[enasseneiff]

In the AP story that follows, I like the comment from the Vatican newspaper in which it is bemoaned that it is the media that makes it look like the Catholic Church is the only organizaton plagued by pedophiles.

Yeah, that's it, blame the media for stirring up people against an organization that protected its perv clergy and not the kids those pedophiles victimized.

If if were not for some Boston newspapermen following up a lead on the Boston diocese selling off property so it could pay out hush money, this scandal would have been kept a secret even longer, and even more kids would have been molested.

Why would anyone continue to give this corrupt organization any money?

Sex abuse scandal in US, Italy taints papacy
NICOLE WINFIELD

The Associated Press

VATICAN CITY - Revelations that the Vatican halted the investigation of a Wisconsin priest accused of molesting some 200 deaf boys have eerie echoes in Italy, where 67 deaf men and women accused two dozen priests of raping and molesting children for years.

Only now , a year after the Italian case became public , is the Vatican directing the diocese to interview the victims to hear their testimony about the accusations, The Associated Press learned Thursday.

The two cases are the latest in a burgeoning abuse scandal on both sides of the Atlantic that now threatens to tarnish the papacy itself. The office charged with disciplining clergy was long led by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, and a church prosecution in the Wisconsin case was stopped after an appeal to Ratzinger.

The Vatican strongly defended Benedict on Thursday and denounced what it said was a concerted campaign to smear him and his aides for a problem that Rome insists is not unique to the Catholic Church.

Benedict's actions have been marked by "transparency, firmness and severity in shedding light on the various cases of sexual abuse committed by priests and clergymen," the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano said in a front-page article.

It lashed out at what it said was a "prevailing trend in the media" to ignore facts and spread an image of the Catholic Church "as if it were the only one responsible for sexual abuses , an image that does not correspond to reality."

The Vatican was responding to the release of documents, first reported by The New York Times, that showed how the pope's former office told a Wisconsin bishop to shut down a church trial against the Rev. Lawrence Murphy, a Milwaukee priest accused of molesting some 200 deaf boys from 1950 to 1975.

Murphy died in 1998, two years after Ratzinger first learned of the accusations, and more than 20 years after they came to the attention of the Milwaukee diocese.

While the Vatican has not directly addressed the Italian abuse case, first reported as part of an AP investigation last September, it bears marked similarities to the allegations brought in Wisconsin.

Both involve some of society's most vulnerable: deaf children for whom the admonition "never tell" is easy to enforce because they have difficulty communicating. And in both, the major priority of church officials grappling with how or whether to discipline accused predators appeared to be protecting the church from scandal.

In a signed statement last year, the 67 former pupils at a school for the deaf in Verona described sexual abuse, pedophilia and corporal punishment from the 1950s to the 1980s. They named 24 priests, brothers and lay religious men at the Antonio Provolo Institute for the Deaf.

While not all acknowledged being victims, 14 of the 67 wrote sworn statements and made videotapes, detailing abuse, some for years, at the hands of priests and brothers of the Congregation for the Company of Mary.

One victim, Alessandro Vantini, told the AP last year that priests sodomized him so relentlessly he came to feel "as if I were dead."

"How could I tell my papa that a priest had sex with me?" Vantini, 59, said through a sign-language interpreter. "You couldn't tell your parents because the priests would beat you."

The bishop of Verona, Monsignor Giuseppe Zenti, initially accused the former students of lying. However, after one of the accused lay religious men admitted to sexual relations with students, the bishop ordered an internal investigation. It found some abuse occurred, albeit a fraction of what had been alleged.

Advocates for the victims, however, said the diocese investigation was fatally flawed because no one interviewed the former students.

Last summer, the diocese forwarded its files to the Vatican office that prosecutes sex crimes by clergy, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. It was headed for years by Ratzinger, who issued a 2001 directive that requires bishops to report suspected clerical abuse cases to the Vatican, but makes no mention of calling police.

The Vatican studied the file but took no action until Feb. 15, when Cardinal William Levada instructed Zenti to interview the former students to determine if any action should be taken against the priests, diocesan spokesman the Rev. Bruno Fasani told the AP.

In his letter to the Verona church authorities, Levada said Ratzinger's old office, which he now heads, had reviewed the files about the alleged abuse and "considers it opportune to proceed" with interviews of the former students.

