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Catholic View On Why Children Are Abused

How did the Pope answer this question?

A LITTLE girl wept as she asked Pope Francis how God could let innocent children fall into prostitution. This is what he said. Ref. Source 5

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I was interested to read how he would explain that and at least he was honest - he didn't know. I've heard many a religious 'scholar' try to explain away this and for me their answers never makes sense.

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Trying to put your challenges in the context of answering the reason for the existence of man's cruelty to man in the face of a loving God, my seminary experience in the Catholic tradition taught that while everything exists as part of His plan and He knows what we will do when given free rein, He allows us to be cruel and harm innocents. It is believed by some that these abuses are repaid in Heaven, or even going so far as to pay for mortal sins by the harrowing of the flesh. There's kind of a mess regarding Purgatory in there as well, that someone who has suffered on earth will have little time to wait for their eternal reward. Of course, the abusers themselves condemn themselves in the fashion of terrible people to Hell, and even if they are later redeemed, they must still pay for their offenses in Purgatory (A not-Heaven afterlife that serves to purify souls so they will be cleansed of their sins and be ready for Heaven).

Is there any solution in religion for this, any kind of relief? The idea that by praying for an end to such abuses and suffering, we ourselves become more empathic and better people as a result is one view. If you believe in miracles, the escape that some of these sufferers receive may be small miracles themselves. Praying isn't enough, however. Working towards social justice is the responsibility of all decent people. Whether it is through politics, good works, or even a life spent in vigilance against such abuses, we can do something to help. Even keeping an open discussion on a site like this one helps, JB. You keep awareness up, and the news blurbs reminds us how close to home these crimes against humanity can be.

Abused Children Why View Catholic

Sometimes I think it can be difficult to reconcile the idea that God is love, and that he loves his creation with the fact that he has also given his creation free will. Does God allow the abuse of children? In a way I suppose so in that he grants us free will and when we choose to abuse or harm another person he does not directly oppose us because to do so would take away our free will.

In the end I think it is a question that lies outside our feeble understanding. We have an extremely limited view of the world, let alone the universe and all of creation whereas God has the entire view. Our understanding is limited largely to our experiences which in the grand scheme of things is so minuscule it is difficult to comprehend just how small we really are.

Trying to answer these types of questions adequately is like a two year old trying to answer a question regarding advanced physics where even adults don't fully grasp the concepts. I think ultimately the better question to ask is not why God allows these things to happen, but why we as human beings allow these things to happen?

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If god has all the answers then why wouldn't he provide a specific answer to something happening a lot around the world. Even if he thought we would not understand at least give it a go. Mankind has improved their ability to comprehend things from 2 millennia ago.

Catholic View On Why Children Are Abused

I'm not so sure we have increased our ability to comprehend all that much over the course of the past two millennium, in universal terms that amount of time is minuscule, less than a blink of an eye in the grand scheme of things. Using my previous example a two and half year old may have developed a little more ability to comprehend than a two year old, but still would be incapable of understanding something like basic physics let alone any advanced form and it would be futile for someone to try and explain it to them.

Personally I think God does give us a lot more answers than we recognize though, but we have a tendency to accept only the things that fit into our world view at the time and reject those things that we don't want to agree with. Being Catholic I believe that answers are provided not only in the Bible, but through the traditions and doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church as well as through the Holy Spirit. Still, being human I do not presume that we have fully comprehended Gods plan or the totality of the universe.

As far as suffering goes The Catechism of the Catholic Church in paragraph 1521 says that suffering is "...a consequence of original sin" it recognizes in paragraph 164 that "We perceive God as 'in a mirror, dimly' and only 'in part'" it says "The world we live in often seems very far from the one promised us by faith. Our experiences of evil and suffering, injustice, and death seem to contradict the Good News; they can shake our faith and become a temptation against it."

Also the Catechism of the Catholic Church in paragraph 412 asks the question regarding evil and why God permits it

That is the answer the Church put forward, accept it or not. Many will not, and that's fine I'm not going to spend a great deal of effort that I think is ultimately futile, in attempting to convince people or defend the Church's stance. I would only suggest that firstly, God gave humanity free will and with that we can choose to cause each other a great deal of suffering, and we often do cause each other a great deal of suffering. If God were to put a stop to it, we would not longer have free will. Second, we in our minuscule understanding, perception and place in the universe, we cannot possibly hope to comprehend the answers fully and third I believe that an answer to the question of why God allows things like child abuse to occur has been answered; in the Bible, through the Church, and the Holy Spirit, but it is not a answer that many of us are willing to accept or find acceptable and so we will rationalize our way around it as best we can so that we do not have to accept the answer.

Catholic View Why Children Abused

The pope recently compared child abuse to sacrifice and I'm puzzled. I was glad to see him cleaning up the Vatican and all the clergy but now he seems to be giving a justification for it which isn't sitting well with me.

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Pope makes groundbreaking decree. Pope Francis has issued a groundbreaking law for all Catholic priests and nuns in response to the global clerical paedophilia scandal. Source 4s.