Friday, April 09, 2010

More Anti-Catholic Bigotry From the BBC...

...with an assist by the Associated Press:

Pope Benedict XVI has become embroiled in new revelations over child sexual abuse, over a letter he is said to have signed in 1985 before becoming pontiff.

Associated Press said it had obtained the letter, signed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, resisting the defrocking of offending US priest Stephen Kiesle.

Cardinal Ratzinger said the "good of the universal Church" needed to be considered in defrocking, AP reported.

This is supposed to be a smoking gun? What horseshit. Of course any laicization must be done with the "good of the Universal Church" in mind. By definition laicization affects the standing of any individual in regards to the Church as a whole. If the problem at hand didn't affect the Universal Church then you wouldn't be talking about defrocking in the first place. (Really, how stupid are reporters these days? I know schools of journalism are not held in the highest intellectual regard, but this is ridiculous.)

Not content with displaying their shaky understanding of common Enlgish words, the BBC then proceeds to outright lie:

[The AP] said the Oakland diocese had recommended Kiesle's removal in 1981 but that that did not happen until 1987.

Cardinal Ratzinger took over the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which deals with sex abuse cases, in 1981.

This gives the impression that then Cardinal Ratzinger was given this case in 1981 and did nothing until 1987. The only trouble is the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was not the venue where sex abuse cases were handled in the 1980's. This has been pointed out repeatedly in recent weeks:

...the competency to hear cases of sexual abuse of minors shifted from the Roman Rota to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith headed by Cardinal Ratzinger in 2001. Until that time, most appeal cases went to the Rota and it was our experience that cases could languish for years in this court. When the competency was changed to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in my observation as well as many of my canonical colleagues, sexual abuse cases were handled expeditiously, fairly, and with due regard to the rights of all the parties involved. I have no doubt that this was the work of then Cardinal Ratzinger.

That this now well known piece of information was deliberately skirted by the BBC (if not the AP) has to be an example of prejudice. It is conceivable, I suppose, that it could have been the result of ignorance, but it would have been ignorance of such a gross and negligent variety, a reckless disregard for the truth bordering on insanity, that the maxim of Ockham's Razor rejects it. Good old fashioned bigotry is much more plausible.

All I can say about the BBC is that they are no good, bigoted, lying sons of bitches.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is not sloppy journalism but the result of the deliberate agenda of a certain group of people who are out to destabalise the catholic church, (as if that were possible!)

Anonymous said...

Why do we pay our tv liceneces? Even if I choose not to watch or listen to the moronic and lying BBC, I still have to pay for a licence to allow the BBC to budget for anti-catholic sentiment. The BBC News backs up its nonsense by referring to it's "top catholic correspondant" we all know who that is, don't we Mr. David-Anti-Catholic-Willy

Rich Horton said...

Sadly, such lunacy is not limited to the BBC. An anti-Christian screed by Richard Dawkins was promoted by US papers on Easter Sunday no less. (You know, because they publish so many anti-muslim tracts on Ramadan. /eye roll).