The latest in a long, long line of expensive headlines:
Archdiocese of Los Angeles agrees to pay $880 million to over 1,300 victims of clergy sexual abuse
The archdiocese has previously paid $740 million to victims in various settlements and had pledged to better protect its church members, so this settlement would put the total payout at more than $1.5 billion, the Times said.
There's more at the link.
Insurance policies have doubtless contributed some of that money, but a very large amount of it has come from the contributions, bequests and donations of ordinary Catholics over decades - possibly over centuries. Investments made generations ago have had to be wiped out to pay these claims.
Has anyone noticed any Catholic donor or contributor being asked for permission to use their donations in this way? No? I've certainly never seen or heard of that - and when I inquired about it, back in the day, I was told that the money belongs to the Church, and the Church alone would make the decision on how it was to be spent. Not a word of appreciation for the "widow's mite" that some donations undoubtedly represented, or the families that contributed so their kids could get "a good Catholic education" but instead were exposed to sexual predators who used the Catholic education system as a private hunting ground.
And still the Catholic hierarchy insists that it's doing the right thing by settling these claims:
After the announcement of the agreement in principle, Archbishop José H. Gomez said in a statement, “I am sorry for every one of these incidents, from the bottom of my heart.”
“My hope is that this settlement will provide some measure of healing for what these men and women have suffered,” the archbishop added.
“I believe that we have come to a resolution of these claims that will provide just compensation to the survivor-victims of these past abuses.”
And yet . . . if the Church had done its job in earlier years by screening candidates for the priesthood more carefully, and supervising their training more rigorously, and insisting that its clergy upheld the high moral standards they preached . . . none of this would be necessary, and countless victims of sexual predators would not have become victims.
Those of you who know my background will understand that I'm feeling particularly heartburn-ish this morning.
Peter
Vote with your money and your feet. If you stay in this relationship you are no different than the abused wife who complains but never leaves
ReplyDeleteI still maintain that there wouldn't have been nearly as many cases of sexual abuse amongst Catholic church leaders if they'd been allowed to marry and engage in traditional marriage relations. Mandatory celibacy needs to be abolished.
ReplyDeleteManiac, I really don't think there is evidence to support your position that marraige or removeal of celibacy would do anything to decrease predation.
DeleteIf that were true, then in the civilian world, the many 'caught' pedophiles that are also married would be the rare exception, and they are not.
It is possible that those changes would have led to a different applicant & selection pool for priests, etc. That only increases the denominator without any impact on the numerator.
The single largest factor remains the massive failure of the church leadership to address the problem as well as aggressively employ prevention strategies.
Homosexuals don't want a wife, friend.
DeleteThe commie pinkos took over the seminaries in the late 1800's. The institutional church was doomed from then on.
ReplyDeleteMy firm, unwavering belief in God has absolutely nothing to do with the people who bring me the "Word of God".
ReplyDeleteIt's a feature, not a bug...
ReplyDeleteMatthew 13:30-33
Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn. [31] Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: [32] Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof. [33] Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.
1 Timothy 4:1-3
Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; [2] Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron; [3] Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.
Matthew 23:9
And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.
Exodus 20:3-6
Thou shalt have no other gods before me. [4] Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: [5] Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; [6] And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
Revelation 17:3-6
So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. [4] And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: [5] And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. [6] And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.
I do not think there has been time enough to bring one thousand cases to court.
ReplyDelete"Screening....carefully"?
ReplyDeleteHell's bells: they screened IN exactly whom they wanted. Unfortunate side-effect was that their boy-toy priests became predators when they grew tired of Bp. X and his seminary professors.
You're in a no-win situation here.
ReplyDeleteThe Catholic church exists, and has assets. It's employess, fostered by management, committed crimes, creating victims. Compensating victims is only right and just.
It sucks that people donated believing they'd be helping the poor and spreading the faith.
You can't go back to the past and fix what had been broken.
While I do not subscribe, I have had people explain to me that "Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past."
For the major traumas in my life, I have not achieved forgiveness. I do, however, recognize the futility of hoping for a better past. I think I've reached acceptance.
Sadly, I doubt that the Church has done a single thing to end this practice and has rather rededicated it to hiding it better in the future. As evil as I think they have become I wonder if hiding it better now means killing the problem (you know, as they see it).
ReplyDeleteI don't give at mass, and I stopped giving to Catholic Charities a few years ago, knowing that they're downstream of the sucking maw of the Perverted Perfumed Princes in Purple. I give to the Disabled Americsn Veterans and two groups in Brazil; an orphanage and also a facility that is similar to the Ronald McDonald House, neither of whom spend their money on bailing out degenerates.
ReplyDeleteStill no recognition that the abused go to become the abusers. Abuse is the gift that keeps on giving. As a down line abused younger brother to an older brother raped by a trusted priest I know whereof I speak. I have expended so much energy dealing with the destruction visited on me that being a functional adult is a challenge. Maybe I should pass my own basket at mass for collections.
ReplyDeleteIsn't harboring a fugitive from justice a crime. And since when did raping a child go from a criminal matter to a civil matter.
ReplyDeleteBingo! That's the 64 dollar question. When will we start to see something actually being done to these criminals? I can suppose it must start at the voting booth by voting out all the politicians that turn their backs on all manner of criminality for a few dollars on the side. If we can't do that, then perhaps it's time for more direct action. I read somewhere that the time is fast approaching when good men will have to do bad things.
DeleteI know from a source that, decades ago, the LA Diocese had a volunteer CPA leave when the numbers did not add up and refused to sign off on the books with millions of dollars unaccounted for. I suspect that was hush money that is NOT included in the above values.
ReplyDeleteNot sure what the problem is here. The diocese is LEGALLY OBLIGATED to pay this money, and it's not just possible but probable that A. none of the current individuals running it were responsible for these events and B. That even if you confiscated all of the property of all of the abusive priests and their enablers it would not amount to $880 million, much less $1.5 billion.
ReplyDeleteI suppose the other option might be for those currently working for the archdiocese to pay the money, but it would be very surprising to me if they could scrape together hundreds of millions of dollars out of their own personal resources.
This is not the problem. The problem is that the RCC has had centuries to be overtaken by the Iron Law of Bureaucracy, and it shows in things like the decision to protect abusive priests rather than to either turn them in or to at the very least put reassign them to places where they couldn't abuse people.
The San Francisco diocese was lucky - they had Kamala Harris as the attorney general and paid her off to not prosecute.
ReplyDelete