Diocese to settle sex-abuse claims

a vote. You will find that I stated my objection to the media's handling of this and other issues but was not blaming them. I'm not going to make an sort of judgment that the media is biased against the Catholic church. It's composed of individuals...each of whom will have their own thoughts. As well, what good would it do. Sexual abusers...no matter what their background or the nature of the abuse...need to be individually and properly dealt with.

CNet would care about that???

If not, I don't get it.
Not unusual, BTW.

whose works were prosaic and not prose like.

Not on SE, though, which is where all of us come to be banned. (I remember the unfortunate Net***, whose prose was as florid as it comes, and I saw only his unpulled posts.)

Anyway, I think I found our present subject tangling with The Proffitt and paying the price.

And seriously,
"So when you do get a chance to interact with our group of moderators, be sure to thank them for their time and efforts."

Consider it done, gang.

That's why I'm asking, hence the question mark.

I do realize that the Catholic Church has suffered a lot of real pedophiles engaged in real acts that need to be punished but I'm not really on a fishing mission to condemn their faith over it.

I am puzzled that there is not a substantial coverage of the same offenses by other faiths. Since the Ctaholic Church is made up of people llike all others I would expect the proportion of offenders to be proportionate to the membership realitive to the sizes of the memberships to other faiths.

This is not what appears to be the case as portrayed by the media. IMO, the media makes it appear that this is a large problem in the Catholic Church, larger than all of the other faiths combined whose stories are minimal in coverage.

Mow I am wondering, is the media coverage objective as it should be or is it slanted? If slanted against one faith more than another is it also more slanted about other ideolgies too?

Catholic Church is so much more centralized and the real problem is the amount of "cover ups" going on by their administration? This problem won't ever go away until some of the higher ups go to jail for criminal conspiracy.

It's not like there's an equivalent to the Vatican for any of the other beliefs. OTOH, I'm not so sure that a big part of the problem is not the media either. We know they color political reporting to no end and that they slant the news by leaving out news on purpose. It just makes me wonder if their reporting on the Catholic Church is really objective or not. When we look at the recent behavior of the media, recent meaning the era of technological revolution, is the media tending towards being that individual yelling fire in a crowded theatre?

speculative answers in the link I provided. I found it while in rather a hurry just for statistical data I was curious about myself. The writer claims to be a PhD in Psychology but I can't know his nearness to the actual problem within the church. He does say, and I have heard before, that this is not largely a problem of pedophilia but involves older persons...primarily teens and young adults. As well he mentions that, in other religions, the hiring and firing of clergy is handled locally. Any inkling of trouble of this sort from a minister might just find him quickly gone. There's no lifelong commitment involved on the part of anyone in most....if not all....Protestant religions and other forms of them.

I'll make another point as well about how the church operates. One very strong teaching deals with reconciliation. That's a topic in itself that can't be stated in a sentence or two. But, the church isn't going to automatically toss someone out on their heals or hand them over to the authorities. It's going to attempt to resolve the problem from within to the complete satisfaction of all and bring everyone back into the full communion. It's going to be done in complete privacy that, from the outside, can appear to be a hush-hush cover up. "Going public" isn't going to help. Sometimes businessmen and politicians do that but generally as damage control when they know they are about to be exposed. I fully expect this statement of mine will be greeted with skepticism but I don't mind.

But the church operates under a different set of rules than does secular authority and the church does not use the same problem solving methods when dealing with misconduct. Sexual abuse of any kind that happens within the church membership is a serious violation of the moral teaching. The church is designed to offer reconciliation in such instances. This would include, I suppose, a young boy turning to his priest for assistance dealing with such abuse in his home environment. The priest isn't going to just call the cops though many say he should. However, there may be some instances where law requires the notification of authorities in certain cases. I'm not sure what these all are. It generally requires notification if evidence of physical abuse is noted. Another subject.

Here's my take and mine only. The Catholic church is large, well organized and centrally "managed". This is not like many protestant churches that operate in a manner similar to a franchise. I know this description won't go well with some and flack is expected. I just couldn't find a better word. Anyway, it's resources are also less scattered. This will mean that lawyers have a chance at a bigger pot of money than in similar circumstances with a smaller church or affiliation of churches which operate with more independence from the parent organization. These lawsuits, I feel, are about money and not reconciliation and psychological healing. Big bags of money draw a crowd. Where crowds can be drawn, the media will also gather. Gettin' verbose here.

Locally and nationally there have been news reports of pastors and choir directors in similar circumstances. I do know that locally the churches were not sued.

Of course, the cover-ups in the cases of the Priests makes the crimes much worse. IMO, this was aiding and abetting.

However, these were not committed in every Church or every Diocese. Yet many other congregations will be responsible to contribute $$$ to make up the difference after the insurance and involved Diocese pay.

The crimes committed by the religious authority figures were abominable. I feel for the victims.

If any good can come from this it could be a wake up call for the Church Authorities to look to their antiquated mind sets, make changes so this does not happen again.

