Pope's Words on Abuse Not Enough, Victim Says

WCSC
April 12, 2014

http://www.live5news.com/story/25230098/popes-words-on-abuse-not-enough-victim-says

[with video]

ROME (CBS) - Pope Francis made his first public plea for forgiveness on Friday for the "evil" committed by priests who molested children and used some of his strongest language yet on the Roman Catholic Church's sexual abuse crisis.

Some, however, say the pontiff's words are not enough. And that they would rather see more concrete action taken against priests accused of child abuse.

Joelle Casteix, an abuse victim and the western director for SNAP, the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, says that Pope Francis is simply following in his predecessors' footsteps.

"This is the status quo. Pope Francis is the third pope to apologize for the sexual abuse of minors. He's doing nothing but continues in the patterns of his predecessors. He is continuing by forming committees, by making apologies, by asking for forgiveness. And he's also following in the path of his predecessors by not doing anything, by not punishing anybody and by not ensuring that what happened to me and other kids isn't still going on," Casteix said.

She also emphasized that the Catholic Church has repeatedly tried to obscure the issue of child abuse by redirecting the discussion away from the central topic of priests molesting children.

"The kids are always forgotten in this. The church does everything they can to make it about money and make it about policies and make it about commissions. But what they forget about are kids like me who where 15 years old, 14 years old, sexually abused, and my perpetrator got me pregnant and gave me a sexually transmitted disease and no one was there to help me," Casteix explained.

Pope Francis said on Friday that the church, which last month named a high-level group on the issue including an abuse victim, had to take a stronger stand on a scandal that has haunted it for more than two decades. And the church indicated there would be repercussions for perpetrators.

Following Pope Francis' plea for forgiveness for the "evil" of priestly child abuse, some abuse victims say they'd rather see actions instead of listening to more words.

"The only thing that would solve all of this is if the Vatican turns over everything they have to external civil and criminal authorities, and if they punish wrong-doers, like bishops who have been convicted or implicated in child sexual abuse. An internal investigation is only going to show the best and the brightest and the most beautiful things that the Vatican wants to show. There's no way that they would willingly hand over and willingly investigate to show crimes that they committed. Only an external investigation will do it. And a committee, an internal committee, can't do that," Casteix said.