ECA GLOBAL NEWS
JANUARY 2021
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Another year is ahead of us and 2021 has certainly brought with it several of the uncertainties and troubling features that lingered throughout 2020 as well as new challenges and opportunities. The phrase “the “new normal” has all of us seeking new ways of adjusting to life under the looming COVID-19 pandemic, such as working from home and safely connecting with family and friends through technologies such as Zoom and many social platforms. Governments and health care workers everywhere are scrambling to get the global pandemic under control and the dire need for the vaccine to be readily available, especially to those most vulnerable, is the urgent call.
In the midst of all of this, ECA is still working to hold accountable those who have violated the rights of children in church settings and ECA is committed to seeking justice for survivors.
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As we begin 2021, Ending Clergy Abuse (ECA) begins its 4th year of fulfilling its mission of ending clergy sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church and providing justice for survivors.
From Argentina to New Zealand, from Poland to Uganda, ECA activists were engaged this past year in the world-wide effort to protect children and young people from sexual abuse. While the focus is the Roman Catholic Church, our international activists report children in all settings are safer as a result of our advocacy.
This quarterly newsletter will provide a summary of our work in 2020 and you can also visit our website for more details at www.ecaglobal.org.
You have made all of our work possible as a result of your past generous contributions. Thank you!
As ECA continues this important work in 2021 please consider a gift at this time to maintain our momentum.
You can donate to our non-profit corporation, Ending Clergy Abuse USA, by sending a check to:
Tim Law
Ending Clergy Abuse
5017 37th Ave SW
Seattle, Washington 98126
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ECA AT WORK–2020:
ECA’s international board meets regularly to plan, set priorities for action, and to communicate with our membership. ECA’s board consists of Sara Oviedo, Ecuador; Denise Buchanan, Jamaica; Simone Padovani, Italy; Adalberto Mendez, Mexico and Tim Law, USA. ECA’S Board.
WHATSAPP GLOBAL JUSTICE: With over 30 activist from 25+ countries and 5 continents, WhatsApp allows us to communicate in real time with each other, to keep us informed about events around the world and allows us respond quickly. Through this platform we can encourage one another and provide emotional support for those fighting daily on the front lines.
ROME, ITALY- FEBRUARY, 2020: 3 members of ECA traveled to Rome for the one-year anniversary of the Pope’s Summit on Clergy Abuse in mid-February. ECA also sponsored 3 Argentine deaf survivors of clergy abuse and their lawyers to come to Rome. They were seeking answers to their abuse cases in documents held by the Vatican and to spotlight Pope Francis’ complicity in their abuse and the cover up of their abuse.
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HIGHLIGHTS OF ECA’S 4TH YEAR
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ECA’S HIGHLIGHTS OF 2020 INCLUDE:
JANET AGUTI OF UGANDA and her groundbreaking grassroots effort to educate local communities about sexual violence and providing services for children and women who are victims of sexual violence; ECA financially supports her important work.
MURRAY HEASELY OF NEW ZEALAND and his successful new podcast, The Reckoning, and his role in convincing the New Zealand government to initiate the Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate institutions, Including the Church, for the historic sexual abuse of its children.
SIMONE PADOVANI (ITALY) and the launch of his PhotoVoice Project and Shutterstock/Alamy Project and for all his contributions to ECA Global.
DENISE BUCHANAN (JAMAICA) and her work with Jamaicans for Justice calling for Parliament to remove the proposed 12-month statute of limitations for reporting sexual harassments in Jamaica.
TIM LAW (USA) and his work with the Seattle based group “Heal Our Church” contend that only full disclosure of the secret files — with a public airing about the archdiocese’s known pedophile clergy members and how the church dealt with them — can ultimately heal the church and rebuild trust within the broader community. See Seattle Times headline.
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LOOKING AHEAD:
In 2021 ECA will continue to support our activists from around the world through social media, press events, financial support for grass root efforts and legal support for hearings before the OAS Inter-American Human Rights Commission and the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child and the Committee on Torture.
We will continue to work through the virtual networks and look forward to the opportunity when we can gather face-to-face to engage as a global collective.
Your continued support is greatly appreciated!
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UGANDA’S SEXUAL ABUSE HOTLINE
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The Totya Platform in Uganda, Africa, has a free and anonymous hotline. The toll-free/hotline is the most used mobile platform by clients for getting psychosocial support. So far sixty seven (67) new users of the toll free line have been registered since February 2020. And with the outbreak of the pandemic, more calls have come in by the day than they used to meaning that the violence is on the rise. Forty two (42) of the calls were made by the neighbors of the victims, six (6) from the local leaders and authorities and the rest are from the clients themselves.
If you experienced sexual violence or know of anyone who has, and you wish to talk to someone, call the hotline:
0800 220 630
(Uganda only)
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PHOTOVOICE PROJECT WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF PADUA
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ECA Board Member, Photographer and Community Psychologist,Simone Padovani, is working with the University of Padua in Italy on a year-long research project to assist survivors of clergy sexual abuse.
Interested participants will be asked to collect a series of pictures accompanied by text that tell their daily life as survivors of abuse. In addition, participants will be interviewed and asked to answer a questionnaire that will investigate the quality of life, resilience, etc., according to the indications of the World Health Organization. A photographic report on the life of the survivor of sexual abuse will be made and sent to the research group of the University of Padua for analysis.
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PHOTO SHARING AND ECA FUNDING OPPORTUNITY
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This project is born to help victims, survivors and friends of ECA Global who would like to help themselves and help ECA raise funds for our projects.
ECA has provided guidelines that will assist you in understanding which kind of images or videos you can produce which can be distributed through 2 agencies: SHUTTERSTOCK AND ALAMY.COM.
We will assist you in how to prepare and send your images for upload to the agency portals and how the financial aspect works.
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Sebastian Cuattromo, Argentina Survivor/Founder,
Adultxs por los derechos de la infancia
“As adult survivors of the crime of sexual abuse and as representatives of our collective association, we are happy to have met new colleagues who, like us, have the conviction to fight to end the sexual abuse of children in the world. It was a great pleasure…
Hopefully we can continue to work together for justice for survivors and for the protection of today’s children.” Sebatián Cuattromo and Silvia Piceda
Founding members of the Civil Association “Adults for Children´s Rights”
Zero Tolerance + Zero Cover Up = Truth and Justice
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BE AN ECA SOCIAL MEDIA AMBASSADOR
ECA’s Social Media Ambassadors Program is an exciting and easy way FOR YOU to get involved with ECA and to encourage existing members who know and love the mission of ECA to spread the word about ECA globally.
ECA will utilize Social Media Ambassadors to direct strong social media campaigns and ECA messages to target specific regions and issues relating to the sexual abuse of children by clergy.
ECA has a number of campaigns in the pipeline and we need you to get involved. Together we will #EnditNOW!
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Signing up is easy!
Here’s how to shop AmazonSmile:
1. Visit smile.amazon.com
2. Sign in with your Amazon.com credentials
3. Choose a charitable organization to receive donations,
4. Select your charity (Ending Clergy Abuse USA)
4. Start shopping!
5. Add a bookmark for smile.amazon.com to make it even easier to return and start your shopping at AmazonSmile!
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While scouring the many deals of Amazon, if you shop via smile.amazon.com, you get the exact same Amazon products you’d normally use, except that 0.5 percent of your purchase goes to a charity of your choice.
Choose ECA and while You shop, Amazon gives.
Go to https://smile.amazon.com/ and choose Ending Clergy Abuse USA as your charity.
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