Quote:
Originally posted by sgtclub
That said, please explain to me the Church's stance on, for instance, exposing the pedifiles in its ranks. As I see it, the Church cannot do so because, if it did, it would be subject to crippling law suits that would leave it on the verge of bankruptcy if not bankrupt, and in turn, powerless. So instead of (a) restituting those many (hundreds, thousands) of people whose lives have been utterly distroyed and (b) preventing the further distruction of the lives of the truly innocent, the Church chooses to be uncooperative in order to stay solvent/powerful.
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I think the hierarchy had three issues: (i) in their view, Church decisions should be the product of deliberation by the hierarchy, NOT public pressure and discussion; if they changed their way of doing things because of public outcry, precedent would be set for the future; (ii) their view was that hiding these problems was the best for the institution, just as College administrators 30 years ago refused to publicly acknoweldge that rape occurred on their campuses even though everyone knew it; and (iii) once you remove pedophiles from the priesthood you have to replace them, and there is a severe shortage of priests. On the third point, if this shortage keeps getting worse, must the hierarchy, sooner or later, turn to women because they have no other choice? On the second point, I believe we have already seen some progress and that we will slowly see more movement within the Church to recognize that these things are better dealt with and not denied. It is a process that colleges went through a couple decades ago, somewhat reluctantly, and that the Church is only now getting around to.
