Pope prays with victims of clergy sex abuse scandal »
Posted by: TechnologyExpert 4 months agoPope Benedict XVI prayed with tearful victims of clergy sex abuse in a chapel Thursday, an extraordinary gesture from a pontiff who has made atoning for the great shame of the U.S. church the cornerstone of his first papal trip to America.
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berkeley4 months ago
at best, this remains a meaningless act as long as he shelters cardinals law and mahony. at worst...
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Natureboy4 months ago
This guy's job at the Vatican for the last twenty years was covering up clergy child abuse and moving the guilty priests to new, more remote parishes where their crimes were less likely to be discovered.
He is proof there is no God. If there were, lightning would burn his hypocritical ass to the ground.
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berkeley4 months ago
fortunately, lightning takes many forms. it will either hit him now, or later.
the truth of whether he deserves to have his ass struck is not open to debate. those who still defend him either have not taken the five minutes to read the documents, or are as guilty as he is.
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1-2-Oscar4 months ago
For twenty years, as a loyal servant of the Church, Cardinal Ratzinger did what he was instructed to do. Now, as Pope, he can claim to receive his instructions more directly from God, or at least he can make decisions and modify the positions taken by his predecessor. I think that what he is doing is a refreshing (and long overdue) change for the Church, and I salute his willingness to deal with the misdeeds of the Church more openly and honestly.
When Ratzinger was elected, critics moaned that the Church had decided to go backward. Instead, he has confounded his critics and brought more candor and realism to the Papacy than anyone expected.
Far from being "proof there is no God," he may be demonstrating, once more, that God can use even the most unexpected instrument to achieve improvements, large and small.
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Natureboy4 months ago
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?st...
"in a 2001 letter to all bishops, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the current Pope Benedict XVI, ordered that all sex-abuse cases be transferred to the Vatican.
As theological watchdog, he also imposed total secrecy on the proceedings, with the threat of excommunication for any violations.
Daniel Shea, an American lawyer who has defended many sex-abuse victims in U.S. courts, accuses the Vatican — and the former Cardinal Ratzinger — of obstruction of justice."
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Bristolfashions4 months ago
Human Faith welcome Interfaith dialogue
Interfaith dialogue refers to cooperative and positive interaction
between people
of different religious traditions and Human Faith would like to
welcome all beliefs for Interfaith Dialogue.
Human Faith is Abrahamic monotheistic faith and would welcome Judaism,
Christianity, Islam,
Buddhism and Hinduism for Interfaith dialogue.
The Human Faith message of life and spreading the understanding of
true Human Nature can bring peace and goodness in our life and in the
life of those who are seeking truth. It advocate spiritual and moral
principles on very high scales for the longest term in Human history.
It is time to modernize our faith by adopting true faith and educate
mankind in accordance with International principle of life and they
are Nine Affirmation of Human Faith.
Web Address Banned URL
IN GOD WE TRUST. WE HAVE FAITH IN HUMANITY.
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Poulenc4 months ago
"Pontiff Makes Surprise Gesture
Meeting Called Unprecedented
Pope Brings His Guests to Tears"...
which headlines greet me after logging onto AOL this AM. Indeed, his "guests" should be brought to tears, but not because they find themselves in the presence of the Church's "supreme" monarch.
A more appropriate response would be fist shaking and tomato throwing.
Here, by the way, is exemplified the perfect collusion between media that would sentimentalize the Holocaust if it thought it would sell product, and an audience too bubble-gummed-out not to respond with utter credulity.
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djrevelky4 months ago
It has a lot to do with that entire him being the head of a church thing...
When you are a religious leader, you just can't win with the press...unless you are damning America of course and are Islamic...or black in Chicago.
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Charlson4 months ago
His act of meeting with the victims is meaningless until he quits protecting his priests instead of his parisoners.
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djrevelky4 months ago
I think removing Cardinal's Law and Mahony would be a good start.
Whatever the Pope does with this, he's in a no-win situation though because no matter what he does he will be criticized.
If he defrocks them he will be attacked because he didn't do it sooner, or didn't stop it when he was a cardinal.
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Dionys4 months ago
The difficulty is that whatever his actions in the past, in terms of actions today he will be criticized by someone no matter what he does or does not do. With all the cries that he do this and that, when he does what was requested it is never "enough," or does not "go far enough." At least he is not responsible, as the evangelicals are, for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and completely unapologetic about it. At least he is trying to make things right.
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Poulenc4 months ago
To make things truly right, the church would have to amend its dogma such that gay people and women were entirely embraced by it.