Fasani said the diocese maintained that it did not interview the alleged victims because they never made a formal complaint to the bishop. The diocese also said it didn't know how to contact them, even though they are all members of a Verona deaf association with ties to the church-run school.

Marco Lodi Rizzini, a spokesman for the accusers, scoffed at the suggestion that the diocese didn't know how to reach the former students. He said he spoke with Zenti twice about the accusations and sent the victims' testimonies about the abuse to the diocese last year.

He said the former students were more than happy to speak to investigators. "Better late than never."

Fasani said the diocese was now forming a team to conduct the interviews after receiving instructions from Levada.

"This is a shameful thing. We never received a formal complaint," he insisted. "It was never formally presented to us."

Vantini and other alleged Verona victims are due to appear on state-run RAI television on Friday to tell their stories.

Benedict also has come under pressure over a case dating back to his time as archbishop of Munich, in his native Germany, three decades ago.

The Munich archdiocese has said that Ratzinger was involved in a 1980 decision to allow a priest who had been accused of abusing boys, the Rev. Peter Hullermann, to be transferred there for therapy.

However, Ratzinger's then-deputy, Gerhard Gruber, said earlier this month he took full responsibility for a subsequent decision to allow the priest to return to pastoral duties. Hullermann was convicted in 1986 of sexual abuse during a later posting.

The New York Times reported Friday that the future pope was copied in on a memo saying that the priest would quickly be returned to pastoral work, and that church officials could not rule out that Ratzinger read it.

[capeAngedlelp]

After reading this story, it looks like the Church was untouchable for a long period of time, guess that separation of church and state worked out for them there...


They were outraged. They distributed “Wanted” posters with Father Murphy’s face outside the cathedral in Milwaukee. They went to the police departments in Milwaukee, where they were told it was not the correct jurisdiction, and in St. Francis, where the school was located, Mr. Conway said. They also went to the office of E. Michael McCann, the district attorney of Milwaukee County, and spoke with his assistant, William Gardner.

“A criminal priest was an oxymoron to them,” Mr. Conway said. “They said they’ll refer it to the archdiocese.” For Years, Deaf Boys Tried to Tell of Priest?s Abuse - NYTimes.com



And yet, the saddest part of all of this, is there is still not "I'm sorry" from anyone in the church.

Blanket letters don't count.

[Itrtuawh]

religion is a joke

people that believe in it are absolute nutjobs

[Menierofe]

religion is a joke

people that believe in it are absolute nutjobs

Yeah, but they're willing to go to war over who has the best imaginary friend, aren't they.

[Hpdovoxm]

Don't reproduce the whole article. It's a copyright violation.

In the AP story that follows, I like the comment from the Vatican newspaper in which it is bemoaned that it is the media that makes it look like the Catholic Church is the only organizaton plagued by pedophiles.

Yeah, that's it, blame the media for stirring up people against an organization that protected its perv clergy and not the kids those pedophiles victimized.

If if were not for some Boston newspapermen following up a lead on the Boston diocese selling off property so it could pay out hush money, this scandal would have been kept a secret even longer, and even more kids would have been molested.

Why would anyone continue to give this corrupt organization any money?

Sex abuse scandal in US, Italy taints papacy
NICOLE WINFIELD

The Associated Press

VATICAN CITY - Revelations that the Vatican halted the investigation of a Wisconsin priest accused of molesting some 200 deaf boys have eerie echoes in Italy, where 67 deaf men and women accused two dozen priests of raping and molesting children for years.

Only now , a year after the Italian case became public , is the Vatican directing the diocese to interview the victims to hear their testimony about the accusations, The Associated Press learned Thursday...

[economex]

yeah well, the AP, New York Times and *******s like Maureen Dowd must be bored. The Catholic Church isnt the only organization with this problem. Hell, more molestations occur at homes within a family.
Why doesn't the AP, New York Times and Maureen Dowd, go after public schools, Synogogues, and protestant churches?

In the AP story that follows, I like the comment from the Vatican newspaper in which it is bemoaned that it is the media that makes it look like the Catholic Church is the only organizaton plagued by pedophiles.

Yeah, that's it, blame the media for stirring up people against an organization that protected its perv clergy and not the kids those pedophiles victimized.

