July 15, 2007
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Priest Abuse Cases
As I mentioned in my photoblog, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles is paying out at least $600 million for its clergy abuse cases.
It is being reported that this is the largest payout in the church’s sexual abuse scandal. Here is the link: Link
The whole issue got me thinking. The money is not coming out of the pockets of those who committed the abuse. It isn’t even coming out of the pocket of those who looked the other way. The money is essentially coming out of church work, money to build churches and God’s work.
Would you feel guilty taking money from a church?
Comments (89)
i would never take money from a church
who do the clergies will confess
their sins to? what is this world coming to.
i don’t think money would help after something like this…
I would never take money from a church. Shame on those who do.
John is right, what good is the money going to do the victim? This is money that normally might have gone to the churches more charitable works. Now the larger share is going to the lawyers
Don’t you get hit by lightning or something after stealing from god?
the money should come from the priests who committed the crimes.
I don’t give money to corrupt organizations, churches included, in the first place.
I accept money from churches all the time. Most of our biggest financial supporters are churches. If it wasn’t for churches, we’d eat mac n cheese for every meal.
However, in a situation like you are discussing, I think the people responsible should pay out instead of the church.
The money should come from the priests; I agree with Anthony. But I don’t think it’s about the money. It’s about justice – and making sure that priest is unable to ever do that again. Do we even know what the victims do with the money? It is very possible they donate it to worthwhile causes like stopping child abuse or the like.
Except priests don’t make nearly enough money to pay off the little boys they fucked.
mmmm no.
yes i would feel guilty. that’s an unjust thing to do.
my heart is sad…
money can’t take away the pain of abuse.
No..
si
I’d feel guilty if I was a scumbag who did the accusing and convicted an innocent man for money.
Not that that’s what happened in all of these cases. But it did happen around my area.
Nope.
I agree with collision_kiss.
of course, in this case at least
ms_skeptic said: “money can’t take away the pain of abuse”
Indeed, I totally agree. However, someone has to pay, and I don’t mean money, I me someone needs to be held accountable for the sexual assults that happened. And if this is all that can be done legally, then dang it they better pay up the money. Hit the church where it hurts in the wallet.
yes. considering half of those cases are frauds by people trying to make a quick buck
Every church is corrupt in some form, way, or level.
Priests have no money. For committing a crime, you should to jail, not be told to pay off the victims lawyers.
As to not giving money to “corrupt” organizations. Something tells me those who say that, give there money and time to nothing but them self. Those words are said in an effort to justify their self centered life’s.
Especially not the Catholic church, since they are the only “real” church…okay I’m being sarcastic.
It’ only problematic if you believe that there is a god but if you don’t then what is the worry.
i read a report that this scandal that is only coming to light will end the catholic church because 1) not enough priests anymore and 2) not enough money
The offenders should be paying up…not the church.
But seriously, I doubt that any amount of money will make the victims feel better
The church is an evil corporation bent on twisting morality and beliefs into their own manipulative agendas. No, I’ll gladly take their money.
Oh yea.
But i’d feel guilty taking money from anywhere.
I guess I would sort of feel guilty about it considering these funds are derived from the givings of generations of dedicated and pious parishioners. And yet, the church like any large corporate institution must be held accountable for its actions and those of its staff. Given the inexcusable and monstrous transgressions of those priests, I think that these fines are not out of line and will hopefully set a powerful example for the future encouraging better human resources management practices in the church.
a pedophile, is a pedophile, is a pedophile. the monetary damages should come from all negligent people and they should be thrown out of the church.
Collision Kiss is making quite a statement if he’s implying that ALL churches are corrupt. I haven’t given to the church in quite awhile. The last time was for supporting a girl in Uganda. I would not take money. At most, I wouldn’t donate anymore.
At this point, no. Even the Bible requires retribution of a sort from every offender; much moreso under the Old Testament law — which is closely akin to the Catholic church today. Furthermore, I would seriously doubt one could honestly say it was a church when it hid these horrid offenses.
I would tend to agree with those that have said that the priests need to pay, too, because they’re the offenders. And when I say ‘pay’, I mean serve jail time — because they don’t have money.
Nope. I could see to it that the money still went to a good cause. The way the churches (bishops/priests) handled the sexual molestation issue suggests that they are very poor stewards of what is entrusted to them.
No. Might as well get something that could help you care for your family, than nothing at all.
Besides, the more money they are forced to give away, the more attention will have to be paid to what’s really going on…the harder it will become to sweep this shit under the rug.
The church is the employer, who failed to properly vet and manage their staff who they then gave access to young and vulnerable children. Why shouldn’t they be held responsible for their failings?
For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. 1 Timothy 6:10
This is horrible. I have come to this site before and shook my head but the topic raised and the responses make my stomach turn.
