The three companies that insure the majority of Protestant churches in America say they typically receive upward of 260 reports each year of young people under 18 being sexually abused by clergy, church staff, volunteers or congregation members. The figures released to The Associated Press offer a glimpse into what has long been an extremely difficult phenomenon to pin down - the frequency of sex abuse in Protestant congregations.Fr. Jonathan Morris strikes the right note, I think.
Furthermore, the prevalence of this particular sin is a widespread cultural problem (abuse in public schools is more prevalent by several orders of magnitude) not fairly laid at the feet of churches.This bad news for Protestant Churches is sad news for all of us. I would prefer the problem be limited to any one church — even if that church were my own — because it would mean more kids would be safe. But as I have said repeatedly over the last few years, the problem of sexual abuse of minors is not an issue of religious affiliation because there is nothing religious about abusing children.
The phenomenon of sexual abuse of minors in church settings is the story of sick human beings taking advantage of their position of moral authority to prey on the weak and vulnerable. If Catholic clergy were to be faithful to their church’s teaching, there would be no abuse in the Catholic Church. The same goes for Protestant clergy. The problem, then, is not one of corrupt doctrine, but of individuals being unfaithful to the most basic precepts of their own religious belief.
Let’s be clear: the report of abuse in Protestant Churches in no way clears guilty members of the Catholic Church — neither the predators nor those who moved them from church to church and put other young people in danger. But the report does give us better perspective. The problem of sexual abuse has no denominational boundaries.Bottom line: my child is less likely to be abused in a Catholic Church than in a public school or another church, statistically speaking. The MSM disinterest in that fact inhibits the culture's taking a good look at itself and asking why it is producing so many sick people all across the board --it's more comfortable to think it's a Catholic problem. Curtsy: Mere Comments
But why, then, is there so much abuse in church settings in general? Because contemporary society is sick and it is producing so many sick people that some of these disjointed souls even end up in churches.
