Data was recently published by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops that was collected by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. The annual report by CARA on sexual abuse allegations confirms what we have known for a long time: the Church is largely free of this problem.
A total of ten credible accusations were made against priests or deacons involving minors in 2013. As usual, 8 in 10 involved male-on-male sex and the most common time period for allegations reported in 2013—including all years, past or present—was the first half of the 1970s.
Homosexuality was implicated once again, though political correctness inhibits an honest discussion. To be explicit, most of the male-on-male sex involved postpubescent boys. Regarding the timeline, it is hardly surprising that the 1970s proved (once again) to be the most common period when the alleged abuse occurred. Though the ideological roots of the sexual revolution are traceable to the 1960s, its rotten fruit was not reaped until the 1970s.
It was not the Catholic Church’s teachings on sexuality, which stress the virtue of restraint, that brought about the sexual revolution; rather, it was the frontal assault on that virtue that gave birth to this mess. Yet those responsible, many of whom are intellectuals, continue to dodge responsibility for their destructive contribution to American culture.
In the past five years, there has been an average of 7.6 credible accusations made annually against roughly 40,000 priests. There is no institution in the nation that can even come close to that proportion. But don’t look for the media to report on this; it gets in the way of its contrived narrative. And don’t look for Bill Maher to start going after other segments of the population where this problem is exploding. No, his pathological hatred of all things Catholic will not allow it.