Look, you are all scared of some big man in the sky more so than actual, living priests who are harming your children. I think the whole of the human race needs some serious medicating for widespread neuroses. If these pedophiles weren’t priests, you all would be honourable in stringing them up but because your superstitious beliefs are involved, well…
no amount of money is going to take away the pain- the catholic church helps so many people- i would be hard pressed to say this settlement is fair
If I were to be a victim in this fiasco, I would be more concerned with getting the abusers behind bars instead of how much money I can get. But then again, I have never been a victim of a sex crime, so I don’t know.
Me personally? Yes. Why would they be giving me money? I’m not even a Catholic!
I might feel differently if I were a Catholic who had been abused at the hands of a priest, though. Especially if I had given money to the church at some point. I’d want a refund.
Being Catholic I know the money comes from what the People from the Parishes give every sunday, who commit to giving money for building projects, justice comittee, and other projects….so wouldn’t that be the people who turned their heads to what had happen??
At the same time I would not then excuse churches for their crimes.
Catholic Church as an institution has more house cleaning to be done. I’m sure there are a good many millions of Catholics that truly want a church they can trust.
Its a fine enough place to worship, but its not the church for me, despite what the pope may think
no amount of money will help victims. But it so far has been the only remedy that could put a boot up the church’s rear to clean up their act…
i wouldn’t feel guilty after something like this. but i do think that the offenders should be the ones who pay, not the church.
in a lot of these molestation cases the church knew what the priests had done and instead of turning them into the authorities they just transferred them to another church without warning the congregation and the molestation events happened again there.
while it is sad that the perpetrator isn’t the one paying the victim’s restitution fees, but rather churchgoers thru their sunday tithe, i would not feel guilty taking these monies if i were on the recieving end even though the giver probably imagined them going to something else, do to the fact that in so many cases there was a church cover up involved.
yes
Yes, I would feel bad. I don’t even get what money has to do with the siatuon to begin with, let alone the church dishing it out.
Not if I were truly in need, or had actually been abused. And even then I would probably think about the fact that the money would come not from the ones who harmed me but from a lot of other good works.
Those who may have made up claims of abuse to cash in, I imagine, don’t have the capacity to feel guilty.
I don’t understand why the church pays off litigation instead of just letting their priests go to jail like normal child molesters.
no amount of money could pay this off
I am not a Roman catholic as a matter of fact i could spend a great deal of my time writing about what that church had done wrong. But for those bashing it as if it were the root of all evil, regarding sex with childern. There are by far more public school teachers who have been involved in this than priests.
I wonder why public school teachers are not so vilified? Far more of them have been involved with sexual abuse of childern than priests. A higher percentage of teachers have been having sex with childern than and priests and far more teachers. So would everyone still think this was so great, if it were there public school system being sued?
This is just another little example of mindless bigotry. Everything that happened in the roman church with priests, is far more likely to happen at a public school.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,286153,00.html
thats a good link to check out. everyone turns a blind eye to the sex abuse going on in protestant churches!
or the fact that many protestant ministers are adulterous.
people need to settle down. yes sex abuse did happen. less then 1% of the clergy. the thing is, our church can do something about because we run from the top down…unlike…the southern baptists…who cant do anything to stop it because each church is its own church.
you have to be foolish not to believe that some of those cases are not just people jumping on the bandwagon to make money
trunthepage! thank you for saying that
In each instance where abuse was found credible, and the church looked the other way and reassigned the priest to another parish instead of dealing publicly with the problem, yes, I feel it is justified. In the cases of years down the road where the charges cannot be substantiated, and money-seekers chose a first-time charge and offense as a way to pay up – no.
It is no different than an auto company that quietly hides testing where problems are found and then people are harmed. Even though the Roman Catholic religion is a belief and a way of life, the church itself runs itself as a business. In the realm of mega-awards, the punishment doesn’t fit the crime, and as in the quest for tort reform in medical suits, product liability, and more, it has to be controlled.
You are not taking money from God – you are taking money from the institution that allowed the wrongs to perpetuate. They have allowed themselves to be in a position to give the money away. Perhaps this can lead to an eventual rebirth of the Catholic church as a responsible religion based on faith and not on the acquisition of wealth.
i have two points to make
1)the catholic church is not a hoarder of money, in fact, they are not rolling in the dough or anything, many diocese are struggling to make it by
2)LA is a very liberal catholic diocese, i find it ironic that the liberals were the ones molesting the most children.
Nope.
they don’t mind passing the collection plate to me…
probably, but i SHOULDN’T. the church makes everyone feel guilty about everything and it’s not productive. you don’t even know how many sermons i have gone to telling me to feel sorry about all the sins i have committed. like, you know, breathing. the people who receive the money should be thinking, “it’s about time the church stepped in and did somebody (the priests) a favor.” i wonder if the church would pull the bail for somebody who wasn’t part of their own institution?
The church needs to be held accountable. In this world, and the next.
maybe it’s time that they took some preventative measures about all this, too. like perhaps they could rethink the concept of celibacy. is it POSSIBLE that being deprived of sex is causing men to go crazy? hmm… well, doesn’t matter, because if we let our priests get married then we would be sacrificing all our principles.
