Organisers of Pope Francis' summit on preventing clergy sex abuse will meet this week with a dozen survivor-activists who have come to Rome to protest the Catholic Church's response to date and demand an end to decades of cover-up by church leaders.
These survivors will not be addressing the summit of church leaders itself. Rather, they will meet Wednesday with the four-member organising committee to convey their complaints. The larger summit of 180 presidents of bishops conferences from around the world begins Thursday.
Chilean survivor Juan Carlos Cruz, who is coordinating the survivor meeting, told The Associated Press he hopes for a "constructive and open dialogue" and for summit committee members to convey the survivors' demand that bishops stop pleading ignorance about abuse.
"This has to stop," Cruz said. "Raping a child or a vulnerable person and abusing them has been wrong since the 1st century, the Middle Ages and now."
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