Washington D.C., Sep 9, 2018 / 01:00 pm (CNA).- When speaking to their children about sexual abuse scandals in the Church, parents should listen to their children’s concerns and be careful to not to make assumptions, experts told CNA.
When discussing the issue of abuse, “the first step is to be sensitive [to] the age and stage the child’s in,” Dr. Gregory Popcak, founder and executive director of the Pastoral Solutions Institute, told CNA.
“Certainly, a kindergarten age child would not need to know as much as an adolescent would, or even a middle schooler.”
When broaching the issue, Popcak said that parents should ask their children about what they understood about what they had heard, or what they think had happened.
Parents should determine what their children actually know before they ask them what they think about the situation, explained Popcak. He suggested parents ask questions to help frame the discussion, giving examples like “When you heard that, what does that mean to you?” and “What did you make of that?” to try to discern where to begin discussing sexual abuse.
Younger children especially may not know how to put their feelings into words. Popcak suggested that parents should provide multiple choices of answers, such as “scared,” “sad,” or “confused.” It is paramount in this type of conversation to identify a child’s knowledge, understanding, and reaction to a situation, he said, so a parent can address the child’s main concern.
Parents, he explained, tend to “get really anxious and sometimes try to over-solve for the child,” and that this is why it is important to determine what exactly a child needs from his or her parents.
Instead of attempting to over-explain or resolve a problem, Popcak said the most important thing a parent could do is to reassure their child that while they may be afraid or confused, their parents will be there to look out for them and to protect them. Small children should also be reminded that they can and should go to their parents to talk about things that upset them or make them uncomfortable.
Roy Petitfils, a licensed professional counselor who has worked with teenagers for the past 25 years, agreed with many of Popcak’s points. He told CNA that he would advise parents to carefully consider their children’s age before beginning to discuss the abuse crisis, saying that younger children simply don’t need or want to know more than is necessary, or they may be oblivious to everything.
“Not everything that can be said should be said. Just because it’s happened or is happening doesn’t mean they need to know all about it,” Petitfils said to CNA.
“As parents our role is to allow our kids access to age-appropriate information.”
Petitfils also said that parents should not attend therapy sessions with their children, as adults handle feelings and emotions differently than children. Adults “should not process [their] feelings with young people, because it will only add to their anxiety and confusion,” he explained.
Parents should instead strive to validate the thoughts and feelings of their children, Petitfils said. They could say things like, “It makes perfect sense to me that you’re angry, scared and confused about all of this,” and explain that these feelings are normal.
Coming to terms with the trauma of sexual abuse in the Church affects Catholics of all ages. But while parents may themselves be upset by reading graphic accounts of some cases, it is very important that they keep their emotions in check when talking about it with their children, Petitfils said. Otherwise, this may make the situation worse.
“Telling your child you’re angry in a calm, but serious tone is helpful. Screaming, stomping and slamming things while you’re angry will only frighten and confuse your child even more.”
If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!
Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.
The Adoration Chapel at St. Peter’s Catholic Church in Beaufort, South Carolina. / Photo Credit: Aaron Miller, Miller Design & Marketing
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 20, 2023 / 05:00 am (CNA).
“Awesome. Awesome.”
That’s how Anna Sudomerski, the communications coordinator at St. Peter’s Catholic Church in Beaufort, South Carolina, describes the parish’s eucharistic adoration program.
St. Peter’s is among the parishes in the United States that are hosting perpetual eucharistic adoration with the Blessed Sacrament exposed 24 hours a day.
Since Church law dictates that exposition of the Blessed Sacrament requires at least one adorer present at all times, this means the parishes that opt for this extraordinary form of worship must coordinate a major year-round effort to ensure at least one volunteer is present before the Eucharist every hour of the day.
Eucharistic adoration, whether exposed or reserved in the tabernacle, is an ancient custom of the Church dating back to its earliest centuries. Yet its practice today occurs among flagging faith in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, with U.S. Catholics signaling a growing reluctance to believe that Jesus is truly present in the Blessed Sacrament.
Yet multiple parishes around the country in recent years have maintained vibrant adoration initiatives, including St. Peter’s, which began its perpetual adoration in the early 1990s.
Sudomerski said the St. Peter’s adoration program started at the parish’s original historic church in downtown Beaufort. With the construction of a new church building in 2006, adoration moved to a purpose-built chapel there.
For years, Sudomerski said, the adoration program was run by team captains who each supervised a specific stretch of hours within a given 24-hour period.
