BishopAccountability.org
	Boycotting Bundestagers By Kristine Ward National Survivor Advocates Coalition September 22, 2011 http://nationalsurvivoradvocatescoalition.wordpress.com/editorials/ Pope Benedict begins his third trip to his native country, Germany, today with an opening day speech before the Bundestag, the lower house of Germany's federal legislature. Nearly 100 members of the 598 member Bundestag plan to boycott. To relieve any discomfort the pontiff may experience from looking at a chamber shy a 100 members, the Germans are filling in the seats with staff and other invited persons. They boycott this pontiff in a country where an unprecedented 181,000 Catholics Germans just in the past year have officially declared they are no longer Catholics in order not to be counted for tax distribution for the support of the Catholic Church in Germany. The tax distribution is the German Church's major means of financial support. No dependence on the voluntary drop in the basket method in the Pope's home country. The boycotting Bundestagers have come under some fire for announcing they won't be in the Chamber when the Bavarian born pontiff speaks. We think they should be saluted. These 100 are not all boycotting because of the issue of sexual abuse of children and minors by priests and nuns. They hold a variety of political beliefs that differ from the Pope's. Still, we believe they should be saluted. We are not advocating rude behavior, the only lens through which some will see their absence from the chamber when the Pope is there. We are not advocating anti-Catholicism another shibboleth that gets trotted out and paraded about in the hope it will be a smokescreen blocking hard and real realities. We salute them for their spines. Sitting can give consent and consent can become complicity. If our readers enter into conversations with friends, family, colleagues, pew mates, blog mates, email mates on this topic – and we encourage you to do so – we call to your attention, in contrast, a court case scheduled today in Australia. Emma Furness of Sydney, Australia, a survivor of clergy sexual abuse, will appear in court charged with criminal, no less, trespass because of her attempts to speak with Cardinal George Pell about survivors. Pell did meet with her once and made promises about support for survivors. Ms. Furness has tried to hold him to it. Once while she trying to do it, the diocesan office staff put her in a waiting taxi, gave her $20 and the taxi took to the place where the staff told her Pell would meet with her. He wasn't there. She returned to his diocesan office looking for both answers and Pell. She was arrested on the trespass charge. As victims of clergy sexual abuse come forward by the hundreds in Europe and Australia to stand side by side with those in the United States, these are not the days for Catholics to look away when those who seek justice "trespass." What a day this could be if "trespass" was forgiven and conscience was exalted. Contact: KristineWard@hotmail.com
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