Today we learn that a retired Catholic Archbishop in the US is claiming in a soon-to-be-published memoir that he did not comprehend the potential harm to young victims or understand that the priests had committed a crime. Said Rembert G Weakland: We all considered sexual abuse of minors as a moral evil, but had no understanding of its criminal nature. Weakland, who retired in 2002 after it became known that he paid $450,000 in 1998 to a man who had accused him of date rape years earlier, said he initially: Accepted naively the common view that it was not necessary to worry about the effects on the youngsters: either they would not remember or they would `grow out of it'.
We all considered sexual abuse of minors as a moral evil, but had no understanding of its criminal nature.
Weakland, who retired in 2002 after it became known that he paid $450,000 in 1998 to a man who had accused him of date rape years earlier, said he initially:
Accepted naively the common view that it was not necessary to worry about the effects on the youngsters: either they would not remember or they would `grow out of it'.
A common excuse in Ireland is that "the cultural norms were different then". Sure they were because the Catholic Church actively fought all those who sought to stand up for more progressive values and human rights. It was the Church which had largely created and maintained those norms against all comers in the first place. The Church was never a passive viction of social norms. It arrogated to itself the right to define them. notes from no w here
