Monday, December 19, 2011

Italian Catholic Newspaper Columnist Slams Dutch Catholic Hierarchy Over Sexual Abuse

I think many of have been weighting for the other shoe to drop big time in the Dutch Catholic Church over the abuse scandal. See Dutch bishops blamed for “organising” paedophiles

It is very true that the scandal of sex abuse has shown up in the most Orthodox of Catholic areas. However as correctly pointed out by Benedict there were many factors that caused this to happen. One being a incredible attempted shift in sexual mores. The Dutch Catholic, that has been in practical rebellion from the Vatican for decades and decades, mirrors sadly the general society here. It will be curious to see what defenders of the Dutch Model have to say. I suspect they will blame the Vatican while of course they have promoted their viewpoint of "Church Governance for decades.

It should be noted that "abuse" in this report could be very wide. For instance abuse is also denoted in the report as unwanted sexual advances. The report mentions Priests, brothers, Nuns, and LAY people. How many lay people were involved I am not sure till I read the actual report in English. Another factor that will have to be looked at is the time period where the abuse occurred and if we saw a decrease in the latter years.

It's horrific but to have such numerous reports from this region is far from not being expected.

No comments: