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Apart from words, little-to-nothing is done by French Catholic Church
to protect kids, sexual abuse survivors tell RT
6 Nov, 2021 13:57
As the line on the bottom of the above picture states - "This is the most serious crime in the 21st century". I have been saying this for years, but, in actual fact, it was the most serious atrocity of the 20th century. There were more children raped or sexually abused than all the victims of all the wars in the 20th century. In fact, the number of abused children in the 21st century already exceeds all the casualties of all the wars in the 20th century. We're talking hundreds of millions! And the Catholic church has been a great contributor to that number.
The French Catholic Church must move beyond apologies and admissions of guilt to truly protect children and compensate victims, sexual abuse survivors told RT.
On Friday, the influential Bishops’ Conference of France (CEF) recognized that the Church bore “institutional responsibility” for scores of child abuse cases within its ranks.
No, hundreds of thousands, if not millions!
The statement came a month after an independent inquiry led by former Council of State Vice President Jean-Marc Sauve estimated that 216,000 children were abused by priests, deacons and other religious workers between 1950 and 2020.
Arnaud Gallais, the founder of Prevenir et Proteger (Prevent and Protect), a support group for sexual abuse survivors, told RT the Church leadership's admission of responsibility was a “positive,” yet belated move.
Until recently, the Church “has viewed itself as being above the law,” and a sincere confession was the bare minimum of what the clergy had to do to address the crimes, he added.
Gallais was abused by a Catholic missionary, his distant relative, when he was between eight and 11 years old. His testimony was among many tragic stories chronicled by the Sauve Commission.
The Church's words of guilt and regret must now be followed by concrete steps to prevent further crimes, Gallais stressed, adding that bishops should pay compensations to the victims, many of whom still struggle with trauma. The campaigner said the French government must hold the Church accountable, forcing the clergy to “guarantee the safety of children.”
Another survivor, Francois Devaux, co-founder of La Parole Liberee (Liberated Word), a sexual abuse victims' association, was equally skeptical about the Church's will for actual change.
It’s a good thing to make strong statements and accept responsibility. That’s what society expects. But, in the end, apart from words, it seems that nothing gets done.
Devaux, who was molested by a priest when he was an 11-year-old scout, said widespread crimes against children destroy the faith in the Catholic Church not just in France, but all over the world.
It is now up to Pope Francis to recognize the institutional responsibility of the Church “for all its crimes and offenses,” as well as their “systematic character and frightening scale,” Devaux told RT.
Luc Crepy, the head of the CEF anti-pedophile unit, said this week that the issue of compensations will be addressed as the Church decides on a method of quantifying how much should be awarded to the victims.
“Maybe in the next few weeks, we will be in a better position to give the figures. It is starting to cost several hundred thousand euros,” CEF Secretary-General Hugues de Woillemont told reporters.
Pope appoints first woman as head of Vatican governorate
By Danielle Haynes
Nov. 4 (UPI) -- Pope Francis on Thursday appointed Franciscan Sister Raffaella Petrini to serve as the new secretary-general of the Vatican governorate of the Vatican, making her the first woman to hold the position.
As the head of the governorate, Petrini, 52, will oversee administrative operations such as the Vatican museums, post office and police, RTE reported. The role makes her the highest-ranking woman in the city-state.
The National Catholic Reporter said the secretary-general position is traditionally held by a bishop.
Petrini is a Rome native and has served on the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples since 2005. She received a political science degree from the Libera Università Internazionale degli Studi Social Guido Carli and a PhD from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, where she teaches, the Vatican News reported.
Pope Francis has said he wants women to play larger roles within the Catholic Church. In January, he changed the church's rules to allow women to act as liturgical readers, altar servers, assist during services and administer communion.
The pope said women have made a "precious contribution" to the church, but the new law merely formalizes roles that women have already been taking in numerous countries, including the United States.
In addition to elevating Petrini, the pope appointed lawyer Giuseppe Puglisi-Alibrandi as deputy secretary-general of the governorate.
Miller 'dumbfounded' appeal dropped over Catholic Church's
residential school payments
Court ruling in 2015 followed disputed deal between government, Catholic bodies
Stephanie Taylor · The Canadian Press ·
Posted: Nov 06, 2021 3:05 PM ET
Newly named Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Marc Miller says he wants to get to the bottom of why Ottawa abandoned its appeal of a ruling releasing the Catholic Church from its settlement obligations to residential school survivors.
