Church and pedophilia, the CEI launches the first national report. ItalyChurchToo’s reply: “We need a super parties commission”
The first is an underway National report on the Church and pedophilia of Italian clergy. The cardinal president of Matteo Maria Zuppi had announced it at the end of the general assembly of the Italian bishops during which he had been appointed as the successor of Gualtiero Bassetti.
The episcopate of the Peninsula has decided to publish, by 18 November 2022, a first national report on prevention activities and cases of abuse reported or reported to the network of Diocesan and inter diocesan services in the last two years and to start an analysis of the data of presumed or ascertained crimes perpetrated by clerics in Italy in the period 2000-2021, guarded by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Non-purely statistical survey – As for the Report, the CEI explained that “the purpose of this investigation, not merely statistics, is to delineate the reality of diocesan services and listening centers, their dissemination and structuring, their effectiveness and effectiveness in the pastoral action of formation, prevention and reception. They will be involved in the research 16 coordinators for regional services, 226 referents for diocesan ones e 96 responsible for Listening Centers: specific questionnaires will be administered for each area to be completed online, guaranteeing maximum confidentiality.
The data collected will be examined by researchers from the Catholics University of Sacred Heart of Piacenza, specializing in economics, statistics, and sociology with specific experience in the analysis of policy on children safeguarding. e. in policies for the protection of minors, which are required at the European level to all organizations working with minors to guarantee them safe environments in terms of prevention, law enforcement, and abuse reporting protocols, and which represent the framework of Church guidelines which is in Italy in 2019 “.
Tips and directions – The CEI also pointed out that “the experts will not only have the task of presenting one radiography of the existing but to draw tips e indications to implement the adequacy of the preventive and formative action of the Churches in Italy. The choice of the Catholic University was based on its involvement as an evaluator of the project ‘SAFE – Educating and welcoming in safe environments’ which involved the Pope John XXIII Community, the Italian Sports Center, for two years, from 2019 to 2021, the Italian Catholic Action and the Interdisciplinary Research Center on Victimology and Security – Department of Sociology and Economic Law of the Alma Mater Studiorum in Bologna “.
As regards, however, the analysis of presumed or ascertained crimes of pedophilia of the Italian clergy in the last twenty-one years, the CEI explained that “thanks to a new space of collaboration opened in recent months with the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, it will then be possible to know and analyze, quantitatively and qualitatively the data kept in the same Dicastery, guaranteeing the due confidentiality. These data refer to alleged or ascertained crimes perpetrated by clerics in Italy in the period 2000-2021. The analysis will be conducted in collaboration with Independent research institutes, which will guarantee high-level scientific and moral profiles, and will allow for a deeper and more objective knowledge of the phenomenon.
This will make it possible to improve prevention and contrast measures, to accompany victims and survivors with greater awareness, and to refine the criteria for other research “.
Period 2000-2021 – Cardinal Zuppi explained the decision to research abuses only in the last twenty-one years: “Why since 2000 we have secure data, those of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. Objective data, not statistical projections. On the research in France, they sent me three university inquiries that demolish the work of the commission. Qualitative means distinguishing the raw numbers and understanding the differences.
Let’s do something serious that hurts us more because it affects us now. It will also help in prevention and to understand the larger phenomenon in society if it is not there prejudice“. Alongside these two important and unprecedented initiatives, the bishops of the Peninsula have also decided to strengthen the network of diocesan representatives and related Services for the protection of minors and vulnerable people.
Already established as of 2019 in all 226 Italian dioceses, this reality will now be supported with training courses aimed at pastoral workers (priests, men, and women religious, catechists, educators, and teachers of religion) and those called to take care of legal aspects. “With this action, – the CEI specifies – we intend to promote, even more widely, a culture of respect and dignity for minors and vulnerable people”.
The prelates also reaffirmed their commitment to implement the establishment of the Listening Centers, which currently cover 70% of the dioceses Italians, to welcome and listen to those who want to report recent or past abuses and address those of competence according to the needs expressed by the people: a doctor, a psychologist, a lawyer, the judiciary, the police, a spiritual guide or a couple of counselors.
The reply: “False image risk” – Immediate reply from the Coordination against Abuses in the Catholic Church – ItalyChurchToo that “considers an annual report based solely on the data collected by the diocesan services, destined to be seriously incomplete and partial and, therefore, to provide a distorted image of the phenomenon. Collaboration with an academic research center during the data analysis phase does not constitute the guarantee of independence necessary to achieve the widest possible knowledge of the phenomenon, which can only be obtained thanks to the accessibility of all the ecclesial archives, made available to a non-partisan body or commission with very high interdisciplinary expertise “.
Furthermore, “the Coordination deems insufficient use of the data held by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, which notoriously constitute only the data that emerged and reached canonical procedural definition.
Furthermore, it considers the period considered discriminatory, as it excludes the victims who emerged in previous times, but also those who did not emerge as they have not yet reached the maturity of awareness of the abuse suffered, whose time has been certified, also in science, up to 30, even 40 years; this time frame is also insufficient to determine both contexts in which the abuse was systemic, and deeper structural dynamics, which can only be identified by examining a longer period. Furthermore, no clear words have been said on the subject of moral and economic compensation essential steps to give substance to the search for truth and the offer of justice “.
Dialogue with the government – Interviewed by some Italian newspapers, the president of the CEI addressed the key issues of his agenda starting with the dialogue with the government of Mario Draghi: “We will seek an interview with the Prime Minister. I believe it is a decisive moment for everyone, the country, and Europe. We have lost the previous future, often we only think about the present. Their pandemic and the Guerra reveal the fragility of many balances that were believed to be taken for granted and ask us to look to the future. It will be a hot October, crises can become dangerous.
At a conference, I heard: how we make a five-year plan with decades of corruption, evasion, and bureaucracy behind it. There is a need for great compactness, awareness, and transversal effort for the common good. Everyone’s challenge is to rebuild the community, to talk to each other ”. Zuppi is also looking to vote for the renewal of Parliament in 2023: “Let’s hope there isn’t a year of the election campaign and that the right differences of vision take into account the need for a united commitment. An Italian and European effort is needed to go beyond the contingent.
This is the real request of those who live in suffering and poverty, six million people, one in ten, a situation aggravated by fragility and loneliness. Europe must show the richness of its humanistic tradition to a world it sometimes fails to understand. The beauty of democracy is not taken for granted.
The position on war – For the cardinal no foreclosure though Giorgia Meloni should become the first female prime minister: “The Church has none, the will of the people is sovereign. Whatever the interlocutor is, the Church will be careful to defend her priorities, the good of people, and the human person at the center. Without any preclusion, with a lot of respect for the differences in role and this reason always saying with secularism and clarity what worries her “. And on the split between left and right, she adds: “Sure mental toponymy they are sixty years old, with no more ideological references. Even in the Church.
In the villages, I find out which side is the mayor in the end. If it comes to defending the person, we must all do it together. Between the parties, there are often unjustified intolerances, an electric and harmful climate. The point is to find answers for everyone ”. the Last topic addressed was the conflict in Ukraine: “The Pope never confused aggressor and attacked and immediately spoke of war. But all wars end in negotiation, even if there is a winner.
All channels must be kept open for that matter stop the slaughter. We are in trench warfare, as in ’14-18, but with ultra-modern technology ”. And on dispatch of weapons: “We need to think about a real commitment to disarmament. Of course, there is a need for self-defense, provided it is proportionate. But we have to invest twice as much in the pursuit of peace without weapons”.
reference: ilfattoquotidiano.it
