A 75-year old self-proclaimed “prophet” has been charged with 27 counts of sexual assault. He had a church out of his home called “The Ministry” that was attended mostly by minors, who he sexually abused:
According to the arrest report, one victim was forced to leave her family and move in with Catello so he could “counsel her.” There she said she was abused several times and coerced into having intercourse and anal sex.
The second victim said she was also assaulted at Catello’s home. If they refused, they were told their families would be kicked out of the church, and they would burn in hell, the victims said.
The strangest part is that this man was in a motorized wheelchair and on an oxygen tube — not the most likely suspect:
Neighbors said they still can’t believe it.“He was on a motorized wheelchair and an oxygen tank. So, how he could do something like this is amazing. That’s what got me,” Pollard said.
But he’s not sorry. He did it because he was “full of the Spirit” and “can’t help what he does” when he’s under the influence of the Spirit of Jesus.
And if Jesus, God, or his Holy Spirit existed, this man would be partially right. They would have known he was going to sexually assault people, threaten them with hell, and ruin young people’s lives. And they did nothing — which, when you’re all-powerful and holy, is a kind of approval.
Another reason they probably don’t exist — this man is just a manipulative, disgusting con man.
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74 Comments
When I was a young boy in Sunday School, i was always a little confused as to what the “Holy Spirit” did, exactly. So he’s in charge of sexual assaults, eh? Gawd I hope I never get “full of the Spirit.”
Wasn’t that part of “Grapes of Wrath”, the preacher who every time he got “full of the Spirit”, he’d find himself with some hot girl in the wheat fields after his preaching was done?
Yep, good ol’ Jim Casy. I love Steinbeck:
That’s pretty amazing, Daniel. I’m not sure how I missed that the first time I read it…
Or maybe Jesus has a very high sex drive and very few respect for women rights, and a different conception about what a minor is, or a twisted meaning for “consensual”.
Ya know, how could we know god’s mind, being us merely humans?
That does rather explain how God got Mary up the duff…
As someone in a motorized wheelchair myself, it baffles me. I’m thinking about the logistics of the assault, y’know? How?
Disgusting dirty old man.
If the truth were known, that old bastard probably uses the wheel chair for sympathy and doesn’t really need it. You can bet his lawyer will use the the “wheel chair” idea as a defense. Which will
mean the prosecution will have to bring in a doctor’s report about the need for the chair.
Well, I suppose there is one difference in that I am a girl and he is a man; depending on his disability, it might not actually prevent his molesting.
But that they will probably use it as a defense, I have no doubt. Sick, sick, sick.
Religion, in all its forms, continues its morbid, shameful, and inevitable slide into the realm of ridicule and disdain.
It is more original than “the devil made me do it”, so there’s that, I guess.
If an atheist murders someone today, do we lay the blame on atheism? Of course not. That would be ridiculous. Likewise, when a man like this 75 year old does something and lays the blame on God, God isn’t really to blame. It’s the screwed up man.
Many who post here claim to be intelligent and enlightened. You’d THINK I wouldn’t have to point out such easily reasoned arguments.
Interesting. So we have a gentleman (and I use the term loosely) who is stating:
1. I abuse children because God says so.
2. Children were taught to believe what this man said, because God said so.
3. The parents of these children let them over to the man’s house because, as a prophet of God, it was OK.
Now, remove these elements. If the man had not been a “prophet”, and if the parents had not believed him to be good because their religious beliefs lead them to a false sense of trust, would he have been placed in a situation to abuse these children? Would the children have gone along with it for so long without the “it’s OK – God is moving through me to touch you this way”?
I would argue – no. The odds of such an event occurring would have been reduced. The evidence is in the incredibly low numbers of minors hanging around pedophiles houses without the excuse of religion (or, in the more usual case, family relationships).
If nothing else, it certainly would have made this sick creep’s ability to get his hands on children much harder. But so far, outside of family abuse, it seems that religion holds the greatest likelihood of convincing people to falsely trust pedophiles, and even more sickening, to defend them of their sick and twisted actions (see also, Catholic Church pedophile priest scandal, Rabbi delivering sexually transmitted diseases to circumcised children that resulted in a death, female circumcision, polygamists marring off barely teenage girls to older pedophile perverts in southern Utah/Northern Arizona/etc).
