Child Molestation by homosexuals and heterosexuals
By Brian W. Clowes and David L. Sonnier
HOMILETIC & PASTORAL REVIEW
MAY 2005
Many homosexual leaders have admitted that there is a natural link between a homosexual orientation and child sexual abuse.
The Church has always had a small number of priests and other religious who have taken advantage of their positions of authority and influence in order to gain sexual favors or to take advantage of the helpless. The problem of clerical child sexual molestation, particularly in the United States, has been widely exposed and publicized over the last several years. The numerous recent revelations have exposed the problem as much deeper and more widespread than most would have previously believed.
During the current crisis, homosexual activists within and outside the Catholic Church have done everything they could to divert attention away from even the possibility that there may be a higher percentage of homosexuals among the priesthood than in the general public, and that this may be the root of the problem of child sexual molestation within the Church. It is particularly the link between homosexuality and child molestation that they seek to deny.
For example, Dignity USA kicked off its "Stop Blaming Gay Priests" campaign during the meeting of the United States Catholic Bishops Conference in Washington, D.C., November 10-13, 2002. The group said, "DigntyUSA [sic] is calling on the U.S. Catholic bishops to stop blaming gay priests for the clergy sexual abuse scandal. All credible evidence discounts any link between the molestation of children and homosexuality."1
1 Dignity USA Web site, February 6, 2004. This campaign was begun during the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops annual meeting in Washington, D.C., November 10-13, 2002. We should point out that the very existence of a group that supports sexually active “gay priests” is a great source of scandal.
More recently, Tarcisio Cardinal Bertone, the Holy See's Secretary of State, suggested that there is a link between homosexuality and child sexual abuse. "Gay" groups all over the world reacted with horror and fury, and echoed what Dignity USA had said years before. As one example, Rolando Jiminéz, president of Chile's Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation, said that "No reputable study exists to support the cardinal's claims."2
The situation has become so charged that anyone who even suggests that there may be a connection between homosexuality and child sexual abuse is instantly and reflexively labeled a "homophobe" and a "gay basher." The powerful homosexual lobby reacts instinctively to negative publicity and information by "ritually defaming" those who dare raise their voices. Organized homosexual groups and their supporters first attempt to ignore the evidence, or, if it simply cannot be disregarded, aggressively smear and discredit those who produced it.3
Such wholesale dismissal of documented facts, and the accompanying refusal to even discuss the possibility of a link between an active homosexual lifestyle and child sexual abuse, is a grave disservice not only to the victims, but to society at large. Obviously, a proven link between homosexual orientation and child sexual molestation would badly damage the carefully crafted public relations image of the “gay rights” movement. Therefore, instead of calmly and rationally discussing the issues, homosexual rights leaders subscribe to the axiom "the best defense is a good [and loud] offense." They remain in a permanent attack mode.
In general, the media and liberal groups seem almost pathologically careful to avoid stereotyping an entire group of people because of the actions of just a few. For example, we are told repeatedly that we must not perceive jihadists as representing Islam. Yet, when dealing with the Catholic Church, the media and others cast even the vestiges of decency and restraint to the wind. As one example, a writer described the Vatican as “an international criminal conspiracy to protect child rapists.”4 Naturally, the Pope is singled out for the most vicious and ridiculous abuse. According to The Irish Times, “Pope Benedict has made worse just about everything that is wrong with the Roman Catholic Church and is directly responsible for engineering the global cover-up of child rape perpetrated by priests.”5
The only way to get at the root of the problem of priestly child molestation is to ignore this smear campaign and proceed methodically. We must first objectively study all facts relating to the situation, and then muster the courage to respond by taking the appropriate steps. If this is not done, any effort to address the problem, no matter how well intentioned or vigorously pursued, will be utterly squandered.
Certainly we owe it to the victims ─ and to the Catholic Church itself ─ to determine the truth behind this volatile topic.
2 Rory Carroll. "Vatican Attacked over Cardinal's Claim of Homosexuality and Paedophilia Link." The Guardian, April 13, 2010.
3Laird Wilcox. "The Practice of Ritual Defamation." Editorial Research Service Web site at http://www.lairdwilcox.com. Homophiles will inevitably use these tactics in attempts to discredit this report. Defenders of the Catholic Church must ignore these attacks and emphasize the quotes, statistics and conclusions contained in this work.
