NY - Victims blast NY Catholic officials & school
For immediate release: Monday, Sept. 23, 2013
Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 566 9790, [email protected])
Shame on every single employee of St. Francis Prep School and the Franciscan Brothers of Brooklyn. They’re using junk yard dog lawyers to force a child sex abuse victim to publicly reveal her identity.
For decades, Catholic officials have deliberately used inexcusable and mean-spirited tactics to intimidate victims, witnesses and whistleblowers into staying silent about clergy sex crimes and cover ups. But there’s no more inexcusable and mean-spirited tactic than this one – insisting that a victim of a heinous, invasive and devastating child sex crime disclose her name.
Shame on every Catholic official involved. Every single church or school employee who doesn’t publicly denounce this viciousness basically condones it and should be ashamed of himself or herself.
We admire Felicia Mooradian and two others – Mark Evangelista and Elizabeth Cucinotta Sorvillo - who are bravely exposing clergy sex crimes and cover ups. We commend them for their courage. We are glad they realize that they have nothing to be ashamed of and have done nothing wrong. The shame here, and there’s plenty of it, belongs to current and former St. Francis Prep School employees who saw, suspected or knew about Br. Ben O’Reilly’s crimes and ignored or conceal them and who keep quiet about this stunningly callous and hurtful legal assault on the privacy of a child sex crime victim.
Contact - David Clohessy (314-566-9790 cell, [email protected]), Barbara Dorris (314-862-7688 home, 314-503-0003 cell, [email protected]), Barbara Blaine (312-399-4747, [email protected])
Winter Appeal 2023
To our friends,
2023 has been a long year with many ups and downs for us all. As we close out the year, we at SNAP hope that you are feeling like you are on your way to being healthy, fulfilled, and happy. This past year has brought both successes and challenges. Thanks to the support you have shown in the past, we’ve been able to celebrate the good days and weather the stormy ones. Now, we are once again asking for your support as we work to support survivors new and old as we ‘Move SNAP Forward.’
At SNAP we are proud to have hosted a very well-attended conference in August 2023. This event allowed us to gather friends, survivors, advocates, and allies for a weekend of camaraderie and connection. We were so happy to be able to welcome many first-time attendees to gather in person and are already looking forward to the next conference.
To strengthen our movement for justice, healing, and prevention, SNAP will be expanding our peer support and providing more volunteer opportunities in the coming year. Through this great work, we are ensuring survivor voices are represented as we work for significant change that will benefit children and survivors.
Right now, survivors worldwide are getting the help they need from SNAP, and more and more reach out to us daily, but we need your help to keep those programs going and get our volunteers the training they need to thrive.
Your tax-deductible gift to SNAP can help offset the cost of our important mission. If you are not in a position to contribute, you can still support us by sharing this letter with those who can. As we continue to fight for survivors across the globe, your donation or sharing the great work SNAP does will help us continue our work to protect the vulnerable, heal the wounded, and prevent abuse.
Your donation ensures SNAP will be there for those who need us more than ever!
Warmly,
Michael W. McDonnell, C.P.S.
Interim Executive Director
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The sexual abuse of vulnerable people by church leaders, according to former priest and Catholic Historian, Rev. Tom Doyle ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwgJn5qikpY ), “…has been a serious issue for centuries. The whole thing [clergy sex abuse incidents] went underground, like a nuclear submarine, in the mid-nineteenth century, and stayed a deep-dark secret – and surfaced again in 1984. There have always been, though, incidences of dysfunctional priests preying on women, on children, on women on men.”
Americans United For Safer Religions’ “SafeWorship Registry” helps society capitalize off our history by putting social safety measures into place that prevent us from reliving the same painful religious episodes from our past. Without your help to launch our 1st-years operational objectives, though, it will not happen and children will go on being abused by trusted pastors and priests. Please support A.U.F.S.R.‘s “SafeWorship Registry” Initiative now. There’s only six more days left on our launching campaign and we still have a long way to go to reach our goal.