Religious organisations and communities are frequent targets of abusers.
Religious institutions are often well-placed and strongly motivated to cover up incidents of sexual and physical abuse.
We work to hold these organisations to account and get justice for abuse victims and survivors.
Many religious organisations enjoy a close relationship with the establishment and tend to see themselves as above the law. This can increase the risk of abuse, prevent perpetrators from facing justice, and impede efforts to support and compensate victims and survivors of abuse.
Those intent on abuse are often attracted to religious institutions. Such organisations give access to, and sometimes extreme control over, numerous children and vulnerable adults.
When abuse does occur, religious organisations often act to protect the reputation of the institution above the rights of the victim. They may pressure the victim to stay silent and move the perpetrator to somewhere unaware of their reputation.
Many religious institutions also have influence and connections that enable them to evade justice and scrutiny, often for decades.
All forms of abuse, be they sexual, physical or psychological, can cause serious harm. Victims of abuse in religious settings have suffered physical and mental health problems, including addiction, self-harm and suicide.
Abuse can take place in any religious setting. That's why we work at the national and international level to hold religious organisations to account for safeguarding failings, and to ensure victims and survivors can get justice.
Take action!
1. Share your story
Tell us why you support this campaign, and how you are personally affected by the issue. You can also let us know if you would like assistance with a particular issue.
2. Write to your MP
Ask your MP to support our work to end abuse in religion settings
3. Join the National Secular Society
Become a member of the National Secular Society today! Together, we can separate religion and state for greater freedom and fairness.
Latest updates
Survivors say Church hierarchy failing to lead on child abuse
Posted: Thu, 7 Dec 2017 15:05
Survivors and campaigners have accused the Archbishop of Canterbury of being "evasive" and failing to offer "clear leadership" over child abuse.
In an exchange of letters with Gilo, who was sexually assaulted by a reverend in the 1970s and now campaigns for a change in Church culture, Justin Welby declined to commit to accepting mandatory reporting requirements. These would mean Church officials who had reasonable grounds for suspecting child abuse and failed to inform the authorities would be breaking the law.
"As you know, we are now in the middle of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse," he wrote. "I am keen to hear its views and wisdom on the subject of mandatory reporting — which is not as straightforward an issue as is sometimes suggested."
He also said the Bishop at Lambeth would take up the "complex issue" of reopening past settlements from the C of E's insurer, Ecclesiastical.
Gilo said Mr Welby's latest letter was "evasive" and inadequate.
"Stating in vaguest of terms the complexity of an issue does not address complexities," he said. "There doesn't seem any ownership of the crisis, nor recognition that questions such as these need facing at archbishop level, and the clear call of leadership required to shift the Church into structural and cultural change and towards authentic justice."
Mr Welby and Gilo have exchanged letters since October, when the Archbishop publicly apologised for failing to respond to 17 previous letters.
And in a series of responses Gilo has gathered and made public this week, other campaigners including NSS vice-president Richard Scorer supported the call for mandatory reporting.
Mr Scorer, who also belongs to the Association of Child Abuse Lawyers, said: "The Archbishop could do much better than this. He should use his position and wider influence to insist on real change in two key respects.
"First, mandatory reporting, so that those who might otherwise be tempted to collude in the cover-up of abuse know that they have no option but to report it. Second, fair and just reparation for survivors, as part of a wider restorative process, so that the true extent of the harm caused by abuse is properly acknowledged.
"Given the extent of the abuse scandal now revealed in the C of E, the Archbishop owes survivors nothing less."
Baroness Walmsley, who in 2014 tabled the ongoing Government inquiry Reporting and Acting on Child Abuse, said it was a "very simple matter". "If you know or suspect that a child is being abused, or has been abused, you must report the matter to the correct authorities. To fail to do so is to collude with the perpetrator."
Simon Barrow, the Director of the think tank Ekklesia, said the Archbishop's "emollient" response had highlighted "a profound danger: a Church previously in active denial over abuse has now learned to mask institutional damage limitation with polite concern".
Dr Julie Macfarlane, a law professor in Canada and an abuse survivor, said there was "no excuse" for the Anglican Church to refuse to adopt mandatory reporting before the inquiry "almost certainly" required it.
The National Secular Society has called for mandatory reporting of child abuse and criticised the Church's links with Ecclesiastical.
This week the C of E also faced pressure from within to change its approach to the issue. The Dean of St Paul's, Very Rev Dr David Ison, said the Church should set up structures for safeguarding and discipline independent of the bishops. Writing in Christian Today, he said the bishops' ministry was "compromised" because they had to administer both pastoral care and discipline.
Jehovah's Witnesses censured by Charity Commission over treatment of child abuse allegations
Posted: Mon, 31 Jul 2017 10:45
A congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses has been severely criticised by the Charity Commission over its handling of allegations of child abuse.
The regulator said the New Moston Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses in Manchester had mismanaged claims made against a trustee who was subsequently convicted of counts of indecent assault. The trustee has since left the congregation.
In a report published this week, investigators said the trustees had failed to: "fully enforce the restrictions they decided to place on the individual's activities at the charity"; "adequately consider and deal with potential conflicts of loyalty within the trustee body"; or "keep an adequate written record of the decision-making process used to manage the potential risks posed by the individual to the beneficiaries of the charity".
They had also failed to "treat one allegation of potential child abuse as such."
Harvey Grenville, the commission's head of investigations and enforcement, concluded that "the victims of abuse were badly let down by the charity".
"The trustees should have made the victims' welfare their first priority," he wrote. "Instead, their actions and omissions, both in response to allegations of abuse, and in their attitude towards our investigation, fell short of what the public would expect of those running a charity in a modern society."
The report said the trustees "'effectively required' victims to attend a hearing where they had to repeat their allegations in the presence of the abuser. The abuser was also permitted to question the alleged victims.
And the charity did not "cooperate openly and transparently with the commission, adding that the trustees 'did not provide accurate and complete answers' about issues under investigation".
A legal attempt to block the investigation on the grounds of religious discrimination failed. Last year WalesOnline reported that "Jehovah's Witnesses have been accused of ordering the destruction of documents in direct contradiction of an order not to do so from [the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse]."
The commission said the charity had subsequently "improved its child safeguarding policy and its procedures for handling misconduct allegations".
The commission is currently conducting another inquiry into another Jehovah's Witnesses charity, the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Britain. This is examining its child safeguarding policy and procedures further, as they are common to all Jehovah's Witnesses congregations in England and Wales.
Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, commented: "The commission's report represents a thorough analysis of the problems at New Moston, despite the attempts to frustrate their endeavours to uphold charity standards and protect victims.
"Sadly, however, for shortfalls of such seriousness to result only in a slap on the wrist and a pious hope about improved policy speaks volumes about the insufficiency of sanctions. The catalogue of child abuse in institutions is huge and most have been skilled in preventing knowledge of it being reported to the appropriate authorities.
"We therefore need mandatory reporting by those in institutions (including religious bodies) of suspected abuse. This has already been enacted in several countries. It has been proposed and debated in the Westminster Parliament in recent years but attempts to introduce it appear to have stalled.
"We call on the Government to amend the law to incorporate this essential measure to protect children with utmost urgency."