4 Perhaps the best general article on the bigotry of the “Pope-hunters” is by atheist Brendan O’Neill. “The Pope- Hunters’ Pathological Campaign.” The Australian, April 15, 2010.
5Hans Küng. “Church in Worst Credibility Crisis since Reformation, Theologian Tells Bishops.” The Irish Times, April 16, 2010.
Studies on the frequency of homosexual child molestation
Dignity USA and other homosexual groups strenuously deny any connection whatever between a homosexual orientation and child sexual molestation. They repeatedly claim, as Dignity USA does, that "All credible evidence discounts any link between the molestation of children and homosexuality."3
Yet these groups never cite any of this "credible evidence," nor do they quote any studies to buttress their claims that there is no such connection.
In fact, a number of studies performed over a period spanning more than half a century -- many of which were performed by homosexuals or their sympathizers-- have shown that an extremely large percentage of sexually active homosexuals also participate in child sexual molestation.
This is not "homophobia" or "hatred," this is simple scientific fact.
For example;
- Homosexual Alfred Kinsey, the preeminent sexual researcher in the history of sexual research, found in 1948 that 37 percent of all male homosexuals admitted to having sex with children under 17 years old.4
- A very recent (2000) study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that "The best epidemiological evidence indicates that only 2-4% of men attracted to adults prefer men. In contrast, around 25-40% of men attracted to children prefer boys. Thus, the rate of homosexual attraction is 620 times higher among pedophiles."5
- Another 2000 study in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that". . . all but 9 of the 48 homosexual men preferred the youngest two male age categories" for sexual activity;' These age categories were fifteen and twenty years old.6
- Yet another recent study in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that "Pedophilia appears to have a greater than chance association with two other statistically infrequent phenomena. The first of these is homosexuality . . . Recent surveys estimate the prevalence of homosexuality, among men attracted to adults, in the neighborhood of 2%. In contrast, the prevalence of homosexuality among pedophiles may be as high as 30-40%."7
- A 1989 study in the Journal of Sex Research noted that " . . . the proportion of sex offenders against male children among homosexual men is substantially larger than the proportion of sex offenders against female children among heterosexual men . . . the development of pedophilia is more closely linked with homosexuality than with heterosexuality."8
- A 1988 study of 229 convicted child molesters published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that 86% of pedophiles described themselves as homosexual or bisexual.9
- In a 1984 Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy article, sex researchers found that "The proportional prevalence of [male] offenders against male children in this group of 457 offenders against children was 36 percent."10
- Homosexual activists Karla Jay and I Allen Young revealed in their 1979 Gay Report that 73% of all homosexuals I have acted as "chicken hawks" - that is, they have preyed on adolescent or younger boys. 11
- In a 1992 study published in the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy, sex researchers K. Freud and R. I. Watson found that homosexual males are three times more likely than straight men to engage in pedophilia, and that the average pedophile victimizes between 20 and 150 boys before being arrested.12
- A study by sex researchers Alan Bell and Martin Weinberg found that 25% of white homosexual men have had sex with boys sixteen years and younger. 13
There are occasional scientific attempts to deny or obscure the fact that a disproportionately high percentage of active homosexuals also molest children. These studies are invariably afflicted with one or more fatal flaws.
A typical example, oft-quoted by gay rights activists, is the July 1994 Pediatrics article by Jenny, Roesler and Poyer that finds that "Using the data from our study, the 95% confidence limits of the risk children would identify recognizably homosexual adults as the potential abuser, are from 0% to 3.1%. These limits are within current estimates of the prevalence of homosexuality in the general community."14
The fatal flaw of this study is that it studied sexually abused children with a mean age of just 6.1 years. Children of this young age are usually targets of true pedophiles, those persons with no sexual attraction to adults of either sex. By contrast, homosexual pedophiles are usually classified as "ephebophiles," persons sexually attracted to pubescent or post-pubescent underage children.
The "ten percent" myth
There is much propaganda claiming that homosexuals comprise about ten percent of the population in the United States and in many other nations.
Even the names of many homosexual organizations and initiatives reflect this number: 'The Ten Percent Foundation," "Project Ten," and the "One in Ten Club" are a few examples. Some leading homosexual authors continue to insist that one in ten persons are born "gay."
As Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen claim in their book After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear & Hatred of Gays in the 90's, ". . . it is simply a matter of the odds --one in ten--as to who turns out gay, and who straight. Each heterosexual must be led to realize that he might easily have been born homosexual himself."15 Kirk subsequently boasted about how effective the homosexual propaganda campaign has been when he said that "When straights are asked for a formal estimate, the figure played back most often is the '10% gay' statistic which our propagandists have been drilling into their heads for years."16
The purpose of the "ten percent" figure is to create in the public mind an easily-remembered "everyone knows" idea that homosexuals make up a much larger percentage of the population than they do in reality.
The original source of the "ten percent" statistic is Alfred Kinsey, the world's most famous child molesting sex researcher. His best-known "finding" held that ten percent of the male population is "more or less exclusively homosexual for at least three years between the ages of 16 and 55. This is one male in ten in the white male population." Kinsey also claimed that four percent of all males are exclusively homosexual throughout their entire lives. 17 This percentage is not only the basis of the homosexual-rights "ten percent" claim, but also serves as a cornerstone of the sex education classes being taught in the United States and much of the rest of the world today.
Researcher Bruce Voeller explains how the mere constant repetition of this statistic made it true in the minds of many,
I campaigned with Gay groups and in the media across the country for the Kinsey-based finding that "We are everywhere." This slogan became a National Gay Task Force leitmotif. And the issues derived from the implications of the Kinsey data became key parts of the national political, educational, and legislative programs during my years at New York's Gay Activist Alliance and the National Gay Task Force.
After years of our educating those who inform the public and make its laws, the concept that 10% of the population is gay has become a generally accepted "fact." While some reminding always seems necessary, the 10 percent figure is regularly utilized by scholars, by the press, and in government statistics. As with so many pieces of knowledge and myth, repeated telling made it SO.18
In fact, the numbers are much smaller. There have been a number of major studies gauging the percentage of homosexuals in the general population. The aggregated results of these studies surveyed more than 218,000 men in several countries and show that 2.6 percent of the male population has ever had a homosexual experience in their lives. 19
So much for the "ten percent" myth.
6 Dignity USA Web site, February 6, 2004.
7 Alfred Kinsey data described in P.H. Gebhard and A.B. Johnson. The Kinsey Data. Saunders Publishing, 1979. Table 443, "Homosexual Sample: Age at First Postpubertal Homosexual Contact," and Table 444, "Homosexual Sample: Age of Partner in First Postpubertal Homosexual Contact." Even though much of Kinsey’s research has been thoroughly discredited, his enduring primacy in the field of ‘sexology’ means that sex educators and others involved in human sexuality study his material intensively, and have therefore been aware of the strong link between homosexuality and pedophilia for more than six decades.
8 Ray Blanchard, et al. "Fraternal Birth Order and Sexual Orientation in Pedophiles." Archives of Sexual Behavior, October 2000 [Volume 29, Number 5], pages 463-478, p. 464.
9 A. Zebulon, Z.A. Silverthorne and Vernon L. Quinsey. "Sexual Partner Age Preferences of Homosexual and Heterosexual Men and Women." Archives of Sexual Behavior, February 2000 [Volume 29, Number 1], pages 67- 76, p. 73.
10 Ray Blanchard, et. al. "Pedophiles: Mental Retardation, Maternal Age, and Sexual Orientation." Archives of Sexual Behavior, April 1999 [Volume 28, Number 2], pages 111-127, p. 112.
11 Kurt Freund, Robin Watson and Douglas Rienzo. "Heterosexuality, Homosexuality, and Erotic Age Preference." Journal of Sex Research, February 1989 [Volume 26, Number 1], pages 107-117, p. 115.
12W.D. Erickson, et al. "Behavior Patterns of Child Molesters." Archives of Sexual Behavior, February 1988 [Volume 17, Number 1], pages 77-86, p. 83.
13 Alan P. Bell, et. al., Institute for Sex Research. Homosexualities: A Study of Diversity Among Men and Women [New York City: Simon and Schuster], 1978. Appendix C, Table 7, “Sexual Partnerships,” page 311.
14 C. Jenny, T.A. Roesler, and K.L. Poyer. "Are Children at Risk for Sexual Abuse by Homosexuals?" Pediatrics, July 1994 [Volume 94, Number 1], pages 41-44.
