ABUSE TRACKER

IRELAND
The Irish Times

BRENDAN HOBAN

RITE AND REASON: There are a myriad of problems facing the church, not least the lack of leadership

TWO REMARKABLE statistics emerged from recent surveys. Firstly, in the census, 84 per cent of people in Ireland ticked the “Catholic” box. And secondly, in an Amárach survey on behalf of the Association of Catholic Priests, 35 per cent of Catholics said they attended Mass weekly.

After all that has happened to the Catholic Church in Ireland in the last two decades no one, I suspect, could have predicted such extraordinary results. The odds against it would have been significant. And yet here we are.

After the child abuse scandals, the failure to deal with them, the scathing reports, the inevitable condemnations, the continuing decline in vocations and church attendance and not least the growing perception that the Irish Catholic Church is in terminal decline, suddenly, extraordinarily, there are reasons for believing that belief in and commitment to the Catholic project is resilient and, numerically, still significant.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

FINTAN O’TOOLE

We are witnessing the cruel humiliation of a generation of clergy that deserves better

THERE’S A column I would have written a few years ago, but can’t be bothered to write now. It was a reliable old standby about the latest abuse of power by the institutional Catholic Church. It would be fuelled by anger and by expectation – rage at the hierarchy’s latest folly but an implicit hope that the innate decency of Irish Catholicism would some day be allowed to blossom. There was something real at stake in this argument – the church’s hold on Irish public culture was so strong that everything it did mattered.

I thought about writing one of those columns in response to the Vatican’s censuring of five priests – Brian D’Arcy, Tony Flannery, Gerard Moloney, Seán Fagan and Owen O’Sullivan – simply for saying what most Catholics actually think about celibacy, women priests and homosexuality. But I couldn’t find either anger or hope.

All that’s left is a double dose of sadness – for a generation of idealists; for a society in need of moral leadership that is being given just one more, all too familiar dose of the most abject cynicism.

What we’re seeing now is the sadistic humiliation of a generation of clergy that deserves better. At a simple human level, there’s something genuinely tragic in the fate of these priests: not just those who have been silenced but all their like-minded colleagues. These were once young men and women, mostly in rural Ireland, in the wake of the Second Vatican Council. They were infused with the energy of reform and renewal. The priesthood still had glamour, and it was still tied up with familial snobbery, social prestige and institutional arrogance.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Huffington Post

By MARYCLAIRE DALE 04/30/12

PHILADELPHIA — A 47-year-old man unleashed his fury Monday at the Roman Catholic Church, staring down a church official in a Philadelphia courtroom as he described being forced as a child to engage in sex acts with a priest.

The man glared Monday at Monsignor William Lynn at the defense table and complained that only one church representative, a priest friend, had ever apologized.

“It always felt wrong. A man should not touch a child,” said the man, the ninth of 10 children in his Levittown family.

Testifying in the sixth week of a clergy abuse trial focusing on the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, the man broke down when he recalled telling his mother in 1998 about being abused by defrocked priest David Sicoli in the late 1970s.

Sicoli molested him at the priest’s shore home in Sea Isle, N.J., in the priest’s red-and-white sports car and on other occasions, the man testified. Like other accusers who have testified, the boy worked at the rectory, and his mother had hopes of him becoming a priest.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Focus

Der Missbrauchsfall im Erzbistum Bamberg sollte nach FOCUS-Informationen mit einer Schweigeerklärung vertuscht werden.

Im Herbst 2007 trafen sich der beschuldigte Domkapitular Otto M., dessen Mitarbeiter, ein Jurist und ein Psychologe in einem Nürnberger Caritashaus mit dem heute 40-jährigen Opfer Erwin S. Dieser sollte eine Verzichtserklärung unterschreiben und sich verpflichten, nie mehr solche Vorwürfe gegen M. zu erheben. Erwin S. lehnte ab, obwohl die Kirchenmänner angeblich mit einer Verleumdungsklage drohten. M. soll als Schulleiter des Knabenseminars Ottonianum in Bamberg mehrere Jungen sexuell missbraucht haben.

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DEUTSCHLAND
inFranken

Interview Der Sprecher des Priesterrates im Erzbistum Bamberg, Michael Hofmann, lehnt eine Pauschalverurteilung der Kirche ab. Er fordert eine rasche Aufarbeitung bekannt gewordener Fälle.

Dass katholische Geistliche mit Blick auf die Missbrauchsskandale oft per Generalverdacht an den Pranger gestellt werden, missfällt dem Sprecher des Priesterrats der Erzdiözese Bamberg, Michael Hofmann. Im Gespräch mit unserer Zeitung weist der Nürnberger Theologe allerdings auch darauf hin, dass angesichts der Vielzahl der Missbrauchsfälle die katholische Kirche in Deutschland ihre Hausaufgaben erst noch machen muss. Die bekannt gewordenen Fälle müssten schnell aufgearbeitet werden – im Interesse der Opfer und um verloren gegangenes Vertrauen zurückzugewinnen. Da sich die Opfer aus verständlichen Gründen oft erst sehr spät den schlimmen Erfahrungen ihrer Vergangenheit stellen können, plädiert Hofmann für eine Verlängerung der Verjährungsfristen.

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DUITSLAND
RKnieuws (Nederland)

MUNCHEN (RKnieuws.net) – De kerkelijke rechtbank van het aartsbisdom München-Freisung heeft een oud kanunnik van het kathedraal kapittel van Bamberg schuldig bevonden aan seksueel misbruik.

De 67-jarige prelaat is op rust gesteld en mag geen openbare pastorale activiteit meer uitoefenen. Ook zijn titel van kanunnik-emeritus wordt ingetrokken. Het is tot op heden de hoogste prelaat die in Duitsland door een kerkelijke rechtbank veroordeeld wordt wegens seksueel misbruik.

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AUSTRALIA
Waverley Leader

by Tim Michell

THE home of Chrissie and Anthony Foster seems like any other – filled with pictures, ornaments and memories.

But something will always be missing.

The couple’s lives changed forever when they discovered their daughters, Emma and Katie, were abused by a priest when they were in primary school.

Struggling in the aftermath, Emma later died of a medication overdose, while Katie was severely disabled in a car crash.

Mrs Foster detailed the family’s anguish in a powerful book, Hell on the Highway to Heaven.

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SANTA CLARA (CA)
Market Watch

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Apr 30, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Ten years after the scandal of child sexual abuse by priests rocked the U.S. Catholic Church to its core, has enough been done to protect children, prevent recurrence, and strengthen institutional accountability and transparency?

The mixed-bag answer to that question is the subject of an upcoming, daylong conference being held May 11 at Santa Clara University. The conference is based on findings from a new book, Sexual Abuses in the Catholic Church, A Decade of Crisis 2002-2012, published in October, 2011 by Praeger.

The conference will feature 13 of 23 authors of the Decade of Crisis book, who were all, in some way, part of the national effort to find justice and healing in the wake of the nationwide scandal.

The panelists include Karen Terry, PhD, the principal investigator for two nationally acclaimed John Jay College of Criminal Justice studies on the nature, scope, and causes of the abuse scandals; Barbara Blaine, who in 1988 founded the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP); Kathleen McChesney, PhD, former FBI executive who was the first executive director of the Office of Child and Youth Protection of the United States Conference of Bishops; and SCU Professor Thomas Plante, a consultant on priest sexual abuse who also helps screen seminarians for sexual-abuse proclivities as vice chair of the National Review Board for the U.S. Bishops’ Protection of Children and Youth office.

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ZIMBABWE
New Zimbabwe

by Staff Reporter

A PRIEST who “put the fear of God” into his maid before raping her several times over a two-year period has been jailed for 15 years.

Ruthless Edias Ncube, 35, threatened the 21-year-old woman with death if she reported the abuse to anyone as he carried out the sex attacks between October 2008 and July 2010, a Bulawayo magistrate heard.

Ncube, a graduate pastor of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, attacked the woman while his wife – a lecturer at Solusi University – was at work or attending workshops, said Goodluck Katenaire, prosecuting.

Originally from Msilahobe in Lower Gweru, Ncube’s crimes went undetected until he made the maid pregnant.

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UNITED STATES
Religion Dispatches

By Marian Ronan

Commentators offer a range of explanations for last week’s Vatican “assessment” charging a group that includes the largest number of US Catholic sisters, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) with “serious doctrinal problems” and “radical feminism.”

