The Pious Orthodox

The more rigidly observant these highly respected men of God appear to be, the more susceptible they are, it would seem, to invalidating their status by flagrantly sinning against the precepts of religion. To do no harm to others, to respect others as you would have them do to you; to have compassion for others, and uphold the humanity residing within themselves as well as others.

The Catholic Church has not stopped reeling from the highly publicized accusations of their having abandoned the needs of their flock to protect the frailties of their clergy that abused that trusting flock. The seeming hordes of priests who took it upon themselves to bring shame to the religious institution they undertook to honour and instead submitted to the beast within.

Instead, becoming heartless predators, stealing childhood from women parishioners and the children, both boys and girls who entrusted their psychic safety to them. Impaling the souls of the innocent and the trusting with the sharp instrument of betrayal. Leaving them shattered and confused, violated and mistrustful.

Then themselves, once their dark secrets were revealed, seeking shelter from their own notoriety. With the help of the church aristocracy, going on to other hunting fields, where their exploitation of the helpless was not yet known, to wreak havoc on others before finally being exposed as the lechers and assaulters they were. At which point the Church really had no option but to admit their guilt and apologize.

The Anglican Church, undertaking in partnership with the Government of Canada, to administer First Nations residential schools, and in the process irremediably twisting the trust of their charges, assaulting their childhoods, leaving them incapable of maturing into functioning adults. That sad legacy is with the damaged children become adults, and with the country as a whole, still festering.

In the Muslim world, in places like Afghanistan, among the Taliban, and among the fanatical hill tribes, even in impolite yet fundamentalist society, the horrible maltreatment of boys, using children as sex toys, torturing them, heedless of the damage done, turning helpless children into catamites. This is a hidden but generally acknowledged societal aberration.

And then there are the ultra-religious Jews, the Hasidim, of whom it has been most recently revealed there exists a similar odious offence. Four ultra-Orthodox rabbis in Brooklyn have been sued or arrested for abusing boys in the past three years, representing, according to the author of a book, "Unchosen: The Hidden Lives of Hasidic Rebels", a tiny fraction of that society's shame.

The Hasidic community is a close-grained, closed community, insular and self-selecting. The rabbis powerful to the extent that victims fear revealing themselves; in so doing bringing opprobrium and shame to the entire community. In New York an elected representative of the New York Assembly, himself an Orthodox Jew and radio talk show host has highlighted the sexual abuse of boys in the community.

And while he declines to reveal names of alleged perpetrators, the pederasts within the community who prey on the young, he claims to be working with the office of the district attorney. Those who have trustingly confided in him, fearful of approaching authorities themselves, have created a free zone for child abusers within their community.

"If you're a pedophile, the best place for you to come to are some of the Jewish communities", says Mr. Hikind. "Why? Because you can be a pedophile and no one's going to do anything. Even if they catch you, you'll get away with it."

Brooklyn's District Attorney, Charles Hynes, owns to having ten active sexual abuse cases that involve Orthodox Jews, inclusive of a school principal whose odious activities were revealed to him by Mr. Hikind and which led to the man's arrest. The Yeshivas in which Jewish children from Orthodox homes are taught are private and by law are not required to report accusations of abuse to civil authorities.

As in all such rigidly religious communities, the reaction when word of these abuses reaches the ears of the hierarchy among the Jewish leaders - much like their Roman Catholic counterparts - is to muffle any kind of chatter, to keep things quiet, and to handle everything through a rabbinical court. Which is an illegal interference with the due process of law.

The obligation is to bring these clearly criminal cases to the attention of civil authorities for investigation. Clearly, the community - any community will do its best to avoid bringing public shame and attention to itself. And these matters can take their toll on a community. In Canada, widespread allegations of child abuse in the City of Cornwall, first surfaced years ago.

The accusations were so all encompassing, that highly respected members of Cornwall, Ontario had acted in collusion with one another, their own little private social club of pederasts, from society's elite, politicians and police among them, that they were suppressed, and denied, and it took the stubborn insistence of several people to finally insist that an investigation was needed.

The result was initially inconclusive - in the wake of a previous investigation into allegations that group abuse starting in the 1950s against the children of Cornwall - there were no definitive findings and no arrests. Leading to a provincially called Cornwall Public Enquiry, a $40-million enquiry that interviewed 170 people over a three-year period, testifying about their experience of abuse.

Some of the interviewees were victims of abuse, while others were representatives of institutions that the victims had attempted to persuade to act on their behalf. Cornwall Police Service, the Ontario Provincial Police, the Children's Aid Society, the Ministry of the Attorney General among them. To no avail, the investigation went nowhere, there was no enthusiasm about revealing the truth.

Until the public enquiry was undertaken at great cost and much disturbance to the community, with the original police officer who had alerted authorities and refused to give up on the case, refusing now - after all those years when he had been shunned by the Cornwall Police Force, having to re-establish himself finally elsewhere - to testify. Sentenced to a term in prison for contempt of court.

In the process, and without his testimony, almost three thousand, four hundred exhibits were entered into evidence, over a period of 345 hearing dates. Generating in the process more than sixty thousand pages of transcripts. So much time has elapsed, so many anguished victims unable to find closure, and it might all have been conclusively looked after if the authorities responsible had taken their duties seriously.

These are matters seen in civil and uncivil society; within closed and close societies and gregariously open ones; religious and secular alike, everywhere in the world. The incidence of abuse of the vulnerable and the helpless is rampant. And society just doesn't seem to care quite enough to deal with it promptly and adequately.