It’s victim-blaming at its worst. Last week, Father Benedict Groeschel, a fairly prominent religious figure who is, among other things, the director of the Office for Spiritual Development for the Catholic Archdiocese of New York, said some utterly appalling things about the victims of sexual abuse by priests.
In an interview with the National Catholic Register, Groeschel declared that some of the victims were likely “seducers,” and expressed sympathy for ”poor” Jerry Sandusky, and suggested that abusers “on their first offense … should not go to jail because their intention was not committing a crime.”
After the comments spurred outrage, the NC Register took down the interview. Here are the relevant sections, which I found reposted by an appalled columnist on the right-wing RenewAmerica site. The whole thing is awful; I’ve highlighted some of the worst parts.
[Interviewer]: Part of your work here at Trinity has been working with priests involved in abuse, no?
[Father Groeschel]: A little bit, yes; but you know, in those cases, they have to leave. And some of them profoundly — profoundly — penitential, horrified. People have this picture in their minds of a person planning to — a psychopath. But that’s not the case. Suppose you have a man having a nervous breakdown, and a youngster comes after him. A lot of the cases, the youngster — 14, 16, 18 — is the seducer.
[Interviewer]: Why would that be?
[Father Greoschel]: Well, it’s not so hard to see — a kid looking for a father and didn’t have his own — and they won’t be planning to get into heavy-duty sex, but almost romantic, embracing, kissing, perhaps sleeping but not having intercourse or anything like that.
It’s an understandable thing, and you know where you find it, among other clergy or important people; you look at teachers, attorneys, judges, social workers. Generally, if they get involved, it’s heterosexually, and if it’s a priest, he leaves and gets married — that’s the usual thing — and gets a dispensation. A lot of priests leave quickly, get civilly married and then apply for the dispensation, which takes about three years.
But there are the relatively rare cases where a priest is involved in a homosexual way with a minor. I think the statistic I read recently in a secular psychology review was about 2%. Would that be true of other clergy? Would it be true of doctors, lawyers, coaches?
Here’s this poor guy — [Penn State football coach Jerry] Sandusky — it went on for years. Interesting: this poor guy — [Penn State football coach Jerry] Sandusky Why didn’t anyone say anything? Apparently, a number of kids knew about it and didn’t break the ice. Well, you know, until recent years, people did not register in their minds that it was a crime. It was a moral failure, scandalous; but they didn’t think of it in terms of legal things.
If you go back 10 or 15 years ago with different sexual difficulties — except for rape or violence — it was very rarely brought as a civil crime. Nobody thought of it that way. Sometimes statutory rape would be — but only if the girl pushed her case. Parents wouldn’t touch it. People backed off, for years, on sexual cases. I’m not sure why.
I think perhaps part of the reason would be an embarrassment, that it brings the case out into the open, and the girl’s name is there, or people will figure out what’s there, or the youngster involved — you know, it’s not put in the paper, but everybody knows; they’re talking about it.
At this point, (when) any priest, any clergyman, any social worker, any teacher, any responsible person in society would become involved in a single sexual act — not necessarily intercourse — they’re done. And I’m inclined to think, on their first offense, they should not go to jail because their intention was not committing a crime.
In the place where the interview originally ran, the National Catholic Register posted apologies from the paper’s editor-in-chief, the The Community of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, and Groeschel himself. The statement from the Friars was at best a half-apology, and offered this “excuse” for his comments:
About seven years ago Fr. Benedict was struck by a car and was in a coma for over a month. In recent months his health, memory and cognitive ability have been failing. He has been in and out of the hospital. Due to his declining health and inability to care for himself, Fr. Benedict had moved to a location where he could rest and be relieved of his responsibilities. Although these factors do not excuse his comments, they help us understand how such a compassionate man could have said something so wrong, so insensitive, and so out of character.
I’m pretty sure getting hit by a car doesn’t make you think that victims of sexual abuse are the ones responsible for that abuse. It doesn’t put that attitude in your head, though it might make you think it’s acceptable to say such things out loud in an interview.
And if Groeschel is indeed so cognitively impaired that he can’t be held fully accountable for the words coming out of his mouth, why was he giving interviews to the press in the first place? How was he still capable of running the Office for Spiritual Development for the Catholic Archdiocese of New York? And why did the editors of the NC Register publish the comments without challenge in the first place? Presumably none of them have been recently hit by a car.
In their apology, the Friars also said:
He never intended to excuse abuse or implicate the victims.
Really? How exactly is suggesting that 14 year old boys are “seducers” preying on the weaknesses of old men NOT intended to “excuse abuse [and] implicate the victims?”
