Looking very grateful: Barbara Dorris, 'Outreach Director' of SNAP
The anti-Catholic advocacy group SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) says it is "grateful" that a criminal jury acquitted a man of felony assault after he brutally attacked an elderly priest that he said abused him some 37 years ago in 1975.
On May 10, 2010, William Lynch used a ruse to enter a retirement home for retired priests. He then violently thrashed 65-year-old Rev. Jerold Lindner in front of shocked witnesses until the priest was bruised and bloody. Lynch readily admitted to the angry beating. [Read more about the case]
Following the acquittal last week in the high-profile trial, SNAP issued a media statement written by its alleged "Outreach Director" Barbara Dorris:
Violence is always wrong. Still, we are grateful for this verdict. The odds that Lynch would ever reoffend are infinitely small.
We hope this case prods lawmakers to reform predator friendly laws that prevent child sex abuse victims from exposing predators in civil and criminal court.
Noticeably absent from SNAP's shifty statement is any condemnation of Lynch's merciless attack. As far as Dorris' weak statement that "Violence is always wrong," well, even the Catholic Church does not believe that.
Dorris' "Violence is always wrong" statement is also insincere and disingenuous. Whether or not Lynch would "reoffend" should not determine whether Lynch is guilty of the crime to which he confessed. (If a priest became incapacitated after abusing a minor, would SNAP be O.K. with a jury acquitting the cleric because the chances of him abusing again were "infinitely small"? Of course not. And neither would we.)
And contrary to Dorris' mean-spirited claim, this purported case of vigilante justice had absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the status of so-called "predator-friendly laws."
The bottom line: SNAP isn't fooling anybody. The organization's hatred for the Catholic Church is so untethered that it is downright giddy over the fact that Lynch got away with his savage assault.
A legal researcher would need to analyze whether these cases are prosecuted evenly.
If you changed the names, genders and professions of the individuals–how are
sentences meted out thoughout the region? This may or may not be another indicator of
the necessity for sustained public relations efforts. An important detail should not be misconstrued:
Defending the reputation of innocent priests is not indicative of denying a credible victim support and
justice. Has this been a challenge? There is no criticism intended for any parties. I am not the
"most religious" person, and, am far from perfect. I have been amazed, though, that more
parishioners did not seem disturbed by the imbalance of media coverage. Maybe the best solution
is for the archdiocese to give a directive to parishioners. If we hear disparaging comments about priests
(in general) not a specific case: Should we speak up and defend them, or say nothing?
This is not an issue of right or wrong, yet protocol tips would be helpful.
The whole situation has made me very sad, and, feeling powerless to improve the
circumstances in any meaningful way.
Now comes Barbara Blaine with stuff to say in public. I have been waiting for her Deposition in that case against SNAP – especially since CEO Clohessy admitted multiple times in his own officially non-responsive remarks at his own first Deposition that “Barbara” actually is the only one who knows how SNAP runs and what’s what and so forth.
She is “gratified” by the Lynch decision. Although – lah de dah – she does so deplore violence. In support whereof she opines that there is very little chance that Lynch will “re-offend”; in fact, waxing oddly theological, the chances of his reoffending are “infinitely small”, she pronounces.
I’m not so sure about Lynch: he cannot but have deliberately premeditated and planned his assault: lying to get “access” to his target, wearing gloves (so as not to hurt his knuckles?), and even telling his victim to take off his glasses before commencing the assault-and-battery phase of his plan. In standard offense-assessment that counts for a likelihood of re-offending, especially since he got away with it the first time, thanks to a strangely we-don’t-wanna-talk-about-it-now jury verdict.
But when is a crime of violence not a crime of violence? And the New Answer is: when you do it because you’re enraged. A marvelous new bit of legal ‘principle’ that will no doubt be taken to heart by a whole lot of folks.
So called “predator-friendly laws” used to be known as laws protecting the rights of the accused, which – once upon a time – were considered vital Constitutional principles, enshrined in the Bill of Rights.
