a reply to:
LordAhriman
I know you're being inflammatory on purpose but I can't let your deliberate misinformation pass unreproved.
If you refer to the movie 'Spotlight' which was about abuse within the Catholic church, you would have had easy access to the best available evidence
for the prevalence of paedophile priests within the Catholic denomination.
In the movie a psychiatrist is quoted whose research is legitimate ('Spotlight' is an account of a true story affecting the City of Boston from the
mid-20th century to the early 00's). It is revealed that abusive paedophilia amongst priests of the Catholic denomination is present to some degree or
another in 6% of priests working as ministers of that denomination. The psychiatrist avers that in his professional opinion, after decades of
research, abusive paedophilia in that 6% of priests is a specifically diagnosable mental deviancy/mental illness, and on that basis there should be
further research into how best to treat individual priests who become abusive as paedophiles, who practice it unrepentantly.
What you would infer from watching the movie is that 94% of priests do not act on any paedophilic impulses towards children under their pastoral care.
As it is common knowledge with only cursory searches online that the percentage of adult men in the West who sexually abuse a minor is around 1% -
though the latest research apparently shows that paedophilia is a neurologically driven trait, rather than a choice, and that therefore the actual
percentage of men with some measure of this sexual drive towards children is likely quite a bit higher. The part where choice comes into it is
whether or not the paedophile will choose to abuse. So clearly, an environment (an institution) where 6% of the members are involved in child sexual
abuse, as opposed to simply having paedophilic attraction yet not acting on it, is a devastating & crushing burden on the children within communities
where the authorities of that institution (the priests) have a prominent role in society, particularly in poorer communities in which the attentions
of a priest are seen as a welcome thing.
If 6% of priests offend by abusing children, but only 1% of the total population overall sexually abuses minors, what is the actual rate of
paedophilia manifestation in society amongst men in the USA? Is it 6%, is it 5%, or is it 10%..? Clearly it's evident that something about the
institution of Catholicism has a major role in predisposing priests to abuse children under their pastoral care. I would suggest that a part of it is
the demand for celibacy - by imposing strict external limiting factors as a burden on the sexual drive of an adult man at the age of peak sexual
maturity, the institution is playing with fire. The sexually frustrated (& sexually immature) priests are thus far more likely to seek opportunities
for illicit sexual contact - as the adults in the community are inaccessible, and there are opportunities to manipulate circumstances in order to be
alone with children, who are less likely to inform the community of what is happening to them at the time, the priest who is sexually frustrated &
immature is far more likely than an adult male of sexual maturity living in the general population of society to abuse a child. Opportunity crafted
by the priest meets with the potential for secret fulfilment of an otherwise frustrated sex drive.
In addition, paedophiles might deliberately enter the priesthood for the express purpose of being able to manipulate circumstances so as to be alone
with children, specifically so as to abuse in secret. At some point in the deep history of the church, when it would have been far, far easier to get
away with the abuse of impoverished children, there was a confluence of the strictures of religious life inflaming a priest's sex drive in an
inappropriate direction, a choice made due to circumstances of opportunity, combined with the fact that men were joining the priesthood specifically
to tap into the possibility of child abuse - and at that moment of confluence, the Catholic church became aware of the scale of the problem, and
rather than expose the problem to the light of research to find ways to deal with the problem, they began covering it up, moving priests around &
placing them in group homes where they would essentially convalesce & receive religious 'therapy' for their condition. This ultimately led to a total
breakdown in trust between the world community & the Catholic church, some time in the mid to late twentieth century, when it essentially became
common knowledge that Catholic priests were extremely prevalent in the constitution of the body of paedophilic offenders within a given society. Cue
the jokes, and the hatred of all churches as apparently being places that literally breed paedophiles.
All of this is to say that although there are legitimate grounds to be wary of Catholic priests around your children, the rates of offending amongst
religious ministers of other church denominations are essentially the same/ far lower than the rates of offending in the general population of
society, because most churches do not ban their ministers from having a wife, with whom he can develop normal sexual relations right from the
beginning of his ministry, or early on after starting up, when he meets a nice young lady in the congregation.
The fact is that these ministers are far more likely to be morally upright & decent men, because of their faith & belief in divine justice, a cosmic
judge who looks upon his earthly works & demands higher standards of him than of ordinary men, because he is spiritually accountable for the conduct
of his congregation, to a certain degree. With that man also being sexually fulfilled with his wife, he is highly unlikely to even commit adultery,
let alone contemplate the commission of any acts of child abuse. The percentage of men who are innately abusive paedophiles is 1%, and so that is at
least equivalent in the population of men who become ministers of some denomination other than Catholicism, and with what I've stated here about the
general moral excellence of non-Catholic ministers of the Christian religion - who specifically are taught to revere love, truth & integrity before
God & Man above all other virtues, it should be clear that the likelihood of ministers of the Christian faith committing acts of child sexual abuse is
far less than a 1% chance of offending. I would estimate that 0.0025% of non-Catholic ministers of the Christian faith are paedophiles who commit
acts of child abuse against the young children in their care within the congregation/ local community.
Indeed, it is a recogniseable mental deviancy/mental health condition known to be specific to Roman Catholic priests alone which causes a large
percentage, relative to the usual societal percentage of men in any other role, who are paedophiles willing to abuse children within their sphere of
influence. The fact of this particular mental deviancy/ mental health condition being demonstrably & specifically occurring in priests of Catholicism
exclusively, should make it plain that Christians, and churches in general, are NOT breeding grounds for paedophiles - the prevalence throughout the
whole congregation, including the ministers, can only realistically be as high as that which is evident in normal society - around 1% - but is likely
far lower.
FITO.