BALTIMORE (MD)
Post Examiner
Sept. 3, 2019
By Bill Hughes
Now, let’s shift over to another kind of evil. In this one, which recently came to public notice, children have been targeted as victims by members of the clergy. I’m referring to the horrific sexual scandal of the pedophile, children-abusing priests engulfing the Roman Catholic Church. It truly shocked the world. I have to wonder what Jung would have said about this kind of clerical sickness. We’re talking here about evil on a massive human scale. Law enforcement officials are working tirelessly to get to the bottom of it.
We already knew the RC Church in this county had a very poor record in opposing the endless, immoral wars that have engulfed this nation since WWII. From the horrific Vietnam conflict to the wars in Iraq, the most you could get out of the RC Church was some bland statement on the subject filled with pious nonsense.
Here are some hard statistics about the pedophile-priest scandal: as of June 1, 2018, the number of priests accused of sexually abusing children in the U.S. stands at 6,846, while the currently known victims total 19,001. The authority for these mind-blowing numbers is the BishopAccountability.org website. This site continues to be updated.
One of the states leading the way in bringing these evil-doing priests, and their disgusting protectors in the church hierarchy to justice, has been Pennsylvania. More than 1,000 young victims were identified in a sweeping Grand Jury Report, which was released on August 14, 2018, by its intrepid Attorney General, Josh Shapiro. (USA Today.) Kudos to Mr. Shapiro.
The report went on to state: “Church leaders…were more interested in safeguarding the church and the abusers than tending to their victims…Priests were raping little boys and girls and the so-called “men of God” who were responsible for them not only did nothing: They hid it all.” More than 300 predator priests were named in the damning report. It can be found at: https://www.inquirer.com/philly/news/catholic-church-clergy-sex-abuse-read-the-full-grand-jury-report-20180814.html
(I strongly recommend, if you have the stomach for it, to read this report in its entirety. It is beyond shocking.)
A tip of the hat to Maryland’s Attorney General, Brian Frosh, who soon followed the Pennsylvania precedent. He began opening a process on September 21, 2018, that allowed local victims of an abuser at a school or place of worship to contact his office.
The Archdiocese of Baltimore updated their list of Religious Brothers and Priests accused of child sex abuse on July 23, 2019. It can be found here. at The 23 names recently added bring the total to 126 accused child sex abusers.
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