But Dorris and SNAP – and they are hardly alone nowadays – have made much hay, hitchhiking like remoras on the ominous shark of defendant-unfriendly laws that have, upon the pretext either of Lefty ‘sensitivity’ or Rightist ‘law and order’, served merely to erode civil-liberty protections and engorge the government surveillance and police authority in this country (and this got going more than 20 years ago, well before 9/11).
An old man gets beat up and SNAP says, Great! The beater got off! How slimey. I want to take a shower now after reading comments from SNAP.
Halleluiah! I've been waiting for this day. Hopefully this is the beginning of the end of the "fair trial" nonsense that has plagued this nation for so long. How absurd that punishment has to wait until AFTER someone is pronounced guilty! And, while we're at it, isn't it refreshing to see individuals meting out justice rather than some duly sworn officer of the peace? Now…if only we could take it one step further, and get actual mobs in on the act. Now THAT would be cooking with gas!
Hey-new to the site. Can't help but point out SNAPs indefensible support for the " incredible lifelong melodrama" associated with males versus females – whom suffer these horrors from cradle to grave on a global and geological time scale. All abuses are despicable. But, if we're happily-snappily teetering on excusing adult male victims retaliation against their alleged abusers, better watch out boys because better than 85% of the world's adult female population is about to explode all over you. Imagine all those offending fathers, brothers, uncles, family friends, doctors, teachers, boyfriends and husbands falling victim decades later to justified anger of their female victims?
Retaliation, revenge and vigilantisim are never acceptable responses to purported crimes in a civil society. Ironically, willing to bet many SNAPpers might wind up on some womans hit list, someday, were this to be a truly a supportable action- as it is usually the "most righteously indignant" that have the most closeted skeletons.
SNAP out of it, dolts.
Barbara Dorris doesn't look, "grateful" to me, she looks concerned for Survivors of Clerical Abuse! Anyone can put any ridiculous caption underneath a picture and it is often totally unwarranted, as is this particular caption! If more people in the Roman Catholic Church had been a little more concerned over the years, the Priest Pedophilia Scandal in the Roman Catholic Church would not have reached the level of depravity it did, not only in the States, but all over the world.
It seems Delphin is trying to point out that while "abuse" is despicable, one who is sincerely
focused on justice itself would not confine their "outrage" to one gender or profession.
If you are accurate, and you may well be, that "apathy" within the church somehow contributed
to the crisis; would "apathy" also be the explanation as to why there aren't hundreds on this
website having this conversation?
If Barbara Dorris is concerned for abuse survivors, and not really trying to destroy the Catholic Church, I will eat my hat. She would have a completely different set ot actions and agenda if she were really concerned for survivors. She has no credibility, whatsoever. BTW, not to be mean, but I thought that was a picture of a man.
Relevance to our time has always been my biggest beef with the SNAP minset. They prove day after day with their rhetoric that they are more enamored with maintaining their own spite spite stemmed from 30 year old ghosts that may or may not exist then they are with dealing with the problem where it is actually happening in our time. I find that mindset to be sick and offensive.
SNAP feigns outrage at the abuse of male minors by church officials. If they were truly outraged by abuse as the focal action, they would not limit themselves to the Catholic Church clergy, but naturally broaden their scope to abuse of all minors by all perpetrators.
SNAP is no better than the racist leftists (eg. Sharpton and Jackson) whose sole focus for "justice" is on those caucasian or "right-wing" entities that have the financial coffers worthy of litigation. It is all about the financial, philosophical and political gains for SNAP- not justice or protection for the victims.
The apathy being expressed is via SNAPs singular focus on male victims as relates to priests and SNAPs justification for vigilantism. Will SNAP support this same vigilantisim for similarly abused women against perpetrators other than priests -even if it means taking down many of SNAPs heirarchy and their most notable and ardent supporters? How many SNAPpers will suffer a similar fate as the old, retired and defenseless (regardless of guilt) priest?
The elephant in the room is the sad fact of the majority of females that are victimized, ad infinitim, at the hands of males. There is no one to sue for those horrendous crimes. SNAP is a fraud for not pursuing/addressing such crimes against nature. The Catholic Church is one of the few global entities that is active in addressing such crimes. Perhaps SNAP is not so supportive of the Church's efforts in this arena? I may even go so far as to postulate that SNAP is inherently sexist (in addition to all the other "isms" from which they suffer).
