Dutch Child Abuse Probe Finds 2000 Allegations

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — The head of a Dutch inquiry into child abuse in the Catholic church school system says yearly complaints are up 100-fold since allegations emerged of worldwide abuse.

Wim Deetman said Thursday that between 1995 and 2009 an average of 20 people each year complained to the Catholic organization Help and Law that they had been abused, but in the past year 2,000 people made such allegations.

Deetman – who was asked by the Dutch Catholics Bishops Conference to begin the independent Deetman Inquiry in March – said Help and Law had been swamped by the number of complaints.

He said the organization's structure – it was set up to help both victims and perpetrators of abuse – "hindered transparency and accountability."

Comments

[Cuds]

01:09 PM on 12/10/2010

Do kids no longer tell their parents when they're molested? Children need to be constantly reminded how to fight and report sexual abuse.

Catholic priests and clergymen in general deserve to be stigmatized. Not all homosexuals are priests and not all homosexuals are pedophiles but WOW, the religious establishment really knows how to recruit them...

[gwinegarden]

12:07 PM on 12/10/2010

My only issue is that this cannot be solely a Catholic problem. They should not spend ALL of their efforts just investigating RC's.

[thepoliticalcat]

09:11 PM on 12/10/2010

The only way these crimes get investigated is when the victims file complaints. Unfortunately, as the above article shows, the various religions try to head off any complaints against them by creating councils to advise their victims. No other criminal would have the audacity to counsel, or have their cohorts counsel, the victims of their crimes. Yet, religion gets away with it repeatedly. So far, at least, the majority of complaints seem to be directed at the RC church. Perhaps the media focuses on them more because of the church's propensity for covering up the crimes, and the fact that it has a large and visible hierarchy.

[KIVPossum]

12:22 PM on 12/11/2010

I am sure it happens in other religions, but doubt with the same frequency. A supposed celibate clergy attracts people who are a little warped to start with

[TYRANNASAURUS]

11:19 AM on 12/10/2010

Dutch Child Abuse Probe Finds 2000 Allegations......

That's just in the Netherlands .....

Go back years and you'll find many thousands..... and if you go back years in the rest of the world you'll find...........MILLIONS.

[LiberalBuzz]

09:12 AM on 12/10/2010

Why do I get the idea of money having possibly playing a small bit in all of this.

[10LittleIndians]

06:51 AM on 12/10/2010

I guess they didn't realize that "Come ye little children" was not to be taken literally.

[madoher]

04:00 AM on 12/10/2010

If you have been raped or in any way molested, go to the REAL police. Not to the church and not to the Dean or campus security. Why isn't this message taught to all our children and their parents?

[StanMann]

08:40 AM on 12/10/2010

Yes, go to the real police. In many people's experience the people within religious communities -- doesn't mind the community turn a blind eye to molestation. Even in secular organizations reporting withing the campus- within the organization does little as they attempt to cover to save their names.

The best chance is the 'real police' --- but this is no saving grace either, Since the 'real police' can be in tight with the molesting organization. The Catholic people did right in forming a movement and challenging. It is forming groups and challenging is what will bring attention and change this issue within Churches

[Bergen2]

10:56 AM on 12/10/2010

Good advice, but it doesn't always work. When visiting potential colleges with my kids, I always visited the local police department to get crime info related to campus/student problems. It seems that many college towns have agreements with local police to allow the school's campus police to take care of some crimes, so that the actual numbers of some crimes such as rape or sexual abuse, etc., never become public information.

[ColdSnowMan]

11:10 PM on 12/09/2010

While people may go to a Catholic agency with their sex abuse complaints, they would do well to also -- go to local or national police -- , and perhaps also a non-Catholic agency that would not face conflict of interest.

[StanMann]

08:45 AM on 12/10/2010

The Mormon Church formed LDS Social Services and keeps it unlicensed, so it has NO state regulations. The 'counselors' report back to the Mormon Bishop. It is a horrible organization. There have been cases of an Male Mormon Social Service worker molesting his 2 year old, the Bishop threatening the wife to be silent or face "the church' taking her children away, then shipping the family out of state.

The Mormon Church is violent with victims and violent against anyone who attempts to hold them accountable.

Sad, but true, many of the religious organizations the people lack the moral integrity when it comes to standing up for victims and abuses. It is more the 'turn the other cheek' and "you deserved it' attitude. And parents who have no backbone and let their kids suffer for the "Lords blessings"

[Woody Stemms]

09:28 AM on 12/10/2010

The state of Utah must be complicit in this.

Don't they have "mandatory reporter" laws?

[savvy7]

10:48 PM on 12/09/2010

Can anyone in the church NOT see a correlation between the "celibate" life imposed on both men and women who devote their lives to the Roman Catholic Church and the epidemic of abuse, both physical and mental, visited on the most vulnerable among us. This is nothing new. Various popes, priests and nuns, all through the ages, have violated vows of "purity", but their so-called sins were at least directed, for the most part toward those considered adults. Now, having discovered built-in little victims who could be scared mute and with little possibility of any tiny ninth month inconveniences, they turned to a different prey. Getting rid of celibacy and allowing the clergy to marry is the first step in attacking this problem, but apparently infallibility isn't necessarily synonymous with common sense.

[xdiesp]

12:06 AM on 12/10/2010

You're saying that anyone who doesn't have sex is automatically a pedophile?

