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1P5 Minute Ep 10 | The Sex Abuse Summit Designed to Fail

The sex abuse summit in Rome hasn’t even begun yet this week, and already things aren’t looking so good for any serious attempt to deal with this global crisis.

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1P5 Minute Ep 10 | A Sex Abuse Summit Designed to Fail

Did you hear the one about a clerical sex abuse summit that was destined to fail?

It starts this Thursday.

I’m Steve Skojec, and this is the OnePeterFive Minute.

Hey everybody, today is Tuesday, February 19, 2019. Let’s talk about some news, shall we?

Well the Vatican summit on clerical abuse is about to get underway this week, and it’s bringing together bishops conference heads from around the world.

The question is, as always: when it comes to clerical sexual abuse…

NEW YORK ACCENT: Whadda they gonna do about it?

We’re already seeing them dodge on the question of why this summit is only going to address the abuse of minors and not vulnerable adults and seminarians, as was originally planned. When asked the question by Ed Pentin of the National Catholic Register, Archbishop Schicluna of Malta basically said that since abuse of minors is the bigger problem, abuse of vulnerable adults is basically being addressed too.

Or something.

When the question went to CARDINAL SCHUPISCH, he actually said that “Those other issues of misbehavior on the part of clerics with vulnerable adults or other adults are topics that need addressing. But we are focusing in these days on those who have so little voice.”

In other words: NOPE. Even though McCarrick’s abuses were largely perpetrated against seminarians and even priests, we didn’t think that was important enough to address specifically.

His answer was about what we’ve come to expect from a prelate who typically operates at a 90 degree angle to reality.

He also said, on the question of addressing homosexuality as a root cause of abuse:

SCHUPISCH also said that “So if in fact you, as some say, there is homosexuality in the priesthood, you can see already that it is not as a result of being homosexual that you abuse, as though homosexual people are more prone to abuse children than straight people, but it is a matter of making sure that the opportunity and the protection of children are priorities.”

Yeah. Because over 80% of the cases being same sex in nature is just coincidence.

But of course, SCHUPISH doesn’t believe that homosexuality is a real problem in the priesthood. Remember, he phrased is response to the question as though it were a hypothetical. And in response to a followup question on whether the prevalence of illicit sexual behavior in the clergy may foster an unwillingness to deal with abuse out of fear that such behavior would be revealed, SCHUPISCH responded:

“I think you were right in saying it’s a hypothesis, and hypotheses have to be proven.”

In case you’re just thinking that this is the usual deluded thinking of old Soupy and that it doesn’t matter, remember that he was hand-picked for a leadership role at this Synod.

Is there any greater indication that it was designed to fail from the outset?

Archbishop Vigano’s assessment of the Synod, which was released last week, rings true: there is “no sign of a genuine willingness to attend to the real causes of the present situation.”

They weren’t kidding when they told us to have low expectations for this debacle.


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