Vatican-backed Catholic research institute IADC is expanding its research into abuse in the church. Sexual and spiritual abuse of adults is also being investigated. So far, the institute has only looked at minors.
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Hans Zollner, one of Pope Francis’ top advisers on abuse, said the broadening of the investigation reflects the lessons of the #MeToo movement. He also referred to the Pope’s acknowledgment that nuns and seminarians can also be abused by their superiors, and that structural problems in the church have allowed abuse to proliferate.
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Facing Abuse
“We can no longer just look at individual problems. We also need to look at the institutional conditions that promote abuse or block a safe environment,” said Zollner, who founded the Center for Child Protection in 2012. It has now been merged into a new protection institute at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome: the IADC.
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Why is it so hard to see reality?
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“I’ve always struggled with the question: why do people within the Catholic Church find it so difficult to acknowledge the existence of abuse among us perpetrated by the clergy?” Zollner said. “Why is it so difficult to accept that? , to see the reality? Because you still have people who deny this reality and say: we have no cases.”
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The IADC head stressed that the institute still has child protection as its core focus, calling child sexual abuse “the most horrifying thing you can think of.” But, now that the investigation has broadened, more cases can be investigated, he explained.
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Cologne Cardinal
Not so long ago there was a fuss about the actions of Cardinal Woelki in Cologne in abuse cases. Research has shown that over three hundred children in the diocese have been sexually abused by more than two hundred possible suspects in recent decades. Woelki himself was cleared of abuse.
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The Pope announced at the end of last month that he don’t fire, but on a five-month contemplation leave. He accused the cardinal of making ‘major mistakes’ in dealing with allegations of sexual abuse in his diocese.
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