Catholic archbishop uses political tiff as teachable moment

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This article was published 18/10/2019 (2150 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BEFORE politicians and the public rush to stereotype all Catholics as abusers, the archbishop of Winnipeg suggests reading a recent national church protocol on protecting children.

The 184-page document, which was released a year ago by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, outlines procedures on dealing with the disclosure of sexual abuse of minors and also emphasizes prevention and pre-emptive action, said Archbishop Richard Gagnon, who has been president of the conference since September.

“If there’s a report of the abuse of a minor, there’s a procedure,” he said, referring to the document Protecting Minors from Sexual Abuse.

“The police are involved right away. The accusations would mean the minister would be removed from active ministry.”

Earlier this week, Liberal candidate Robert-Falcon Ouellette called upon fellow Winnipeg Centre candidate Leah Gazan of the NDP to explain a 14-month-old Facebook post that she shared, which stated “every practising Catholic is complicit in the rape and sexual abuse of children by predatory priests.”

Ouellette said Gazan’s post shows contempt for people’s deeply held beliefs and members of Parliament are expected to represent all members of their riding.

“If it is not acceptable to make such sweeping generalizations about one group, it is not acceptable to make them about any group,” he said in a media release.

On Aug. 21, 2018, Gazan posted a link to an article by Michael Stone, which was published on the religion and spirituality website Patheos.

Stone equates supporting the Catholic Church with supporting the abuse of children. He referred to a Pennsylvania grand jury report on child sex abuse in the Catholic Church, which documented the abuse of more than 1,000 children by 300 priests.

In a statement released Wednesday, Gazan said she reposted the link without any comment or context and promised to change her social media practices.

“Like many people in Canada and around the world, I’m horrified and saddened by the history of sexual abuse within Catholic institutions. I shared on Facebook an article about that abuse with no personal comment. I understand the headline of the article was inflammatory, and I commit, going forward, to provide more context when posting articles from other sources.”

Gagnon said people in the Catholic Church are working hard to change their culture and structures to prevent abuse. They are all too familiar with sweeping statements about them, he said.

“The lived experience of Catholics in their parishes is quite different than what is said in this article,” he said.

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In 1992, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops was the first body within the worldwide Catholic Church to implement protocols to deal with abuse, said Gagnon, and the 2018 protocol updates that first document.

It applies to all Canadian dioceses, parishes, and religious communities.

“We’ve already completed our work in bringing the existing guidelines and protocols in line with the new document,” said Gagnon.

“We’re advancing the work of building a culture of prevention, of awareness, and responsibility.”

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Brenda Suderman
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Brenda Suderman has been a columnist in the Saturday paper since 2000, first writing about family entertainment, and about faith and religion since 2006.

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