ROME
Crux
Inés San Martín
VATICAN CORRESPONDENT
Apr 25, 2018
ROME – A Canadian victim of clerical sexual abuse who describes herself as a “prayer warrior and encourager” for reform says a recent meeting with Pope Francis’s main anti-abuse panel “provided a lot of closure” for victims and praised the group for listening to them, many of whom, she said, experience a great deal of “pain and anger.”
Last week, Francis’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and Young Adults met for the first time since half of its members were changed this February, after the term of the original group expired last December. According to a statement from the commission, members encountered the pope, discussed abuse prevention education and policy, and ways the Church might work more closely with abuse survivors.
The commission dedicated the first day of its plenary session to hearing the testimony of people abused by priests.
Among them was Deborah Kloos, a Canadian from Windsor, Ontario, who’s long advocated for the Catholic Church to publicly pray for, and with, survivors, and who describes herself as the commission’s “prayer warrior and encourager.”
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