Because right-wing media is constantly painting trans people and drag performers as predators, and saying 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵-𝘴𝘰-𝘧𝘶𝘤𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨-𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 about the absolute 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘨𝘶𝘦 of kiddie-diddlers in the clergy.
That can't be answered. That's rather like proving a negative. If, instead, you want to know why I asked, it's because I don't see the immediate relationship between the content of the article and the content of the comment. It's akin to stating that they're not a gardener. It's not particularly useful information, nor apparently relevant, so I was interested.
Ditto. And the audacity of one church group I recently read about that only got rid of it's perceived "gay" perpetrators of sex crimes against children. Like if it was a man against a little girl, he'd just be suspended & then could come back later. Are you kidding me right now?! What the hell?! It's a felony either way, especially if they're really young. FUCK's SAKE! They don't get to decide which crimes get "punished" or not. This drives me bonkers!
People like that need to NEVER be around children or youths ever again. Period.
" Brusquement, sous Henri III (ordonnance de Blois de 1579), la majorité civile est fixée à 25 ans (il demeure des variantes avec les coutumes locales)."
"Suddenly, during Henri III reign (Blois executive order, 1579), the majority age was set at 25 years old (there was still local variants). Previously, it was 14 for the boys and 12 for the girls. With an exception for minor Kings, the official age of coronation was 13 (with one notable exception, Marie de Medicis had her son officially crowned at 8 years old, to ensure her mainmise as a dowager Queen, Louis XIII has also serious rivals born from some of Henri IV mistresses who had signed promise of marriage in their possession).
No sé. At that time, all his brothers were dead, he didn't have legal nephews. His heir was his cousin and brother-in-law Henri IV who was not popular for being protestant.
At least according to some of the legends, Merlin lived backward and for centuries, so he could have known why the age of majority should be 25 and clued Henry III in.
Here again we have a court side with someone’s mythical belief, sans evidence, to the detriment of an innocent child? And potential future victims. Imaginary belief over real live flesh and blood. What insanity!!!
Religions keep claiming they provide superior ethics to atheism… So then they turn around and use those ‘ethics’ to shield a child rapist from punishment for his crimes. It is really sad that only one state had the courage to stand up and say what the real abomination is. Child molestation needs to be made universally reportable by anyone who finds out about it everywhere in the country. Joe Jervis (JoeMyGod) has had reports on pastor-perverts every day this week. It is a national disgrace!
The Boston Globe reports didn't stop it. The movie "Spotlight" didn't stop it. The sexual abuse of children by priests goes on to this day, yet parishioners do not protest and law enforcement apparently refuse to do deep-dive investigations into these atrocities.
What will it take, I wonder, to cause these sheep to wake up?
The ability of parishioners to ignore the brutal attacks on our children is incredible. Our most precious resource, bobbing in a Sea of Perversion, unprotected from sharks that would eat them.
And the “holy men” that become aware of systemic abuse of children by clergy members? “Move along…nothing to see here.”
My own sister refuses to believe it can happen even when I repeatedly show her evidence. I sincerely hope the universe never rubs her face in it with my nephew or niece.
Once AGAIN, yet ANOTHER pedophile is caught. Is the pedophile ___?
A- RELIGIOU$
B- REPUBLIKAN
C- BOTH
Hint: Only one answer is correct, all others only half correct.
____________________________________
No other field allows confessions NOT to be used in court. Only damned religion arrogantly grants itself the Special Right to be exempt from laws EVERYONE ELSE (except gazillionaires & megacorporations) have to obey.
But, librarians are book pushers. We can't have kids being influenced by and reading about history and fun, I mean demonic, fantasy & Sci-Fi. You know they'll start learning real spells from those Harry Potter books. 🤣
Alohomora would be quite handy when the pet sitter locks the door to the garage and you didn't take your keys to the airport because why would you need them.