One frequent explanation is that the report was issued in retaliation for support given the 2009 Affordable Care Act (ACA) by Network, a Catholic social justice lobby with close ties to the LCWR. For example, in a BBC News interview several days after the release of the assessment, Sister Simone Campbell, Network’s executive director, acknowledged “a strong connection” between Network’s challenge to the US bishops over the ACA and the Vatican accusations.

No doubt there is some truth to this analysis. But it’s worth noting that the Vatican launched the investigation that culminated in this document in January 2009, more than a year before Congress passed the ACA. Given the speed with which Rome does things, it’s more than likely that while the sisters’ support for the ACA contributed to the harshness of the statement, it by no means caused it. Indeed, Pope John Paul II mandated a previous investigation of US religious in 1983, though the outcome of that process was less brutal than the current one has proven to be.

In point of fact, throughout the history of the Church, bishops and popes have struggled mightily to keep committed celibate Catholic women under control. Already in the early Christian centuries male church leaders forced virgins to describe themselves as “brides of Christ” rather than use the male martial imagery they had come to use during the Roman persecutions. The early equality between male and female desert monastics was likewise undercut when eighth century bishops began taking control of women’s monasteries and ordained monks to the priesthood for the first time (but not nuns, of course.) And as, throughout the following centuries, groups of dedicated Christian women came together—canonesses, Beguines, beatas, recluses—popes, bishops, and male theologians went to great lengths to rein them in.

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SOUTH CAROLINA
The Post and Courier

BY ALLYSON BIRD
abird@postandcourier.com

A former Goose Creek pastor who pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a child over an eight-year stretch was sentenced to 26 years in prison Friday.

James Doscher, a 63-year-old Ladson man, served as pastor of New Life Church in Goose Creek, authorities said. A witness who spoke on Doscher’s behalf in court said Doscher more recently served as a small group leader at Faith Assembly church in Summerville.

A circuit court judge sentenced him to 26 years in prison on a charge of first-degree criminal sexual conduct with a minor, 20 years on a charge of second-degree criminal sexual conduct with a minor and 15 years on a charge of committing a lewd act on a child. The sentences will run concurrently, and Doscher must serve at least 85 percent of the 26 years.

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GOOSE CREEK (SC)
Patch

By Greg Hambrick

A former Goose Creek pastor plead guilty Friday to sexually abusing a child over an eight year period.

James Doscher was sentenced to 26 years in prison for criminal sexual conduct with a minor in the 1st degree. He was also sentenced to 20 years and 15 years on related charges, but the sentencing will be served concurrently. Doscher will have to serve more than 22 years before he is eligible for release.

Assistant Solicitor Anne Williams of the Ninth Circuit Solicitor’s Special Victims Unit said the maximum sentence would have been 30 years because of the “Doscher was only subject to the sentencing ranges in law at the time of the offenses,” said Assistant Solicitor Anne Williams. “Because the crimes occurred 10 years ago, the maximum time he could have been sentenced to on the most serious charge was up to 30 years.”

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NEW YORK
Reuters

NEW YORK, April 27 (Reuters) – A Brooklyn rabbi convicted of sex abuse will get a new trial, after a New York appeals court ruled that prosecutors failed to promptly hand over a detective’s notes about an alleged bribery attempt.

The Appellate Division, Second Department, held that Rabbi Baruch Lebovits was “substantially prejudice(d)” by prosecutors’ mid-trial disclosure of a detective’s handwritten notes detailing a conversation in which the alleged sex-abuse victim said he was offered a bribe by a key defense witness in exchange for his silence.

“The untimely disclosure of the interview notes precluded the defense from fully and adequately preparing for cross-examination and set a trap for the defendant which had already sprung at the time the notes were finally furnished,” the court wrote in a unanimous order released last week.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
KSHB

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – A woman admitted in court Monday to plotting her husband’s murder with their former pastor.

Teresa Stone pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.

Teresa Stone’s husband, Randy Stone, was found dead March 31, 2010 in his Independence insurance office.

Teresa Stone’s voice was shaky and she broke down into tears as she told the court she planned her husband’s death.

The Stones’ former pastor, David Love, pleaded guilty last year to second-degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison.

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GALESBURG (IL)
WGIL

POSTED 2:53pm 4/30/12 A man claiming now to be a St. Louis resident, and also claiming to be a priest, has pleaded not guilty to charges including theft, financial exploitation of the elderly, and deceptive practices in Knox County.

The Reverend Ryan St. Anne Scott made the plea during a brief appearance in Knox County Circuit Court Monday morning.

Scott appeared with his attorney, dressed in religious garb including a cross around his neck, and also asked for a trial by jury. This, despite the fact that the Catholic Diocese of Peoria has previously labeled Scott a “fraudulent” priest.

Prosecutors accuse Scott of borrowing large sums of money from an elderly Galesburg woman between 2009 and last year, without paying her back.

Scott formerly owned the Holy Rosary Abbey Church in Galesburg.

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CALFIORNIA
Calaveras County Sheriff’s Office

Contact: Sgt Chris Hewitt
Release Date: 04/30/12
Time: 0830 hrs

(San Andreas, CA) The Calaveras County Sheriff’s Office is currently completing interviews with persons associated with the Father Kelly case. Attempts are being made to locate potential witnesses and victims, however this effort is complicated by the fact that many persons now reside out of the area.

One Detective from the Sheriff’s Office is specifically assigned to the case, and it is the intention of the Sheriff’s Office to submit a report to the District Attorney within the next 30 days.

No further information will be released pending the submission of a completed case to the Calaveras County District Attorney.

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CALIFORNIA
MyMotherLode

April 30, 2012

B.J. Hansen, MML News Director

San Andreas, CA — The Calaveras County Sheriff’s Office has released a statement regarding an investigation into Michael Kelly, a priest that previously worked in the Mother Lode.

As reported two weeks ago, the Catholic Diocese of Stockton will pay nearly $4 million to settle a lawsuit related to alleged sexual crimes that Kelly performed on an altar boy in Stockton. To read the earlier article, click here. Before working in Stockton, Kelly was a priest in Sonora, Big Oak Flat and San Andreas.

The Calaveras County Sheriff’s Office has been investigating additional allegations made against the priest. Kelly has reportedly returned to his native Ireland. If additional charges are brought against Kelly, it could potentially lead to him being extradited back to the U.S.

Sheriff Gary Kuntz has released the following statement, “The Calaveras County Sheriff’s Office is currently completing interviews with persons associated with the Father Kelly case. Attempts are being made to locate potential witnesses and victims, however this effort is complicated by the fact that many persons now reside out of the area. One Detective from the Sheriff’s Office is specifically assigned to the case, and it is the intention of the Sheriff’s Office to submit a report to the District Attorney within the next 30 days.”

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MASSACHUSETTS
Wicked Local Winchester

By Jennifer Brown Bonniwell
Wicked Local Winchester

Posted Apr 30, 2012

Winchester, MA —

The Archdiocese of Boston has completed its internal investigation of sexual abuse of a minor by former St. Mary’s of Winchester Rev. John M. Mendicoa and has determined the allegation to be unsubstantiated, the Archdiocese said Monday.

Mendicoa was placed on administrative leave in August 2011, after the Archdiocese received an allegation of sexual abuse of a child. Mendicoa is no longer on administrative leave and has now been assigned the status of senior priest, restricted, the Archdiocese said in a statement. The status is equivalent to retirement.

The allegation concerned conduct alleged to have occurred in the 1980s. Mendicoa was a pastor at St. Mary’s in Winchester from 1986 to 1994 and at St. Michael’s in Lowell from 1982 to 1986. The Archdiocese declined to say if the incident occurred in Winchester or Lowell or any further details about the victim, citing internal policy.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Intelligencer / Wheeling News-Register

April 30, 2012

PHILADELPHIA (AP) – A man accusing a priest of sexual assault dropped a separate allegation against the same priest, the judge in an internal Catholic church trial testified Monday.

Monsignor Kevin Quirk of Wheeling, a canon lawyer who presided over Brennan’s 2008 church trial, took the stand Monday in the Rev. James Brennan’s criminal priest-abuse trial in Philadelphia.

Quirk, an aide to the Most Rev. Michael J. Bransfield, bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, detailed allegations that Brennan sexually assaulted a 14-year-old during a 1996 sleepover at the priest’s apartment.

On cross-examination, Quirk said he never delved into the man’s second allegation because the accuser withdrew that complaint. That involved an accusation that Brennan abused the teen – apparently in a garden shed – when he was performing court-ordered community service at the parish.

