These numbers are alarming. Life is difficult enough growing up. I'm thankful I missed out.

I was brought up Catholic, and my experience (thankfully) wasn't that most priests are predators — but some do exist, for sure. There was only once that I thought a priest might have been getting a little carried away, wrestling with us altar boys, but nothing actually happened so much as a sense that the priest was a little too into it. The Church's history of sheltering pedophile priests, ignoring the problem, and denying wrongdoing is unconscionable, and the rhetoric that came later was disgusting: rather than making unequivocal statements about how the lives of many children were ruined, their innocence stolen, etc., the former pope, Benedict, and other officials within the Catholic Church always talked about how it hurt the reputation of the Church. Yeah, it did, but that's not the point. That should never be the point. For that to even make it into the public statements is egregious. Not only is it a self-serving sentiment, it's a genuinely stupid thing to say from a basic public relations standpoint — which shows just how evil their view of the situation is, because they can't even help themselves from bringing it back to the "reputation" of the Catholic Church when they talk about the victims.

6 years - from 8-14 years of age, by a christian cult of extremely wealthy peoples. They had festivals and taught and included us in sexual practices most will just maybe read about. It changed me forever and It's hard for me to develop a healthy identity, still.

Nope. Grew up in a rural town of 20 or so people and never got touched by a stranger or family member. I did have a fellow ask if he could wash my back in the shower while serving in the military, told him no.

Yes at 7 years old and also physically and mentally abused by my mother throughout my childhood.

I also grew up Catholic and lived in Texas. I also went to parochial school and was even an altar boy. But I have never been molested nor have my siblings. It is hard to understand how this can happen and how it effects people. I do know that the Catholic Church is hurting (good). The numbers of men going into priesthood is way down and often a priest has to serve several parishes. The bind is the loss of priests, the reduction of people becoming Catholics (which is why they are preying on the people in developing countries) and this increasing scandal. The church feels it needs to cover up it;'s misdeeds simply to stay viable. I, for one. hope they fail on all counts.

I just saw an exposé on VW. The information started leaking out how the exhaust numbers didn't match up. The company initially went into denial and redirection mode. When that failed it built new, better devices. In the end the whole house of cards crashed (unfortunately it was shown that BMW and Mercedes also have these devices). This is normal behavior for large organizations including the religious ones.

I was never "molested" but beaten horrendously many times, burnt a couple of times and even stabbed twice, but never molested. I have all sorts of scars and as a young child thought many times I was going to die, I never once received medical treatment as my parents feared us kids would be taken away.
Sadly I have 2 young female friends who were and I was for support years later when the police finally took things seriously. The father is in prison now. A couple of cases I know involved boys and sports coaches, no legal action at this stage but the guys are doing it really tough well over 30 years later. I don't know if it means anything, but I tell these kids (they are kids to me as I am twice their ages) to look at it as seriously unfortunate, along the lines of being born with a disability. Through no fault of their own their lives are harder than others, but it doesn't define them. I know you are dealing with so many thoughts and emotions, you are brave to confront it and I sincerely hope you can overpower it all. I know it is not the same, but my world came crashing down when my kids got to the age of my early memories.

I don't know if it visible to others but my screen shows how I voted

My brother was molested by a DEFROCKED priest who was never criminally proscecuted thus allowed to open and operate a "Boys Home" in Stuart Iowa several years until the Des Moines Tribune newspaper "outed" the rapist on the front page.....in turn my brother molested me apparently in ways he learned from the former FROCK RAPIST. ... ......... most people would consider the precise pains inflicted upon me or my brother "minor" and only the false esteem still bestowed upon clergy makes molestation much worse. .... ........a fitting epilogue to this Iowa story is about Jack Cafferty now an MSNBC "news" show host. ...........2011 as I recall he was WHO TV NEWS ANCHOR NBC affiliate at the very end of the 10:29 broadcast. .... following sports late breaking reports fill in the sign off "chatter" and his last night employed there A WOMAN RAPED @ Drake University was reported. ... ........... the last words heard by viewers were from CAFFERTY : " CONFUCIUS SAY:'when rape inevitable, lay back and enjoy.' " snicker face Jack camera zooms in and horror face of co-anchorette. ....then opening scene of late nite TV talk show. .... .......... papers and radio&tv all reported condemnation of Cafferty for days on end. ... ......... but why did this scum get a job anywhere in USA on camera or a live microphone ?

A developmentally delayed teenaged neighbor playmate took my temperature rectally when I was about 4. Not sure if this counts, really, because I think he was probably just legitimately playing "nurse"--like a child, commensurate with his mental age. I don't think there was anything sexual or predatory about it, and neither did my parents--but I never played with him again...

I have some sexual hang-ups, and I was told that I was abused (I was never told any specifics, so I don't know if it was physical, sexual, or what) but I can't recall any sexual abuses.

Seeing this post breaks my heart, though, because I feel like I'm in the minority. There are so many stories of hurt here, and so many more that won't get told, and it's fucking awful that this isn't an uncommon story. What is wrong with our species that so many people are able to stand up and say, 'yeah, me, too'?!

This isn't something NEW! This isn't something where people with an over-inflated sense of morbid superiority can say, "See? Look at the world today! The world has gone straight to Satan because Gawd isn't in schools and homes! We didn't have this when I was a child!".... yes. You did. And every generation before us has.

What the hell is wrong with our species that so many adults will prey on children? That so many men prey on women?!

Has anyone got an answer, because I'd like to find a real thing to focus on to bring an end to these stories.

I'm sorry for the pain all of you have suffered. Words are insufficient to the task of comforting any of you.

@silvereyes include medical training programs in that too The list could go on forever,law enforcement agencies etc etc

From 9 to 14 and although the fucker pretended to be a devout christian, it had nothing to do with any church

Yes, but I didn't go to church.
Just some POS older guy that lived across the street.

Six years of my (and my sister's) life, non-stop, by my mother's second husband (aka the monster).

Stranger rape at 17 (still a child, technically).

I was never molested as a child. I do believe I managed to dodge an attempted abduction - I was walking home from school in the rain one day and a total stranger pulled over and tried to get me into his car. I aimed the point of the umbrella at him and he changed his mind and drove off. But, I digress. I personally know five women who were molested as children.

Yes, my maternal grandfather from 4-12 yrs old. All the family kept it quiet, even my parents. I later found out on my father's deathbed that he'd raped my mom from childhood throughout her teens; she ran away from home on the night of her high school graduation. That should have told the family something was going on. Ironically, he was the music leader in his church for many years. I will never understand my family's secrecy. No way in hell would I keep such a secret! Is take the child to the police station. All of them should have been arrested as accomplices for aiding a criminal!!! To this day, I have no contact with my relatives and my girls have been kept well away!

Probably. While seeing a babysitter when I was very little I completely stopped shitting. My mother didn't send me back. The same mother who had almost no sense of boundaries and engaged in what felt to me like emotional incest.

Yes, at the tender age of 10 by 3 men who were devout Catholics.

I wasn't molested, but my dad's boss got highly inappropriate with me once.

My father would always walk me up to bed it was three flights of stairs with no light fitting for the first flight so in the dark, When we got me to bed we would both read Alice in Wonderland, him pointing to each word and me chipping in with the words I knew. then he would say OK Myfanwy (joke name) II'm going now I'll see you in the morning and he would turn out the light and pretend to go out of the door -opening and shutting it but he never left my room and my experience was when the father left he let in the night monster. My mother knew exactly what was happening - I left home at fifteen.

It was a fundamentalist Christian sect. We were molested and raped multiple times for years upon years until I was able to get out. I'm gonna stop there. A bit to raw