The Roman Catholic diocese in Buffalo has released the names of 42 'priests' dismissed for alleged sexual abuse of a minor.
Good riddance!
https://www.northcountrypublicradio...-lists-42-priests-dismissed-for-alleged-abuse
Cue the NTS fallacy chorus of atheists wanting to disown them.
42 Christian pedophiles.
I wonder what it is about Christianity that makes so many of them pedophiles.
Sexual repression. Christianity imposes a bunch of arbitrary rules about sexual behaviour, all of which have the effect of limiting the options people who try to follow those rules have to release the buildup of sexual tension and desire. Prohibiting men from masturbation significantly increases the chances that they will release their sex drive in an uncontrolled way that can harm others. In the case of RC priests, this effect is made even worse by the prohibition against marriage - effectively the religious dogma says that men can and should completely abstain from orgasms for their entire life, and that attempting this is a laudable and positive thing. It's yet another example of how religion gets everything wrong.
A man who has no qualms about having a quick wank in private if he feels the urge to do so is unlikely to seek sexual release by raping people. A man who is allowed no sexual release at all will likely fail to restrain himself sooner or later (due to basic biology); And when he does, it is likely to happen when in the presence of, and at the expense of, people he is supposed to care for, again for basic biological reasons. The endocrine system can only be suppressed by the CNS for so long, and the hormones involved in erotic love are much the same as the ones involved in filial love.
Trying to avoid harmful sexual encounters while remaining completely celibate and sexless is about as easy as trying to avoid crashing your car while driving drunk - the chemicals in your bloodstream make it very difficult indeed. Of course, not all priests rape children; Some are lucky (just as some people get away with driving drunk without crashing); Some are smart (or fortunate) enough to choose non-harmful outlets such as masturbation, or a (theologically unsanctioned) consenting relationship with another adult - often another priest, or a parishioner or congregant, due to availability - but then suffer needless psychological trauma because their religion sets them up to feel intensely guilty about doing that.
The whole thing is HUGELY fucked up. If priests were allowed to jerk off in the privacy of their own bathroom or bedroom; and/or were allowed to have normal sexual relationships with other adults (including marriage if they so choose), this problem would be FAR less prevalent.
Successful religions always try to control and dictate the lives of their members, and to convert or kill non-members. This power grab is absolute - they are like the Party in Orwell's
1984, who demand obedience in ALL things, for obedience's sake. Dictatorial control inevitably leads to harmful attempts to break free; And when everything is subject to inviolable rules, it becomes hard for the enslaved to understand which rules are more immoral than others. This utter and abject failure to grasp which rules should or could be safely broken is visible throughout the response of the RCC to these scandals - they cannot grasp how blaming the victims is wrong, because their twisted and immoral dogma implies that everyone involved - including (or even especially) the victims - are sinners and should be punished. Indeed, the degree of blame that they actually attach to an offence seems to be determined not by the severity of the crime (or sin), but by the identity and hierarchical position of the criminal (or sinner). A Bishop is entitled to more presumption of innocence, and to greater protection from his crimes, than is a priest; A priest is less blameworthy than a parishioner; and adults who toe the dogmatic line are less blameworthy than children, who often do not (simply because they are untrained in the arbitrary regulations that the church seeks to impose).
It's a vile and pernicious ideology, in which morality is dependent, not upon what is done, but rather upon who is doing it.
Of course there's also likely an element of the fact that people with an innate paedophile tendency might be attracted to the 'easy pickings' that come with being a priest; But it's probably easier for such people to get access to children by becoming sports coaches, teachers, or childcare workers, than it is to go through seminary, whereby it could be years, if ever, before they are given charge over their victims.