Defense lawyer William Brennan, who is not related to his client, noted that the jury has heard about priests accused of molesting a dozen boys over many years. But James Brennan was removed quickly after the archdiocese received the complaint in 2006, because of new church guidelines on handling abuse complaints.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
KSRO

MARYCLAIRE DALE

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A 47-year-old man has unleashed his fury at the Roman Catholic church, staring down a church official in a Philadelphia courtroom as he described how a priest forced him to engage in sex acts when he was a boy.

The man glared Monday at defendant Monsignor William Lynn and broke down when he recalled telling his mother about the alleged abuse by defrocked priest David Sicoli (suh-KOL’-ee).

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin and Joseph A. Slobdzian
INQUIRER STAFF WRITERS

One of the priests on trial in the landmark clergy-sex abuse case acknowledged that he let a 14-year-old boy view online pornography and share his bed but denied touching the teen or exposing himself, according to statements he gave church investigators.

The Rev. James J. Brennan said he later realized his decision to let the boy view porn and sleep next to him that night in 1996 was “borderline” inappropriate. Still, he told interrogators at a canonical trial that he was blindsided when the young man came forward a decade later and accused him of sexual assault.

“I was just devastated,” Brennan testified in 2008.

His statements from that proceeding were introduced Monday as the Common Pleas Court trial against Brennan and Msgr. William J. Lynn opened its sixth week. Brennan is charged with attempting to rape the 14-year-old; Lynn, a former ranking official for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, is accused of endangerment for not removing Brennan from ministry despite signs that he might abuse minors.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — The prosecution in the Philadelphia clergy sex abuse case today shifted its attention back to defendant James Brennan, who is accused of sexually molesting a fourteen-year-old boy in 1996 (see related stories).

Today, the jury heard statements made by Father Brennan during a 2008 church investigation of the allegations.

During questioning by one church official in 2008, Brennan denied that he had sexually assaulted his accuser. He said that nothing happened physically between them but conceded that he had made a number of regrettable decisions that night — including allowing the boy to stay overnight in the first place, giving in to the boy’s demand to watch porn on the Internet, and sleeping in the same bed the night of the alleged assault.

But in that 2008 church probe, Brennan categorically denied any physical or sexual contact. In related questioning, Brennan denied ever massaging the boy in public, although witness told church investigators that he once saw Brennan massaging the boy’s shirtless shoulders during a party at the boy’s home.

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UNITED STATES
Boston Globe

April 30, 2012|By James Carroll

The Catholic hierarchy is walling itself off ideologically, intensifying its campaign to slam shut church windows opened by the liberalizing Second Vatican Council. This month alone, the pope has rebuked the disobedience of European priests and, acting through a Vatican congregation, set in motion a severe disciplining of American nuns. The US Catholic bishops advance the pope’s agenda with their recently announced “religious liberty” campaign, timed to climax this summer — a blatant intervention in presidential politics, inevitably favoring the far right wing.

Today’s church is taking “the Benedict Option,” defined by Rod Dreher of The American Conservative as a “pioneering form of dropping out of a barbaric mainstream culture.” This approach is named after St. Benedict of Nursia, the sixth-century founder of monasticism. Joseph Ratzinger, upon his election as pope in 2005, did not take the name Benedict by accident. But the implied parallel is false: Cloistered and detached as it seems now, the monastic life was, in St. Benedict’s day, a model for forward progress.

The current Benedict’s vision seeks a purer counter-culture. Like medieval monasticism, it would preserve essentials of humane living as a dark era dawns. If this reaction leads to fewer clergy, smaller congregations, and less mainstream clout, so be it. Good riddance to the liberal “relativists,” implies this Benedict. Welcome home to the rigid “orthodox.”

If such reactionary moves further alienate majorities of Catholics, who have never seen such fervor from the pope or his bishops on behalf of children abused by priests, that is the price paid for the Benedict option. “God is not concerned so much with great numbers and with outward successes,” the pope said during Holy Week, “but achieves his victories under the humble sign of the mustard seed.”

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MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on April 30, 2012

We’re grateful that a St. Louis County judge is letting Darrell & Rhonda Pitts’ case against Rev. Billy Lee Little and the Christ Memorial Baptist Church move ahead. (Judge Steven Goldman issued his ruling this morning.) We’re always glad when victims are given their day in court, and not left helpless because of archaic or arbitrary legal technicalities.

We hope others who saw, suspected or suffered crimes or misdeeds by Little will step forward. Keeping silent endangers others, hurts victims and helps predators.

The couple represented by Ken Chackes of Clayton (872 8420, 369 3902 cell). Little (who lives in St. Charles County with his third wife) is represented by Aaron Staebell (636-272-3606, aaron@lohmarstaebell.com). The church is represented by Cynthia S. Holmes (721-7010, officecsh@aol.com). The suit was filed in December of 2011.

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MINNESOTA
National Survivor Advocates Coaliton

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at sidewalk multiple news conferences, clergy sex abuse victims and supporters will herald a hopeful end of the insidious secrecy, minimizing and hiding heinous child sex crimes and sexual exploitation.

They will hang symbolic May Baskets with an unprecedented list of known villainous Minnesota cleric’s names and assignments on the chancery doors. They will “ring the chancery door bell” but not run away. They will wait for church officials and demand them to add names and assignments of those missing from our list, and:

¨ Announce and discuss the list of 130 villains,

¨ Ask why Minn. church officials continue to keep clergy sex crimes secret and thus continue to keep children in harm’s way,

¨ Speak publicly for the first time about a priest known to have abused children, Rudolph Henrich,

¨ Urge anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes to call police not church officials.

WHO
Clergy sex abuse victims and child abuse prevention advocates and members of the support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org).

WHEN
Tuesday, May 1 at 1 p.m.

WHERE
Outside these Catholic headquarters:
•Archdiocese St. Paul & Minneapolis, 226 Summit Ave., St. Paul
•Diocese of Winona, 55 West Sanborn St., Winona
•Diocese of New Ulm, 1400 6th St., New Ulm

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UNITED STATES
Pope Crimes & Vatican Evils…

Updated April 30, 2012

Paris Arrow

This is the most number of priests from one country ever silenced by the Vatican, 6 Irish priests and still counting, read the “Vatican retaliates Ireland” below. Cardinal Ratzinger silenced the Liberation Theology priests but they were not all from one country, read about them here http://pope-ratz.blogspot.ca/2010/03/benedict-xvi-cardinal-ratzinger-and-his.html Benedict XVI just came from Cuba after lecturing Fidel Castro on the “freedom of speech” and soon as he returns to the Vatican, he does not practise what he preaches, and he silences Irish priests for speaking out what the Holy Spirit inspires them to do. Has Benedict XVI forgotten that St. Peter (the first pope) wrote and preached the least and St. Paul wrote and preached the most in the New Testament ? Yet St. Paul is outside-the-wall of the Vatican? but he is the most read and most cited in the Daily Mass and by all theological writings? May The Hague call on hypocrite Benedict XVI to stand trial soon before he falls ill or dies and thus bring the one-and-only-justice to the hundreds of thousands of children sexually abused by his B16 Army Benedict XVI Pedophile Priests Army also known as JP2 Army-John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army whose beatification is celebrated by Benedict tomorrow

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Little Grape

Mari Passananti

There’s a photo bouncing around Facebook of an adorable child hugging an equally adorable retriever. The caption reads: “There’s a special place in hell for those who abuse children and animals.”

If there is indeed a hell, and there’s any justice in that fiery place, the saying must be correct. And surely those who aid and abet abusers would qualify for the same “special” kind of damnation as the abusers themselves.

A landmark trial is underway in Philadelphia. For the first time, a church official (one not accused of laying a hand or other body part on a child) is charged with child endangerment. Prosecutors in the City of Brotherly Love allege that Monsignor Michael Lynn knowingly allowed sex-abuser priests under his supervision to remain in roles where they could continue to torture children.

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OMAHA (NE)
KHAS

[with video]

An allegation of sexual abuse by an Omaha priest dates to his service at Norfolk church.

Deacon Timothy McNeil, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Omaha, says the allegation against Reverend Franklin Dvorak came to light at the end of March.

He’s accused of sexually abusing a female student from 1970 to 1972.

Dvorak was placed on leave Friday from St. Elizabeth Ann Seton parish in Omaha.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Lebanon Daily News

By MARYCLAIRE DALE Associated Press
Updated: 04/30/2012

PHILADELPHIA—The judge in an internal Catholic church trial says a man accusing a priest of sexual assault once changed his story.