I live in Tempe. Nice town. But Arizona is a state adamantly opposed to protecting children from anything (sex predators, gun violence, parental neglect). At least the murderers and rapists aren’t drag queens. There’s that!
Tempe is in the Phoenix metropolitan area. Most statewide offices, eg, governor, attorney general, Secretary of State, are currently occupied by democrats. The fly over portions of the state get their revenge by sending wing nut Republican state senators to the legislature
I also live in Arizona. Just as a side note: Mesa is also part of the Phoenix metro area and shares borders with Tempe. It's locally known as "Little Salt Lake" thanks to the very high percentage of Mormons living there.
Can we just put 𝘢𝘭𝘭 clergy in a suspect class and prohibit them from being around children unsupervised, already? This is a problem every single organized religion on 𝘌𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘩 has. There's clearly something about religious leadership roles (could it be unearned and unaccountable authority? 𝘎𝘦𝘦, 𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳.) that attracts predators, and the problem is widespread and consistent enough to warrant special scrutiny. You wanna join the clergy? You never get to be alone around kids again. You wanna join the clergy and you already have kids yourself? 𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘤𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘥𝘺. You wanna join the clergy and 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯 have kids? Nope. You either get the snip, and agree to become ineligible for adoption, 𝘰𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘵𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘶𝘱 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘭𝘰𝘵𝘩.
Too harsh? Too bad. These are the same fuckers who accuse my entire demographic of being predators, when they're the ones more often than not actually committing the crimes. Time to put up or shut up, preachermen.
I'm going to propose something, a change for society. I know its going to rile some people up, but here's an idea (based on my experience living across the U.S., Japan, Hungary and studying other cultures and visiting other countries, and a M.A. in Christian history (which made me realize it was b.s., but I got the credential, the end)):
1. Churches should not have special tax exemption status. Because they pray to an unprovable invisible entity who fails to answer 99% of prayers does mean they deserve special benefits. If that's the case than anyone who believes in a FICTION (or at least something that can't be verified scientifically) - - anything, name the topic, aliens, pseudoscience, MAGA, lizard people, etc - - should be allowed to not pay taxes, right? (You know I secretly healed Biden of his cancer, but he didn't know it and it came back, so I'm a doctor - thus no taxes for me, right?)
2. Pastors/ministers/church staff who molest children in any form should not be "retired" out of active duty to spend retirement in a paid-for room and told to pray and repent. They should be treated like any other person who does the same. Don't know why they can't pray in jail. So no immunity for breaking a law nobody else gets immunity from.
3. Things said in confidence between a pastor and a church member/member of the public can be confidential, but not unless its related to a crime or is a confession of some sort or incriminating evidence. In that case I say make the listening pastor now an accessory to the crime (no different than someone who covered it up or assisted the person to get away or hide, etc), and be arrested and charged as based on the crime. So, accessory to murder or accessory to theft or rape or whatever, obviously, will have different charges. UNLESS they hear a confession and within so many hours go to the police. That will be the loophole. So they heard something and then within a reasonable amount of time (as they may not be able to get immediately away), took a jaunt to the police station to due to their ethical duty.
4. And, if the church can't survive having to pay taxes, if they have to sell buildings, if they have to take out bank loans, if nobody shows up, if their staff is in jail ...... well, PRAY. God will help. Just pray, right? (insert laughter here)
(While that's the case of the Christian Science church. At its peak it was something like 20,000 churches and reading rooms and now its like 700 - except in Africa where it seems to thrive. I went into one a decade ago out of curiosity as I'm interested in cults and fringe groups (and this was at one point next to the Mormons the biggest fringe Christian group) and the "newest" member introduced herself. She arrived 6 years earlier. No new members in 6 years! Yeah, that's a dead church. While their reading room is no longer downtown but in the basement of the church. And, guess what? Nobody misses them nor their wussy newspaper, nor their empty useless reading rooms, nor their empty buildings in Boston and lousy museum, nor their killing of children and family members! Society survived and for the better! So if the Catholic Church falls ....... maybe it might not be a huge tragedy. I'm sure we can take one of those Catholic Churches and turn it into apartments, or be used as a community theater or flea market or offices. My mother-in-law's Methodist church was sold and is now part of their city executive offices in the small town, while the boy scouts rent out part of the space. A church in my town is now fancy apartments in a residential district, so history preserved, no new housing needed to be built.)