“They were in charge of certain times, like from midnight to 6 a.m., in case the adorer could not make it, so the captain would have to find a substitute or cover the hour themselves,” she told CNA. “We had four team captains covering midnight to 6, 6 to noon, noon to 6, and 6 to midnight.”
She said the church’s adoption of the sign-up software Adoration Pro “made it a lot easier for people to sign up.”
“From there, ever since, we’ve done several campaigns,” she said. “One to pass out interest forms to see who would be interested in what hour. We just finished another campaign because Father thought the Eucharist is the most important thing that we have. We’ve done callouts, mailings.”
Light of the World Catholic Church in Littleton, Colorado
Kathryn Nygaard, the communications director at Light of the World Catholic Church in Littleton, Colorado, outside of Denver, said the parish has maintained an adoration program since 2007.
“There are two parishioners who are the main adoration chapel coordinators and they do an incredible job,” she said. “In addition, there are 24 ‘hourly coordinators’ to assist with making sure substitutes fill in during open hours and communicating with the adorers in their specific hour.”
“There are approximately 270 people involved in adoration, as either regularly scheduled adorers or as substitutes,” she said. The church hosts two “renewal weekends” in February for adorers to re-up for the coming year; regular announcements are also made at weekend Masses to attract more interest.
Adorers at Light of the World use the church software Flocknote to communicate with one another, Nygaard said. “Most requests for substitutes are filled within 1-2 days,” she noted.
Bishops aim to ‘start a fire’ of eucharistic renewal
The U.S. bishops last year launched the National Eucharistic Revival, meant to “start a fire” of eucharistic devotion among Catholics in the United States. The initiative was first conceived following the 2019 Pew poll showing low numbers of Catholics with a belief in the Real Presence.
As part of the three-year program, parishes around the country have been encouraged to launch Eucharist-focused programs and events to draw parishioners into a deeper relationship with Jesus through the Blessed Sacrament.
Next year, the bishops will host a National Eucharistic Congress featuring multiple high-profile Catholic speakers along with what is expected to be a crowd of about 80,000 Catholics. Pope Francis in June called next year’s national congress “a significant moment in the life of the Church in the United States.”
St. Bonaventure Catholic Church in Columbus, Nebraska
At St. Bonaventure Catholic Church in Columbus, Nebraska, worshippers have been keeping perpetual adoration there for more than 62 years — since Feb. 14, 1961, according to a live clock on the parish’s website.
The exposed Blessed Sacrament at St. Bonaventure Catholic Church in Columbus, Nebraska. Credit: Tim Cumberland
The parish on its website says the roots of its adoration program go back to 1949 and expanded thereafter. The program now includes worshippers from other nearby parishes who come to participate in adoration.
Parishioner Tim Cumberland told CNA the church is “blessed to have about 550 people in the program.”
“A few years ago, we went to an automated process of managing our perpetual adoration program, using the Adoration Pro software,” Cumberland said. “This has greatly improved our ability for our adorers to find subs online when necessary. A request for a substitute is usually filled within minutes.”
Kim Waller said the 25-year-old adoration program at Holy Infant Catholic Church in Ballwin, Missouri, still uses a coordinator-led sign-up program instead of an online sign-up. Like many programs, Holy Infant breaks down management of the adoration schedule into hourly segments.
“The 24 hourly coordinators form the backbone of perpetual adoration,” she said. “They ensure that there is at least one adorer present in the chapel at all times. The hourly coordinator reviews the sign-up list weekly to ensure that their committed hourly adorer fulfills his/her commitment and contacts the adorer if she/he has not been to adoration as committed for two consecutive weeks.”
A new team of coordinators just took over in January, Waller said. “The last several years, the ministry was administered by a couple who since have passed within six months of each other,” she said.
St. Mary Help of Christians in Aiken, South Carolina
Donna Pierce told CNA she helped launch the 24/7 adoration program at St. Mary Help of Christians in Aiken, South Carolina, roughly 30 years ago.
“I think we have about 10-15 people who have maintained their Holy Hour since it began, and currently we have 318 weekly adorers and about 60 substitutes, not counting the many people that pop in the chapel when they can,” she said.
Pierce said a priest from a perpetual adoration apostolate helped the parish launch the program. “He told us that having perpetual adoration is actually much easier to run than a 40-hours or other time frame,” she said. “Adorers incorporate their hour into their schedule, so you don’t have to keep signing up from scratch.”
The exposed Blessed Sacrament in the St. Claire Chapel at St. Mary Help of Christians in Aiken, South Carolina. Credit: Lori Rainchuso
She said the parish maintains participation in the program by way of biannual talks at Masses (which Pierce described as “our fall and Lent blitzes”). These efforts usually result in upwards of a few dozen sign-ups.
