PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
Posted by David Clohessy on June 27, 2012
June 27, 2012
Dear Archbishop Chaput;
We are leaders of a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. Our mission is to protect the vulnerable and heal the wounded.
We are writing you today with a simple and straightforward request about Monsignor William Lynn. He has been tried. He has been convicted. He should be defrocked.
This is not about being vindictive. It’s about being prudent. It’s about trying to reverse decades or centuries of self-serving secrecy in child sex abuse cases by thousands of Catholic officials. It’s about sending the most clear and severe message possible to current and future church employees who ignore, conceal and enable heinous crimes against kids. That message should be a “no brainer” – if you protect predators and hurt kids by hiding known and suspected crimes, you will be out of a job.
Sadly, even now, that message is virtually never sent. With only a handful of exceptions, Catholic staffers who act recklessly, callously and deceitfully with the safety of kids are virtually never disciplined by officials like you. So sadly, the same hurtful patterns of complicity – that have been so thoroughly exposed, so extensively documented and so widely criticized – continue.
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