Sexual Abuse of Children

It seems that the situation must be very different from here (or Europe) to the USA:
most sexual abuse here is done by the parents and close relatives.

Walter, I think for the most part that is the case here in the U.S. too. The news about the ongoing abuse from priests has opened a whole new can of worms.

This topic just brings me to tears. How can a
person - sworn to vows - trusted by church
members, do such a horrible thing to a child?
The damage done now - but the after effects
on the unprotected young person's life may
well give them a skewed and terrible outlook
on life, love, sexuality. There is NO GREATER
SIN than to harm even one hair on the head
of a child.

I would rather agree with Mr. Hinteler. Priests do not hold "monopoly" on the sexual abuse of children. I cannot provide a link right now, but I have read once some report online that stated that the most frequent abusers of kids were relatives, neighbors and friends of family. Teachers also appeared in the list, and their percentage was higher than this of the clergymen. I do not advocate the lusty clergymen (I think that they should be immediately fired from the church-related organizations and their employment in future in the churches to be prohibited -- in addition to criminal punishment), but I have an opinion on all this scandal, where the priests' role was accented: someone was interested in decreasing of influence of the church on the society in the USA. I would not wonder if later it is disclosed that some Islamic fund financed all this media campaign.

That sounds a bit paranoid to me. American media loves sex scandals and nobody has to fund it.

Stats in the Educational System

Victim Characteristics.
The victims of sexual abuse reported to the Division in 1988 were typically female (75%). Nearly half (47%) of the victims were between the ages of six and eleven. Thirty percent were 12 years old and over, and 24 percent were 5 years old and under. Of the reported victims of sexual abuse, 22 percent previously had been victims of sexual abuse substantiated by the Division.

Offender Characteristics.
In 39 percent of the cases the perpetrator was not related to the victim. Of those perpetrators related to the victims, 15 percent were fathers and 14 percent were siblings. Also noteworthy was that stepfathers and uncles each represented 9 percent of the total number of cases.

Nearly half (42 percent) of the perpetrators were 19 years old or under, with the largest group (33%) being between the ages of 12 and 19. The next largest category were the perpetrators in their thirties (22 percent), followed by those in their twenties (16 percent).

http://www.jrsa.org/pubs/forum/archives/Mar92.html

Sexual Abuse Stat by Dr. Faulkner

Steissd, you and Walter are, of course, correct in saying that most child sexual abuse occurs in the child's intimate network - however, to then leap to the thought tha publicity about the uncovering of sexual abuse in the churches is an Islamic plot is pretty out there!

I think that it being "accented" is a recognition of the degree of betrayal involved in abuse by those whose care-taking role is seen, by the institution involved, to transcend the merely temporal - and also concern about the ways in which the churches are thought to have been prepared to cover up this abuse - eg simply moving priests/ministers on.

IF it is being unduly "accented" I believe this would be due to the normal sensationalism of the media. I know these things can become a witch hunt, but I also just how powerful are the societal and intra-psychic forces which cover up abuse...

Mr. de Kere, I agree that any media like to publicize sex scandals, but the fact that priests, and not teachers were put into its center makes me think that it was inspired by the enemies of the Christian church. I do not suspect atheists and liberals, I believe in their decency. But Islam teaches its adherents that any method that may defeat the enemy is morally justified; therefore, I think that this scandal was inspired by Islamists. They did the same thing the extreme conservative did with the story of Mr. Clinton and Miss Lewinsky -- exaggerated it beyond any proportion. I agree that children should be protected from abusers, but this does not mean that any of the Christian churches should be continuously denigrated in mass media.

I fail to see the logic in accusing the followers of Islam for that. Who exactly would fund it? And how would they fund it? Would they pay Americans to be interested in the sex lives of others?

As far as I know America has always loved sex scandals. The notion that another religion is behind it is the most far fetched theory (IMO) that I've seen on this site thus far.

After all, Christianity was not denigrated, Catholicism was. Most people pinned it on Catholics and not the religion.

In any case it's a very outlandish idea and the implementation of such a plot would become public knowledge. Scandals have staying power when people show an interest in the story. You can't easily buy that and you certainly can't do it in secret.

Since one religion trying to take down another religion in this manner is a much more interesting story it would be incongruous if your theory didn't get picked up by those scandal hounds.

Are you really serious that you think that kind of media scandal can be bought secretly?

