The Vatican newspaper says the members' "dissolute" lives and John Lennon's boastful claim that the band was more popular than Jesus are in the past, while their music lives on.
Well, if the Vatican thinks that forgiving the actions of young four guys suddenly thrust into world-wide fame at the peak of the sexual revolution should cause the rest of the world to forgive the Catholic Church for centuries of murder, rape, child rape and abuse, theft, lies, suppression of women, interference with governments, and really, really tasteless outfits, they are mistaken.
First off, the actions of the Church were not only immoral, they were criminal. Secondly, they are not in the past, but continue today.
It takes a monstrous hypocrite to pretend that they have any moral authority whatsoever when it comes to defining and judging dissolute behaviour.
Under constant attack from all around the world for its actions, the church is scampering Steve Harper style to save their asses by pretending to be taking action to deal with their own corruption.
The Vatican responded Monday to allegations that it had concealed years of clerical sex abuse by making it clear for the first time that bishops and other high-ranking clerics should report such crimes to police if required by law.
Not good enough.
We have the word “should” and the phrase “if required by law.”
It is not law in all countries that the church report such abuse. Why include that line unless they are still looking for a dodge? Or maybe they really don’t get it: Raping a kid is not wrong because it’s against the law and the law may punish you if you get caught, it is against the law because it harms someone. So whether a country requires that such crimes be reported or not, that should not be the deciding factor as to whether or not a complaint should be reported. The simple desire to be good, decent, not harm others, and refusal to turn away in silence when abuse is suspected should mandate behaviour.
The word “should” also offers the church a fuzzy way out by not stating unequivocally that every single instance of suspected abuse must absolutely be reported to police.
And how seriously is the Church itself taking this token add-in to their polices?
A Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Ciro Benedettini, said the reporting requirement had been the internal policy of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith since 2003. Asked how bishops were supposed to
know of this internal policy, he declined to comment.
A cover-their-ass phrase meant only to give the illusion that the church has any intention of ever stopping its criminal activities.
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