When I wrote the post recently, The Devil Made Me Do It, I mentioned that it was based on a tweet I had seen that was about the Pope saying that the problems in the church today are due to Satan attacking it.  I really didn’t want to discuss that at   in that post, just wanted to use it to move forward something we see all the time with the faithful: The devil is always out there making us do things we don’t want to do.

Of course, it’s laughable. But it’s also disturbing and when the leader of a major religion resorts to blaming the devil for all of their recent problems, then their issues are larger than what they’d like us to know. Here’s the blog post from that tweet, and here’s an article from Reuters discussing at length what the Pope actually said.

It’s exasperating to read both of these. Instead of the Catholic Church taking personal responsibility, all they’ve done is move it over to some other mythological being. It’s a terrible example to set for all believers. By the way, when some believer gets pulled over by the police for driving 70 in a 40 MPH zone, I really doubt they’ll avoid a ticket by proclaiming that the devil made them do it.

Instead of blaming Satan, the church should be purging their ranks, openly, of those priests that have been known to abusing children and also those in the hierarchy who conspired to cover up these crimes. Not just one or two at a time, but if they have to fire a thousand, they should do it immediately.

This is a public relations problem that will not go away until they decide to accept complete responsibility for what has gone on for decades, and yes, centuries.

Imagine a major multi-national corporation (Which the Catholic Church actually is)  accused of sex trafficking or abusing children and those in the upper echelon knew about it and covered it up. The value of that company would plummet the next day. Who would want to do business with a company that not only allowed these activities to occur, but conspired to cover them up?

If the Pope wants to restore confidence in the church they he needs to take responsibility for their ills and not blame Satan. It’s a trash heap and those of us speaking up about it are the ones with the matches to light and stoke the fire.

I guess the good thing is they’re no longer blaming the victims.