eGuide Archives: Clergy Abuse

Clergy Abuse

About 4 percent of Catholic priests have been accused of sexually abusing minors over the past half-century, according to a draft of the first comprehensive study of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in the United States. Bishop accountability study

The percentage is higher than many people, including church officials, had anticipated.

The draft of the study, done by John Jay College of Criminal Justice for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, found that 4,450 of the 110,000 priests who served between 1950 and 2002 were accused of sexual abuse of minors, according to CNN, which reported that it had reviewed the draft.

The number of alleged perpetrators given in the draft study is higher than the tallies by news media outlets, including the Associated Press and The New York Times, which have tried to count reported allegations nationwide.

The number is also higher than that projected by church officials. Pope Benedict XVI, who at the time was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, said in 2002, according to the Catholic News Service: "In the United States, there is constant news on this topic, but less than 1 percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type." Bishop accountability Study

The John Jay Report, updated in 2006, gives a statistical look at the pedophile priest scandal within the US Catholic Church. John Jay Report

As Figure 1.2 shows, the annual accusation rate against Catholic priests peaked at nearly 9 per 1,000 in 1980. However, since the reports, Table 1.1, are generally made after the victims become adults, with most of the reports coming after 1990, this could mean that abuse that occurred in the late eighties and in the nineties has just not yet been reported.

As Table 3.5.3 shows, roughly ¼ of the pedophile priests abused girls, although they have gotten less attention. In fact, both SAVE and SNAP were founded by women who were sexually abused by Catholic priests as young girls.

It's not just Catholic priests. There have been offenders who were spiritual leaders of many various groups, as diverse as Buddhist monks and Jewish rabbis. According to reformation.com 838 ministers from major Protestant denominations have sexually assaulted children. The website quotes the Right Reverend William Persell, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago as saying "We would be naïve and dishonest were we to say this is a Roman Catholic problem and has nothing to do with us because we have married and female priests in our church. Sin and abusive behavior know no ecclesial or other boundaries."

Reminder of the week: In the words of Michael Reagan in his book Twice Adopted (page 119) "If the suspected molester is a member of the clergy, do not report the abuse to church authorities. Call the police immediately. Unfortunately, some churches worry more about lawsuits and bad publicity than the emotional and spiritual needs of abused children. Go to the police first so that crucial evidence is preserved and the molester is prevented from hurting other children."