Comments on: Threat forecast for Confession

By: Joseph Hannah

Joseph Hannah — Mon, 16 Mar 2015 12:47:27 +0000

Surely a Priest hearing a confession directed to God should be given at least the same or equal right as a legal advisor on behalf of his client, or the person himself who under section 60 of the evidence act 2006 may as a defendant refuse to give evidence which is self-incriminating. Has our society in NZ now got to the moment of hating Catholicism to the point of persecution, there is no doubt that this will happen, it’s just a matter of when.

By: Francis

Francis — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 10:08:10 +0000

Another important thing the media doesn’t mention in articles on the cases of child abuse in the Church is the beliefs and practices of the Priests. In many of the cases these were not orthodox Priests who fully adhered to the Church’s teachings etc. Many of these Paedophile Priests were disident Priests who were often Heretics who disagreed with many of the Church’s Teachings like on Homosexuality etc. So you can hardly say that Paedophilia is a fruit of the Church, firstly because %-wise the numbers were not big compared to the vast numbers of Priests, but also because who were offenders, many did not believe many Catholic Teachings etc.

By: Leo

Leo — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 03:34:19 +0000

There was an interesting segment on the ABC’s Law Report (19 April 2010) where Damian Carrick interviewed a retiring judge Antoinette Kennedy. The report is pretty lengthy but following is an extract.

Damien Carrick: Antoinette Kennedy recently stepped down as the chief judge of the WA District Court. She was the state’s longest serving judge, and she’s also a trailblazer: Antoinette Kennedy was WA’s first female judge.……………[speaking about how the media selectively reports]……………..
Antoinette Kennedy: Oh, in Western Australia paedophiles go to jail for very, very long periods of time. No-one should be under any illusion about that. But most of it is not reported, and it’s not reported for the simple reason most of it is in the family, and therefore the media can’t name and shame the offender.
Damien Carrick: Because they would identify the survivor or the victim ?
Antoinette Kennedy: That’s right. And so the community is unaware of the real paedophilia problem in the community, which is one of the greatest failings of the media of all time. I’m not asking them to publish every one of those, because I know that would be very boring if they said, ‘Today a stepfather, today a father, today whatever, was sentenced to 6, 10, 12 years jail.’ But it would be nice if they pointed out that 95% of paedophiles are heterosexual, adult males, who are not priests or schoolteachers……………..

By: Donna

Donna — Tue, 10 Mar 2015 09:37:37 +0000

I didn’t see anything in this article that suggested covering up abuse was a good thing. I think sometimes it helps to remember that plenty of ‘general public’ commit similar crimes and use up resources – think of Rolf Harris, dodgy doctors, teachers, coaches the list goes on. Just because you become a priest doesn’t mean you never do anything wrong again – in fact I am sure the devil is rubbing his hands with delight about the whole thing, and the suffering of the victims must be indescribable. I don’t think however that turning away from God is the answer to these problems, he has given us all free will, the ability to know and choose right or wrong. It hurts Him so much when people trusted in His name abuse that trust and damage such innocent young people. So the only one that wins out of the whole thing is the devil, not only does he potentially gain the soul of a priest, he also is happy about the hurt of the victim and the pain in causes God. Let’s not let him keep on winning! What kind of a world then? Let’s stay close to God, and trust that he will do the judging.

By: danny

danny — Sun, 08 Mar 2015 22:55:01 +0000

perhaps the time is at hand when all roman catholics live in one place and therefore can keep secrets and cover up child rape and money laundering and all the other crimes they commit in the name of god..?
that way our courts and social service systems and tax payers money will be used for the general public?