Sex-abuse survivor takes leave of absence from Vatican panel

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis sex abuse advisory committee voted Saturday to sideline one of its members, a high-profile abuse survivor who had clashed with the commission over its mission.

A prominent and outspoken British member of a papal advisory commission on sexual abuse by the clergy yesterday refused to step down despite a no-confidence vote, and said only Pope Francis could dismiss him.

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“It is slow. It’s not going to make changes overnight”.

His departure would leave Marie Collins of Ireland as the only abuse survivor on the 17-member commission, which includes clergy members, nuns, academics, social workers and health professionals from throughout the world. And when it was made clear to him that the commission had no mandate whatsoever to deal with individual cases or to investigate cases of abuse, his public statements to the media-for instance in the case of the Chilean bishop-suggest that he took little account of this and clearly thought otherwise. “I was appointed by His Holiness Pope Francis and I will only talk to him about my position”.

“I have not left and I am not leaving my position on the commission”, said British children’s advocate Peter Saunders.

A Vatican official who requested anonymity told journalists the panel will likely be modeled after a similar panel established for Saunder’s United Kingdom organization.

Saunders, head of Britain’s National Association for People Abused in Childhood, would now “consider how he might best support the commission’s work”.

Last week, ahead of the three-day meeting of the commission that started Friday, Saunders challenged Francis to meet with members, saying it would be “outrageous” if the pontiff failed to show. “But if we can change policy and get policies put in place that will stick around the world that will make children safer in the future, then it’s worth making time to get it right”.

Last year, the commission successfully proposed that the Vatican create an in-house tribunal to hear cases of bishops accused of failing to protect their congregations. No bishops are known to have been tried. On the eve of that gathering, however, speaking to the Los Angeles Times, he expressed himself in highly critical terms of Francis, charging that the pope had said “phenomenally damaging and painful things about survivors” in relation to the Chile case, and said that people in that country now see the commission “as a laughingstock” and added that he, too, would consider it meaningless “unless he sacks Barros”. Sexually assaulted as a child by a hospital chaplain, Collins went onto become a leading Irish activist demanding justice for the victims of priestly abuse and a fierce critic of the Catholic Church’s handling of the scandal.

In a statement Saturday, O’Malley said the group’s members had asked Saunders to advise them on possibly creating a victim/survivor panel to help with their work.