I’d THINK I wouldn’t have to point out such easily reasoned arguments.
And probably the chruch leaders are now going to haras the victims trying to make them shut up. And that priest will probably be rewarded by a promotion to some kind of penthous in a foreign country so the press will forget about it.
John,
You are STILL just pointing out cases where humans are behaving badly. IF there comes a time when the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of Christians are doing such things, then I’ll concede you have a good point. Until then, you’re pointing out examples of criminal activity.
You’d think…
Criminal activity facilitated by religion.
People behaving badly using religion as a tool to do so. Do pay attention.
I’m pointing out a case where their behaving badly could be mitigated by removing an excuse for their behavior.
If I see an aromatherapist letting someone die of cancer, I blame the person *and the false belief that lead to their behavior*.
In this case, people behaved in an irrational fashion *aided by a religious belief that a man was being lead by a divine being, and without that belief they wouldn’t have trusted him with a 10 foot pole*.
If the man was a teacher, having private lessons at his house, there would have been some filtering system (background checks, perhaps a parent physically there to verify nothing bad was happening).
If the man was a Scout Master, well, the same thing.
We have a situation where normal thought would go (in a control group):
Adult Man + Teenage Girls = No Trust
But, when we add in a variable:
Adult Man + Teenage Girls + Religious Belief = Trust
The fact that this man used, and may even believe, in his irrational beliefs directly aided in his ability to prey upon children. Without those, he may have *wanted* to prey upon children, but odds are parents wouldn’t deliver their children up to him for his rapacious desires. Might it have stopped it 100%? Probably not – you have idiots all over. But it would have made his job a hell of a lot harder to perform instead of letting religiously blind parents actually *give* their children to him.
“We have a situation where normal thought would go (in a control group):
Adult Man + Teenage Girls = No Trust
But, when we add in a variable:
Adult Man + Teenage Girls + Religious Belief = Trust”
Maybe I misunderstand the point being made, but it seems to be missing something. What about “Adult Man + Teenage Girls + adult man’s integrity, honesty, and respect for the teenage girls = Trust”? Isn’t that normal? (Shouldn’t it be normal?)
Well, I’d say that’s the universe I’d love to live in. But I was writing from the point of view of a parent. Let me do it in a different way for kicks.
If I was suppose to drop my daughter off at someone’s house, my response would not be “Oh, sure, let’s do that.”
My thought would be:
JohnHummel(Man && Teenage girl && Man’s House != Trust)
I’m kind of cheating, but imagine this is a function call. Inside a rational person (yes, me – hush now, I’m rather rational), this setup returns No Trust. Actually, it’s not even a function, but work with me here – this is getting too silly as it is ;).
Now, I’d *love* to live in a world where I knew that 99.9% of the men out there were perfectly decent, and in reality – they likely are. But it’s not a risk I’m willing to take.
Now, if I’m in a situation where the person is a school teacher hired by my daughter’s public school, I might think like this:
JohnHummel(Teacher && Teenage Girl && Teacher’s House != Trust)
I know that Man(Type:Teacher) means that he’s been vetted by the school system (background checks, lessons on why touching kids is a no-no, etc). I still likely won’t have trust if he says “Just drop her off at my house!”
But:
JohnHummel(Teacher && Teenage Girl && School Building && Normal School Hours == Trust)
Then I’m OK – I know that the school building and normal school hours means there are other adults present, who have all been vetted. Still possible that he’s a horrible guy – but the likelihood is now much, much smaller.
As far as this story, the equation becomes (for, I would hope, most people):
John Hummel (Religious Leader && Teenage Girl && Man’s House != Trust);
However, you have people for whom the equation turns into:
Religious Person: (Religious Leader && Teenage Girl && Man’s House == Trust)
Anyway. The “adult man’s integrity, honesty, and respect for the teenage girls” – for me, I have no way of validating that. He could claim it, but that doesn’t make it true. In the case of public education, they have a vetting process (background check), and other constraints (teachers in rooms with windows, other adults present trained to report bad behavior, etc).
Since I have no way of validating that the Religious Institution is doing the same checks (especially in this case, where the girls were at the guys house), the function still returns No Trust.
…
OK – this went on too long, but I think it works ;).
control group, logic expressions, funtion call… are you a mathematician working as a programmer?