Angeline
Speakeasy Moderator

The article mentions that insurance will cover part of this. I was unaware that a policy of this type could even be written. I think this should not be and for two reasons. First, I'd have to think that many who are insured might tend to be less careful than those who aren't. As well, I believe lawyers will willing take cases that involve insurance money and shun those that might be of equal merit which won't have a big payout. It's a whole new game when insurance money is in the mix and the total cost of services involved is going to rise. This won't result in equal justice to anyone on either end of these suits, IMO.

that it would be illegal to insure or underwrite illegal acts?

a big company wanting to insure itself against damage generated by it's own employees criminal actions. A driver for a courier service who mows down a pedestrian while running a red light isn't going to be sued...at least not alone. The company he drives for will get the first phone call from the victims attorney. It would be necessary to write exclusions into the policies to make plain what is covered and what is not. I was truly surprised to read that insurance would be covering part of this. I have to think their underwriters will be revisiting the policy's language and content.

..... that was halted by the settlement was a criminal or civil case.

I can stand corrected, but somehow I have the idea that what was to be tried was the cover up.

Angeline
Speakeasy Moderator

going to trial would have brought [voluminous] cover-up evidence into public view, and into the view of a jury charged with awarding actual and punitive damages. A "plea bargain".

Don't you watch Law and Order?

hit-run driver in a stolen car. He got away and my insurer paid me the value of my car. The illegal act was not insured, just my coming to $ harm from it.

And it's a two-edged sword. Here in NM the insurance companies are using [adjuticated] evidence of 40-year coverups to show fraud of a sort; precludes the requirement to pay. The Archdiocese and the insurers are arguing this apart from the original court and victims. Don't know how that's going. The Archdioceses that went bankrupt, I think, fell into just this kind of bind.

... and shoplifting also costs us all. We need a world with no shoplifters or molesters. Ps 37:29

Does this mean if we do all we are told but don't achieve the promised reward after death that we can sue? How do I get into that business and start collecting premiums?

According to one law book, liars will be punished:
Rev 21:8, NWT "But as for the cowards and those without faith and those who are disgusting in their filth and murderers and fornicators and those practicing spiritism and idolaters and all the liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and [brimstone]. This means the second death."

"All" means, in my opinion ... "all".

The existence of a lawsuit always means dissatisfaction on at least one side. However, there is this promise for the time after the establishment of Jehovah's kingdom on the earth:
Ps 145:16 "You are opening your hand and satisfying the desire of every living thing."
and
Ps 16:11 "You will cause me to know the path of life.
Rejoicing to satisfaction is with your face;
There is pleasantness at your right hand forever."

And no premiums, as this happens just before all of the above:
Eze 7:19 "Into the streets they will throw their very silver, and an abhorrent thing their own gold will become. Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to deliver them in the day of Jehovah's fury. Their souls they will not satisfy, and their intestines they will not fill, for it has become a stumbling block causing their error."

I think you can see why the bible is distasteful to some. Especially those whose preachers haven't taught them this:
Ps 37:29 "The righteous themselves will possess the earth,
And they will reside forever upon it."

Good joke, BTW.

Actually, your thumbnail descriptions are accurate. For instance, a local parish wanting to affiliate with a parent church will have to commit to using a particular hymnal, bought from the parent. That's like the local Burger King having to buy its patties from the recommended distributor. That's a legal fact, but as you say, some will take it as a slur.

"These lawsuits, I feel, are about money"
That unqualified statement is not ours to make unless we have suffered the abuse. (Assumes we have not.) In the absence of Jehovah stepping in to heal and remove the pain of memories (Rev 21:3,4), money is the only palliative we have to offer each other. It's well established also that money awards can be partly punitive.
(It's scriptural, also. Luke 19:8 "And Zacchae'us stood and said to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold."" The Mosaic code required only twofold compensation.)

Protestant churches, local and parent, have indeed paid big awards to victims. Remember that often a damage award is a sealed verdict, usually as a 'plea bargain' by the defendant. The Catholic Archdioceses have been unable to take full advantage of this because, as Angeline noted, they are under pressure to show good faith as to past coverups.

I should have been more clear in differentiating between the lawyers and clients. I never badmouthed the clients but often do trial attorneys. It was to them that I referred. I also could think that these abused could have gone right to the police but I'm not sure what the statute of limitations reads in that regard. It would seem, however, that once the bandwagon got rolling and a golden glow from a rainbow's base came into view, it became more like a convoy.

Sometimes motives are less venal: Remember the woman portrayed by Julia Roberts. She wanted justice from PG&E, and just enough money to keep her in miniskirts. She got much more, partly due to the punitive damages I mentioned elsewhere.

As to the criminal end, in many cases the S of L did run out. [Sidebar: S of L has been extended by many states for two reasons. DNA solves many old rape cases, and abuse of children by adults goes unreported for long periods of time.]

Someone in loco parentis and 'speaking for God', tells a child not to report a very disturbing incident. What do you think will happen?

Here's the sad part: De 19:15-21 and Mt 18:15-17 contain virtually a complete system for handling wrongdoing on the part of clergy or anyone else under the headship of the church. If that had been used from the first, the church would not be in its present position.
(The phrase "let him be to you just as a man of the nations and as a tax collector" (NWT; others similar) means 'don't have any more association with him' (1 Cor 5:11) What you call excommunication and we call disfellowshipping.)
But any organization- religious or secular; yours or ours- that counts its traditions equal to its rulebook will often [always?] fall back to this traditional rule: "Cover thine own posterior." When individuals do this- and they will- the organization has to take the often painful step of enforcing the rules at the expense of the more flexible traditions or human tendencies. Jer 10:23, 17:9

No, I could not say there is a media conspiracy (yet) to single out the Catholic Church for criticism. They're isn't enough in it for them. However, if they found one of their targeted politicians to be a devout member of any specific religion, they might try to topple 'em both.