For Stupidity Click Here

11:29 PM September 24, 2005 (Ottawa)


I've made a point of reading some of the news articles I see on the BBC's international news page recently. Normally my focus is on Japan, but I read anything that has an interesting headline too just to see what's going on.

Today I came across something that struck me as remarkably dumb:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4276912.stm"

Banning gay priests because they think it will prevent child molestation. This is utterly pointless because as the article says there is no proven connection between instances of homosexuality in the priesthood and instances of child molestation by priests.

Do homosexual people who aren't priests regularly molest children? No.
Are male children the only ones that have been molested by children? No.
Do heterosexual people necessarily forego sex crimes? No.

What does it matter if a priest is homosexual or not? How can you even tell? They can't date, they can't have sex, they can't even look appreciatively when somebody attractive walks by. They are practically eunuchs.

As a side note I'd like to point out to the church that you are suffering from a drastic shortage of dedicated followers right now. There are not nearly as many priests as there once was, faith in the church is on the decline. If that article is correct 25% of the priests in the United States are homosexual. Can you really afford to go on your pointless witch hunt among your own clergy and further alienate people?

I agree that you have to do something about the incidents that have occurred where children have been taken advantage of by members of the Clergy. I don't think that attacking a group of individuals who were completely uninvolved is the correct solution.

Thankfully, times are not what they once were. If you call out the Inquisition over something this stupid it's your future that you're burning at the stake.