A lot of you know that Pope “Palpatine” Benedict “led Vatican investigations into abuse for four years before assuming the papacy in 2005.” You may know that he makes a habit of [p2p type=”slug” value=”pope-benedict-xvi-more-closely-tied-with-sex-abuse” text=”not addressing these issues”]. Pretty incredible, considering the intentional cover-ups and reassignments of acting pedophile priests that are revealed constantly. But now he is pretending to be unaware of abuses that occurred in his homeland, Germany.

“Nonsense,” said Father Doyle, who has served as an expert witness in sexual abuse lawsuits. “Pope Benedict is a micromanager. He’s the old style. Anything like that would necessarily have been brought to his attention. Tell the vicar general to find a better line. What he’s trying to do, obviously, is protect the pope.”

It gets better, too: The super-conservative Catholic church is idiotically maintaining that its mandatory celibacy for priesthood has no influence on child abuse & child rape (AP).

I feel so ashamed that so much of my extended family places their trust, faith, and money in the hands of this evil, corrupt institution!

More here on the New York Times, which is where today’s quotes are to be found. Hat tip to @vjack for first covering this.