sethnintendo said:
Yea doesn't help when more old cases keep being brought up. Seems like there are still bad apples being exposed from the 60s, 70s and 80s. Not sure why they just don't allow them to marry which would hopefully cut the deviant behavior because I suspect most of it comes from being sexually suppressed. Just takes a few bad ones to tarnish entire reputation. Another prime example would be cops. There are a lot of good cops but the bad ones make people dislike all of them. |
A 2000 year old institution doesn't just let priests marry because of abuse crisis. It's a very complicated theological issue. Even more complicated is the fact that ex-anglican priests who converted to being a catholic priest can remain married (they can't re-marry of course) and priests of the Eastern Catholic rite can marry as long as it's before their ordination (and the Church is looking if that's a possability for the latin rite as well). However, it seems they managed to assert better control of the clergy and better weed out rotten apples before they can cause any damage.
Taking care of their past rotten apples till now has been a problem, but Pope Francis enacted even stricter clerical laws where members from the lowest segments of the clergy can immediatly report abuse to the Vatican (which should quickly be followed by an investigation and possible suspension or even exclusion of the offending member).
As in most things, it's a very complicated matter and very few people know about the inner machinations of the church unless someting lands in the newspapers.