On the website for the National Eucharistic Revival, the bishops say that the current year of the program is focused on “fostering eucharistic devotion at the parish level, strengthening our liturgical life through the faithful celebration of the Mass, eucharistic adoration, missions, resources, preaching, and organic movements of the Holy Spirit.”
Catholic evangelist Tim Glemkowski in a video for the revival urged parish leaders to “prioritize personal encounters with Jesus in the Eucharist” over the course of the year.
“The heart of this invitation … is to create space in our parish calendar this year for people to come and encounter Jesus in the Eucharist personally,” he said. “This could mean parishes that don’t have perpetual adoration start that opportunity, or opportunities for eucharistic processions, or different devotional experiences.”
Pierce said that starting the St. Mary program decades ago was a daunting prospect, but she went ahead with it by putting her trust in God.
“It was terrifying when Msgr. [Thomas] Evatt asked me to be head coordinator to start it so long ago — I was 30 years old with a toddler and working part time,” Pierce said. “So I made a deal with God. He would have to be responsible for sustaining it, and we would just be his instruments.”
“How many, many times he made it obvious he was running it!” she said.
Graces for eternity
St. Bonaventure’s website, meanwhile, predicts that the graces of perpetual adoration will redound not just in the present but for eternity.
“Someday far, far from now, there will be a magnificent heavenly banquet where all of the adorers in the St. Bonaventure adoration program will be reunited,” the parish’s website says.
“Won’t it be wonderful,” the website continues, “for all of us who have been in the program to share stories of how many of our lives, and the lives of those we touched as a result, were radically changed by this personal and enduring encounter with Our Lord!”
Dr. Johanna Olson-Kennedy (third from the left, with president of ABC Entertainment Karey Burke, Caitlin Jenner, and producer Jane Cha Cutler at at fundraiser event for the Center for Transyouth Health and Development-Children’s Hospital on Feb. 1, 2020) is being sued by a woman who says she was rushed into a gender transition. / Credit: Michael Tullberg/Getty Images
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 11, 2024 / 15:35 pm (CNA).
A 20-year-old California woman is alleging that doctors, a children’s hospital, and a pediatric gender clinic negligently pushed her into a hormonal and surgical gender transition beginning when she was only 12 years old in a lawsuit filed late last week.
The lawsuit, filed by UCLA student Kaya Clementine Breen, claims that “her body has been profoundly damaged in ways that can never be repaired” following the hormone therapy and surgeries she received to make her body appear similar to a boy.
Breen was prescribed puberty blockers at age 12 after one visit to a gender clinic, received testosterone at age 13, and had a double mastectomy at age 14 to remove both breasts, according to the court filing. She suffered mental health problems and irreversible physical changes after the procedures.
The lawsuit alleges the doctors failed to properly assess her mental health problems and provided her parents with false and misleading information to encourage the gender transition she now regrets. She is seeking monetary damages for ongoing physical and mental repercussions.
“This so-called ‘treatment’ of Clementine by her providers represents a despicable, failed medical experiment and a knowing, deliberate, and gross breach of the standard of care that was substantially certain to cause serious harm,” the lawsuit asserts.
Immediately prescribed puberty blockers at age 12
According to the lawsuit, Breen first expressed to a school counselor that she felt “life would be so much easier if she were a boy” when she was 11 years old in the fall of 2016. When the counselor informed her parents, they took her to the Center for Transyouth Health and Development at the Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles (CHLA).
Breen was put under the care of Dr. Johanna Olson-Kennedy, the medical director of the center whom she met on Dec. 27, 2016, shortly after Breen turned 12, according to the lawsuit. The suit states that Olson-Kennedy “immediately diagnosed [Breen] with gender dysphoria and told her that she was ‘trans’ … within minutes during her very first visit.”
According to the lawsuit, Olson-Kennedy “immediately” recommended puberty blockers to be surgically implanted into her arm — a procedure Breen received on March 6, 2017.
The lawsuit asserts Olson-Kennedy “performed no mental health assessment” and “did not ask about things like past trauma, abuse, or mental health struggles or diagnoses” before her recommendation. For this reason, Breen’s lawyers allege that Olson-Kennedy did not learn of the “prolonged sexual abuse she suffered around the ages of 6 and 7” or the numerous mental health problems she struggled with, including anxiety, depression, and undiagnosed PTSD.
