluation of Father Murphy that concluded the priest likely assaulted up to 200 students at the school. | |
| Weakland resigned as Archbishop in 2002 after admitting the Archdiocese secretly paid $450,000 to a man who accused him of sexual abuse. | |
| On Wednesday, the Pope accepted the resignation of Bishop John McGee, an Irish Bishop, for his failure to report child molesting priests to police. | |
| Last week the Pope issued an unprecedented letter to Ireland addressing the 16 years of church cover-up scandals there, but he has yet to say anything about his handling of an abuse case in Germany. | |
| In that case, Ratzinger approved the 1980 transfer of Reverend Peter Hullormann to a psychological center to receive treatment for pedophilia, Ratzinger, then a Cardinal, was the Archbishop of Munich and did not report Hullerman's alleged abuse of boys to German police. | |
| Since January, more than 300 former Catholic school students and others have stepped forward with abuse claims. | |
| What has the response at the Vatican been? | |
| Pope Benedict said he was, quote, ashamed of the sexual abuse scandal, adding, quote, it is a great suffering for the church in the United States and for the church in general, for me personally, that this could happen. | |
| What is missing from this revolting statement? | |
| Nothing is said about the countless molested children. | |
| No empathy for those he failed to protect, for those he exposed to additional attacks. | |
| Only self-pity. | |
| On Thursday, a group of clerical abuse victims staged a press conference outside St. | |
| Peter's Square in Rome to denounce Benedict's handling of the case and give reporters church and Vatican documents on the case. | |
| Afterward, Italian police detained four American abuse victims for two and a half hours because they didn't have a permit for the news conference and suggested they get a lawyer in case a judge decided to press charges, the victims said. | |
| It's good to know that at least some police are finally taking an interest in the case. | |
| Peter Isley, the Milwaukee-based director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, said, We've spent more time in the police station than Father Murphy did in his life. | |
| Ratzinger's deputy, Cardinal Tarquisio Bretoni, shut the investigation into Father Murphy's abuse down after Murphy wrote Ratzinger a letter saying he had repented, was old and ailing, and that the case's statute of limitations had run out. | |
| So, if I understand this correctly, a church which holds newborn infants morally responsible for a crime committed by Adam and Eve thousands or millions of years ago is now suddenly taking protection under the umbrella of a statute of limitations for crimes? | |
| A priesthood which tells innocent children that they are responsible for the murder of Jesus Christ 2,000 years ago now believes that pedophilia a decade or two in the past cannot be prosecuted because too much time has elapsed? | |
| I would like you to imagine something. | |
| Imagine that this is not the Vatican or a church or a priesthood. | |
| But rather a multinational corporation running worldwide daycare centers or private schools. | |
| What do you think would happen to the executives of such a corporation if they were caught willfully covering up child molestation for decades? | |
| If they did not tell their parents, why not? | |
| Were they afraid to? | |
| Why? Can anyone seriously believe that children being repeatedly molested would exhibit no behavioral changes such as night terrors, nightmares, panic attacks, or a fear of the school or its head priest, and a desire to stay away from such a predatory lair? | |
| Their parents must have known that something was wrong. | |
| This predatory priest was groping and masturbating boys in a dorm room, While other boys hid under the covers and wept in shame and helplessness and rage. | |
| Did their parents not notice that anything was wrong? | |
| Did their parents listen to their pleas for protection? | |
| Did their parents continue to go to church? | |
| Who is most responsible for the continued molestation The pedophile who rapes children? | |
| Or the parents who keep sending their children back to him? | |
| It's easy to focus on these most obvious evils of the Catholic Church, but can you imagine what would happen to a man who ran a daycare and told gullible and dependent children that invisible ghosts would suck out their eyeballs for eternity if they ever disobeyed him? | |
| What if he told them that they were morally responsible for the murder of a great and noble man because they stabbed him in their sleep? | |
| What if he told them that they were evil simply for being born, but that they could buy forgiveness and virtue from him by paying him money for the rest of their lives? | |
| What if he sold them magic water for thousands of dollars, telling them that it would ward off ravenous and evil ghosts that would chew their hands off if they did not buy it? | |
| What if he told them that non-believers and gays and witches and atheists should be murdered? | |
| Suppose these evil and abusive indoctrinations came to light one day. | |
| What would we think of such a man? | |
| What would we think of the parents who told their children exactly the same terrifying lies? | |
| What would we think of parents who sent their children back to the psychotic daycare day after day, week after week, year after year, generation after generation? | |
| Who would be the most responsible for the resulting damage to the children? | |
| The religious sexual abuse of children is a symptom. |