Here's Rick:
Wow!
I just read all of the posts after my last one. There are several convincing arguments made and points to be considered. As usual Loff56 cracks open the egg to take a peek without bias, without agenda and just with simple questioning.
I want to give a response worthy of the conversation and will need to digest some of the clearly agenda riddled tones of the some of the things posted.
When I can catch my breath, I hope to provide some answers to the direct questions asked of me as well as some facts that keep the dialog open.
I know your penchant to win is greater than your ability to critically think about the positions presented. You forget, as a Sicilian, crying uncle will never happen and that Calabrese blood that runs through our veins makes our craniums steel plated and I'm sure entertaining to the readers.
I'll give you something to chew on... If the numbers were billions of dollars instead of millions to settle these cases, does that make it more pandemic even though the same, less than 5% of priests actually engaged in such abhorrent acts? 1/2 full 1/2 empty? No 95 % full 5 % empty. And yes, all of the churches and priests I've been involved with are part of the 95%.
Did you know the Pope was a member of the Hitler youth?
Here's PL:
I'm not sure what you are trying to say here, Rick, especially with the last paragraph and last line? Is there actually a percentage of cases in which spiritual guides sexually abusing children is acceptable? Or lends one to saying that the institution in question should be given some slack because it's only __ percentage who are molesting the kids and __ percentage of the authorities who are covering it up?! WHAT?!!?
One thing that you are saying above is clear, however, and is very clearly wrong. I am not trying to "win" anything here, my friend. It's actually you that has a "penchant" for thinking that these dialogues are some kind of contest. This isn't a sport to me. I am attempting to be a voice on this blog to help expose things that our society has a penchant for glossing over and sweeping under the rug, and especially when it comes to one of my dedications in this lifetime - helping children - I will brook no bullshit. There is no "winning" when it comes to the abuse of children.
Children are being hurt - by priests, by parents, by doctors, by teachers and by therapists, to begin with. And I don't care what percentage of those professions or callings are perpetrators or obstructors. If it's not zero, it's too high. And if it's not being dealt with front and center as a top priority by the leaders of those professions, in full public view, then the profession is corrupt, and we'd be better off starting from scratch.
I rarely even refer to myself as a "therapist" anymore these days, Rick, because I am so disgusted by the people in my profession who drug children and call it "therapy." And I don't know or care what percentage it is. And likewise, I am equally disgusted by the people in your profession who think that making kids conform to ritualized behavior, sit still in chairs, take rote tests, get arbitrarily graded and slave over homework after 6 hours of the above is even remotely "education." Do I need to go on? Do I need to go over yet again here all of the damage done to children by each and every profession purportedly established to help them, including and especially the "parenting profession?"
The huge problem with "conservative" thinking, Rick, whether it's in politics or religion, is that it sees an inherent good in keeping the established order of things. The Church isn't stronger because it has been operating basically the same way for 2,000 years, it is weak and corrupt because it hasn't fundamentally changed and grown in two millennia. Same with mainstream medicine, traditional education and, most unfortunately, parenting. And I'm not talking about Dr. Spock or Baby Einstein or breast-feeding approaches. Parents still don't get, and don't want to get, that if they don't work on themselves to become self-actualized in their lives, and that includes in love, Eros and sex, in their creative/work-lives, and in their mental, emotional and physical health, then they are abusing their children. Period.
And kids would be better off without them.
Thanks for stimulating me this morning, Rick. I hope you are equally stimulated!
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Well Rick...
I was trying to help you out a bit by separating the values of Christianity from the people of Christianity, but you're continuing to make the percentage argument that's just a sinking ship as more and more information on this thing comes out. So I'm just gonna' have to take you to task on this.
So 5% of priests actually engaged in those abhorrent acts. First of all I can't see how you wouldn't agree with Pete that that's 5% too much. Second of the other 95% of the other priests, how many of them knew one of those 5%, knew what was going on, and did not report them immediately to authorities? Those priest are absolutely in the wrong as well. Just as you would be wrong for not reporting a fellow teacher who you knew was abusing kids. As it is becoming more and more clear the amount of people that knew what was going on and didn't say anything is starting to get pretty large and now apparently includes the Pope himself! So your 5% figure of priests who did something wrong is probably more like 20% or 30% or maybe even more and probably includes the very leader of the Church itself. I hope you're not saying that morally you're in the clear if you're only one who knew of something but didn't actually perpetrate the abuses. Even the law in most circumstances sees the purposeful withholding of information in a crime as a crime itself. So I'm sorry, 95% not guilty, 5% guilty is not only an incredibly weak defense, but it's also just plain false.
This is not to say that an individual, like yourself, can't find what they need to find in Christianity without being in the percentage of people that have committed a crime directly or indirectly. But even at that, I'd have to say if you're not at least keenly aware of the scope of the problem and are not willing to ask hard questions of even the people that you know are not part of the problem, you're definitely not part of the solution.
How is it that the Bishops and other higher ups have been able to cover this thing up for so long? Because people blindly accept their authority. If you're not questioning them, you're not helping.
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