Blaine: To
Ruben, Kevin and Dean--I was just wonderin--have your guys
been street-preaching to any of these priests?
washingtonpost.com
Nearly 4,500 Priests Accused of Abuse, Draft Report
Finds By Alan Cooperman Nearly 4,500 Roman Catholic priests have been accused of sexually abusing a
total of 11,000 children in the United States between 1950 and 2002, CNN
reported yesterday, citing a draft of a study scheduled for release at the end
of the month by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Those figures are two to three times as high as previously reported, but
senior Catholic officials have warned for weeks that the study's findings could
be "startling" if viewed in isolation. While victims groups contend that the numbers of victims and abusers are
probably even higher, Catholic leaders say that no other large religious group,
corporation or profession has conducted a similar self-examination. "We're the only institution in the country that has done a study like this,
so it's hard to compare," Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick of Washington said in
an interview last week. The study was commissioned 11 months ago by the National Review Board, a
panel of prominent lay Catholics appointed by the bishops conference. It hired
researchers at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York to collect and
analyze confidential data reported voluntarily by U.S. dioceses. The goal is to produce the first full accounting of the "nature and scope" of
sex abuse in the church, including the number of accused priests; the number,
age and gender of the alleged victims; and how much money the church has spent
on legal fees, settlements and psychological counseling. Worried that someone might leak partial data to advance a particular cause,
the review board warned last year that if any findings were made public before
Feb. 27, it would immediately release the entire study to avoid any
misrepresentation. But the board backed away from that position yesterday. Its members declined
to confirm or deny the CNN report, although they suggested that CNN may have
obtained preliminary figures that John Jay researchers gave to some board
members to aid in the writing of a companion report on the "causes and context"
of the scandal. "We are awaiting the receipt of the John Jay report, which is still in the
process of being written," said Washington lawyer and board member Robert S.
Bennett. "We're still drafting our report, and they're still drafting their
report, and as far as we're concerned, the 27th is when both will be
released." Another board member, former Clinton White House chief of staff Leon E.
Panetta, said, "We're all a little frustrated that this thing has leaked out."
Noting that the CNN report contained a brief summary of the scandal's possible
causes, he said, "It appears that somebody is piecing together bits of
information." CNN's report gave only a smattering of details and no information on the
financial cost of the scandal or the gender of the victims. It said 78 percent
of the 11,000 alleged victims were between the ages of 11 and 17, 16 percent
were 8 to 10 years old, and nearly 6 percent were 7 or younger. Of the 4,450 accused priests, it said, more than half faced a single
allegation, 25 percent faced two or three allegations, 13 percent had four to
nine allegations, and 3 percent had 10 or more allegations. David Clohessy, national director of the 4,600-member Survivors Network of
Those Abused by Priests, said that if more than half the priests faced a single
allegation, "then it's obvious there are many, many victims out there who have
yet to come forward." "No one who knows anything about sexual abuse thinks it's a one-time event,"
Clohessy added. "This is just a self-reported survey, not an independent study,
much less a thorough investigation. Common sense tells us the real numbers are
much higher." When the John Jay researchers sent out a request for information to all 195
U.S. dioceses last spring, some bishops balked, and the original chairman of the
National Review Board, former Oklahoma governor Frank Keating (R), said church
leaders were acting like "La Cosa Nostra" in their devotion to secrecy. Keating subsequently resigned, and the board's remaining members made
extensive efforts to repair relations with the bishops. Ultimately, all but a
few bishops provided confidential information for the study, and many have made
public the results of their reviews of local church records. As of Monday,
according to the Associated Press, 84 dioceses had publicly reported a total of
2,990 claims of abuse against 1,413 clergy members since 1950. Among the most controversial findings in the final report will be the
percentage of U.S. priests accused of abuse. There are about 46,000 active
priests today, but the number who have served since 1950 is far higher. CNN did
not say what percentage has been accused. The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights issued a report this month
concluding that the incidence of sexual abuse of minors "is slightly higher
among the Protestant clergy than among the Catholic clergy" and "is
significantly higher among public school teachers." But it was unclear how the
league could have reached that conclusion before the percentage of alleged
abusers in the priesthood has been made public.
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- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/child abuse victims Blaine Borrowman
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/child abuse victims Kevin Deegan
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/child abuse vic... Kevin Deegan
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/child abuse... Blaine Borrowman
- RE: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/child a... David Miller
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/ch... Blaine Borrowman
- RE: [TruthTalk] Catholic priests/ch... Kevin Deegan
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic priest... Blaine Borrowman
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic pr... Kevin Deegan
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic pr... Kevin Deegan
- Re: [TruthTalk] Catholic pr... Blaine Borrowman