During the darkest part of human history, many friars, priests, and bishops had raped virgins and pillaged villages in the name of God and country with little fear of imprisonment or the punishment of hanging or beheading.
Yet, no matter how far and wide the influence of the Catholic Church might have spread for the past centuries, the truth about these vile acts of depravity against the innocent and the powerless would come out eventually.
From the sixties to the late seventies, a huge number of allegations of sexual abuse of minors were raised against members of the clergy and church workers.
Throughout the eighties and nineties, the recorded cases of abuse rose and dipped annually, but the numbers consistently remained within a significant range.
Can We Blame the Vocation's Commitment to Celibacy? Many theologians and religious scholars have pointed out that this predilection for deviant sexual behavior stemmed from the persistent practice of celibacy among priests and nuns.
Yet, this personal commitment towards sexual abstinence doesn't fully explain why the accused clergy did what they had done.
If these were widely practiced in seminaries and monasteries, then that would have explained much of these men's sexual tendencies.
In truth, less than five percent of these priests may be clinically diagnosed as pedophiles with a strong sexual attraction for children under the age of eleven.
Meanwhile, some of them became enamored with teens aged twelve or older (ephebophilia).
Apart from the issue of celibacy, many people also framed the presence of sexual predators in religious institutions as a combined result of the growing laxity towards sexual self-expression and the loosening of the priest's personal commitment to abstain from any sexual contact with others.
The puzzling results of a statistical analysis of reported clergy abuse incidents over a five-year period encouraged a criminology research team to delve further into other causal factors of deviant behavior.
Can We Blame the Rising Acceptance of Homosexuality? In ancient times, many Roman and Greek soldiers used their squires for sexual release.
Rather than being penetrated, the older man simply inserted his member between the young man's thighs and simulated intercourse until they both found their release.
Yet, these warriors mostly lived as heterosexual men with wives and children, and only considered this temporary relationship as a business transaction that brought mutual satisfaction.
In comparison, the priests who chose to rape their young victims, forcing them to endure the humiliation and pain countless times, never thought of themselves as gay men.
How a Twisted Mindset Was Formed To these men, intercourse with someone of the same sex does not constitute homosexual behavior.
This extreme rationalization of a forbidden act further twisted the perpetrator's mindset that it's the victim who seduced and took advantage of the priest's weakness.
Actually, the final analysis of historical data revealed some valuable insights.
Most priests who already had sexual experience before and during their seminary education were likely to break their vow of celibacy.
However, they preferred other adults as their sexual partners rather than children.
Also, priests who participated less frequently in human formation programs at the seminary will more likely become abusive later.
This training program helped seminarians reach maturity in their understanding of human sexuality and led them to reconcile conflicting views and attitudes towards sex.
Increased isolation and the lack of emotional support during stressful periods likely contributed to the fallen clergy's loss of spiritual direction.
Depression or a personality disorder may push a desperate man to use sex as an antidote to his loneliness.
Yet, the madness that destroys a religious man's resolve to always follow the path of righteousness often comes after years of mental anguish and physical longing.
This is especially true for those priests who were ordained before the Sixties and early Seventies back when seminary life didn't offer any counseling or human formation training.
For every 100 of these men, 44 turned out to be abusive later in life.