I agree, Delphin.
To mercifully finally end my tirade: how interesting it is to observe those other bastions of maleness (sports, syngagogues, boy scouts) where it is presently being revealed that minor abuse (again, committed by males aganst males) was brushed aside so as to defend or protect the "institution" (think PSU here).
The issue is, and always has been, that males (God love them, as I do – this is NOT a bashing session) simply do not see child care and protection issues thru the same prism as do females. They operate on the " just get over it" principle regarding many emotional and physical insults.
SNAP knows this well, but, to advance their insidious agenda, they will happily exploit gender (and avoid the obvious role that unbridled homosexuality contributes to this issue) differences to frame their case against the Church.
Our Church would benefit by having more female warriors on the front lines (not as clergy) to expose the fraudulent hype of SNAP, et al.
Agreed. In many professional arenas it required full-time, professional females "without" children
to stand up and voice division of labor & scheduled time off (Holidays) issues with full-time professional
females "with" children.
Sure, men think about sex more. Everyone gets it.
Make no mistake, though, female-female abuse can be quite insidious. Just because the laws
lack the sophistication to ensnare all abuses of the mind and heart and soul does not make
these perpetrators "innocent."
First of all, men beating up catholic priests is nothing new. Will Lynch's story became public, is all. Priests who rape children are unjust agressors and must be stopped by any means available. The Jesuits promoted Lindner knowing he raped children. The Courts couldn't try Lindner because the Statute of Limitations are predator friendly. Lindner got a punch in the nose for raping Will and his brother as wee children. Linder drove himself to the hospital and had stitches. Boo hoo.
The remarkable part of the Will Lynch story is this: that Will Lynch had the courage not to accept a plea bargain, so that the Jesuit criminals who kept Lindner in business would be exposed. And that Will's mother and father have been able to witness his strength and courage. And yes, it took strength and courage, the likes of which we have yet to see from members of the Roman Catholic hierarchy who still, somehow, believe themselves to be priests.
Men, masquerading as Catholic priests and bishops who rape or enable the rape of children deserve, in the least, a punch in the nose. I write in honor of mothers EVERYWHERE, including the Blessed Mother of Our Lord Jesus. He ( Jesus) taught that millstones around their necks were too good for these. And in the bottom of the sea.
Mr. Pierre and Publion, it is your fascination with attacking the brave folks at SNAP while defending "Poor Father Linder" and his silent ecclesiastic enablers, which rings of a virulent Anti-Catholicism. Otherwise, it would be downright silly.
It has been my experience that with certain types of comments and the minds that make them, there is really no better way to handle them than to let them stand up there where they were put, for all to see.
Next best is to discuss the material in them – not so much to jump into the pigpuddle with its actual denizens but rather to shed light on whatever might be usefully gleaned.
So to this comment from the (I think inaptly) self-titled ‘Fitasafiddle’ (hereinafter: “FAAF”).
“Men beating up Catholic priests is nothing new”. I don’t recall coming across much evidence supporting that assertion – but then again, magically, FAAF says that’s just because Lynch’s story is the first one that “became public”. How then does FAAF know? Perhaps from stories exchanged around the Kool-Aid cooler at SNAP meetings … but if so, just how much can such productions be credited by those not slurping down the stuff around the cooler?
“Priests who rape children are unjust aggressors and must be stopped by any means available”. A) How does FAAF or anybody know that Lindner raped the children? How does FAAF or anybody know that Lindner raped Lynch? And are we to abandon the rule of law on the basis of what some people are just so sure that they ‘know’? Back to the Dark Ages then? B) Exactly how much a potential threat to current children did Lindner constitute? Or is the idea that Lindner was assaulted justifiably as an ‘example’? And if so, then On whose authority?
“Statutes of limitations are predator-friendly”. This rather recently concocted mantra – stuffed into his conceptual blunderbuss here by FAAF – is a treacherous perversion of the Constitutional principles that the accused is to be presumed innocent and that the government must prove any case against an accused in a rational way, requiring credible evidence. Rather than having to try and explain why the Constitutional principles are getting in their way, certain perverse elements of both the Left and the Right have now tried to reverse the Frame of the Question by ignoring the inconvenient Constitutional stuff and calling the Bill of Rights protections “predator-friendly”. It’s a lethal, treacherous, anti-Constitutional scam.
