7 Very Questions to the Catholic Church
The first five of the six questions below illustrate the core of the discrimination of the children of catholic priests. They refer to the different aspects of this discrimination and demand from the catholic church, that it give accurate information about its conduct and about the situation children of priests and their mothers are in. The sixth question refers to a method of this discrimination, that is apparently being used by the Order of the Jesuits in particular.
- How many priests within the catholic church in Europe do to your knowledge / your estimate have children of their own, are there official numbers about that?
- Is it possible for the respective father, and the mother and the child, to openly establish contact with each other, and to then maintain this contact to the extent that they themselves wish?
- Does the priest, the respective diocese, the individual member of an order or the order as a whole, pay child support, and if yes, is this payment made without being attached to conditions?
- What are,in the case of the death of the father, the regulations concerning the inheritance?
In cases where the father was a member of an order: Are the orders prepared, given that its individual members had admittedly vowed poverty, but considering that the order as a whole has made a considerable gain through the often highly qualified and accordingly paid work they did (in universities etc.), to pass on a share of this gain to the children?
What are the regulations in this respect concerning parish priests, which receive above-average income in most countries? Do their children after the fathers death at least receive their statutory share of the inheritance? - Is the catholic church prepared to compensate children of priests and their mothers, to whom human and civil rights have been denied, and to apologize to them?
- On the website www.humanrightsforchildrenofpriests.org, it is described that the Order of the Jesuits coerced a former provincial into a forced marriage with an elderly widow convenient to the order, in order to thwart permanent contact between him and his son, and to make it more difficult for the son to assert his rights to child support and inheritance. The described case took place in Australia, but, before further investigation, at least two similar cases are known from Germany. There too, men who until shortly before had been members of the order of the jesuits, married an elderly widow shortly after the birth of their child, instead of the mother of the child. As one can't help suspecting a method used more often here, I ask you to comment on whether it is certain that the Order of the Jesuits does not use this method any more.
- Im Abschlussbericht seiner Tagung im Februar 2014 hat der ständige Ausschuss der UN-Kinderrechtskonvention den Vatikan ermahnt "die Anzahl der Kinder von katholischen Priestern festzustellen, herauszufinden wer sie sind und alle erforderlichen Maßnahmen zu treffen um sicherzustellen, dass das Recht dieser Kinder ihren Vater zu kennen und von diesem elterliche Zuwendung zu erhalten, respektiert wird", und der Kirche eine Frist bis zur nächsten Tagung im Jahr 2017 gesetzt, diese Ermahnung umzusetzen. Ist Ihnen bekannt was der Vatikan dem Ausschuss hierüber bei der Tagung 2017 berichten wird, und ob es dazu einen Gesprächsprozess innerhalb der katholischen Kirche gibt?
- In the concluding report of it's meeting in February 2014, the pemanent commitee of the UN- convention on the rights of the child exhorted the Vatican " to assess the number of children born of Catholic priests, find out who they are and take all the necessary measures to ensure the rights of these children to know and to be cared for by their fathers, as appropriate“ and set the Vatican a deadline until it's next meeting in 2017 to implement the recommendations of this exhortation. Do you know what the Vatican will report to the commitee at it'smeeting in 2017, and whether or not there is a discussion about this within the catholic church
If you want to support us, you can send a mail, a fax, or a letter with those 6 questions to
- the President of the commission of the bishop's conference of the European community
Adrianus van Luyn
comece@comece.org and/or bureau@bisdomrotterdam.nl
Fax: 0032 (2) 230 33 34
COMECE, 19, Square de Meeûs, 1050 Brussels, Belgium
- You can find a suggestion for your mail, fax or letter to the commission here -
- the Superior General of the Order of the Jesuits
Adolpho Nicolas
curgen@sjcuria.org
Fax: 0039 06 6868
Curia Generalizia, Borgo Santo Spirito 4, 00193 Rome, Italy
- You can find a suggestion for your mail, fax or letter to Mr. Nicolas here -
- the provincial of the Australian Order of the Jesuits
Steve Curtin
info@jesuit.org.au; and/or steve.curtin@pacific.net.au;
Fax: 0061 3 9810 7388
or to the
President of the Jesuit conference os East Asia and Oceania
Marc Raper
mark.raper@pacific.net.au
Fax: 0063 2 426 5974
(The Australian jesuits are listed separately here, as they are known to have used the method of the forced marriage that question number six refers to.)
- You can find a suggestion for your mail, fax or letter to Mr. Curtin and Mr. Raper here -
and demand an honest answer to the questions.
If you want to send one mail to all addresses, you can use this one.
Additionally, you can also send a letter with the questions in German to church institutions in Germany.
You can also draft your own letter of course, and you could again refer to the demands that are stated in our online-petition.