Catholic Church Sex Abuse Scandal

During the 20th century, the estimated 50 million children were in out-of-home care in Australia. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (The Royal Commission) was founded in by the Australian government in 2013 to investigate how institutions like out-of-home care and school responded to allegations of child sexual abuse. Whereas the research of the Royal Commission focused on child sexual abuse, they were also interested in how recordkeeping practices can promote transparency and accountability and released a consultation paper Records and recordkeeping practices (consultation paper) which was advocated by professionals of records.

“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).

Child abuse has been a big issue in the world for a long time. There has not always been child protective services like there is now. Children would be abused and neglected and nothing was being done because it was not being reported. The New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children was the world’s first organization in the late 1800s which was dedicated totally to child protection (Myers, 2008).

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.

This article interests me because they are eager to respond in this kind of situation by suspending the priest, whose mistake only is to used the product of modern technology as a way of reaching his young parishioners during mass, while the diocese authorities never suspend priests who keep molesting children.

For 30 years, advocates, program administrators, and politicians have joined to encourage even more reports of suspected child abuse and neglect. Their efforts have been successful, with about three million cases of suspected child abuse having been reported in 1993. Large numbers of endangered children still go unreported, but a serious problem had developed: Upon investigation, as many as 65 percent or the reports now being made are determined to be "unsubstantiated", raising serious civil liberties concerns and placing a huge burden on investigative staffs.

Surely humanity suffers when the function of sex corrupts by representing it as a service or commodity and religion corrupts when it is a matter of dry rituals or abstract doctrines; consequently, underscoring the situation with confusing sex scandals. As a result, sexual misconduct is a major issue in the churches today. Child molestation within the churches reeks of priests being caught-up in lust and unmistakably is a real sign that the brotherhood lacks guidance of the profound reality of the LORD’S sexual identity. Notably, in these past several decades, an enormous amount of priests, along with various other ‘proclaimed’ Christians, predominantly waver with uncertainty, puzzled why they have sexual desires and totally unaware of their Divine sexual heritage. Concurrently, just as the Catholic Church, the Protestant Church also suffers from sex scandals worldwide. Figures released to the Associated Press in 2007, reveals that the numbers of these sex abuse cases appear higher in the Protestant Church than in the Catholic Church. At any rate, the process in obtaining Protestant sex abuse statistics evolves as harder to come by and sketchier because the denominations happen to be less centralized than the Catholic Church. Various Protestant congregations occur independently, making reporting even more difficult.

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.

The Penn State child sex abuse case involves many legal, ethical, and moral complications. The participants in this case include Jerry Sandusky, former defensive coordinator, Joe Paterno, former head coach, Graham Spanier, former Penn State President, Tim Curley, former athletic director, other witnesses, informants, and victims. Jerry Sandusky was arrested on charges that he abused and molested boys he met through his charity, The Second Mile. Sandusky used his access to Penn State and connection to the misguided youth of his organization to prey on and eventually rape young boys. Sandusky was charged with 52 counts of child molestation and sentenced to 30-60 years in prison. Other parties involved were charged with perjury, failure to

In Thiel’s paper, she analyzes the article, “Campus sexual assault adjudication and resistance to reform” by Michelle J. Anderson. Thiel clearly gives the claim of the article—the act of rape is not taken serious enough. The article gives a great topic and a controversial issue in the society. And she also makes the problem more related to our lives by giving the sexual assault that happened in Baylor, which immediately takes my attention and interest to the paper. The essay has a great introduction that can attract readers and she gives a brief description for what will be discuss in the rest of the paper.

Even though I’ve heard the brutal stories before, I never understood anything about the Catholic Church. After this conference, I understand the emotional roller coaster that comes along with the church. The beatings, rape, sexual assaults all liberally come back to each survivor. All the feelings that they were feeling, the hurt they went through, the loneliness, and the heartache. They can’t just brush it under the rug. Although they may feel broken, they are warriors for overcoming everything and remaining strong. Children were not able to speak their native tongue, or wear their clothing attire that they came with that was related to their Native culture. They really wanted to make all native children white. Boarding schools have left a huge impact on individuals, families, tribal communities, and tribal

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

The case centers on actual events that occurred in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans from 2001 to 2009. In 2008, the archdiocese announced that it had lost more than $100 million as a result of Hurricane Katrina — because insurance failed to cover all its property losses. Those losses had no bearing on the parish a closure, the church says. Not all the faithful are convinced. Later released prospectus indicated that the Archdiocese paid over $10 million directly from its own assets to settle claims of sexual abuse, and these payments were not part of financial statement or notes. Due to unauthorized expenditure parishioners and media questioned about Good Counsel’s. Good Counsel’s parishioners were very

There are many forms of child abuse. Not only can children be physically abused, but they are also in danger of experiencing sexual abuse. In the more recent years, child sexual abuse has come to the attention of a larger part of society. As such, it is becoming more openly discussed. Child sexual abuse is a growing problem, and the stories that have begun to circulate around the world work to illustrate just how serious the problem is. Despite what society is lead to believe, the sexual abuse of a child is the least common out of all forms of child abuse. Out of the different types of child abuse, neglect is the most common, followed by physical abuse, and then sexual abuse comes at the bottom. Still, of all the cases of child abuse reported to and substantiated by authorities, approximately 15% of them concerned sexual abuse. ). It is possible that there are more cases of child sexual abuse, however, and they simply are not being reported. Due to the number of undisclosed cases of child abuse, researchers have conducted various prevalence studies over the years to determine the true number of sexual abuse of children. These studies have determined that around 20% of women and 5-10% of men in America in were sexually abused as children. A great deal of controversy surrounds the number of male victims of child sexual abuse, due to a lack of quality studies. The problem with prevalence studies is that they don 't all share the same definition of abuse, nor do they share