I’m a man of many talents and few fortunes ;).
sure, you seem to be a good writer too.
Only being curious, I work as a datamining consultant and something in your posts sounded too familiar to me
I’m guessing you recognized my good looks and charm. No, I kid.
I agree with your logic (and I like the way you expressed it). But it’s sad that we have to think like that. Especially when it’s the people we should be able to trust that we can’t.
I’m glad that I’m a single guy, no kids, living on his own.
Oh dear.
He promised to leave – a promise he’ll break by keeping only for a while – because he couldn’t hack people actually calling him on his hatred, blind spots and double standards… He hates it when people dare to disagree with him, even worse when they see through him to his hatred, but I couldn’t resist anyway:
He’ll wait until an OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of christians are as bad as this abuser, and *then* he’ll concede a good point made.
Not enough to have the hypocrisy now, not enough to keep having the facts increasingly give the lie to his claim that it’s rare, no, he has to have an OVERWHELMING MAJORITY.
Sick.
Would aromatherapy be to blame?
Background checks haven’t prevented numerous teachers from having sex with students. Is the teaching system to blame, or is it instead the poor teachers?
You’re making this easy for me! Nobody would say the Boy Scouts were to blame if a scoutmaster molested kids. Thanks for making my point for me.
Again, religion is not to blame. A criminal and stupid parents are…
Yes.
Background checks have reduced the amount of pedophile teachers. Now, reading comprehension time:
Gotta love how you skip over that. Like I said, you have idiots all over. Of course, you can’t stop 100% of bad people from doing bad things. But, you can reduce the risk. One way of removing the risk is not to trust people with your children without a good reason. These people’s “good reason”? Religion. Without that, they wouldn’t have had reason to trust him.
I would *if the Boy Scouts actively worked to defend the scountmaster, moved him to a different area, and covered up his crime*. I would blame the Boy Scouts if parents trusted their children without conditions *because* the man was in the Boy Scouts. If that trust allowed him – and many others in a systematic way – to abuse children, then you’d have to say “Huh – must be something bad about the Boy Scouts – there’s tons of evil scoutmasters around!”
Now, if someone sent their kids to a scoutmaster, and there was another adult there, and a background check, and *still* the kids were abused, then you could easily blame the scoutmaster and the scoutmaster alone – the parents had taken every other precaution. But if they took the irrational viewpoint and went from:
Adult male + teenage girls = No Trust
And went to:
Adult Male + teenage girls + Boy Scout participation = Trust
Then you’d have to blame Boy Scout participation as being the reason why they falsely placed trust in the Adult Male.
We should be able to trust our teachers, scout masters, soccer coaches, child mentors, etc etc etc. With YOUR line of argument we should do away with education, the Boy Scouts, and all of those other things where pedophiles have reared their ugly heads.
I’d say your logic fails.
Again: the criminal and the stupid parents are to blame for what happened in this article.
If the scouts kept having incidents of child abuse, and were covering it up at every turn, I’d want to get rid of them, too.
Sexual abuse in the church is kinda like a plane crash: you hear about all of them because they are rare. Some people won’t fly because such a big deal is made when one crashes, but looking at the data logically shows it’s one of the safest forms of transportation in the world.
Would you care to enlighten us with the percentages? How many Christians are there in the world? How many cases of abuse? How many attempted cover ups? How does this compare to other aspects of human endeavor?
When one comes from the place where he/she is an atheist and wishes others were also, it’s easy to make illogical leaps in trying to prove one’s point. That’s what’s happening right now in this article.
Considering that there was an institutional protection of child predators for 50 years (that we know of – could be longer) in various regions around the world, I don’t think I’d put my trust in them.
If an airline had pilots who raped their passengers, then got moved by the airlines to other distribution routes and the victims told to shut up or that they were lying, I’d certainly be less willing to fly because of a conscious and willing attempt to protect the guilty. And if their reasoning was “Hey, you should trust pilots – your odds of being raped by them aren’t that bad!”, then I’d have to say “Yeah. Fuck that. I’m driving because I don’t trust you. Thanks.”
I haven’t seen institutional child rapist protection programs in any other institution other than religious ones. So I don’t care that the odds of a child being raped by a false prophet, a minister, a priest, a rabbi or otherwise are <1%. Even if the odds are <0.001%, religious organizations have not proven themselves trustworthy with children without supervision by their parents.
