The Catholic Church’s Sex Abuse Scandal Is A Crisis Of Faith

1. The crisis did not arise from the teachings of the Catholic Church, it arose from the abandonment of those teachings by a faction of U.S. priests, bishops, and theologians amid the ferment of the sexual revolution in the 1960s and ‘70s.
2. After all, the church has been embroiled in a sex abuse scandal for more than 15 years, a crisis that has exposed horrifying sin and corruption—evil, in fact—within the ranks of its priests and bishops.
3. “We are committed to work in determined ways so that such abuse cannot happen.” Such language echoes the weak response from U.S. bishops recently to revelations of misconduct by former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who resigned last month amid allegations he had for years sexually abused boys and had sexual relations with adult seminarians.
4. Earlier this month, First Things published an open letter from 44 young Catholics—journalists, academics, and activists—addressed to church leaders and asking for “a thorough, independent investigation into claims of abuse by Archbishop McCarrick, both of minors and of adults.
5. It not only details widespread sexual abuse of boys and girls by Catholic priests over the past 70 years, it also reveals a systematic coverup by Catholic bishops across the state.
6. What should faithful Catholics conclude from all this? In the coming days and weeks we will no doubt hear, as we have ever since the scandal first broke in 2002, that the problem is with the church itself, with its backward teachings about priest celibacy and homosexuality and a host of other things.

http://thefederalist.com/2018/08/16/catholic-churchs-sex-abuse-scandal-crisis-faith/