"I am as puzzled as everyone," Miller, who previously served as Indigenous services minister, told The Canadian Press in a recent, wide-ranging interview.
"I don't know what there is to do yet."
The ruling, handed down by a Saskatchewan judge in July 2015, found a deal had been struck between the federal government and a corporation of Catholic entities. That deal released the church groups from their remaining obligations within the $79 million worth of payments and in-kind services owed to survivors under the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement, approved in 2006.
That included, for example, a "best efforts" fundraising campaign to generate $25 million, but the court was told that only about $3 million was raised by the groups since the agreement took effect in 2007.
Meanwhile, they raised more than $300 million to build new churches like this one in Saskatoon:
The efforts made by Catholic bodies to relieve the church of responsibilities under the historic arrangement are now facing renewed scrutiny as First Nations searching former residential school sites confirm the discovery of what are believed to be hundreds of unmarked graves of Indigenous children forced to attend them.
Thousands of people told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that they had been neglected, starved, and both physically and sexually abused at the church-run, government-funded institutions.
According to the Indian Residential School Survivors Society, the Catholic Church was responsible for operating up to 70 per cent of residential schools in Canada. United, Anglican and Presbyterian churches were among those operating the remainder.
Several questions have been raised around why survivors didn't receive more compensation from the Catholic Church, including why the federal government discontinued its appeal filed not long after the 2015 decision was handed down.
"I question why that refusal to appeal occurred," Miller said.
"As everyone, I'm dumbfounded by it. End of the day the whole point was about compensation."
'I want to get to the bottom of it': Miller
At the heart of the legal ruling was a dispute between a government lawyer and counsel for the Catholic entities about whether they had agreed to let the groups walk away from all obligations outlined in the settlement in exchange for $1.2 million, or only resolved a more specific part of those obligations.
The disagreement occurred as they went back and forth negotiating details of the arrangement. It ultimately fell to the court to resolve the issue, with Catholic entities contending they had a deal covering the entire settlement and Ottawa asserting that wasn't true.
After the federal government lost its case, it filed a notice to appeal in August 2015. Overshadowing the matter at the time was a federal election campaign consuming the country, which ended that October with the former Conservative government falling to current Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
By November, a government lawyer submitted another document to Saskatchewan's Appeal Court. This time, it contained a single sentence saying it was abandoning the appeal.
Miller, who was then a rookie MP from Quebec and not yet invited into cabinet, said he hasn't seen the final agreement releasing the Catholic bodies from their obligations, but he wants to have a look.
"I absolutely do want to see it. I want to get to the bottom of it," he said.
Former minister Carolyn Bennett was criticized both for a text she sent to then Independent MP Jody Wilson-Raybould, who is Indigenous, which the former justice minister labelled as racist, as well as not doing enough to advance the department's mandate of building a new nation-to-nation relationship with Indigenous communities.
Giving land back a priority, minister says
Hours after being sworn into his new role, Miller said last week that land was at the centre of that relationship, and it was time to "give land back."
"It's sort of unfair to have piecemeal examples of which particular parcel could be returned," he said, outlining how his department must work alongside other federal departments, such as defence, to find ways for lands to be bought back.
"It needs to sit squarely in people's minds that the relationship that has become broken with Indigenous Peoples did start with land, and it will be solved by returning land."
The Liberals' commitment to reconciliation has been tested over the past six months — not only by the discovery of unmarked graves but by its ongoing court battle around compensating First Nations children who lived on-reserve without adequately funded child and family services or who were separated from their families through foster care.
More tension arose after Trudeau travelled to Tofino, B.C., to spend time with his family on Sept. 30, the country's first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. The stated purpose of the new statutory holiday is to honour residential school survivors through taking time to reflect and attend in-person commemorations.
Trudeau has said travelling that day was a mistake, and he has since visited B.C.'s Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc nation after not responding to its initial invitation to do so on Sept. 30.
Asked what the prime minister's trip did to the government's process of trying to build trust with First Nations, Miller said it "doesn't help."
"I think the prime minister would be the first to recognize that."
That's true, but it doesn't mean that he wouldn't do exactly the same thing next time!
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