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Old 29-05-2015, 04:37 AM
anditmakesmewonder anditmakesmewonder is offline
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I don't think celibacy should be blamed, you know? I mean, when they decide to join the church they know they make vows and what they stand for, it's not like it was suddenly imposed.
Only exception being married priests when this celibacy was imposed by some pope I don't recall the name right now many years ago. They said even the married ones were prohibited of having intercourse with their wives.

From all I know celibacy is way to try to keep priests away from the worries of a family so they can focus in God and their "extended family"(people that go to church, confess, seek advice, etc).

Anyways, ok, let's say a priest(or nun) believes he can handle celibacy but then (s)he can't, the right thing to do is seek some advice about it and/or simply leave his position. It's the moment they need to decide what they really want. If they love God they know they won't be punished if they have to leave. Sure some people are almost obliged by family to be priest, some because of parents promises or sense of duty, which means that they don't have a vocation for it.

There are some churches, religions that allow their leaders to marry. Quite a number of priests and nuns give up their position because they fell in love and so they get married. See? No harm done to anyone. Just be honest about who you are, how hard can this be?

Now, there are priests that were caught with prostitutes. Breaking their vows but at least they didn't molested anyone, big difference.
I remember also a case of a priest harassing sexually another priest that complained about it publicly and he was removed from his position. This is another thing, it seems some priests(and possibly nuns, though I haven't really heard about it) are homosexual and choose to live in celibacy as way to escape the temptation, like they believe they will be safe there. Homosexuality is not seen with good eyes by the bible and so some of them that had such a rigorous and religious upbringing would rather "find shelter" than act out their real selves. This obviously may go wrong, as they will be too close to lots of men(or women) and so cases like the one I mentioned happen. However this doesn't mean that these people will molest anyone, any child.

Molesters, well, one can only wonder what happened to themselves in their childhood, but we can't really take this into account generally speaking as it is really particular to which case. One thing for sure is that they like to be in position of power, like priest and teachers, that children are usually taught not to question their motivations or have their complains dismissed.

Not sure if you've seen but
Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2111478/
is a documentary about an unsolved case that ended up with the molester/rapist still being buried when he died as an honorable priest, despite at some point he admitting his crimes and saying that he did it to free them(deaf boys) of their sins or some nonsense like that. It's really outrageous to see a nun that was taking care of him(as he was old) saying to one of the victims to forgive and forget like God teaches us to do.

Btw, one priest that tried to help the victims in this case had left the church and was admittedly gay. The accusations never really went anywhere, last attempts of getting justice were at the time of Pope Benedict XVI, I guess. Not sure if it's because I'm a woman, but it made me cry.

Karma, reincarnation, childhood aside...
Some people that were molested/raped don't end up doing the same. Some people that weren't molested/raped may do it. Some people that were molested/raped do the same to other people. Things is, most of people that doesn't have any help to deal with traumas and abuse in life may end up doing bad things, while some overcome it, with love, therapy, spiritual support, etc.

I fail to remember her name but there was a case of a girl that was sexually abused by her father. She had a younger brother, her mom died at his birth. Her father apparently started being bad after his wife's death, abusing her, not even giving proper food to them. When police finally rescued them they were malnourished and mentally damaged. (they were like 4 and 1 year old)
The kids were adopted by a family, but they didn't know how far the abuse had gone and then that girl tried to kill her brother(beating his head to the floor) and molested him. She also had nightmares about the abuse suffered and made drawings of it. She was sent to an institution and the family gave up her and kept only her brother. It seems there's no info available to how her brother ended up, but she was the most damaged one by her father and apparently the only one sexually abused by him.
There is literally a very sad video of her, a child, saying that she wants to kill her adopted family and brother, how she plans to do it, no sign of emotion at all while being asked about it.
Anyways she remained being treated and eventually somebody else adopted her and nowadays she's a functional stable woman that tries to help other survivors of abuse.


And there are cases like one guy, I know nothing about his life, and I'm inclined to believe the amount of time he spent in jail he had no psychological support. He was in jail because he was a rapist, the years went by and he was finally free. In the same week he raped 6 other girls in the neighborhood(and nearby hoods) I live and went back to jail. How likely is he to heal? To become a good, functional human being? Unfortunately cases like this make us think that they should remain locked. However as I said, I doubt the prison system really did anything to "change" him.

Now back to the subject, rapist/molester priesst are really "sick" when we think of it, because we see or a taught to assume them to be someone to ask for advice, support, comfort, etc Also the belief that they're faithful to God, honesty and all things that are "preached"... But in the end they are human beings like us, qualities and flaws.
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