
On Jan. 20, 2025, a strong-minded and determined 15-year-old named Jessa (not her real name), who was healed and empowered at the Preda Foundation’s home for abused children, won her case against her grandfather Emmanuel “Lolo Manny” Clave of Del Pilar village, Castillejos town, Zambales, in the Olongapo City Film Court Branch 12 of Judge Gemma Theresa Hilario-Logronio. She did so with the help of prosecutor Bernadine S. Santos.
Clave was convicted of nine counts of qualified rape and one count of qualified rape by sexual assault. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole for every rape count. If that sentence wasn’t long enough for him to repent and ask for forgiveness, he was also given 13 to 16 more years for sexual assault. In addition, he was also fined a total of P815,000.
Santos did a remarkable job in proving the rape and sexual assault committed against Jessa. The defendant denied all the charges and suggested alibis but could not prove them to be true. “Bare assertion of alibi and denial cannot prevail over the categorical testimony of a victim,” Hilario-Logronio wrote in her decision.
The justice Jessa secured from a just judge, with the help of a determined prosecutor, is the first for a child helped by Preda in 2025. In 2024, 27 Preda children won convictions. Their victories give great hope and encouragement to child abuse victims and their families.
United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) Philippines says one in five children has experienced some form of sexual abuse, including online abuse. Three in five suffer corporal punishment inflicted by adults. One in every 100 has been trafficked and exploited in making online sex photos and videos. Unicef says “many children do not speak up or report these incidents because of shame, fear, mistrust or, worse, ignorance. In some cases, the abuse is initiated, perpetuated, condoned or disregarded by their family, school or community.”
Speaking of child abuse, it is far from being eliminated in the Catholic Church. Clerical child sexual abuse is widespread. Some Filipino bishops and priests fail to uphold the teachings of the Church and of Pope Francis and hold clerical child abusers to account in a court of law for their heinous crimes. These clerics offer payments and college education to silence the victims and their parents.
Two experts on this crisis from BishopAccountability.org, the world’s leading research organization on clerical sexual abuse, are in the Philippines to challenge the church’s tolerance of this heinous crime. Some clerics are allowed to continue their ministry or retire without answering for the abuse or helping the victims get justice and healing.
On Jan. 29, the United States-based international watchdog and research group will launch the first database of Catholic clergy in the Philippines who are publicly accused of sexually abusing children. This resource provides detailed summaries and hundreds of sources about allegations against more than 70 priests and brothers. Most are Filipino clerics who allegedly abused children in the Philippines or the US. The list also includes accused American priests who ministered in the Philippines.
The data points to two troubling conclusions about the Philippine church’s response to abuse, says Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org. “Despite countless pledges to support victims and protect children, Philippine bishops still side with accused clergy, and they’re still hiding the true extent of the church’s abuse problem,” she says.
In the Philippines, the names of most accused priests remain hidden, Barrett Doyle says. The 70 accused priests and brothers documented by BishopAccountability.org are only a fraction of the actual number. Barrett Doyle will substantiate this statement at a press conference — to be held at the University Hotel in UP Diliman, Quezon City, on Jan. 29 at 11 a.m. — pointing to comparable data from countries where the church has faced greater pressure to disclose.
“The bottom line: children are still at risk in the Philippine Catholic Church,” says Suzanne Nauman, database manager at BishopAccountability.org
During the press conference, the two researchers will also detail several cases of active Philippine clergymen who are ministering in parishes today despite serious allegations against them. The new database will be posted on BishopAccountability.org during that time.
Founded in 2003, BishopAccountability.org is the largest public archive of Catholic clergy abuse documents in the world. The Philippine database is part of the organization’s long-term project to create a global database of accused Catholic clergy.
We must act on the words of Jesus of Nazareth when he said child abusers should be held to account. In Matthew 18:5, he said: “Whoever welcomes in my name one such child as this welcomes me, and if anyone should cause any one of these little ones to lose faith in me, it would d be better for that person to have a large millstone tied around his neck and he be drowned in the deep sea.” There must be zero tolerance for all child abusers.
END
This column was first published in The Sunday Times (www.manilatimes.net) on January 26, 2025. Print, digital, and online republication of this column without the written consent of the author and of The Manila Times is strictly forbidden.