They also say:
We hope that these unfortunate statements will not overshadow the great good Fr. Benedict has done in housing countless homeless people, feeding innumerable poor families, and bringing healing, peace and encouragement to so many.
They might as well have replaced their entire “apology” with this sentence, which reflects what seems to be their main concern here – that is, Groeschel looking bad, and making them look bad.
David, your poetry never ceases to rock.
Damn, Pell’s humor was absolutely shit. ”Crazy cat lady! Crazy cat lady! You guys are you listening I said crazy cat lady! See, it’s funny because it’s a crazy lady with a cat! See! See?!”
Actually my poem was just an old nursery rhyme with a couple of altered letters.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_do_not_like_thee,_Doctor_Fell
All righty, then, your ability to selection quotations and/or pictures to best fit the situation never ceases to rock.
Aw, I missed Pell’s latest transformation?
Don’t you love the way he was pretending doctors with patients in crisis spend their time blabbing about it on the Internet? How is Pell removed from reality, let me count the ways.
I don’t have enough fingers and toes to do that.
It’s boring when they don’t even try. Good riddance to Pell!
Cod, the Catholic church continues to shoot itself in the foot. But no, it’s not limited to the Catholic church is it? It’s all organised religion. Terrible institutions that impart the patriarchal paradigm of a god on top, then male pastors/priests/rabis/imams, then men, then women and children, then animals. I reckon Jesus is spinning in his grave.
I think dismissing abuse and protecting those in power is a tendency for any traditional/hierarchical group, because one some people (i.e., priests, coaches, men) are worth more than others (children, women), you protect the people who are more important, even if they are the abusers. You see that in the boy scouts too, as well as non-Catholic religious groups.
one=when
OT, but I’ve just spent a happy day (yeah, at work, ha) reading old posts and encountering … well, I won’t tempt fate by saying their names, but some really, really classic troll meltdowns, from whiny nineteen-year-olds who want to, apparently, fuck bitches (I’d have thought that was illegal – is that his real problem?) to explode-and-repeat fecal obsessives, to even more horrible ones I won’t even describe. Now I understand the laments about the poor quality of modern trolling compared to the good ol’ days of a few months ago. 😀
^You’re catching up on your wonky-eyed David Foster Wallace fans? Truly, the quality of past trolls was impeccable. (I do think Pell is great entertainment as well, though.)
Yup, and the ones who seem to have major problems understanding that urethra =/= vagina, or that semen =/= urine. And who don’t grasp the difference between “people being offended by you” and “people laughing their arses off at you”.
Whee, 3pm! Hometime! Niters, all. 🙂
Rumpole said:
“Serenwali-Is that what he said?All gays are paedophiles? It does appear though that a disproportionate number of molesters are though. From the churches,mosques,synagogues etc When you consider that about 1% of the population is homosexual and that all of these cases involved boys then NWO does make a good case that some people have less control over their impulses and it likely stems from the same brain dysfunction as homosexuality. What motiovates you to deny what is apparent to everyone else? And btw, the same is true of lesbians who are like 1/2 of 1% of the pop. They have a very high % of both forcing sex onto straight girls after grooming them and also a high rate of DV, like 70% compared to about 1-2% with normal man and wife relationships.”
Molesters will go wherever they have access to children be it schools, churches, childcare agencies or whatever. Especially if they know that these agencies will throw the victims under the bus and protect the abusers. Why would you not expect to see them more often in places that give them relatively easy access to potential victims. Reputable agencies working with children know this and are extremely vigilant, unfortunately some, such as certain churches, have more to lose by exposing abusers in their ranks than they do by protecting them, thus the victims become “seducers” and the perpetrator is recast as the victim.
I’m also curious to know how many gays you actually know who would trust you enough to talk to you about this and what your sources are for these really unpleasant allegations made against them. If either you or NWO have any reliable sources please cite them. Also seeing a cite about that allegation against lesbians would be nice too. Or is this all MRA scuttlebutt with no sources at all?
Then there’s the issue, as others have pointed out, of what you mean by “gay”. Do you mean “out” gays, people who have ever felt attracted to a member of the same sex, anyone who has ever had a sexual encounter with someone of the same sex? Who exactly are we talking about here?
Some failed traditions just won’t die. Like celibacy among other things. The human sex drive is just too powerful to resist temptation for that long. Catholic priests have been doing this sick shit for centuries and the world has finally realized this and had enough.
As for pedophiles, I’m skeptical that individual pedo-rapists are indiscriminate about the sex of the children they prey on. Now if straight men aren’t allowed to be girl scout leaders, why shouldn’t gay men be barred from being boyscout leaders?