This is what sickens me about the Catholic church. They ban gay marriage, they won’t even allow for information about how to protect yourself from pregnancy or STDs, yet they seem completely fine with molesting young boys and then taking money FROM THE CHURCH to pay for it.
It’s disgusting.
hell no. the church molested CHILDREN. There is nothing in the world that can restore the innocence of these children. In today’s modern world, we equal money with happiness and suffering. I’m not saying money can bring anything back, but it’s good to know that there was some justice served by making the church suffer for their losses.
Why isn’t there more criminal attention being payed to this issue? What I mean is, victims have been sucessfull in civil suit cases, so why isn’t there as large a success criminally? I, as a victim, would preffer legal justice to monetary imburstment…
I don’t know if I’d take the money, though.
and VoicesoftheRain : the Church didn’t molest children. Several of its clergy did…I think there is a difference.
Although I’m not equating church with God, saying the chirch did it is like saying it’s God’s fault that I made a stupid decision…
Do they feel guilty for the lifetime of emotional scarring and damage they have done to these kids?
I was raised Roman Catholic, and those priests are supposed to take a vow of celibacy. They are supposed to have “pure” thoughts, and not think of sex. They don’t even have wives because they are married to God and the church. It’s not like this was a chance occurrence, it’s about immature males being sworn into priesthood and not doing what they’re supposed to do and keeping it in their pants.
The money will not change what happened to the victims and the priests probably will not serve much jail time. Plus, very little of the money will go to the victims, the vast majority will go to the lawyers.
Even if I deserved it, yes.
Some of those churches have Starbucks in them. That’s going too far
I think it’s sad that the church let these people down so much. They should take it. It would make me sad, but it’s right.
I wouldn’t want money. I would want that priest to pay for his crime.
No amount of money would make me feel better if I was sexually abused. I wouldn’t even bother suing. The church shouldn’t be the ones paying, the money should come out of the pockets of the abusers.
No, especially when the Catholic Church did it.
What makes them think that sexual abuse is … okay? Did something go wrong in their brains?!
VietKongPhooey,
The “not enough priests” is in the US. Not worldwide.
The Church regularly operates on a budget of roughly $250 million and often in the red. I doubt this would end the Church. We’ve been around for 2000 years, buddy. Lol.
mightymarce,
This is what sickens me about people like you. You ignore the facts and choose to rant against something you know little about, engaging in demagogue’s tactics. Save the insults for a more infantile setting.
play_up,
the vow of celibacy is found in the Latin, Ethiopian, Syriac and Syro-Malankaran liturgical rites of the Catholic Church. In other rites, especially some of the Byzantine and Eastern Rites, Catholic priests are allowed to marry.
I wouldn’t feel guilty in the least if that church did something to cause me harm. why should I?
Yes. Unless I were in need, and they were trying to help me.
I don’t know how to answer this question. It’s sad though…
Speaking from experience, no, money in its first form doesn’t make you feel better, but using said money to get therapy helps tremendously. The situation is simple. The priests are responsible for their actions and should pay… however, who was the institution that allowed them to have a position of power in which they could carry out these things? You can’t say that everyone within the catholic church was ignorant to their sins, thats just a stupid assumption. It’s corruption, those who did the deed, and those responsible for allowing the deed to take place should pay. I wouldn’t feel guilty at all, not one little bit.
Quantumstorm-
Mightymarce actually has a very valid point. Saying that he ignored facts is uncalled for, though diplomacy would have been more desirable.
The offenders should not be paying up, they should be going to jail. They should not be using the parishioner’s money to avoid the consequences of their actions. If they were true Christians, they would be confessing what they did and accepting the just consequences.
Mikaisaotome,
How is implying that the Church is okay with child molestation a “valid point”? Clearly an ignorance of the FACTS.
I have taken money from a church and not felt guilty about it but it was not a pay off.
*EDIT 250 billion, not 250 million
The Church didn’t keep this from happening, so I think that it is, in part, responsible. However, I personally would feel a little bit weird taking the money no matter where it came from. I just don’t associate money with retribution. That’s just me though.
If the clergy did it right, took it to the Lord in prayer, with an actually repentant notion to stop sinning, they would lose their sinful natures. If the people of the abuse cases forgave those clergy, in Jesus, the church could use the money, instead to adequately support those who actually needed it for human dignity and survival, and the purpose of –the Christian communities. These ideas I have, are unheeded by those who give money to pay the fines, and restitution of the sexually abused people that has been happening in the Catholic Church, today.
Priests should be able to get married. Then they wouldn’t be so sexually frusterated. Not that that’s any excuse at all.
jesusmoshes2,
As I mentioned earlier, priestly celibacy is observed specifically in the Latin, Syriac, Ethiopian and Syro-Malankarn liturgical rites. In some of the Eastern liturgical rites of the Catholic Church, priests are allowed to marry.
…well when you put it that way, yeah.