Publicity Trumps Kids’ Safety: SNAP Knew About Abuse Claim Against Chicago Priest ‘For Several Weeks’ But Did Not Call Police; Instead It Held a Press Conference, TheMediaReport (April 29, 2014)

Publicity Trumps Kids’ Safety: SNAP Knew About Abuse Claim Against Chicago Priest ‘For Several Weeks’ But Did Not Call Police; Instead It Held a Press Conference

TheMediaReport
April 29, 2014

http://www.themediareport.com/2014/04/29/snap-publicity-before-kids/

Microphones before victims: SNAP founder and president Barbara Blaine

The anti-Catholic pressure group SNAP sets the bar very high in its purported quest to protect children from abuse – or it least when it comes to the Catholic Church.

In the past, SNAP's hysterical founder and president, Barbara Blaine, has said that it is "reckless" and "irresponsible" for Church officials to fail to call law enforcement and keep an accused cleric in ministry "even for one day" before calling police and yanking an accused cleric out of ministry.

But if nothing else, SNAP is rich in hypocrisy. So it should come as no surprise that, according to an Archdiocese of Chicago press release, SNAP did not call police or alert Church officials even though it knew "for several weeks" about a shocking sex abuse allegation against a Chicago priest.

Rather than acting according to its purported mission to protect children, the group instead held a press conference, strategically timed for a slow news day on the Monday after Easter. The conference was led by Blaine herself, who in the past has personally written a letter of support on behalf of a man arrested with over 100 images of kiddie porn on his computer.

Publicity first, safety of kids last

Blaine's latest publicity stunt only adds more evidence to the fact that SNAP is not really about protecting children but actually about pummeling the Catholic Church in order to advance its own political agenda.

Here we have Blaine not only not calling the police about an abuse allegation against a priest – and thereby "endangering children" by her own standards – but instead withholding information until she felt it was an opportune time to hold a press conference and generate some more free publicity for SNAP.

What's more: This is not the first time SNAP has pulled a stunt just like this. As we reported back in 2011, SNAP knew about a Los Angeles priest still in ministry who had been accused of an inappropriate relationship with a teenage girl back in the 1960s. But rather than immediately calling law enforcement or alerting the Church, it took its information to the New York Times, who then dutifully trumpeted a big story that was embarrassing to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

The time is long overdue for the media to reveal the truth about SNAP and its hypocrisy when it comes to reporting abuse. We especially call on Manya Brachear, religion reporter from the Chicago Tribune, who has regularly enabled SNAP by giving them free publicity.