I can be even-handed

Lest any accuse me of never going after liberals, progressives, or people on the non-or anti-religious side of the spectrum-

This guy is a total asshat.

Regarding the accusations of sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests, deplorable and disgusting as those abuses are, they are not so harmful to the children as the grievous mental harm in bringing up the child Catholic in the first place. I had a letter from a woman in America in her forties, who said that when she was a child of about seven, brought up a Catholic, two things happened to her: one was that she was sexually abused by her parish priest. The second thing was that a great friend of hers at school died, and she had nightmares because she thought her friend was going to hell because she wasn't Catholic. For her there was no question that the greatest child abuse of those two was the abuse of being taught about hell. Being fondled by the priest was negligible in comparison. And I think that's a fairly common experience. I can't speak about the really grave sexual abuse that obviously happens sometimes, which actually causes violent physical pain to the altar boy or whoever it is, but I suspect that most of the sexual abuse priests are accused of is comparatively mild - a little bit of fondling perhaps, and a young child might scarcely notice that. The damage, if there is damage, is going to be mental damage anyway, not physical damage. Being taught about hell - being taught that if you sin you will go to everlasting damnation, and really believing that - is going to be a harder piece of child abuse than the comparatively mild sexual abuse.

Let me be one of the first to say this:

(Uses his best "Stan from South Park" voice.)

Up yours, Richard Dawkins, you douche.

Exploiting and minimizing the pain of children in order to advance your own anti-religious agenda is total bullcrap. Tons of people dislike the Catholic church, for a whole bunch of reasons. But comparing questionable theology to being forcibly sodomized is not only offensive, it's also unfair.

The word atheism sounds negative; let me call it rationalism. It is a rational view of the world where you stand up proudly, in your humanity, you look life straight in the face

You have offcially lost the right to use the "r-word", Rich. There is nothing rational or logical about using a fallacious and hyperbolic comparison to anal rape to get a cheap shot in at a religious system you disagree with. Next you'll be saying female circumcision isn't nearly as bad as learning the Qu'ran.

Here's an idea, why don't you go look some of these folks straight in the face? Then try telling them, "you know what, this is nothing compared to catechism".

You ass.

Edit: See Mea Culpa.

Hat-tip: Jewish Atheist.