An Evangelical Culture of abuse?

The US is currently being rent with claims of sexual harassment and assault.  The powerful #metoo meme has gone around social media, and men as well as women have been brave enough to come out as survivors of abuse.  The fall of media mogul Harvey Weinstein led to widespread denunciation, and return of his donations from politicians and universities.  Academe is jolted by revelations and is grappling with how to deal with claims old and new.

Spectacularly at odds with this, in the state of Alabama, archconservative Christian judge Roy Moore (who was removed from office twice for contempt of court) has been accused of inappropriate activity with teenage girls years ago, including sexually fondling a 14 year old.  In a relentlessly sourced report, the Washington Post has found evidence for his predilection for girls in their early teens, and this has been confirmed by the Wall Street Journal.  A former colleague remembers him hanging out with teens at malls, when he was in his 30s.

Astonishingly, the right wing has circled the wagons, and a number of evangelicals say they are MORE likely to vote for Moore given these accusations (that sound is my mind, boggling).

What's going on here?

In an op-ed in the LA Times, Kathryn Brightbill (a survivor of hard-core home school Evangelicalism) reports on a culture that blames the girls for the fall of men.

WWe need to talk about the segment of American culture that probably doesn’t think the allegations against Republican Senate candidate Roy Moore are particularly damning, the segment that will blanch at only two accusations in the Washington Post expose: He pursued a 14-year-old-girl without first getting her parents’ permission, and he initiated sexual contact outside of marriage. That segment is evangelicalism. In that world, which Moore travels in and I grew up in, 14-year-old girls courting adult men isn’t uncommon.
I use the phrase “14-year-old girls courting adult men,” rather than “adult men courting 14-year-old girls,” for a reason: Evangelicals routinely frame these relationships in those terms.

She goes on,

As a teenager, I attended a lecture on courtship by a home-school speaker who was popular at the time. He praised the idea of “early courtship” so the girl could be molded into the best possible helpmeet for her future husband. The girl’s father was expected to direct her education after the courtship began so she could help her future husband in his work. 

In retrospect, I understand what the speaker was really describing: Adult men selecting and grooming girls who were too young to have life experience. Another word for that is “predation.”

David Atkins explains,

In their world, young women are a burden to their families, a constant temptation to sin, their bodies a Devil’s playground. For them, the goal of an upstanding parent is to raise sons who will defend their honor and their heritage by any means necessary, and to raise daughters who will keep their own honor pure via chastity until they can be transferred to the “care” of an approved man in an arrangement sanctioned by both sides and by their God. From this perspective, age of consent laws are an inconvenience merely allowing more time for young women to develop rebellious habits and engage in unbecoming conduct.

The man is not at fault here, because she wickedly tempted him.  Nancy LeTourneau:

What actually shocks me is that many of Roy Moore’s defenders aren’t even bothering to defend him by denying the charges that he preyed on a 14 year-old girl. Instead, they’re saying that “there’s nothing illegal or immoral here,” or that somehow it was consensual. Just to be clear, there is no such thing as “consensual” when it comes to a sexual encounter between a 32-year-old man and a 14-year-old girl.

And this is the take-home:

Has the tribalism of our politics gone so far that people are now willing to excuse the behavior of sexual predators because they’re on “our team?” Or is there more to it than that? Frankly, this wouldn’t be the first time that I’ve heard people dismiss the sexual assault of a teenager because they are old enough to consent. This story is a reminder that there is still a lot of denial in this country about what it means to be a sexual predator.

The Vatican still doesn't get it

The Roman Catholic Papal Nuncio in the Dominican Republic, basically the Vatican's Ambassador, was discovered to be a child abuser. He was whisked back to Vatican City and laicized. From the NY Times:

But far from settling the matter, the Vatican has stirred an outcry because it helped Mr. Wesolowski avoid criminal prosecution and a possible jail sentence in the Dominican Republic. Acting against its own guidelines for handling abuse cases, the church failed to inform the local authorities of the evidence against him, secretly recalled him to Rome last year before he could be investigated, and then invoked diplomatic immunity for Mr. Wesolowski so that he could not face trial in the Dominican Republic.