15 John Jay College of Criminal Justice. The Nature and Scope of the Problem of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests and Deacons in the United States. April 2004, Section 3.1, "Introduction to the Problem of Child Sexual Abuse by Adult Men."
Definitions and calculations
The John Jay study on the sex abuse crisis in the Catholic Church in the United States defines "pedophiles" as people who "exhibit recurrent, intense, sexually arousing fantasies, urges or behaviors related to sexual contact with a prepubescent child over a period of at least six months duration."20
When people speak of the current crisis being a problem involving "pedophile priests," they are addressing only a small portion of the situation. According to the John Jay study, most of the sexually offending priests are not true pedophiles. They are, instead, "ephebophiles," who "exhibit these same fantasies, urges or behaviors towards post-pubescent youths."21 Generally, the John Jay study recognized that pedophilia can be defined as the molestation of children aged ten and younger. The National Review Board study defines "ephebophilia" as "homosexual attraction to adolescent males," a definition that certainly is validated by quotes by "gay rights" activists elsewhere in this artic1e.22
Table 3.5.4 of the John Jay Study is reproduced below. It clearly shows that, as the age of the victims rises, the percentage of victims decisively shifts from primarily female to overwhelmingly male.
(85.3%/10.0%)/(14.7%/90.0%) = 52
times more likely to molest a child than a heterosexual priest. If we use the more reasonable assumption that five percent of all priests are homosexual
(still about twice the average in the general population), we see that a homosexual priest is (85.3%/5.0%)/(14.7%/95.0%) = 110
times more likely to molest a child than a heterosexual priest. It is logical that homosexuals who sexually desire young children deliberately seek
employment that will bring them into proximity with the greatest number of children possible. The most "promising" jobs of this nature include clergymen working in youth ministries, Boy Scout leaders and schoolteachers.
This is primarily why homosexual teachers have been involved in a hugely disproportionate number of all recorded cases of teacher/pupil sex. A nationwide survey of school principals showed that they received 13 times as many complaints about homosexuals sexually molesting students than they did about heterosexuals molesting students. 20 Other studies have shown that homosexual teachers are from 90 to 100 times more likely to molest students than heterosexual teachers. 21
Supporting Quotes by Homosexual Activists
As further evidence of the strong connection between active homosexuality and child molestation, many homosexual leaders have openly admitted that there is a natural link between a homosexual orientation and child sexual abuse.
Many “gay” organizations and leaders not only admit to, but support, the sexual abuse of children by homosexuals. An editorial in the San Francisco Sentinel, a member of the National Lesbian & Gay Journalist's Association, claimed that The love between men and boys is at the foundation of homosexuality. For the gay community to imply that boy-love is not homosexual love is ridiculous. We must not be seduced into believing misinformation from the press and the government. Child molesting does occur, but there are also positive sexual relations. And we need to support the men and the boys in those relationships. 22
20 J. Dressler. "Gay Teachers: A Disesteemed Minority in an Overly Esteemed Profession." Rutgers/Camden Law Journal, 1978, 9(3), pages 399-445.
21 Ibid.
22 Point of View. "No Place for Homo-Homophobia." San Francisco Sentinel, March 26, 1992.
The notorious North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), one of several major organized pederast groups, always has a drawing or a photo of a pre-teen boy on the cover of its NAMBLA Bulletin, as well as many other such depictions within each issue.23
Pedophile Philip Hutchinson's poem entitled "Choirboy" is entirely typical of the fare found in the Bulletin;
"You look like a cherub, but you're worldly-wise. You'd love to have me think you're newly-born, but I can spot the twinkle in your eyes; you know damned well how much you turn me on. Between us, you're the satyr ─ I'm the saint, so shed your sacred robe and bare your skin, surrender to my touch without restraint, and later, put your halo on again.
