Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission

A year after his resignation plunged Belgium’s Roman Catholic Church into a crisis, the former bishop of Bruges provoked almost universal condemnation on Friday, this time by admitting that he had abused a second nephew – and insisting that he was not a pedophile.

In a television interview late Thursday that reopened deep wounds, the bishop, Roger Vangheluwe, 74, recounted with apparent lack of contrition events leading up to his resignation as bishop of Bruges last year, when it emerged that nearly 25 years ago he had abused a boy who was later revealed to be one of his nephews.

Those revelations prompted hundreds of people to come forward, claiming that they, too, had been victims of priests, and forced Belgium’s Roman Catholic Church into its deepest crisis of recent times.

In a broadcast from a location in France, Bishop Vangheluwe, dressed in an open-neck shirt, suggested that the 13-year relationship revealed last year had not been opposed by his nephew, and, in an unexpected new twist, he admitted having abused a second nephew for a much shorter period…

Bishop Vangheluwe is not facing criminal charges because of Belgium’s 10-year statute of limitations, and the Vatican says he is receiving “spiritual and psychological treatment” outside Belgium…

During the interview, to which Bishop Vangheluwe had agreed only on the condition that it would be broadcast live, he denied that he had been driven by sexual motives…the abuse had been restricted to the touching of genitals…

Um, the Pope said – well, the Pope said nothing. When the abuse became public he condemned the police for searching church property and took the Bishop’s fate into his own hands. Since then – the Pope said nothing.




  1. Thomas says:

    #54
    Every Church in Christendom condemns pedo behavior, so any practicing such is doing so against the rules

    The rest of us live in the real world where evidence is used to back claims unlike religion. Numerous Churches have already been show to be covering up pedophilia and molestation. They might verbally state they condemn it but what matters are their ACTIONS in the face of tangible evidence which paints a very different story.

    You have an agenda against God, you feel He wronged you in some way, so everything is spun against anything religious.

    Way off base. I have an agenda against people that cover for reprehensible behavior such as pedophilia and molestation such as the various Christian denominations. Arguments such as “they are not “real” Christians”” or your NAMBLA rant are perfect examples of trying to deflect attention away from the effects of your religion’s brainwashing.

    Further, I have a serious problem with hypocrites. The religious make loud arguments against homosexuality and then we find numerous examples of leaders of those same religions being homosexual. They make pronouncements of family values and then we find them involved in adulterous relations. They argue for being moral and then we find them prosecuted for criminal activity.

    I could care less whether you believe in a deity or flying pink unicorns. What you personally believe is your own business however comical I may find it or however illogical it may be. However, I do have a problem with the behavior of the religious. You can believe the Earth is 6000 years old all you want, just do not try to have it taught as science. You can worship purple leprechauns for all I care on your own time; just don’t try to force children in public schools to recite your prayers. You may think homosexuals are evil, just keep that prejudice to yourself and don’t get in the way of letting them care for their own via marriage (or whatever you wish to call it). Like I said, what you believe is irrelevant. What you do is what matters.

  2. pedro's confused donkey says:

    Pedro said

    I guess that doesn’t make him gay either. But that’s not wrong, isn’t it?

    Then what happened to you? Oh ya, I forgot, you were born that way.

  3. Alphie's confused donkey says:

    Alphie, my beeg boss.

    Typical boss, you forget all the weettle boys you bring home. And don’t fourget:

    http://morallowground.com/2010/12/17/douche-du-jour-house-republicans-rally-to-support-child-sex-slavery-and-rape/


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