If if were not for some Boston newspapermen following up a lead on the Boston diocese selling off property so it could pay out hush money, this scandal would have been kept a secret even longer, and even more kids would have been molested.

Why would anyone continue to give this corrupt organization any money?

Sex abuse scandal in US, Italy taints papacy
NICOLE WINFIELD

The Associated Press

VATICAN CITY - Revelations that the Vatican halted the investigation of a Wisconsin priest accused of molesting some 200 deaf boys have eerie echoes in Italy, where 67 deaf men and women accused two dozen priests of raping and molesting children for years.

Only now , a year after the Italian case became public , is the Vatican directing the diocese to interview the victims to hear their testimony about the accusations, The Associated Press learned Thursday.

The two cases are the latest in a burgeoning abuse scandal on both sides of the Atlantic that now threatens to tarnish the papacy itself. The office charged with disciplining clergy was long led by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, and a church prosecution in the Wisconsin case was stopped after an appeal to Ratzinger.

The Vatican strongly defended Benedict on Thursday and denounced what it said was a concerted campaign to smear him and his aides for a problem that Rome insists is not unique to the Catholic Church.

Benedict's actions have been marked by "transparency, firmness and severity in shedding light on the various cases of sexual abuse committed by priests and clergymen," the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano said in a front-page article.

It lashed out at what it said was a "prevailing trend in the media" to ignore facts and spread an image of the Catholic Church "as if it were the only one responsible for sexual abuses , an image that does not correspond to reality."

The Vatican was responding to the release of documents, first reported by The New York Times, that showed how the pope's former office told a Wisconsin bishop to shut down a church trial against the Rev. Lawrence Murphy, a Milwaukee priest accused of molesting some 200 deaf boys from 1950 to 1975.

Murphy died in 1998, two years after Ratzinger first learned of the accusations, and more than 20 years after they came to the attention of the Milwaukee diocese.

While the Vatican has not directly addressed the Italian abuse case, first reported as part of an AP investigation last September, it bears marked similarities to the allegations brought in Wisconsin.

Both involve some of society's most vulnerable: deaf children for whom the admonition "never tell" is easy to enforce because they have difficulty communicating. And in both, the major priority of church officials grappling with how or whether to discipline accused predators appeared to be protecting the church from scandal.

In a signed statement last year, the 67 former pupils at a school for the deaf in Verona described sexual abuse, pedophilia and corporal punishment from the 1950s to the 1980s. They named 24 priests, brothers and lay religious men at the Antonio Provolo Institute for the Deaf.

While not all acknowledged being victims, 14 of the 67 wrote sworn statements and made videotapes, detailing abuse, some for years, at the hands of priests and brothers of the Congregation for the Company of Mary.

One victim, Alessandro Vantini, told the AP last year that priests sodomized him so relentlessly he came to feel "as if I were dead."

"How could I tell my papa that a priest had sex with me?" Vantini, 59, said through a sign-language interpreter. "You couldn't tell your parents because the priests would beat you."

The bishop of Verona, Monsignor Giuseppe Zenti, initially accused the former students of lying. However, after one of the accused lay religious men admitted to sexual relations with students, the bishop ordered an internal investigation. It found some abuse occurred, albeit a fraction of what had been alleged.

Advocates for the victims, however, said the diocese investigation was fatally flawed because no one interviewed the former students.

Last summer, the diocese forwarded its files to the Vatican office that prosecutes sex crimes by clergy, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. It was headed for years by Ratzinger, who issued a 2001 directive that requires bishops to report suspected clerical abuse cases to the Vatican, but makes no mention of calling police.

The Vatican studied the file but took no action until Feb. 15, when Cardinal William Levada instructed Zenti to interview the former students to determine if any action should be taken against the priests, diocesan spokesman the Rev. Bruno Fasani told the AP.

In his letter to the Verona church authorities, Levada said Ratzinger's old office, which he now heads, had reviewed the files about the alleged abuse and "considers it opportune to proceed" with interviews of the former students.

Fasani said the diocese maintained that it did not interview the alleged victims because they never made a formal complaint to the bishop. The diocese also said it didn't know how to contact them, even though they are all members of a Verona deaf association with ties to the church-run school.