Lastly, it does appear to be quite obvious that the majority of feminists actively want men who are low status and/or otherwise sexually undesirable to women to turn gay somehow in order to neutralize the threat they perceive from such fellas.
@OOmpalOOmpa
A lot of priests and monks actually are celibate. As are laypeople. I don’t think lack of sex is the problem here. Predatory behavior is. These priests are rapists who use their power to rape. That’s all there is to it.
You apparently haven’t read anything about the subject. The vast majority of pedophiles are men who self-identify as straight preying on boys. This is because the sex isn’t important to predators; the power is. They prey on boys because they’re given more power over boys. Sexual orientation has nothing to do with it If sexual orientation was the primary factor, then there would be no sexual abuse in the Scouts. Unfortunately, it isn’t, and there is.
I actually think straight men should be allowed to be girl scout leaders.
What? How is it obvious? Where is there any proof whatsoever of this? What feminist thinks it’s even possible for a straight man to “turn gay?”
Yeah, no, celibacy does not magically cause people to rape children. Celibacy that one chooses voluntarily for oneself especially does not magically cause people to rape children. The vast majority of celibate and/or asexual people go about their daily lives just fine without raping anyone, let alone children. Celibacy is really not the problem here.
Shockingly, different child molesters have different victim profiles. Some only target boys. Some only target girls. And a fairly large number target both, because what they’re looking for has more to do with “child” than “girl-child” or “boy-child.”
If you can seriously not figure out any reason why an organization explicitly for girls wouldn’t have male leaders besides “they think all men want to rape children of their preferred gender,” I think you may need a replacement brain, because yours isn’t working too well.
Incidentally, my dad was a Girl Scout troop leader for a couple of years. No one seemed to be particularly concerned he’d rape anyone; Girl Scout HQ just made it clear that when and if he could find a woman to take over troop leader duties, they’d prefer he step down. It’s almost like their policies are less “men who prefer a particular gender all totally want to rape 6-year-olds of that gender!” and more “You seem like a good guy, and we’re happy to have your help, but we try to give the girls positive female role models wherever possible.”
This is really the only suitable response here. Well, or maybe Pecunium’s sparkly “citation needed,” but I don’t have the link to that offhand.
It’s seriously bizarre that it has to be explained to so many people that rapists are responsible for rape.
Feminists want men to turn gay? Ohhhhhkay. That will probably be in the top five stupid things I read today. Keep in mind I’m reading TWoP’s Breaking Bad forum, so that’s saying something.
Straight men are allowed to be girl scout leaders.
http://www.gsnetx.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=ezrOG59fh8A%3D&tabid=222
Straight women are allowed to be boy scout leaders (since 1988).
http://www.nytimes.com/1988/02/14/us/boy-scouts-to-allow-women-to-be-leaders.html
You might want to use the google before you post declarative statements, just on the (really high) chance that you’re wrong.
I’m curious about this human tendency I’m seeing everywhere lately to try and deal with an individual’s behaviour by making global rules. People don’t seem to want to hurt the feelings of the one person who’s not complying with group norms, so they impose new, stricter rules for the whole group instead of taking that one person aside and telling them, “Hey. That’s not on.”
It’s frustrating.
Maybe “feminists want to turn men gay” is code-speak for “feminists want to turn men feminine and compliant”?
Because the only other thing I got is feminists are going to kidnap men and take them to super special secret femspitals where the doctresses inject them with some sort of sciencified gay-serum.
God only knows why I’m going to give a serious answer to a question posed by someone who thinks feminists are trying to turn men gay.
Men (generally) aren’t girl scout leaders because the whole point of the girl scouts is to foster leadership and independence in girls, and part of that is providing them strong female role models since the world at large has a disproportionate number of men in positions of authority. Gay men, OTOH, can be perfectly good role models for boys. In both cases, fear of rape is an insufficient and unjust reason to bar people from leadership. (I notice you’re failing to acknowledge that boy scouts themselves also aren’t allowed to be gay. What justification are you going to supply for that?)
That said, I’m leery of the necessity of gender segregation for kids; if problems like adults tending to give the boys more attention can be surmounted, I’d prefer to have coed organizations where adults of any gender and orientation can be leaders.
@Katz: Here in Sweden the scouts are mixed, actually. I was in the scouts when I was a kid.
About pedophilia and homosexuality… isn’t it pretty well-known that there are child-prostitutes of both genders? That in countries with an abundance of child prostitution it’s really common for GIRLS to be prostitutes from a young age? But perhaps they only have lesbian costumers?
Oh oh oh, you mean they’re made to dress in dungarees and have butch haircuts? 😛