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	Guest Column: Catholic Church Was Right All Along By John Baldini Daily Times March 14, 2011 http://www.delcotimes.com/articles/2011/03/14/opinion/doc4d7d754dea7c7793115843.txt Turns out the Catholic church was right all along. The current never-to-end crucifying of the Philadelphia archdiocese points out some old truths. First, the church has always stood against the sexualization prevalent in today's popular culture: gay sex, same sex marriage, promiscuity. The church has always rejected these as material gratification of the moment at the cost of the health of one's eternal spiritual soul. The church has always stood against indulging in one's every desire of the flesh. That's why they get such a bad rap as Fuddy Duddys. No organization has done more to keep a moral bulwark against the forces of so-called Modernism, which is just another excuse for hedonism, than mother church. It's just shocking they were so right. Imagine if priests were allowed to have sex, be homosexual, marry. They would be just as bad as all the rest of us: cheating, divorcing, addicted to sex. It was a smart move keeping them chaste after all. For those paying attention to history, this isn't society's first dance with these issues. Read (or see the movie) Quo Vadis, "Where Are You Going," by Henryk Sienkiewicz. It depicts the early days of the Church in Nero's Reign. Early church worshipers were thrown to the lions for merely declining to "enjoy" the fad of the day, the orgy. They cut off Paul's head for pointing out how destructive the licentious lifestyle is. With recent calls to lift statutes of limitations, our modern society has found a worse death for Christians — throw them to the trial lawyers. The church has always stood against the ever-increasing sexualizing of children. It has been amazingly successful in fighting pedophilia, just compare it to the public school system, where Charol Shakeshaft of Virginia Commonwealth University estimates there were 290,000 cases of sexual abuse in American public schools between 1991 and 2000. The church turns out to be the safer environment for children. One reason is public schools obsess on and glorify sex, while the church teaches a more modest role for it in our lives. In the public school system, children are exposed to sex by showing them naughty pictures and condoms under the ridiculous pretense this is "health education." (They use to call it sex education, but that was just too creepy, considering it is 7-year-old first graders being "educated.") Some have argued this is a resurgence of classic bigotry against Catholics. Writers like Monica Yant Kinney, who blame church leaders for suicides and make all kinds of accusations, may be tapping into the old hatred of Catholics. People seem to forget the Klux Klux Klan's heyday wasn't the Antebellum Period, it was the early 1900s, when large numbers of Catholics immigrated to America. By then, the Klan had successfully beaten down African Americans and was targeting Catholics. The Klan rose to national prominence on the hatred of Catholics, enough to even have a place on the stage with Democratic presidential candidates. Yant isn't the first writer to believe in Catholic Conspiracy theories. It's an ongoing, if disrespectful, industry. Some have argued this is overkill. Since when do we care about the children anyway? The Dr. Kermit Gosnell case might be no isolated incident. It might be in every abortion clinic there are Gosnells, killing women, stabbing newborn babies in the back of the neck and cutting off their feet so they can put them in jars on the shelf. Just recently Ms. Yant pointed out the grand jury that heard the priest abuse scandals from 40 years ago also heard testimony about Gosnell. (She was unclear what caused the grand jury members' distress. Surely it wasn't abortions — everyone knows they are nothing more than fetus, or cells, or medical waste, or whatever euphemism you want to call them … until they are old enough to molest, at that point they become worthy of protection?) Some have argued this is a witch hunt. That even the church can be victimized by pedophiles has only showed us how vigilant we must be in all our organizations. I am sure that Seth Williams and the Philadelphia District Attorneys' Office is going to be just as tough on the overwhelming larger number of pedophiles running around the public school system. While Ms. Yant and her investigators will target school administrators who "knew" about 40-year-old allegations that were never proven and "did nothing" about them after investigating them. Then having been forced to return the not-proven-but-forever-tainted non-offender back into contact with children. And all involved will not take any stories from those administrators about how they couldn't do anything because nothing was proven. No that day is over. All administrators and district attorneys who knew or should have known will be browbeaten into resigning or prosecuted — just like Monsignor William Lynn. This is a new day. The powers-that-be have finally realized that how you treat the least among us, the children, has a generational cost. The dividends of evil we allow today will pay exponential dividends of evil tomorrow. We will now protect the children, from the womb on up, from the church to the public schools. We will teach the children standards of morality, based on life, respect for life, love of fellow man and rejection of hedonism in all of its forms. The powers that be will stop trying to tell the Catholic church to give into baser urges, to sexualize the priesthood, to recognize gays, same sex marriage, and fallen priests. We will keep priests chaste, and children safe. It's a new day, and the Church, was right all along. John Baldini is a resident of Drexel Hill.
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