Petition: Tell Pope Francis It's Time to End Sexual Violence in the Catholic Church

by defender of truth 3 Replies latest social current

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  defender of truth

  4,264 signed of 5,000 goal

  Tell Pope Francis It's Time to End Sexual Violence in the Catholic Church

  with Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, Center for Constitutional Rights

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  Please help by signing and sharing.
  

  The petition can be signed through this page:

  www.takepart.com/spotlight/take-action

  Full Petition Text

  The church has failed to protect hundreds of thousands of children and vulnerable adults from sexual violence in the Catholic Church and institutions and adequately address this ongoing global crisis.
  

  We are asking you to ensure that the church complies with the United Nations recommendations, beginning with the immediate removal of all known and suspected abusers from assignment, increased transparency when dealing with these crimes, and ordering that all cases and reports be turned over to local civil authorities for independent investigation of the perpetrators and those who concealed or otherwise enabled these crimes.
  

  Words are not enough. You must act to bring real, meaningful change to the church and accountability for these crimes.
  

  Sincerely,
  

  [Your name here]

  About the action

  By some estimates, the number of victims of clergy sexual violence is in the hundreds of thousands and on the rise as more survivors come forward and civil authorities begin investigations in Europe, Latin America, Africa, Australia, and Asia. The Vatican’s own experts have said there are 100,000 cases in the U.S. alone. Sexual violence in the Catholic Church is not a historical crisis but an ongoing problem, as is the lack of accountability.
  

  
  

  Today, throughout the world, perpetrator priests who are known to church officials continue to hold posts in congregations, schools, orphanages, and elsewhere, unbeknownst to local communities.

  The church has shown over and over that it cannot police itself.

  In 2014, the United Nations issued a series of recommendations on what the Vatican must do to fulfill its obligations to human rights treaties and end this epidemic of sexual violence.

  Pope Francis has all the authority he needs to move from words to action and stop further abuse.

  By signing this petition, you’re standing with SNAP, CCR, and many others to demand that Pope Francis take the following concrete steps to address the violence:

  
  

  Immediately remove all known and suspected child sexual abusers from assignment, and refer the matter to relevant law enforcement authorities for investigation and prosecution;

  Hand over files containing details of cases of sexual violence to civil authorities for investigation and prosecution of abusers as well as those who concealed their crimes and knowingly placed offenders in contact with children, and demand bishops do the same in their local jurisdictions;

  Encourage and protect church whistle-blowers who have come forward with information about the crisis of sexual violence. So far church officials have intimidated and retaliated against whistle-blowers.
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  defender of truth

  The Catholic church is telling newly appointed bishops that it is “not necessarily” their duty to report accusations of clerical child abuse and that only victims or their families should make the decision to report abuse to police.

  A document that spells out how senior clergy members ought to deal with allegations of abuse, which was recently released by the Vatican, emphasised that, though they must be aware of local laws, bishops’ only duty was to address such allegations internally.
  

  www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/10/catholic-bishops-not-obliged-report-clerical-child-abuse-vatican-says

  ...Does any of this sound familiar?
  
• 

  David_Jay

  As an adult survivor of child abuse myself, I am very much for petitioning and even far more practical action to induce change on the Catholic theater regarding this horrific and disgraceful criminal activity.

  But it should be pointed out that the report that bishops should "not necessarily" be the ones responsible to report abuse (which is silly, if you ask me, because if you hear of abuse you should feel it a duty to make sure it is reported regardless of the circumstances) is itself controversial. The document the quote originated from was not officially approved by the Holy See, and the Church has made sure all involved do not follow the very odd advice (which was written by someone in the Church who has made other controversial statements before).

  See http://www.cruxnow.com/church/2016/02/15/papal-commission-bishops-must-report-sex-abuse-charges/ for more information.

  In the end, however, it demonstrates that upheaval is necessary to rid the Church of this evil. Apparently some people within want the status quo to remain the same, even to the point of trying to make their warped ideas official when they are not. I am not excusing the Church, of course, because there is no excuse for allowing this to happen or go on.

  What I am saying is that if I were one of these bad clergymen, I would be frightened. Like the accused bishop who recently got hissed, booed, and faced the releasing of black balloons by Catholics at his appointment, I think Catholics are about to stop waiting for the Church to do anything and take matters into their own hands. Catholics can't be excommunicated or disciplined for kicking priests and bishops out of office and power, and the good Catholics aren't going to leave the Church. They will eventually drag the culprits out and show these idiots that there are more of them than there are good-for-nothing clergy who won't do anything about it. They will take power of appointments out of the hands of the heirarchy like most Prostants have done becuase it is the laity that has the wallets. Many have stopped giving monthly to the Church over this, and money talks loudest in the end...along with well-deserved cold jail cells.
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  the girl next door

  Sounds exactly like what is happening within the Watchtower organization.