It's Hard to be Catholic

The latest scandal to hit the church is especially egregious.  The latest count has 300 Pennsylvania priests raping and abusing kids that number into the thousands.  The individual stories of abuse are so sick and depraved that they can only be defined as evil personified.  

That's personally why I'm struggling so much with this.  Lord knows this is hardly the only priest abuse scandal.  There have now been too many to count.  But while other cases and stories, numerous as they were, continued to pile up, we were saved details.  Not this time.  This time we were informed not only of the abuse but also of the nearly satanic efforts employed around it.  Incredibly evil and sacrilegious behavior and rituals.  

But that's just the start - which is a remarkable thing to type.  The cover-up and lack of any kind of action are where the evil really establishes its deepest roots.  It moves up the chain of the church to some of the highest levels.    

As a practicing Catholic, we cannot state that these are one-off behaviors.  They're not. Priest sexual misconduct (pedophilia, heterosexual, and homosexual) and its subsequent cover-up has been and continues to be an issue everywhere.

Everywhere.

It has been that way for decades, and still exists today, and even at the highest levels of the church.  Just a little over a year ago Vatican police raided a drug-fueled gay-sex party at an apartment belonging to an aide of one of Pope Francis’ key advisers.

As a Catholic - one that truly believes that this is Christ's church here on Earth, one that truly believes in the sacraments and what they mean, one who believes that the Holy Spirit has worked to guide it, one who believes that it is the outcome of Jesus' call to Peter to be the rock - I truly don't know what to do.

I'm angry.  I'm convinced more than ever that evil has permeated our church, and not just via behavior.  This is evil of a super-natural and satanic variety.  How could you not read the report out of PA and not come to the exact same conclusion?

This is Christ's church.  This is my church.  It is under attack from the inside.  I can either walk away, as millions and millions of Catholics have already done, or I can stay and fight.  

Is there a chance, or is the battle already lost?  Is the fight a righteous one, or an ignorant one?  

I have been shaken by this and I really, truly don't know what to do.