It absolutely doesn't "require that other members of the church know about a choir member's past drug conviction" or presence on the sex offender registry! None of this was, or should be, made public. I wasn't at all involved in the administration side of this – which was done at the diocesan level, not the parish level – but to my knowledge nothing was widely disseminated.
I also want to note that we've been discussing this in the context of background checks, but I don't think that was the sole purpose behind getting fingerprints. Fingerprints certainly aren't necessary for sex offender registries: I don't know off the top of my head how the CA registry works, but here in NY, the list of level 2 and 3 sex offenders (the higher levels) is publicly available online, and for level 1 offenders you call a hotline and provide a name and other piece of identifying information (e.g., driver's license number, SSN, birthdate) to check if someone is on the list; I expect the system in CA is similar. True, a fingerprint check might turn up an arrest that didn't lead to a conviction, or someone might be using a fake name, but I think a major rationale for the general fingerprinting requirement was proactive rather than retrospective and aimed at having evidence in case a volunteer committed a crime in the future.
I agree that sex offender registries not being differentiated based on whether a person's victim was a child or an adult results in some people being subject to restrictions (e.g., not being able to live near schools) that really don't need to apply to them. But that's not a problem I expect anyone will be dedicating administrative resources to in the foreseeable future – sex offenders, even if their victims were all adults, aren't exactly the most sympathetic constituency.
mark someone as unfixably bad and untrustworthy – I do think those are two very different things.
[cut for non-graphic discussion of child sexual abuse] As an example, I worked on a case a couple of years ago against a woman who had sexually abused her children for over a decade. Now, I don't believe anyone is truly irredeemable. I hope she someday repents of what she's done and becomes a better person; I regularly pray for her. But no matter how she changes, I would never – not if a hundred years had passed without evidence of reoffending since she were released from prison – trust her to be left alone with a child. Even if I truly believed she was no longer dangerous! I would't trust my own assessment enough to take that risk.
no subject
I also want to note that we've been discussing this in the context of background checks, but I don't think that was the sole purpose behind getting fingerprints. Fingerprints certainly aren't necessary for sex offender registries: I don't know off the top of my head how the CA registry works, but here in NY, the list of level 2 and 3 sex offenders (the higher levels) is publicly available online, and for level 1 offenders you call a hotline and provide a name and other piece of identifying information (e.g., driver's license number, SSN, birthdate) to check if someone is on the list; I expect the system in CA is similar. True, a fingerprint check might turn up an arrest that didn't lead to a conviction, or someone might be using a fake name, but I think a major rationale for the general fingerprinting requirement was proactive rather than retrospective and aimed at having evidence in case a volunteer committed a crime in the future.
I agree that sex offender registries not being differentiated based on whether a person's victim was a child or an adult results in some people being subject to restrictions (e.g., not being able to live near schools) that really don't need to apply to them. But that's not a problem I expect anyone will be dedicating administrative resources to in the foreseeable future – sex offenders, even if their victims were all adults, aren't exactly the most sympathetic constituency.
mark someone as unfixably bad and untrustworthy – I do think those are two very different things.
[cut for non-graphic discussion of child sexual abuse]
As an example, I worked on a case a couple of years ago against a woman who had sexually abused her children for over a decade. Now, I don't believe anyone is truly irredeemable. I hope she someday repents of what she's done and becomes a better person; I regularly pray for her. But no matter how she changes, I would never – not if a hundred years had passed without evidence of reoffending since she were released from prison – trust her to be left alone with a child. Even if I truly believed she was no longer dangerous! I would't trust my own assessment enough to take that risk.