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| Bishop Robert Morlino of Madison, Wisconsin. "It was the gays!" Credit: CNS/Jason Studnicka |
The current frantic campaign by Catholics to try to combine their need to dissociate themselves from the crimes of paedophile and sexually predatory Catholic clergy with their desire to victimise and demonise homosexuals, did not start with Bill Donohue of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights; he was merely following the party line it seems.
It was the line also taken by Bishop Robert Morlino, Bishop of Madison, Wisconsin, last August when the Pennsylvania report detailing the abuse of over 1000 children by 300 Catholic priest in Pennsylvania was released. In a letter to his diocese Morlino said:
It is time to admit that there is a homosexual subculture within the hierarchy of the Catholic Church that is wreaking great devastation in the vineyard of the Lord...
Morlino, like Donohoe, is trying to conflate paedophilia and homosexuality despite evidence that children are no more at risk from homosexual men than they are from heterosexuals, including the 2011 John Jay College of Criminal Justice studyPDF commissioned by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops which directly contradicted Marlino's assertion.
As this report in the National Catholic Reporter points out:
The statement from Morlino, along with similar ones from at least two other bishops, stand out from others made by dozens of fellow bishops who have focused their comments on apologizing and calling for concrete actions. They follow a series of postings in recent weeks from conservative Catholic websites, including Church Militant, the Lepanto Institute and LifeSiteNews, attempting to link the clergy sexual abuse scandal to gay priests and calling for their removal from church ranks.
It is noticeable too from comments like those on the right on postings on this subject that I have made in Google+ that this 'blame the gays' response is being eagerly taken up those trying to divert from the paedophile priest scandals and to victimise and blame the LGBT community for the actions of abusive priests. It seems to be particularly eagerly taken up by those with sexual identity problems of their own, manifesting as excessive homophobia.
Clearly what is going on here on is a conservative campaign to regain their assumed right to victimise and abuse minorities of their choice by reversing the recent gains made by the LGBT community in achieving the same same rights for themselves as other people enjoy. And they are harnessing the guilt they have inflicted on repressed homosexuals to do it. As Andrew Seidel of the Freedom From Religion Foundation said:
This is a disgusting attempt to paint LGBTQ Americans, who have made great strides toward acceptance and equality despite the best efforts of the Catholic Church, as “disordered,” “deviant,” and “ in violation of the natural moral law.” As the tidal wave of this scandal again crashes down on his church, Morlino is trying to shift the blame.
This does not auger well when senior Catholic clergy see reports on the paedophile activities of their priests and colleagues as not so much a problem for them to get to grips with as another opportunity to victimise and demonise gays and to roll back several decades of social progress towards an egalitarian, inclusive society - the very same change in social climate that gave their victims the courage to come forward and report the abuses in the first place.
Clearly, these people would like to get back to a time when they could rely on deference and turning of the blind eye while they got on with abusing and victimising vulnerable minorities of their choice under cover of sanctimonious piety.
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