The Vatican’s handling of the case shows both the changes the church has made in dealing with sexual abuse, and what many critics call its failures. When it comes to removing pedophiles from the priesthood, the Vatican is moving more assertively and swiftly than before. But as Mr. Wesolowski’s case suggests, the church continues to be reluctant to report people suspected of abuse to the local authorities and allow them to face justice in secular courts.

Meanwhile,  the Bishop in Kansas City remains in office, despite being convicted of a crime of failing to report child abuse.

RC Bishops and Accountability (Updated)

I have told you before about Roman Catholic Archbishop John Nienstedt of Minneapolis-St Paul, who is an implacable foe of marriage equality, even suggesting that parents would go to hell if they supported their gay children.  This really tore apart the Catholic community in Minnesota. And of course, MN now has marriage equality.

Recently, Abp Nienstedt has been in the hot seat over the sadly all-to-familiar accusations that he "overlooked" child abusing priests when he became Archbishop.  Apparently he was too busy attacking gay families to pay attention. This ability to "overlook" is sadly familiar.  And stonewalling appears to be a problem:

... the chief [of police] took exception to the archdiocese’s repeated assertions that it has been cooperating fully with police in those investigations. Smith said his investigators have been denied access to certain clergy members. 

“We have, through written and verbal request, made clear our desire to speak to individuals connected with the archdiocese, and we’ve been told, ‘No,’ ” Smith said.

They might want to be careful.  Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City  was actually charged in civil court, and convicted,  of neglecting to report child abuse.

Yesterday, it came out that Abp Nienstedt has himself been accused of "inappropriate touching" of a young man.  The single accusation comes from an occasion of a group photograph of confirmandi.  It may be spurious, it may be real.  The Archbishop calls the accusation entirely false. An investigation is underway.

Now, I will credit the Archbishop with one thing.  He  did exactly what he should do yesterday:  he stepped aside, at least temporarily, so this accusation could be investigated thoroughly.

 Contrast this with the situation in Kansas City . Despite an actual civil conviction, Bp Finn continues to serve.   Many commentators feel that if Pope Francis is serious about changing the culture of coverup, at the very least, Bp Finn should go.

As for Abp Neinstedt, time will tell.  If he is cleared of the current charges, can he continue as an effective leader?  Already, calls are coming for him to resign.

There is no way that Nienstedt can turn this situation around, as his faux apology, far more than these charges announced yesterday, reveals. The good of the Church, not just in St. Paul but in the entire country, requires he relinquish his office and give a new man a new start at righting the situation. That may be unfair. It is certainly unfortunate. But it is also, now, unavoidable.

Update: And meanwhile, Michael S Winters at the National Catholic Reporter, tells us this:

Nienstedt has demonstrated before that on issues related to human sexuality, something is not quite right. In 2006, while serving as the Bishop of New Ulm, Nienstedt wrote a column in his diocesan newspaper urging his flock not to attend the movie “Brokeback Mountain.” Nienstedt wrote of the movie, “The story is about two lonely cowboys herding sheep up on a mountain range. One night after a drinking binge, one man makes a pass at the other and within seconds the latter mounts the former in an act of wanton anal sex.” I must say that I never in all my years expected to read the phrase “wanton anal sex” in my diocesan newspaper. In my experience, diocesan newspapers tend to be read by an older, largely female, demographic. Did they really need to read that phrase? Why did he feel the need to include it?

Oh, my eyes....

Family values in Minnesota

The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Minneapolis and St Paul, John Nienstedt, is one of the fiercest opponents of gay rights. He led a vigorous campaign for the Minnesota Prop8-style amendment in 2012, which did not pass (in large part because of pro-equality Catholics).  He notoriously has suggested that mothers abandon their gay children for the sake of their souls, and that people who disagree ought not to take communion.  The Archdiocese attempted to indoctrinate high school students, by insulting kids with gay parents and kids who are adopted (way not to win the next generation...)  and recently stated that marriage for gays was like various forms of sexual misbehavior, and a plot of Satan.

Nienstedt is very, very, very strong on "protecting marriage" .

Protecting children, not so much.  From MPR, a sadly familiar tale of how the Archdiocese ignored evidence and covered up for a troubled priest who eventually came to abuse children,and who finally (and rightly) ended up in prison.  This went on through three archbishops.  And then there was the spinning...leading to the Archdiocese chancellor resigning.

