Root & Branch: Stand By Me – International Meeting

STAND BY ME
2 – 3.30pm Saturday 7th June London Time
3pm Rome, 6.30pm Mumbai, 9pm Perth, 11pm Sydney, 9am New York, 6am Los Angeles
Sunday 8th June 1am Wellington

Please note a different day and time for this international meeting.
Please Register even if it’s too late or early for you, and we’ll
ensure that you’ll be able to see the video.
You may well remember the case a few years back. Here’s our update.

A former Superior General of a small diocesan congregation (order of religious sisters) in the Punjab, India, bravely disclosed that her bishop had raped and sexually abused her multiple times.  From that moment on her life has been a nightmare.
 
The abuse happened after her three terms as Superior General, when she was the Superior of one of the congregation’s convents in Kerala.  She wrote many times to the Church authorities in India and at the Vatican asking for intervention. Even though the official Church response was silence, her family was threatened and bribed. After waiting more than a year she eventually filed the case with the police. 

For Stand By Me we’ve invited three members of Sisters in Solidarity (SIS) who offer practical, spiritual and emotional support to the Survivor and her religious sister companions, and an activist priest from Save Our Sisters (SOS).

These are co-founders Kochurani Abraham, Astrid Lobo Gajiwala and Virginia Saldanha. All three are from the Indian Women Theologians Forum (a collective of feminist theologians) and they have been walking with the Survivor and her companions since she went public in 2018.

They, and activist priest Fr Augustine Vattoli, will share with us what it’s meant to them to be an ally these past seven years. We will not discuss the case because it is sub judice. 

Penelope Middelboe and husband Jon Rosebank, who travelled to see the Survivor and her companions with Kochurani in February this year, will introduce our gathering. We will hear from the Survivor what it’s meant to find support from so many people when her own congregation and diocese and the local parish has responded with silence or intimidation. 

We are deeply grateful to Survivor Sister and her allies for giving us this chance to truly Stand By Me.
REGISTER HERE for Stand By Me

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