Breen, the lawsuit states, was “struggling with the thought of developing into a woman, not surprising given the sexual abuse she had suffered.”
A spokesperson for CHLA told CNA that the hospital does “not comment on pending litigation; and out of respect for patient privacy and in compliance with state and federal laws, we do not comment on specific patients and/or their treatment.”
“The Center for Transyouth Health and Development at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles has provided high-quality, age-appropriate, medically necessary care for more than 30 years,” the spokesperson said. “Treatment is patient- and family-centered, following guidelines from professional organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical Association, and Endocrine Society.”
Olson-Kennedy has come under scrutiny after the New York Times reported that she concealed the results of a taxpayer-funded study about the mental health effects of providing children transgender drugs because her research could not find any mental health benefits.
Jordan Campbell, one of Breen’s lawyers, told CNA that Breen was “one of the patients in that study.”
Olson-Kennedy did not respond to CNA’s request for comment.
Both the CHLA and Olson-Kennedy are named as defendants in the lawsuit.
Testosterone at 13, transgender surgery at 14
During Breen’s third visit to the transgender clinic on Sept. 9, 2017, the lawsuit alleges that Olson-Kennedy questioned her about whether boys in her school were going through puberty and recommended that she receive testosterone to “keep you on track.” It adds that Breen “expressed doubt” about testosterone, but Olson-Kennedy told her she “would be more likely to fully ‘pass’ as a ‘cis male.’”
The lawsuit asserts that Breen “hesitantly agreed” to receive testosterone, but her parents “were very much against the suggestion.” It alleges Olson-Kennedy “lied” to the parents and told them Breen was “suicidal” and “if they did not agree to cross-sex hormone therapy, [Breen] would commit suicide.”
“She bluntly asked them if they would rather have a living son or a dead daughter,” the lawsuit asserts. “In tears, [Breen’s] parents would ‘consent’ to allowing Dr. Olson-Kennedy and her team [to] inject their confused, suffering child with life-altering testosterone.”
The lawsuit alleges Olson-Kennedy failed to discuss the “irreversible effects” and did not discuss alternatives. Breen began receiving testosterone on Jan. 26, 2018, when she was 13.
During her sixth visit to the gender clinic on Sept. 5, 2018, the lawsuit states Olson-Kennedy recommended a double mastectomy to remove both of her breasts. It alleges she “misled them by emphasizing the supposed importance of getting such a radical procedure early.”
Breen received the surgery on May 14, 2019, when she was 14. According to the litigation, Breen “had a brief, 30-minute pre-op meeting” with the doctor, Scott Mosser, and was given a consent form that was “facially deficient, including but not limited to failing to disclose the experimental nature of the procedure, failing to list the known risks, and failing to list all alternative forms of treatment.”
CNA reached out to the Gender Confirmation Center, where Mosser is employed, to ask him for comment but did not receive a response by the time of publication. He is named as a defendant in the lawsuit.
Following the surgery, the lawsuit states Breen had “thoughts of suicide” and her “mental health had begun to spiral” with depression and intense anger. She also developed psychosis and had “auditory and visual hallucinations,” attempted “suicide by hanging,” and began “cutting her wrists.”
Campbell told CNA the doctors were “completely ignoring her rapidly decreasing mental health” and acted “negligently” by prescribing “life-altering treatment” to a “deeply troubled, traumatized child.”
The lawsuit states Breen “began to realize that she may not actually be ‘trans’ but rather had been suffering from PTSD and other issues related to her unresolved trauma.” She scaled back the testosterone and her mental health issues began to resolve. She eventually stopped taking testosterone.
“Once she stopped, her mental health issues improved even further,” the lawsuit adds. “Her psychosis and hallucinations went away. Her depression went away. Her attention problems went away. Her anxiety went away. She began to have a healthy view of her body. In short, she began to heal.”
Campbell said Breen is trying to “recapture her femininity” and is now taking estrogen to reverse some of the effects of testosterone and intends to get chest reconstruction surgery, but added that “of course, it’s not the same thing as having her healthy breasts.”
“All the damage from the hormones, the surgery, is pretty much irreversible,” Campbell said.
The lawsuit adds that Breen is likely infertile, “would not be able to breastfeed” even if she could get pregnant, and is “at risk for bone-related problems later in life.”
Breen is seeking monetary damages for medical expenses, pain, and suffering, and the cost of the lawsuit. Her lawyers are seeking a trial by jury.
In 24 states, lawmakers have banned transgender drugs and surgeries for children, and two states have banned just the surgeries. Both procedures remain legal in 24 states.
Leave a Reply