Public Education vs. Catholic Church

We saw yesterday a story that seems to follow a pattern-- high school teacher, male or female, accused of sex with a student.  There have been so many stories such as this in recent years that it is impossible to keep count.

The Catholic Church took a major public relations hit because of the phenomenon of male priests having homosexual contact with minors in their charge.  But I suspect if you looked, in aggregate, at sexual offenses in the field of public education, the dimensions of that problem might be much greater. 

Of course, it is not reported or regarded as a major indictment of the field of public education.  It is not regarded as a systemic problem within that discipline.  Yes, there are numerous school systems involved nationwide, and that tends to dilute those who would make across-the-board accusations.  But there is no question there is still a double standard. 

Comments

[Cynthia Freyer]

I agree with you in entirety. The recent Jesuit allegations involved 1 percent of 3000 priests -- three -- and the allegations are based on memories of 40,50 and 60 years ago. That fact is not included in media stories. Why? Where is the accuracy in telling the news story? I attended Catholic schools, Catholic boarding schools, private Catholic high schools and private Catholic Jesuit college, so I was in the Catholic world daily from the age of six to the age of 24. I even worked in the Jesuit house, serving Jesuit priests their meals. I don't understand how I could be so immersed in this world for nearly 20 years and did not hear even a rumor of misconduct. Assuming all of this is true, then why aren't we paying for counseling services to these folks? Why instead is it money that they want -- or the lawyers want. Seems to me that there is quite a bit of greed occurring.

[Joe Guarino]

No doubt, Cynthia. The Catholic Church is viewed as one monolithic entity by the media; and is also viewed as having deep pockets. It also is viewed as the enemy by certain forces within the media. The church is therefore quite vulnerable to these types of attacks and characterizations.

The public education establishment, by contrast, is dispersed across hundreds, if not thousands, of individual school systems. It is conferred legitimacy via the imprimatur of secular government. There are no systemic villains, therefore, to be found.

[Harold]

These priests are pediphiles who prey upon and have sexual contact with underage boys and girls. Not homosexuals, pediphiles.

Unlike the secular educational community who reports and prosecutes these offenders in their midst, the Catholic Church has a history of transferring known offending priests to other parishes where these monsters continued their heinous practices. Unfortunately, it's been the victims of the Catholic Church who have brought this to public light while the Catholic hierarchy has made every attempt to keep it hush hush.

Perhaps you shoulda made a comparison among other religious beliefs and their history of sexual offense against minors instead of a secular organization.

I know of no other religious group, Protestant, Judaic, or Muslim, who has a history of pediphilia as does the Catholic Church. However, some branches of the Mormon Church might qualify........

[Joe Guarino]

Harold, my recollection is that the vast majority of the sexual contact of which we are speaking was homosexual, not heterosexual. It was homosexual pedophilia for the most part.

Again, it is difficult to compare the Catholic Church with other religious denominations, because most others are more decentralized in the eyes of the public and the media. Instances at individual Protestant churches are not necessarily viewed as part of a larger pattern, just as with the schools. But there has been a huge problem with adultery among Protestant ministers. I do not doubt, however, that pedophilia was a larger problem in the Catholic Church than in other denominations; this may be associated in part with the institutional expectation of celibacy for priests.

[Lex]

Joe, I suspect that it might be interesting to know whether the per-capita or per-teacher rate of sexual assault upon children is higher among Catholic priests than among public-school teachers. But ultimately it is irrelevant.

That's because of a fact that you gloss over: The Catholic church has hidden its guilty from the civil authorities for decades and in diocese after diocese around the world has sought to buy off and/or intimidate complainants and other witnesses.

You talk about the church not being as centralized as the public perceives, but the fact of the matter is that on this issue, at least, the Church has been monolithic in its support of a continuing criminal enterprise. Pope John Paul II -- who was a political head of state as well as a spiritual figure -- was involved in aiding and abetting felonies against children and obstruction of justice for the duration of his papacy, and his successor remains involved to this day.

There is simply no moral equivalence between this situation and unrelated sexual assaults by public school teachers, and for you to suggest otherwise means either that you are incredibly ignorant or that you think the rest of us are.

[bubba]

".....and for you to suggest otherwise means either that you are incredibly ignorant or that you think the rest of us are."

