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	Sidebar: Sexual Abuse Victims Criticize Pope's Outreach Monsters and Critics September 24, 2011 http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1664857.php/SIDEBAR-Sexual-abuse-victims-criticize-pope-s-outreach Erfurt, Germany - A network of sexual abuse victims on Saturday criticized pope Benedict XVI's meeting with German victims the previous day as 'sanctimonious.' The meeting took place late Friday in the city of Erfurt, during Benedict's four-day tour of his homeland. Afterwards, church officials said he was 'moved and shaken' by the suffering of abuse victims. 'This serves no purpose. It is a strategy to signal to society, 'we are doing something',' said Norbert Denef, the head of the Network of Victims of sexualized Abuse. Denef, who has said he was abused by a priest starting when he was 10, said the meeting was a step backwards, serving to conceal and deny abusive practices. The 62-year-old campaigner called instead for the church to open its files and for the statute of limitations to be lifted in cases of sexual abuse. 'Nobody really asks how the victims are really doing, it is sanctimonious behaviour,' Denef said, accusing the church of only seeking dialogue with obeisant people who would not launch public criticism. On Friday, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) also criticized the meeting as a hollow gesture by a man who 'could easily protect children but refuses to do so.' 'This papal visit will enable a handful of abused people to feel better for a while,' said SNAP spokesman Emmanuel Henckens in a statement. 'But the meeting with the pope will not change anything, so that priests finally stop molesting children or preventing bishops from hushing up crimes,' he added. '(The pope) behaves like 'God's rottweiler' towards theologians with opposing views, but acts like a tame pussycat with his complicit bishops and criminal priests,' Henckens said. SNAP demanded on Wednesday that the pope cancel his plans to meet German victims of sexual abuse by priests, calling the move a 'hollow gesture' and alleging that there were around 300 paedophile priests in Germany, none of whom had been stopped. Last week, SNAP filed a complaint at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, charging high-level church officials with concealing and enabling the sexual abuse of children.
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