US watchdog launches database on Catholic priests accused of sex abuse of minors in the Philippines
US watchdog launches database on Catholic priests accused of sex abuse of minors in the Philippines
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A United States-based watchdog on Wednesday launched an online database on more than 80 Roman Catholic priests who have been accused of sexually abusing minors in the Philippines and said the silence of Filipino bishops on the crimes amounted to a cover-up.
The Philippines is the third-largest Roman Catholic nation in the world, and public discussions of sexual assaults by members of the clergy, who are revered especially in rural regions, has long been generally muted. None of the 82 members of the clergy, including seven bishops, who have been included in the new online database on clergy sexual abuses by the group BishopAccountability.org had been convicted in any Philippine court.
The database featured their faces, names and details of their alleged sexual assaults on minors, some of which dated back more than two decades ago. The nonprofit said that it had also set up such online databases on Catholic clergy abuses in the U.S., Argentina, Chile and Ireland.
Anne Barrett Doyle, a director of BishopAccountability.org, said that the long silence of bishops in the Philippines encouraged such sexual assaults by members of the clergy. She asked Philippine prosecutors to investigate church officials, who failed to report abuses.
"Philippine bishops feel entitled to their silence. They feel entitled to withhold information about sexual violence toward minors. They feel entitled to defend accused priests,” Doyle said at a news conference in Manila. “What we hope to achieve is raise awareness,” she said. “Secrecy only benefits the perpetrators. Secrecy equals complicity.”.