Monsignor Kevin Quirk, a canon lawyer now in West Virginia, testified Monday in the Rev. James Brennan’s criminal priest-abuse trial in Philadelphia.

Quirk presided over the 2008 church trial. He detailed allegations that Brennan sexually assaulted a 14-year-old during a 1996 sleepover at the priest’s apartment.

On cross-examination, Quirk said he never delved into the man’s second allegation because the accuser withdrew that complaint.

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MISSOURI
Riverfront Times

By Chad Garrison
Mon., Apr. 30 2012

A retired Baptist minister and licensed psychologist who, according to his biography, once hosted a counseling program on KMOX and worked as a sports psychologist for the baseball Cardinals, stands accused today of taking advantage of a female patient.

And the plaintiffs and their attorney believe more victims may be out there.

“The primary motive of my clients is to encourage others to come forward,” says attorney Ken Chackes, who’s representing Darrell and Rhonda Pitt in their lawsuit against Pastor Billy Lee Little and the now-defunct Christ Memorial Baptist Church of Cool Valley. “It’s our understanding that the church board established a fund for victims of Little, and it’s believed that one other person came forward but that no relief was awarded.”

Cynthia Holmes, the attorney representing the church, tells Daily RFT that no such fund exists. In March a St. Louis County judge dismissed the church from the lawsuit, though the Pitts are seeking to reinstate the defendant. Meanwhile, at a hearing today the attorney representing Little is expected to ask that his client also be dismissed from the case.

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UNITED STATES
Huffington Post

Jeff Schweitzer

Over dinner with a group of good friends awhile ago, I was taken aback when during one of the many lively discussions someone offered a defense of the Catholic Church in the now-old-news sex abuse scandal. I had previously operated under the assumption that even the biggest Church apologist would hesitate to venture in that direction in any public debate in a mixed crowd no matter what justifications one might conjure up in private. Yes, my friend is a practicing Catholic who attends church every week, but I had assumed that her association would increase rather than diminish her outrage. Not so.

Her defense did not attempt to dismiss the facts of the case or diminish the horror of the crimes. Rather my friend offered a defense of relativity: the Church is a human institution and the number of sex abusers is no greater proportionally than in the general population. There was the tangential argument that the media unfairly targeted the Church and so gave the impression of a larger problem than really exists. Finally, coming soon after the Sandusky scandal at Penn State, she argued that the problem of pedophilia is perhaps even more prevalent in the world of sports, or at a minimum at least as bad. She posited that, as with the Church, in the case of Penn State plenty of people in a position of authority chose to turn a blind eye.

I had largely forgotten the discussion until yesterday. I was talking to the owner of an Indian restaurant who was lamenting her problems with vendors. She then made a comment that caught my attention: “I now try to deal mainly with Christian sellers.” She herself is Buddhist. The implication clearly is that Christians bring to the table a higher degree of morality and therefore honesty. This assumption is so deeply embedded that no further explanation was offered in the statement — it was considered self-evident.

My first reaction to that unquestioned assumption was to think of the more than 10,000 children alleged to have been violated by Catholic priests, and in contrast to that ugly reality, the dissonant claim to a higher morality. In that grating contradiction lays a central problem with the Church, and more generally, with religion: any embarrassing challenges to divine claims can be dismissed as the consequence of human frailties. The Church can claim simultaneously to be the arbiter of a morality inspired by god while offering the excuse that they can be expected to be no better than the general population when it comes to abusing children because it is a “human institution.”

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UNITED STATES
Christianity Today

Michelle Van Loon

The news rumbled like an earthquake through evangelical circles. Tom White, the 64-year-old director of religious-persecution group Voice of The Martyrs (V.O.M.), had committed suicide after allegations that he’d molested a 10-year-old girl. For those of us who have no connection to the case or the ministry, the sad news may have been, say, a 4.0 on a spiritual Richter scale – enough to rattle a few pictures and shift our routines for a moment or two. I wonder what number on the spiritual Richter scale the little girl and her family would give to this news.

There is a predictable arc to the way many Christians talk among ourselves about high-profile cases of children victimized by high-profile spiritual leaders. We recoil in shock as the revelations of the leader’s misconduct unfolds, while simultaneously reminding ourselves of the size of his organization and the impact of his ministry has had on congregation, community and world. (In most cases, it is a “he” we’re discussing.) Days or weeks later, we may engage in a wistful airing of previously unvoiced suspicions: “He was always a little too friendly to the junior high kids, but I never felt like I could say anything because of his position.” The third act comes as those loyal to the church or organization heroically proclaim that the message of the gospel will go on.

A fallen leader has never stopped the progress of the gospel, and never will. But I do not believe we are proclaiming the gospel well when we do not put priority on first things: namely, the victim and his or her family.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic League

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on the way some pundits are rallying on behalf of nuns:

Anyone who has read New York Times columnists Maureen Dowd and Nicholas Kristof, and the editorials in the Boston Globe (owned by the Times), knows how contemptuous they are of the Catholic Church. There is one exception: they love left-wing dissidents. Hence, their rally for “progressive” nuns.

Yesterday, Dowd sounded like a stand-up comic when she said “the Vatican is trying to muzzle American nuns.” Maybe she should talk to the Sisters of Life and then write a column on how “muzzled” they feel.

Yesterday, Kristof also showed how clueless he is when he wrote about “a stinging reprimand of American nuns.” Perhaps he should speak to Mother M. Assumpta Long of the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist and ask if she’s been reprimanded.

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IRELAND
Irish Central

By
PATRICK COUNIHAN,
IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Monday, April 30, 2012

Nuns and priests wore gags in the Vatican colors as they protested in Dublin against the Catholic church’s latest censorship moves.

A silent vigil outside the Papal Nunciature was held to oppose recent Vatican attempts to silence five high profile clerics.

The move came after celebrity priest Fr Brian D’Arcy confirmed that he had been censored for his Sunday World newspaper column.

Redemptorist priests Fr Tony Flannery and Fr Gerard Moloney, Marist priest Fr Seán Fagan and Capuchin priest Fr Owen O’Sullivan have also been the subject of Vatican censorship in recent weeks.

The Dublin protest attracted more than 200 lay Catholics and religious.

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BOSTON (MA)
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston

“The Archdiocese of Boston today announced that the allegation of sexual abuse of a minor by Father John M. Mendicoa has been found to be unsubstantiated. Fr Mendicoa was placed on administrative leave in August, 2011, after the Archdiocese received an allegation of sexual abuse of a child. The allegation concerned conduct alleged to have occurred in the 1980s. Fr. Mendicoa is no longer on administrative leave and has now been assigned the status of Senior Priest, restricted.

Father Mendicoa’s ministry, beyond sacramental celebrations with members of his family, will be exercised with the permission of the Vicar General and Moderator of the Curia of the Archdiocese of Boston. In reaching this decision, Cardinal Sean O’Malley reaffirmed his care and concern for all persons impacted by the reality of sexual abuse of children. The Cardinal and the Archdiocese remain committed to resolving cases of this nature in a manner that is as just as possible for all involved.”

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BOSTON (MA)
Boston Herald

By Associated Press
Monday, April 30, 2012

BOSTON — The Archdiocese of Boston has determined that allegations of child sexual abuse lodged against a Boston priest last year were unsubstantiated.

The church announced Monday that the Rev. John Mendicoa has been taken off administrative leave.

Mendicoa was placed on administrative leave last August after the archdiocese received an allegation of sexual abuse of a child dating to the 1980s. He has been assigned the status of senior priest, restricted.

Mendicoa was most recently a vicar at Sacred Heart Parish in the city’s Roslindale neighborhood.

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BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe

Archdiocese says allegations against Roslindale priest were found to be unsubstantiated

By Martin Finucane, Globe Staff

The archdiocese of Boston says it has determined that a child sex abuse allegation against a Roslindale priest was unsubstantiated.

The archdiocese said today in a statement that the allegation was made against the Rev. John M. Mendicoa of Sacred Heart Parish in August. Mendicoa was accused of actions in the 1980s.

Mendicoa was placed on administrative leave, but has now been taken off administrative leave and assigned the status of senior priest, restricted, the archdiocese said.

Mendicoa’s ministry is limited to celebrating the sacraments with his family, unless he gets permission from top church officials, the statement said. Mendicoa is retired and no longer a pastor of a church, a church spokeswoman said.

