I have received many responses to my last post regarding Fr. Jmes Jackson’s guilty plea in a Federal court to receiving CSAM (child pornography). While most comments were sad or hopeful, a few were ugly and bitter. People naturally feel angry and betrayed at such moments and, to be clear, I am neither positively asserting Father’s guilt or innocence. My only purpose was to ponder the pecular circumstances of his case.

I have since obtained newer information which offers more clarity regarding his plea. Even so we may never know the actual degree of Father’s moral culpability. For instance, what are the possible effects of a 20 year old Right Orbitofrontal Brain Tumor on his behavior, or could some early childhood sexual trauma have been a contributing factor? Such questions are admittedly far beyond my pay grade. It now appears that he did knowingly receive and view CSAM although there is no indication of his ever “acting out” or attempting any kind of grooming or predatory action against minors. In fact, it seems that many of the images found in his possession were “virtual” computer generated images, or CGIs. It now seems more probable is that he suffers from some compulsion or addiction to (mostly female) child porn images.

We will never know what early influences or later life situations may have triggered such a compulsion. It is a sobering reminder that each and every human alive is to some extent broken. I myself am no exception. My mother often said, “there but for the grace of God go I.” That is why in our private judgments I believe that it is always best to err on the side of charity. This is not to excuse any deviant behaviors or to hide one’s head in the sand, but neither should we let our emotions or imaginations run wild, especially when we do not have all the relevant facts.

Healing is always conditioned on one’s ability to forgive. This is doubly true when one feels hurt or betrayed by someone in the clerical state. As every priest, through sacramental confession, becomes the chosen instrument of God’s forgiveness for our sins, who are we to withhold forgiveness from a man who for years faithfully absolved us of our transgressions? The Gospel tells us that Our Lord forgave Mary Magdeline her many sins because of her great love. I daresay that Father J’s faults were not born out of malice but derived from human weakness. And so I pray that the great shame and humiliation he must endure will become the source of his salvation just as it was for Alesandro Serenelli, who murdered St. Maria Goretti. After years in prison Serenelli repented, eventually begging forgiveness from Maria’s mother, Asunta Goretti, who assured the broken man, “Alesandro, if God firgives you how can I not forgive you?” Serenelli went on to become a very holy friar, a reminder that God invariably brings good out of evil if only we permit Him to do so.

Remember that faithful priests today are straining under tremendous spiritual attacks, both from within the Church and a hostile secular society. They need our prayers and sacrifices far more than our criticisms. Do not forget that these men are being subjected to the same depraved culture that today attacks the family unit and especially targets children. One of the more poisonous spearheads of that attack is widespread internet pornography. Television and the internet have become portals of unimaginable corruption which silently infiltrates young and impressionable minds. Yet too many parents neglect their duties by failing to protect their offspring from harmful influences, even within the very sanctuary of their home.

Contrary to conventional legalistic theory that adult porn is okay but only child porn is bad, ALL porn whether hard or soft, adult or kiddie has a corrosive effect on anyone subjected to it. Drawing artificial distinctions or rationalizing the problem as restricted by age categories only sweeps its devastating effects under the rug. Porn addiction is age and even gender neutral. It entraps and demoralizes adults just as effectively as it does adolescents and younger children.

One consequence of this societal denial concerning widespread porn availability is the ugly reality of global child sexual abuse and trafficking, an inescapable consequence of pervasive internet porn which creates a vicious cycle of supply and demand. The problem is not just a few weak or bad priests, a statistically miniscule group which the media has turned into a convenient “straw man” scapegoat. In fact sexual abuse is rampant at all levels of society, a horrendous global problem which plagues every nation and human sector.

According to Tim Ballard, founder of Operation Underground Railroad, nearly 2,000,000 chidren are today being exploited by sexual slavery. I encourage you to patronize the movie “Sound of Freedom” just released which narrates Ballard’s rescue of trafficked children. Yet I predict that this powerful movie will barely nudge the needle of public opinion. I say that because societal indifference to the awful fate of so many children is to be expected in a society that feels justified in murdering millions of unborn children in the womb. Too many consciences have already been anesthetized by abortion. And that is where the callous objectification of children really begins, prodded on by forked tongued politicians who shrilly insist that butchering her living child is somehow protecting a “woman’s health.”

According to Ballard, the largest consumer of child porn in the world is the United States, raising the uncomfortable question of how much responsibility the individual who views such porn bears. Ballard asserts that only about 1% of such users ever “act out,” that is actually become predatory. The vast majority, including consumers of adult porn, are passive voyeurs who hide their guilty addictions under the anonymous cover of digital devices. In many cases even their own family members are unaware of the dark secret. Researchers now estimate that upwards of 80% of adult males over age 18 and possibly 60% of females are regular users of internet porn. This represents a rarely acknowledged yet staggering spiritual and social crisis in our nation. Yet the damage to family life, work, and social relations from this scourge is undeniable. It affects all strata of society and children become especially vulnerable to its effects.

