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	Maltese Abuse Victims to Meet Top Vatican Official Earth Times April 16, 2010 http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/319059,maltese-abuse-victims-to-meet-top-vatican-official.html Valletta, Malta - A group of Maltese men who claim to a have been abused as minors by priests, said on Friday they have been granted a meeting with a top Vatican official. Monsignor Charles Scicluna, the Promoter of Justice in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, has agreed to meet them in Rome in June, the men said. The 10 say they were molested at a local orphanage during the 1980s and 90s. Scicluna, who is also Maltese, is responsible for dealing with sexual and physical abuse by members of the clergy. The announcement was made on the eve of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Malta, his first overseas visit since a sex abuse scandal involving priests, particularly in Ireland, the US and the pontiff's native Germany rocked the Roman Catholic church. "This is very good news for us. It shows that the Maltese church and now the Vatican are now taking our case and our pain seriously," one of the alleged victims, Lawrence Grech, said in a statement. "We have been waiting for seven years for our case to end but justice has not yet been done," he added. Joseph Magro, another alleged abuse victim, added: "We are very happy that our cries are now being heard by the church authorities, locally, and at the Vatican." The victims have already had a meeting with Malta's Archbishop Paul Cremona. The abuse victims are still waiting for a response from the Vatican to their request for a short private meeting with Pope Benedict XVI in Malta. Earlier this week the pontiff's spokesman did not rule out the possibility of such a meeting, pointing out that Benedict had met abuse victims in previous trips to the US and Australia. While the pontiff was available for similar meetings in the future, these would not take place under "media pressure," the spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, said. The Maltese victims also asked the pope to specifically refer to Maltese victims of abuse in his public speeches during his visit.
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