It's not just Catholic Priests

In every religion there are sexual predators. I was raised in a Mystical Christian religion during the 1950s when I was growing up and a man in that religion molested my cousin and well over 100 other boys there and then my 13 year old cousin molested me when I was 8. Though I was able to talk to people and get counseling over the years my cousin did not. He died of alcoholism in 2001 partly because of what happened to him and what he did to me and his inability to cope and to survive with the whole thing long term. Though he was married twice and had two children this whole episode always haunted him the rest of his life.

What creates sexual predators within religious or organizational settings of all kinds? The first thing that creates them is that they were molested and never talked about it to anyone or got any kind of real therapy about it and so the experience twisted them and their concept of what sexuality was or is.

The second kind of way that predators are created is when people become sociopathic. In other words they are able to rationalize everything they do no matter what it is or does to other beings on earth. People who are the most intelligent but are also intellectually based who are not necessarily emotional or intuitively based fall into this category.   People who are the most capable of extreme self discipline  also fall into this category.

Unfortunately, many monks and priests and nuns and ministers of all religions fall into both of these kinds of categories. For example, many boys and girls who were molested while in Sunday School or singing in the choir get twisted by this and then become monks, priests, nuns, or ministers of any religion   or people who are internally but secretly twisted within any religion. Then, since all people in that religion are psychologically vulnerable because they are taught from the cradle to automatically trust other people in that religion they have no way to protect themselves as children and young adults from this predatory behavior from people who aren't right emotionally and have secrets. And so this kind of behavior is perpetuated century after century in every religion and in all religions all over the world.

The Catholic Church won't be the last religion to be rocked by molestation scandals. It's just that the celibacy rule within the Catholic church tends to create these kinds of scandals since there is no one I have ever met that stays completely sane or rational and who is celibate for over 5 years.

It is my personal opinion that unless the Catholic Church permits Priests and Nuns to marry(not necessarily each other) that the basic economics of Catholicism will collapse worldwide under the molestation weight within the next 50 years. I think basic economics will change this rule within 25 years.