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They nearly always follow the same tired script: “How are you, darling?” Then comes the supposed interest in friendship, followed by the same questions about my age, marital status, children, and personal life. After promising friendship and “good conversation,” the real purpose eventually appears: selling cryptocurrency investments, nude photos or videos, or asking for Apple gift cards.

Whether these accounts are bots, scammers, or even the women they claim to be no longer matters to me. The pattern is obvious, repetitive, and exhausting.

So, no more Mr. Nice Guy: I will no longer respond to or accept unsolicited contacts through Tumblr. If that describes your reason for messaging me, don’t bother.

Pastel drawing on watercolor paper

I am not saying that all schools or teachers are like this, or that all politicians are like this, or that this happens in all religious institutions, families, etc., but after reading this report, I have to say that my concern goes far beyond this particular church or this particular case.

What I see here is not simply a story about sexual abuse. What I see is a story about misplaced trust. Trust that is automatically granted to certain people and institutions simply because they are religious, because they occupy positions of authority, or because they present themselves as representatives of something supposedly sacred.

That is where the danger begins.

If stories like this teach us anything, and we've seen similar stories in the Catholic Church, schools, sports organizations, youth groups, families, and countless other institutions, it is that no institution deserves automatic trust.

None.

Not because it is called a church. Not because it is called a school. Not because it is called a government. Not because it is called a family.

Trust should never be the starting point.

Trust should be the conclusion.

One of the most disturbing aspects of this report is the way forgiveness appears to have been elevated above accountability.

Forgiveness is a personal decision.

Justice and the protection of children are social responsibilities.

A victim may choose to forgive the person who harmed them. That does not eliminate the obligation to report a crime, protect other potential victims, or ensure that consequences exist for those who commit abuse.

The moment forgiveness becomes a substitute for accountability, it stops being a virtue and becomes a problem.

What may be even more troubling is the moral pressure placed upon victims.

According to the report, if the offender asks for forgiveness and the victim continues speaking about the abuse, the victim can be viewed as bitter, resentful, or spiritually deficient.

That creates a terrible psychological trap.

The abuser commits the act.

The abuser asks for forgiveness.

The victim continues to carry the trauma.

And then the victim becomes the problem for refusing to forget.

The moral burden shifts from the offender to the victim.

That is not justice.

It is a complete reversal of responsibility.

I am also deeply troubled by the idea that religious authority can somehow supersede civil authority.

When a religious leader receives allegations of child abuse and decides to handle them internally rather than calling law enforcement, that leader is assuming responsibilities for which they are neither trained nor qualified.

They are not criminal investigators.

They are not child protection specialists.

They are not prosecutors.

They are not judges.

Their responsibility should be very simple: protect the child and notify the authorities.

Nothing more.

And this is where I think there is a broader lesson for society.

I do not believe the lesson is "don't trust churches."

Nor do I believe the lesson is "don't trust teachers," "don't trust politicians," or "don't trust the police."

The lesson is something much more important:

Never grant automatic trust to anyone simply because of their title, uniform, position, religion, education, or social status.

A pastor may be a good person.

A teacher may be a good person.

A politician may be a good person.

But none of them deserves a free pass.

Trust must be earned.

And trust is earned through transparency, accountability, oversight, and a willingness to be questioned.

In fact, I think we make a serious mistake in how we educate children.

We teach them to respect authority.

We teach them to obey authority.

But we spend far less time teaching them that authority should also be questioned when something feels wrong.

We do not teach often enough that no human being is above scrutiny.

That adults can lie.

That leaders can be mistaken.

That respected people can abuse their position.

And that predators often hide behind symbols of trust.

If there is one lesson I take from stories like this, it is that society needs more healthy skepticism.

Not the kind of skepticism that sees conspiracies everywhere.

Not the kind that rejects expertise or evidence.

But the simple skepticism that asks:

Where is the evidence?

Who is holding this person accountable?

Who is overseeing this institution?

What happens when they fail?

Because a truly healthy institution should never demand blind trust.

It should invite scrutiny.

It should say:

"Ask questions."

"Verify what we're doing."

"Hold us accountable."

"Demand transparency."

And if an institution fears questions, resists transparency, or attempts to silence those who report wrongdoing, then the problem is not the questions.

The problem is the institution.

The final quote in the article is freaky:

"My sins have been forgiven. Have yours?"

To me, that statement captures the entire danger.