On the other hand, you could just be an arrogant ass of the first order. We have evidence that indicates that's the case.

[Joe Guarino]

Lex, I am not suggesting there is equivalence between the two situations. Instead, I am suggesting the problem within public education might be much greater in scope than the problem within the Catholic Church.

It appears law enforcement is getting involved in at least some of the situations involving teachers and students. That was not happening enough with respect to the errant priests. I do not know why. Perhaps the students and their families were not reporting the situations to law enforcement.

Lex, do you think any teacher/student relationships in the United States have ever been covered up or "smoothed over" by public school administrators? I suspect that has probably happened quite a bit, and we simply do not know about it. (Remember also that many of these relationships have likely been consensual, and thus may be less likely to be handled in a disciplinary fashion.)

[Lex]

Joe, you strongly imply that the field of public education should be treated as the Catholic church has been, and then when someone calls you on it, you pretend you didn't write what you wrote. C'mon, you're better than that.

If you don't know why law enforcement wasn't getting involved enough in cases of "errant priests" (which is an interesting choice of phrase for people who prey sexually on children), there's a world of information out there with which you can educate yourself. One big reason is that the church was hushing cases up and then moving the priests into other locales ... where they could continue their predation, frequently for decades. That's not just "smoothing over" the odd case; that's running a continuing criminal enterprise, as defined in RICO statutes, in some cases using religious confidentiality and diplomatic immunity to further the scheme.

Have cases involving public-school faculty/staff and students been hushed up? Of course. Has there been an ongoing, decades-long effort by public education not only to hush individual cases up but also to allow predators to continue to prey on children? Not in the least. (And "consent" is irrelevant in the case of either church or public school if the younger party is not of age in his/her jurisdiction. Indeed, it may be irrelevant irrespective of age if a professional or custodial relationship is involved.)

Bubba, are you really going to suggest that outrage over the facilitating and protecting of serial victimization of children by a large, wealthy, respected religious institution makes me "an arrogant ass of the first order"? Please. My credentials are much stronger than that.

[Joe Guarino]

"Has there been an ongoing, decades-long effort by public education not only to hush individual cases up but also to allow predators to continue to prey on children? Not in the least. (And "consent" is irrelevant in the case of either church or public school if the younger party is not of age in his/her jurisdiction. Indeed, it may be irrelevant irrespective of age if a professional or custodial relationship is involved.)"

Lex, I would argue that we do not know to what extent public education systems have covered up these situations historically. There are so many systems involved, and the potential for these problems have existed for many decades. But I am primarily concerned with the moral and ethical content of the actions taken by priests and teachers, respectively. These situations are very comparable. As you suggest, it involves taking sexual advantage of a minor
when there is a professional or custodial relationship. And my suspicion is that it has happened much more in the public schools than in the Catholic Church. While I understand the antipathy you and others have had for the Church, and the mistakes the Church had made, those things do not diminish the prevalence and the nature of the offenses committed in the public school systems around the country over the years.

[bubba]

"My credentials are much stronger than that."

Your credentials are as worthless as your credibility is. We've known that about you for a long time.

[Harold]

So, Bubba, do you have an opinion on the Catholic Church's pediphilia problem or is your main responsibility here is to run interference for Joe.

[bubba]

No, but I do know how to spell pedophilia correctly.

[Harold]

Bubba, is it, No, I don't have an opinion on the Catholic man-child church wide sexual predator issue, or is it, No, my main responsibility on this blog is not to run interference for Joe when his back is to the wall? Which one is it?

[bubba]

Yes.

[Lex]

[[And my suspicion is that it has happened much more in the public schools than in the Catholic Church. While I understand the antipathy you and others have had for the Church, and the mistakes the Church had made, those things do not diminish the prevalence and the nature of the offenses committed in the public school systems around the country over the years.]]

Depending on how you do the counting (raw numbers vs. numbers per 1,000 priests or teachers, say), the crime might well be more prevalent in public education than in the Church. Neither one of us knows, nor are we ever likely to.

But in other ways, no, these situations are not at all comparable. Public-school principals, superintendents and education officials at the state and federal levels are not, and, to the best of our knowledge, have never been routinely conspiring to protect predators from prosecution and move them from one place to another where they can continue their predations. Church officials have done so for decades and, via failure to turn over information they have on predation cases of which they have knowledge as required by law, are continuing to commit criminal acts and further an international conspiracy to this day. It's difficult to prove a negative, I'll grant, but we have no evidence of any comparable criminal enterprise on the part of public-education officials.

