The Pell( Sydney cardinal) Perspective

[geopol]

Child sexual abuse? An historical anomaly. Never a systemic failing within the church.

There is insufficient evidence to justify a NSW royal commission into these assaults.

Anyway, we’ve been unfairly vilified.

(It’s all the fault of universal original sin and anti-Catholic prejudice?)

This was taken and modified from North Coast Voices!

[zombie]

The abuse of children was wide spread not just isolated insidences, and for a good deal of the priest church was a vocation for predatoring, hence why the big cover up.

The catholic church should reform its no marriage and sex policies, weed out the perverts.

[Earl Grey]

[pim]

What's "predatoring"?

[geopol]

The language leaves wonderful scope for inventiveness.....

[zombie]

Yep ..predatoring I did indeed coined that one...adj: predator of rings...oh dear...never mind.

In short the preying on children was far more widespread than the church is prepared to reveal.

Priesthood for many young men wasn't a vocation for spiritual oneness with God, (albeit there were such Priest and nuns but a wayout to try and seek a cure and hide their homosexual identity.

When inside the church they found similar minded individuals, a deviate perverts heaven, which has been in place for centuries.

[Freddy]

The PM has just announced a Royal Commission into child abuse within the Church.
Not about time, I guess.

[zombie]

I don't think a Royal Commission it will achieve much as the damage is done, the only effective course that will rein in the church and its abuses to children, is making the church pay compensation to the victims...hit em where it hurts..

[pim]

The damage is done, Zombie? Past tense? Have you been listening to DCI Fox? Did you hear him on last night's Lateline with Emma Alberici? He totally refutes your "damage is done". He reckons it's still happening. Like ... now! As we speak ... or type on keyboards. Kids are being abused by clergy, not as random acts by individuals but systemically as part of a culture that involves a massive conspiracy of silence.

Normally I have little time for conspiracy theories. But the trouble is what do you do about conspiracy theories that are true!! This guy DCI Fox has put his career where his mouth is. He acknowledged on Lateline last night that his whislte blowing has probably meant the end of his police career. He said a lot of stuff that was quite interesting - even brought in the Woods Royal Commission. But something important happened when tht guy opened his mouth on television, Zombie, and the fact that a Royal commission has resulted is big bickies and not to be sneezed at.

[zombie]

Indeed it must be so Pim, the perpatrators are still there, and they need to be found and charged for their crimes.

I don't disagree with a Royal Commission and sicerly hope it will be able to get the offenders, perhaps will not be that effective, given the Catholic church and its Lawyers, but certainly gven the opportunity to knock the church and Cardial Pell of its pedestal

What the Church will find offensive is having to pay compensation, something I think will stop the preying on children for sex and violence by sick minded people. Perhaps the commision will find that to be a suitable course.

Until then the Church will try to hide the abuse.

[geopol]

Pell just dioes not get it...He thinks the church lives in another world, quite separate from the state and that it can run its agendas with inpugnity.This" sanctity of the confessional" in matters of priestly child abuse will fuel anti catholicism like nothing else in the last fifty years.

[zombie]

My wife a catholic, met Pell when she was a child...inot for any nasty reasons it was a instant didn't like the bloke.

She is a very good judge of charchter.

[pim]

I listened to "AM" as I drove home from the gym this morning and Pell's statement that the "seal of the confessional is inviolable" seems to be becoming a big issue. And superficially it is an issue - that is, of course, if you only have a superficial understanding of the Catholic sacrament of Penance, which is the canonical name for catholic confession. Mind you discussion about it is becoming so fuzzy that the language itself is becoming fuzzy, with the adjective "confessional" being used as a noun instead of "confession". Much as media ignoramuses talk about "aboriginals" instead of "aborigines".

At this stage may I make a plea? If we're going to talk about Catholic practices and protocols - such as the sacrament of confession - can we just accept that it's a Catholic practice and not bring in all the paleo-atheist stuff that KTJ carries on with? You don't have to agree with it to discuss it objectively as a phenomenon.

To my mind the growing controversy about the "inviolable seal of confession" is a distraction. What lies behind the controversy is a false idea that a paedophile priest can obtain absolution simply by confessing to a fellow priest and go off to re-offend with a clean slate and a clear conscience. A confessor isn't God who can look into the soul of a penitent. So while a confessor may not know that the confession he is hearing is a false one, God knows it.

Again, this is the logic behind the canon law which authorises a priest to hear confessions, and the Gospel text John 20:21-23 which Catholics claim to be its biblical basis. I'm not trying to convince anyone. This is not a theological debate. Your disagreement is noted. Now, moving on ...

A Catholic argument would be that if a paedophile priest made a false confession - which means he did not have true repentance, which means he had every intention of doing it all again - then his sins would not be forgiven. Even if the confessor intoned the words of absolution. These words are not some sort of magic spell. They are not what linguists call a speech act which is an act that is performed by the recitation of certain words. For example you get legally married by reciting after the marriage celebrant certain agreed words. Before you spoke them you weren't married. Once you've spoken them, you are. The words of absolution spoken by a father confessor only become a speech act, according to Catholic teaching, if God can see that repentance is genuine and a resolve never to repeat those sins is sincere.

I'm surprised that Barry O'Farrell can't see that - given that he's a practising Catholic. It's a red herring and a phony issue and risks becoming a distraction. I thought what Pell had to say about confession was quite accurate and correct in terms of canon law.

Right now this is a red hot political issue and the media are running hard with it. You're getting blowhards and blabbermouths like Barnaby Joyce (who is also a Catholic and should also know better) grandstanding about the terms of reference and how long the commission should be given to do its work. My answer to "How long should the Royal Commission be given" is "As long as it needs!" If it means that it takes a lot longer than the lazy and shallow Australian media's attention span then good! That means it does its work in a quiet atmosphere away from all the white noise of politics and the media. Which in my view will lead to a better outcome.

[geopol]

I am sure what you have stated is correct in terms of canon law and catholic theology, but the issue is really what went on in realation to the abused children and what the church has or has not done about it...The laws of the land should be paramount in my opinion and the business of what" god can see" or cannot see is really a load of hogwash in the context of what has obviously gone on. The SMH has published some terrible information recently about abuse by clergy and others and it's pretty sickeneing to read. I am all but sick of what also appears to be self serving prelates spinning crap on tv too.

[zombie]

And if the priest on the other side of the confessional box is a pedophile....what chance is there for reform and action against child abuse in the church....none what so ever.