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	I Am a Catholic Boy By Brian Karem The Sentinel Juky 16, 2008 http://www.thesentinel.com/363836593290786.php I'm redeemed through pain and not through joy. At least according to the Jim Carroll Band and their song "Catholic Boy" that's the fate of those raised Catholic. It seems appropriate considering the news of late. It's not that we of the Catholic faith must once again moan as allegations of abuse are made against a priest - such as the recent allegations in Germantown. It isn't that the archdiocese didn't know about the priest, nor is it the fact that it appears the priest was shuffled from parish to parish across the country. It's that and so much more. We, and by that I mean me, just wants to assure everyone that it isn't like that everywhere. For more than 20 years I have covered crime - and some of the foulest crime you'll ever run across when I worked in Texas and for the television show America's Most Wanted. One day I found myself walking in lower Manhattan with a lobbyist for NAMBLA - the North American Man/Boy Love Association who was trying to convince me that the age of consent laws should be lowered so he could legally engage in physical relations with extremely young children. I cringe almost as much now thinking about it as I did then when I interviewed the man. In retrospect it may have been one of the most important interviews I ever conducted. Why? Because I came to learn something the Catholic Church should know and something we all should remember. Priests do not become pedophiles. Pedophiles become priests. They also become teachers and coaches and anything else that will put them in close contact with our children. Pedophiles are like the lions waiting in the underbrush for the wounded wildebeest. And when they find them they pounce. They call it love, they call it friendship, but it is anything but that. I wrote a book called "Innocent Victims" that made a brief stop on the bestseller list. It is about a young man who killed another young boy. The murderer had met a pedophile on-line and was being masterfully manipulated by him. Another child died because of that and the pedophile, which I interviewed on several occasions, either never wanted to admit the connection or honestly couldn't see how his actions sowed the seeds of destruction. Pedophiles are dangerous. But the priesthood isn't. Let me give a quick example. I've written about the Rev. Lee Fangmeyer before. He's a priest at St. Francis of Assisi in Derwood. I am amazed how he seems to be at his best when things are at their worst. When Nicole Lee, a local teenager and former Magruder High School student, died in a horrible traffic accident this year it was Fr. Lee who provided a great deal of comfort to our parish community. Last week I witnessed such events again. Another Magruder student died in a traffic accident. Again this child was a member of our parish. During a Sunday morning mass his mother became visibly upset. It's not something we normally see in a Catholic church. We're usually a very stoic lot. But there was this emotional interruption and Father Lee handled it very well. It was nearly miraculous how just a few quiet words from this man calmed the woman when it seemed nothing else could. When we are at our most vulnerable, when we are beyond hope and we give ourselves over to faith it is life and faith re-affirming to see someone step in and ease our suffering. That is what Fr. Lee did. It is because of actions like this that we shouldn't throw scorn on the entire priesthood. Of course, it is also because we turn to priests or other ministers of faith when we are so vulnerable that we become enraged when our faith and trust is betrayed by pedophiles masquerading as caregivers. I ran across a priest in a Chicago airport probably 10 years ago who got this. He was the man who exposed the first group of pedophiles in the D.C. archdiocese. He told me something I'll never forget. "No matter what we do, this stain will not be easy to erase." On that he was and remains correct. But the facts also show that no pedophile operates in a vacuum. There are usually signs - such as urging meetings in secret or telling children not to talk to their parents -that we should be aware of. There are many more. We should act on these as parents and be less damning of an entire institution. Father Lee's actions this week renewed my faith in that. I hope it does the same for you.
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