SNAP Responds to New Catholic Cardinals

By David Clohessy
The Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
January 12, 2014

http://www.snapnetwork.org/snap_responds_to_new_catholic_cardinals

We are grateful that Pope Francis named none of the eligible U.S. archbishops (Chaput of Philadelphia, Vigneron of Detroit, and Lori of Baltimore) as a new cardinal.

But we are disappointed that Archbishop Gerhard Ludwig Müller of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has been elevated.

Each of these four men have dreadful records on children’s safety.  

At the same time, we are disappointed that Pope Francis did not promote Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin. While far from perfect, he’s better than more prelates on abuse. Promoting him would have been encouraging to many survivors.

But the pope’s cardinal choices are less important in many ways than his decision to rebuff Polish law enforcement officials who want a credibly accused child molesting archbishop returned from the Vatican to face criminal charges. Pope Francis’ decision to essentially harbor a fugitive who allegedly molested at least five boys is terribly disturbing and hurtful to tens of thousands of suffering child sex abuse victims and millions of already betrayed Catholics.

(SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims. SNAP was founded in 1988 and has more than 15,000 members. Despite the word “priest” in our title, we have members who were molested by religious figures of all denominations, including nuns, rabbis, bishops, and Protestant ministers. Our website is SNAPnetwork.org)

Contact: SNAPclohessy@aol.com