Day Five Report on Congregational Conference 2015, Wa.

The FIC General Conference 2015 began its fifth day in Wa with a morning prayer service themed "We Listen to God where life cries out". The focus of our prayer was an awareness of God's created things around us and our responsibility to take proper care of them, including young vulnerable children under our  care. The conference devoted the whole day to resolution 13 of the General Chapter 2012 which deals with prevention of sexual abuse of minors in FIC institutions. The issue of human sexuality has been widely discussed in religious congregations in the past decade. The issue of sexuality later became more serious as a result of the revelation of numerous sexual abuse cases involving minors in Europe and America. So serious was the issue that some of our brothers in Europe were proven to have been involved.  The sexual abuse of minors is considered not a serious misdemeanor but also an irresponsible misconduct on the part of religious. Since FIC deals with children in their apostolic areas, the congregation had to put measures in place to stem this transgression on children in our institutions. As a step further, the General Council 2012 put in place a process of creating an awareness among brothers and co-workers regarding the care and protection of children under our care. The GC therefore charged all provinces to compose a set of rules of conduct for the brothers and co-workers to guide minors. The discussion today centered on what each province has compiled for use in our institutions. 

Each province produced a comprehensive set of guidelines based on the ethical code and ecclesiastical regulations of each locality. The main substance of the documents was set out in topics such as the definition of terms like "abuse" and "minor", effects of sexual abuse on victims, prevention of abuse, obligations of children, teachers and parents and how to deal with abuse cases when they occur.  The sharing of these provincial documents were as enriching as they were informative. We discovered that what constitutes a sexual or offensive act in one society may be seen as an acceptable behaviour in another. A number of relevant comments and suggestions were made for the improvement of each of these documents. In the end all provinces agreed on a clear general structure for the document, namely the "what", "why" and "how".  The "what" refers to the definition of key words regarding the topic. The "why" takes care of the effects of abuse or reasons for child protection; and the "how" should discuss methods used to prevent abuse or deal with cases of child abuse. Concluding issues could take care of role of civil law, canon law and role of the church in matters of abuse of minors. 

Participants also appreciated the positive dimension in which provinces handled the title of the document. Instead of "prevention of sexual abuse of minors," many prefer the term "Child protection Policy" or "rules of conduct for the protection of children". Commendation was also given to some provinces for the time devoted to dealing with this proposal, namely organizing a workshop for all brothers to create awareness and consulting with both civil and church leaders in the composition of the document. All participants realized the huge effort expended in the compilation of the document and therefore gave encouragement and hope for the realization of a credible document for use in our institutions. 

The follow-up of this discussion is that after each province has revised their document, it should be signed by the appropriate authority and a copy forwarded to the GC. The day ended with the usual Eucharistic celebration, where we united our hearts in thanksgiving to God for a day well spent. 

Raphael Besigrinee