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The Dakota Access pipeline developer said Monday that it has placed oil in the pipeline under a Missouri River reservoir in North Dakota and that it's preparing to put the pipeline into service....
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Vatican City, Mar 27, 2017 / 10:26 am (CNA/EWTN News).- After a victim who suffered past clerical abuse resigned from the Vatican's anti-abuse commission, the group is aiming for more effective ways to communicate with survivors and include them in its work.According to a March 26 press release from the commission, members “unanimously agreed to find new ways to ensure its work is shaped and informed with and by victims/survivors.”The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors (PCPM) met March 24-26 at the Vatican for their eighth Plenary Assembly since being formed by Pope Francis in Dec. 2013.The session came less than one month after clerical abuse survivor Marie Collins resigned from her position on the commission, citing pushback from certain Vatican dicasteries, specifically from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, as one of the main reasons for stepping down.In a March 1 communique announcing her decision, the commission praised Collins as ...
Vatican City, Mar 27, 2017 / 10:26 am (CNA/EWTN News).- After a victim who suffered past clerical abuse resigned from the Vatican's anti-abuse commission, the group is aiming for more effective ways to communicate with survivors and include them in its work.
According to a March 26 press release from the commission, members “unanimously agreed to find new ways to ensure its work is shaped and informed with and by victims/survivors.”
The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors (PCPM) met March 24-26 at the Vatican for their eighth Plenary Assembly since being formed by Pope Francis in Dec. 2013.
The session came less than one month after clerical abuse survivor Marie Collins resigned from her position on the commission, citing pushback from certain Vatican dicasteries, specifically from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, as one of the main reasons for stepping down.
In a March 1 communique announcing her decision, the commission praised Collins as someone who has “consistently and tirelessly championed for the voices of the victims/survivors to be heard, and for the healing of the victims/survivors to be a priority for the Church.”
In their latest meetings, commission members again voiced “strong support” for Collins and for “her continuing work to promote healing for victims of abuse and the prevention of all abuse of minors and vulnerable adults,” the press release stated.
Members also expressed gratitude that Collins has agreed to continue working with the commission in their educational programs for new bishops and with other offices of the Roman Curia.
With relation on how to best include survivors as they go forward, the commission’s statement said that they are carefully considering several ideas that have been successfully implemented in other places for recommendation to Pope Francis.
In addition, the commission discussed the response to communications from survivors/victims directly to their office and other offices of the Holy See, agreeing that “acknowledging correspondence and giving a timely and personal response is one part of furthering transparency and healing.”
They talked over the importance of responding “directly and compassionately,” while acknowledging that this is a major undertaking due to the volume of this type of correspondence the Holy See receives.
Each letter also requires a large amount of attention in order to give the specific resources and assistance necessary.
However, the commission agreed to send further recommendations on this matter to Pope Francis for consideration.
The latest plenary session of the PCPM immediately followed an educational seminar held March 23 at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. The event was co-hosted by the PCPM and the Gregorian University’s Center for Child Protection.
The day-long educational seminar focused on what the local church and institutions are doing to combat abuse of minors specifically in schools and the home, and was attended by at least half a dozen heads of Vatican departments, with every Vatican department represented in some way.
IMAGE: CNS/Paul HaringBy Carol GlatzVATICANCITY (CNS) -- Acknowledging correspondence and treating victims with respect isthe very least church officials can offer, said survivors of clergy sex abuse.Neverletting a letter or email languish unanswered was such a key "bestpractice" of showing care and concern for victims of sexual abuse byclergy and religious that Marie Collins, an Irish survivor, stepped down fromthe Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors over the issue. When itcomes to whether an office should respond to a victim, "There's anamazing ability to take whatever is simple" and make it sound "as ifit's highly complex," said Declan Murphy, who was abused as an adolescentby two Christian Brothers in Dublin in the 1960s. Murphy, who was in SouthKorea, spoke to Catholic News Service via Skype in mid-March.It's a"basic courtesy" to respond, even if it is just a briefacknowledgment of receiving the letter with a general time frame of intendedfollow-up. "That's the ...
IMAGE: CNS/Paul Haring
By Carol Glatz
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Acknowledging correspondence and treating victims with respect is the very least church officials can offer, said survivors of clergy sex abuse.
