IRELAND
PRI
[with audio]
“There is no excuse for any form of violence or exploitation of children,” said Archbishop Silvano Tomasi.
He’s the Vatican observer to UN and in an historic move, he testified on Thursday on behalf of the Vatican before the UN’s Committee of the Right of the Child in Geneva.
“Such crimes can never be justified, whether committed in the home, in schools, in community and sports programs, in religious organizations and structures,” said the archbishop.
Colm O’Gorman has been waiting more than 20-years to hear those words. He’s a survivor of childhood sex abuse by his local parish priest.
“It’s another moment hopefully towards the eventual ending of the Vatican’s impunity, for not just its failure to address the crimes of its priests, but the creation of a system to cover up those crimes,” said O’Gorman.
Still after these past 20 years of fighting and advocating for survivors of sexual abuse, this is only the beginning he says.
Colm O’Gorman grew up in Adamstown, a small town in Ireland. He was 14 when he first met Father Sean Fortune, who went on to sexually abuse him for years.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.