Marco Lodi Rizzini, a spokesman for the accusers, scoffed at the suggestion that the diocese didn't know how to reach the former students. He said he spoke with Zenti twice about the accusations and sent the victims' testimonies about the abuse to the diocese last year.

He said the former students were more than happy to speak to investigators. "Better late than never."

Fasani said the diocese was now forming a team to conduct the interviews after receiving instructions from Levada.

"This is a shameful thing. We never received a formal complaint," he insisted. "It was never formally presented to us."

Vantini and other alleged Verona victims are due to appear on state-run RAI television on Friday to tell their stories.

Benedict also has come under pressure over a case dating back to his time as archbishop of Munich, in his native Germany, three decades ago.

The Munich archdiocese has said that Ratzinger was involved in a 1980 decision to allow a priest who had been accused of abusing boys, the Rev. Peter Hullermann, to be transferred there for therapy.

However, Ratzinger's then-deputy, Gerhard Gruber, said earlier this month he took full responsibility for a subsequent decision to allow the priest to return to pastoral duties. Hullermann was convicted in 1986 of sexual abuse during a later posting.

The New York Times reported Friday that the future pope was copied in on a memo saying that the priest would quickly be returned to pastoral work, and that church officials could not rule out that Ratzinger read it.

[VIAGRA-VIAGRA]

yeah well, the AP, New York Times and *******s like Maureen Dowd must be bored. The Catholic Church isnt the only organization with this problem. Hell, more molestations occur at homes within a family.
Why doesn't the AP, New York Times and Maureen Dowd, go after public schools, Synogogues, and protestant churches?

Maybe they're starting with the catholics and will get to the others later. Ever think of that?

[NewYorkDoctorD]

Maybe they're starting with the catholics and will get to the others later. Ever think of that?

well theres the boy scouts too. but what the media doesnt understand is that in the last 40 years many of the bishops and priests thumbed their noses at Rome and allowed these vermin in the seminaries and sometimes actively recruiting homo's despite the objections from the Vatican. Read Michael Rose's "good bye good men".

[Cheaperisdeeper]

they were not "homos" they were pedophiles there is a different. "Homos" like Men Pedophiles like children, simple huh.

[LindaSmithXV]

...sometimes actively recruiting homo's despite the objections from the Vatican.

LOL homo's. I forgot, this is a homo problem. And what about the priests who abused young girls?

You are probably overlooking the one thing all these abusers have in common though--they're all catholic. I'd say it's more of a catholic problem, but divide it up any way you like to make you feel better.

Read Michael Rose's "good bye good men". The full title being "Goodbye, Good Men: How Liberals Brought Corruption Into the Catholic Church."

Does the author equate liberal and homo? Because that sounds like an awesome book.

[domeffire]

religion is a joke

people that believe in it are absolute nutjobs

Indeed, religion's history in all denominations is plagued with corruption, hatred, and seediness.

Ya got yur horny old rabbis too, and I know one old pervy presbyterian "father" too that likes his "boys" on the side. (or on their stomachs)

When my mom died in 1984, I had to put on a smile face to the catholic perv priest at my family's church to discuss funeral stuff.
I used to see him drive around Bridge & Pratt at night, out looking for tricks in his black buick.

Yet, for some odd reason, people go to these "houses of worship", probably from brainwashed parents that followed the crowd too.

It's all bullcrap if you ask me.
Religion causes more problems than it's supposed to "heal".

[Unhappu]

It's mostly the uneducated people that equate the word homo with pedophile.

i.e. that 40-something gay dude who's shacked up with a 48y/o gay dude... keep him away from your 14 year old or they'll BOTH rape him [when your son's probably already screwed around with at least 5 girls by now].



While I don't agree that homos or bisexuals can be altered that much any more than non-curious straights, I similarly think it's fruitless trying to get the stupids to be more accurate in their labeling of pedophiles. If a horny priest is molesting your daughter, I doubt the last thing on your mind will be "holy Jesus Father McNasty is a faggot!"

[zttrftwsq]

Cardinal Bertone says priest pedophilia is linked to homosexuals -- in the molestation of young girls
Cardinal Bertone says priest pedophilia is linked to homosexuals -- in the molestation of young girls | Crooks and Liars

[ElenaEvgeevna]

they were not "homos" they were pedophiles there is a different. "Homos" like Men Pedophiles like children, simple huh.