Never letting a letter or email languish unanswered was such a key "best practice" of showing care and concern for victims of sexual abuse by clergy and religious that Marie Collins, an Irish survivor, stepped down from the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors over the issue.
When it comes to whether an office should respond to a victim, "There's an amazing ability to take whatever is simple" and make it sound "as if it's highly complex," said Declan Murphy, who was abused as an adolescent by two Christian Brothers in Dublin in the 1960s. Murphy, who was in South Korea, spoke to Catholic News Service via Skype in mid-March.
It's a "basic courtesy" to respond, even if it is just a brief acknowledgment of receiving the letter with a general time frame of intended follow-up. "That's the way most people work when they value and respect a person," he said.
However, "if your starting point is not wanting to do it, you will drag in lots of reasons" to justify why writing back cannot or should not be done, he said.
After 38 years of keeping his abuse hidden from everyone and "coping on my own," Murphy said he was back to relying on his own resilience, with the support of family, to make sure his voice was heard with repeated calls and arranging meetings with church leaders after he came forward in 2006.
The most hurtful response he got, he said, was telling a high-level church representative about being raped for three years by two religious priests and "he looked at me in the eye and said, 'I can't help you,'" in "a cold and callous" way.
That kind of dismissal only made sense, Murphy said, for someone who looks at the issue from a legal or organizational point of view, in which different people are responsible for their own separate jurisdictions -- and the problem gets volleyed back and forth over ecclesial lines.
In every situation, he said, the thing that hurt most "was the fundamental lack of respect for me as a human being whose childhood was taken away."
"No one can go back and fix what happened to me," Murphy said, and "I try to remain fair, articulate and balanced. But what I've seen is horrendous" when it comes to how people have responded to his coming forward.
Murphy said he had three objectives in all of his efforts to reach out to the church: "Somebody to listen to my story; I wanted them to believe me and say 'I'm sorry'; and I wanted my costs back," meaning medical and legal costs incurred since 2006, the year his health broke down and he revealed the past abuse.
The best responses he received, he said, were when someone said he was going to do something and then actually did it. Another time, the same person "sent a Christmas card. It was a small gesture, but it showed a human side."
Church leaders and personnel should not be driven by legal concerns, fears of litigation or self-interest, he said, but by a pastoral compassion that asks, "What can we do to help you? Tell us what you need."
Helen McGonigle, a lawyer living in western Connecticut, told CNS in a series of emails that she faced so many "obstructionist tactics at the local level in the secular legal system, what choice do we have but to turn to the Vatican, canon law and natural law," since the sexual violence against children is a crime against nature.
McGonigle and her sister, who later died from a prescription drug overdose in 2005, were victims of late-Norbertine Father Brendan Smyth when he was assigned to Rhode Island.
He was ordained and assigned to ministry in Northern Ireland, Ireland, Rhode Island, North Dakota and other places, despite the knowledge and complaints by other religious that he had molested children, as found in an independent Northern Ireland Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry. He died in prison one month after starting his sentence for 117 counts of children molestation in Ireland and Northern Ireland over four decades.
Because Father Smyth was a member a religious order, based out of an abbey in Ireland and was sent to multiple dioceses, McGonigle wrote to numerous jurisdictional bodies in her efforts to gain information and help.
"I tried the local route in every imaginable way and felt the need to circumvent" the appropriate channels after letters went unanswered and questions and requests went unaddressed. Her civil suit was dismissed because of the statute of limitations.
However, when recipient offices at the Vatican denied having "competence" in the matter and redirected her to other authorities, McGonigle said she felt "that an internal strategy of leaving survivors twisting in the wind seems to have been adopted by the Vatican."
There is no way to know how many survivors are ever able to bring themselves to write or even bother, she said, which is why "those who do choose to write should be acknowledged in some way and provided some measure of assurance that their concerns are being listened to. After having been raped and our rights trampled upon, it is the very least these people could do. Are they beyond compassion?"
The most helpful responses, she said, came from a priest in North Dakota who confirmed facts "in an open and candid way." In fact, she said when news broke in 1994 of Father Smyth's crimes, the Diocese of Fargo "went door to door in their outreach campaign."
