Posted on 05/31/2002 11:04:03 AM PDT by Antoninus
Lay Group Calls on UN to Sanction Vatican Over Sex Abuse
By Lawrence Morahan
CNS Senior Staff Writer
www.CNSNews.com - A Catholic activist group is calling on the United Nations to invoke the Convention on the Rights of the Child to denounce sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church. Catholics for a Free Choice (CFFC) announced it is launching a petition drive calling on Jacob Egbert Doek, chairman of the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child, to "immediately demand a report from the Holy See on both the magnitude of the problem and its plans to end pedophilia and ephebophilia in the church."
The CFFC said neither the United Nations nor its member states could ignore what it calls the systematic abuse of children or violations of the Convention on the Rights of the Child by the Vatican, which has permanent observer status at the United Nations.
"The Holy See - the government of both Vatican City and the Roman Catholic Church - has an obligation to the world community to address this problem publicly and to take steps to ensure the safety of children in its care," the CFFC stated.
Frances Kissling, CFFC president, said the Vatican for years turned a blind eye to high-ranking officials who covered up the abuse. She described efforts underway by American cardinals and Pope John Paul II to find solutions to the problem as "a bit like asking the fox to guard the chicken coop."
Kissling called for the resignations of church officials who have covered up for offenders, including Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston and Cardinal Edward Egan of New York. [But not Mahony of LA or George in Chicago? Hmmmm.....]
"The Holy See must demonstrate a zero-tolerance policy. Sexual abusers must be dismissed and defrocked promptly. High-ranking officials who have covered up abuse or impeded civil and criminal proceedings must resign or be dismissed," Kissling stated in a press release.
The CFFC said the church should "apologize to the world for the tragic child sexual abuse by its priests and its lack of action to end this abuse." It also called on the Vatican to reinstate its contribution to the United Nations Children's Fund.
Traditional Catholic groups quickly denounced the petition drive and accused the CFFC of using the scandal to harm the church.
"They will take any stick to beat the Catholic Church and they are riding on the suffering of adolescent boys in order to give a black eye to the church. It is a despicable effort," said Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute in New York.
"This is aimed less at the member states of the U.N. than at raising money for CFFC," he said. Patrick Scully, a spokesman for the New York-based Catholic League, called the CFFC's petition drive a "most transparent attack on the Catholic Church" by "a group that has been twice denounced by the bishops as being fraudulent. They're not Catholic," he said.
The CFFC is a group without legal standing that has spent the last two years trying to get the Vatican kicked out of the United Nations, or at least have its status lessened, Scully said.
"Now they ask the U.N. to intervene in an internal church matter. This group is so transparent, it's sad," he said.
Both Scully and Ruse said Kissling was on record as saying she wants to overthrow the church. "Their concern is not with the church," Ruse said. "Their concern is with overthrowing the church." A spokeswoman for CFFC said Frances Kissling was unavailable for comment.
An important point of irony. Clearly, in addition to being morally wrong, they are also too stupid to see the irony in their own contradictions.
I agree.
Kissling is a gnat, annoying, but certainly not important in the grand scheme of things.
I, too, wish that the Vatican would squash her, but there are far more important and spiritual issues than an annoying baby killer. The real problem with Kissling is that the Vatican can't make her change the name of her organization. She shouldn't be allowed to use the name "Catholic" in her title, and I believe that the U.S. Bishops, to their credit, denounced using "Catholic" as part of the name of her organization. But being America, I don't think that's going to happen.
The real way to win is to have the Vatican and the U.S. Bishops lead a renewal to turn all Catholic hearts away from abortion and to a culture of life. We need to be the pro-life church. While I believe most Catholics are pro-life, many are sucked into the secular argument of "choice". We need to emphatically and lovingly stand up and say that abortion is wrong, abortion is immoral, abortion is a sin. Not only committing the act of abortion, but voting for abortion-supporters.
We need to turn Catholics away from the contraceptive mentality that makes it easy to talk about "choice" and ignore the reality of abortion. Until we, as a laity, work closely with our dioceses and support the Catholic moral position on Life, we will continue to lose ground.
God bless.
William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site
Catholics who say it is fine to commit infanticide are not Catholics.
They deserve our pity and prayers.
God bless,
EODGUY
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