abuse, ongoing
The investigations of priest abuse in our area are ongoing. Things are bit confused in that the only people currently being charged with anything are three friars, in relation to the monk that raped a bunch of my classmates in school. Religious Order jurisdiction is separate from the dozens of rapist clergy under the jurisdiction of the diocese proper.
Relatedly, there are new accusations that Paterno knew about Sandusky way back in 1976, and Sandusky just filed a new appeal of some sort. I wish the sick fuck would die already. He's had a long, full life of raping children and should go gently into that good night.
Thankfully, people seem slightly less inclined to defend JoePa after his death. The cult of Penn State football is not really explicable unless you've been here, but it does, in fact, exist.
Also thankfully, there's been surprisingly little "Pull together, Body of Christ, rah rah" invocations, at least in the media. Maybe people going to mass are subjected to this weekly. I wouldn't know. We're not Boston, but in a sense that makes it worse. There's nowhere for people to go that isn't connected to something that's connected to someone.
Last night I had a sex dream about one of our old pastors (I have sex dreams about everyone sooner or later; I've learned to roll with it.). And in the dream, when he invited me into his bed, I thought, at least he's not going after kids. But if he had, like some of the other priests that've been in parishes I've been in, that I've sat and listened to their sermons, delivered with moral authority, well. I'm sure he'd have gotten away with it, too.
Anyway, here's a piece on Sinead O'Connor and how no one believed her, either. And here's a piece on our local atrocity from when the story broke.