Canadian survivors of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests are calling on the church’s bishops to follow the lead of some of their U.S. counterparts and release the names of clergy facing credible misconduct charges and allegations.
The survivors made the call in Cornwall, Ontario, where the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops is holding its annual meeting this week.
Earlier this month, a bishop in the Archdiocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph released the names of 19 clerics with substantiated sexual abuse allegations against them.
Dioceses in Alaska and Vermont released similar lists in August. The former comprised seven names, the latter had 40.
“In any other institution, if you’re protecting people who have offended, who have broken the law, nobody would stand for that,” Gemme Hickey told Canadian Press.
“But it seems like, because they’re hiding behind the guise of the church, they’re not being challenged in this way.”
“It’s not up to survivors to come forward to release the names. It’s up to the institutions that have harmed us,” said Hickey, a Newfoundland activist who doesn’t identify as either male for female, who was part of a group that met with seven bishops on Sunday to press survivors’ demands.
A spokeswoman for the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Lisa Gall, responded.
“When a diocese or religious order receives a credible allegation of abuse of a minor, the police are informed,” Gall wrote in a statement.
“It is then for the police to determine whether it is in the public interest to disclose details of their investigation including, in appropriate cases, the name of the alleged abuser.”
In May, Pope Francis issued a new canon law in a effort to hold the Catholic hierarchy accountable for failing to protect victims of abuse.
With files from CP, CBC, CTV
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