As for those saying the loss of a church will hurt local soup kitchens. I got it. Fair. I doubt all churches will collapse. The ones that do will need help so they can build up their charity arm. And, the church can always turn itself into an LLC or charity or whatever where their mission is to be a food bank, immigrant shelter, homeless shelter, educational group. They'll save so much money just doing that and not paying for room and board for criminals.
Those helpful agencies that feed and clothe the poor would all be publicly funded by our tax dollars in a just society. Especially in the richest nation in the world. Muthafuckin greed rules the day.
Christian “charitable” works always come with a catch, so in my opinion it cancels out. You must obey rules and submit to some form of indoctrination in order to receive such support. No thank you.
If you can get all of that through ANY state or federal legislature, never mind get a signature from a governor or the president (THIS president? [TS dies laughing!]), you win a prize.
The public will simply isn't there, and the social inertia supporting religion continues to be formidable. It might GET there as more people walk away from religion, but I frankly don't expect any of your proposals to get any serious traction.
Again, we're looking at someone trying skip steps in the forgiveness process; Mario Rodriguez-Ramirez isn't willing to accept the consequences of his actions, and is now just using a convenient dodge to get away with child sexual abuse that he's apparently not all that sorry for. Accepting the consequences of one's own actions is part of the process, and when someone bypasses that, it's a clear indication that they either don't understand why their actions were a problem or they just don't care; at that point it's not forgiveness, it's just permission.
This, this, this. Everyone telling folks to just forgive and forget are really just telling victims to keep allowing the trespass, to give permission to keep being abusers. Especially when there’s no apologies or attempts to rectify things. Saying “it’s okay” for halfhearted “sorrys” tells the perpetrator it’s fine to keep doing it. If you accept the apology, say “I accept your apology.”
With the confession, you are given acts of contrition, but they rarely address the actual crimes. What does reciting Hail Marys do for the victims? It’s just the cost of abusing other people. Like a fine for rich people. It isn’t a deterrent, it’s just the cost for parking in the no parking zone. It has no weight and rarely deters the behavior.
This is why I don’t have any sympathy for losing this sacrament. It’s irrelevant to living in a society, and it is too far removed from enticing people to be decent human beings.
His fighting instead of pleading guilty and facing the consequences just tells us that he's not really sincere about regretting what he did. Just sorry he got caught.
Christopher Hitchens nails religion for its lack of morality
"We keep on being told that religion, whatever its imperfections, at least instills morality. On every side, there is conclusive evidence that the contrary is the case and that faith causes people to be more mean, more selfish, and perhaps above all, more stupid."
Obligatory:
𝗡𝗼𝘁 𝗔 𝗗𝗿𝗮𝗴 𝗤𝘂𝗲𝗲𝗻.
Drag queen? No.
Transgender? No.
Religious leader? Yes.
Anyone here surprised? No.
Why state this?
Because right-wing media is constantly painting trans people and drag performers as predators, and saying 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵-𝘴𝘰-𝘧𝘶𝘤𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨-𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 about the absolute 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘨𝘶𝘦 of kiddie-diddlers in the clergy.
Stating that in the comment section of an already niche newsletter shan't inform those who watch such media, though.
You severely underestimate the number of wingnuts who read the comment section on this blog.
I hope so! That at least means that this newsletter impacts those that it should.
You severely underestimate the amount of “impact” required to sway them.
Because those are facts. Time and time again.
I’m starting to get sus feelings about this “Mr Beedell” guy.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5bd27855a7db08db7c41be410fa0e14036c726bc671c04b3ca49f2f97b19eaed.png
I’m out of fucks to give for today.
