The buck stops where?
Damian Thompson is again upset that people think Ratzinger is implicated in the church’s cover-up of generations of child-rape and other abuse. He ought to read what Hans Kung has to say.
Is it not time for Pope Benedict XVI himself to acknowledge his share of responsibility, instead of whining about a campaign against his person? No other person in the Church has had to deal with so many cases of abuse crossing his desk…
In his 24 years as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, from around the world, all cases of grave sexual offences by clerics had to be reported, under strictest secrecy (“secretum pontificum”), to his curial office, which was exclusively responsible for dealing with them. Ratzinger himself, in a letter on “grave sexual crimes” addressed to all the bishops under the date of 18 May, 2001, warned the bishops, under threat of ecclesiastical punishment, to observe “papal secrecy” in such cases.
In his five years as Pope, Benedict XVI has done nothing to change this practice with all its fateful consequences.
I have nothing to add.
Thompson would also benefit from reading this…
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1001141.htm
Just finished reading Hans Kung’s piece. Classic! What a put down! Notice that he calls him Joseph Ratzinger throughout! That’s chutzpah!
Damian Thompson is a pet dog of the hierarchy. He’s just peeing on fire hydrants, but they’re open! His little yellow stain will simply disappear in the flood of justified opprobrium addressed to his owners.
I did notice that. Ouch. Well of course Kung has always known him as such.
Ratzi should resign. He is a disgrace.
No, NewEnglandBob, der Papenfuhrer Ratzi is not a disgrace (within the framework of the Papacy, at least): He is in fact the very essence and pinnacle of Pope-ness. Assertion of truth without any actual evidence, insistence on moral authority without any actual morality, insistence on his own absolute authority without the slightest hint of accountability – that is the stuff of which ALL Popes are made.
Der Papenfuhrer Ratzinger is not in any way an exception or aberration – he is in every way a typical Pope. He is a blatant mass murderer without the slightest hint of accountability or shame (see any of the Congregation of the Doctrine of Faith’s proclamations regarding birth control and condoms for evidence of der Papenfuhrer’s culpability for literally millions of deaths in Africa), so it is no surprise at all that he is also a deliberate concealer of child rape. Vast, impersonal, horrible evil is exactly what the Catholic Church does, and does best. Observe, if you want examples, the entire history of the Church: When in its entire history has the Catholic Church been a beacon of morality and knowledge and progress rather than the source of all oppressiveness and ignorance and evil? Pretty much never. Ask Galileo. Ask Bruno. Ask all the victims of the Inquisition. Sure, Catholic scholastics reclaimed the history of Western thought (i.e. the Greek intellectual tradition represented by Plato and Aristotle) from Arabic scholars, but even then they completely twisted and misunderstood everything those thinkers said in order to force their thoughts into a framework that supported the Church’s oppressive agenda.
Frankly, nothing but contempt and laughter should be the response to anyone who pretends to be surprised by the evidence for der Papenfuherer’s crimes: I knew all along that Ratzinger was not only aware of but complicit in spreading the HIV epidemic in Africa and concealing the child rape epidemic in the Catholic Church. And so did any and every objective outside observer. Only true believers can or ought to pretend shock or even the slightest moment of surprise at his inexcusable behavior.
Evil is as evil does – and the Catholic Church is clearly and unequivocally evil because of its actions. The last Pope, all the ridiculous sanctification of him aside, was not significantly better than this one – or he wouldn’t have hand-groomed this one for decades to succeed him. The Catholic Church could have followed the path of liberalization and progress after Vatican II: Instead, the prior and current Pope have chosen the path of regression and oppression and arch-conservative idiocy: Hate gays, oppress women, and ignore the rot at the heart of the Church – that was the agenda of John Paul II, and that’s the agenda of his successor, may they both rot in the imaginary Hell of their ludicrous Christian fantasies.
The Times (Sat. 20th) gets it wrong, (surprise, surprise):
“The Pope’s own revulsion at what has been going on for decades is not in doubt. In 2001, as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he ordered bishops to report abuse cases to the Vatican and remove abusers from contact with youth. “
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/leading_article/article7069181.ece
Well, isn’t he just the model of moral rectitude…but what about reporting all the evidence to the local authorities and letting secular justice take its course..? Ah. Not so much…
This is now so much in the public domain,I doubt if even the Catholic Church,with its deserved reputation for covering its own arse, can survive this without quietly knifing Ratzinger in the back.I’m trying to get odds from a UK bookie on Josef not being Pope by the end of the year.Of course,Ratzinger’s going won’t really change anything.His church will still be a corrupt,evil institution.