Abp Nienstedt apparently is less concerned with protecting children than with demonizing gay families.

There's something not-quite-right about that, don't you think?

Cardinal sins

The Roman Catholic child abuse scandal percolated up again this week.  In Philadelphia, Msgr William Lynn is on trial for covering up abuse in the archdiocese.  The defense is, believe it or not, that he was "low man on the totem pole" and just following orders of the deceased Cardinal Bevilacqua.

[Marci Hamilton, a professor at Cardozo Law School says], that is not a legal defense. Under the law, Lynn had a duty to protect children. 

"He had the power to pick up the telephone to call the police," she says. "He had the power to tell parishioners the truth. He had the power to warn parents at schools. He didn't do any of that."

It is breathtaking that conservative Catholics would defend the "just following orders" defense for a man who is a priest. If anyone has a fundamental imperative to defend helpless children, wouldn't it be he?  Yet he admitted he did not follow upon on complaints.  He was a good "company man".  Regardless of the outcome of the trial, he represents a complete collapse of moral authority.

Remember, the Sandusky scandal at Penn State also reminds us that we all have an affirmative responsibility to call the police if we are aware of abuse.

Next up is our favorite mendacious Cardinal, Timothy Dolan.  Some time ago it was rumored that while Archbishop of Milwaukee, he arranged payoffs to abusive priests to get them out of the priesthood.  At that time, he dismissed such claims as "“false, preposterous and unjust".

Maybe not so much.  Reports the NY Times, 

a document unearthed during bankruptcy proceedings for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and made public by victims’ advocates reveals that the archdiocese did make such payments to multiple accused priests to encourage them to seek dismissal, thereby allowing the church to remove them from the payroll. 

A spokesman for the archdiocese confirmed on Wednesday that payments of as much as $20,000 were made to “a handful” of accused priests “as a motivation” not to contest being defrocked. … 

“It was a way to provide an incentive to go the voluntary route and make it happen quickly, and ultimately cost less,” said Jerry Topczewski, the spokesman for the archdiocese. “Their cooperation made the process a lot more expeditious.”
…
A victims advocacy group, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, sent a letter of protest to the current archbishop of Milwaukee on Wednesday asking, “In what other occupation, especially one working with families and operating schools and youth programs, is an employee given a cash bonus for raping and sexually assaulting children?"

Cardinal Dolan continues his mendacious bluster,  insisting that his religious freedom requires that non-Catholic women can't get contraception and non-Catholic gays can't marry.

Andrew Sullivan lays it on:

Dolan may recall that lying violates one of the ten commandments (which, for some mystifying reason did not include "Thou Shalt Not Have Non-Procreative Sex"). Maybe there's some exculpatory explanation for what appears to be, on its face, a bald-faced and aggressive lie. 

Hearteningly, priests in the US are beginning to join the rebellion against the hierarchy,  as apparent in these remarks by a pastor in Cleveland (in a parish newsletter no less).

The Vatican is hypocritical and duplicitous. Their belief is always that someone else needs to clean up their act; the divorced, the gays, the media, the US nuns, the Americans who were using the wrong words to pray, the seminaries, etc. It never occurs to the powers that be that the source of the problem is the structure itself…. 

 It is the last gasp for control by a dying breed, wrapped in its own self-importance. It is a struggle for the very nature of the church; who we are, how we pray, where we live, who belongs, why we believe. The early church endured a similar struggle. The old order died. The Holy Spirit won.

I wonder if he will be disciplined for this prophecy.

Protecting whose family? Roman Catholic bishops in MN and KC

The Roman Catholic archdiocese in MInnesota is mobilizing against marriage, in advance of the vote on an anti-equality amendment.

Archbishop John Nienstedt sent a letter to every priest in the state at the start of October urging them to put every Catholic church in Minnesota to work passing a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage....

The archbishop said it wants priests in every parish to identify a “church captain” in order to create an “ad hoc committee” in every church in the state. The “church captain” is a component of the Schubert Flint strategy used in 2008′s divisive Proposition 8 battle in California...

Nienstedt wrote [:] “The sanctity of marriage and vital role of the family is at stake. It is a firmly-held teaching of our church that a marriage is a union of a husband and a wife, and that they together are the ones suited to be a father and a mother.”