It takes an idea that may have personal value to many people, forgiveness, and transforms it into a shield against accountability.

Forgiveness may be a religious virtue.

Sometimes I don't understand this lable of Pro-Life.

A serious ethic of life cannot begin and end at birth. If someone claims to be “pro-life” while supporting policies that cage migrants in degrading conditions, excuse medical neglect in detention, celebrate war, defend the death penalty, cut food and medical aid to the world’s poorest people, and show indifference toward children once they are born, then we are not dealing with a consistent moral philosophy. We are dealing with political branding.

The unborn are useful to that branding because they make no demands after birth. They do not ask for housing, vaccines, school lunches, asylum hearings, cancer treatment, clean water, or protection from bombs. But living people do. Refugees do. Poor children do. Pregnant women do. Detainees do. Civilians in war zones do.

That is where the contradiction becomes impossible to ignore.

A truly pro-life position would be horrified by preventable death wherever it appears: in a womb, in a hospital, in an immigration detention facility, under rubble after a bombing, or in a village that loses medicine because humanitarian aid was cut. But the political version of “pro-life” often seems less concerned with preserving life than with controlling women, punishing outsiders, and defending a tribal identity.

So maybe the more honest label is not “pro-life.” Maybe it is “pro-birth.” Or even more precisely: “pro-birth when it fits my politics.”

U.S. Attorney's Office under fire after dropped ‘Broadview Six' case

“I have read hundreds, if not thousands of grand jury transcripts," Judge Perry said to prosecutors. "I have never seen the types of prosecutorial behavior before a grand jury that I saw in those transcripts."

First, let's define the word intuition instead of relying on the way we casually use it.

Intuition is the ability to understand or know something immediately without conscious reasoning. Often described as a "gut feeling," it occurs when the subconscious mind rapidly sifts through past experiences and recognizes patterns to form a quick conclusion.

Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/intuition

I share these thoughts because so many people I know rely very heavily on their intuition—or at least they claim to. Personally, I'm not inclined to trust my intuition to that degree. To each their own, of course. That being said, I'm often amazed by how completely some people trust it.

I'm not saying intuition is worthless. In fact, it can be extremely valuable, especially in areas where a person has accumulated a great deal of experience. An experienced physician may intuitively recognize signs of illness before consciously identifying them. A skilled artist may immediately sense that a composition is unbalanced. A veteran mechanic may hear an engine and instantly suspect a specific problem. In cases like these, intuition is often the brain rapidly processing years of accumulated knowledge.

What I want to stress, however, is that intuition is not magical.

As I see it, the mistake we often make is assuming that because an intuition feels immediate and compelling, it must therefore be true. Many people treat intuition almost as if it were a supernatural faculty that provides direct access to reality. But intuition did not evolve to discover objective truth. Like many mental shortcuts, it evolved to help us make decisions quickly, often under conditions of uncertainty.

The feeling of certainty is not evidence of accuracy.

Intuition can be a useful guide, but it isn't a magic shortcut to the truth. The problem is that most of us remember the times our gut feeling was right and forget the times it was wrong. We tend to look back and say, "See? I knew it!" while ignoring all the occasions when our intuition completely missed the mark.

Because of this, people often end up trusting their intuition more than it deserves. They confuse feeling certain with actually being right. The stronger the feeling, the more convinced they become that they've uncovered some deeper truth.

One of the biggest reasons people overestimate the reliability of intuition is that they keep track of their successes far more than their failures. When an intuition turns out to be correct, it becomes memorable: "I knew that person couldn't be trusted.", "I had a feeling that would happen." "My gut told me so." These experiences become evidence, in our minds, that intuition works.

What often gets left out of the calculation are all the times intuition was wrong.

How many people did you mistrust who turned out to be decent? How many bad outcomes did you anticipate that never happened? How many strong feelings about a situation turned out to be based on incomplete information?

Those misses are often forgotten, rationalized away, or never counted in the first place.

This creates a powerful illusion. If we remember our intuitive successes while overlooking our intuitive failures, we can convince ourselves that our intuition is far more reliable than it actually is. We become like a baseball player who proudly counts every hit but never records any strikeouts. The resulting batting average would be meaningless.

To me, intuition is best viewed as a starting point, not a destination. It can suggest possibilities worth exploring, but it should not be mistaken for evidence. Let intuition raise questions. Let evidence, reason, and careful investigation help answer them.