Weakland's memoirs should be burned. .
The Archbishop writes that he knew the sexual abuse of minors and children was morally wrong, but "we" didn't know it was a crime. Huh? What? And "we" believed children would just grow up forgetting about it. His tell all book is as much of a scandal as the scandal itself. These statements betray his hardness of heart, as well as a callous disregard for the dignity of persons. Only a completely self-absorbed, narcissistic, sexual deviant could be capable of believing or even acknowledging such falsehoods. It would have been better if this guy had never been ordained...
.
Stupid is as stupid does.
.
"In the early years of the sex abuse scandal in Milwaukee, retired Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland says in his soon-to-be released memoir, he did not comprehend the potential harm to victims or understand that what the priests had done constituted a crime.
"In the early years of the sex abuse scandal in Milwaukee, retired Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland says in his soon-to-be released memoir, he did not comprehend the potential harm to victims or understand that what the priests had done constituted a crime.
.
"We all considered sexual abuse of minors as a moral evil, but had no understanding of its criminal nature," Weakland says in the book, "A Pilgrim in a Pilgrim Church," due out in June.
.
Weakland said he initially "accepted naively the common view that it was not necessary to worry about the effects on the youngsters: either they would not remember or they would 'grow out of it.'" - Source
.
Now that is a hate crime.
Posts
I wonder if the Lord will forget and grow out of it when the Archbishop's final hour is at hand.
ReplyDeleteYou cannot imagine how angry I am about this - I edited out my comments, so I wouldn't offend the 'tender-hearted'. Weakland is a gay-activist and people should see through that agenda. As Christ said about Judas - it would be better for him if he had never been born.
ReplyDeleteI use to think that Catholics were holy , and when I became Catholic my father cried, and he refused to have anything to do with me for years. Oh the crap that I had to put up with from my family. They use to sit ,and make fun of me behind my back - as a group activity. I still have protestant family who will not speak to be. Some people make big sacrafices to become Catholic. Imagine the depth of my disapointment to learn of how sinful ,and sick some of these people really are. I am heartbroken about this stuff, and on many levels.
ReplyDeleteI predict the progressives will gloss over this and rave over the book. I'm keeping my eyes open for it.
ReplyDelete"Weakland said he initially "accepted naively the common view that it was not necessary to worry about the effects on the youngsters: either they would not remember or they would 'grow out of it.'" - Source"
ReplyDeleteCOMMON VIEW?!!! This was a perception held in common by himself and others among the ordained? Is THAT what he is saying? This is outrageous and when this book hits the shelves there will be many asking the same thing and demanding answers - where is that millstone when you need it?
I have problems with his past hypocrisy -- having had a sexual relationship with someone, while operating as an ordained priest and bishop in a Church which doesn't allow that -- but I certainly don't have a problem with honesty. I will read this memoir.
ReplyDeleteYou can just about multiply his naivete on sex abuse and rehabilitation of priests by nearly the number of dioceses across the US. For every such bishop who has come out of the closet as gay, one can identify another whose crimes, re the sex scandal, are equally appaling. Some conservative ones - like Cardinal Law - even got plush assignments like the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome.
Hmm.. maybe Notre Dame faculty will ask him to be a chaplain?
ReplyDeleteWeakland apparently hasn't spoken to the mothers of sons who killed themselves because they couldn't grow out of having been ravished by a handsomely-hosted demon. Our own diocese is as notorious for its bishop as our state is for its legislators. Amid many other charges going way back and into the archdiocese, our priest-shuffler once said on tv that he thought some rape charges shouldn't be leveled against this Diocese, as the priest in question was not wearing his clerics at the time and thus was not wielding Church authority against the boy. Ugh.
Weakland's audacity tops that.. but the tie is back on, for there was that gay sexual excitement-cardiac arrest here, over which our Fella sent another priest to go tidy up from before the cops got there. That priest forgot one of the leather items as it was still on the body..ugly stuff to read in the daily newspaper, especially if grade-schoolers. The plot thickens (somehow). Since it is indeed a dirty game, the Bishop denied calling and sending him, so the priest turned around and said the Diocese had now conspired to frame him as being involved and was trying to ruin his "career."
If not for the Eucharist, and hope that the Holy Spirit is indeed cleaning house, and moving (for me, sadly) to the Maronite rite, now, and if not for believing Christ when He said the gates of hell would not prevail, I'm afraid the Catholic church in America would be even more echo-y. Ad limina visits are clearly not enough. After Sunday, I'm beginning to wonder if Rome gave up on us.