FAAF then justifies the criminal assault on Lindner by A) presuming that Lindner has been proven to have raped “Will” (does FAAF know Lynch that well?) and his “wee” brother (that’s a queasy bit there). But nobody knows for sure. And by B) apparently presuming that somehow the presumed rape (or even – for purposes of argument – real rape) justified what Lynch did. With Citizens like FAAF, we don’t need Communists or any of their successor enemies of the American Idea.
And then we get the Lynch-is-a-courageous-hero bit, first given public credibility by Janet ‘the Waco Kid’ Reno in 1997: Victimism is Heroism. But I would say that heroes don’t plan (and FAAF admits it here, whether s/he realizes it or not) and carry out criminal activity – and the precedent set by “Will” and the now-hiding jury that let him off will result in lynch-mob type activity before all is said and done. (There’s a SNAP-py soundbite: Lynch leads to lynch-mobs. FAAF can share it around the Kool-Aid cooler; I don’t claim any rights to it.)
Just who has been “exposed” by Lynch’s premeditated assault? Lindner? The Jesuits? That happened in 1998, didn’t it? Why – for that matter – did Lynch settle for cash 15 years or so ago? Why did he refuse to help police in their investigation all those years ago? And why did he pull off this A&B so conveniently close to both the Philadelphia trial and that Jesuit-run, victim-friendly conference held just down the road at Santa Clara University? And did some party or parties unknown conspire or collude with him or encourage him in the planning and commission of this A&B? Was he promised remuneration (the settlement money may well have run out by now)?
FAAF – so very SNAP-ily – waxes theological (a curiously favorite pose SNAP-pies like to assume): the hierarchy and priests “still believe themselves to be priests”. They’re not? They’re only “masquerading”? All of them? Has SNAP deposed, defrocked, or otherwise de-ordained them?
They “deserve” a punch in the nose? This is the talk of a blowhard barfly after a few too many. Or a Kool-Aid water-cooler-fly. But I do think it is an accurate revelation of the level of thinking and the general quality of discourse around the SNAP Kool-Aid cooler.
Think about that. Is this the level of thinking and discourse the country wants to see as ‘normal’? What happens to the Rule of Law when this level of thinking becomes acceptable as the norm?
In a smarmy self-serving crescendo of posturing, FAAF writes “in honor of mothers EVERYWHERE” (the caps indicate that the patient should perhaps take a time-out on the sun-porch), and – again, so queasily ‘theological’ – he drags the Mother of God into supporting his support for Lynch-mobbery.
Jesus did indeed talk about millstones. But would the pious and learned FAAF kindly indicate where Jesus then authorized any human beings to do the tying-of-the-millstone? And how does the pious and learned FAAF factor in that rather clear bit Jesus did indeed leave us about ‘casting the first stone’?
I have no “fascination with attacking the brave folks at SNAP”. I am fascinated that such a queasy Oz-like outfit (they are not brave, any more than Lynch was or is) – now espousing such treacherously anti-Constitutional lynch-mobbery – has managed to maintain the public presence that it has for so long. In other comments on this site I have outlined the ways that SNAP, like a remora , has pulled this off by attaching itself to some of the large sharks swimming in America’s troubled political waters. That era is now ending, I think.
As for the Church, she will emerge stronger for the fire – not wholly undeserved – through which she has now passed. SNAP – with intensifying and now violent desperation – will seek to keep the fires going. We shall see how God’s Providence disposes.
With a careful read, dear Publion, you will learn that Father Jerry Lindner is indeed an established pedophile Jesuit with millions paid out by the Jesuits to his many victims. His own mother, dear Publion, has stated publicly during the trial that if he wasn't a catholic cleric he would be in prison.
Will Lynch and his wee brother ( ages 7 and 4) were raped by Father Lindner as were some of Father Lindner's own family members. The Jesuit Superiors knew and kept Lindner in business. Sometimes facts are difficult, Publion, yet they must be taken into account.