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IRELAND
Donegal Democrat

By Michelle Nic Phaidin
Published on Monday 30 April 2012

Donegal will be the backdrop for a new hard hitting documentary that promises to reveal more startling facts about clerical abuse in Ireland. “The Shame of the Catholic Church” which is to be broadcast this Tuesday night outlines how decades of clerical abuse and cover up have left the Catholic Church in Ireland at breaking point.

In this programme, journalist Darragh Mac Intyre, a BBC journalist whose investigations into the Father Eugene Greene case rocked the Catholic Church, once again, unearths more truths about the manner in which clerical sexual abuse was dealt with in this country.

Paul Breslin, a native of Bealtaine who has been living in London for many years, first went public with his harrowing story of clerical abuse after he was approached MacIntyre for a 2002 BBC Northern Ireland Spotlight programme. By that point, Father Greene was already in jail. He had been sentenced in 2000 for abusing boys in west Donegal from 1962 to 1985. The former priest has since been released from jail and has escaped the attention of the press.

This documentary, promises revelations that will stun the Irish public. Mac Intyre is understood to have spent a period of time interviewing victims and those related to the subject in Donegal ahead of the Raphoe Diocese Report’s press launch last year. It is speculated that the show was broadcast to a select audience in recent weeks. However, the makers of the programme are remaining tight lipped as to the content of their Tuesday night programme.

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IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

Towards an Assembly of the Irish Catholic Church.

10.15: First Session: Naming the Reality
Opening words by Brendan Hoban.
Chairperson: Gerry O’Hanlon
Prayer/Reflection: Brendan Butler

Speakers: (In the following order): Joe Mulvanney; Emer Dolphin; Garry Keogh; Phil Dunne (five to six minutes each).

Open discussion.

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IRELAND
Vatican Insider

Over 200 Catholics, including priests and nuns, protested in silence outside the residence of the papal nuncio in Dublin at the silencing of several Irish priests, and called for the lifting of this disciplinary measure and the opening of dialogue

Gerard O’Connell
Rome

More than 200 people participated in a silent vigil outside the Holy See’s Nunciature in Dublin on April 29 to protest the silencing or censuring of several Irish priests by the Vatican and to ask for the revocation of these disciplinary measures and their replacement by dialogue.

This large crowd of committed Catholics, which included several priests and many nuns, braved icy-cold weather conditions to publicly protest their strong feelings against the silencing of five Irish priests whose names have been made public and others whose names are still being kept secret.

Brendan Butler, a spokesman for the Catholic lay group We are Church Ireland which organized the vigil said, “So many Irish Catholics are expressing their anger at this heavy-handedness by the Vatican against Seán Fagan, Tony Flannery, Gerry Moloney, Owen O’Sullivan and Brian D’Arcy — all outstanding priests of the Irish Church.”

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DEUTSCHLAND
Mittel Bayerische

Bamberg/München. Wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs ist ein früherer Bamberger Domkapitular von einem kirchlichen Gericht dauerhaft in den Ruhestand versetzt worden. Zugleich untersagte ihm das Gericht des Erzbistums München jede seelsorgerische Tätigkeit, wie das Erzbistum Bamberg am Montag mitteilte. Überdies darf der Geistliche, der bereits 2008 in den vorläufigen Ruhestand versetzt worden war, nicht mehr den Titel „Domkapitular“ tragen. Das Kirchengericht war überzeugt, dass der heute 67 Jahre alten Priester vor rund drei Jahrzehnten während seiner Tätigkeit in einem Bamberger Kircheninternat Schüler sexuell missbraucht hat. Im Urteil ist von sechs „minderschweren Fällen“ die Rede. Die Staatsanwaltschaft hatte ihre Ermittlungen im Jahr 2009 wegen Verjährung eingestellt.

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DEUTSCHLAND
domradio

Mit einem Schuldspruch endete nach mehr als drei Jahren ein kirchenrechtlicher Prozess gegen einen früheren Bamberger Domkapitular wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs. Der 67-Jährige wurde strafweise in den Ruhestand versetzt und darf nicht mehr den Titel eines emeritierten Domkapitulars führen, wie das Erzbistum Bamberg am Montag mitteilte. Der Verurteilte ist der bisher ranghöchste deutsche Geistliche, dem sexueller Missbrauch nachgewiesen wurde. Den Prozess hatte das Gericht des Erzbistums München-Freising im Auftrag der römischen Glaubenskongregation geführt.

Dem Kirchengericht zufolge verübte der Priester während seiner Tätigkeit im Erzbischöflichen Knabenseminar Ottonianum in Bamberg zwischen 1978 bis 1984 sexuelle Übergriffe an Minderjährigen in sechs “jeweils minderschweren Fällen”. Nach dem rechtskräftigen Urteil legte die Bamberger Bistumsleitung fest, dass der Priester auch weiterhin keine seelsorglichen Funktionen “in dem in der Öffentlichkeit wahrnehmbaren Bereich” ausüben darf. Erzbischof Ludwig Schick entschuldigte sich erneut in einem Brief bei den Opfern.

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DEUTSCHLAND
BR

Ein Kirchengericht hat einen ehemaligen Bamberger Domkapitular wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs dauerhaft in den Ruhestand versetzt. Zudem ist ihm in Zukunft jede seelsorgerische Tätigkeit untersagt, teilte das Erzbistum Bamberg mit.

Das Gericht des Erzbistums München hat außerdem beschlossen, dass der Geistliche den Titel “Domkapitular” ab sofort nicht mehr führen darf. Der 67 Jahre alte Priester war wegen des Verdachts auf sexuellen Missbrauch bereits im Jahr 2008 vorläufig in den Ruhestand versetzt worden. Er war von 1978 bis 1984 im Bamberger Ottonianum tätig.

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DEUTSCHLAND
MissBiT

Priester werden entpflichtet und anschließend wieder eingesetzt.

Die Entpflichtung erfolgt auffallend häufig nach einer Verurteilung wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs.

Das neue Tätigkeitsfeld dieser Priester ist auffallend häufig die Krankenhausseelsorge.

Was geschieht also dann mit den beiden Missbrauchspriestern, die Bischof Ackermann – aufgrund des medialen Drucks – offiziell am 10.04.2012 entpflichtet hat?

Offensichtlich ist die “Entpflichtung” eines Priesters nur eine Farce.
Und das “Kinderroulette” geht weiter!

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

Tue May 1 2012

About $336 million will be earmarked in Tuesday’s state budget to reform Victoria’s broken child-protection system.

The government has released a strategy in response to 90 recommendations for an overhaul of the child protection system from a panel headed by former Supreme Court judge Philip Cummins.

It committed last February to spend more than $61 million to employ 19 extra child protection workers, expand family support services in areas of extreme demand, and establish three new centres where police, child protection officers and counsellors will work together to address child sex abuse.

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NEW JERSEY
Observer-Tribune

Posted: Monday, April 30, 2012

By PHIL GARBER, Managing Editor

MENDHAM ‑ Bill Crane recalled how he felt when he got the phone call at his Oregon home last November that someone had shattered the memorial to clergy sexual abuse survivors at St. Joseph Church.

“It was exactly how I felt,” said Crane, 46, who lived in Mendham when as a child, he was sexually assaulted by former parish priest, James Hanley. “Shattered.”

The 400-pound black basalt monument was replaced at its original spot next to the West Main Street church at a public ceremony on Saturday.

Church bells rang while a bagpiper played “Amazing Grace” to an audience of about 70 people. They included Crane and survivors and family members of survivors of Hanley who, during his tenure as pastor ofSt. Joseph’s from 1972 to 1982, sexually abused more than a dozen boys in the church rectory.

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UNITED STATES
firedoglake

By: Scarecrow Monday April 30, 2012

A lot of Americans, Catholic or otherwise, were offended, even outraged when the Vatican presumed to lecture America’s nuns about being too devoted to helping the poor and insufficiently obedient in spreading blatantly discriminatory Vatican doctrines against gays, contraception, and the whole question of women’s place in the church.

Catholics were especially shocked at the overtly male attack on the respected nuns and appalled when the Vatican assigned an out-of-touch American Bishop to start an inquisition attempting to silence the organization representing 80 percent of American nuns.

As the Dad says in the Eddie Murphy comedy, “this is America, Jack,” and folks here are not fond of foreign rulers, let alone religious potentates, presuming to tell them what to believe. It just struck a lot of folks as being not just out of touch but unAmerican.

