CSSA confirms safeguarding judgements on five religious life groups

15 December 2025

In the first audit of their safeguarding practice today, five religious life groups have been judged by the Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency (CSSA) with the following grades:

Congregation of Jesus – Firm Progress

Dominican Sisters of Saint Catherine of Siena of Newcastle, Natal – Firm Progress

Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Africa – Met

Sisters of Mercy, Gravesend – Met with Recommendations

St Joseph’s Society for Foreign Missions (Mill Hill Missionaries) – Firm Progress

The Inspectorate for England and Wales report that these religious life groups demonstrate varying progress towards the eight national safeguarding standards.

They offered different levels of evidence to independent analysts from within the CSSA about how they help keep people safe.

Steve Ashley, Chief Executive Officer, CSSA said: “These baseline results show satisfactory levels of safeguarding in the six church bodies.

“Each religious life group must either sustain its progress or make improvement. Only this way can they assure the public that everything possible is being done to help prevent harm.”

CSSA safeguarding audits for larger religious life groups range on a scale from: ‘below basic,’ ‘basic,’ ‘early progress,’ ‘firm progress,’ ‘comprehensive assurance’ and ‘exemplary.’

For smaller religious life groups, grades range from: ‘not met,’ ‘met with recommendations’ and ‘met.’ In each case, the overall grading represents a combination of their scoring across eight areas of work relating to safeguarding standards.

The CSSA publish the safeguarding audit and inspection results from every Catholic diocese, religious life group and eparchy in England and Wales. You can find the audits for religious life groups HERE.

ENDS

More information about the CSSA’s audit and inspection process can be found  HERE

Journalists: to speak with a spokesperson from the CSSA, please initially contact Sarah Gleadall: sarah.gleadall@catholicsafeguarding.org.uk