Can these figures about church sex abuse of children be true? I guess they are - they were just tabled at the Royal Commission during evidence given by Catholic Church representatives.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/ne...l/news-story/49ad5fc861be48500963449b04c83f67
"The figures were revealed by Senior Counsel Assisting Gail Furness SC and tendered to the Commission yesterday along with an in-depth report documenting child sexual abuse from 1950-2010. The report compiles data from a survey of 75 Catholic Church authorities — with priest members — and 10 Catholic orders whose members are religious brothers and sisters. It classes 7 per cent of priests over that period of time as alleged perpetrators of sexual abuse."
1 in 14... disgusting.
"The St John of God Brothers had the highest proportion of religious brothers who were classed as alleged perpetrators (40.4 per cent) followed by Christian Brothers (22 per cent), Salesians of Don Bosco (21.9 per cent) and Marist Brothers (20.4 per cent). The highest proportion of alleged perpetrators who were priests came from the Benedictine Community of New Norcia (21.5 per cent) along with the Salesians of Don Bosco (17.2 per cent) and Marist Fathers (13.9 per cent)."
So 2 in 5 of the St John of God Brothers were "alleged" kiddy fiddlers? And 1 in 5 Christian Brothers and Marist Brothers were also apparently suss?
That's an absolutely abominable abuse of trust by organisations that supposedly care about the interests of people in the communities they work amongst. Absolutely appalling that nothing was done by the Catholic Church itself about this apparently endemic pedophilia... too little too late now.
Proportion of priests identified as alleged perpetrators (1950-2010)
Diocese of Lismore — 13.9%
Diocese of Wollongong — 11.7%
Catholic Archdiocese of Canberra-Goulburn — 8.4%
Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle — 7.9%
Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney — 7%
Diocese of Parramatta — 2.2%
So if you were a Catholic in Lismore or Wollongong, there was a 1 in 10 chance that your priest was allegedly a kiddy fiddler? An in Sydney there was a 1 in 13 chance? (Thank God - pun intended - that Parramatta had it down to just a 1 in 45 chance that the person preaching to kids might rather have been "reaching" to them...)
I don't know how anyone with a conscience can attend church (or send their kids to a church school) and give moral authority to these people and their failed systems?