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AUSTRIA
National Catholic Reporter

Apr. 30, 2012
By Christa Pongratz-Lippitt

Analysis

VIENNA, AUSTRIA — Cardinal Christoph Schönborn is an old hand by now at dealing with Austrian church crises. Appointed archbishop of Vienna in 1995 (at the age of 50), after the late Cardinal Hans Hermann Groër had to step down after being accused of sexually abusing a minor, Schönborn has had to cope with constant demands for church reform ever since — demands that have now become a perennial issue and frequently hit world headlines. And although he makes no secret of the fact that he is a conservative at heart and an adamant advocate of both mandatory priestly celibacy and of Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae, for example, he has often surprised Austrian Catholics and others by the courageous way he has tackled seemingly insolvable dilemmas. He has, moreover, never hesitated to criticize the Vatican when to his mind it was at fault or shared in the blame for crises in the Austrian church.

In his chrism Mass sermon on April 2, the Monday of Holy Week, he offered his own Jesus-solution on how priests can cope with three of the most problematic situations confronting them in their pastoral work today:

•The large number of people, including many young, conservative Catholics, who cohabit without being married;
•The large number of divorced people who remarry;
•The increasing number of same-sex partnerships.

“We priests usually give up when we are faced with complete incomprehension at what the church teaches about marriage and abstinence, proliferation and indissolubility. … There is only one way, the way his disciples learned: get to know Jesus himself better, grow into his friendship,” Schönborn told his priests. Priests should learn to walk the tightrope between canon law and true mercy as Jesus practiced it by asking themselves what Jesus would have done in each problematic situation and then following in his footsteps, the cardinal said.

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UNITED STATES
The New York Review of Books

[read the story]

Garry Wills

The Vatican has issued a harsh statement claiming that American nuns do not follow their bishops’ thinking. That statement is profoundly true. Thank God, they don’t. Nuns have always had a different set of priorities from that of bishops. The bishops are interested in power. The nuns are interested in the powerless. Nuns have preserved Gospel values while bishops have been perverting them. The priests drive their own new cars, while nuns ride the bus (always in pairs). The priests specialize in arrogance, the nuns in humility.

There was a vogue, just after the Second Vatican Council, for some Catholics to demonstrate their liberation from Catholic schooling by making fun of nuns, as strict disciplinarians or prissy moralists. I wrote at the time that this was untrue of the many nuns I have known, beginning with the Dominican Sisters of Adrian, Michigan, who taught me for five of my grade school years. They taught me the Latin of the old liturgy; Father Sullivan, our pastor, just got angry at words mispronounced or forgotten. The Dominicans never physically punished anyone that I saw or heard of.

They were more supportive of talent than were most of the lay teachers I met in a brief experience of public school. I had no artistic inclinations, but classmates who did were encouraged. The nuns’ genuine interest in their pupils can be seen in the fact that my seventh grade teacher kept in touch with me for all the years until her death in 1996. She was Sister John Joseph when I met her, but she recovered her real name after the Council, and as Anne O’Connor congratulated me on anything I wrote. (I would no more have kept up with Father Sullivan than with cholera.)

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

OLIVIA KELLY

A SILENT vigil was held outside the papal nunciature in Dublin yesterday to protest against the censuring of priests by the Vatican.

Well-known priest and journalist Fr Brian D’Arcy last week said he had been censured by the Vatican over four articles he wrote for the Sunday World newspaper in 2010.

Fr D’Arcy is the fifth Irish Catholic priest known to have been censured by the Vatican recently. The others are Redemptorist priests Fr Tony Flannery and Fr Gerard Moloney, Marist priest Fr Seán Fagan and Capuchin priest Fr Owen O’Sullivan.

More than 200 lay Catholics and religious, several of whom wore gags in the Vatican colours of white and yellow, yesterday handed in a letter at the gates of the residence of papal nuncio Archbishop Charles Brown, calling for the censures to be revoked. It is not known if the archbishop was at home.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Edel O’Connell

Monday April 30 2012

A GROUP of Catholic nuns, priests and lay people wore gags yesterday as they demonstrated outside the office of the Pope’s envoy to Ireland to protest at the Vatican’s silencing of several dissident priests.

We Are Church Ireland says its members are “very angry and shocked” by the news that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has ordered a number of priests to refrain from writing, or to clear all written work with their religious superiors prior to publication.

The protesters chose to hold their protest outside the Papal Nuncio, Monsignor Charles Brown’s residency on the Navan Road in Dublin, as the 52-year-old has worked at the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith since 1994.

More than 200 people joined the demonstration, despite inclement weather conditions.

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IRELAND
The Irish Sun

By BARRY MORAN

Fr Martin McVeigh stirred outrage when he flashed the graphic snaps at a First Communion meeting in Pomeroy, Co Tyrone, last month.

Yesterday he begged his parishioners for forgiveness for what he described as “this awful episode”.

But in a statement the cleric insisted that the images — which popped up in a Powerpoint presentation to primary school parents — weren’t his.

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WISCONSIN
Fox 6

[with video]

Posted on: 10:20 pm, April 29, 2012, by Ted Perry

HUBERTUS — Even before he was installed as Milwaukee’s Archbishop, there was a sense among Catholics that Timothy Dolan would not be in Milwaukee long, and they were right. Saturday, April 28th, Cardinal Dolan made a trip back to Milwaukee and held Mass at Holy Hill — his first trip back since he was elevated to Cardinal. FOX6′s Ted Perry sat down with Dolan for a one-on-one interview before he celebrated Mass.

62-year-old Timothy Dolan bursts into a room the way he arrived in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee 10 years ago. Early on, he spoke with the optimism that Catholics had longed to hear and even then, was downplaying his imminent rise. Back in 2002, Dolan said he was going to die in Milwaukee, and this weekend, he said he meant it. “I was relishing spending the rest of my life in Milwaukee because I loved it here,” Dolan said.

Dolan’s critics say he didn’t do enough to move along the healing process regarding the clergy sex abuse scandal – a point Dolan concedes, but not for lack of effort. More recent sore points for Catholics are changes to the Mass, which many find simply unnecessary, and a recent rebuke of Catholic nuns by the Vatican for straying from church doctrine.

“From the beginning, what do you see? That the church had challenges, difficulties, people leaving, divisions, dissents, wrong teaching. We’ve seen it since the beginning,” Dolan said.

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ROME
Blitz Quotidiano

ROMA – Ora che il caso della sepoltura di Enrico De Pedis detto ‘Renatino’ dentro la Basilica di Sant’Apollinare a Roma è stato riaperto, ‘Il Corriere della Sera’ pubblica una rivelazione: la vedova del boss della Banda della Magliana avrebbe pagato un miliardo di lire nel 1990 per quella sepoltura.

Ora che Vaticano e Stato italiano hanno trovato l’intesa per lo spostamento (entro maggio) della tomba del boss, emergono quindi dettagli sul “prezzo” da Carla Di Giovanni all’epoca della morte del marito. Una fonte vicina alla Santa Sede (interpellata dall’Ansa) ha spiegato che davanti alle insistenze del rettore di Sant’Apollinare, Piero Vergari, “il cardinale Ugo Poletti, inizialmente reticente ad approvare la concessione, di fronte a una cifra così cospicua diede la sua benedizione”. D’altronde quel fiume di danaro “fu usato per le missioni e in parte per lavori di restauro della basilica”, è la salomonica conclusione.

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ROME
The Independent (United Kingdom)

Michael Day
Milan
Monday 30 April 2012

The Vatican is facing a deepening controversy over the burial 22 years ago of a notorious crime boss, with reports emerging that the church accepted a one billion lire (£407,000) payment from the mobster’s widow to allow his interment in a basilica.

A source at the Holy See told the Ansa news agency that “despite initial reluctance” the then vicar-general of Rome, Cardinal Ugo Poletti, “in the face of such a conspicuous sum, gave his blessing” to the controversial interment of Enrico De Pedis, the former boss of Rome’s notorious Magliana gang. The money was reportedly used on missions and to restore the Basilica of St Apollinare, where the mobster was laid to rest next to popes and cardinals after his death in 1990.

The claims, which the Vatican has not commented on, may explain how such a reviled criminal was buried in such a hallowed site. Last week, to deflect growing criticism and to help resolve a 30-year-old murder mystery, it emerged that Vatican officials had decided to move the remains of De Pedis from his special crypt.

