There’s been a lot of renewed chatter in recent weeks about sex abuse happening within the Catholic church after more than 300 priests from Pennsylvania were accused of sexually assaulting countless victims, many of whom were young boys.
Last week, Louisiana’s “family values” Attorney General Jeff Landry weighed in on the matter when he said his office couldn’t possibly investigate the Catholic church for sex abuse crimes because, well, he just couldn’t. OK?
Landry, who doesn’t want anyone to know he has a gay brother, released a statement on Friday saying he totally supports going after child molesters. But, also, he’s a Catholic. So what’s a guy to do, right?
“As a practicing Catholic, I wholeheartedly support efforts to root out pedophile priests and end the horrific misconduct by Church authorities,” he said. “Those who sexually abused children and those who covered up their despicable acts should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
He just doesn’t want anything to do with it. Even though he’s the state’s Attorney General.
Related: Antigay politician finally, and awkwardly, acknowledges that, yeah, OK, he has a gay younger brother
Instead, Landry’s office said anyone who may have been raped and/or sexually abused by a priest should contact their local law enforcement and let the little guys handle it.
But here’s where the story gets even weirder.
After the Times-Picayune reported on Landry’s remarks, the 47-year-old lawmaker went on the defensive, saying that “as a father and a Catholic” he was “deeply offended” by people’s criticisms of him.
“This article by the Times-Picayune is pure unadulterated religious bigotry which we have not seen in this State since the hey-day of the Ku Klux Klan,” Landry said in a statement.
Wait… what? How did we go from child molesting priests to the KKK?
“Claiming that I, or any other head of a law enforcement agency, will cover up criminal conduct because of our religious beliefs is bigotry, plan and simple,” Landry added.
Got that, folks? Forget, for a moment, any children who may have been raped by priests and clergymen. Jeff Landry and his fellow Catholics are the real victims here.
In addition to standing tall for religious freedom, Landry has made it his personal mission to chip away LGBTQ rights for years.
In 2010, he supported a constitutional Amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman. In 2012, he campaigned to rid the University of Louisiana’s LGBTQ Studies minor. And in 2016, he won a court battle against the state’s Democratic Governor to void existing LGBTQ protections for state employees.
Related: In Louisiana, LGBTQ protections were just declared illegal… Wait, what?!
In his statement, Landry also noted that his office “has not received one single complaint against any clergyman of the Catholic Church in the State of Louisiana.”
Probably because he told people not to contact him with those sorts of complaints.
And he concluded by saying his critics “should be ashamed” of themselves and “should apologize to all Catholics within Louisiana.”
OK, Jeff, we’ll get right on that.
Coruna2018
What no comments about a man who aids and abets sexual abusers of children? It must be a busy day in the LGBT neighborhood for no one to respond to this. I wonder if Landry, himself, might have been abused sexually by priests and doesn’t want to face that realization? In any event, he has a legal mandate to investigate and try anyone accused of sexual abuse, whether it’s a member of clergy or not. We’re all human and, supposedly, not above the law, only in Landry’s mind. He’s shirking his duties and could be arrested for failing to act upon his duties. I will look forward to when LGBT people who read Queerty will respond to articles about sexual abuse as they do about Armie Hammer, Colton Haynes, etc.
PinkoOfTheGange
Not defending the lil’ idget…but,
Does his not going after the RCC have to do with the strange laws that LA has. It’s system is based on Napoleonic Code and not English Common law like the Feds and the 49 other states.
Plus state A’sG have different authorities, state to state, over what they can do and sometimes that means they can only prosecute crimes that are against the state like tax fraud.
DCguy
He didn’t say he can’t. he said he shouldn’t.
