What IS good, and how do we determine it?

[Jenny A]

I'll be a lot more blunt than CL: the Catholic Church's mistake was in believing that gays could be accepted into the priesthood in the first place without the problems that are being discussed surfacing eventually.

There is no "heterosexual priest" problem in the Catholic Church.  There is a "homosexual priest" problem that is being mis-identified by the media as a "pedophile priest" problem. But these aren't straight, horny priests molesting girls. These are predatory homosexuals preying on boys. (And the affairs with parishioners you speak of are nothing in comparison to the problems experienced in Protestant churches.)

So, the irony here is that the Church was TRYING to practice what it preaches by treating these homosexuals as if they were just as qualified for the priesthood as the straight seminarians were. They weren't. But does the Catholic Church get any kudos for that? Hell. No.

And let's lay one other card on the table: homosexuals flocked into the Church in droves during the 50's and 60's because society wasn't ready for them to live as gays openly. What was a gay man to do if he didn't want to explain why he wasn't dating? He considered the priesthood. Final point (and this will drive some of you nuts): Satan, yes, that ancient serpent who is opposed to all of God's plans, has, IMHO, had a hand in all of this. I have no doubts that he has been targeting the Catholic clergy by infiltrating its ranks with men with whom he has an inordinate amount of influence and sway. It is an unseen spiritual battle, and their are plenty of casualties.

In the U.S. about one in five victims of sexual abuse by a priest is female.

Female victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests tended to be younger than the males. Data analyzed by John Jay researchers, shows that the number and proportion of sexual misconduct directed at girls under 8 years old was higher than that experienced by boys the same age

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_C...buse_cases

Thousands of Dutch girls have suffered sexual and physical abuse by Roman Catholic Church officials since 1945, a report says. An independent investigative commission, funded by the Dutch Bishop's Conference and mandated by the government, reported on Monday that the girls were molested by members of the clergy in their homes or in churches.

http://www.presstv.com/detail/2013/03/11...tch-girls/

One of the most stunning allegations concerned a nun impregnated by a priest who forced her to have an abortion; she died from complications, and he officiated at her funeral. Priests were also alleged to have raped young nuns who approached them for the required certificates to enter religious orders; to have told nuns that oral contraceptives would protect them from AIDS; and to have used nuns as “safe” alternatives to prostitutes in countries plagued by AIDS—with some priests going so far as to demand that heads of convents make the nuns sexually available to them.

And it is not just nuns, of course. As in the recently reported case of a priest who allegedly molested a 14-year-old Minnesota girl and was not de-frocked but simply transferred to a parish in India (after the Vatican supposedly toughened up its policies), thousands of girls, from infants to adolescents, have been molested by priests. Adult Catholic women have been subject to clerical transgressions that range from sexual exploitation to harassment to rape to beatings to potentially negligent homicide. Many sexually active priests have left a trail of wounded women and fatherless progeny in their wake—testament to the hypocrisy of a “celibate” priesthood.

http://msmagazine.com/blog/2010/04/14/no...men-girls/

If you want to know the young victims are mostly boys, I have one word for you: access.