blk_pope_no_hope.jpgSome say it’s unfair to harp on the Catholic Church’s child-abuse scandals when the Pope’s in town. It would be a cheap shot, for instance, to call Pope Benedict XVI the kind of guy who protects pedophile priests from prosecution.
Well… In 2006, the BBC documentary program Panorama claimed that, as a Cardinal, Joseph Ratzinger issued a “secret church directive” that guided the Vatican’s systematic cover-up of boy-fucking fathers.
This is no conspiracy theory that’s been retro-fitted to indict a Cardinal who became Pope. On Aug. 7, 2002, the National Catholic Reporter connected Ratzinger to Crimen Sollicitationis, a 1962 document that outlined the Vatican’s policy for handling allegations of sexual abuse. Their Vatican correspondent reported that Crimen Sollicitationis was referenced in a “letter from Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, head of the Vatican’s doctrinal congregation, to the bishops of the world regarding new procedures for sex abuse cases.”
Clearly, these new procedures had nothing to do with honesty, or justice, not even decency.
The documentary is here (click “watch” on the right). Or, read a transcript href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/panorama/5402928.stm">here.
-Jeff Koyen