SNAP, Rankle, and Flop

Russell E. Saltzman, a Lutheran pastor, recounts a perplexing experience he had with SNAP (Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests) in 2004, and questions the real motives and goals of the group:

SNAP did as of 2009 meet all the IRS requirements for a charitable organization, but it fails examination by the Better Business Bureau's Wise Giving Alliance. The BBB allows board-member compensation for no more than one individual or ten percent of the board (whichever is greater). Two of eight SNAP board members receive payment for their work. Nor does SNAP provide the BBB with "effectiveness assessments" on its work or adequate information on the allocation of fund raising expenses. In the 2009 IRS filing SNAP reported $419,607 in income; $396,661 of that received in donations. Salaries, other compensation, and employee benefits were reported at $342,599.

But iffy bookkeeping is not my major problem with SNAP. Despite that one small foray into one Lutheran scandal, SNAP focuses almost exclusively on Catholic clergy, as a brief excursion through nine years of SNAP press release archives will show. The 2004 archive doesn't even mention the lone Lutheran from Texas.

SNAP has never to my knowledge examined scandals among mental health professionals. It never says anything of public school districts, where reports say children are at far greater risk of abuse. Nor has it said anything of volunteer youth organizations. The simple fact is SNAP targets Roman Catholics. If SNAP routinely seeks "donations" from settlements, well, Catholic pockets are easier to reach, for a lot of reasons starting with media bias.

Whatever genuine aid SNAP may provide victims of priestly sex abuse is well matched by the harm SNAP does by mounting little less than an anti-Catholic smear campaign and wantonly portraying every priest as a sexual predator waiting to happen and every bishop an enabler.

Read the entire post, "SNAP is No Fit Advocate for Sexual Abuse Victims", on the First Things "On The Square" blog. For much more about the dubious workings of SNAP, visit Dave Pierre's site, www.TheMediaReport.com.