Is The Papacy Threatened?

There is also no denomination in the world anywhere near the size of the Roman Church. That being said, I believe these offenders must be purged from the roles of the clergy and face whatever legal consequences are due them.

Some of the bishops were guilty of playing shell games with a dozen or more of these creeps in collars. It remains a source of amazement to me that not one bishop in the United States has been indicted (much less sent to prison) for aiding and facilitating child rape.

That being said, as far as the New York Times reporting that "Ratzinger was copied in on a memo stating Hullermann would be returned to pastoral work within days of beginning psychiatric treatment", I think the following article shed some doubt on that:

http://www.zenit.org/article-28769?l=english

 

what you never understand is that baptist churches are independant of each other, anything is within one single baptist church and is not all baptist churches, as withe rcc, it is all under one roof no matter where in the world the church is located, makes the whole church responsible, in baptist churches only one church is responsible, and none of us is answerable for another church, since rcc is all one then each is answerable for anyother in the world. if you could understand this you'd understand the difference.

in the catholic church this never happens, no one is ever answerable for these crimes against children. they allow them to continue knowing what they are doing to children.

as the pope himself has done

 

That is a bit of a bend-and-stretch on historic facts:

The actual fact is that there is an issue of the Catholic publication "Our Sunday Visitor" that claims that there exists a Papal mitre that has the words "Vicarius Filii Dei" written on it - which when using the Latin form of numbering a name -- adds up to 666.

Facinating that the Catholic document "The Donation of Constantine" also claimed that same title for the Pope many centuries before the "Sunday Visitor" said word one about it.

In Christ,

Bob

 

Certainly the future looks bleak for Ratspoison, which is ironic given the fact that he's toughened up the procedures to prevent this kind of thing.

 

Not true. What is true is that the sex scandals of the Catholic Church are most publicised. However, protestant denominations have quite a few themselves. Mormons are probably the top of the list as far as "Christianity" goes. I would say Islam is the largest perpatrator of sexual crimes but the majority of those happen in Islamic countries that find that behavior acceptable. The difference between the Protestant offenders is the "cover up". Usually, protestant ministers are tried in a civil court. Where as Catholics have such a large institution that they are able to move preist around and internationally to prevent scandal.

 

I am on topic. Always have been. The statement to which I replied was that RCC is the greatest offender in this regard. Not true, it is the most publisized. The difference between Catholic Church and the baptist churches is one of organization. Believe me if the Baptist were as large and institutionalized as the RCC it would have its own coverups. Fortunately, each baptist church is independent and therefore unable to hide guilty pastors in Red tape or just move them around. There are baptist pastors who avoiding legal entaglements have moved to another state and perpurtrate more crimes. But this occurence is less often because there is no higher authority (in civil cases) than the pastor save the civil authorities. Because of Baptist independence and democratic structure, when its highest officer has committed an offence the issue is taken up by the local authorities which judge based on the laws of the Land. So the baptist pastor is more likely to serve jail time than the catholic priest.
Note the three top insurers of Protestant churches report that an average of 260 reports a year are filed against protestant pedophiles in the clergy.

did a study that found

This isn't saying that one is better than the other but I think because of media coverage the truth has been compromised. Yet I think that baptist churches are the best equiped to deal with this problem primarily due to its organization and structure.

 

I am glad your affiliated churches follow a procedure that eliminates this type of thing. Not all baptist churches do this though. Some churches I've attended I wondered if they followed up on referrence calls much less do an criminal background check. And note those checks only reveal charges that have been made not actual events. However, my point is that the structure of baptist churches is responsible for eliminating a lot of the problems associated with this type of thing. Even in your affiliated churches I am sure there are members and others who you might question their salvation. So its not reasonable to suppose that only people in attendence are those who are saved. Unfortunately, there are tares among the wheat.
And its not only liberal Churches that have sexual scandal issues. Fundamental churches have their share. Note this article about an IFB church

I know my church affiliation is problematic (SBC) for some of IFB but I don't consider us to be liberal nor is baptist problems secluded to just SBC. I went to an American Baptist university an they also have their share of problems. So you can find any denomination any church and find issues.
Note there is a website that deals with Just IFB problems of abuse http://freedomfromabuse.net/
the fact is that sin is sin and it permiates all christiandom because among our ranks there are people who are sinners. And some still need to be born again. No group is free from it.

 

DHK why do you keep ignoring what I say? Note I said this in the same post you quoted

Also note that my point was that the RCC was not the largest purpertrator of this type of proplem but it certainly is the most publicized.
Also note that the whole point of the article I posted was to show that despite the baptist structure we still have problems and this pastor was an IFB to which you've commented that Our pastors do not have that problem. The problem of pedophilia or being moved. If being moved I've already commented that our baptist structure helps avoid this issue. However if baptist were structured like the RCC then we would have similiar issues. Why? Because we have sinners in our churches too. Though I'm not IFB but SBC we still have the very same issues.

 

DHK, you are a few years behind the times. The reforms in the RCC over the past 10-15 years have eliminated the problem of accused priests being transferred, etc. You can't entirely eliminate abuse, (abusers are notoriously good at covering their crimes) but the RCC has taken as many steps as humanly possible to root out abusive priests and punich them. There is always throughout society a minority of men across all professions (coach, teacher, minister, Boy Scout leader, etc) who will commit terrible crimes against children.

There is a process in the RCC whereby a priest is forbidden from excercising priestly functions if he has been convicted of abuse.

My friend's priest was removed from his parish with a mere accusation of acting inappropriately. He is now retired and does not have a parish anymore. There was never any proof of any wrongdoing, but the mere accusation was enough to remove him from parish life.

I'm not RCC, but I gotta ask how many times must the Bishops and Pope say they are sorry before the apology is accepted? How many millions/billions of dollars must be spent before the victims/accusers are satisfied?

Most of the crimes were commited 30-50 years ago, and many of the accused priests are dead and no longer able to defend themselves. Yet the RCC still made payments to the accusers and their lawyers. In what civil jurisdiction do we pronounce the word "guilty!" when the accused is not able to defend himself?

 

DHK said: "Secondly they ARE the largest perpetrator of this crime."

Thinkingstuff provided evidence to the contrary. Where is yours?