Catholic church - time to call it a day?

[Chil1234]

I truly hope that the latest scandals and accusations have hit the catholic church hard or preferably killed it stone dead. If it were isolated incidents or if the problems had been handled considerately, it might be put down to the vagiaries of life or the human condition. If other religious organisations had the same breadth of complaints one might make a faith connection. But it isn't the case.

The catholic church's position of absolute authority, of 'doing God's work', and expecting unthinking obedience, has resulted in apalling corruption and terrible abuse..... from the Magdalen Laundries, the Holly Mount Orphanage, the organisations that shipped children off to terrible conditions in Australia to the cover-ups surrounding abusive priests today. People in my own family have been direct victims of 'pastoral care', having their lives ruined when they most needed help. It's not enough to say that the church does a lot of good work or that there are good people in the organisation... that does not compensate for the instutionalised megalomania and abuse of privilege.

When the Pope visits I, for one, will not be there to greet him. Shame on the lot of them

Posie makes seeker a cup of tea.

I love a jammie dodger!

Well, I have banana cake and tea for dittany and seeker....now I'm off to collect dcs1-3 from my sisters, two whole weeks without my DH is taking it's toll.

Right, having just trawled through 13 pages-worth of this very interesting thread, I can't believe how someone who's posts I generally agree with (Dittany) can take off so ragingly against someone who is basically agreeing with her wrt the Catholic paedophilia scandal (which is, after all, what this thread is about). The witch-burning is such a straw-man it's not worth discussing and to then conclude Bernadette is misogynist because of it? Really??

Back to the OP, I'm one of those Catholics who wishes that the election of the Pope wasn't up to the College of Cardinals and all the in-house politicking and wasn't a job for life because that ARSEHOLE Ratzinger deserves to be booted out on his arse and into a jail cell for his part in this cover up, together with all the others, from abusers to excusers.

I hate that my Church is becoming so right-wing, led from the top. I hate that converts (and I agree with whoever said converts were worse, my Irish Grandad always said a convert was the worst kind of religious fanatic because they'd bothered to read up on it and STILL agreed with it all!) these days tend to be women-haters and gay-bashers fleeing the CofE - where's God in all this? Where's love and tolerance and compassion? It scares me that people like StrictlyKatty can defend the indefensible so vehemently.

That said, the Church is my culture and my heritage and I'm not about to walk away from it because of this, not when it does so much good elsewhere. I'm in favour of women priests and an end to celibacy in the priesthood.

So, as I believe it was BadgersPaw (?) that asked, where does that leave us 'ordinary' Catholics? Feeling angry and betrayed by the Church, in my case, but not knowing where else to go. It is a bloody mess and I don't know what to do.

Thanks lovecat I had to go and cheer myself up on the CuntCube thread on AIBU I think we had the same Grandad cos that is what my old fella used to say, he was from Thurles Tipperary. To give Dittany her due she was quite supportive earler yesterday I think we fell out around 1:AM she took eception to my winking, bloody near dislocated my eyelid as well!

sorry the X is not working very well on my keyboard!

Only just seen this thread and have quickly skimmed through it.

There can be no excuse for child abuse or covering up child abuse no matter what the organisation or individual. Those in the Catholic Church involved with either have committed a huge sin and it is shameful.

I am a convert to Catholocism (about 10yrs ago) from CofE. ( Lovecat - I am not a "woman-hater" or "gay-basher" !)

I converted because being a Catholic facilitated my personal relationship with God. I am now involved in our parish with running weekly sessions for adults enquiring into becoming a Catholic.

I am amazed that there are still adults with the desire to become Catholics with the appalling behaviour of many Catholics throughout history. Our parish has 10 adults being received into the Catholic Church this Easter. In our weekly meetings, there have been discussions about Papal Infalliability and also about the child abuse scandals.

I only hope and pray that, these outrages will now be dealt with appropriately, proper apologies (for the cover ups as well as the abuse) will be made and that the Catholic Church can start to show that it will not tolerate child abuse and lay open how it deals with any accusations in the future.

Having typed a fairly wordy post, I still feel I cannot find the words to express my abhorrence at what has happened whilst still wanting to be part of the Catholic Church. The two just don't seem to go together well but that is how I find myself feeling.

I have to say I agree with Lovecat wrt the witch-burning as an argument, and also wrt the facts of the case. I'm in a parish where about a half dozen adults are baptised every year; none of them have so far come across to me as horrified homophobic refugees from Anglicanism. I'm sure there are some though, (but my parish is probably not the place they would be attracted to) and there have been moves recently to welcome Cof E priests and their congregations into some sort of adjunct Catholic-ish communion -- I'm sure these disaffected groups were prompted by developments in the CofE to think about their allegiance to Canterbury.

There is a huge amount of anger in the Catholic Church right now; the sense of betrayal that was so evident in Ireland when the Bishop Casey scandal hit the headlines back in 1992 has been magnified as more and more revelations of hypocrisy, immaturity, perversion, criminality, amorality and lack of integrity have emerged. Seeing older men breaking their silence and talking on tv about abuse they suffered at the hands of priests in Ireland is something akin to an earthquake and I hope the Church realises that.

I hope this doesn't turn into a witch-hunt, though, with the baby thrown out with the bathwater. I believe in justice, and hope to see plenty of it for all.

Nothing to say but: as usual, agree with mathanxiety. Except when she's telling me that my secret-shame girl's name is a brand of adult diaper...

< happy to oblige, CheerfulYank. Has the snow melted in your neck of the woods yet?>

It has! It's the terrible time of almost-spring when snow has melted, leaving an absolute disaster zone of last year's dog poo, but the flowers are not blooming yet so as to distract the eye.

You need a very undistracted eye when there's all that poo scattered around though. Every cloud has a silver lining.

Marjoriew "The Church is also asking it's parishioners for contributions towards the compensation payments for historical abuse."

Abride "I have supported my diocese in carrying through measures that will prevent the abuse and cover-up ever happening again. And this has included financial support(which I can ill afford) for training lay people and clergy in child protection."

Can I ask if you are all contributing to the compensation payments and prevention measures? How do you feel about that?

LadyBiscuit - those two posts rendered me (nearly) speechless as well!

Liar liar pants on fire Dittany you bloody upset me and started the attack, I suggest you try the AIBU thread for some light relief it cheered me up. I asked for your hateful kkk post to be deleted you can basically dish it out but can't take it can you? A bit like a few men I know!

LadyBiscuit.
I was brought up by nuns and priests in the Catholic Church and am an adult survivor of across the board historical instutional abuse.
Needless to say, I am no longer a practising Catholic.
All the money in the world will not remove the nightmares I still suffer at age 62. I carry physical and mental scars from the abuse suffered.

Money does not prevent abuse.
Making an example of perpetrators will perhaps go some way to deterring further abuse of children.
I want to see prosecutions, excommunications, de-frocking, and justice.

Bernadette - could you c and p the offending post?