Between the latest bit with Fr. Corapi, the indictments in Philadelphia, and the business in Kansas City with Bishop Finn, I've noticed something of a trend. A report is issued. The bulk of people immediately presume the guilt of the cleric in question, whether it's an accusation of being a child molester or tolerating molesters or just doing something else that was bad. This reaction almost always entails excoriating anybody who might defend the accused or even just suggest that we wait until all the facts come out before passing judgment. The ones treated the worst are people who offer anecdotal evidence of how they know the priest/bishop personally and can't believe they would do such a thing.
This lasts right up until a darling of the mob is accused of something. I still get defenders of Archbishop Weakland telling me that he didn't really do anything bad, and that's now that we know what he was into (presumably all of it). Not saying anything about whether he was guilty, but Cardinal Bernardin was accused of a whole lot of stuff, yet he was/is immediately granted the presumption of innocence apparently based on nothing more than the same sort of personality cult that the mob claims is the source of the aforementioned anecdotal sympathies.
The great masses very much enjoy focusing on the hypocrisy of bishops not taking care of their flocks in these circumstances. No doubt, there is justifiable criticism that needs to be made. However, there seem to be a lot of folks who need to clear out the planks in their own eyes along the way. The hypocrisy from the mob is just as nausea-inducing.
2 comments:
There is another pattern. Yet another priest is accused of raping more children, and the Catholic mob immediately comes to their defense, accusing the victim of lying, looking for money, and Catholic bashing. This ignorance might have been tolerable back int he 1980s when everyone thought it was impossible that a priest could have raped a child, but now we know that thousands of priests raped tens of thousands of children, and that bishops hid it from the congregation and moved them around to do it again.
Every one of them should be followed up by a Grand Jury investigation to see what else they have been hiding.
When they did an investigation in Philadelphia, the results were horrifying. You owe it to children and to victims to read just the first 6 pages to see how sexually perverted these priests were with children and to see how the bishops intentionally hid the truth. Tell others.
Read just the first 6 pages of at http://bit.ly/jyfXni
I'm familiar with the events in Philadelphia and have discussed it here. Being familiar with it, I also know that not all the evidence you mention pertains to all the parties indicted. Given that I'm an attorney, I also know that the old adage about grand juries and ham sandwiches is true, which is why I withhold judgment on such things and let the process work itself out.
I'm unfamiliar with current examples of the pattern you mention. Not since the Boston revelations at least. Were there mobs of people rushing out to defend the priests in Philadelphia? I must have missed that. All the responses I saw wanted summary execution of all those involved. Which is all the more reason to be careful. A presumption of guilt in these cases seems to be becoming the norm.
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