Doubt

After watching the movie Doubt in class today, I began thinking about the whole Catholic Church molestation scandals. A certain line in the movie struck me as being funny on the surface, but when I started to think about it it worried me a bit. Father Flynn was talking to the boys about girls and how to handle themselves around them. When a boy asks him what if every girl he asks to dance turns him down, Father Flynn replies "then you become a priest." This may make the boys laugh at the time but maybe Father Flynn really didn't mean it as a joke. Maybe these men are turning to religion because they can't find women to marry and, being human, they feel the need for companionship and they will take it any way they can find it. And even if the clergyman finds a woman that he could potentially date and marry, the church does not allow it. The molestation scandals could potentially be avoided if these clergymen were allowed to date and get married. Maybe the church could amend their rules to accommodate this new trend of lonely priests.