C of E abuse report out now HERE

Both the Catholic and C of E churches have been exposed as two-faced, twisted, sick, vile b'stards - the exact opposite of what they preach.

Other big religions have similar problems especially towards abuse of people from other religions.

If you want to have religion, go to the smaller churches/religions and don't carry on giving money to these employment schemes for the most corrupt in our society.

Not too many disagreeing with you dd although the word hierarchy after catholic and c of e would be more accurate. The covering up of it is just as sick.sadly its everywhere bbc schools scouts church secret organisations etc etc

Just a wild guess, but I gather you're not fussed on mainstream religion then DD

Not quite, most organisations encourage and promote honesty, the church demand it of others and preach it.

It brings me back to scenario with the police, I'm sure there are a lot of good people but they have to use their own honesty to oust the rot otherwise they are part of it. If 60% of the Church of England gave an ultimatum to the hierarchy the cleansing would happen - and the same for the police!

I'm not expecting everything to be squeaky clean, but sensible lines have to drawn and maintained. You hear of crimes that have real long impact on victims (and I'm not talking about solicitors lying sob stories) yet the transgressor gets away with sod all of a penalty.

That's me laying into the church, police, solicitors and courts - ffs don't get me started on estate agents!

Not defending these cases one bit, although one main difference is, nobody has to go to church but they do have to attend school.

Teachers also preach the wrongs and rights in our communities.

Google 'ex teacher in abuse of children' , there's a list as long as your arm, all very recent, but parents are unable to shout and rant and keep their kids off school until it's sorted nationwide!

Unfortunately, those with vile tendencies DO hide behind the cloth, the blackboard, the dib dib dib, the social climbers and anything else they can conjure up to protect themselves.
Children are intimidated and scared into being quiet, which is quite possibly what originally happened to Joe.

The fact that he eventually found the courage to speak out, as we know, forty years ago this was probably thought to be a figment of his imagination, it is only this century that it's all being brought into the light, with a realisation that such dreadful things happened on a massive scale.

It is of interest, where he met all these Bishops and when, as they are scattered far and wide, so far as I can see. One resigned in 2000, one died in 1990. They did wrongly, agreed ,but I don't understand why he didn't go to the police.

Churches don't actually 'demand' anything of anyone.

The biggest difference is that the Church offers sanctuary you are supposed to feel safe there and be protected, the Catholic church offers confession I believe, who fancies telling your sins to a pedophile priest? how can he offer you forgiveness when he is tainted? give me five hail Mary's or maybe something else depending on your age! its not just child abuse look at the Magdaline Sisters, slave labour, taking money off those least able to afford it because they had such large families to feed courtesy of their religion, Jihad, Crusades all in the name of religion.

Just as an aside I thought I'd relate my personal experience of the loving Catholic Church. It concerns a particularly vicious bitch of a nun in St. Anne's infant school in Rock Ferry, I won't reveal her name for fear of litigation but she taught the 11+ class. Give her her due she warned us on our first day that she was going to hurt us but it was for our own good, and by God she was true to her word. Violence became an intrinsic part of our education. One occasion comes to mind, indeed it's hard to forget, on one of our tests we were required to score 100 correct answers but I only scored 99, her response to this was to drag me by my hair to the front of the class and make me sit down, she then proceeded to repeat the question and each time I gave a wrong answer she kicked me, eventually she lost any semblance of self control and once again dragged me by my hair and began smashing my face into the blackboard, I then wet myself from fear before losing consciousness. The woman was totally insane and I believe she died a hopeless alcoholic, may she burn in hell.

Jesus Lud, I thought our school was bad, what a sad story, in most schools violence against pupils was the norm, there were very few teachers that didn't use some form of punishment, I only remember two in our school, they didn't need to resort to punishing kids because they had respect.

Can completely believe it Lud. On teaching practice donkeys' years ago in a Catholic school ,in class time, I looked out of the window into the quad ,to keep an eye on two infants Id sent for something or other , to see a nun dash over , grab them, and literally bang their heads together for not being in class. No questions , just 'bang'.
In her own mental arithmetic class I watched her visciously take a ruler to knuckles for every wrong answer.

Horrific revelations here, and probably one thing stands out, as with many other cases.

Did anyone report these crimes ? Did you Venice,or Lud tell anyone at the time ?

Physical punishment was accepted within the education system, and at the same time parents could batter their kids. No repercussions, just simply considered 'the norm' in many areas.
They were still hanging people for murder.

'No hopers' were probably pressured into the religious organisations either as a way of escape or as Casper says 'sanctuary' because they didn't fit in anywhere else. They too may have been abused.

One big horrible place for those who suffered at the hands of, and I dare say we could all, at one level or another, relate a story that would now be deemed fit for the courts.

Yes Granny, people were aware of Sister sociopath's behaviour but at that time the Catholic Church was held in great respect and in a lot of people's eyes could do no wrong. We even had to go to 7 o'clock (a.m.) mass every weekday at the convent and we had to sit with her at 9o'clock mass every Sunday in church, if we didn't, even if we went to another mass, on Monday we would be taken into the cloakroom where she really let her sadism have free rein and have our heads banged against the coat hooks, how she didn't kill anyone is beyond me.Each day started with a prayer to Saint Jude ( patron saint of lost causes) so we were made to feel pretty worthless really and I don't think any of us regained any self esteem for a long time after escaping her evil clutches.

If I'd of been in her class for maths,I wouldn't of had any knuckles left,I was hopeless at maths

Thinking back, my elder step sister used to scare me with tales of the nuns, she used to say they'll lock you in cells and whip you, I used to grass on her to my mum, and she would deny it, childhood days.

lol -- its never been my favourite thing either ! Defo not a natural!

Standard procedure in the landowning classes was that the first son inherited the estate, second son went into the army, third son went into the church.

Ive only grainy recollections now granny . Probably told contemporaries about it , but likely didnt say anything in the school - as you say, you tended to accept things more in those days . Certainly banging heads together would have been a difficult thing to comment on as although it must have hurt, no-one was knocked out or anything so nothing to point to.If you think about it as well, it was a commonly used expression by parents , that trivialized the actual act .

As for the ruled knuckles, that was definitely not particularly frowned upon in those days for bad behaviour - I think the mentality was that you had choice - you brought it upon yourself if you chose to be 'naughty', but yes it was more controversial when used for 'wrong answers ' etc, but Id been warned beforehand that it was a 'very strict' school that got superb results , so I guess as a student at the time , I probably just accepted it.

Wow its shocking to read those stories.