Sexual abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church reached 'epic proportions'
On February 13, the final report of the Independent Commission for the Study of Sexual Abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church will be released.
In October, the commission had already validated testimony from 424 witnesses, but most had already expired in legal terms.
However, Pedro Strecht, President of the Independent Commission for the Study of Sexual Abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church, says what they have is compelling: "The witness reports present a lot of identical information, a fact that reinforces the consistency of the testimonies and outlines serious situations existing over decades that become more evident the further you go back in time, and in some places, they assumed truly epidemic proportions."
The initial figures presented by the commission came as no surprise to those who work in the field of sexual abuse in Portugal, including Carla Ferreira, a technical adviser to the board of the Portuguese Association for Victim Support (APAV).
"It's a significant number, but we have to be aware that this number is just 'a drop' in this area, explained Ms Ferreira. "We already have this notion in relation to a more general perspective of sexual abuse, that is, we have a clear perception that only about a third of situations are formally reported."
https://www.euronews.com/2023/02/03/sexu...roportions
On February 13, the final report of the Independent Commission for the Study of Sexual Abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church will be released.
In October, the commission had already validated testimony from 424 witnesses, but most had already expired in legal terms.
However, Pedro Strecht, President of the Independent Commission for the Study of Sexual Abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church, says what they have is compelling: "The witness reports present a lot of identical information, a fact that reinforces the consistency of the testimonies and outlines serious situations existing over decades that become more evident the further you go back in time, and in some places, they assumed truly epidemic proportions."
The initial figures presented by the commission came as no surprise to those who work in the field of sexual abuse in Portugal, including Carla Ferreira, a technical adviser to the board of the Portuguese Association for Victim Support (APAV).
"It's a significant number, but we have to be aware that this number is just 'a drop' in this area, explained Ms Ferreira. "We already have this notion in relation to a more general perspective of sexual abuse, that is, we have a clear perception that only about a third of situations are formally reported."
https://www.euronews.com/2023/02/03/sexu...roportions
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