The uncomfortable reality is that children in our society are now being systematically sexualized, not by some nefarious predator around the corner: they are being slyly groomed literally from the day they are first exposed to a television screen. For decades Hollywood and advetrisers have been using what they euphamistically refer to as “soft porn” to sell products and elicit viewers. And the group most susceptible to these images are toddlers and children whose minds absorb sexualized imagery like sponges. The music industry is perhaps even more depraved than many TV producers in promoting lewd and suggestive costumes, dancing, and lyrics.

Meanwhile millions of passive, tuned-out parents look on blithely as their children are exposed to the kind of smut which has become standard fare even during Super Bowl half time shows. Add to that the all too frequent kiddie “drag queen” story hours in public libraries, sexual and gender identity indoctrination in public schools, and trashy Net Flix movies and programming before realizing that for some mysterious reason 10 and 12 year olds are increasingly sexually active. Our entire society has seemingly devolved into a pornographic freak show since the halycon days of the sexual revolution movement in the 1960s. Basically the Lords of Porn have been busy grooming several generations of children (many now adults) under the very noses of clueless parents, educators, and yes, even priests and ministers. And the discouraging statistics now reveal that the chickens have definitely come home to roost.

Suddenly people seemed alarmed when fully naked men can parade down the main street of Toronto in full view of very young children. We become outraged when some poor clerical schlub like Fr. Jackson gets caught up in an internet kiddie porn sting. But where was the outrage when Janet Jackson was baring her breasts to the world at a Super Bowl or when casual fornication and adultery became embedded in almost every Hollywood production after 1969 when Mrs. Robinson so cavalierly seduced a young Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate? Hugh Heffner’s promise of a glamorous, ever youthful sexual fantasy playground somewhere along the way morphed into Epstein Island’s dark and secretive Lolita Express.

So yes, while there is no soft-peddling the fact that someone downloading kiddie porn is a part of the problem, that is but one small piece in a very much larger puzzle. The solitary “consumer” of all stripes of internet porn is perhaps not so much a victim as the unfortunate sex slaves under the power of ruthless pimps and predators, but the consumer of porn is in one sense also being victimized by a $150 billion sex trade industry which nurtures and then feeds on his or her addictions, beginning almost from the cradle.

If current studies even roughly approximate reality, over 100 million men and 70 plus million women frequently consume pornography in this country alone. Experts believe that fewer than 1% of these ever actually abuse, groom, or become child predators, but even that small 1% represents a million or more potential rapists. Until the leaders of society show a determined willingness to turn off the porn faucets and shut down providers, traffickers, and purveyors of every kind of pornography, not just the kiddie stuff, the problem will only metastasize and grow. Much like the ill-named War on Drugs which after decades has seen only a massive growth of substance abuse nationwide, the same thing is true of the pornography industry. No amount of law enforcement can ever replace the consequent loss of moral fiber, and nothing depletes a people’s moral fiber like illicit drugs or pornography.

How is it that Government, Big Tech, and Social Media companies can effectively censor, condemn, and shut down political actors and views they deem offensive but somehow seem unable to throtle the interrnet pornography pipeline? They will happily mute or silence my views for violating “community standards” but seem unwilling to prevent the open transmission of vile or illegal images. I suggest that there are 150 billion reasons why such depraved images are not blocked, namely that the smut and filth cartels have become too lucrative a business to seriously interfere with. Yet in one happy instance, the State of Virginia passed a law requiring proof of age to prevent minors from accessing internet porn. As a result the Canadian company Porn hub, perhaps the world’s largest supplier of internet porn, decided that this law is too onerous to comply with and will therefore no longer deliver any porn in that state. So yes, it seems that the flow of porn can be controlled, even stymied, if leaders have the will and stamina to do so.

Such an effort cannot succeed solely at the governmental level, however, but any dismantling of the prevailing porn culture must include the cooperation of families and the churches. Until those key institutions recognize the problem and determine to attack it, little can be done to reverse the trend. Please pray for vulnerable clerics like Fr. Jackson who are being buffetted by the same evil winds that today threaten all adults and children alike. And if you still feel the impulse to vilify, rather turn that impulse into a small prayer. If the roles were reversed I am sure he would do the same. Perhaps you or some loved one has become entangled in the web of internet porn. Remember, no sin is beyond the reach of God’s mercy. To learn more about a healing path to recovery from the soul deadening scourge of pornography and sexual addiction go to Road to Purity at http://www.roadtopurity.com It could save your family.

Francis J. Pierson +a.m.d.g.