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	Catholic Church in England Criticises Vatican the Catholic Church in England and Wales Issued a Rare Public Rebuttal of the Vatican on Wednesday Following Suggestions by Its Second-In-Command That the Sexual Abuse of Children Was Linked to Homosexuality. By Peter Hutchison Telegraph April 15, 2010 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/7590789/Catholic-Church-in-England-criticises-Vatican.html In a sign of tension between the hierarchies over how best to handle public outrage over clergy child abuse Father Marcus Stock, the general secretary of the Catholic Bishops Conference, said research showed that paedophilia was "not a question" of sexual orientation. His comments followed remarks by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, number two to Pope Benedict XVI, that research had shown a clear link between homosexuality and paedophilia. Cardinal Bertone, the Holy See's secretary of state, denied that celibacy was the cause and said homosexuality was the "problem" that caused Catholic priests to molest children. Father Stock said: "To the best of my knowledge, there is no empirical data which concludes that sexual orientation is connected to child sexual abuse. "The consensus among researchers is that the sexual abuse of children is not a question of sexual 'orientation', whether heterosexual or homosexual, but of a disordered attraction or 'fixation'. "Many abusers of children have never developed the capacity for mature adult relationships. Instead, their sexual attractions focus on children – boys, girls, or both. "In the sexual abuse of children the issue is the sexual fixation of the abusers, and not their sexual orientation." Cardinal Bertone made the comments in Chile earlier this week. He told a news conference: "Many psychologists and psychiatrists have demonstrated that there is no relation between celibacy and paedophilia. "But many others have demonstrated, I have been told recently, that there is a relation between homosexuality and paedophilia. That is true. That is the problem." France's foreign ministry condemned the comments as "unacceptable". Yesterday the Vatican tried to clarify the Cardinal's comments. Father Frederico Lombardi said: "General assertions of a specifically psychological or medical nature are not the responsibility of Church officials." The Vatican spokesman added that Cardinal Bertone was referring to statistics, recently supplied by the Holy See's prosecutor which showed that 60 per cent of sex abuse cases being investigated involved adolescents in homosexual relations. Father Lombardi and other Vatican officials have suggested that the Church is unfairly singled out for paedophilia, noting that it is a widespread social phenomenon. "All objective and informed people know that the issue is much wider, and to focus accusations only on the Church leads to a skewed perspective," he said last month. Peter Tatchell, of the gay human rights group Outrage!, said: "The reputation of the Vatican and the Pope has been badly damaged by recent attempts to blame gays, the media and Jews for the public outcry over the sex crimes of Catholic clergy. "The response of the English and Welsh bishops is much more mature and reasoned than the nonsense that has been coming out of the Vatican in the last few weeks."
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