I do not think that potential of the psychological warfare should be underestimated. Islamic terrorists know well that Christianity is one of the core values of the American moral, and they may tend to undermine its positions. The Roman Catholic church is a large organization, and it is statistically probable that among its numerous clergy there may be trespassers: sexual abusers, drug takers, embezzlers, etc. The aim of the campaign was to undermine the reputation of the world largest and the most influential Christian church by accentuating negative events and making generalizing conclusions.
Undermining of national moral of the leading Western countries was always an aim of both terror organizations and rogue regimes. Some of the Mideastern terror groups see in drugs trafficking not only a source of moneymaking, but an efficient weapon demoralizing the "imperialists"' population. The Soviet secret services in late '50s (I am not sure of the date) hired Neo-Nazis and ordered them to launch a series of vandalism acts against Jewish property (cemeteries, synagogues, etc.) in FRG: the aim was to affect prestige of the West German democracy in the world. The KGB officer responsible for the action was Maj.-General Ivan Agayanz.
Psychological warfare decreases readiness of nation to resist the enemies and alleviates achievement of their evil goals. I regard the recent anti-Catholic campaign as a part of a clandestine psychological war against the USA that is led by Al Qaeda and similar groups.
I must add some clarification: I am not a Roman Catholic myself, so I do not pursue any goal of personal defense.

Steissd - I cannot speak for other countries, but here in Australia, at least, the education system began grappling with the notion of abuse by teachers years ago, and developed a reasonably transparent process for dealing with allegations - I think the churches have seriously lagged behind in such matters.

I think you must also agree that the churches, because of the very intimate nature of some of the functions of their various institutions - eg children's homes, children's groups, pastoral care etc - have perforce placed their people in situations of great power and intimacy - and hence temptation.

I do NOT think there is anything especially "evil' or weak about clergy and religious (although some predators will choose certain lines of work because of the opportunities they give for their activities - like youth workers and so on) - in my experience, (and I have worked for 14 years as a therapist in the area of CSA), opportunity - especially in the presence of power - means a certain number of people will abuse their charges. Some populations have more opportunity.... so it goes. It is in the DEALING with such matters that institutions must be judged - and I think the churches have had great difficulty - not surprisingly - with this.

Craven says: "After all, Christianity was not denigrated, Catholicism was. Most people pinned it on Catholics and not the religion."

(Will I EVER work the wretched quote function correctly? Grrrr)

It seems to be Catholics in the news right now - but ALL the churches are grappling with this one!

steissd,

A: Christianity has nothing to do with the morals of my country. It's just a silly religion like all others.

B: America is not very Catholic, undermining America by undermining Catholicism is a stretch.

C: There is no "campagin" to credit to the terrorists. First you have to prove that one exists. What I've seen is that the media has harped on a sex scandal (which is nothing new). The media is predominantly secular (thank goodness!) and might have their own agenda but there is certainly no organized campaign except in the minds of conspiracy theorists.

Simply put, it's a stretch to establish the notion that the scandals are a concerted campaign and an even greater one to attribute this to Islamic terrorists.

This is nothing like ordering hate crimes. You are suggesting a degree of manipulation that the US government would be hard pressed to acheive. Add to that the fact that the motives you suggest are weak motivation for someone to undertake this (if you indeed think this was a bought campaign then what was the return on the money invested?).

Any factual basis to this conspiracy theory or is the theory of your own creation?

Of course, I agree that the attack was aimed only on the Roman Catholic church and not on all the Christian churches; but when there is a fire in some neighborhood, none of the neighbors may feel safe...
I strongly believe that absolute majority of the Christian ministers are fair and decent people having nothing to do with sexual abuse, even if their position renders them certain opportunities for doing this.

Deb,

What churches are grappling with this? Sure, all humankind is dealing with these horrors but do you have any statistics on declining congregations, donations etc to other Churches?

If I had any proofs of my assumption, I would not discuss it here, I would share the information I possess with the FBI and security services of my country. It is an assumption, nothing more than that.

Ok, good to know something of that magnitude didn't slip under my radar.

Craven - I can only speak for my own country on this one, since I have not been following any hullabaloo in the American media about the matter - we ae in the midst of our own hullabaloo, and that is more than enough for me - nor did I realise anyone was attributing declining congregations and donations to the Catholic church to sex scandals - is this attribution being made in the USA? Here, ALL churches are suffering from these things - (well, the very fundamentalist charismatic ones seem to be doing ok).

Here, in Oz, I am aware that the Church of England is struggling with this matter - quite publicly - especially since the current Governor General - an ex-Anglican Bishop - has been publicly accused of covering up sexual abuse by Anglican clergy, and such accusations have been specifically, as well as generally, made about other leaders in both the Anglican and Catholic churches.

Other churches are also struggling with it - most especially any churches (many) which have run orphanages in the past - bearing in mind that there is a special scandal involving the abuse (sexual and otherwise) of many children who were exported to Australia after the war - apparently to get them away from poverty and bad parents in Great Britain - and abuse of the many part-Aboriginal children who were taken from their parents (whether for eugenic or protection purposes, she said cynically and bitterly) from the 1920's up until the late sixties and placed largely in the care of various church institutions - just as Native American and First Nation children were in the USA and Canada - ( I think Canada has a major head start on Oz, at least, in confronting and attempting to deal with this issue - but, as usual, I digress..)

I seem to have an inability today to make a sentence short or coherent - sorry.

I will try to look up articles if you like - want me to?