The Devil Made Me Do It!

It's been a few months since the Catholic Church child molestation scandal (re-)erupted.  And I was going to write earlier, but I was waiting to see how long Benedict would keep up his nonsense.  He has finally apologized for the actions of his priests.  Ya know, the ones he shuffled around from parish to parish, told to keep quiet past the statute of limitations, and whom he ordered--upon pain of excommunication--to conduct child molestation investigations "in the most secretive way, restrained by perpetual silence." (If you haven't seen this, it's 20 minutes well spent: Stephen Fry eviscerating the Church and arguing that it is not a force for moral good in the world: Part 1, Part 2).

But if you're left feeling a little unfulfilled by Benedict's apology, you're in good company.  You see, he didn't really ask the offending priests to come clean with their crimes.  Why?  Well, the Devil made them do it.  That's right, kids.  The man in red with the pitchfork and horns--he who tempts us all--he's the one to blame.  Oh, and the gays.  Nevermind that pedophilia is entirely separate from homosexuality, but it's far easier to blame a group you've already branded as sinful than it is to accept that perhaps your ridiculous requirements that priests cannot marry--which by the way have no basis in scripture--is what is actually spawning sexually dysfunctional priests who do horrible things to kids.

So, yes, it is indeed part of Christian dogma that Satan tempts all of us, just as surely as he tempted Jesus on the mountain.  But even if you buy into such a canard, you must at some level address the issue of free will.  Philosophers and theologians have made free will one of those topics that torture philosophy students unnecessarily.  Unless you're a hardcore determinist (and therefore retarded), it matters not whether the Devil tempts us or not.  In every potentially sinful act, the human actor is still the one pulling the moral lever.

Accordingly, it should make the religious and irreligious alike wince when the Pope or his minions fall back on "the Devil made me do it" defense.  It's too easy of a cop-out, particularly for a generation of Americans who seem to have an almost constitutional inability to accept responsibility for their actions.  What's that you say?  I can blame my shortcomings on something other than my own sloth and ineptitude?  Score!

I have written in the past about how a reliance on God and prayer causes people to pause and kneel when they should be jumping up and working to solve the problems in their lives.  Tis better to call the police when your husband beats you than it is to pray for him to stop hitting you.  But until this child rape scandal re-emerged in the press, I had underestimated just how much religious people still rely on God's nemesis to excuse (or at least cushion) their horrific actions.

What a remarkable message it would have sent if the Pope had cleaned house from top to bottom and reminded his followers that the Church was--instead of an ole boys club that protects one another--an institution that valued the sanctity of an unmolested little kid.

Call me cynical, but because Benedict (while he was merely Ratzinger) shuffled priests around and ordered bishops to keep child abuse secret from civil authorities, his apology rings a bit hollow.  Real men don't blame child rape on a scary guy with a pitchfork.  Real men report child rapists to the police.

...But what do we expect out of a religion that still, in 2010, employs a Chief Exorcist?...