By Christie Weeks

Consultant to the VIRTUS® Programs

We are approaching the fifth anniversary of the Charter to Protect Children and Young People, the landmark document written and adopted in June 2002 by the members of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. The Charter was designed to provide a comprehensive approach to preventing and managing child sexual abuse: reporting allegations; response and care for victims, their families and affected communities; establishment of ethical and behavioral standards for ministry; provision of safe environments for children and young people; and the recruitment, training, and education of seminarians, priests, and other ministers.

In particular, Article 6 of the Charter states, “While the priestly commitment to the virtue of chastity and the gift of celibacy is well known, there will be clear and well-publicized diocesan/eparchial standards of ministerial behavior and appropriate boundaries for clergy and for any other church personnel in positions of trust who have regular contact with children and young people.” This article goes beyond mere assumption of adherence to chastity and celibacy on the part of priests. It requires the development and broad distribution of clear-cut written expectations of responsible actions by ALL who have regular contact with children and young people in Catholic parishes and schools.

Gratefully, the Report on the Implementation of the Charter to Protect Children and Young People states that all dioceses and eparchies that participated in the 2005 audit were found to be compliant with Article 6¹. Among our next questions may be: Does this mean we can rest on our laurels? If not, what more can be done? Are there ways we expand the influence of this particular policy which insists on having written standards of behavior?

Thankfully, many child-serving organizations have policies regarding how adults interact with children and have set clear parameters. Some, like the Catholic Church, had to candidly address these issues after incidents of the abuse of children in their care were revealed. Within our society, however, there remain organizations and businesses that have only vague, if any, written policies. Thus, the efforts of parents, grandparents, employees, volunteers, and everyone concerned about the welfare of children are still needed to demand safety for those who are vulnerable. What should those efforts be? They may include:

• Asking if the child-serving business or organization has written policies and procedures regarding the safety of children;
• Inquiring how and to whom those policies are disseminated;
• Learning whether ongoing abuse prevention training is required of employees/volunteers, in addition to training on how to recognize and report abuse that has already occurred; and
• Calling for consistent application of policies and procedures, including monitoring and reporting of employee/volunteer compliance.

We know that even if all incidents of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church can be eliminated, there will still be many victims in our world. By publicly sharing her response to this grave problem, we believe that the Catholic Church can demonstrate the value of “establishing permanent polices and procedures that lay a foundation for a future in which all within and outside the Church can have confidence.²”

¹ http://www.usccb.org/ocyp/OCYPREPORT.pdf

² Dr. Patricia Ewers, Chair, National Review Board,  http://www.usccb.org/ocyp/OCYPREPORT.pdf