Mack
Typical Republican NOT doing his job because of his religion. If they’re not going to do what they’re paid for THEN QUIT!
o.codone
Keep it real dude You have Auntie Maxine in your camp. She not doing her job because of her identity politics. Any questions?
o.codone
He’s using the social just warrior’s playbook. Someone asks you a problematic question, you change the subject to an inflammatory topic such as the KKK. SOMEONE SAYS: “How’s your Mom doing”? AND YOU ANSWER: “My Mom’s been an advocate for women’s rights since women’s rights even existed”. Now, suddenly it’s no longer about your Mom, it’s about women’s rights. Right? That’s how it’s done.
Kangol
Please, put the pill bottle down. Better yet, take it back to the pharmacy, whether you got it from there or not.
o.codone
Kangol. I just got a refill on Tuesday. A full container of the little angels. I’m delirious, literally delirious. Hahahaha.
Kangol
Hahaha! Your reply made me chuckle, and I mean that in a good way!
DCguy
Awwww, how adorable, one of the screenames that regularly defends anti-LGBT bigotry is doing it’s best to deflect from the simple topic of….
Another Republicans is defending child molesters and rapists.
gaimingfoxer
If you’re being accused of covering up for the RCC while being catholic it’s not biggotry, it’s CONFLICT OF INTEREST.
It’s the same as a person who owns stocks in a company that would be in charge of investigating it. It’s the same as a person who is a member of come country club to decide if that country club should face criminal charges.
You are a member of the organization, you should not be allowed to decide its fate – period.
Scout
No surprise here. When the Boston priest scandal broke back in 2002 and 2003, Thomas Reilly, an Irish Catholic, was the AG of Massachusetts and he said it was a church problem to be dealt with, and even after it had been proven that Cardinal Law was covering up for all these pedophile priests by transferring them, he ignored the whole scandal and let Law escape to the Vatican. Our two senators at the time, Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, two more Irish catholics, refused to say anything or offer support for the investigation. All three men washed their hands and looked the other way.
Maleko
I find it offensive to the U.S. that the Vatican calls back to Rome every corrupt leader in this phony church. The molesting of another person under the guise of authority is the definition is a serious crime; RAPE is a very, very serious felony crime, of forcing a boy or a man to have sex with you. These phony Catholic leaders have committed serious crimes and should be in prison for a long time. But the leader of the Catholic church is protecting and covering his leadership in American ‘leadership.’ What a contemptible organization.
Kangol
Pass a federal law mandating that church authorities, including bishops, have to report sexual allegations to local and state authorities, with severe penalties if they don’t. No allowing the Church to address this problem by itself, and make it for all religions so that the Orthodox Jewish rabbis, the Mormon leaders, all the evangelical “youth leaders” and coaches, etc., are subject to the same rules. That’ll snap the churches out of their complacency, and shake up their enablers, like Landry, as well.
Maleko
Religion makes otherwise good people do some pretty awful things. You get to the point where god is the source for your actions and you get a couple of good Senators that would never do this under different circumstances actually walk away from sexual molestation acts.
DCguy
Republicans have a very very strong recent history of supporting child molesters, people who defend rape as “Women’s fault” and child abusers.
Him not wanting to go after the abusers is no shock.
jaack
This Attorney General must resign. He refuses to understand certain men of his religion do commit sexual crimes! Because some men who commit these crimes are Catholic priests, he refuses to believe facts for some unfathomable reason. In the Catholic faith, even priests go to the Sacrement of Confession. Members of the clergy of any faith are not immunized against committing crimes. Criminal activity has been going on for a long, long time. I went to parochial high school 1961 and I was taught by Catholic clergy where both physical and sexual abuse took place in my prescence and against me, too. I cannot forget the abuse I suffered even these many decades later! Law suits are proceeding in many jurisdictions against Catholic clergy. Louisana has not been immunized against sexual crime because of the Attorney General’s religious beliefs. Facts are facts and no clergy member is ABOVE THELAW against criminal activity.
If Louisiana’s chief enforcement authority denies Catholic clergy can commit crimes, he can deny too that there haven’t been accusations becasue he denies the basic premise that a VICTIM was assaulted. He shames all the good people helping victims of these most heinous crimes.