Washington, D.C., attorney Robert Bennett was part of the 13-member board of prominent lay Catholics appointed by the U.S. Catholic bishops to investigate the sexual abuse crisis. He chaired the research committee that interviewed some 100 victims, psychiatrists, theologians, seminary heads and church officials and prepared the report on causes of abuse.

DignityUSA “works for respect and justice for all gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender persons in the Catholic Church” and elsewhere. Contact executive director Marianne Duddy-Burke.

BishopAccountability.org is a Massachusetts clearinghouse for information on sexual abuse by priests and on the hierarchy’s reactions. Contact President Terry McKiernan.

SNAP, or the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the foremost advocacy group for clergy abuse victims. SNAP has regional directors and local support groups. Contact President Barbara Blaine in Chicago.

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious is an association of leaders of Catholic women religious in the United States and represents U.S. nuns and sisters. While male clergy commit the vast majority of abuse cases, victims’ advocates say abuse by women religious is an overlooked problem. The LCWR is also based in Silver Spring, Md. Contact the […]

The Conference of Major Superiors of Men represents religious orders in the United States. Unlike diocesan priests, the priests and brothers in religious orders – Franciscans, Jesuits and Dominicans, for example – generally live in communities and by their orders’ rules. They are subject to local diocese mandates, but concerns have been raised about how to integrate […]

Voice of the Faithful is the leading grass-roots lay organization to emerge in the wake of the sexual abuse scandal. Based in Boston, the organization pushes for church governance reform and holding bishops accountable, and promotes victims rights. It has been critical of an effort to ban gay priests from ordination. Contact President Mark Mullaney.

The Chicago-based National Federation of Priests’ Councils is the leading voice for the nation’s Catholic priests. Contact the president, Father Anthony E. Cutcher.

Bettina Arnold is associate professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and author of “Justifying Genocide: The Supporting Role of Archaeology in ‘Ethnic Cleansing’” for the book Annihilating Difference: The Anthropology of Genocide (University of California Press, 2002).