UPDATE 5/7/10: Archbishop Blames Pro-homosexual Culture for Priest Abuse
UPDATE 4/12/10: Vatican's Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone explicitly states root of problem is homosexuality
-- From "Bill Donohue: Catholic Sex Abuse Scandal Is Not A Pedophilia Crisis But A Homosexual Crisis" by Nicholas Graham, Huffington Post 3/31/10
Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, has emerged as one of the most vigorous defenders of Pope Benedict XVI . . .
Donohue wrote in a full page ad in the New York Times:
"The Times continues to editorialize about the "pedophilia crisis" when all along it's been a homosexual crisis. Eighty percent of the victims of priestly sexual abuse are male and most of them are post-pubescent. While homosexuality does not cause predatory behavior, and most gay priests are not molesters, most of the molesters have been gay."To read the entire article above, CLICK HERE.
From "Church in Crisis" by PBS Newshour 2/27/04
MARGARET WARNER: The two long-awaited studies on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church were released at a press conference today in Washington. The first report was a statistical study by academics at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Principal investigator Karen Terry explained its focus.
KAREN TERRY: The mandate for this study was four-fold: To determine how many cases of child sexual abuse by priests and deacons occurred between 1950 and 2002; to collect information on the people who perpetrated this abuse; to collect information about each alleged incident or type of abuse; and to find out how much money the church has paid out as a result of the abuse.
MARGARET WARNER: The findings were based on detailed surveys filled out by 97 percent of the nation's Catholic dioceses and 60 percent of its religious orders. Among the highlights: 80 percent of the more than 10,000 victims in the last half-century were male; half of the male victims were between the ages of 11 and 14; and just 3 percent of the nearly 4,400 abusive priests were responsible for more than one-quarter of the cases. Reported incidents surged between the mid '60s and mid '80s, the study found.
Click here to read the entire transcript above; Click here to view the PBS Newshour video.
From "Church in Crisis interview with Robert Bennett" by PBS Newshour 2/27/04
MARGARET WARNER: Now when the scandal first... not first erupted but most recently erupted a couple of years ago, the huge debate -- and we had many debates on this show -- were between those who felt homosexuality was the problem and others who felt celibacy was the problem. Does your report give ammunition to either? What is your conclusion or assessment of those two issues?
ROBERT BENNETT: Well, we certainly deal with both of those issues in depth and they require very nuanced treatment.
I think it's clear that neither homosexuality nor celibacy are causes of the crisis, but both of them are very relevant issues to discuss and study for the following reasons: A substantial percentage of the victims were victims of clearly homosexual acts. I think most of these acts were committed by men who were sexually immature, dysfunctional people who were locked into an age group well below their true years.
There is no question that because of the statistics that we've learned, there has to be great scrutiny about whether men who come in heterosexual or homosexual, to be sure that they can stick to their commitment to celibacy, and because you are basically entering an all male culture, I think that the board's view is there may be a need for more tailored inquiry of somebody who has a homosexual orientation. But we also found that there are a tremendous number of homosexually-oriented priests who are sensitive and compassionate and are wonderful priests and have always honored their commitment to celibacy.
In terms of celibacy, we don't think the answer to the crisis is get rid of celibacy.
MARGARET WARNER: In other words, married priests.
ROBERT BENNETT: Yeah
Click here to read the entire transcript above; Click here to view the PBS Newshour video.
