Victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church are calling on the Czech government not to enter into an agreement with the Vatican, saying it threatens justice, particularly stipulations in the treaty which would extend confessional secrecy, they argued in an open letter made available to CTK yesterday.
The Czech-Vatican treaty was signed in October by Prime Minister Petr Fiala (ODS) and Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin. However, it still needs to be approved by Parliament and ratified by President Petr Pavel.
The treaty briefly states that the Czech Republic recognises confidentiality, and that pastoral workers have a right similar to confidentiality under the conditions laid down by law. However, the signatories of the letter note that a pastoral worker could be anyone designated as such by church leaders.
“In view of the painful experience we have gone through, and in view of the experience of secrecy and denial of abuse cases in the Catholic Church, we urge you: stop the negotiation of such a contract!” the letter reads.
Among the signatories are Ladislav Koubek and Jirina Koci, who also signed a petition in February demanding the establishment of an independent commission to map cases of sexual violence in the Catholic Church. Both have previously described their personal experiences of sexual abuse by priests to Seznam Zpravy.
The authors of the letter argue that the Church can already effectively hide behind confessional secrecy in the current system. The treaty, they say, will help those in the Catholic Church who wish to protect paedophiles to use and abuse confessional and pastoral secrecy as a practical barrier to investigating child sexual abuse.
“This is a publicly stated omerta between the state and the church,” the letter states. “Even today, the police do not dare to investigate in dioceses and shrug their shoulders when priests tell them they cannot testify because of confessional secrecy. Now they want to protect ‘church workers’ with this secret, i.e. anyone the church says.”
They said it was fair and necessary that the rights of the victims be fulfilled and their demands heard before an agreement is made. “At the same time, we insist that any extension of confidentiality to other persons arbitrarily designated by the church will make the church a privileged organisation that can effectively hide abuse,” they added.
The Czech Republic is one of the last European countries that does not yet have its relations with the Vatican regulated by treaty. The recently agreed deal enshrines that the Czech Republic guarantees full freedom of thought, conscience and religion in accordance with the legal order. The Czech Republic also guarantees the right to refuse military service and to refuse to provide medical services on grounds of conscience or religion under lawful conditions.
