A Ten Year Progress Report

National Review Board
June 14, 2012

http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/child-and-youth-protection/upload/10-year-report-2012.pdf

[with pdf]

Preamble

In 2002, the bishops of the United States approved the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People. Ten years later, there has been striking improvement in the Church's response to and treatment of victims. Children are safer now because of the creation of safe environments and action has been taken to permanently remove offenders from ministry. Yet, much work still needs to be done. The National Review Board (NRB) offers this report to the bishops and the faithful to highlight both what has been done and what is still needed to be done to protect children and restore trust.

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The Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People begins with the Section entitled: To Promote Healing and Reconciliation with Victims/Survivors Of Sexual Abuse of Minors. It includes Articles 1-3.

In the past ten years over 15,000 victims have come forward to tell the secret they had carried for years; and each year more have come forward. It is impossible to know the final number of victims. The John Jay Study of the Nature and Scope of the abuse found the incidence of abuse began to rise in the sixties, peaked in the seventies and declined sharply in the eighties. 1 (Fig. 1)

The new cases reported yearly continue to fall into this same pattern. The peak of the curve is not moving forward or broadening as time goes on. While it often takes years for 1 Nature and Scope of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests and Deacons in the United States 1950-2002