VERSION|0.5.1|NAME|HarryR|DATE|1367228641|CONTENT|From the link to earlier POTD

[blockquote]Being more virtuous is what Catholics have been saying all along. It&#039;s why increasing numbers of people are looking to the Catholic church to guide them in large scale, ethical practise. You wouldn&#039;t find the Catholic church, for example, involved in a world wide cover up of a thoroughly heinous crime, convinced that with their victims sworn to silence, no one would ever find out.[/blockquote]


That&#039;s not correct. It was worse. It was not the RCC discovering, shock horror, that some clerics were paedophiles and and exploited the the trust and responsibility of the their position to torture and rape children which the RCC then resolved albeit internally without refering to local police authorities.

The RCC ruled that all cases should be investigated and dealt with solely by the Vatican under the personal direction of Ratzinger the later ex-pope. 

Far from resolving the problem and stamp it out it was simply managed and accepted as an on-going process with a hush fund with a budget of $5m per year for bribes to parents and the abused ( which should have not been accepted. What other pressure bought to bear?)

The message that sent was that it may be disapproved of (?) but was tolerated as long as it didn&#039;t go public. The evidence is that knowledge of such behaviour did not stymie a cleric&#039;s career and if necessary the vatican will always provide refuge to abusers.

The former abbot of Ealing Abbey is just one of many clerics sheltered by the vatican despite being wanted for questioning by UK police for sexual abuse charges.|IP-ADDRESS|91.64.59.122|MODERATIONFLAG|