Offered by Gregorian University, Rome
In October 2017, someone by the name of Franz Marcus from Germany contacted me. He was coming to Delhi and wanted to meet with me.
His letter said:
“I would like to share with you some ideas and experiences about child protection.
“Kindermissionswerk “Die Sternsinger”, the German branch of the Pontifical Society of Missionary Childhood, supports more than 2.000 projects every year to help disadvantaged children in Africa, Asia, Oceania, Latin America and Eastern Europe. We target vulnerable children such as street children, working children, children with disabilities or diseases, refugees, etc.
“One of our concerns is also the protection of children and their prevention from sexual and other abuse. Together with our Holy Father Pope Francis we consider this a huge challenge in all countries worldwide. As a board member and commissioner for child protection of Kindermissionswerk I try to encourage and support measures for child protection of local Churches in different continents.
“In this context we started cooperation with the Centre for Child Protection (CCP) at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome with the purpose of supporting the implementation of child protection measures through education and prevention programs.
“The CCP has developed, partly with the financial support of Kindermissionswerk, an E-learning program on Child Protection. The program offers the necessary tools and knowledge to give professional and adequate attention to the victims of sexual abuse and their families, as well as to establish measures of action to protect minors.
“Our goal is to offer this program to local churches, bishops’ conferences, dioceses, catholic universities, religious congregations and formation centers that are interested in organizing education and prevention courses and form trainers and multipliers for child protection.
“I am grateful for the opportunity to meeting you tomorrow and I am looking forward to it.”
Franz Marcus and I met, and had a very meaningful conversation about this programme.
The online course offered by the Gregorian is free, with a limited number of seats.
Religious, especially formators, who would like to do this course, can contact me for more details—or check their website.
I have gone through their website and checked the programme and its course contents. It is a relevant and praiseworthy initiative from which educators, especially religious and priests, can benefit.
Here is some information from the Programme Website:
The CCP E-Learning Programme
The Centre for Child Protection (CCP) develops a distance learning programme (E-learning) for the safeguarding of minors. An interdisciplinary team of international experts is involved in developing a web-based education programme that offers the knowledge required to professionally and adequately relate to victims of sexual abuse and to their families and to act upon of safeguarding of minors. The programme will be available in six languages: English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish.
Becoming a Partner
The E-Learning programme can be joined by Institutions–such as Universities, Congregations, Seminars, Dioceses, Schools, etc. By linking the E-Learning programme to their educational programme, these institutions become CCP partners. The partners’ institutions will be invited to choose units that are the most useful to their trainees and to combine them with face-to-face sessions organized and held by on-site trainers. By doing so, each partner will be involved in adjusting the content of the E-learning programme according to its cultural, linguistic and legal context, and to its needs.
The Learning-Units
The units are sorted by thematic areas:
- Core Units
- Human Formation
- Theology
- Care
- Systemic Factors and Contexts of Abuse
- Intervention and Prevention
Each unit includes texts, videos, graphics and powerpoints and can therefore address different learning and educational needs. Academic components and recommended readings are also provided for those who wish to implement the programme at an academic level.
The course is free. The number of participants is limited. Those interested can check the website, or write to: crioffice2013@gamail.com
Fr Joe Mannath SDB
