Concerned Catholics backs archdiocese healing program

By Haidee V Eugenio
Pacific Daily News
April 18, 2017

http://www.guampdn.com/story/news/2017/04/18/concerned-catholics-backs-archdiocese-healing-program/100556536/

David Sablan

In this Jan. 29 file photo, members and supporters of the Laity Forward Movement and the Concerned Catholics of Guam hold a protest against Archbishop Anthony Apuron in front of the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral-Basilica in Hagåtña.

A group of Catholics seeking Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron’s removal and defrocking said it's supporting a program that offers professional counseling, treatment, spiritual healing, compensation and justice to Guam clergy sex abuse victims.

“The quicker we can bring healing and justice to the victims of clergy sex abuse, the better,” David Sablan, Concerned Catholics of Guam president  said Monday, referring to Hope and Healing Guam.

Sablan said Concerned Catholics believes the program is an alternative to trying the clergy abuse cases in court, which he said have limitations in helping abuse victims heal emotionally, mentally and spiritually.

“The archdiocese is moving in the right direction in initiating the program and having an independent body administer it,” Sablan said.

The Archdiocese of Agana faces 50 clergy sex abuse lawsuits in local and federal court. Hope and Healing hopes the plaintiffs and their counsels will become a part of the program.

While the archdiocese initiated and funds the program, it doesn't have control over its administration and operations. The program’s executive director, California-based attorney Michael W. Caspino, will be assisting an independent board of directors that will administer it.

Professional counseling has started for clergy sex abuse victims who have already called Hope and Healing’s hotline, 1-888-649-5288, Caspino said.

“We support the approach that Archbishop Michael Jude Byrnes is taking in helping clergy sex abuse cases. We also appreciate the efforts of others who help provide healing to the victims,” Sablan said.

Apuron is now undergoing a Vatican canonical penal trial, and Rome hopes to complete the trial by early summer. Two of Apuron’s accusers, former Agat altar boy Walter Denton and Doris Concepcion, mother of a deceased altar boy, gave their testimony directly to a Vatican tribunal in March.

“Concerned Catholics believes that Walter Denton’s and Doris Concepcion’s testimony are very strong and that the Vatican will take action against Apuron. We are hoping that the Vatican will remove Apuron as archbishop and defrock him. We continue to pray for and support all victims of clergy abuse,” Sablan said.