Comments

1
If there's any surprise to this, it's that he said it, not that he believes it.

We all knew he never meant it when he apologized. He probably got a lot of shit for it from above. (The Pope, that is, not God.)
2
Oh, he's sorry, all right.
sor·ry (/ˈsɑri/, /ˈsɔri/)

2. Worthless or inferior; paltry: a sorry excuse.
3. Causing sorrow, grief, or misfortune; grievous: a sorry development.
3
So I presume this retraction is on the advice of the Church's legal counsel? I can’t think of any other reason, except to polish the silver.
4
I am stunned, but sadly not surprised. I do hope Catholic parishioners will start some sort of revolution within their churches. The systematic coverup of abuse, and the lack of any real punishment for the perpetrators is one of the most vile things that the Catholic church has done in my mind (and it has done a lot of fucked up shit).
Cardinal Egan along with all these "leaders" should be living with public shame and humiliation everyday. The amount of lives that were ruined and continue to be ruined by a complacent church is disgusting. It is far too late too polish up a legacy now.
5
This is the guy that confirmed me. Ah, he touched me. I feel so gross now. At least I realized the error of my ways and am atheist now.
6
Right. coz raping little boys and covering it up to protect the institution is just what jesus would do.
7
Total scum. Worthy of Hell, if such a place existed.
8
Nobody ever accused the Catholic Church's leadership of having humanity or humility in the face such shameful behavior. It's always been arrogance with them. And that's why they have caused so much harm over so many centuries. They just can't admit their errors.
9
THIS JUST IN:

A press release was just made by a Mr. G. Warming after a noisy Town Hall Meeting yesterday.

Mr. Warming stated the science was still out on Santorum.

In fact, Mr. Warming went to far as to state the say that it was a complete hoax - and on a global scale, perpetrated by 6,500 communist - and probably gay - scientists, and that the was no evidence for it at all.

He snarked that it probably felt more Santorum these days due to all the hot air coming from the "long-haired, lefty leninist-marxist" terroscientia that"palled around" with that kenyan fellow.

Earlier in the day, during the meeting to rally his supporters, when asked for his views by local cub reporter from the Fox Daily Ails, Mr. Warming joked that if there was any such thing as Santorum, it certainly was not man-made, and that Santorum has been comi...ng and going for generations. He added also that anyone speading this needed to be sent to cell block Freddie in the Dodd-Frank County Jail.

Things DID heat up after the meeting, when a protesting university student, - whom police later identiied as a Miss E. V. Lution - dropped her placard on the sidewalk and tried to get her 180 year dog, a Beagle, to attack Mr Warming. Fortunately, the Beagle has been on a very long sea voyage and was too tired.

This morning Miss Lution appeared in court in Scopes, Tennessee. When she shouted out "police brutality!" to a startled county cout clerk. The magistrate - Judge Barkman, asked her lawyer, a 6000 year old dinosaur, by the name of GeorgeSauros what on earth she meant. The dinosaur informed the County Judge that Miss Lution as she was arrested, the police they threw the book at her: She alleged that the town police had drawn their automatic bibles from their holsters, and threatened to shoot the old testament at Miss Lution, starting with the garden of eden and the talking snake. Apparently, the police were stilling clinging so tightly to their religion that they left their guns in the church vestible.

However, before a fine was registered by the court, the plaintiff - Mr. Warming - had a change of heart, and said that if Miss E.V. Lution would categorically deny that their was no such thing as man-made Santorum, he would drop the charge - entered in the police station charge sheet as "attempting to spread santorum".

Miss Lution agreed, and, being a minor, was remanded to the custody of her parents - her step-father, Mr. Sol Lution, and her Mother, an unmarried woman by the name of miss E. Lection.

