AUSTRALIA
Anglican Communion News Service

[ACNS, by Gavin Drake] The deans of Australia’s cathedrals have expressed grief at hurt and trauma caused by clergy and church workers after hearing reports about the country’s Royal Commission on Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse and the newly established Royal Commission into the Child Protection and Youth Detention Systems of the Northern Territory.

The deans had gathered at St James’ Cathedral in Townsville, North Queensland, for their annual conference. In a statement, issued at the end of their gathering, the deans strongly condemned any form of abuse. The statement said that the deans – the senior clergy person in charge of a cathedral – had “reported on safeguarding measures in their own cathedrals, affirmed the importance of public acknowledgement and repentance for past wrongs, and the need for transparency and openness of conversation to enable a process of healing and the prevention…