Catholic Church Research Papers

“In the 60s, the Catholic Church in Massachusetts began hearing complaints that Father James Porter was sexually molesting children. Rather than relieving him of his duties, the ecclesiastical authorities simply moved him from one parish to another between 1960 and 1967, actually providing him with a fresh supply of unsuspecting families and innocent children to abuse” (Ericsson 162).

In over a period of years, an increasing amount of attention has been shed to the problem of child sexual abuse in the church. While churches, and other facilities which care for children, have had their experience of this problem, most attention has been brought to the abuse in the Catholic Church. Around the world, case after case has been seen in the press of clergy and members of religious orders being charged with sex offenses against children. Some of these cases go back decades. The issue has certainly brought attention around the world. The reason why, is the question that ponders in everyone mind.

I have been in a country where this kind of sexual abuse, like sexually assaulting a child, is being kept away from media. Some authorities will not make any legal actions regarding this, instead, they will do their best to cover this up to protect the wrongdoers. In fact, there was a situation where “priests with pending court cases were acquitted and even quietly reinstated to pastoral duties.”

The Catholic church shouldn’t have let it slide under the rug and move him to a different school, avoiding any controversy that may have come up. Shifting forward to Keough, Franz is positive that the Catholic church knew about his abuse from Maskell prior to 1992 when Jane Doe came forward. While the Archbishop denied this, they also said that “the initial allegation could not be corroborated and Father Maskell returned to active ministry in 1993 to 1994” (The Conclusion). With Franz’s account of what happened with Maskell prior to Keough, Jane Doe would have had the corroboration she needed to make the case against Maskell.

The Boston Catholic Church’s dangerous employment of power prevented justice and instead allowed for the growth in number of churches and children that were exposed to the sexually abusive priests through the concealment of the abuse.

Michael Rezendes worked for the “Boston Globe” on the Spotlight team, which was small team of people who worked for months on a specific project to make a massive headline on the cover of the “Globe” about every other month. In 2001, Rezendes was working on a small story, one with some potential, alongside his team when they discovered a massive controversy hidden in the dusty files of law offices, parishes, and their own newspaper- the veiled crimes of the assaults on children by local Catholic priests, after which the priests were never convicted.

“If one forgets who he is as priest, look upon our Lord on the cross, who is the High Priest, who is the celibate High Priest, who offered himself as a victim for our sins on the holy wood of the cross.” A Priest offers the holy sacrifice of the Mass each day, and he is suppose to configure himself to that divine victim, who is on the alter of the cross, and the alter of sacrifice. “A Priest is to be like a shepherd as Jesus was, willing to lay his life down for the flock” and yes, “the priest is supposed to be a bride groom like our lord, willing to shed his blood for his bride, the Catholic Church.” Looking back at Father Alberto and his actions it is quite apparent that he had a series of identity crises. So confused was Father Alberto that he left the church founded by Jesus Christ, and sustained by the holy ghost, for the Especial union. In Epsical union everything changes except the bread and the wine. That is to say with in the ecclesiastical communion of the Especial church dogma can be voted on and changed, how ever the bread and wine stay the same at communion, unlike the Catholic church that confects the Eucharist at each and every Mass. Before the leader of EP in Miami Florida, Father Alberto publicly denounced several teaches of the Catholic Church for which he was ordained a Priest of Christ into. Now Father Alberto declared he did not want to

She reveals the severe consequences this type of lying can have. Father James Porter was sentenced was 18 to 20 years in prison for his “obsession” to sexually abusing close to 100 young boys within the Catholic churches he preached at (10). Still it took a long time before he was charged with rape. The members of the Catholic Church were his “co-perpetrators” that turned a blind eye to Father Porter’s crime and allowed him to continue preaching at many different churches between the years 1960 and 1967 (10). They were sending him to different churches and giving him “fresh supply” during that time and in fact, allowing him to rape more young boys. This paragraph is considered pathos since it influences the readers feeling about each raped kid and makes the reader angry. Ericsson is no longer discussing the “white lie” when she alludes to the Porter case; rather, she is purposefully using an extreme illustration of the effects that ignoring the truth can have. Ericsson portrays a small amount of background information on the case that gains her credibility. Including the reference to the

Mike Rezendes is a member of the Spotlight team and made it his obligation to inform the public about the sexual abuse in the Catholic Church with priests. Rezendes was raised as a Catholic, so to find out the priest were raping little children especially boys he wanted to know why these

John Geoghan was a Roman Catholic priest who was found guilty of a sexual offense, as well as accused of many accounts of rape. Geoghan was caught in the act many times before he was ever charged with rape or sexual assault. However, instead of being held accountable or being put on trial, he would simply be relocated. Geoghan was even caught by other priests bringing young boys into his bedroom. He denied the accusations of his peers at first, but later admitted to the molestation of four boys (“Who is John Geoghan?” n.d.).

In a similar way to Abigail, the Catholic Church has used methods of diversion by hushing victims or as The Age reported, “moved (paedophilic priests) from Parish to Parish”. Such as (more evidence?)

He wrote, “offenders were unlikely to change and should not be returned to ministry." He discussed the problem with Pope Paul VI (who’s papacy began in 1963 and ended on his death in 1978) and "in correspondence with several bishops" (Zoll, 2009). It was not until 2001, that offences were to be reported straight to the Rome hierarchy at the Vatican before that, it left management of the cases to local dioceses (Paulson,

But Friar Alberto and Monna Lisetta were not Boccaccio’s only example of mischief that had its roots in a church: the wife of Pietro di Vinciolo essentially asked a friend to arrange extramarital liaisons for her in exchange for a piece of jerky. According

The Catholic Church has been aware of their issue of child abuse for several years. Research conducted by John Jay College confirmed that sexual abuse of children is often ignored by the Catholic Dioceses. Scholars revealed that between the years 1950 to 2000 most allegations accusing priest of sexual abuse were reported directly to dioceses. Their response was to simply transfer the accused to a new parish. This process highlighted the fact that several clergy members were aware of internal issues, but also it obstructed any type of police investigation. In other words, the church moved the accused and therefore they did not have to face any more scrutiny. As investigators ultimately discovered in some cases clergy members took active steps to conceal the abuse and protect their priests (Goldberg, 2013). After the Catholic Church practices were brought to light they received a tremendous public and legal pressure to alter the manner in

The church had a study done by researchers at John Jay College. In two major reports spanning from 1950 to 2010, the church had the researchers report on the scope and nature of sexual abuse of minors by Catholic priests. The research disclosed some important issues (John Jay College Research Team, 2004). The major findings disclosed there was no single cause as a predictor of abuse, 75% of the abuses were alleged to have taken place from 1960-1984, there were about 3,000 priests accused of abuse