It Is Time To Close All the Seminaries

We are at a crisis point in the Church that rivals anything in our 2000 year history.  Yet another sex abuse report came out today, this one from Germany.

A study commissioned by the German Bishops Conference examined 3,677 cases of abuse allegedly perpetrated by clergy nationwide, German magazine Der Spiegel reported on Wednesday. The universities of Giessen, Heidelberg and Mannheim were involved in the research, which implicated 1,670 priests in sexual abuse spanning from 1946 to 2014.

This is a worldwide scandal in the Church.  It seems to be happening everywhere and has been for decades.  Most likely it has been happening much longer than that, but was much more easily covered up in the days before mass communication.

The question is, why is this happening?  What is the common denominator in these scandals?  What do all priests in the Catholic Church have in common?

They all went to seminary.

Pope Francis Says Root Cause of the Abuse Crisis is Clericalism

On August 20, Pope Francis sent out a letter in regard to the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report which reviewed 70 years of sexual abuse in Pennsylvania dioceses involving 301 priests and over 1000 victims.  You can read the entire papal letter HERE.  Pope Francis makes no excuses for the abuse. He wrote:

With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives. We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them. I make my own the words of the then Cardinal Ratzinger when, during the Way of the Cross composed for Good Friday 2005, he identified with the cry of pain of so many victims and exclaimed: “How much filth there is in the Church, and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely to [Christ]! How much pride, how much self-complacency! Christ’s betrayal by his disciples, their unworthy reception of his body and blood, is certainly the greatest suffering endured by the Redeemer; it pierces his heart. We can only call to him from the depths of our hearts: Kyrie eleison – Lord, save us! (cf. Mt 8:25)” (Ninth Station).

Many have cried foul at this letter. Some complain that this is just more words and no action.  Other are upset because nowhere did Pope Francis so much as mention the word "homosexuality."  After all, isn't homosexuality at the core of this crisis?