The Catholic Thing: When Men of the Cloth Do Wicked Things

By Filip Mazurczak, The Catholic Thing, 28, 2018

It’s quite clear that 2018 has not been a good year for the Catholic Church. With the Cardinal McCarrick affair, the damning Pennsylvania grand jury report, and ongoing clerical scandals in Australia, Chile, Germany, and elsewhere, controversies over the Youth Synod and homosexuality, coverage of the Catholic Church in the secular media has overwhelmingly focused on priestly sexual abuse and cover-ups by bishops.

Rather than causing us to grow discouraged in our faith, however, revelations of misconduct committed by men and women of the Church should be an opportunity for our personal conversion and a call for greater public Christian witness.

When we read about crimes against young people by priests, we should keep things in perspective. In his study Pedophiles and Priests, historian and criminal justice expert Philip Jenkins (an Episcopalian who left the Catholic Church decades ago, and therefore cannot be accused of pro-Catholic bias) estimates that between 1.5 and 3.5 percent of Catholic priests in the United States may have engaged in the sexual abuse of minors….continue reading…..https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2018/10/28/when-men-of-the-cloth-do-wicked-things/