One of NAMBLA's flyers says that
There is no age at which a person becomes capable of consenting to sex. The age of sexual consent is just one of many ways in which adults impose their system of control on children ... Amazing as it may seem in this child-hating and homophobic society, boy lovers find boys attractive and like their spontaneity and openness.24
Convicted pederast and NAMBLA member David Thorstad has said that "I think that pederasty should be given the stamp of approval. I think it's true that boy-lovers are much better for children than the parents are ..." 25
NAMBLA is by no means on the fringe of the "gay rights" movement. For years, it was a member in good standing of the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA), and was only jettisoned by ILGA when the parent organization applied for United Nations consultative status in 1993. Years earlier, the ILGA itself had resolved that "Young people have the right to sexual and social self-determination and that age of consent laws often operate to oppress and not to protect." 26
Homosexual defenders of NAMBLA declared that "man/boy love is by definition homosexual," that "man/boy lovers are part of the gay movement and central to gay history and culture," part of "the Western homosexual tradition from Socrates to Wilde to Gide," and part of "many non-Western homo-sexualities from New Guinea and Persia to the Zulu and the Japanese." 27
In fact, one of NAMBLA's "gay" defenders got right to the point when he said that "Homosexuals denying that it is 'not gay' to be attracted to adolescent boys are just as ludicrous as heterosexuals saying it's 'not heterosexual' to be attracted to adolescent girls." 28
23 Pedophile Philip Hutchinson's poem entitled "Choirboy." NAMBLA Bulletin, January-February 1984, page 14.
24 NAMBLA flyer, quoted in Shirley J. O'Brien. "The Child Molester: Porn Plays a Major Role in Life." National Federation for Decency Journal, May/June 1987, pages 9-11.
25 David Thorstad, quoted in Joseph Sobran. "The Moderate Radical." Human Life Review, Summer 1983, pages 59- 60. “Pederasty” is generally defined as the sexual molestation of a boy by an adult male not in his immediate family.
26 Wikipedia entry on NAMBLA, April 14, 2010.
27Joshua Gamson. "Messages of Exclusion: Gender, Movements, and Symbolic Boundaries." Gender and Society April 1997 [Volume 11, Number 2], pages 178-199.
28 Ibid.
“Gay” leaders and researchers have recognized and publicized the natural relationship between homosexuality and pederasty [adult male sexual molestation of boys] for decades. NAMBLA and similar groups may be in the forefront of promoting "gay" sex with young boys, but many other prominent homosexuals have transmitted the same message;
• Larry Kramer, founder of the homosexual group AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT-UP), said that "In those cases where children do have sex with their homosexual elders, I submit that often, very often, the child desires the activity, and perhaps even solicits it, either because of a natural curiosity, or because he or she is homosexual and innately knows it. ... And unlike girls or women forced into rape or traumatized, most gay men have warm memories of their earliest and early sexual encounters; when we share these stories with each other, they are invariably positive ones." 29
• Pat Califia, lesbian author and activist, wrote in the "mainstream" homosexual publication The Advocate that "Boy-lovers and the lesbians who have young lovers are the only people offering a hand to help young women and men cross the difficult terrain between straight society and the gay community. They are not child molesters. The child abusers are priests, teachers, therapists, cops and parents who force their stale morality onto the young people in their custody. Instead of condemning pedophiles for their involvement with lesbian and gay youth, we should be supporting them." 30
• Steve Hanson wrote in the homosexual magazine Bay Area Reporter "Shame on us if our lesbian/gay voices remain silent while our NAMBLA brothers are persecuted once again, and shame on those lesbians and gay men who will raise their voices to condemn NAMBLA, insisting that boy lovers (and presumably the boys they love and who love them) are not part of this thing called the lesbian/gay community." 31
• One of the authors of The Big Gay Book said that "Sex between youths and adults is one of the most difficult issues in the gay movement. When does a youngster have the right and the power to make his own sexual decisions? How are laws against intergenerational sex used specifically to target gay men? What are the issues that make the romantic image of the Greek teacher and his student in times of antiquity turn into something ugly and forbidden in the modern age?" 32
• Lesbian Gayle Rubin wrote that "The recent career of boy-love in the public mind should serve as an alert that the self-interests of the feminist and gay movements are linked to simple justice for stigmatized sexual minorities. ... We must not reject all sexual contact between adults and young people as inherently oppressive." 33
Like the "ten percent" myth, the modern-day concept that adults can legitimately have sex with children originated with the Alfred Kinsey team. Sex educator and Kinsey collaborator
29 Larry Kramer, in Reports from the Holocaust [New York City: St. Martin's Press], 1991.
30 Pat Califia, in The Advocate, October 1980.
31Steve Hanson. "Shame on Us." B.A.R. (Bay Area Reporter), January 23, 1992.
