News reports out of Providence, Rhode Island consist of what has now become the norm: Roman Catholic Church officials closing their eyes to sexual abuse and allowing sexual predators to continue to prey on children and youths. And sadly, no one has been punished or removed from office. As noted before in past posts, until Pope Francis acts to clean up the cesspool within the Church hierarchy, any hopes that change may be in the wind will be largely imaginary and solely in the minds of those who refuse to recognize the truth about the institutional Church. The Providence Journal has coverage. As the coverage notes, boys and males were not the only victims. Here are excerpts:
Victims of sexual abuse gathered for a news conference on Wednesday to condemn the Catholic Diocese of Providence for allegedly failing to properly investigate more than 800 allegations of sexual abuse over the past 20 years.
Among those presenting in a downtown hotel conference room stories of abuse by local parish priests were Ann Hagan-Webb, a representative from Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, SNAP; and Jeffrey Thomas, of Massachusetts, and Helen McGonigle, a lawyer from Connecticut.
Thomas and McGonigle said they were raped as children by the Rev. Brendan Smyth, an Irish priest who was at Our Lady of Mercy Church in East Greenwich from 1965 to 1968. Smyth returned to Ireland and pleaded guilty to 141 counts of sexual abuse there. He died in prison in Ireland in 1997. Thomas and McGonigle had made similar allegations about Smyth at a news conference in December 2009.
The victims said Wednesday they want the office of Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin and U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha to launch an in-depth investigation into what they said were 831 complaints of pedophilia and sexual abuse filed with the diocese. They also said many of the abusive priests continue to serve in parishes in Rhode Island and elsewhere.
“This has to change if we are going to protect the children of Rhode Island,” Hagan-Webb said.
McGonigle, who said she was raped beginning at age 6 and continuing through age 9, referred to Smyth as “an international serial pedophile.” She said that, in June 2006, she met for about an hour with diocesan officials about Smyth and has since filed a lawsuit against the church. She also told them that her late sister, Kathleen, had been a victim of Smyth. She died of an a drug overdose in 2005, McGonigle said.
While alleging that the diocese had not investigated hundreds of abuse claims, the victims, along with Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of bishopaccountability.org, of Waltham, Mass., provided reporters Wednesday with an inch-thick set of files they said that McCarthy had turned over to the state police. They all contained redacted information about priests allegedly molesting boys and men, girls and women from August 2003 through last February.
Barrett Doyle estimated that at least 500 of the more than 800 allegations of abuse involved victims under the age of 18. She also said that the abusers were priests and some lay employees of the church. Some of the abuse, she pointed out, was inflicted on adults.
Yes, you read it correctly - instances of abuse that occurred through last February. Nothing has really changed and it will not change unless and until bishops and cardinals are sacked for their malfeasance. The Church has proven it deserves no deference whatsoever. Yet politicians prostitute themselves to the Church's whining about gays and contraception. They ought to be hanging up their phones and not even meeting with Church officials.
No comments:
Post a Comment