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	Standards for Church Should Be Different By Nancy Ettenheim Milwaukee Journal Sentinel March 30, 2010 http://www.jsonline.com/news/opinion/89556467.html As can be expected, the Child Victims Act has generated a lot of heat, both from sexual abuse survivors and from the church. (In this column, I refer to "the church" to mean all religious denominations.) I strongly support the bill and believe it is long overdue. The church loudly complains that the legislation treats it unfairly, essentially holding it to a higher standard than others. My position is that religious organizations and individuals should and must be held to a higher standard of behavior as well as consequences because they already claim that position for themselves in many ways. Why? My answer is threefold and resides in the nature of the victim, the perpetrator and the seriousness of child sexual abuse. Who are the victims? They are children who are taught to respect their priest, minister, imam or rabbi. They are taught that this adult represents the interpreter of divine word. When a child is assaulted, he or she is usually threatened to keep quiet. This pressure to keep quiet is enormous; the trauma of these assaults is often extremely deep. Between the threats and the trauma, the victim often cannot disclose or seek help until well into adulthood and past the current age limit of 35 to bring a lawsuit. There are two groups of offenders involved: individual clergy and the host institution. Members of the clergy occupy a place of exceptional trust within their religious communities. They present themselves to the community as the gold standard of behavior; their role is to lead by example and to teach life lessons. Consequently, their perpetration of child sexual assault is at the highest level of outrage and violation of trust. The culpability of religious institutions begins when they seek to play a shell game and hide the offenders, moving them from place to place to discourage disclosure, prosecution and justice. It is this very coverup that constitutes the institutional crime and creates roadblocks that make investigation and accountability almost impossible. Thus, the elimination of the statute of limitations is both necessary and compensatory. It gives greater incentive to institutions to cleanse themselves of pedophilic clergy and helps eliminate the reward for stonewalling. Finally, we have the nature of the crime itself. A child's deep sense of shame prevents disclosure. Some kids try to disclose to family or other church adults who refuse to believe them because the offender was a clergy member. Many victims I have spoken with have felt that adult disbelief was actually more harmful than the assaults. Many want acknowledgement of guilt more than they want money damages. Unfortunately, this acknowledgement has largely only come through the process of litigation. Because of the lifelong impact of clergy sexual assault, the elimination of the civil statute of limitations is appropriate. There are concerns that the lawsuits brought under these more liberal provisions will bankrupt religious institutions. However, we must remember that these lawsuits are typically brought against churches that have refused to get rid of pedophilic clergy and have simply shifted them from place to place. I would respond that those churches are already bankrupt - in a moral, if not financial, sense. Their hold on the moral high ground is tenuous. Religious institutions should not be allowed to hide behind the shield of the various services they provide - day care, elderly services, etc. - as a form of extortion to prevent their accountability to the community. The Legislature has an obligation to carefully craft the language of this bill to avoid constitutional complications. Our elected officials have a strongly compelling need to provide an avenue of relief for the survivors in our midst. *** The Child Victims Act (Senate Bill 319 and Assembly Bill 453) would remove the statute of limitations for victims of childhood sexual assault to pursue civil action. It also would open a three-year window in cases where the previous statute of limit Nancy Ettenheim of Milwaukee is a retired criminal prosecutor. E-mail nette7759@gmail.com
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