You know what they say about opinions; everybody’s got one.
Provide evidence.
This is also confirmation bias. Churchie sees church in best possible, slanted light, defends church.
Read William Lobdell;s book “Losing My Religion” for an iceberg-tip of what he uncovered.
Would you?
In this thread, religion is being prosecuted. The burden of proof lies with the person who lays charges. If a case is to be, those making the accusations need to provide the numbers to justify that case.
As of right now the numbers are 1 religious child molester out of 1 “prophet”
Waaaahhhhh! Call the waaaambulance!
In this thread, religion and its hate-filled representatives like you are spewing hostility, demanding evidence and statistics while having the hypocritical double standard of making broad sweeping opinions without any statistics.
Just for some number crunching.
Children in priest run schools (or at least, how many the buildings could hold): 30,000
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/20/irish-catholic-schools-child-abuse-claims
Reports were that child abuse was “endemic” in the boys section. So let’s say 15,000 boys. Out of 30,000. Maybe not 100% of the boys were abused, and the priests protected from prosecution because, after all, they represented God’s will on earth (and, evidently God’s will was that boys got buggered).
An epidemic is 7.7% of the population. So about 1,000 boys. Every year. For 50 years.
I’d say those numbers are pretty bad. All thanks to a religious organization. Must be nice to have God on your side when you’ve got lust for boys in your heart – at least, if you’re a sicko who uses people’s trust in religion to enact your evil designs.
“Some people won’t fly because such a big deal is made when one crashes, but looking at the data logically shows it’s one of the safest forms of transportation in the world.”
That and nobody is trying to cover up Plane Crashes.
Ohhh no they are not rare at all!
I was in a catholic school, and I have seen enough to realize that anyone in a religious function tend to abuse their power. They prey on the weak and children. I also saw many supposed to be very religious people hit their children and if you listen to the stories from 50 years ago it was even worse in schools! Boths nuns and priests!
I don’t think anyone is talking about xtians in general. They are talking about christian preachers, pastors, priests or what ever else you might call them. In any case they have placed themselves in positions of authority by being leaders in the communities they work in. When people are so deluded to rely on religion as a way of life they are really saying “How should I live my life?”. This opens the door for the priest to take advantage of the most gullible ones. The biggest problem is that religions have become a collection place for perverts much like a playground full of kids is a magnet for child abusers.
The laws of the land should be strong enough that child abusers and other perverts like them are put away for good. And being a priest, pastor etc should not be an excuse for lighter sentences.
Hey, nice strawman you built yourself there! Must make yourself feel big and strong to go punching at it. Grrr! Strong man you are! Look at the sweat gleam off your pecs and glint in the sunlight!
Let me try it! By your reasoning, if a school hired a person off the street, you should think it’s OK as long as they have the word “teacher” in their title. After all, “We should be able to trust our teachers”. Granted, *I* wouldn’t send my children to such a school if I knew they didn’t do at least some vetting process, but hey – you take that risk with your kids.
Me, I’ll channel some Nancy Reagen and Just Say No.
Of course, I said nothing of the sort. By my reasoning, people would not have *trusted* this man just because he claimed to be religious. Just like I don’t trust a teacher because they’re a teacher. I trust the teacher because I know there are systems in place to, within reasonable risk, ensure that they are less likely to be a pedophile.
The response of these parents should have been “You claim to be a man of God, and want to instruct my children. Fine, but since you have not been vetted by any independent process to make sure you aren’t bad for my children, I’ll sit in on their instruction. Or ask there be a camera present. Or, any number of things.”
They didn’t. They trusted because they had an irrational faith in a man because of their religious beliefs. And their children paid for it.
I’m starting to think you have a mental deficiency because you are yet again making MY ARGUMENT FOR ME. Thanks.
You’re right. Those parents should have asked those things. They (the parents) placed faith in a MAN. Please tell me of any church that says we should place faith in anyone other than God. So, yet again, Christianity is not to blame (’cause Christianity says to place faith in God alone), stupid parents and a criminal are.
Amazing how you keep ignoring the fact that the only reason why they placed their faith in this man was because of religion. You keep going back to “the bad man! He was a bad man.”
