Are the Vatican Scandals Bad for the Jews?

Sure the continuing scandals are hurting the Catholic Church. We need to ask, Are the Vatican scandals bad for the Jews?

That used to be a veiled way of asking whether such events will lead to an upswing in anti-semitism, surely directly bad for the Jews. Well that could happen but we don't see it as a likely direct outcome of the woes of the Pope and his cohort.

We do definitely think that the damage that is being done to the organized Catholic Church has started to reverberate loudly and negatively and is being heard by all religious people around the world. It's bad for all Jews who care about Judaism to see the world's leading religion under attack and suffering such wounds.

We've seen the studies of the sociologists from year to year. They suggest to us that a large proportion of affiliated members of churches, synagogues and mosques worldwide are always looking for an excuse to slack off or drop out, to disaffiliate.

The disgusting facts of the current raft of scandals give a road map to people of all faiths who want to find the doorway out of their respective groups.

In a word: this negative church history about religious leaders protecting and enabling pedophiles is bad for the whole religion industry, not just for Pope Benedict XVI, not just for the Vatican and the Catholic Church. That's why we are so continually incensed by the festering evil that needs to be rooted out of the specific organized religion that has harbored it so that all religions can maintain a stature of propriety.

Alas. It already may be too late. The facts that are out there defy deniability. They are bad for the Pope and the Church. And yes, indirectly but assuredly all of this is bad for Jews who care about the dignity of organized religion in general.