I'm with Michael.
ReplyDeleteAnd to connect it with "hate crimes" is intellectually and morally dishonest.
Not at all - the bishop is intellectually and morally dishonest.
ReplyDeleteI can think of no greater hate crime than to seduce and corrupt souls and to substitute lies for the truth. The destruction of souls is the greatest hate crime of all.
Terry, you mean to say that if the Matthew Shepherd Act were not currently up for a vote you still would have amended your original post to include "hate crime?"
ReplyDeleteIt appears as if a connection is trying to be made where one does not exist.
Oh - exactly - I see what you mean.
ReplyDeleteBut yeah, that was my point.
I also refer to abortion as a "crime against humanity" - right up there with torture and genocide.
Before becoming Archbishop of Milwaukee, Weakland was "Abbot Primate of the Order of St. Benedict." I assume that position was the head of all of the Benedictine/Cistercian/Trappist/Carthusian orders in the world.
ReplyDeleteOne assumes that he is still subject to a vow of obedience. Why the current Abbot Primate, or whoever is directly responsible for Weakland, has put restrictions on the publication of these memoirs is puzzling?
This can't be food for the order.
Of course, many Benedictine orders suffer from the same diseases as do the Jesuits.
I have never had the misfortune of being sexually abused. But I don't have any trouble imagining that it would be life-altering in an extreme way; that even after recovering and perhaps going through therapy, that the memory would never go away; any peace achieved would be an uneasy one. For people who had the charge of souls to so lack empathy and understanding that they would think ..."that it was not necessary to worry about the effects on the youngsters: either they would not remember or they would 'grow out of it.'" - is profoundly disturbing.
ReplyDeleteSo, Terry, you're upset with the former Archbishop for toeing the "party line"? Yet where's your outrage with "the party," with the system - one that includes all of the bishops and the Vatican.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to it's sad and sorry history of child sex abuse - and cover-up of these abuses, it's a sick and dysfunctional system to be sure. And yet you're trying to deflect attention from it by targeting Weakland - who at least has the courage to admit the terrible shortcomings of the system and his sad and pathetic role in it.
I wonder: is it just because he's gay that you choose to target him? Or is it because his "going public" with the truth of the moral corruption of the hierarchy on this issue?
Peace,
Michael
Bet you $5 he was molested and has pushed that to the depths of his memory.
ReplyDeleteAngela - some priests/guys who were abused liked it, which may explain why Weakland thought it wasn't a big deal - "The kid got his rocks off, big deal."
ReplyDeleteTerry, what you just wrote reminded me of an article I read about 15 years ago about 3 young brothers who had been molested by their stepfather. The man was arrested and jailed but incredibly the brothers continued to abuse each other because physically it felt good. I felt like vomitting when I read that. I threw the magazine out long ago but that horrific image is still deeply imprinted on my brain. God help us all.
ReplyDeletePS...I totally understand if you choose not to publish this comment.
Why is it when the story is "child sexual abuse" it is almost always a case of same-sex abuse.
ReplyDeleteIn fact the John Jay College of Criminal Justice (of the City University of New York) study of all of the known cases of sexual abuse charged against Church employees by 2002 determined that 83% of all of the cases were incidents of attacks on post-pubescent males (those who have reached puberty) by adult males.
The balance of the cases were some rare incidents of female abusers, and other incidents involving males with adult males, males soliciting, males with pornography, and some males with women.
Ray, the John Jay study was a survey of Catholic Church abuse.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what the same study would find with public schools? Betcha it's not a "queer" thing.
Could it have anything to do with the fact that priests are men, and that much of the abuse happened with altar BOYS?
Just thinking out loud here....
It is a hate crime, Bishop Weakland and his cognoscenti sampled from among the pretty boys of the diocese having had a meeting of the minds (i.e. conspiracy) and determined that the young ones would not remember well and that they would just get over it. This is what I am understanding. Now to me it seems that the collusion to perpetrate a sexual crime on a class of weaker individuals - underage boys - is a hate crime. Just because it was done by a GAY in priests vestments does not make it less, just being GAY does not make one above being capable of hate .
ReplyDeleteThom - studies appear to demostrate that the rate of same sex sexual abuse is pretty much the same in public schools. Check it out:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.catholicleague.org/research/abuse_in_social_context.htm
You missed my point. I wasn't speaking to the rate of molestation, but the genders and orientations of the molesters, which, conveniently, Donahue's compilation of studies didn't address, except in the priestly abuse.
ReplyDeleteOK.
ReplyDelete