He was a bad man *who was enabled to be bad because of religion.*
They didn’t put their faith in a man. They put their faith in their religion.
You’re pretty thick headed, John. The same can be said in the cases of children molested by teachers:
“The only reason parents left their student with the teacher who molested them was because they placed their faith in that teacher because of our educational process… (s)he was a bad teacher *who was enabled by our education system*. They didn’t put their faith in a teacher, they put their faith in the educational system”
If your argument works for religion, it should work for the educational system, too. So, because some teachers still find ways to molest students even with all the safeguards in place, should we eliminate public education and institute a system of home schooling alone?
Again, using this argument against religion is very poor.
You’re pretty hostile and full of hatred, puffed up with self righteousness, and hypocritical to think of yourself as a “loving christian”, Donny.
Since you can’t logically win, you’re going to attack with unjustified assumptions, is that it? Where have I indicated that I am pro-child-rape? Please quote me. Where have I said it’s okay as long as it’s done in the name of religion?
Most churches have very strict safeguards in place. Very few churches have “move(d) the pedophile to the next place”. A few Catholic churches did that (by the way, I’m not Catholic). Most churches turn offenders over to the police. Those that do not are not indicative of the beliefs of modern US Christians, ’cause we despise such offenders too.
My hope is that someday you’ll move out of your mother’s basement and learn a bit of logic. You wouldn’t be making such a fool of yourself here if you already possessed such intelligence.
John, I’ve indulged your lack of logic long enough and am unsubscribing from this thread.
G’day.
Knocking all the pieces over and flying back to the nest to claim victory.
The argument “b-b-but he’s not a reeeeaaaalllll christian!” is very poor. You get to cover up in muleheaded denial of the fact that christians are doing this, and that your opinion that it is rare is not backed up by the statistics that you demand from anyone disagreeing with you. It’s also increasingly being uncovered as not rare.
Donny, I and probably others here have indulged your flaming hatred long enough.
Promise?
You keep bouncing back like a bad check.
@ Joe B: Hahahahahahahaha!
That quote is so excellent that it deserves another full showing.
“Debating creationists on the topic of evolution is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon; it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flies back to its flock to claim victory.”
- Scott D. Weitzenhoffer
Donny pauling has spewed his hate, crapped on the board, and flown back to his flock where he can pretend he is a loving christian, because they will fail to see through him, or will play along with it.
lol, nice quote claymore
‘Most churches turn offenders over to the police.’
NO THEY DON’T;
They try to cover it up big time by harasing the victims hoping they will shut up. There is a direct relation Priests = Phedophelia!
Here in Europe, priests and nuns were feared 50 years and longer ago. They had absolute power. What we see is only the sucface, if we dig a bit deeper a lot of things will come to the surface once people dare to talk freely. We have not seen the bottom yet, it will get much much uglier.
“Knocking all the pieces over and flying back to the nest to claim victory.”
Don’t forget spamming posts to get several “last words” in.
It would only work against education if people put blind faith in people because they had the word “teacher” in front of their names.
If schools didn’t put the safeguards in place, then you bet I’d pull my kids out for home schooling. But, since they have, I can state they are far more moral than religions who simply move the pedophile to the next place to rape more children.
I’m trying to figure out now why you’re pro-child rape. Something about kids that’s getting you all horny? I’d like less children to be raped, you seem to think it’s not a problem as long people do it in the name of religion.
Oooohhhh, he gives love-bombs in church and hate-bombs here.
(Leaving the smoke and stench of hypocrisy.)
Hey, you’re the one who seems to think that religion is a good enough safeguard to protect pedophiles from prosecution. See ya – oh, and don’t go sniffing around my kids. I get nervous when religious people tell me they have something they want to “teach” my children.
“Hey, nice strawman you built yourself there! Must make yourself feel big and strong to go punching at it. Grrr! Strong man you are! Look at the sweat gleam off your pecs and glint in the sunlight!”
Win.
It’s hard for a believe to see things not in black and white. I think that’s why you aren’t picking up on the difference (giving you the benefit of the doubt, that you aren’t just ignoring it), it’s about reducing risk. There’s risk in everything, that doesn’t mean we should do nothing. You take the steps you can to reduce the risk. When the situation involves children being alone with a adult they are suppose to trust, there needs to be some precautions and attention paid to whats going on. How many parents move their child in with a teacher, scout master, coach or mentor? The issue is the because this pedophile was dressing himself up in religion the parents just trusted him when they should have taken precautions and realized that something was up. They were blinded by religion.
