Healing Mass offered for abuse victims

By Andrew Junker, The Catholic Sun
March 15, 2007

Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted will celebrate a Mass for Healing and Reconciliation for victims of abuse 6:30 p.m., March 29, at Sacred Heart Parish in Prescott.

The Mass will be an opportunity “to have people come forward from the community who would like to pray for these folks, whether they were abused by clergy or a lay volunteer or anyone else,” said Jean Sokol, director of the diocesan Office of Child and Youth Protection.

“We want the whole community to come together in prayer, because when it comes to sexual abuse, or any kind of abuse, it’s bigger than any of us can ever be,” she added. “We have to give it to God in prayer.”

Bishop Olmsted said he recognizes how difficult it is for victims of abuse to maintain their faith in the Church or even God.

“Whoever has been abused finds it especially hard to trust again. If persons have been abused by someone in the Church, it is not uncommon for them to find it hard to pray and worship with others in a parish, or even to trust in God,” the bishop said.

He hopes that through this Mass, “God will grant the grace for trust to be rebuilt and will bring healing and new hope to those who have suffered.”

This will be the third such Mass offered by the Diocese of Phoenix.