32 John Preston, quoted in The Big Gay Book: A Man's Survival Guide for the '90s [New York City: Plume], 1991.
33 Gayle Rubin, quoted in Leaping Lesbian, February, 1978. This article originally appeared in an article entitled "Sexual Politics, the New Right, and the Sexual Fringe" in The Age Taboo [Alyson Press], 1981, pages 108-115.
Wardell Pomeroy said that "People seem to think that any [sexual] contact between children and adults has a bad effect on the child. I say that this can be a loving and thoughtful, responsible sexual activity." 34
Interestingly, while the mainstream press and liberal groups systematically pillory the Catholic Church, they entirely ignore the well-organized and determined efforts by professional associations to decriminalize and normalize child sexual abuse.
For example, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) recently sponsored a symposium in which participants discussed the removal of pedophilia from an upcoming edition of the group's psychiatric manual of mental disorders. At about the same time, the Archives of Sexual Behavior published a special edition in December 2002 discussing whether pedophilia should remain classified as a mental disorder. 35
As early as 1988, a leading American psychological journal, Behavior Today, claimed that "Pedophilia may be a sexual orientation rather than a sexual deviation. This raises the question as to whether pedophiles may have rights."36
Information Provided by a Diocesan Administrator
It is clear, even without reference to the numerous reports throughout the recent years, that homosexuals have infiltrated the ranks of the clergy to an astonishing degree. In some corners of the Church, such behavior has long been seen as acceptable.
To cite just one recent example, Msgr. Richard Sniezyk, appointed to head the Diocese of Springfield-in-Massachusetts after its bishop resigned amid sexual abuse allegations, said in an interview that the recent scandal in the Catholic Church stems from a belief among some priests during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s that sex with young men was "acceptable;”
Monsignor Richard S. Sniezyk, 66, the leader of the Springfield Diocese until the Vatican names a bishop to replace Thomas L. Dupre, said that as a seminarian and then a young priest ... he heard of priests who had sex with young men, but "no one thought much about it" because priests didn't recognize how mentally and emotionally damaging their behavior was ... "It was that era of the '60s ─ most of it took place from the mid-'60s to the early' 80s ─ and the whole atmosphere out there was, it was OK, it was OK to do."
37
This is not a statement by an anti-Catholic or homosexual activist, but rather an admission from none other than the duly-appointed shepherd of souls in this Massachusetts diocese.
34
Wardell Pomeroy, quoted in Michael Ebert. "Pedophilia Steps Into the Daylight." Focus on the Family Citizen, November 16, 1992, pages 6-8.
35
Lawrence Morahan. "Psychiatric Association Debates Lifting Pedophilia Taboo." CNSNews.com, June 11, 2003; Archives of Sexual Behavior article discussed in Linda Ames Nicolosi. "International Academy of Sex Research Joins the Debate: Is Pedophilia a Mental Disorder?" NARTH, June 26, 2003.
36 Behavior Today, December 5, 1988, page 5.
37 John M. McElhenny, "Monsignor Says Harm of Abuse Wasn't Recognized." Boston Globe, February 23, 2004.
It is easy to look back on the crisis in the Catholic Church in the United States and place blame on the Vatican, on the bishops, on the seminaries, or even on our society's permissive attitude toward sexuality in general. But much terrible damage has already been done ─ to the victims, to the Church, and to the souls of many whose faith has been shaken or even destroyed by the scandal.
Our primary responsibilities at this point are not blame and condemnation, but reparation and prevention. We must compensate the victims, and we must reassure them by making certain that there are no more future cases of child sexual molestation by clergy or other Church workers.
Does Pederast Equal "Gay"?
Some researchers assert that just because an activity is homosexual in nature does not mean that the person committing the act is a homosexual. For example, criminologist Margaret Smith said that "The majority of the [clergy] abusive acts were homosexual in nature. That participation in homosexual acts is not the same as sexual identity as a gay man." 38
This is like saying that someone who steals is not a thief, or that someone who races his car down a crowded city street at 200 kilometers per hour is not a reckless driver.
Men who sexually molest boys may claim not to be homosexual, but this assertion is disingenuous at best and deliberately deceptive at worst.
Many of the studies quoted above show that homosexual men are attracted to young boys. An Archives of Sexual Behavior study compared the sexual age preferences of people who described themselves as heterosexual men, heterosexual women, homosexual men, and lesbians. The results showed that "all but 9 of the 48 homosexual men preferred the youngest two male age categories," which included males as young as age fifteen. 39
Sometimes homophile groups allege that men who sexually molest boys are generally not sexually attracted to adult males, and therefore should not be considered homosexuals.