Joe,
Are you paying attention to my comments, or are you making assumptions? My comments clearly spell out that kids’ parents were stupid. Nowhere did I say that they should trust the man because he claimed to be a prophet. All churches teach that faith should be in God alone. Christian churches don’t teach that Sunday School teachers should have students moving in with them. The times when such situations are found, the root cause and problem is with the idiotic parents and the people who would use any tool available to get what they want.
Reducing risk is essential. Most churches do so, which is why this sort of thing is rare. The problem isn’t religion. That’s clear as day without the atheist agenda clouding your vision. The arguments against religion in this thread wouldn’t stand up in any court.
Ok, I’ll try reading though this thread tomorrow before reading my daily atheist talking points and agenda review e-mail.
The problem is that religious belief was used in place of actual safeguards. They trusted him because they believed he was a prophet. Not because he had been put under any reasonable scrutiny.
I like how you accuse me of not reading your comments, then throw up another straw man. Who is taking religion to court?
All churches teach that faith should be in god alone? No.
False. Blatantly false. Your ignorance is showing.
Oh, and you don’t think those parents “asked God” about this guy and the little imaginary voice in their head told them it was ok?
@Donny: I think the point is that he was in a position of authority – regardless of whatever checks were or should have been performed. Because of his position of authority, parents and children trusted him. Sadly, bad people do take advantage of the trust that others put in them, because of their position of authority. And that trust is often (but not exclusively) one that relates to a person in a position of authority because of religion. Not all priests, rabbis, pastors, whatever, abuse that trust. But some do. One is too many
“Most churches do so, which is why this sort of thing is rare.” I wish it were more rare.
Just as a rifle with a scope doesn’t force someone to become a freeway sniper, so coercive religious authority over unattended children doesn’t force someone to become a pedophile; it just facilitates their endeavors. As for the parents, they may as well have told their children that, since it’s such a long walk home from school, they should just jump in if someone offers them a ride.
Donny: “(by the way, I’m not Catholic).” Lol, I don’t think our *prophet* is either.
Btw, this whole episode happened right here in Las Vegas NV, so now that Donny’s gone we can all come clean and name the real culprit: GAMBLING!!
Don’t forget drinking, gays, and strippers.
And probably the hookers over the hump in Pahrump…
“But he’s not sorry. He did it because he was “full of the Spirit”” He’s full of something.
There is no possible defense or justification for religion. Only excuses.
I looked over the comments, and I have to say – besides religion and trust, did anyone consider the fact that the man was in a wheelchair cause people to believe he’d be relatively harmless? I mean, well, he must have coerced the children verbally and had some power of authority over them, and yeah, religion, reasoning he was doing god’s work and convincing naive children of this… so their parents didn’t do a great job of telling them how to run away from people who touch them or want to be touched by them, and even if they tell you god said it’s ok or not to tell, they are a liar and you should always tell.
So yeah, the guy seems to believe the voices in his head tell him it’s ok to molest children, these are the same voices all pedophiles hear. He attributes them to god, and the people who go to his church think because he runs a church, he’s probably a decent sort of guy. And then because he’s in a wheelchair – let’s get these generalizations out of the way about the handicapped – unless they are very bitter about their disability (a generalization that they weren’t always bitter about something), people in wheelchairs are always _______: inspirational, kind-hearted, etc., those good qualities we always see, that we would hope we could live up to if we who are able would someday become disabled. Because they may not get around easily, it’s always very thoughtful to come by and see them. I mean, I myself think people in wheelchairs vary in personality a great deal (just as able people) and meet them like a person, deal with them on an individual basis, but the public perception is one (I think) that the handicapped are a little better than the rest of us in a very generic way.