[savvy7]

08:11 PM on 12/10/2010

"You're saying that anyone who doesn't have sex is automatica­lly a pedophile?"

Had that been my intent, that is what I would have written, so your attempt at being arch is just b.s. The statement stands as is.

[thepoliticalcat]

09:40 AM on 12/10/2010

Utah has the highest rate of reported child s3xu@l ab use incidents. (Child s.a. is notoriously under-reported.) Yet Mormon clergy are not celibate. Your argument fails.

The clergy are not pedophilic because of their celibate status. They chose "celibacy" and a church that allows them to prey on those to whom they owe a moral and legal duty to act as guardians.

[randy of the netses]

11:58 AM on 12/10/2010

I agree. The Church created an environment where pedophiles could go and feel free to do as they wished ... without having to pay any price for their wrongdoing. I think that this is true for homosexuals too (not to be confused with pedophiles ... homosexuals do not rape children). I mean, back in the day, if you didn't get married, people questioned what was wrong with you ... so you could become a priest and live a life of expected celibacy and no one would wonder if you were gay or not. So the Church offered gays a place to hide ... and they chose to hide there rather than come out and be who they really were. It's just all so sad. The Catholic Church is just a sad, pathetic organization.

[savvy7]

08:22 PM on 12/10/2010

Roman Catholic clergy do not "choose" celibacy, it is imposed upon them and they must adhere to the rules if they want to remain in the order. As for your stats re: Mormon child sex abuse, I would appreciate knowing where you got your information and are you sure these cases are all perpetrated by Mormon clergy ("Utah has the highest rate of reported child s3xu@l ab use incidents. Yet Mormon clergy are not celibate") as you seem to imply? This article WAS about child abuse in the R. C. church so the comments seemed appropriate.

[cadawa]

09:23 PM on 12/09/2010

Talking to friends who have attended Catholic school in this country, the whole system appears to based on abuse. Imagine telling little children they are sinners and having them make up stuff to confess. Some of them still hide under chairs when they see a nun.
But it's the part of this article that bothers me is the reference to an "average number of reports of abuse". An average number of children that are abused by religious figures charged with their education and moral upbringing? Why are these schools still open?

[Lore Splitt]

10:40 PM on 12/09/2010

I know, right? The fact there is an "average number" is so mind boggling disturbing to me as well! These children look to those people to keep their eternal souls from burning in Hell... I'm not a believer, but the fact is, those kids are.

It's hard enough to get children to talk about being abused when it's an authority figure, but someone they're taught represents their religion??? How can children feel safe after that?

[thepoliticalcat]

09:42 AM on 12/10/2010

Little children tend to believe anything adults tell them. It's a matter of survival. Children are dependent on adults for their very existence - food, shelter, clothing, nurture, education. It takes years to begin to question the myths and lies with which adults filled childish heads.

[cadawa]

01:27 PM on 12/10/2010

Many of them never do.

[jsgaetano]

08:44 PM on 12/09/2010

I have to laugh when religious fanatics claim that atheists must be sociopaths, because people ONLY get morality from religion.

[UncleJimbo]

08:49 PM on 12/09/2010

Fanned & Faved!.....Though I already was a Fan?......

[ArjenBoatsma]

08:56 PM on 12/09/2010

And Exhibit 2 in this case would be Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church. See the article about them protesting at the funeral of Elizabeth Edwards.

[GeorgeWGump]

07:32 PM on 12/09/2010

Gah!

I knew I shouldn't have believed that priest when he told me it was a "Pope-sicle".

[lthuedk 1]

07:12 PM on 12/09/2010

May I suggest the large size with extended papal pouch?

http://www.light-to-dark.com/Protection_For_Everyone.html

[fredgladys]

06:51 PM on 12/09/2010

Organisation set up by Catholic Church for victims to report abuse -'Help and Law' had been swamped by the number of complaints. Deetman said the organisation was set up to help both victims and perpetrators of abuse. Apparrently the organisation "hindered transparency and accountability."

So once again it is perpetrators 1, abused 0.

[jsgaetano]

08:46 PM on 12/09/2010

There's already an organization in place to help victims and punish perpetrators- it's called "The Police".
 
It really disgusts me how religions put themselves above the law.

[Lore Splitt]

10:44 PM on 12/09/2010

The problem is they believe too deeply in absolving sins. A priest confesses, and does his penance, and voila! His sins are wiped clean and he can continue the horror. As long as he has last rights before he dies, he doesn't have to worry about hell after all!

I think many people, good people- can benefit from the release confessions can have. We all accidentally do the occasional messed up things. I'm not a catholic, or christian, and I can understand that much of it. But, something like this- it kind of backfires, and then you end up with a nutshell game of "hide the pedophile" and more children getting hurt.

[4peace]

06:36 PM on 12/09/2010

And we have all this hoopla over Julian Assange...

When are these abusive priests going to see the inside of a prison cell? And that guy with the funny clothes, you know the one that is supposedly God's rep on earth, he needs to be behind bars too for enabling his flock to terrorize children.

[Billy Jack]

05:56 PM on 12/09/2010

I suspect this is not what Jesus had in mind

[thepoliticalcat]

09:45 AM on 12/10/2010

What, when he said "Suffer, little children, to come unto me"? Oh, wait, there were no commas in the original, were there?