Reply #2: Oh, there are cover-ups

[shrike]

You just don't hear about them. Here's why:

Not to excuse the behavior of the Catholic hierarchy, but as a sometime-member of the media I can vouch for the fact that there's a storyline in place: the Catholic Church is rife with corruption and pedophiles and the bishops do nothing but cover-up. Protestant churches, on the other hand, have a zero tolerance policy towards child molesters and nip these problems in the bud practically before they start.

Again, I'm not trying to excuse the bishops' behavior but I've seen this kind of storyline in action. If you ever get a chance to go over to Buzzflash's archives, Robert Parry has a great description of just how the media works in these situations.

From my experience, it's sheer laziness that causes these storylines to form: okay, we know there've been scandals here in the past, ergo we can rehash a lot of what we already know, fit this new story in the pattern, and go home early.

In my area, there's been several scandals with a local Baptist Church: one affair between minister and student was ignored 'til the two ran off together. You can bet the church didn't approach the victims' family "with humility" in that instance.

I've actually heard non-Catholics and non-religious people grumble about all the priest-pedophile coverage: they say a) other denominations have their scandals, too, the media doesn't cover them. b) some of these victims may just be looking for money (unfair, I know.)