Not to mention human sexuality as something that can and should be freely expressed by ALL.
This will not happen--at least not during the present pope's reign (and I use the term after due consideration).
Eventually, slowly, s-l-o-w-l-y, by the end of this millennium, perhaps, some progress will be made.
But why rush? The forthright response to the pedophile scandal occurred only after pressure became too acute for the church to ignore. Previous to that--lies, hiding and silence.
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KISA452a4 months ago
LMAO! How would this apply to child molesting? I assume it doesn't so... Basically you see a way to bring up your personal complaint against the church and say "He can't help with the child sex abuse scandal without doing unrelated things!!!!"
Look, you disagree with the catholic church. You make me laugh when you basically say they have to change to suit your whims. Sorry, but that is the height of arrogance.
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Dionys4 months ago
"To make things truly right, the church would have to amend its dogma such that gay people and women were entirely embraced by it. "
This has nothing to do with Pedophilia. A good number of the Catholic churchs I am familiar with welcome women and openly homosexual men and women in not only their regular Mass rituals but hold seperate gay-affirming GLBT masses by request of the GLBT community.
Maybe you're still living in the 50's or pre-Vatican II era?
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Poulenc4 months ago
rd, the problem is not with Catholics but the the RCC.
Sort of like hating the sin but loving the sinner....
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Locky124 months ago
The more I see vitriol for the Catholic Church and the more I see Catholics not getting offended in the way the Jewish, Islamic or any other religion would...
The more I see the Catholic Church as the ONE true religion as Jesus himself said: I am THE way, THE truth, and THE life.
And anybody not part of the Catholic Church is on the outside looking in while Catholics on the inside know and feel sorry for those on the outside.
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djrevelky4 months ago
I am not Catholic, but I agree with you. The Catholic Church gets more flak than Islam but the reaction is nothing like it is in the Islamic world.
To Muslims, it seems that Islam is a religion of peace...and if you disagree then they will show how peaceful they are by killing you.
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IAmMine4 months ago
"The more I see vitriol for the Catholic Church and the more I see Catholics not getting offended in the way the Jewish, Islamic or any other religion would..."
are u kidding? You're blinded by faith....
And "no", you don't need to feel sorry for me almighty Locky12... Sheesh.
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Dionys4 months ago
"And anybody not part of the Catholic Church is on the outside looking in while Catholics on the inside know and feel sorry for those on the outside."
This kind of stuff is garbage.
"The more I see the Catholic Church as the ONE true religion as Jesus himself said: I am THE way, THE truth, and THE life. "
So is this. The Catholic church has open communion and agreements with a number of other Christian churches.
You must still be living in the 50s, too.
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Dionys4 months ago
In fact, here is the Pope calling for "religious freedom to be protected against secularist views and against majority religions that sideline other faiths:"
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080418/ts_nm/pope_...
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DeadXXXManXXXTalkin4 months ago
''The more I see the Catholic Church as the ONE true religion** as Jesus himself said''
** = missing punctuation, oh like a period.
Did Jesus ever I mean EVER say anything positive about religion?
It was religion that killed him
and if his like was around these days, 50-75% of those that call themselves Christians would applaud his next early and painful departure from this earthly plane.
book it
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Dionys4 months ago
"and if his like was around these days, 50-75% of those that call themselves Christians would applaud his next early and painful departure from this earthly plane. "
Possibly true, but I suspect it might be that they'd find the error in their ways with such a guiding light living amongst them and change their ways. Perhaps. We can be somewhat hopeful, right?
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Natureboy4 months ago
"And anybody not part of the Catholic Church is on the outside looking in while Catholics on the inside know and feel sorry for those on the outside"
Translation - those on the outside can see the Catholic Church for the disgrace that it is, but those on the inside remain supercilious, condescending twits, unable even to smell their own funk.
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Poulenc4 months ago
Oh, Kisa, please! I speak not just for myself but for many others--in fact, if a may, for fairness and decency. If that is arrogance, then I am arrogant.
(Practically speaking, I don't think the Pope is hanging out at Propeller right now, nor do I expect the RRC to bend to my whims or those of others who think similarly. The Church doesn't do bending, in any case, and that's one of its major problems, IMHO.)
