Tell Your Story
How survivor and witness intake works: what the form asks, the three consent choices, and the promise that nothing is published outside the choice you make.
If a child is in danger now
Call 911. To report suspected child abuse in Pennsylvania, call ChildLine at 1-800-932-0313 — the line is staffed around the clock, and reports can be made anonymously. Reporting to authorities and telling your story here are different things; if a child may be at risk today, make the call first.
The intake
The archive’s intake form collects accounts from survivors and witnesses of abuse in churches and church-run schools. It asks what institution was involved, when you were there, what happened, and whether you reported it at the time and to whom. You may give your name and contact information or leave them blank — the form works anonymously.
Your three choices
Every submission requires one choice, and the archive is bound by it:
- Publish with my name. Your account may be published, attributed to you, in the relevant case file’s allegations tier.
- Publish anonymously. Your account may be published with every identifying detail removed.
- Record only — do not publish. Your account is kept in the archive’s records and never published. It may still matter: it can point the archive to documents, dates, and records requests. But it will not appear on this site.
Publication, when you choose it, is always as an attributed allegation under this archive’s Standards — labeled as an account, not presented as a court finding. Choosing to share your story with investigators or with a survivors’ attorney is a separate question on the form, with its own choices, and it is never inferred from your publishing choice.
Two rules that protect everyone
- Do not name any current minor. Accounts should concern your own experience or what you personally witnessed. Names of people who are minors today are removed before anything is recorded for publication.
- Tell the truth as you know it. The form asks you to affirm that your account is truthful to the best of your knowledge. Accounts that cannot be squared with the public record are not published as if they could be; they are recorded, and the discrepancy is part of the archive’s work, not a reason to discard a survivor’s account silently.