The hierarchy of the Catholic Church, which works in a top down fashion, is incapable and unwilling to stop child abuse within its ranks.  NBC news has recently called the Church a "criminal syndicate" after the Pennsylvania grand jury report showed the Church behaving like one.  It is time for ordinary church-goers to fix the problem.  The child abuse is made worse by celibacy.  I ask the Pope to revoke the the 879 year old rule that requires clergy to be celibate.  I ask  all Catholics to sign this petition and withhold their weekly donations until such time as celibacy is revoked.

The Church tries to deny that celibacy is related to the rampant child abuse among its clergy.  I was exposed to their flawed logic during a Boy Scout EIM (Ethics and Integrity in Ministry) training held by the local Church.  They said that scientific surveys show that priests are attracted to boys (homosexual tendencies?) at the same rate as other adult males, suggesting that celibate priests are no different from ordinary men.  Of course, the flaw in this logic is that it is not the attraction that is the problem.  It is ACTING upon the attraction in a criminal way that is the problem.  It doesn't take a scientist to realize that an unsatisfied, natural sexual urge among thousands of clergy is going to cause heinous problems.  Other denominations and religions seem to survive just fine with married priests, and the Catholic Church will too.