Because after all, two happily married gay people are monstrous threat to children and family, unlike the Roman Catholic hierarchy. Of course, previously, Abp Nienstedt suggested that parents should reject their gay children to save their own souls:

those who could not agree with "the teachings of the Catholic Church on homosexuality ... ought not participate in the sacramental life of the church." The archbishop added that the mothers' "eternal salvation" could depend on their adopting the church's position on homosexuality.

And then of course, there's the Church's stallwart defense of family and children in the Diocese of Kansas City

On Friday, prosecutors in Kansas City, Mo., secured an indictment from a grand jury that alleges Bishop Robert Finn neglected to inform the police for months after discovering "hundreds of disturbing images of children" on a priest's laptop in December 2010, including photographs focused on the crotch, up-skirt pictures and at least one image of a child's naked vagina. The offending priest — Shawn Ratigan — was relieved of his position as a church pastor and transferred to a convent, but neither the police, his parishioners nor parents of students at a nearby Catholic school were informed of the pictures until May 2011. In the interim, Ratigan continued to attend events involving children, including birthday parties and a first communion, and allegedly attempted to take lewd pictures of a 12-year-old girl. Finn and Ratigan have both pleaded not guilty to the charges against them.

Hypocrites.

UpdateDr Primrose points out that the Episcopal Bishop of MN has come out against the amendment. Similar to what happened in NY and before that in CA, where the contrast between TEC and RC bishops was very striking.

Update 2: yes, this is legal. Churches can campaign on social issues. TEC can campaign pro marriage, and the RC (to their credit) have typically been positive voices for the immigrants. That's not the point. The point is the double standard on children, what it means to campaign to deny non-Catholics their civil rights, and the hypocrisy of logs and motes....

We want answers

Another report of a predator being sued for child abuse. Lest you think only the Roman Catholics have this happening - the latest one involves a man who was a known predator and yet was ordained an Episcopal priest by none other than our own Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori when she was bishop of Nevada. He told her he had abused at least one young person. But still he was allowed to go forward in the process. Every Episcopal priest knows that abusers never stop abuse - we are required to take abuse prevention courses. Bishops are responsible for seeing that all the clergy and leaders and anyone with contact with children take the prevention training. There is no "not knowing" that such a person cannot be put in a position of power like that of a priest.

I am stunned that of all people Katharine went ahead and ordained this man. It is time for the church to come clean on all the cases that are being stonewalled. The health of the church and justice for victims is at stake. We cannot hide behind a veil of secrets and attorneys. I have heard many stories of those who cannot get justice if things move beyond the diocesan level or need the national church to act (for instance in the case of bishops or cases that cross diocesan boundaries). Bishop Paul Marshall alludes to this issue in his comments at Episcopal Café. SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) is calling for action and truth telling.

Hopefully any who have suffered from the treatment by the Episcopal Church will come forward and know they are not alone. The Presiding Bishop and her staff need to speak -- the sooner the better - it can no longer be hidden.

For more read here and here with links to the press reports and Parry's full statement of all the abuse.

Vatican rejects resignations

From Ireland. Dublin Archbishop blocked from child abuse clean up:

Dublin Archbishop Diarmuid Martin has told priests that the Vatican has rejected the resignations of his two auxiliary bishops following their reported involvement in the Roman Catholic Church's cover-up of child abuse.

The Vatican's rebuff deals a blow to Martin, a veteran Vatican diplomat who was appointed in 2004 to lead Ireland's most populous diocese through a growing storm of child-abuse scandals. From the start he has clashed with predecessors who suppressed reports of child molestation and transferred abusive priests to new parishes in Ireland, Britain and the United States.
...
Victims groups said Wednesday they were disgusted, but not surprised, that the Vatican had decided to back Walsh and Field rather than Martin.

"All this abuse was covered up by successive Dublin archbishops and in the full knowledge of every auxiliary bishop until Martin's arrival. On those grounds, every single bishop involved in the governance of the Dublin Archdiocese until 2004 ought to have resigned by now," said Andrew Madden, a former altar boy who became the first Irish victim to go public with an abuse lawsuit against the church in 1995.
....
Analysts said the Vatican had sent a strong message to Martin not to criticize colleagues in public again.