Abuse Scandals in The Catholic Church

http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idINIndia-46805620100310

News stories of abuse continue to come out of the Vatican. It’s almost sad to think that these stories are no longer surprising.

“In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus says that if anyone leads innocent children to sin, "it would be better for him to have a great millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea."

That passage must now be ringing in the ears of the Roman Catholic clergy in Germany and the Netherlands, where the Church's latest scandals of priests sexually abusing boys have broken out, and echoing down the marbled halls of the Vatican.

The alarm bells are tolling all the more urgently in Rome, where tenuous links run from Bavarian boarding schools all the way to the German-born Pope Benedict. Critics are asking what he knew and did then and what he will do now.

His brother, Rev. Georg Ratzinger, has admitted to slapping boys in his Regensburg choir repeatedly. Ettal Abbey, scene of brutal beatings and sexual abuse in the past, is located in the archdiocese the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger once headed.”

The world needs to call the Vatican out on its continued assault on the innocent children it has harmed. If any other “nation” was responsible for committing such atrocities it would be condemned. Politicians are starting to speak out against these crimes but more needs to be done.

“In addition, politicians and the public have lost patience with the once mighty institution. "There has been a massive loss of trust," Batlogg told Reuters from his office in Munich.

That has been evident in Berlin, where Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger has accused the Vatican of covering up the scandals and pressed the bishops to cooperate with prosecutors "like in Ireland’.”

Other leaders should follow the example of Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger. The Vatican may be a religious organization but that does not make it immune to criticism.