F6, consider, Pope Benedict XV1 vs Helen Thomas .. which FEELS MORE INSENSITIVE .. more ANTI-OTHERS? ..
the Pope's approval of ..
“Christ ‘established here on earth’ only one church,” the document said. The other communities “cannot be called ‘churches’ in the proper sense” because they do not have apostolic succession — the ability to trace their bishops back to Christ’s original apostles. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19692094/
or, Helen Thomas' off-hand reply to a blogger ..
They should get the hell out of Palestine. They are occupying, you know. It’s not Poland or Germany." "Where should they go?" asked the blogger. "Back to Germany or Poland or America or someplace." Ok-kay! Grotesquely insensitive in the extreme, considering what happened to millions of Jews in Germany and Poland. But ....... http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=51007929&txt2find=thomas
Personally, imo, the Pope's position is more damning of him, than Stewart's of her.
Ok .. legs moved .. fresh air .. head cleared .. thanks ..
The church scandals spreading across the Catholic world are prompting a renewed debate on clerical celibacy.
In an unprecedented move, a group of Italian women who have had relationships with priests wrote an open letter to Pope Benedict XVI, saying that priests need to love and be loved.
In Italy, it's common to hear churchgoers say they have known priests with mistresses — women who passed as housekeepers or cousins.
Fiorella di Meglio, 50, knew one in her small town a two-hour drive north of Rome.
"Years ago, we had a priest here, Don Giorgio, he was a schoolteacher. The kids liked him and so did their mothers," di Meglio says.
"When it came out he was having an affair with a woman, all the mothers rallied around him saying he was a good man. But all the people who didn't know him were scandalized, and of course he was sent away," she says.
The Voice That Can No Longer Be Ignored
In most cases, the priests' companions continue to live in the shadows — until now. In March, some Italian women came out into the open after Benedict spoke of what he called "the sacred value of celibacy."
"And so we decided to tell people this is not a value, and this is not a sacred value, because sacred is the right of people to get married," says Stefania Salomone, an office manager in Rome.
I think I represented a stain on his church dress. He wanted to see me, but after seeing me he was not happy with his decision. He always tried to find a way to go away. I wasn't seen as a woman, I was seen as a danger, as a sin.
- Stefania Salomone, an Italian woman who had a five-year relationship with a priest
Salomone started an Italian website for women in relationships with priests. Little by little, 40 women contacted her; yet only two others joined her in signing the letter.
"Italian women don't want to disclose the stories because when the priest knows that the woman has talked to somebody, has disclosed the story to somebody, sometimes, very often he leaves the woman. That's why it has been so difficult for us to take this decision," says Salomone, who is in her early 40s.
In their open letter, the women say "ours is a voice that can no longer continue to be ignored," and they denounce what they call "the tattered shroud of mandatory celibacy."
They say a priest "needs to live with his fellow human beings, experience feelings, love and be loved."
Salomone's relationship lasted five years, but she says her priest companion was unable to treat her as an equal.
"I think I represented a stain on his church dress," Salomone says. "He wanted to see me, but after seeing me he was not happy with his decision. He always tried to find a way to go away. I wasn't seen as a woman, I was seen as a danger, as a sin."
And sin is the judgment the Catholic Church assigns to nearly everything to do with sex outside marriage.
Like An Alcoholic 'Practicing Sobriety'
But it's an open secret that priestly celibacy is often violated.
Richard Sipe is a mental health counselor for priests and a former Benedictine monk. He says the way celibacy is taught today is not in tune with contemporary reality. While studying in the monastic environment of the seminary, Sipe says, a priest can remain celibate for two to three years. But what happens when he goes out into the world?
"He does not know the psychological dynamics, the social dynamics of sex and what it means to be celibate," says Sipe. "If a man is going to be celibate, it's like a man who is an alcoholic and practicing sobriety. Every day he says, 'I'm going to be celibate today,' but that is not the way celibacy is constructed or taught."
Salomone is particularly angered by what she sees as the hypocrisy and secrecy imposed on priests by the Catholic Church.
