In a move that caught both sides of the debate off guard, Rep. Margaret Markey has announced that she’ll amend the Child Victim Act to include public institutions as well as private organizations in the bill designed to protect children and punish sexual predators and the institutions that protect them.
A spokesperson for the NY State Catholic Conference seemed dumbfounded when confronted with the news. Dennis Poust, quoted in the NY Times, stated, “This is not what we expected; this is something new.”
An interesting quote from the representative of the NY Catholic dioceses. They wanted to kill the bill entirely by calling it unjust and unfair. Now that the amendment has been offered removing the inequity they are caught in a difficult situation. They have no excuse to keep fighting the bill. That is, of course, if they’re interested in protecting children.
The Catholic Church is in a public relations jam with this new revelation. They can’t appear to oppose the bill now that their main objection has been removed. On the other hand, if the bill passes and becomes law, their secrets and the manner in which they shuffled offending priests around will be exposed.
While anything can happen in politics, this should be a no brainer. The NY legislators should overwhelmingly support this legislation. We’ll see what happens.