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
Mexico blasted by UN Child Rights watchdog over child abuse in Catholic institutions
Posted: Fri, 21 Aug 2015 10:52
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has strongly criticised Mexico over "corroborated reports that hundreds of children have been sexually abused for years by clerics of the Catholic Church and other religious faiths".
The Committee is particularly concerned about "the general impunity which perpetrators have enjoyed so far" and "about the low number of investigations and prosecutions of the perpetrators as well as alleged complicity of state officials." It also notes the "lack of complaints mechanisms, services and compensation available to children".
Keith Porteous Wood, the National Secular Society's executive director, said that the Committee's recommendations to Mexico "could hardly have been more direct".
The Committee "strongly urges" Mexico to:
- "Take immediate measures to investigate and prosecute all members of the Roman Catholic clergy and other religious faiths involved in or accomplices of sexual abuse and exploitation of children, and ensure that those found guilty be provided with sanctions commensurate with the gravity of their crime;
- "Provide children victims of sexual abuse with all necessary services for their physical and psychological recovery and social reintegration, and adequately compensate them;
- "Ensure that specific measures taken to prevent sexual abuse by clerics become part of all policies related to violence against children and that empowered children learn how to protect themselves from sexual abuse and are aware of the mechanism they can refer to in case of such abuses;
- "Take concrete measures to raise awareness on this type of abuse in order to overcome social acceptance and taboo surrounding these crimes;
- "Collect disaggregated data related to cases of sexual abuse against children involving the Roman Catholic clergy and provide detailed information in its next report on the convictions and sentences pronounced."
Mr Porteous Wood added: "The Committee should be commended for making these points so strongly, especially given that, as far as can be established from the Committee's website, no specific representations were made to it about this matter by civil society organisations in Mexico.
"We hope that representations made to the Committee about child rape and other violence under the aegis of the Catholic Church worldwide by international abuse victim/survivor organisations, and ourselves, have helped to raise a general awareness of these issues.
"More important, though, is that these latest recommendations are taken seriously and acted upon. The Catholic Church centrally has set a bad example. The Holy See was the subject of even more damning criticism in 2014 , which was reported widely, but the Vatican was dismissive of it.
"There is room for rather more optimism over Mexico following the Committee's recommendations than the Holy See doing so."
In response to the Committee, the Government of Mexico has recognised that there are "many challenges" to "the rights of children and adolescents in the country", and stated that the Government will work to "provide care in a coordinated way in addressing these recommendations".
The Committee's first task in the next review in five years' time will be to check the progress made.
NSS briefs UN committee on state of children’s rights
Posted: Wed, 1 Jul 2015 16:24
The National Secular Society has warned that faith schools are becoming increasingly divisive and inimical to the realisation of children's rights in a submission to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child.
The warning came in a briefing to the pre-sessional working group ahead of the Committee's examination of the UK's progress in implementing the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
In its submission the NSS made recommendations relating to concerns about the way in which faith-based education is impeding the realisation of young people's rights under the Convention.
The UN Committee has previously raised concerns about the extent of segregation in Northern Ireland schools and in its submission the NSS says insufficient progress has been made in addressing this, pointing out that just 7% of children in Northern Ireland currently attend integrated schools.
The NSS also warned that the organisation of education around religious identities in other parts of the UK, fuelled by the Government's free school initiative, is leading to greater religious and ethnic segregation. The submission says the opportunity for schools to play a vital role in building social cohesion is being missed.
In a series of proposals on education the NSS urge the Committee to recommend that:
- Children and young people's access to local schools is never determined by their religious beliefs or activities, or those of their parents.
- All new publicly funded schools are secular in character and truly inclusive and equally welcoming to children of all religion and belief backgrounds.
- Legislation is changed to remove any requirement on children to "take part" in worship and make attendance at collective worship voluntary in all schools.
- Legislation is passed requiring all state-funded schools, including faith based schools, to provide age-appropriate and objective sex education.
The NSS also raised concerns about the prevalence of children being taken out of mainstream education to attend unregistered religious schools without proper regulation or oversight.
The submission said a greater emphasis needs to be placed on ensuring that all children receive an education which allows them to develop to their fullest potential; develops respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; and prepares the child for responsible life in a free society.
To that end the NSS urged the Committee to recommend that the UK Government does everything within its power to ensure that all children and young people attend registered schools which are subject to regulation and monitoring.
The NSS' warnings come as the Children's Rights Alliance for England (CRAE) released an alternative report to a Government submission, welcomed by 76 NGOs, warning that the Government had failed to "fully address" recommendations made by the UN in 2008.
The CRAE report points to emerging evidence of the free school programme leading to "narrow or religiously-based curricula being taught in some places, religious proselytization, unequal treatment and gender segregation" in violation of children's rights to a broad and tolerant education under Article 29 of the CRC.
It notes that "16% of places at state schools are allocated on the basis of religion, despite evidence that religious selection criteria may lead to discriminatory selection of pupils and curtail children's ability to make their own choices over religious beliefs."
In addition to expressing concerns about education and social segregation exacerbated by faith schools, the National Secular Society raised issues around child abuse by clerics and a "consistent pattern" of abuse being covered up by religious institutions.
The NSS called on the Committee to demand that all diplomatic avenues are exploited and pressure is applied to "secure co-operation and the recovery of necessary evidence" held by the Catholic Church.
Because of this, and other large-scale abuse, the NSS has recommended that the Committee call for the UK to introduce mandatory reporting of child abuse, including within religious organisations, and urged that within the "maximum ability of the law" the duty should apply to historic abuse, with severe penalties for non-compliance.