My greater antipathy toward the Church in this context is directly proportional to what I believe to be its greater culpability. Should evidence surface in the future that public-education officials have been involved in a criminal enterprise of similar scope, I'll be just as hard on them. Where rapists of children are concerned, I'm an equal-opportunity hater.

[Joe Guarino]

Lex, my recollection is that you have also had antipathy toward the church because of its moral stand on issues like abortion and contraception and the like. But again, while I acknowledge the problems associated with covering up these instances of homosexual pedophilia among some priests in the church, I must once again call attention to the sexual behavior itself that preciptates this whole discussion. We cannot simply gloss over the sexual behavior as if it is a minor detail. It is, in fact, the main problem-- that minors are used sexually by people in positions of authority over them.

While it was primarily homosexual in the church, it has often been heterosexual in the schools. And it is very interesting that we are now seeing many instances of female teachers involved in these relationships. You described it very well when you said it consists of taking sexual advantage of a minor when there is a professional or custodial relationship.

I am convinced the many instances we have seen suggest there is a major problem in the public schools in this regard. I think parents should be very wary of entrusting their kids to public high schools. And I suspect there has not been sufficient effort in public school systems around the country directed toward preventing these instances. Perhaps we should now be directing our concern at the fact that the schools should be doing more to assure we don't see these types of instances over and over again.

[Jim Langer]

Are Catholic schools run by priests?

[Joe Guarino]

Jim, I believe so, usually indirectly. Catholic schools are often under the auspices of a local parish, which a priest usually heads as pastor. But the diocese or archdiocese also has a role.

Priests have had direct access to minors, for instance, because of the phenomenon of altar boys or altar servers. They assist the priest with conducting Mass.

[Lex]

Joe, I have differences of opinion with the church over abortion and contraception, not least because I believe the church's policies lead directly to greater human suffering in violation of Christ's second great commandment. But if you honestly think that my problem with the church over this issue merely a matter of policy difference or political disagreement, you're sadly misguided.

And if you think that not just tolerating but facilitating child rape and obstructing investigations of same in an organized fashion, particularly by a religious denomination that preaches precisely the opposite, is on the same moral plane as perhaps numerous but almost certainly unconnected crimes in the public schools, then you're not just sadly misguided, you're morally illiterate.

There are two possible ways to look at your position, Joe, and neither flatters you. Either you truly don't understand why what the Church has done is so much worse, or you understand quite well but are trying to create false equivalencies so as to distract attention from a sick institution that you feel some equally sick need to protect. And frankly, the longer you go on like this, the more inclined I am toward Door No. 2, because while there are hard moral and ethical dilemmas, this isn't one of them.

[Joe Guarino]

Lex, when you use Christ's great commandment to justify birth control and abortion, it is fairly creative. I can't imagine Christ was necessarily including those two "institutions" when He said what he did. (I suppose that is the PCUSA in you to make that assumption!:) )

In fact, abortion and contraception CREATE much loss and suffering and pain, aside from the moral dimensions. Perhaps that is why Christ never explicitly recommended those things. Remember, as God, He had the power to make these "institutions" available to women instantaneously when He walked this earth, but He did not do so.

Once again, the Catholic Church clearly did wrong when they covered up and smoothed over these instances of misconduct by priests. However, the fundamental wrong that took place-- the most egregious wrong-- is when those young boys were sexually taken advantage of. And that is almost precisely the same type of violation that is taking place at seemingly epidemic rates in our public schools.

Once again, where is the outrage over what is happening in the public schools? I don't hear it coming from you, Lex. Perhaps this explains much about how issues such as these tend to get covered in the media. Since you used to be an editor, I can easily see how your thought processes might have worked when you assessed these situations.

[bubba]

"Since you used to be an editor, I can easily see how your thought processes might have worked when you assessed these situations."

We have ample evidence about how his thought processes work. They do not flatter him personally or professionally, as evidenced from past experience, and further evidenced by his substantive arrogance, selective moralizing, and the evident personal prejudices displayed for all to see in this thread.