"There is a lot of suffering around the world due to this rule," she says. "Bishops know that priests are not celibate, but they don't care about this. They say, please do what you want but do it anonymously, nobody has to know, otherwise scandals arise and we cannot afford this, so please do what you want but don't let the world know about this, and [most] of all don't make it children."
Salomone and the other authors of the letter say mandatory celibacy clashes with the reality of priests' lives, and they ask the pope, "all this destruction in the name of what love?" __________________________________________________________________
This is exactly the under current of ethics [or the lack there of] that stems from the root problem of the catholic church. Here you are seeing a bishop saying: "Bishops know that priests are not celibate, but they don't care about this. They say, please do what you want but do it anonymously, nobody has to know, otherwise scandals arise and we cannot afford this, so please do what you want but don't let the world know about this, and [most] of all don't make it children."
It's the old tried and true measure of catholic guilt rearing it's ugly head.
Jesuits settle US abuse claims for $166 million By Donna Gordon Blankinship, Associated Press Saturday, 26 March 2011
In one of the largest settlements in the Roman Catholic church's sweeping sex abuse scandal, an order of priests agreed yesterday to pay $166.1 million (£103m) to hundreds of Native Americans and Alaska Natives who were abused at the order's schools around the northwestern US.
The Jesuit order, called the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus, has been accused of using its schools in remote villages and on reservations as dumping grounds for problem priests.
Attorneys representing the mostly Native American and Alaskan Native victims said the abuse added to the mistreatment already endured by these children, some of whom were forcibly removed from their homes to attend these schools.
The settlement between the more than 450 victims and the province also calls for a written apology to the victims and disclosure of documents to them, including their medical records.
"It's a day of reckoning and justice," said Clarita Vargas, 51, who alleges she and her two sisters were abused by the head of St. Mary's Mission and School, a former Jesuit-run Indian boarding school on the Colville Indian Reservation near Omak, Washington state, in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
The abuse began when they were as young as 6 or 7, she said. "My spirit was wounded, and this makes it feel better."
St. Mary's now operates as Paschal Sherman Indian School and is run by the Colville Tribe.
The province ran village and reservation schools in Oregon, Washington state, Idaho, Montana and Alaska. The claims are from victims who were students at schools in all five states.
The Very Rev. Patrick Lee, speaking for the Oregon Province, said the organization would not comment on the settlement announcement because of its ongoing bankruptcy proceedings, "as well as out of respect for the judicial process and all involved."
He said the province hopes to conclude the bankruptcy process as quickly as possible.
The province previously settled another 200 claims. Then it filed for bankruptcy in 2009, claiming the payments had depleted its treasury.
An issue that surfaced when the bankruptcy proceedings got under way was the relationship between the province and other Jesuit properties, such as Gonzaga University. Attorneys for the victims initially argued the province was wealthy because it controls and owns Gonzaga, along with Gonzaga Preparatory School, Seattle University and other schools and properties.
Both Gonzaga and the Jesuit order maintain they are separate entities, and victims' attorneys did not pursue the issue during bankruptcy negotiations. Neither Gonzaga nor the other schools are contributing to the settlement announced yesterday.
California attorney John Manly, who represented some of the abuse victims, contends the Jesuits knowingly put molesters in a position to abuse children.
"It wasn't an accident. The evidence showed they did it on purpose and it was rape," Manly said.
He added he was certain not all the victims have come forward, and he believes the pattern of abuse among Catholic priests continues.
Both the order and its insurers are paying into the settlement. About $6 million (£3.7m) of the settlement is being set aside for future claims.
Attorney Blaine Tamaki said the priest who molested Vargas and about 100 other children has not been charged with a crime because the statute of limitations in Washington state is so restrictive. A bill before the state's 2011 Legislature would remove that statute of limitations.
The settlement is believed to be the Catholic Church's third-largest in the sex abuse cases, behind the Los Angeles Diocese, which agreed to pay $660 million to 508 victims, and the San Diego Diocese, which agreed to pay $198 million to 144 victims, according to the website BishopAccountability.org.
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