The Ceremony of Innocence
Pedophilia, Boy Scouts, and the Slippery Slope
by Glenn R. Jackson
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, … and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned… (Yeats “The Second Coming”)
The Catholic Church in the United States has a problem, but it is not greater than and really only a mirror of the problem facing American society as a whole. To demonstrate the point let’s examine just one sentence from the U.S. Cardinals after their Vatican meeting with the Pope. Their statement on the crisis included a notice to the fact that “almost all the cases involved adolescents and therefore were not cases of true pedophilia.”
This is a very curious statement coming as it does from a meeting reacting to a most serious crisis within the Catholic Church. It seemed to be an attempt to differentiate between “levels” of the seriousness of the problem. This backing off a notch on the seriousness scale did not escape the notice of many of the victims and their families, many of them expressing outrage with the statements seeming lessening of the impact of their grief and hurt.
Amidst this growing crisis is the playing out of the continuing saga of the Boy Scouts of America and their battle with the homosexual agenda and the vast liberal establishment. Most recent of course is the growing move within the United Way to discontinue that organization of charities’ support for the Boy Scouts because of the Boy Scouts’ insensitive insistence on not allowing homosexual Scout Leaders.
The Boy Scouts is an organization for “adolescent” boys.
Herein, with the hair-splitting on “adolescents”, do we find that point of tension between the nearly acceptable and the morally wrong. With the focus on “adolescents” we can see how far we have gone down the path from what society had held as an absolute morality.
While one group is facing criticism for backing off on the seriousness of pedophilia or sexual predation, another group is facing increasing pressure for trying to keep such a tragic situation from engulfing their organization. The controversy for each is revolving for now around "adolescents." Behold the results of American society sliding down the slippery slope of sexual deviancy and moral relativism.
This slippery slope comes to us courtesy of the aggressive push of the driving philosophy of the homosexual agenda. Broken down to its basic element, the philosophy of the homosexual agenda is built on the morality of the individual, i.e. moral relativism or the idea that right and wrong are open to infinite interpretations.
Do the individual captives of this false and terrible philosophy understand the agenda being enacted in their philosophical name. Most do not, but to some, to whom “misery loves company” means something, theirs is a drive to legitimize their false and endangering philosophy within American society.
On the near horizon is legitimacy for groups like NAMBLA (North American Man Boy Love Association). Even some of our fringe academics are beginning a drumbeat for the correctness of sexual relations with “consenting children.” A yet unpublished book from the University of Minnesota by Judith Levine, “Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex”, is a breakthrough publication touting “statistics” to support the “mere” sexuality of children.
Will something stop the next step down the slope?
The homosexual agenda and its advocates are determined to impose their views as an acceptable lifestyle. This has led them to lobby for actions incompatible with public morality and an attempt to redefine or make meaningless that morality.
Those currying favor with this lobby have followed practices that are neither compatible with logic, nor reasonably believed in the light of emerging facts. Yes, this is a defining moment for the nation’s moral foundations.
If the Catholic Church will recognize its own near captivity to an alien and false philosophy, then speak out regardless the perceived cost. Maybe a societal rallying point will be found for the faithful and other absolutist. Yet if they do not see their way clear there is another rallying point. It is an organization dedicated to individual self-sufficiency and taking action for the morally upright.
In my house we are dropping the United Way and giving 100% to the Boy Scouts of America. God bless them.
Glenn R. Jackson is Chairman of the American Reformation Project, former State Chairman for Buchanan Reform and former state Chairman of the Georgia Freedom Party. Glenn also served on the Executive Committee of the Reform Party USA. Glenn holds an MA in Philosophy from Georgia State University in Atlanta.
© Glenn R. Jackson