ROME
Daily Record
By Abbott Koloff, Daily Record
Barbara Blaine was sitting in the massive St. Peter's Basilica, close enough to see Cardinal Bernard Law at the altar but too far away to see his face. She had been standing outside in the rain before the Mass, handing out leaflets, telling people from all over the world about Law's role in the American church scandal.
She told them how Law, when he was in charge of the Boston Archdiocese, sent abusive priests from one parish to another, essentially allowing them to sexually abuse more and more children until there were hundreds of victims. She said a lot of people in St. Peter's Square had never heard of Law. They knew only a little about the abuse scandal in the American Church. Some members of the Italian press asked Blaine why victims just didn't forgive Law, since he has apologized, and move on with their lives.
She told them her protest was not about forgiveness.
"It's about preventing more pain," Blaine, the founder of the national group Survivors of Those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, said in a telephone interview from Rome on Tuesday.
Posted by kshaw at April 13, 2005 11:08 AM