Throughout the long scandal of sexual abuse by rogue priests, the Vatican has blatantly resisted the idea that civil law must trump church rules in confronting criminal acts. This was evident again in the revelation that the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland continued to cover up abuse cases long after it had issued rules to protect children in 1996.Rico says maybe they'll consider an arrest warrent 'merely a study document'. Assholes...
“The law of the land should not be stopped by crosier or by collar,” Prime Minister Enda Kenny declared, after receiving a detailed report showing that abuses were occurring as recently as 2009.
A principal factor in the cover-up, the government study found, was a Vatican letter in 1997 warning Irish church leaders against full cooperation with law enforcement authorities. The papal representative wrote that the anti-abuse policies conflicted with church law and should be considered “merely a study document”.
This turned criminal law on its head and, as the study noted, gave bishops “freedom to ignore” the tougher rules and protect abusers in the church. In the diocese of Cloyne, investigated in detail by the Dublin government, church officials did not act on complaints against nineteen priests in the thirteen years after the rules were put in place. The new findings showed that the abuse was not confined to previous generations. “This is about Ireland now,” said Frances Fitzgerald, Ireland’s Minister for Children. As usual, apologies were offered, this time by John Magee, the longtime bishop of Cloyne, who resigned last year. Bishop Magee had been accused of improperly embracing a seminarian, but that allegation was dismissed.
With the paedophilia scandal under investigation worldwide, Vatican officials point to new, tougher rules. But the rules, which do not require dioceses to report allegations of crimes to the police, are considered only advisory guidelines to bishops. The Dublin government has enacted a new law making it a crime for anyone, church officials included, to fail to report child abuse to civil authorities. The Vatican has a valuable lesson to learn in Ireland.
15 July 2011
Ireland 1, Vatican 0
The New York Times has an editorial about sexual abuse by priests:
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1 comment:
Love the arrest warrant line.
The Catholic church has a world-wide, consistent, organized approach to concealing rampant child sex abuse by Catholic priests. In places where it's investigated by outsiders - like Philadelphia, Ireland, etc, they've found epidemic child rape and criminal cover up.
To see how bad it still is in 2011 in the US, Google "Philadelphia district attorney grand jury report" and read just the first 6 pages. The perverted sex with children, and the organized cover up are horrifying.
It's organized crime, and should be investigated and prosecuted in the US using RICO statutes. Unlike the mafia, it's not the primary job of the church to commit these crimes, but there's no question that they committed thousands of child sex crimes in the United States alone, and covered it up in criminal fashion, although they knew the laws well enough to outlast the statute of limitations.
This makes them an organized crime institution, and they should be investigated like the mafia.
The fact that they continue to ignore or fight the victims, and the fact that they continue to lie and mislead their sheepish congregation makes them a horrible church. God made the laws so simple, yet Catholic priests and bishops don't follow them, and their congregation can't figure that out.
Elsewhere in the world, Amnesty International and others should use their power to sue the Vatican.
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