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Report says 1,100 complaints of child abuse made against Australia's Anglican church

By Byron Kaye

REUTERS

 

Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge departs after giving evidence at the Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney, Australia, February 8, 2017. Picture taken February 8, 2017. AAP Image/Paul Miller/via REUTERS

 

SYDNEY (Reuters) - The head of Australia's Anglican Church expressed sorrow and shame after a government report published on Friday said close to 1,100 people had filed child sexual assault claims against the church over a 35-year period.

 

The interim report, which said most children were aged around 11 when they were abused, came a month after a high-level inquiry into child abuse was told the Australian Catholic church had paid A$276 million ($212 million) in compensation to thousands of victims since 1980.

 

The report, which was published by the same inquiry, the Royal Commission Into Child Abuse, said the complaints identified 569 Anglican clergy, teachers and volunteers as alleged abusers. There were another 133 alleged abusers whose roles at the church were not known.

 

Melbourne Archbishop Philip Freier said he felt a "personal sense of shame and sorrow" at the way the church had apparently silenced victims.

 

"Anglicans have been truly shocked and dismayed (by) the scope of our failure to tackle child sexual abuse within the Church," Freier, the church's primate, said in a statement on its website.

 

A royal commission is Australia's most powerful kind of government-appointed inquiry and can compel witnesses to give evidence and recommend prosecutions.

 

The current royal commission had previously heard that seven percent of Catholic priests working in Australia between 1950 and 2010 were accused of child sex crimes, but few were pursued.

 

The commission's latest report said 1,082 people had lodged complaints between 1980 and 2015 about 1,115 alleged incidents while they were under the care of the Anglican church. Some of the incidents dated back to 1950.

 

The Anglican church had paid A$31 million to 459 of those complainants, the report said. Another report published by the inquiry last month said the Catholic church had paid compensation to about three-quarters of complainants.

 

"It tells us that any processes we had in place did not prevent abusers working in our church, as clergy and lay leaders and, in the roles most trusted to care for our children, as teachers and youth workers," church general secretary Anne Hywood told the inquiry.

 

"We are deeply ashamed of the many ways in which we have let down survivors, both in the way we have acted and the way we have failed to act," she said.

 

The royal commission is due to report back to the government in December.

 

(Reporting by Byron Kaye; Editing by Paul Tait)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2017-03-17

[boomerangutang]

If Aussie Christian authorities respond like Christian authorities elsewhere, there will be a stern looks, maybe a fine, and the issue will be hushed up as much as possible.

 

If you or I did what the clerics did (assuming you're not in the Church hierarchy) we'd get thrown in jail and forced to pay large fine.   

[sanukjim]

18 hours ago, boomerangutang said:

If Aussie Christian authorities respond like Christian authorities elsewhere, there will be a stern looks, maybe a fine, and the issue will be hushed up as much as possible.

 

If you or I did what the clerics did (assuming you're not in the Church hierarchy) we'd get thrown in jail and forced to pay large fine.   

Their response might be "Hey that's only about 31 complaints a year,so that is not so bad.".

[Ian Maxwell]

Well here is even more proof of abuse of trust and authority ! this has always been a taboo subject around the globe but quite honestly its a subject that must be addressed once and for all as this kind of behaviour is disgusting and not tolerated in our modern world and there are legal measures that are in place to deal with such criminals so why are they not implicated ? quite simple because the church themselves are corrupt and it appears above the law so it seems even today sadly !

why not set up a independent investigators to deal with abuse claims to do with clergy and church representatives if they are under suspicion of cruelty or child abuse then they must be investigated and tried in a court of law according to country of origin and while they are investigated the are not allowed any association with children or work with the church in question and all priverlidges suspended until after trial !      

when they are brought to trial and if found guilty they must be fined and defrocked and added to the child molesters/ abusers  register around the world for all to see and must serve sentence in prison for there offences upon there release from prison a probation period must be attached to them and must report and be assed periodically for a set number of years to be determined by the court judge