Juba, 30 June, 2024 / 11:28 am (ACI Africa).
On the annual celebration of the International Day of the African Child (DAC), which was belatedly marked in South Sudan on June 26, the Director of the Pontifical Mission Societies (PMS) in the country has emphasized the need to pay keen attention to the safeguarding of minors.
In his message for the event marked annually on June 16, Fr. Santo Gaba urged citizens to report all cases of suspected child abuse as a way of promoting the rights of children.
“The Church must see that children are safe because the children are the future of the Church,” Fr. Gaba said in his Wednesday, June 26 message.
He added, “The Catholic Church and the leaders in South Sudan should ensure that children’s dignity and their rights to a dignified life and bodily integrity (are) respected, nurtured and safeguarded.”
The member of the Clergy of South Sudan’s Catholic Diocese of Tombura-Yambio (CDTY) recognized children as of paramount importance to the Church, and urged the people of God to be open to acquiring a deeper awareness of the danger of subjecting minors to abuses.