Surely no one is surprised today to see the Catholic church yet again shown to be the exact opposite of everything it claims to be. Over 200,000 victims of sexual abuse in the French Catholic church and the “Eric de Moulins-Beaufort, the head of France’s Conference of Bishops, said Tuesday that the scale of abuse outlined in the report was ‘more than we ever could have imagined,’ and asked forgiveness to ‘those who were victims of such acts'” (CNN) Asked forgiveness? How could this asshole have not known it was going on? How are we to believe that the upper echelons of the church wouldn’t know about this? Hell, the Boston Globe broke the story of Cardinal Law and the widespread sexual abuse in the Boston diocese almost twenty years ago. That was huge and it should have been the spark that engulfs all these pedophiles and assholes who cover them up, but every few years, it happens again.  Next we’ll hear about Italy. Then Spain. Then Poland. And it should all be common knowledge now. These jerks should have all been behind bars for a decade now.

The film Spotlight detailing the Boston crime is six years old, and it ends with these words:

The scandalous crimes have been surfacing now literally for decades and they’re still not all out in the open.

There is only one way the church can regain any moral credibility: each and every priest, monk, nun, and non-religious employee must be fully and completely investigated at the cost of the individual diocese. The church must make the results of the investigations that turn up anything public and turn them over to the police. It will bankrupt many dioceses, but that is the price they must pay for the coverup that apparently has been going on for centuries and is continuing.

And if the people in the pews had any sense of — I don’t even know what — they would refuse to donate any money until that is done.