Religion

There are really two issues to talk about here. Celibacy and child molestation. So let’s tackle them one at a time and see where we end up.

Celibacy
Catholic priests are not allowed to have sex. Most people know that these days. What a completely stupid idea. How can they counsel married couples if they have no foundation for what they are talking about? Not only that, but all people get “urges". Ok, people get horny. If you are the type to believe in god, then you would say, “God made us that way". What happens to the average person when you try to force them to not have sex. They manage for a while, but gradually they become more and more horny. Eventually, they get so horny that their judgement gets a little blurry. This is basic behaviour for withdrawal from addiction. Lets face it, men are addicted to sex. This is programmed into them. Us poor fools can’t help it. So, the judgement starts to suffer and soon, they start looking at anything that moves (and some things that don’t, poor knot holes) differently. If there were a god and this god loved his/her/its people, then this god would have made a third gender that was asexual. This third gender would then become the clergy.

Child Molestation
This is a difficult one to talk about, because I am sure to step on toes as I go. Then again, that’s the wonderful thing about free speech. I can say what I want, as long as it doesn’t spread hate, and as long as I don’t force others to believe as I do. It should be noted that I am not trying to hurt people’s feelings, and if I do, I apologize that your feelings were hurt by what I said.

Let me start by quoting the character Ron Stoppable from the Disney cartoon “Kim Possible". “This is worse than sick and wrong! It is wrong-sick". (I have kids and have grown to like that show). This topic is really hard for me to talk about. I have a lot of trouble getting around the nausea that I feel when I think of it. That idea that someone can do that to children really proves that those people are definitely not wired the same way as I am. OK, here we go

Yes, yes. There are lots of different groups people molesting children. You’ve got your school teacher, your piano teacher, your policeman, your sporting coach, your parent!!! or other relative, and so on, and of course, your catholic priest. I guess that it is not fair to only pick on priests when so many other groups do this, so why am I? Well, you see, it’s like this. Priests put themselves into a position of moral superiority in a way that far exceeds the other groups. Priests are “chosen by God". In my opinion, there seems to me to be an extra level of trust placed on priests. They are the community’s spiritual and moral leader. When a priest abuses his position of power by molesting a child, as bad as that crime is, it is made worse because he is not only betraying the child and some people directly involved, but the entire community.

Over the years, as the world has grown smaller and smaller, we as a community have come to discover more and more how truly dangerous the world really is. People often tell me that they think the world is getting worse, but in my opinion, that is not the case. I think that we are becoming more aware. What we are learning is that priests are people. They are not any better than others. They have their good members and their bad members, just as does society at large. When we stop treating priests as superior, we will be able to do a better job of raising our children in a safe environment.

Conclusion
Is there a link between these two issues? I think there is. I do not believe that celibacy causes child molestation, but I do think that celibacy impairs judgement, and weakens willpower. That effect could push someone who may be so inclined over the edge from thinking about it to doing it. This is a completely reprehensible behaviour and I in no way condone it (quite the opposite in fact). I also can not claim to understand how someone can find themselves in the position where they would be thinking of this behaviour in the first place. I do, however, see a possible explanation for why priest have a harder time controlling themselves than other people in positions of power over children.

If there were a god, it would not be too likely that he would make men addicted to sex and then require some of them to abstain. I have to go back to Occam’s Razor here. This is far too unlikely. It is far too complicated a situation for it to be reasonable. What is more reasonable is that the church has imposed this restriction in an attempt to put their clergy above the masses. “Look at how devoted WE are. We gave up sex for our Lord.”

I guess what I am saying is that celibacy is a really bad idea that leads to lots of problems on it’s own. As far as child molestation goes,