Leaving this for anyone’s access: https://www.friendlyatheist.com/p/arizona-court-blocks-predators-confession/comment/123167599
And leaving this as a reminder to myself: https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d6c6dcd55d8420ce27e5c52dc20d862660ebedbec2da44c7df9fdd425cb501a3.jpg
Blocking him now.
Maybe it's a Jesus bot.
👆👆🎯
That O2 is diatomic is true, but irrelevant. Both properties should be fulfilled. You certainly know this.
Why not?
That can't be answered. That's rather like proving a negative. If, instead, you want to know why I asked, it's because I don't see the immediate relationship between the content of the article and the content of the comment. It's akin to stating that they're not a gardener. It's not particularly useful information, nor apparently relevant, so I was interested.
https://tenor.com/view/spongebob-plankton-alright-i-get-it-i-get-it-enough-gif-19558825
There is no horror that cannot be, and has not been, justified in the name of religion.
“For good men to do evil, it requires religion”
...ad nauseum.
Ad-𝘳𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘴-𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯-𝘵𝘰-𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘵-nauseam. Shit's a chronic condition.
A reasonable person would hear about this and run away from the church as fast as they can. Just deplorable behavior.
It is past time for federal mandatory reporter laws, including the clergy.
They'll scream PERSECUTION!!! as is their wont.
They can scream all they want. I'm told there's a lot of that going on in a prison cell block.
Ditto. And the audacity of one church group I recently read about that only got rid of it's perceived "gay" perpetrators of sex crimes against children. Like if it was a man against a little girl, he'd just be suspended & then could come back later. Are you kidding me right now?! What the hell?! It's a felony either way, especially if they're really young. FUCK's SAKE! They don't get to decide which crimes get "punished" or not. This drives me bonkers!
People like that need to NEVER be around children or youths ever again. Period.
Yes, that was extremely gross, child sex abuse is heinous.
Time to make all churches, synagogues and mosques in this country 21 years and older. No minors allowed.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3621648/
"It is well established that the brain undergoes a “rewiring” process that is not complete until approximately 25 years of age."
Edit: At one time, France age of majority was 25 years old. It was not science based so the coincidence is funny.
It would be interesting to know what the thinking was back then that caused the French government to come to that conclusion.
I don't have the reasoning. This is what I found
" Brusquement, sous Henri III (ordonnance de Blois de 1579), la majorité civile est fixée à 25 ans (il demeure des variantes avec les coutumes locales)."
"Suddenly, during Henri III reign (Blois executive order, 1579), the majority age was set at 25 years old (there was still local variants). Previously, it was 14 for the boys and 12 for the girls. With an exception for minor Kings, the official age of coronation was 13 (with one notable exception, Marie de Medicis had her son officially crowned at 8 years old, to ensure her mainmise as a dowager Queen, Louis XIII has also serious rivals born from some of Henri IV mistresses who had signed promise of marriage in their possession).
Maybe fewer legal adults to challenge Henri III's whims?
No sé. At that time, all his brothers were dead, he didn't have legal nephews. His heir was his cousin and brother-in-law Henri IV who was not popular for being protestant.
Merlin gave him a clue?
Gné ?
At least according to some of the legends, Merlin lived backward and for centuries, so he could have known why the age of majority should be 25 and clued Henry III in.
That's a great idea.
It’d at least cut way down on handsy clergy having access to youth.
Here again we have a court side with someone’s mythical belief, sans evidence, to the detriment of an innocent child? And potential future victims. Imaginary belief over real live flesh and blood. What insanity!!!
A nine year-old, no less. I hope they castrate the bastard.
Best to do the procedure at the 𝘯𝘦𝘤𝘬, in this case.
You have a point!
Just be specific as to which head you're referring to.
