7% of Australia’s Catholic priests were accused of abusing children

Bristolscale7

This is so shocking it deserves its own thread rather than being relegated to the scandals thread.


"The numbers were even worse in some national Catholic orders. By far the worst was the order of the St John of God Brothers, where a staggering 40% of religious brothers are believed to have abused children."

"Twenty-two per cent of Christian Brothers and 20% of Marist Brothers, both orders that run schools, were alleged perpetrators."

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/feb/06/4444-victims-extent-of-abuse-in-catholic-church-in-australia-revealed

gctest50

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robindch

Bristolscale7 wrote: »

This is so shocking it deserves its own thread rather than being relegated to the scandals thread.

Some years back, there were so many reports - government, news and church - concerning clerical abuse, that the mods decided to amalgamate all the related threads into one. When this thread runs its course, I might move it over just to keep things straight.

FWIW, there was a large bunfight concerning the exact percentage of priests who were abusers, or who had plausible allegations of abuse made against them. At the time, and so far as I remember, there was general agreement about a figure of between four and ten percent, depending on how exactly one counted it, which countries and so on. Seems the Australians came up with very similar figures.

Akrasia

It's absolutely appalling.

The RCC is in some regards an organised paedophile ring and anyone who tries to cover for them should be absolutely ashamed of themselves.

recedite

I see Australia has been given the same two fingers by The Holy See...

She also revealed that the Holy See had refused to hand over documents involving Australian priests accused of abuse. “The royal commission hoped to gain an understanding of the action taken in each case,” Furness said. “The Holy See responded, on 1 July 2014, that it was ‘neither possible nor appropriate to provide the information requested’,” she said.

.... that Ireland got, and the UN got.

Jan_de_Bakker

It is appalling ... but why doesn't peadophilia in other faiths cause as much upset ?

genuine question ...

Hotblack Desiato

Because this is an Irish board, other churches are tiny in comparison to the RCC and don't have mandatory celibacy which warped the sexuality of seminarians. Parents were so cowed by the power of the RCC they usually reported abuse only to the church, if they reported it at all. Gardai often refused to investigate the few reports of abuse they did get.

Meanwhile the RCC still controls 90% of our state funded schools, still has control over how religion is taught in non-RC schools (ETB) and still influences our laws and constitution inculding women's rights and abortion. While the RC religious orders hide their wealth in trust funds and refuse to pay the (tiny) share of compensation for the abuses they carried out, as a result of the sweetheart deal they did with FF behind closed doors with no Oireachtas oversight. A deal done with a minister who was allegedly a member of an RC secret society, and this has cost the taxpayer hundreds of millions.

So that's just some of the reasons why.