Mr Warming was last seen on the cable tv 700 club praying away the gay, or if that was too hard to do, get a mysterious bearded chap by the name of zod to ringfence them into the men's room at minneapolis airport, hoping that any and all alleged "santorum", if struck by spontanenous combustion due to the localized climate change causing the air to warm, could be put down as a "freak" of "nature".
10
Read the interview transcript. This is a man who is supposed to be a spiritual leader, yet there is nothing in there but cold, calculating, CYA. All those cases were in his predecessor's time, he says, so nothing to do with him.
------------------
"T Magazine: One criticism of your tenure in the Bridgeport diocese was that you refused to meet with victims of sexual abuse.

EGAN: First of all, I couldn’t apologize for something that happened when I wasn’t there. Furthermore, every one of those cases was in litigation before a court, or threatened to be, and every one was handled correctly. I had the first fellow dismissed and the Holy See didn’t allow us to do that anymore, right?, and I handled every case exactly the right, I never hesitated to have the very finest treatment, the very finest of everything. And not any of them did anything out of line. If I was sure, I couldn’t do anything, if I wasn’t sure, I controlled them. No one could have done any better and if there was any mistake in any of that—I’m sorry—but I don’t think there was any mistake at all."
---------------

What about some compassion for the souls in your care, Archbishop? Oh, right - souls only count when they are in embryos. Once they're born, fuck 'em.
11
@10: I just read it too, and I read it because I didn't want to believe it. But yeah, the guy sounds like a real dick, unrepentant, and cocky about the whole thing.
12
one of the wonderful things about a philosophy freed from the black/white thinking of religion is a true apprehension of nuance. there are many sides to each story, and there are almost always at least some circumstances that mitigate, at least a little bit, the awfulness of most crimes. however. these miserable motherfuckers that rape children under the guise of godliness and their pals that covered it all up deserve no second thought. just a truly righteous condemnation. and a punishment that tests the outer bounds of the 8th amendment. christ.
13
"I never hesitated to have the very finest treatment, the very finest of everything." I'm sure you did.
14
So glad I never confirmed in the Catholic church.... I felt it was the right decision then, and clearly, it was. Those unrepentant supporters of terror.
15
Why does everyone keep calling them "the Catholic Church"?

Shouldn't we just be referring to them as NAMBLA now?
16
@15: The Catholic Church is based in Europe, not North America.
17
@6 Jesus is a bad joke.

Jesus' teachings(if we are to be extremely generous and assert without any evidence that he even existed), even when stripped of the wizardry and silliness, are still hugely problematic and potentially harmful. They can be summed up as follows:

Jesus asserts that mankind lives in a kingdom ruled by a powerful and terrible celestial king, who created mankind for the sole purpose of serving the king. However, man has willfully disobeyed the king and as a consequence, will suffer greatly.
To avert this suffering, Jesus teaches that he will be offered as a blood sacrifice for the benefit of a select few members of mankind. Those who do not blindly swallow these assertions as true will suffer terribly during the end of the world, which will happen within a few decades.

In other words, Jesus was a creator of fake problems, an incredible fear-monger, and a pie-in-the sky utopian who encouraged people to ignore their real-life problems instead of dealing with them.

18
His Excellency is just another in a long line of charlatans, peddling hatred and bigotry, lies and misinformation. A piece of shit, in other words.
19
@ 16: Really, that's your reason? A geographic technicality?
20
So he is a fucking liar. I believe that it is #9: "Thou shalt not bear false witness".
21
This man should be prosecuted.
22
Nicely put @17
23
Catholicism gets its cult members to believe that the Pope (and his bishops) have Infalibility and Complete Authority over the flock.

They start when you are very young, beating it into your heads, every day.

Once the sheep buy into that, the trap is sprung. The Church heirarchy can, and have, gotten away with murder and genocide, literally, and many other crimes over the centuries. Mix in some medieval attitudes towards sex, sexuality, gender roles, and the today's scandals are not surprising in the least.

I went thru 12 years of Catholic school, and saw this in action every day. Somehow I started to break free at about age 13, thank God!

Sad to say, but they will never change their tune. Maybe they will go extinct.
24
This must have been pursuant to legal advice. Just like they tell you, after a car accident, never say "I'm sorry" to the other driver, because it equates to an admission you were at least partially at fault.