Religions keep claiming they provide superior ethics to atheism… So then they turn around and use those ‘ethics’ to shield a child rapist from punishment for his crimes. It is really sad that only one state had the courage to stand up and say what the real abomination is. Child molestation needs to be made universally reportable by anyone who finds out about it everywhere in the country. Joe Jervis (JoeMyGod) has had reports on pastor-perverts every day this week. It is a national disgrace!
The Boston Globe reports didn't stop it. The movie "Spotlight" didn't stop it. The sexual abuse of children by priests goes on to this day, yet parishioners do not protest and law enforcement apparently refuse to do deep-dive investigations into these atrocities.
What will it take, I wonder, to cause these sheep to wake up?
The ability of parishioners to ignore the brutal attacks on our children is incredible. Our most precious resource, bobbing in a Sea of Perversion, unprotected from sharks that would eat them.
And the “holy men” that become aware of systemic abuse of children by clergy members? “Move along…nothing to see here.”
They don't call them "sheep" for nothing. Parishioners are taught from the get-go to pray, pay, and obey, and that's it.
If Catholic laity ever grew a genuine backbone, the RCC would collapse of its own weight in the time it takes to talk about it.
Strong motivation for the church to “get ‘em while they’re young.”
In more ways than one, sadly.
My own sister refuses to believe it can happen even when I repeatedly show her evidence. I sincerely hope the universe never rubs her face in it with my nephew or niece.
She's as bad as any creationist who refuses to recant their lies even when the evidence for the exact opposite is shown to their faces.
Self preservation at all costs for the church
Yes. Protect the moneyed institution.
They cannot, they are sheep, trained to be fleeced, or fucked.
Once AGAIN, yet ANOTHER pedophile is caught. Is the pedophile ___?
A- RELIGIOU$
B- REPUBLIKAN
C- BOTH
Hint: Only one answer is correct, all others only half correct.
____________________________________
No other field allows confessions NOT to be used in court. Only damned religion arrogantly grants itself the Special Right to be exempt from laws EVERYONE ELSE (except gazillionaires & megacorporations) have to obey.
GOP = TREASON
I'm noticing a distinct lack of drag queens, transpersons, and librarians in this story.
Every accusation is a confession
Funny how that works out.
And not just transgenders but all LGBTQs.
But, librarians are book pushers. We can't have kids being influenced by and reading about history and fun, I mean demonic, fantasy & Sci-Fi. You know they'll start learning real spells from those Harry Potter books. 🤣
Alohomora would be quite handy when the pet sitter locks the door to the garage and you didn't take your keys to the airport because why would you need them.
If shit like this keeps happening, how much longer before we see a Christian-produced reality TV series titled "To Protect a Predator."
Wasn't that a prime time show on the Gilead Broadcasting System?
I'm sure Bill Donohue is already working on it.
Only he'd limit it to the RCC, of course. To the other sects? "Let 'em make their own show!" Bildo would say.
I live in Tempe. Nice town. But Arizona is a state adamantly opposed to protecting children from anything (sex predators, gun violence, parental neglect). At least the murderers and rapists aren’t drag queens. There’s that!
What is it about Arizona that makes this so? Republicon “leadership?”
Tempe is in the Phoenix metropolitan area. Most statewide offices, eg, governor, attorney general, Secretary of State, are currently occupied by democrats. The fly over portions of the state get their revenge by sending wing nut Republican state senators to the legislature
“Owning the libs” is seemingly the only thing the cult leaders could have hoped to accomplish. That and maybe spreading more chaos.
Thanks for the info, Bonnie.
I also live in Arizona. Just as a side note: Mesa is also part of the Phoenix metro area and shares borders with Tempe. It's locally known as "Little Salt Lake" thanks to the very high percentage of Mormons living there.
Is this where, or near where some legislator signed something to lower the child labor laws recently as well?
