them. Why do they need them to worship their God? I don't get it and I doubt I will
ever understand it.

It's not as easy as it sounds though. There's the indoctrination to overcome, the this is going to upset my family, etc.

My Mom actually understood my decision. She rejected a lot of the church's politics but she truly believed in God and the prayers she was saying. I kind of felt bad for her because she didn't like to go places by herself, and when both my sister and I quit going to mass, she wouldn't go either. I know she missed the comfort of it, but it was a no win situation. The hypocrisy in the sermons used to make me boiling mad and it took a Herculean effort to keep quiet and sit there. One day in the middle of one I just looked at my Mom and said "I'm sorry I just can't do this anymore." I've only been back for family funerals and a couple of remembrance services for my Mom.

I wasn't sexually assaulted but I was beaten a few times and verbally abused on almost a daily basis in Kindergarten, first grade, and sixth grade by nuns and lay teachers whom I wouldn't have let care for a pet, let alone a child. I know people have positive Catholic School experiences and that's great for them but mine was a nightmare. My doctors believe it played a significant role in my developing recurring bouts of severe depression and anxiety, and avoidant personality disorder. I don't have a great deal of self esteem and had to be declared disabled.

I know it's the past, I should forgive, forget, etc, stop letting them ruin my life, but it still hurts and it still ticks me off that they never ask for forgiveness for what they've done to so many of their parishioners that trusted them, and yet they call us the sinners and want us to beg them for God's forgiveness. I don't think that anger is going away anytime soon. My Mom did say she was sorry she sent me there and didn't transfer me to the Public Schools until highschool. I forgave her.


I apologize if this is TMI in response and again I am only speaking from my experience.

it is none of my business how one chooses to worship..I have no issues with that. What I
am struck by and find so hard to understand is how one reconciles the over reach of
power by this established church..they seem lawless to me. I get that lawyers can say
to them, this is what we can do to protect you, but in the end, it is the church who
decides to go forward with these actions..that is mind boggling to me and why I have
no understanding why their members continue to support them.

I am sorry you suffered under any ones hands..so awful. Sounds like you and your
Mom are in a good place too..good on the both of you.

If the church truly wants to redeem itself, it would not be pulling things like hiding money that rightly and legally belongs to the victims. People should be allowed their own faiths true but freedom of religion shouldn't act as prosecutorial immunity for clergy who commit criminal acts, or the sentences imposed on them.

I don't understand how people justify it and stay, but then again I don't know how people justify staying Republican either with all they pull.

Dante did have places in Hell for clergy; I think the ones walking along in red hot lead robes were convicted of Simony (the buying or selling of ecclesiastical privileges). So how about these guys?

I am so disgusted by this. How can anyone be faithful to the church after hearing about this?

I look forward to the day when organized religion is a quaint memory.

A few thoughts from Steven Weinberg, Nobel Laureate in Physics:

"I can hope that this long sad story, this progression of priests and ministers and rabbis and ulamas and imams and bonzes and bodhisattvas, will come to an end. I hope this is something to which science can contribute ... it may be the most important contribution that we can make."

"Good people will do good things, and bad people will do bad things. But for good people to do bad things -- that takes religion.

"Though aware that there is nothing in the universe that suggests any purpose for humanity, one way that we can find a purpose is to study the universe by the methods of science, without consoling ourselves with fairy tales about its future, or about our own."

And one from the wonderful Douglas Adams:

"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?

nothing less than total decimation.

Since it's inception (the tragic compromise of Emperor Constantine in 325 AD), it has been nothing more than a vessel for the power hungry.

What the church has argued and agreed by the lower court is that religious institutions can get away with anything (including criminal acts such as rape/molestation) as their "religious liberty" trumps all, including the rights of others.

How can we be a free and just nation if this ruling is allowed to stand.

all aspects of life. If you want to understand what the Bishops and Cardinals really believe, listen to the insidious Bill Donahue of the Catholic League. He has called for the RCC to recapture control over all aspects of society.

in twice the known life of the universe.

Tch.

I predict at least three!

seriously, it is disgusting

A criminal cult. The hard hand of law needs to nail the entire entity.

Heads will roll.

that's what they tole me when I wuz a kid.

Would they lie?

for religious exemption to be valid - wouldn't that mean that sexual abuse and rape are part of the religious doctrine, and thus exempt per "religious freedom"?

Implied application per the "religious freedom" defense:

"I am sorry you were raped, but it is a protected action since it was done by a priest, and is thus covered by religious freedom - because it is part of the (non-disclosed to church goers) religious doctrine of the church."

WTH????

The second thing I thought was "Is this REALLY the message they want to be sending -- that this is an integral part of Catholicism?"

how dare those drunks in dresses and red shoes make any excuse for preserving their ill gotten money conned out of fools putting their money in the Sunday collection box. The clergy sux.

3 different priests at my Cambridge school were drunks.

That said,I haven't been a Catholic for 40 years,at least,I just hate generalizations.

Haven't been a catholic for 55 years.

I for one, am proud to be a 'fallen catholic'. Its all about their money. You know the money, that comes from the poor peasants, of third world countries. True men of god and their vow of poverty.

While the government is expected to give wide berth in matters of religious sentiment it has long been established that if there is a compelling state interest the law trumps.

I'm pretty sure conspiring to conceal predatory crimes would -- and ought -- to qualify.

If an organization is convicted of a crime in a court of law it follows that it is subject to the penalties for that crime. Period. Jesus would likely have agreed.

is going to be much amused or moved by that argument.

about religious freedom.