Nuns are coming forward to accuse priests and bishops of sexual assault

Nuns are forcing the Catholic Church to face another kind of sexual scandal among its clergy: the abuse of “religious sisters by priests and bishops,” the Associated Press reports.

 

The big picture: The Church has a rocky history of abuse of young children, but the abuse of sisters is a matter the community has “yet to come to terms with.” And in the era of #MeToo, no stone is being left unturned.

 

What’s happening

This isn’t a new problem. However, sisters are now going public with their stories around the world, the AP reports. The Vatican received a report on these issues in Africa in the 1990s, but no serious action was taken.

 

Nuns used to be considered “safe” sexual partners, per the AP, for men in the Church who were concerned about contracting a sexually transmitted disease if he went to women “in the general population.”

 

A leading expert on clergy sexual abuse, Karlijn Demasure, told the AP, priests “can always say ‘she wanted it.’ It is also difficult to get rid of the opinion that it is always the woman who seduces the man, and not vice versa.”

 

Source: Nuns are coming forward to accuse priests and bishops of sexual assault – Axios