The editorial of 23 May regarding immediate plans to amend legislation to make reporting of child abuse to the competent authorities mandatory is indeed most welcome. As things stand, leaders of institutions who are aware of, or suspect, child abuse in their organisation are not required by law to report it to civil authorities and they keep all cases under wraps to prevent bad publicity of their institution.

Many cases of cover-ups have been going on in the Church over many years. Catholic officials recruit, educate, ordain, hire, train, transfer and shield priest child predators, then ‘cut them loose’ when the heat gets too intense, letting them walk free to molest again.

In 2000 I gave my testimony to the Curia Response Team about an “allegation” I knew of. Dissatisfied with the lack of follow-up, I started writing in newspapers about the problem. In 2006, shortly before retiring, Archbishop Mercieca called and asked me to meet him. I went along with my husband. Archbishop Mercieca showed me a file he had with my letters to newspapers. At first he said that I had no proof of what I was writing about. When I held my ground, he told me that the priest in question (whom he named) had done so many ugly things that he had sent his file to the Vatican and the priest had been suspended more than a year before.

I invited the Archbishop to issue a press release so that parents would know and keep their children away from the priest. He told me he would ask for advice. No information was ever published.

Fact is Church officials know where the abusive priests defrocked by the Vatican are living. No safeguards are in place to prevent these abusive priests from preying on children. Giving sex offenders privacy is dangerous. The Archdiocese should provide photographs of all priests who have been credibly accused of abusing minors, and should also list their previous church assignments. Archbishop Cremona must immediately release the names of all credibly accused priests. Every day that goes by, children are at risk.

When one knowingly allows a child to be put in harm’s way, that person is guilty and should be held accountable at law. How in the world did bishops miss the obvious fact that you could not place a known child abuser near children and expect him not to offend again? How did they not know that allowing an abusive priest to continue working in his priest’s collar meant giving him a badge of trust that helped him victimize still more children?

It is high time that mandatory legislation to report child abuse is in place the soonest possible.

Louise Vella

MOSTA