Arkansas
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/10/1162531885/arkansas-child-labor-law-under-16-years-old-sarah-huckabee-sanders
It exhausts me to try to keep up with the wingnuts in AZ
Can we just put 𝘢𝘭𝘭 clergy in a suspect class and prohibit them from being around children unsupervised, already? This is a problem every single organized religion on 𝘌𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘩 has. There's clearly something about religious leadership roles (could it be unearned and unaccountable authority? 𝘎𝘦𝘦, 𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳.) that attracts predators, and the problem is widespread and consistent enough to warrant special scrutiny. You wanna join the clergy? You never get to be alone around kids again. You wanna join the clergy and you already have kids yourself? 𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘭𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘤𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘥𝘺. You wanna join the clergy and 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯 have kids? Nope. You either get the snip, and agree to become ineligible for adoption, 𝘰𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘵𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘶𝘱 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘭𝘰𝘵𝘩.
Too harsh? Too bad. These are the same fuckers who accuse my entire demographic of being predators, when they're the ones more often than not actually committing the crimes. Time to put up or shut up, preachermen.
Amen.
IF THERE ISA GOD watching everything, it has watched every child rape in history. That omnieverything bastard has done NOTHING.
The gullible claim it will punish them after they die. LOLOOLOOLOLOLOLOL
Man, you WOULD put it that way and set me off, wouldn't you? 😁
𝑌𝑜𝑢 𝑒𝑖𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑎 𝐺𝑜𝑑 𝑤ℎ𝑜 𝑠𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑠 𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑑 𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑒 𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑑𝑟𝑒𝑛 𝑜𝑟 𝑦𝑜𝑢 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑎 𝐺𝑜𝑑 𝑤ℎ𝑜 𝑠𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑦 𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑐ℎ𝑒𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑠𝑎𝑦𝑠, “𝑊ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑦𝑜𝑢’𝑟𝑒 𝑑𝑜𝑛𝑒, 𝐼’𝑚 𝑔𝑜𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡𝑜 𝑝𝑢𝑛𝑖𝑠ℎ 𝑦𝑜𝑢.” 𝐼𝑓 𝐼 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑝 𝑎 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑜𝑛 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎 𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑑, 𝐼 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑. 𝑇ℎ𝑎𝑡’𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑖𝑓𝑓𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑡𝑤𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑚𝑒 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝐺𝑜𝑑.
-- Tracie Harris
Meanwhile, god and jeezy and the holy spook apparently spend their time whacking off as they watch kids get raped.
I'm going to propose something, a change for society. I know its going to rile some people up, but here's an idea (based on my experience living across the U.S., Japan, Hungary and studying other cultures and visiting other countries, and a M.A. in Christian history (which made me realize it was b.s., but I got the credential, the end)):
1. Churches should not have special tax exemption status. Because they pray to an unprovable invisible entity who fails to answer 99% of prayers does mean they deserve special benefits. If that's the case than anyone who believes in a FICTION (or at least something that can't be verified scientifically) - - anything, name the topic, aliens, pseudoscience, MAGA, lizard people, etc - - should be allowed to not pay taxes, right? (You know I secretly healed Biden of his cancer, but he didn't know it and it came back, so I'm a doctor - thus no taxes for me, right?)
2. Pastors/ministers/church staff who molest children in any form should not be "retired" out of active duty to spend retirement in a paid-for room and told to pray and repent. They should be treated like any other person who does the same. Don't know why they can't pray in jail. So no immunity for breaking a law nobody else gets immunity from.
3. Things said in confidence between a pastor and a church member/member of the public can be confidential, but not unless its related to a crime or is a confession of some sort or incriminating evidence. In that case I say make the listening pastor now an accessory to the crime (no different than someone who covered it up or assisted the person to get away or hide, etc), and be arrested and charged as based on the crime. So, accessory to murder or accessory to theft or rape or whatever, obviously, will have different charges. UNLESS they hear a confession and within so many hours go to the police. That will be the loophole. So they heard something and then within a reasonable amount of time (as they may not be able to get immediately away), took a jaunt to the police station to due to their ethical duty.