Curse your airtight logic, Cardinal Egan! Now there will be no record that you EVER said such a self-incriminating thing as "we're sorry this happened"!
25
@19: Yeah.
26
@17,22, I'm sorry to say this is not what Christ taught. Most of the claims you made are either specific interpretations, or inventions and additions.

You don't have to like what he says, but you should at least be fair to him. From saving that adulterous wife to condemning those who thought showing off as 'virtuous' was what it took to be good, he clearly showed he had ideas worthy of consideration.

Which is of course not to say that the Catholic Church (or any other for that matter) gets a break in child abuse issues. But as far as I know this was never a practice encouraged by, or indulged in, by Christ himself, his famous saying about children notwithstanding.
27
26@

Of course, NoTrue Scotsman fallacy is one of the most common tricks in superstitionist's book.

Every person within every one of more than 30 000 sects of Christianity has its own customized and personalized version of superstition.

After all, superstition is all about faith and faith is belief without evidence.
When you believe things without evidence there is no way to check the validity of what you believe, and if believing without evidence is respected then there is no way to condemn those who do morally repugnant things in the name of their faith. Faith provides no mechanism for moral decision-making, for self-examination, for discerning what is true.

That is why it is useless, incoherent, harmful and dangerous.

28
@27, all I'm saying is that the book contains a number of saying by Jesus with which I think rational people can agree, like the one I alluded to.

I'm saying nothing about faith. I'm saying nothing about 30,000 interpretations. I'm saying nothing about believing things without evidence. I'm saying nothing about not condemning people who do morally repugnant things. I'm saying nothing about the mechanism of moral decision-making. I'm saying nothing about self-examination.

But I am saying something about what is true, namely, that that guy said a number of things that a rational person can rationally agree with -- if s/he knows the evidence, if s/he checks the validity of her beliefs, if s/he is capable of moral decision-making, self-examination, and discerning what is true.

That's all I'm saying. Don't put words into my mouth, and don't "disagree" with things I haven't said.
29
Son of a beesting... A slap in the face to the survivors and to the Catholics who are trying to salvage the Church's good name.
30
@27: Um, that's not No True Scotsman. Ankylosaur wasn't saying that only REAL Christians think like him; he was saying that not all branches of Christianity are all that bad.
31
It is beyond me why ANY Catholics keep on giving their money to this thoroly corrupt and totally unredeemable Institution!
They may think their money goes to "Charity"; but the ONLY "Charity" the Hierarchy is interested in, is the "Charity" of paying enormous sums for legal defenses of Pedophiles {and paying off their Victims to keep silence}; and the "Charities" that they can take over to stop Women's Services formerly provided, such as Abortion, Birth Control, Sex Education and Counseling free of their narrow religious bias.
While with some Catholics the ritual, etc., still resonates; there is no way to save or to reform the Vatican Church but to LEAVE it and form a non-Vatican Catholic Church. Not all Catholics want to become Atheists or Protestants {or Hare Krishnas, etc.}. Many have various reasons for wanting to call themselves Catholics; altho they may in their real lives practice Birth Control, be non-celibately Gay or Bi, etc.
For these people, the ONLY honest answer is to LEAVE THE CHURCH AND FORM YOUR OWN.
This is actually happening, or has happened, in some areas.
I am hoping to see, in my lifetime, a real co-ordinated split, away from the rotten, rotting Vatican Church, such as took place during the 16th-century Reformation. For example, in Europe {as well as in North and South America} there are historic, beautiful church buildings that could and should be wrested away from Vatican financial control, and taken over by the "new" congregations for THEIR worship purposes; or else turned into schools, museums, community arts centers, etc., if people choose to do that.
I say this as an Atheist tolerant of others' beliefs -- I would love to see such a development take place!
32
@28

Nothing that purported "Jesus" "said" amounts to anything worthy of exception because Roman and Greek philosophers and teachers were far superior many centuries before in ethics, social structuring and reasoning.

You are just uninformed. Religion is simply another kind of illiteracy.

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