But please do keep your discourse public.
Fitasafiddle:
Let’s assume your details are correct. If and when all the Catholic Church cases have been settled, will you and/or these others continue marching forward on with the prosecutorial zeal you have today?
This is the heart of the matter: Would these groups pursue all other institutions and individuals with the same vigor? If airfare and travel were covered, would these groups travel to countires with brutal regimes with unspeakable cruelty taking place at this moment? Or, would these groups adopt orphaned children and provide them with loving homes, education and healthcare? There are very specific professions and actions individuals take make it clear their intent is to care for children. What do these people do for children in between depositions and trials? Do they volunteer days off for a foster care child? Do they spend time @ Perkins School for Blind reading to a blind child? Do they volunteer to teach religious education? Do they offer their spare time to babysit for a single mother with a weak support system to give her time to get recharged? Do they offer to make dinners for a full-time working mother sometimes to reduce the stress? The simple truth may be that every hour invested in anger @ the past, could be an hour invested in the strengthening of a child today to ensure the past is not repeated.
Again, only the useful material:
“With a careful read” of what? A reference would surely be useful here.
What precisely does “established” mean in this context? It is not a legal term, and is otherwise unclear in its relevance to Lindner and the Jesuits.
I point out again the queasy use of the descriptor “wee” in regard to children.
While repeating the unsupported assertions about Lynch being raped, FAAF still offers no proof or reference.
As A.J. Liebling said: people are entitled to their own opinion, but not to their own facts. Liebling clearly would not be welcome around the Kool-Aid cooler.
By commenting on this site, I am under the rather strong impression that my “discourse” is indeed “public”. Or perhaps FAAF has as much difficulty with ‘words’ as with ‘facts’.
And among the many matters FAAF has not taken into account in either the first or the second comment here, are all the rather substantive points I raised which – one would think – should have provided a broad and deep opportunity for FAAF to rebut them with facts and ideas. But no.
Lastly, if the repetitive “wee” in regard to children is a bit much, the repetitive use of ‘dear’ simply reinforces the odd impression. Best, I would say, to stick to provable facts, as inconvenient and unfamiliar as that might be.
KMC, It has been my experience , that it is the population you describe, -those who do the caring, the nurturing, the educating of children- who are the most outraged at the massive coverup of these crimes against the wee ones by the very men who, we were taught, held the keys to our eternal destiny. These are the men of the sacraments, those who dispense Sanctifying Grace. and with all their training, their privileged educations, their Holy Orders, they did not possess the simple human decency to remove their pedophiles from altars, leaving their evil influence all over the parishes and schools, hospitals and prisons in which they served. We need to understand why this was allowed to happen.
Those who spend their lives feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, as mothers do, really do understand that the men who rose on up the ecclesiastical ladder at the expense of the bodies and souls of children ( and that is precisely how they rose; if they spoke and tried to stop it, they were discarded) have much to explain and to account for.
The Heart of the Matter? What kind of prayer life, training, etc. fuels that destruction of conscience in men who dare to call themselves priests?
It may seem masochistic, but I’m going to comment here even though FAAF’s most recent comment is aimed at ‘KMC’. In doing so I do not in any way intend to imply that I am speaking for KMC or that my ideas are KMC’s ideas.
What “experience” does FAAF have by which we can establish that the various care-provider populations “are the most outraged”? As far as I can establish by looking at all the extant online material, there is no such widespread phenomenon as FAAF and such types would have us believe. And while there might have been some simulacrum of that a decade or more ago, it surely doesn’t exist now.
Along those same lines, “the massive coverup” claim is – or was – viable (to the extent that it was ever viable at all, still an open Question) a decade or a dozen years ago, but not today. The FAAF-SNAP gambit now is not only to confabulate but also to confuse the time-frames: it is 2012, not 1982, or 1992, or 2002.
Beyond that, the FAAF-y recitation against Church, priests, sacraments, Sanctifying Grace, and – even more curiously – “privileged educations” trails the scent of something far more hostile, darker, and virulent than merely an outraged concern for children – let alone about matters that happened decades ago and have been – by all demonstrable evidence – addressed effectively in the past decade.
