Vatican Protected Paedophile
Are people missing the point? The current crisis in the Catholic Church demonstrates that religious organisations are corruptible in the same way that political, business and community structures are corruptible. Society's laws and moral standards must apply to the church as well. There should be no special "divine" immunity for the church.
Instantaneous worldwide media and Internet coverage means crimes committed by priests and church officials can no longer be swept under the Vatican carpet. We learn from recent news reports that thousands of innocent children have been abused in Catholic institutions worldwide. This has been going on for decades and little is being done by the Vatican to address the problem or help the victims of abuse.
In 2002 Stephen Kiesle, a paedophile Catholic priest, was arrested and charged with 13 counts of child molestation, incidents that occurred in the 1970's. From 1981 to 2005 Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, was Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. In 1985 he signed a letter (presumably he composed it) to prevent Stephen Kiesle from being defrocked because "...any decision to defrock Kiesle must take into account the good of the universal church and the detriment that granting the dispensation can provoke within the community of Christ's faithful...". According to The Age this was "...the strongest challenge yet to the Vatican's insistence that Benedict played no role in blocking the removal of pedophile priests...". - reported by The Age, Melbourne, 10 April 2010.
The Pope has been talking about reforms, but what about past acts of abuse? What about the ongoing denial and cover-up of the problem by the Vatican? Importantly, where is the support for victims? If the Pope is genuine about reform he should begin with a massive and transparent investigation, bringing to account everyone implicated and making everything public. Those responsible are no better than criminals who should be arrested, tried and imprisoned if convicted.
Read about the Stephen Kiesle case on The Age website.
Instantaneous worldwide media and Internet coverage means crimes committed by priests and church officials can no longer be swept under the Vatican carpet. We learn from recent news reports that thousands of innocent children have been abused in Catholic institutions worldwide. This has been going on for decades and little is being done by the Vatican to address the problem or help the victims of abuse.
In 2002 Stephen Kiesle, a paedophile Catholic priest, was arrested and charged with 13 counts of child molestation, incidents that occurred in the 1970's. From 1981 to 2005 Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, was Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. In 1985 he signed a letter (presumably he composed it) to prevent Stephen Kiesle from being defrocked because "...any decision to defrock Kiesle must take into account the good of the universal church and the detriment that granting the dispensation can provoke within the community of Christ's faithful...". According to The Age this was "...the strongest challenge yet to the Vatican's insistence that Benedict played no role in blocking the removal of pedophile priests...". - reported by The Age, Melbourne, 10 April 2010.
The Pope has been talking about reforms, but what about past acts of abuse? What about the ongoing denial and cover-up of the problem by the Vatican? Importantly, where is the support for victims? If the Pope is genuine about reform he should begin with a massive and transparent investigation, bringing to account everyone implicated and making everything public. Those responsible are no better than criminals who should be arrested, tried and imprisoned if convicted.
Read about the Stephen Kiesle case on The Age website.
posted by Robert Charroux at
11:33 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home