Good news! Today the Pope will be issuing a letter that he hopes will help “repentance, healing and renewal” in regard to the hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of sexual abuse allegations against the Catholic Church.
In particular, M.C. Pope is responding to two relatively recent reports. The first, from four months ago, accused church leaders in Ireland of covering up decades of child sexual abuse by priests. Another, released last May, reported of the seemingly ceaseless sexual, physical and emotional abuse of children by priests and nuns in church-run schools.
And now—a letter.
I have many Catholic friends, so please don’t take this as an anti-religion or anti-God rant. It is, instead, an anti-Catholic Church rant.
A letter? A fucking letter!? Are you kidding me? Are you serious? Were he not The Pope (all bow), this guy would either be laughed off the international stage or—perhaps—arrested for being complicit in a major, major sexual abuse scandal. Seriously, how do we allow this stuff to fly?
And, equally important, when is the church going to wake up and realize how wrong the whole abstinence thing is? It’s sadly ironic–all this slamming of “the sinful, unnatural homosexual lifestyle” when the truly unnatural thing is expecting adult men and women to never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever respond to their sexual needs and desires and impulses. Hell, it’s the church itself that stands largely responsible for the horribly repressive way people live; the sex-is-bad-and-taboo-and-only-to-make-babies thought process that has helped corrode our culture. Truth be told, free sex is significantly more natural than no sex; masturbating is more liberating than a cold shower; admiring a beautiful body is better than admiring a beautiful painting.
I can’t say that priests molest kids because they’re sexually repressed, but … wait—scratch that. I do believe priests molest kids because they’re sexually repressed. And emotionally stunted. I have a very close friend who is an ex-priest; who was dragged off to the church at age 14 and told, “This is your future.” He missed out on proms and first kisses; making love in the back of a car (or the front) and the different levels of emotional and physical maturation that we all need to go through.
I love Catholics—I really do.
But the Pope and the Catholic Church—to hell with ’em.
To hell with ’em.
