Just weeks ahead of his visit to Belgium in late September. victim of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church penned a letter to Pope Francis appealing for more to be done for survivors.
Published in Le Soir, the letter urges the Pope to understand the survivors' pain and outlines their demands. "Despite your clear and convincing approach on this subject, you have never addressed us, the victims, or more precisely all the survivors," the signatories wrote. "Isn’t it time to send this vital message to the world, which so many shattered lives need, often without realising?"
Pope Francis is set to have a private audience with sexual abuse survivors during his visit to Belgium. "This encounter should not be the end of the story, but rather the beginning of a sorely needed journey of liberation for hundreds of thousands of people," the letter continued.
The letter further proposes numerous "tasks" for the prevention and recognition of sexual abuse within the Church. These include "thorough work" in the dioceses and an "honest effort for information, prevention, and training of teachers, laity and religious". It further calls for profound contemplation on priestly celibacy.
The authors of the open letter emphasise that it was written in the name of "all those who have endured the worst crimes against children under the care of the Catholic Church, both past and present: rape."
The Pope will be in Belgium between 26 and 29 September. Following the announcement of the visit's agenda, the Church was accused of hand-picking the victims who were allowed to meet with the Pope. In a press release from July, the Interdiocesan Press and Information Service stated that no further details regarding Francis' audience with victims would be disclosed until the meeting.
