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SYDNEY: The scandal over child sex abuse by Catholic priests flared
again Wednesday as Pope Benedict XVI prepared to take center stage
at the world’s biggest Christian festival in Sydney.
While more than 200,000 young pilgrims attended
beach concerts, barbecues and religious classes, the head of the
church in Australia Cardinal George Pell faced a threat of
confrontation by the parents of two victims of abuse.
The pilgrims are in Sydney for World Youth Day
celebrations, which will be led by the Pope from Thursday at the end
of his four-day holiday at a retreat on Sydney’s outskirts.
But the scandal over sex abuse by corrupt
clergymen has partly overshadowed the festival, despite the pope’s
pledge to apologize to victims as he did in the United States in
April.
The father of two girls abused by a Melbourne
priest, one of whom committed suicide, has said he and his wife
would travel back to Australia from Europe within the next few days
for a confrontation.
Anthony Foster told the Australian Broadcasting
Corp. he would not accept an apology unless the Pontiff also changed
the way the church and its lawyers dealt with victims of sex abuse.
“I want them to set up a system which provides
lifetime help to victims, a system where they beg forgiveness of the
victims,” he said.
Foster said he planned to make a public
statement when he arrived and would demand a response from the Pope
and the head of the Roman Catholic Church in Australia, Cardinal
George Pell.
He said he hoped the pope would meet him to hear
his demands for the church to adopt a new approach to the victims of
abuse.
“I should not have to try to see them. They
should be coming to us to beg our forgiveness,” he said.
Foster’s 26-year-old daughter, Emma, committed
suicide this year after struggling to deal with abuse by a priest
while she was at primary school.
Her sister Katie was also abused and turned to
alcohol in her teens before being left brain-damaged after being hit
by a car while drunk, the broadcaster reported.
The priest involved, Fr. Kevin O’Donnell, died
in 1997 after serving time in jail for multiple sex offenses, but
the Fosters had to fight an eight-year legal battle for compensation
from the church for the abuse, ABC said.
World Youth Day coordinator Bishop Anthony
Fisher told reporters at a regular briefing that most people were
focusing on the positive aspects of World Youth Day “rather than
dwelling crankily as a few people are doing on old wounds.”
But Pell later described the story of Emma
Foster as “tragic,” saying he apologized to her and her family
in 1998.
“I met with her parents. We offered them some
financial help. We also offered them counseling,” he told
reporters.
Broken Rites, a support group for victims of
church-related sexual abuse, says that 107 Catholic priests and
religious brothers have been sentenced in Australian courts on sex
charges.
-- AFP
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