At Mass several weeks ago (a big traditional Church with the 'Head' priest and two others) it was announced that one of the priests was entering Holy Life in his 60's. This is very unusual at this age, normally it's younger. My immediate thought was, ' The man is a priest, surely that means he already is in Holy Life? Apparently not, this man is going into a Monastry. Now that surely is Holy Life. I saw the big Cahoona priest in Tesco the other morning and honestly, if I'd not known him I would not have thought, 'Oh, a priest', as you would exprect.
He was just wearing a ski jacket, no dog collar in sight, which is fair enough but led me to wonder if priests think their job ends at a certain time like office hours.
I'd always thought not, but then you wonder about this huge problem of child abuse in the Catholic church. I've asked my originally C of E mother, 'Why do you not hear of this problem in the C of E? Is it because of the choice of marriage there?'
This is doubtful to me, as I can bear witness to many stories of married or partnered men abusing their own and other children, so how could this be the case?
My mother thinks that, as the C of E is much smaller and, of course, is the national Church, you may not hear about it as freely.
The problem the Catholic church faces has crippled it's growth, although not the faith of the Catholics. It's a total shame. I always think, how can even a 'normal' bog standard bloke even think of looking at a child in such a way, let alone abuse. It's so frightening. But a priest....I mean, it's not that easy to get into priesthood, and surely you must believe in the teachings, so how can they go so totally opposite to what they are supposed to stand for? Are they evil or just extremely weak people?
I pray that this Pope all those in power make some choices that will obliterate this issue.
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