Pressure mounted earlier this month when a prosecuting magistrate, Giancarlo Capaldo, claimed senior officials at the Vatican knew much more than they were letting on about the Magliana gang’s links to the Holy See, and the gang’s suspected kidnap and murder of Emanuela Orlandi, the 15-year-old daughter of a Vatican official, in 1983. “There are people still alive, and still inside the Vatican, who know the truth,” he said. Some believe Emanuela’s father had evidence linking the Vatican Bank, Istituto per le Opere di Religione, to organised crime, and that she was snatched to keep him silent. The theory is that De Pedis, who was shot dead in 1990, organised the kidnapping.

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MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

…In a Clayton courtroom tomorrow (Monday), look for Rev. Billy Lee Little’s lawyers to ask a judge for permission to file a defamation suit against Darrell and Rhonda Pitts. The Pitts are suing Little for allegedly exploiting her during a counseling session at Christ Memorial Baptist Church in Cool Valley. Little is a former psychologist (the state yanked his license after a similar case in the 1990s). He’s also an ex-Cardinals consultant and ex-KMOX radio talk show host… Cardinal Tim Dolan’s “homecoming” mass yesterday in Wisconsin saw lower attendance than predicted. Milwaukee archdiocesan PR flak Julie Wolf estimated the crowd at about 1,200 though the basilica had prepared seating for as many as 2,500. After the event, Dolan acknowledged the criticism of clergy sex abuse victims, who say he left much work unfinished. “They have a point,” he admitted. Meanwhile, look for an announcement soon about a key St. Louis archdiocesan insider being replaced soon.

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NEW YORK
New York Post

By MICHAEL LESHER

If anyone had dared to suggest that Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes’ office has an official policy giving preferential treatment to Orthodox Jewish sex criminals, the critic would probably be knee-deep in editorials charging him with anti-Semitism.

Alas, what’s an Orthodox Jewish lawyer like me to say when the DA’s lieutenants themselves announce just such a policy?

I’ll say this: Hynes’ refusal to disclose almost any information about the arrest or prosecution of alleged sex offenders from the politically powerful Orthodox community is not only discriminatory; it’s also a cynical insult to the victims his office is pledged to support.

Mind you, the discrimination is no mere allegation; it’s a matter of record. In letters this month to reporters Paul Berger, of Forward, and Hella Winston, of The Jewish Week, Assistant DA Morgan Dennehy explicitly affirmed that his boss’ policy for suppressing information about sex abuse is “unique” to the “Hasidic” community.

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VATICAN CITY
Chiesa

VATICAN CITY, April 30, 2012 – The congregation for the doctrine of the faith has charged the archbishop of Seattle, James Peter Sartain, with bringing back to the straight and narrow the “Leadership Conference of Women Religious,” the conference of religious superiors of the United States of America, initials LCWR, the cartel that connects most of the communities of sisters in the country.

He will be assisted in the enterprise by bishops Leonard P. Blair of Toledo, Ohio, and Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois. The former was also in charge of the two-year investigation, from 2009 to 2010, that led to this decision.

On the same day as the appointment of Sartain as “commissioner,” on April 18, the congregation for the doctrine of the faith also made public an eight-page document of its own, in English, that reconstructs the run-up to the decision and above all presents its justifications.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Sunday April 29 2012

Editorial

MICHAEL McDowell once warned that canon law had no more status than the rules of a golf club. Sadly, the Catholic Church’s response to the tightening of the rules on the reporting of sexual abuse suggests that recognition of new realities comes dripping slow to that institution.

Its hysteria over the seal of the confessional should not disguise the fact that were the new laws on child protection retrospective, or applicable over the past 30 years, quite a few Episcopal ‘wounded healers’ would be facing criminal sanctions. The church should face its responsibilities to children and drop its Non serviam (‘I will not serve’) attitude.

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NEBRASKA
KCAU

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) _ An allegation of sexual abuse by an Omaha priest dates to his service at Norfolk church.

Deacon Timothy McNeil, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Omaha, says the allegation against Rev. Franklin Dvorak came to light at the end of March. He’s accused of sexually abusing a female student from 1970 to 1972.

Dvorak was placed on leave Friday from St. Elizabeth Ann Seton parish in Omaha. He was appointed pastor there in 2007. McNeil says Dvorak was at Sacred Heart Parish in Norfolk at the time of the alleged abuse. He says the claim has been deemed credible by a review board.

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NEW JERSEY
The Daily Journal

Written by
Colleen Diskin
The Record

HACKENSACK — Schools are forbidding teachers and coaches from befriending students on Facebook and banning them from giving students gifts or rides home to guard against situations that could potentially lead to sexual abuse of children.

Employee behavior is being more closely scrutinized and staff members are being trained to act as watchdogs as more school officials in New Jersey realize they need to do a better job policing their own.

“The worst thing that a school district can do is to ignore this and to pretend that it doesn’t go on,” said Steven Engravalle, interim superintendent in Fort Lee. “I wish it were being spoken about more. It’s still a very dark subject that people don’t want to talk about.”

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OMAHA (NE)
Omaha World-Herald

By Susan Szalewski
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

A 68-year-old Omaha priest has been placed on administrative leave while the Catholic Church investigates an accusation he sexually abused a teenage girl in the 1970s.

The Rev. Franklin A. Dvorak, pastor at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church, denies the allegation, a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Omaha said.

An archdiocesan review board conducted a preliminary investigation and determined there was enough evidence to meet the church’s standard for a credible allegation, said Deacon Timothy McNeil, the archdiocese’s chancellor.

At Masses on Sunday, parishioners at St. Elizabeth Ann and St. James Churches were notified through a letter from Archbishop George Lucas. St. James parishioners were included because they share an elementary school with St. Elizabeth Ann, McNeil said.

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OMAHA (NE)
WETV

OMAHA, Neb. –
Omaha’s Archdiocese said it is investigating allegations of sexual abuse against a pastor.

Officials said the accusations date back 40 years.

The Rev. Franklin Dvorak is the pastor at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church at 114th and Fort streets.

Dvorak was placed on administrative leave while an investigation is completed.

The allegations surfaced at the end of March that Dvorak sexually abused a female student from 1970 to 1972 while he was at a parish in Norfolk, Neb. He has been pastor at St. Elizabeth’s since 2007.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Greg Harkin

Monday April 30 2012

HUNDREDS of people travelled from all over Ireland yesterday to show their support for Father Brian D’Arcy as the cleric admitted to initially thinking he would have to leave the priesthood.

More than 1,000 people attended midday Mass at the Passionist Monastery near Enniskillen and heard the priest apologise to them for the furore over the Vatican move to censor his views.

Fr D’Arcy got a standing ovation from the congregation in St Gabriel’s Chapel as he managed to make light of the controversy.

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OMAHA (NE)
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish

My name is Fr. Franklin Anthony Dvorak. I was born on a farm near Dodge, NE. I attended St. Wenceslaus Catholic grade school in Dodge and attended The Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio for all twelve years of my Seminary training. I was ordained by the Apostolic Delegate Luigi Raimondi in Columbus, Ohio on March 21, 1970.

My parish assignments are as follows: Sacred Heart/St. Mary’s Parish in Norfolk, NE from 1970 to 1974; St. Patrick’s Parish in O’Neill, NE from 1974 to 1979; St. Mary’s Parish in Spencer, NE from 1979 to 1985; St. Michael’s in Coleridge NE and St. Mary’s in Belden, NE from 1985 to 1989; Holy Trinity Parish in Hartington, NE from 1989 to 1995; St. Wenceslaus in Omaha from 1995 to 2007; and since then at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton.

I am involved in the Archdiocese Christians Encounter Christ movement and have been for over thirty-five years. I am on the Archdiocesan Priest’s Personnel Board and have served at different times for a total of over fifteen years. I am Dean of Suburban-north Deanery and have served as Dean in the various Deaneries in which I was stationed, which in turn means that I have also been on the Archdiocesan Priest’s Council and served on various committees during these times. I am on the Archdiocesan Deposit and Loan Committee and have served for over ten years. During my forty one plus years as a priest I have given many, many retreats to grade and high school students. I have served on the Archdiocesan Liturgy Committee, the Archdiocesan Young Adult Committee, on the Archdiocesan Stewardship Committee, as an Archdiocesan Consultor, and also for ten years on the Archdiocesan Natural Family Planning Committee.

I am a Chaplain for the Omaha Police Department and have been serving for the past fifteen years.

My parents are both deceased. I have a brother and two sisters. My brother is married with three married grown children. My older sister is a Notre Dame Sister, serving at St. Rose in Genoa, NE. My younger sister is married with one grown son and one deceased son.

