SPOKANE (WA)
Spokesman-Review
February 25, 2020
By Jared Brown
Jennifer Beste acknowledged the message she brought to Gonzaga University on Tuesday evening wasn’t going to leave her lecture audience in a good mood.
It was a message about how the Catholic Church has the power and wealth to address the ongoing clergy sexual abuse crisis and is complicit in abuse as long as it doesn’t act.
She said young adults have the power to sway Church leaders as fewer young people stay religiously affiliated.
“The Catholic bishops are acting differently than they did the first decade of the 2000s. They are apologizing. They are trying to gain the trust of the laity,” Beste said.
And she urged people to turn those feelings of anger and exasperation into action because a majority of Catholics are necessary to sway the opinion of Church leaders.
“I ask you to please make your voices heard,” Beste said. “We need to organize. We need to protest.”
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