It’s clear that referring to children as “wee” is a FAAF-y thing and I’ll leave it up there where it was once again put. There’s something there under the surface there that I doubt is going to be easily remedied.
To what extent, I would ask, does the Church’s rather highly publicized reform-work of the past decade not help us “understand why this was allowed to happen”? Rather, I think that while trying to strike an open and deliberative and scientific pose, FAAF is really working on a hidden and ulterior plan: the only “explanation” that will suffice is the one SNAP wants, which is one that can only be had by Keeping the Ball Rolling – neat.
Once again returning to ‘motherhood’ – clearly a favored trope – FAAF conflates mothers and all Christians who follow some of the Gospel exhortations. And then goes after the “men” – perhaps a bit of a give-away here – who “rose up the ecclesiastical ladder at the expense of the bodies and souls of children”. I’m not sure FAAF is coherent theologically here: only sin can damage a “soul”, so is FAAF implying that the children who were genuinely abused were also somehow active participants in those sins? Or is the question itself thinking-too-much in a milieu where ‘facts don’t matter’?
I have the impression that the somewhat grammatically confused “they” in the parenthesis is a valentine to the few SNAP-valorized priests such as Fr. Sipe and Fr. Doyle, although I didn’t know they had been desirous of ecclesiastical promotion to begin with.
Lastly, FAAF raises a solid point in his final question about the training of priests. But again, it is a Question that FAAF poses in the present tense, when it is - I would again say – most properly a Question to be posed in the past tense (‘past’ as in a decade or more ago).
With all of that said, two final points here.
First, I myself have never been comfortable with the type of organizational politics that besets the Church as it does many other large human organizations. I am praying that the past decade will have some good effect on the selection-process of bishops as well as the ordination-criteria for priests. And also the seminary (spiritual even more than psychological) training of prospective priests.
Second, I have kept up a commentary on the FAAF comments for the simple reason that those comments provide some useful indicators of the general mentality and programme embraced by SNAP. And I would like to repeat in this comment what I said in other comments since the Lynch trial verdict: SNAP – in what I believe is a sign of its desperation to Keep the Ball Rolling – has now embraced violence, no matter how much its agents and apologists try to wish or rationalize that stunning reality away.
And just this, dear Publion, one more time: The call to violence was the call the bishops and cardinals and vicars of clergy gave to their pedophile priests who had free reign to commit sexual violence against children. And for centuries, dear Publion.
Perhaps you should be more concerned with this violence promoted by Roman Catholic Hierarchy than a merciful punch in the nose to the likes of Father Jerry Lindner, S. J. who raped the wee ones.
If FAAF has any evidence whatsoever that the bishops issued a 'call to violence' (which I presume in this case would somehow dovetail with a 'culture of rape' – that old radicalfeminist saw) I'd like to see that evidence. So far, in these court cases, we have found nothing but a small number of aberrant priests and bishops by and large trying to deal with them. Clearly the Philadelphia trial, which was supposed to be a world-class, slam-dunk, trial of the century resulted in a jury taking 2 weeks and many questions just to reach a guilty verdict on one of seven charges. And there exists no small possibility that the one guilty charge will be reversed on appeal on Ex Post Facto grounds.
Meanwhile, apparently FAAF is quite satisfied with what the Lynch jury has now unleashed. The pious imagining of the A&B on Lindner as a "merciful punch in the nose" simplyh has to be left there to hang in the wind. On what grounds was it "merciful" and on what authority does FAAF imagine Lynch was justified in perpetrating it? And what of the legal precedents set by this highly ill-advised verdict?
At best, FAAF's assertion (and I believe it represents the overall SNAP attitude) regresses criminal-justice to the Old Testament eye-for-en-eye bit – which is not only a profound spiritual regression but a regression in Western law itself. But perhaps this would explain FAAF's position: the A&B was "merciful" because Lynch really would have been justified in raping Lindner – an eye for an eye.
Once again, I ask: what sort of people are these and how much serious thought have they given to what they are advocating?
The Santa Clara former-jury might well ask itself the same question, now that it has gone along with the whole thing.