McGonigle said she wrote to church leaders, not to be "listened to," but to do "the right thing. I did feel it was right to make an attempt to do my part in exposing Smyth's crimes and requesting honesty and transparency" in her right to know the truth.
The very heart of the correspondence, however, is not just about eliciting a reply letter, she said: "What survivors want to see is action, child protection, perpetrators prosecuted and removed."
"Action goes a lot farther than any one letter," McGonigle said.
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Copyright © 2017 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. www.catholicnews.com. All rights reserved. Republishing or redistributing of CNS content, including by framing or similar means without prior permission, is prohibited. You may link to stories on our public site. This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. To request permission for republishing or redistributing of CNS content, please contact permissions at cns@catholicnews.com.
IMAGE: CNS photo/Edgard Garrido, ReutersBy David AgrenCUERNAVACA, Mexico (CNS) -- An editorial in a publication of the Archdiocese of Mexico City condemned Mexican companies wishing to work on the proposed wall being built on the U.S.-Mexico border as "traitors" and called on authorities to castigate any company that provides services for fencing off the frontier."What's regrettable is that on this side of theborder, there are Mexicans ready to collaborate with a fanatical project that annihilatesthe good relationship between two nations that share a common border," said the March 26 editorial in the archdiocesan publication Desde la Fe."Any company that plans to invest in thefanatic Trump's wall would beimmoral, but above all, their shareholders and owner will be consideredtraitors to the homeland," the editorial continued. "Joininga project that is a grave affront to dignity is like shooting yourself in thefoot."President Donald Trump ran on a promise ofconstructing a wall between...
IMAGE: CNS photo/Edgard Garrido, Reuters
By David Agren
CUERNAVACA, Mexico (CNS) -- An editorial in a publication of the Archdiocese of Mexico City condemned Mexican companies wishing to work on the proposed wall being built on the U.S.-Mexico border as "traitors" and called on authorities to castigate any company that provides services for fencing off the frontier.
"What's regrettable is that on this side of the border, there are Mexicans ready to collaborate with a fanatical project that annihilates the good relationship between two nations that share a common border," said the March 26 editorial in the archdiocesan publication Desde la Fe.
"Any company that plans to invest in the fanatic Trump's wall would be immoral, but above all, their shareholders and owner will be considered traitors to the homeland," the editorial continued. "Joining a project that is a grave affront to dignity is like shooting yourself in the foot."
President Donald Trump ran on a promise of constructing a wall between the United States and Mexico and has signed an executive order to begin building the barrier on the nearly 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border.
The Mexican government has repeatedly said it will not pay for any border wall. Security analysts say illegal merchandise mostly crosses through legal ports of entry and express doubts a wall would keep out drugs, as Trump insists. Catholics who work with migrants transiting the country en route to the United States express doubts, too, saying those crossing the frontier illegally mostly do so with the help of human smugglers, who presumably pay bribes on both sides of the border.
Some Mexican companies have mused about working on the wall, though others such as Cemex -- whose share prices surged on speculation it would provide cement for the wall -- told the Los Angeles Times that it would not participate in the building of a border barrier.
Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray Caso has urged company officials to use their conscience when considering work on the wall, though the archdiocesan editorial said, "What is most surprising is the timidity of the Mexican government's economic authorities, who have not moved firmly against these companies."
Desde la Fe has previously blasted Trump's proposed policies. In September 2015, it called Trump "ignorant" and a "clown" and blasted Mexican government passivity in defending its migrants as "unpardonable."
Father Hugo Valdemar, Archdiocese of Mexico City spokesman, told Catholic News Service some conservative Catholics in Mexico viewed Trump's positions on pro-life issues favorably and were still angry the U.S. ambassador to Mexico marched in the annual pride parade. But he said he knew of no one in Mexico that openly supported the U.S. president.
"What we see from him is an authentic threat and an unstable person," Father Valdemar said.
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Copyright © 2017 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. www.catholicnews.com. All rights reserved. Republishing or redistributing of CNS content, including by framing or similar means without prior permission, is prohibited. You may link to stories on our public site. This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. To request permission for republishing or redistributing of CNS content, please contact permissions at cns@catholicnews.com.
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