Sexual Abuse in Social Context:
Catholic Clergy and Other Professionals

Excerpted from a special report, Sexual Abuse in Social Context: Catholic Clergy and Other Professionals, published by the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. The complete text with footnotes can be found at www.catholicleague.org

Reprinted with permission

Overall data

The National Child Abuse and Neglect Data Systems was developed by the Children's Bureau of the U.S. Department of Human Services in partnership with the States to collect annual statistics on child maltreatment from State child protective services agencies.

The purpose of this special report is to put the recent scandal in the Catholic Church in perspective. It does not seek to exculpate anyone who had anything to do with priestly sexual misconduct, but it does seek to challenge those who continue to treat this issue in isolation. Indeed, to discuss the incidence of sexual abuse committed by Roman Catholic priests without reference to the level of offense found among the clergy of other religions, or to that of other professionals, is grossly unfair. It is the belief of the Catholic League that no meaningful conversation can take place on this issue without having some baseline data regarding the incidence of abuse that occurs outside the Catholic Church. That was the sole intent of this special report, and if it contributes to that end, then it will have been a success. William A. Donohue, Ph.D, president Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights

For the year 2001, it was found that approximately 903,000 children were victims of child maltreatment, 10 percent of whom (or 90,000) were sexually abused. It also found that 59 percent of the perpetrators of child abuse or neglect were women and 41 percent were men.

In 2001, clinical child psychologist Wade F. Horn reported on the work of researchers at Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health. The researchers found that nearly 20 percent of low-income women, recruited through family planning, obstetrical, or gynecological clinics, had experienced child sexual abuse.

Horn summarized the researchers' findings on poor women as follows: "Family friends and acquaintances compose the largest group of perpetrators (28 percent), followed by such relatives as uncles and cousins (18 percent), stepfathers (12 percent), male siblings (10 percent), biological fathers (10 percent), boyfriends of the child's mother (nine percent), grandfathers and stepgrandfathers (seven percent), and strangers (four percent)." Horn was struck by the fact that 10 percent were biological fathers and only four percent were strangers.

Priests

According to a survey by the Washington Post, over the last four decades, less than 1.5 percent of the estimated 60,000 or more men who have served in the Catholic clergy have been accused of child sexual abuse.

According to a survey by the New York Times, 1.8 percent of all priests ordained from 1950 to 2001 have been accused of child sexual abuse.

In a database analysis of reports on more than 1,200 alleged victims of priests identified by USA Today, 85 percent were males. In another study by USA Today, it was determined that of the 234 priests who have been accused of sexual abuse of a minor while serving in the nation's 10 largest dioceses and archdioceses, 91 percent of their victims were males.

Much has been made of a survey done by the Dallas Morning News which claims that two-thirds of the nation's bishops have allowed priests accused of sexual abuse to continue working. But the problem with the survey is its definition of abuse - it includes everything from "ignoring warnings about suspicious behavior" to "criminal convictions." Thus, the survey is of limited utility.

Ministers

The data on the Protestant clergy tend to focus on sexual abuse in general, not on sexual abuse of children. Thus, strict comparisons cannot always be made. But there are some comparative data available on the subject of child sexual molestation, and what has been reported is quite revealing.

According to a 2000 report to the Baptist General Convention in Texas, "The incidence of sexual abuse by clergy has reached 'horrific proportions.'" It noted that in studies done in the 1980s, 12 percent of ministers had "engaged in sexual intercourse with members" and nearly 40 percent had "acknowledged sexually inappropriate behavior."

In the spring of 2002, when the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church was receiving unprecedented attention, the Christian Science Monitor reported on the results of national surveys by Christian Ministry Resources.

The conclusion: "Despite headlines focusing on the priest pedophile problem in the Roman Catholic Church, most American churches being hit with child sexual-abuse allegations are Protestant, and most of the alleged abusers are not clergy or staff, but church volunteers."

Other clergy and professionals

Rabbi Arthur Gross Schaefer is a professor of law and ethics at Loyola Marymount University. It is his belief that sexual abuse among rabbis approximates that found among the Protestant clergy.

According to one study, 73 percent of women rabbis report instances of sexual harassment. "Sadly," Rabbi Schaefer concludes, "our community's reactions up to this point have been often based on keeping things quiet in an attempt to do 'damage control.'"

According to one study, .2 percent of athletic coaches nationwide have a criminal record of some sort of sexual offense. This translates to about 6,000 coaches in the U.S. who have been tried and found guilty of sexual offense against children.

Between three and 12 percent of psychologists have had sexual contact with their clients.

Teachers

The American Medical Association found in 1986 that one in four girls, and one in eight boys, are sexually abused in or out of school before the age of 18. Two years later, a study included in The Handbook on Sexual Abuse of Children, reported that one in four girls, and one in six boys, is sexually abused by age 18.

It was reported in 1991 that 17.7 percent of males who graduated from high school, and 82.2 percent of females, reported sexual harassment by faculty or staff during their years in school.

All of the accused admitted sexual abuse of a student, but none of the abusers was reported to the authorities, and only one percent lost their license to teach.

Conclusion

The issue of child sexual molestation is deserving of serious scholarship. Too often, assumptions have been made that this problem is worse in the Catholic clergy than in other sectors of society.

This report does not support this conclusion. Indeed, it shows that family members are the most likely to sexually molest a child. It also shows that the incidence of the sexual abuse of a minor is slightly higher among the Protestant clergy than among the Catholic clergy, and that it is significantly higher among public school teachers than among ministers and priests.

In a survey for the Wall Street Journal-NBC News, it was found that 64 percent of the public thought that Catholic priests frequently abused children.

This is outrageously unfair, but it is not surprising given the media fixation on this issue. While it would be unfair to blame the media for the scandal in the Catholic Church, the constant drumbeat of negative reporting surely accounts for these remarkably skewed results.

Without comparative data, little can be learned. Numbers are not without meaning, but they don't count for much unless a baseline has been established. Moreover, sexual misconduct is difficult to measure given its mostly private nature.

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