Those who were molested where teen boys. Sorry they are fags.

[WGfg4CCZ]

they were not "homos" they were pedophiles there is a different. "Homos" like Men Pedophiles like children, simple huh.

It's mostly the uneducated people that equate the word homo with pedophile.

i.e. that 40-something gay dude who's shacked up with a 48y/o gay dude... keep him away from your 14 year old or they'll BOTH rape him [when your son's probably already screwed around with at least 5 girls by now].



While I don't agree that homos or bisexuals can be altered that much any more than non-curious straights, I similarly think it's fruitless trying to get the stupids to be more accurate in their labeling of pedophiles. If a horny priest is molesting your daughter, I doubt the last thing on your mind will be "holy Jesus Father McNasty is a faggot!"

Oh I love the uneducated label. Whatever.

[BrainTop]

We should just put these pedophiles in jail and the priests and bishops with them. This has been going on for decades and the only way to slow it down is jail these child molesters. I think comparing them to NAMBLA is accurate.

[Reatclaplen]

Oh I love the uneducated label. Whatever.

[aabbaDE]

The other think I find interesting from the liberal media and the liberal left as a whole is that the majority of the boys molested were post-pubescent. The priests were going after teen males for sex. Why not altar girls? Gee...because they are gay.


http://www.aim.org/media-monitor/hom...nd-pedophilia/


Also -

The 2002 definitive John Jay study exhaustively documents the sex abuse scandal by priests in the Catholic Church in America. This is Exhibit 1 in support of Cardinal Bertone’s candid statement that “homosexuality is a pathology which is linked directly to sexual abuse of children”, and specifically is the primary cause of the sex abuse scandal in the Church by gay priests abusing young boys. Only truly ignorant deniers can profess that a gay priest abusing young boys has nothing to do with homosexuality?! Excerpts from the Executive Summary of the John Jay report:

* The majority of priests with allegations of abuse were ordained between 1950 and 1979 (68%). Priests ordained prior to 1950 accounted for 21.3% of the allegations, and priests ordained after 1979 accounted for 10.7% of allegations.

*Over 79% of these priests were between 25 and 29 years of age when ordained. For priests whose age at the time of the first alleged abuse was reported, the largest group—over 40% was between 30 and 39. An additional 20% were under age 30, nearly 23% were between 40 and 49, and nearly 17% were over 50.

*The majority of priests (56%) were alleged to have abused one victim, nearly 27% were alleged to have abused two or three victims, nearly 14% were alleged to have abused four to nine victims and 3.4% were alleged to have abused more than ten victims. The 149 priests (3.5%) who had more than ten allegations of abuse were allegedly responsible for abusing 2,960 victims, thus accounting for 26% of allegations. Therefore, a very small percentage of accused priests are responsible for a substantial percentage of the allegations.

*The largest group of alleged victims (50.9%) was between the ages of 11 and 14, 27.3% were 15-17, 16% were 8-10 and nearly 6% were under age 7. Overall, 81% of victims were male and 19% female. Male victims tended to be older than female victims. Over 40% of all victims were males between the ages of 11 and 14.

*In the 51% of cases where information was provided, half of the victims who made allegations of sexual abuse (2,638, or 25.7% of all alleged victims) socialized with the priest outside of church. Of those who did socialize with the priests who allegedly abused them, the majority had interactions in the family’s home. Other places of socialization included in the church, in the residence of the priest, and in various church activities.

[Vegeinvalge]

LOL Catholics.

[Adollobdeb]

The other think I find interesting from the liberal media and the liberal left as a whole is that the majority of the boys molested were post-pubescent. The priests were going after teen males for sex. Why not altar girls? Gee...because they are gay.

*The largest group of alleged victims (50.9%) was between the ages of 11 and 14, 27.3% were 15-17, 16% were 8-10 and nearly 6% were under age 7. Overall, 81% of victims were male and 19% female. Male victims tended to be older than female victims. Over 40% of all victims were males between the ages of 11 and 14.

I am failing to see how the first paragraph meshes with the second. Especially given the parts i bolded. For F's sake, almost 73% were 14 and under. I f you want to excuse that amount of pedophilia for some misguided hatred of teh gheys, then you may have some serious issues you need professional help with.