Call for action against molesters

BARBADIAN Roman Catholic Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers supports action against Catholic priests found guilty of child molestation.  “Even one child molested is one child too many,” he told the Daily Nation in an interview.Reacting to the scandals surrounding child molestation in the church, Burke-Sivers said: “Unfortunately, we are talking about a small group of priests who did this up to 20 or 30 years ago, and even though these things happen, and they happen in all the churches, not just the Catholic Church, what you cannot lose sight of is that the people who do this are not living in accord with what the Catholic Church teaches.”He also did not absolve from blame, those priests who moved around offenders. “Even the malfeasance of bishops who may have moved people around or knew certain things were going on and did not act appropropriately, they are not in accord with what the church teaches.”The son of Barbadian calypsonian Harold Lord Sivers has been a permanent deacon in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States for almost eight years. He hosts three programmes on the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) broadcast around the globe.He was here for last weekend’s celebration of the patronal feast of Our Lady Queen of the Universe Roman Catholic Church, Black Rock.The deacon led a two-day session of workshops designed for men, young people and families of the Roman Catholic Church.He challenged men to “get back on track” towards responsible living, and urged young people to reject a culture that “is full of moral relativism”. Burke-Sivers is founder and director of Aurem Cordis, a Christian envangelisation and apologetics organisation dedicated to the promotion and dissemination of Catholic values, principles and teaching.He is a Benedictine Oblate of Mt. Angel Abbey, living in that monastic community in his early 20s. He, however, left and subsequently married.Burke-Sivers is director of public safety at the University of Portland, Oregon. (GC)