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DeadXXXManXXXTalkin4 months ago
arrogant is putting on a funny hat and setting yourself above others, as part of an organization that aided and abetted the rape of children.
people bow to and applaud the relocating bishops- if they were joe blow citizen, they'd be arrested for aiding abetting.
any bishop, or the pope himself, that could be proven to have known that a predator was in their midst, and instead of calling the police and reporting it, relocated that same predator to other hunting grounds, should be IN JAIL.
could you imagine a regular citizen offering a mere apology for hiding a child raper so he could rape more children, and people saying, 'oh that's OK. carry on and Godspeed'?
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Poulenc4 months ago
Dion, above, I appreciate your point, but it's one thing for a number of "liberal" Catholic churches to welcome gays "into the fold," and quite another for official dogma to be altered such that gayness isn't condemned.
As for the women problem...well, call me radical (please!), but any institution that opposes the freedom of women, in cases of unwanted pregnancy, to terminate that pregnancy--that would deny women the right to do with their own bodies as they choose--isn't exactly embracing them or their HUMAN RIGHTS (see the pope's UN address today), is it?
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Dionys4 months ago
"Dion, above, I appreciate your point, but it's one thing for a number of "liberal" Catholic churches to welcome gays "into the fold," and quite another for official dogma to be altered such that gayness isn't condemned. "
Is it a different thing, or is it a swell of change that eventually the Church will be forced to accept? I agree that the dogma is terrible, not to mention hypocritical and not particularly theologically sound these days. I don't think Catholics or the Pope goes out of his way, as many evangelicals do, to condemn homosexuals. I could be mistaken, surely, but my experience in both liberal and conservative Catholic churches has never been one of condemnation, though the liberal ones do tend to be more welcoming. Of course.
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Dionys4 months ago
As for abortion, I feel similarly to you. However Catholic dogma (and theology) says the fetus is a fully human being imbued with that which makes every human a human.
So while I disagree with their policy concerning the need to force laws upon women (or people in general) who disagree (for whatever reason, religious, scientific, et cetera) with their dogma/theology/outlook I can understand where they're coming from with that.
So while you see it as a violation of human rights to force a woman to keep her child (which I agree would be a violation of human rights) against her decision, Catholics see it as a violation of human rights to kill another human for no reason other than the mother doesn't want the baby.
It's a sticky thing, a fine line and both sides are based on asumptions that cannot be proven. Which makes it the difficult subject it is.
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Poulenc4 months ago
Dion, the way I see it, you pays your money and you takes your cherce.
That is, you either come out (sorry!) for the rights of ALL people or you hedge a bit and say, well it's not on so-and-so's program to do so, and there are a lot of so-and-so's, and further they have rights, too....
I don't have to tell you where this sort of moral equivocation can get one, do I? Much, much, much, evil has been done in the name of (a) god, right? At the moment, I'm thinking jihad....
...or keeping the faithful barefoot and....PREGNANT.
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Dionys4 months ago
"That is, you either come out (sorry!) for the rights of ALL people or you hedge a bit and say, well it's not on so-and-so's program to do so, and there are a lot of so-and-so's, and further they have rights, too.... "
I agree. I am without a doubt for the generally accepted human rights of ALL people.
What happens next is where the dilemma arises, though:
What constitutes a 'person?' If a human fetus is a 'person' then who's right triumphs between the mother and the fetus?
I know where I stand in terms of the law, but morally and in terms of defining who is a 'person' it gets really, really sticky.
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albdlsm4 months ago
Shame on those Priests. They are criminals and should be thrown in jail. The Church should not CLOAK their sins. I think this Pope is truely trying to to make a change and start the healing process for these victims. These Priests were predators and will be judged. Hopefully, now, our kids will be believed and speak up and this shame can stop.
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Natureboy4 months ago
"I think this Pope is truely trying to to make a change and start the healing process for these victims."
Then you probably don't realize that this pope, when he was cardinal, was central to the church's effort to conceal child abuse by the clergy and protect and harbor the perpetrators.
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equineartist4 months ago
I am commenting on the sex abuse scandal that really started in 2001. My son who lived with me when he was only 17 was abused by the WORST Catholic priest in the church. My son had a major mental breakdown at 15 and so of course the Catholic priest was up in our very small town and was just helping out with the church here. I never ever noticed that my son was being molested by one of the worst priests ever. He is now in jail, thank heavens and hopefully he will never get out. He was moved from parish to parish for many years and of course he ended up in the small town where we lived. My son is now having alot of issues because of the abuse that my son went thru. He has been in many many mental hospitals and sometimes for 2 years. He is a very decent person but of course all the trauma that he went thru has totally changed him, and it is very very sad. What a HORRIBLE church that would let these pedophile priests stay in the church. I am very upset over what he had done to my son.
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