4. And, if the church can't survive having to pay taxes, if they have to sell buildings, if they have to take out bank loans, if nobody shows up, if their staff is in jail ...... well, PRAY. God will help. Just pray, right? (insert laughter here)
(While that's the case of the Christian Science church. At its peak it was something like 20,000 churches and reading rooms and now its like 700 - except in Africa where it seems to thrive. I went into one a decade ago out of curiosity as I'm interested in cults and fringe groups (and this was at one point next to the Mormons the biggest fringe Christian group) and the "newest" member introduced herself. She arrived 6 years earlier. No new members in 6 years! Yeah, that's a dead church. While their reading room is no longer downtown but in the basement of the church. And, guess what? Nobody misses them nor their wussy newspaper, nor their empty useless reading rooms, nor their empty buildings in Boston and lousy museum, nor their killing of children and family members! Society survived and for the better! So if the Catholic Church falls ....... maybe it might not be a huge tragedy. I'm sure we can take one of those Catholic Churches and turn it into apartments, or be used as a community theater or flea market or offices. My mother-in-law's Methodist church was sold and is now part of their city executive offices in the small town, while the boy scouts rent out part of the space. A church in my town is now fancy apartments in a residential district, so history preserved, no new housing needed to be built.)
As for those saying the loss of a church will hurt local soup kitchens. I got it. Fair. I doubt all churches will collapse. The ones that do will need help so they can build up their charity arm. And, the church can always turn itself into an LLC or charity or whatever where their mission is to be a food bank, immigrant shelter, homeless shelter, educational group. They'll save so much money just doing that and not paying for room and board for criminals.
*Applaud*
France has secular soup kitchens, food banks and shelters. Where there is will, there is a way.
Those helpful agencies that feed and clothe the poor would all be publicly funded by our tax dollars in a just society. Especially in the richest nation in the world. Muthafuckin greed rules the day.
Christian “charitable” works always come with a catch, so in my opinion it cancels out. You must obey rules and submit to some form of indoctrination in order to receive such support. No thank you.
If you can get all of that through ANY state or federal legislature, never mind get a signature from a governor or the president (THIS president? [TS dies laughing!]), you win a prize.
The public will simply isn't there, and the social inertia supporting religion continues to be formidable. It might GET there as more people walk away from religion, but I frankly don't expect any of your proposals to get any serious traction.
Again, we're looking at someone trying skip steps in the forgiveness process; Mario Rodriguez-Ramirez isn't willing to accept the consequences of his actions, and is now just using a convenient dodge to get away with child sexual abuse that he's apparently not all that sorry for. Accepting the consequences of one's own actions is part of the process, and when someone bypasses that, it's a clear indication that they either don't understand why their actions were a problem or they just don't care; at that point it's not forgiveness, it's just permission.
“It’s not forgiveness, it’s just permission.”
This, this, this. Everyone telling folks to just forgive and forget are really just telling victims to keep allowing the trespass, to give permission to keep being abusers. Especially when there’s no apologies or attempts to rectify things. Saying “it’s okay” for halfhearted “sorrys” tells the perpetrator it’s fine to keep doing it. If you accept the apology, say “I accept your apology.”
With the confession, you are given acts of contrition, but they rarely address the actual crimes. What does reciting Hail Marys do for the victims? It’s just the cost of abusing other people. Like a fine for rich people. It isn’t a deterrent, it’s just the cost for parking in the no parking zone. It has no weight and rarely deters the behavior.
This is why I don’t have any sympathy for losing this sacrament. It’s irrelevant to living in a society, and it is too far removed from enticing people to be decent human beings.
His fighting instead of pleading guilty and facing the consequences just tells us that he's not really sincere about regretting what he did. Just sorry he got caught.
Quelle surprise, eh?
Same as it ever was.
Christopher Hitchens nails religion for its lack of morality
"We keep on being told that religion, whatever its imperfections, at least instills morality. On every side, there is conclusive evidence that the contrary is the case and that faith causes people to be more mean, more selfish, and perhaps above all, more stupid."
👏
Slave morality