Southern Alberta Council on Public Affairs (SACPA)

The sexual scandals of some priests in the Roman Catholic Church make big news but are extremely distressing to the faithful. The Roman Catholics are not alone in their distress though. Nearly every religious institution in Canada has faced the fallibility of their human leaders. Some formerly faithful people claim the scandals have pushed them away from organized religions and we have seen church attendance plummet over the last few decades. There is no question that the sexual crimes of clergy must be punished, but can the exposure of these failures of the clergy and administration ultimately be good for religion? The speaker will argue that it is good the problem is now being exposed because it reveals the truth about human nature: power corrupts most of us. The sexual crimes of clergy and the scandals about their cover up have forced the churches to examine the power of the clergy and the role of the church hierarchy. Those same scandals have convinced the majority of people to pull the clergy class