Greta Christina has been writing professionally since 1989, on topics including atheism, sexuality and sex-positivity, LGBT issues, politics, culture, and whatever crosses her mind. She is author of
The Way of the Heathen: Practicing Atheism in Everyday Life, of
Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do with God, of
Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other, and Why, of
Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and of
Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories About Pain, Power, Religion, Unicorns, & More, and is editor of
Paying For It: A Guide by Sex Workers for Their Clients. She has been a public speaker for many years, and many of her talks can be seen on YouTube. Her writing has appeared in multiple magazines and newspapers, including Ms., Penthouse, Chicago Sun-Times, On Our Backs, and Skeptical Inquirer, and numerous anthologies, including
Everything You Know About God Is Wrong and three volumes of
Best American Erotica. (Any views she expresses in this blog are solely hers, and do not necessarily represent this organizations.) She lives in San Francisco with her wife, Ingrid. You can email her at gretachristina (at) gmail (dot) com, or follow her on
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I agree wholeheartedly; I’m a regular Guardian reader, but find Andrew Brown to be an unmitigated wanker.
One other point: Some coverups are worse than others. Suppose an Archbishop says to a rapist priest, “We’re covering up your crime, but on condition you accept this transfer to a monastery in the middle of nowhere. Refuse, and we hang you out to dry.” Still morally reprehensible, but a far cry from sending him to another pastoral position where he will continue to have contact with children.
As for why they didn’t do this… bureaucratic convenience? A shortage of priests such that they want to keep even child rapists in service to make up the numbers? A reckless and destructive (yet distinctly Christian) belief that if you confess and claim to repent, all should be forgiven and you suddenly have a clean slate? I don’t know, but any plausible answers make the Catholic hierarchy look even more evil than before.
D’oh! Wrong post, this comment should of course have been on the Catholic-church one.