Cardinal Schönborn says celibacy partly to blame for clerical sex abuse

A cardinal seen as a future candidate for the papacy has broken a Vatican taboo by raising the possibility that priestly celibacy is among the causes of the sex abuse scandal sweeping the Roman Catholic Church.

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, the Archbishop of Vienna and a protégé of Pope Benedict XVI, wrote in his archdiocese's magazine this week that the Church must make an "unflinching examination" of the causes of the scandal.

He said that these included "the issue of priests' training, as well as the question of what happened in the so-called sexual revolution of the generation of 1968".

He added: "It also includes the question of priest celibacy and the question of personality development. It requires a great deal of honesty, both on the part of the Church and of society as a whole."

His remarks came days after Father Hans Kung, the dissident Catholic theologian, blamed the Church’s “uptight” views on sex for child abuse scandals in Germany, Ireland and the US.

The cardinal's spokesman, Erich Leitenberger, later issued a "clarification" claiming that the cardinal was not "in any way seeking to question the Catholic Church's celibacy rule" after headlines in the German and Italian press such as "Schönborn says priestly abuse is the fault of celibacy" and "Celibacy must be reconsidered, Schönborn says".

<SNIP>http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article7058065.ece

could always have had affairs with adult, consenting people but chose to prey upon children.

Brave man.

that being said, I think celibacy should be optional for priests but that's my opinion.

The priesthood is attractive to pedos: "There's something wrong with me--I'm different than other people. I don't see myself getting married, anyway, but I do love kids. I know! The priesthood! God will cleanse me of these satanic thoughts if I serve him." I recognize that that is not the inner motivation for the vast majority of priests, but you can see how someone who is sexually oriented toward children, who knows that they OUGHT to be celibate, might find the priesthood an alternative to becoming a monster. Except, of course, when they find that they still have these feelings, and access to children, and the desire to act on them.

The celibacy requirement attracts people who are sexually repressed including those who are trying to control feelings of pedophilia and self-hating homosexuals. If I put god in charge, he will keep me from sin. Well, they get in a find a culture that enables pedophilia. It even provides cover for a lack of a regular family life. So I think the celibacy requirement is at the heart of the problem. Besides, sexual repression makes people capable of doing things that normally they would not.

institution. It seems clear that many, if not most, of those accused of sexual offenses went into the priesthood because they thought that the systemized celibacy would prevent them from following the urges they already felt. Instead, they wound up as symbols of authority and given complete confidence and trust and access to children.

Instead of going into the priesthood they needed to go into therapy. The priesthood only made easier what they were trying to avoid.

And dogma that commands obedience to these abusers, and calls sex shameful.

Then he is part of the problem.

If they want to be a Priest they know the rules. If they can't follow them, that's their problem, not the rule's problem.

It was orginally adopted to prevent there being legitimate offspring of the clergy. This prevented the disolution of church property by its being passed from a clergyman to his sons through inheritance. In the Middle Ages, church property was often owned directly by members of the clergy.

needs to end. No, mandatory celibacy isn't the cause of sexual abuse of whatever stripe - there are lots of sex abusers who are neither Catholic nor in a profession that allegedly requires celibacy. But revisiting mandatory celibacy for clergy by the Church is something I'm in favor of and hope they do soon. Although I won't hold my breathe.