AUSTRALIA
The Age
September 11, 2013
Barney Zwartz
Religion editor, The Age.
Australia’s most senior Orthodox rabbi has apologised for years of mishandling and cover-up of child sexual abuse within the Jewish community and urged abusers to hand themselves in to police.
“For whatever reason a culture of cover-up, often couched in religious terms pervaded our thinking and actions. It may even have been well-intentioned, but it was simply wrong,” said Moshe Gutnick, the president of the Organisation of Rabbis of Australia, on Wednesday.
Ahead of the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, the Day of Atonement, Rabbi Gutnick told victims no one could know their pain and what they had been through.
“And the pain has only been magnified by our inaction. On this holiest of days, I sincerely beg your forgiveness on behalf of all of us who did not hear your voice.
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