Once again, research does not support such a claim. A study of sex offenders against male children in Behavior Research and Therapy found that male pederasts are sexually attracted to "males of all ages." Compared to non-offenders, the offenders showed "greater arousal" when viewing slides of nude males as old as twenty-four: "As a group, the child molesters responded with moderate sexual arousal ... to the nude males of all ages." 40
In fact, a large percentage of pedophiles consider themselves to be homosexual. A study of 229 convicted child molesters in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that "eighty-six percent of [sexual] offenders against males described themselves as homosexual or bisexual." 41
38
Jeremy Schulman. "Expert: Donohue's Claim that Most Abusive Priests are Gay is "Unwarranted." Media Matters for America Web site, April 2, 2010.
39
Zebulon, Z.A. Silverthorne and Vernon L. Quinsey. "Sexual Partner Age Preferences of Homosexual and Heterosexual Men and Women." Archives of Sexual Behavior, February 2000 [Volume 29, Number 1], pages 67- 76.
40 W.L. Marshall, H.E. Barbaree, and Jennifer Butt. "Sexual Offenders Against Male Children: Sexual Preferences." Behavior Research and Therapy, 26 (1988): 383.
41
W.D. Erickson, et al. "Behavior Patterns of Child Molesters." Archives of Sexual Behavior, February 1986 [Volume 17, Number 1], pages 77-86, p. 83.
Is Celibacy the Problem?
Many opportunists claim that, if the Catholic Church would simply relax its rules on celibacy, the sexual abuse crisis would be greatly ameliorated.
This assertion simply makes no sense.
Those priests who sexually molest boys have just as much access to adult women as other men. In fact, since priests are admired and respected professionals, we might reasonably say that they have more ready access to women than do other men.
The most certain proof that there is no correlation between celibacy and child molestation comes from the fact that married men commit child sexual abuse at about the same rate as Catholic priests.
There are about 260 reports each year of children under 18 being sexually abused by Protestant clergy, church staff, volunteers or congregation members. By comparison, 4,392 priests (out of 109,000) were accused of sexual abuse during the time period 1950 to 2002, an average of 84 per year. 42
These numbers are backed up by a comprehensive study by Professor Philip Jenkins of Penn State, which found that between 0.2 percent and 1.7 percent of priests are pedophiles, and 2 to 3 percent of Protestant clergy are pedophiles, a somewhat higher rate. 43
Since Protestant clergy are free to marry, it is obvious that allowing priests to marry will not solve the problem.
"Born that Way?" So What?
We often hear from the homosexual-rights movement that "gays" are "born that way." This may or may not be true, depending on which of the hundreds of conflicting studies we choose to believe. Some experts believe that, in many cases, homosexuality is an acquired condition due to the lack of an effective male role model.
In the most fundamental sense, this point is irrelevant. We are all born with weaknesses, a direct result of our fallen natures.
We can accept them as crosses given to us by God, and we can glorify His Name by struggling to overcome them with the aid of His grace. Or we can simply give in and use the "born that way" excuse, the weak and cowardly road that is a vote of no-confidence in God's grace and its ability to save us.
We can deal with these weaknesses in one of two ways.
A person can have a genetic predisposition towards alcoholism. Yet our spouses do not accept the "born that way" excuse if we arrive home drunk every night. Kleptomania may indeed also be genetic, yet no court in the world has ever accepted the "born that way" excuse as a defense against shoplifting charges.
Nevertheless the gay gene myth is proven to be a lie from the very beginning.
At least three answers seem possible.
The first, the answer of tradition, is as follows: homosexual behavior is a
bad habit that people fall into because they are sexually permissive and experimental.
This view holds rat homosexuals choose their lifestyle as the result of self-indulgence
and an unwillingness to play by society rules. The second position is held by
a number of psychoanalysts (e.g., Bieber, Socarides). According to them, homosexual
behavior is a mental illness, symptomatic of arrested development. They believe
that homosexuals have unnatural or perverse desires as a consequence of poor
familial relations in childhood or some other trauma. The third view is "biological"
and holds that such desires are genetic or hormonal in origin, and that there
is no choice involved and no "childhood trauma" necessary.
