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01-03-2010 | Original Paper

Generativity and the U.S. Roman Catholic Bishops’ Responses to Priests’ Sexual Abuse of Minors

Author: Clare McGrath-Merkle

Published in: Journal of Religion and Health | Issue 1/2010

Abstract

In this article, Erik Erikson’s and subsequent researchers’ ideas on generativity are applied to “the clerical abuse crisis,” in which 111 U.S. Roman Catholic bishops protected priests rather than safeguard children. The goal was to discover what psychological dispositions led bishops to act in the manner they did. A case is made that pre-existing tendencies coupled with an all-male, celibate environment and formation indoctrination led to deficits in psychological development, moral judgment and leadership capacity, revealing an Episcopal subculture characterized by pseudo-speciation and authoritism.

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Title: Generativity and the U.S. Roman Catholic Bishops’ Responses to Priests’ Sexual Abuse of Minors
Author: Clare McGrath-Merkle
Publication date: 01-03-2010
Publisher: Springer US
Published in: Journal of Religion and Health / Issue 1/2010
Print ISSN: 0022-4197
Electronic ISSN: 1573-6571
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-009-9288-0

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