It never ends--now the Pope says that nuns were sexually abused by priests and bishops

How deep does the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic church go? Very deep, as it turns out. It seems that every time I turn around, there is a new allegation of abuse. Now the Pope has acknowledged that nuns have been sexually abused by priests and bishops:  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/05/world/europe/pope-nuns-sexual-abuse.html . I didn't see the statistics presented anywhere, but I'm sure they will be available shortly. It wouldn't even matter to me at this point what the actual numbers are. What appalls me is how the Church initially responded to the victims--by ignoring them, by supporting the abusers, or by sweeping all of it under the rug to be dealt with at a later time, or never dealt with. The latter was the modus operandi until the past few years when the outing of criminal priests became a reality and forced the Church's hand. One wonders if they ever would have dealt with the sexual abuse scandals had they not been forced to.

I am disgusted by the entire business and appalled by the hypocrisy. Here we grew up with all these strict ridiculous rules regarding sex--no premarital sexual activity short of intercourse, no intercourse, and no birth control. All were grievous sins. That's what we were told. Even married couples were made to feel that practicing birth control put their souls at risk. The truth is that most lay Catholics behave much better than many of the priests who have been preaching to them all these years. We grew up with the fire and brimstone sermons. We feared going to confession, feared being reamed out, but if you ask me, our sins pale in comparison to the sins of the sexual abusers, the pedophiles, and the rapists (all criminals) that were and are found in the Catholic clergy. I saw a comment in the New York Times to the above article that said, and I quote "The Pope does not seem to understand that the Church is burning to the ground. The credibility of the Pope's statements and the Church's actions are questionable." I agree with the commenter; it scares me that we may be living in a time where all the things that we took for granted were good and true, are in reality, quite the opposite, and are now being exposed for the shams they actually are. The question is--what remains when the dust and ash settle--when the fire is over. That's what scares me. I no longer believe that the Church is the road to heaven. I know that it is possible to honor Christ without having to believe that. Do I still go to Church? Yes, I do--because I like the celebration of the mass and that one hour a week to reflect on something other than the rampant materialism that characterizes the world. But the part of me that doubts, the part that is confused, the part that is furious--all those parts are growing stronger by the day. I don't know if I will be able to contain them. I am no longer patient inside. I would prefer a quiet mass without sermons. Sometimes I sit in the pew and listen to yet another uninspired irrelevant sermon and I feel like standing up and yelling--talk about the sexual abuse scandal in the Church, tell us what you are doing about it, condemn it and the perpetrators, talk about the misuse of power, the abuse of children and women. Talk about the inequity between men and women, talk about the patriarchies that have ruined the lives of women and children, talk about the refusal of the Church to take women seriously and to allow them to become priests, talk about spousal abuse (physical, emotional, psychological), talk about the brutality of the messages that many of us grew up with. But I don't think I will hear any of those sermons in my lifetime. So much of our childhood was about fear of authority, about instilling compliance in us, about having absolute power over us. I no longer have that fear, I am no longer compliant, and no one has absolute power over me. Those days are long gone. I rely rather on the fact that if God made us all in his/her image and likeness, that we were given a powerful brain by that same God, a god-like brain, that God intended for us to use wisely, humbly and gratefully. I for one, have chosen to use it in those ways.