So you're saying that, since it is a moral issue then priests should clear their names by requesting a trial to prove they've met a moral standard?

can you recommend a court that will hear the case?

I am saying that the Church worked very deliberately to avoid having trials. I would be happy for them to receive trials, and for those who are innocent to be cleared.

By covering up, stalling past the point at which they could be charged, and refusing to accept real responsibility, they have tarnished the reputation of all of the church, not just a few bad eggs. They have played into and affirmed many peoples' worst opinions and biases. Had they acted morally from the start, they would not be in the discredited state they are in today. How some of those men in the leadership sleep at night, I do not know.

Hi Anonymous,

If the priest is a pedophile, then right or wrong is more like something put on and off like clothing. Most pedophiles have strong narcissitic and sociopathic elements to their personalities. That is why they can sexually abuse children in the first place. Don't you think that a person of conscience would find a way to control such nasty behavior?

To shift the conversation a bit, I was very interested in what Glenn Greenwald had to say about dualism, the notion that there must be good to combat evil. If there is a God then there must be a devil. I have known some truly evil people. I have known some pedophiles. What I have most come away with from my experience is that human behavior is complex indeed. It is not that sociopathic people have no concept of good. They do. They could hardly miss it because concepts of good and evil are so much a part of any civilized society. What sociopaths do is make the concepts of good and evil self-serving. Most pedophiles characterize what they do to children as love and not as exploitation.

Our current administration has decided that a higher purpose -- defeating terrorists -- justifies a reordering of priorities. To fight terrorists, we must set aside certain constitutional rights. The Catholic Church clearly decided that the church itself, its money, reputation, and its priests, should come before the welfare of the children who were molested.

To me, that sort of thinking inevitably, sooner if not later, leads to the violation of people's rights. In this case, the people just happen to be children who are not well-positioned to defend themselves.

Therefore, if a priest is a pedophile, he will not in the first place be concerned with the welfare of children. He will first be concerned with his own needs and his own reputation. Serving his needs requires sex with children. Protecting his reputation requires secrecy. Almost all pedophiles use threats or bribes to enforce secrecy. The church, buy extension, carries out the pedophile mission when it seeks to get victims or the parents of victims to agree to keep the abuse secret. Protecting the church's wealth and the church's reputation is secondary to the needs of victims.

When like-minded people decide to protect each other, then you have something even more sinister going on. I have been telling people for years that pedophiles are organized.

Think about it.

I think most of us would agree that the pedophiles are not deeply connected to a sense of right and wrong, or as you say, put it on or off or turn it to their own ends.

But I am really talking about the priests, like Cardinal Bevilacqua in Phila., who handled or oversaw the handling of the complaints. Foolishly, it seems, I expect the church leadership to act morally, whatever the civil law. (I believe they have pledged their lives to this very idea, haven't they?)These men not only told people not to say anything, they lied to the complainants and said things had been done when they hadn't, that complaints had been investigated when they hadn't. They moved repeat offenders from parish to parish to parish, with little or no warning to the parish about who was landing in their midst. They stashed them in archdiocesan mental health facilities, and then absolved themselves of responsibility with a note from the psychiatrist. Read the report. Their behavior was truly craven.

They are part and parcel of the pedophilia, as you say, and in my book they are worse in many respects.

What the pedophiles themselves did was truly horrible. And if some are falsely accused, that is awful as well. But what really made me sick upon reading the DA's report was what the leadership did.

Now that was a telling letter. Pedophilia, we read, is not a disease. It's is a "behavior". Now what, pray tell, is a behavior ?

For Smith, it's just a new word. Because, as we read before, she considers them "rotten to the root". If it was just a behavior in the conventional sense, it was something that could be changed. People change habits all the time. But Smith - and with her substantial part of contemporary America - do not think that such behavior, actually, can be changed. And of course she rejects the notion of "disease", because then she would have to treat them with compassion. So, as Mr Bush did when he invented "unlawful Combatants", she invents a new category as a device to deny the objects of her scorn compassion as well as autonomy - both core elements of humanity. In her world view, a pedophile is not only unable to choose his path, but also unworthy of human empathy.

"Rotten to the root", indeed.

Dehumanizing an enemy is always the first step to killing him. When will you start organizing hanging parties, Ms Smith ? Or will you only - being the lawful citizen you are - advocate euthanizing them ?

isn't this the rule rather than the exception?

what can one expect from such a antiquated authoritarian business that is run by an old ex-Wehrmacht macher?

remember what PRIEST stands for:

Pedophile

Resident

In

Every

Small

Town