Abusive priests shatter trust in church leaders

As a cradle-Catholic, I am saddened by the scandals involving the church. A few abusive priests have shattered out trust in our church leaders, they have driven away thousand of followers and they have depleted millions of dollars in church funds through settlements. We were in Ireland last summer and the Irish were also complaining about their abusive priests. Monetary settlements in Ireland are too high for the local churches so the Irish taxpayers have to pay the difference. We were told that declared Christians are automatically taxed 10 percent for this church and state.

The pope is outraged in his opposition to abortion, euthanasia and same-sex marriage and he is urging Catholic politicians to vote against such practices in an effort to "defend the basic right to life from conception to natural death." Where was all this outrage when children were suffering abuse from his priests?

Through his church policies of silence, secrecy and misdirection, abusive priests were systematically protected and moved to other locations where they could continue molesting other children. How was he defending the children's "right to life?"

The pope and his church leaders chose to close ranks and protect a few degenerate priests and their "holy" reputation rather then their youngest parishioners. This hypocrisy puts the pope's credibility and His moral infallibility in question.

Any politicians who kowtow to religious leaders instead of their constituents, have no business being in politics, and religious leaders who do not defend the basic right of all their parishioners from birth to death have no business being in religion. We must continue to maintain the separation between church and state.

T.R. VALDEZ

Yuma