PHILIPPINES
Philippine Daily Inquirer
October 8, 2018
By Ramon Farolan
First, I was an Aglipayan. Shortly after my mother passed away, my surrogate mom who raised me as her own, had me rebaptized in the Catholic Church by Belgian missionaries. Since then, I have remained a Catholic although not the fervent, devout kind she would have wanted me to be.
Through the years, I have looked upon the Church as all-knowing, all-powerful, all-righteous, and perhaps, all-perfect. And so, whenever I went against her it was heavy on my conscience with the fires of hell very much in my thoughts as impressed on me by religious mentors in Catholic schools. As a young boy, how many times have I confessed to having impure thoughts when there was nothing else to say in the confessional?
For the past few months, the Church has been rocked by scandal involving sexual abuse in particular, of minors by members of the clergy. In the beginning, they were seen as isolated cases but as more and more news reports appeared on the subject, it has become apparent that sexual abuse by the clergy is one of the major problems of the Church. It is not only worldwide in extent but it also appears to permeate its ranks, from deacons, priests, bishops, archbishops, and even cardinals. Many are involved in the actual abuse of children but some are cases of cover-up or failure to take action by higher authorities.
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