So anyway, a nice Christian man in a wheelchair running a church. A swell combination for the prospective pedophile. It doesn’t mean he is, but that gives a pedophile very convenient access mentally and physically to children and their parents offer willingly. What more you got to say about that? He can’t possibly physically overpower our children, so trust is built in. Forget all that – most or even all pedophiles coerce their victims verbally and not physically. Play with their heads, threaten them not to tell, it makes a very confusing situation to go home and describe. Let’s not forget these people are usually known to the parents as a decent person, that is part of the game. A child would remember and be able to basically feel ok telling mom or dad their teacher yelled and held them down and did crazy violating things. Not so much that “I did what he told me to do and said it was ok and I don’t know what it was but I think it might have been wrong.” Well you must have been imagining it because I can’t figure out what you’re trying to tell me and he’s a nice man and he’s your teacher, you should do what he says. Or, “I don’t want to go back to school.” You’re going to school young man, now get dressed or you’ll miss the bus.
Anyway, what are this man’s qualifications to run a church, did he do a background check on himself or did god tell him the most efficient way to gain trust in the community and gather numerous children to his home since it was probably more considerably difficult for him to prey on them elsewhere. Not only is it the same voice that guides other pedophiles to children, it’s the same certainty in that voice and direction, that it is coming from god and not a sexual deviance that dictates other practice and assertions of such foolishness derived from faith (e.g. to pray your team wins or compulsively picket abortion clinics and gay pride parades, etc.). I’m not sure what kinds of background checks are done in other systems, and children are in contact with a number of adults per school day, like do they check out busdrivers and custodians as thoroughly as they do teachers and administrators?
Yes.
If he was just a spiritual leader, they might not have let their children with him. But a handicapped spiritual leader? Why, what harm could such a lovely old man bring?
As someone who is handicapped and, as aforementioned, in a motorized wheelchair… yeah, we get the wishy-washy sentimentalism (you’re such a winner…! wow, thanks lady, I am so very proud of breathing and actually living like a rational human being). It’s almost as bad as the baffled looks (what? You work at a court?! You are a bachelor in computer science?! – as if I was somehow incapable of doing such a thing) and the condescendence (like when people don’t talk directly to you, but your friend/mother/whatever).
Yes, I do have a problem. Yes, I did overcome some odds. But I did no more than what I had to, when I had to, simply to survive. There are a lot of people out there far more deserving of praise than I am, yet I get it because I was randomly struck by a crippling illness as an infant. It’s annoying (almost as annoying as random religious people praying over you, uninvited). Almost insulting, at times.
[/rant]
Look it is very simpel! If this religion if following the good jezus and the loving god, then the complete chuch would hunt those phedophelia priests down with stakes and burning flames and burn him to hell with a huge burning stake since this guy is the puppet of Satan hurting those poor inocent children. The number of Phedophelia priests should be near zero.
And the children would be blessed so they have a highway to heaven.
But Christian and Catholic religion do not follow the loving god, since they will do a lot of effort to harras the abused children into shutting up and not going to the press, while they displace the priest that misbehaved to another city where no one knows what he did, so it can all start over again. And the childrend treatened with condemnation to go to hell.
So when I was in high school, I had a youth minister that was not shy about expressing his attraction to me. He would have me come up to his office (in the church building) and help him work on things for the youth group. It took about three visits with him to notice that he was shutting the door a little bit more each time. During our next visit, I asked him if it was okay that the door was shut and he told me that it was fine because nothing bad was going to happen. He told me that he liked the way I looked and he had been very attracted to me since he started working there. For the rest of the summer, I spent a lot of time with him. Why? I have no clue. I was 16 years old and he was 31. He would tell me I was mature for my age and that it was nice to have someone like me in his youth group. I can remember on afternoon where I was going to go pray or something up in this beautiful area of my former church and before I headed that way, he asked me if I knew how to deep throat. I stood there shocked and he said he was just kidding. Oh, he also told me not to tell anyone how he felt about me because he was married.
Fast forward 2 months.
I’m talking with my friend from church and she begins to tell me how our youth minister also hit on her. Pretty much the exact same way.
So over the next few months, things were awkward between me and him. He never stopped hitting on me but finally I’d had enough. I told his wife who told the preacher. So the preacher, my youth minister, his wife, and I sat down one afternoon and talked about it. Somehow my youth minister’s incredibly inappropriate behavior was just a “struggle”- something satan was testing him with. And the whole thing was swept under the rug.
Oh and why did I trust him?
Because he was my youth minister.
Roll that in your blindness-inducing-drug stogie and smoke it, Donny Flaming!
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