UNITED STATES
The Observer
December 13, 2012
By DAN O’ROURKE , The OBSERVER
In some ironic ways, the priest pedophilia scandal in the Roman Catholic Church, which the Boston Globe revealed (and for which it won a Pulitzer Prize) did something positive for all our institutions by disclosing the sexual abuse in them.
All society’s institutions wield two-edged swords. That’s a belligerent and bloody metaphor. A better one would be that our institutions have their shadow side. They do lots of good, but they also can give rise to darkness and evil.
It’s not only our churches. The United States Military, the British Broadcasting Corp., the Boy Scouts of America, and, of course, our schools and universities come to mind.
The abuse of children is not just a Catholic problem. Many mainline Protestant churches have recognized and addressed the issue. And in Brooklyn’s ultra-orthodox Satmar Hasidic community, Nechemya Weberman, an unlicensed counselor has been convicted of abusing many young girls. This extremely strict community ostracizes and severely disciplines its adolescent girls for normal teenaged behavior. It reminds me of the agonizing and heartrending story of the Madelines in repressive Catholic Ireland in which rebellious girls were kept isolated in virtual slavery. This was as recent as 1960. That tragedy is documented in the film, “The Madeline Sisters.”
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