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OMAHA (NE)
San Antonio Express-News

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — An Omaha priest has been placed on administrative leave amid an allegation of sex abuse.

Deacon Timothy McNeil, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Omaha, told WOWT-TV (http://bit.ly/Ii8g8i ) that an internal review board found the allegation that Rev. Franklin Dvorak abused a female student from 1970 to 1972 credible.

Dvorak denies the claim.

Dvorak was ordained in 1970. He was appointed pastor of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish in 2007.

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OMAHA (NE)
WOWT

Reporter: WOWT
Email Address: sixonline@wowt.com

An Omaha priest has been put on administrative leave by Archbishop George Lucas after an allegation of sexual abuse.

Reverend Franklin A. Dvorak, pastor of St. Elizabeth Ann Parish in Omaha is accused of sexually abusing a female student from 1970-1972.

Dvorak denies sexually abusing a minor.

A letter written by Archbishop Lucas informing parishioners of the allegation was given to St. Elizabeth Ann and St. James parishioners at the weekend Masses.

Deacon Timothy F. McNeil, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Omaha, says the allegation was reported to law enforcement officials and the Archdiocesan Review Board.

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IRELAND
RTE News

At least 200 people are taking part in a silent vigil in support of priests who have been censured by the Vatican.

Those taking part say they are committed Catholics who wish to show their solidarity with the priests, who they say are articulating the views of the majority of Irish Catholics.

The vigil, taking place outside the residence of the Papal Nuncio in Dublin, has been organised by We Are Church Ireland, an organisation which is pressing for reform in the Catholic Church.

The group has handed in a letter to the Nuncio calling for the revocation of the silencing of the priests by the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, which they say “punished these men without due process and through secretive procedures with no right to appeal”.

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IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

Good Shepherd Sunday has Jesus show us a leader’s true character, for a true leader is concerned for those in their care, and not in their own self-interest.

Sadly, for the second time in a few short weeks, I find it necessary to pen these words in support of a fellow priest, who finds himself censored for expressing his views on Church discipline.

Fr. Brian Darcy is a fellow Fermanagh man, a colleague and member of our Diocesan Branch of the ACP. Brian is a much loved and respected priest, who always comes across as warm, caring, honest, and courageous. Brian’s unique ministry has touched many Catholics and priests down the years, meaningfully and successfully evangelising where very few others has ventured.

Many Catholics comment on what a different Church we could have in Ireland, if priests, freed from fears and jealousies, would strive to emulate Fr. Brian. Then the Gospel would take precedence over the institution, and compassion would come before regulations and man made rules.

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IRELAND
BBC

Duration: 1 hour

Decades of clerical abuse and cover up have left the Catholic church in Ireland at breaking point. Now Darragh MacIntyre reveals new evidence of a scandal that goes to the very top of the Irish church.

Tue 1 May 2012
22:35
BBC One
only on Northern Ireland

BBC HD
Wed 2 May 2012
21:00

BBC HD
BBC TwoWed 2 May 2012
21:00

BBC Two
except Northern Ireland (Analogue), Wales (Analogue)

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Ballymoney and Moyle Times

The priest at the centre of a stand-off over the accidental showing of pornographic images at a presentation to parents in a Co Tyrone primary school is to leave the area.

Parish Priest of Pomeroy Father Martin McVeigh announced his decision following a row that has brewed for weeks after parents were outraged when the indecent images of men were screened as the clergyman began a PowerPoint presentation in preparation for their children’s First Holy Communion.

The priest, as well as Catholic primate Cardinal Sean Brady, issued statements where Fr McVeigh denied being responsible for the images, and said he destroyed the memory stick carrying the pictures because he was shocked in the aftermath of the incident.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
RTE News

A Catholic priest in Co Tyrone has apologised unreservedly after indecent images were inadvertently projected onto a screen during a meeting of parents at a primary school last month.

In a statement this afternoon, Fr Martin McVeigh said he wanted to assure parishioners in Pomeroy that he was not responsible for the presence of the offending images in his PowerPoint presentation.

The images were shown at a First Communion meeting at St Mary’s Primary School on 26 March.

He said the memory of what he described as “this awful episode” would remain with him always.

“I deeply regret my failure to check, in advance, my presentation I had no knowledge of any offending imagery existing in it,” Fr McVeigh said.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

A Catholic priest who “inadvertently” showed indecent images during a presentation at a primary school in County Tyrone has asked to take sabbatical leave.

Father Martin McVeigh projected the images onto a screen during a meeting for parents in Pomeroy in preparation for First Holy Communion on 26 March.

One child was present. Parents said 16 indecent images of men were displayed.

The priest said he had no knowledge of the offending imagery.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
The Irish Times

A Catholic priest from Co Tyrone who “inadvertently” displayed gay pornographic images to a group of parents and a child has issued an unreserved apology.

The images were shown on a screen by Fr Martin McVeigh, the parish priest of Pomeroy, during a PowerPoint presentation at St Mary’s Primary School about children’s first Confession on March 26th

In a statement today, Fr McVeigh said he “deeply” regrets his failure to check his presentation in advance.

“I had no knowledge of any offending imagery existing in it. After the images were inadvertently shown, I immediately removed the memory stick from the laptop,” he said. “In my shock and upset and in my concern to ensure that the images would never be shown again, I destroyed it later that evening.”

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

By Oren Yaniv / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

A Brooklyn rabbi’s conviction on charges of molesting a teenage boy was tossed aside on appeal Wednesday because detectives failed to disclose documents regarding bribery allegations.

Baruch Lebovits, 61, was sent to 10 2/3 to 32 years in prison based on testimony of a 22-year-old admitted drug user who claimed the rabbi sexually abused him at age 16.

Only after the alleged victim testified in March 2010 did prosecutors hand over notes indicating he had told police that Lebovits tried to bribe him.

But by then, the defense questions opened the door for prosecutors to ask about the bribery offer, which the rabbi later denied.

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NEW YORK
Haaretz (Israel)

By Paul Berger

Orthodox Jews convicted of or charged with child sex abuse in Brooklyn should have their identities protected because of the community’s “tight-knit and insular” nature, prosecutors claim in a response to The Forward’s request for information about the cases.

Rejecting the request under the state’s Freedom of Information Law, the Brooklyn district attorney’s office stated that Orthodox Jews deserve a blanket exemption from the usual public disclosure rules.

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NEW YORK
New York Post

By JOSE MARTINEZ

The conviction of a Brooklyn rabbi who was sentenced to up to 32 years for preying on a teenage boy has been overturned by a state appeals court.

The Appellate Division ordered a new trial for Rabbi Baruch Lebovits, who was found guilty in 2010 of sexually abusing a then-16-year-old boy.

Judges this week reversed the conviction, noting that prosecutors didn’t give defense lawyers a detective’s notes about a possible plot by the teen.

“It’s an absolute victory for us,” said lawyer Alan Dershowitz.

Lebovits had charged that the teen admitted he was “going to try to make money,” the judges noted, by accusing Lebovits of sex abuse.

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IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

When I tried to send a comment on 22nd May the ‘capptcha code got me, and the message was lost. Now that Brian d’Arcy has been censured I think it is important to re-send the post about ‘Dialogue within the church’

In the book ‘Future Directions’, ” A Call to Dialog within the Church” which he edited, the late Carroll Stuhlmueller C.P. wrote that, ‘the ordination of women enlarges a dialog across the entire church, male and female, and forces us to re-examine the nature and force of symbol within the sacramental system of the Catholic church. Dialog such as this unites rather than divides. It enriches and so makes the bond within the church more worthy of Jesus’ death and resurrection.’… ‘ this book presents no final answers…, the authors, however, call all of us to dialog with honesty and dignity, with openness in the pastoral and scholarly forum, that the future directions of priesthood reflect the guidance of the Holy Spirit in our midst’.

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UNITED STATES
Pope Crimes & Vatican Evils…

Updated April 28, 2012

Paris Arrow

It was the right thing and the right time to do it when Ireland recently closed down its Vatican Embassy in Rome because now the Vatican Totalitarian Regime and Reign of Terror of God’s Rottweiler Benedict XVI is retaliating Ireland from his despot control Vatican Bank Tower by silencing Fr. Tony Flaherty and other outspoken Irish priests. The Vatican Titanic Ship is sinking in moral bankruptcy as it has hit icebergs in Ireland and the USA and in all countries where the JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army existed during the longest papacy of Blessed John Paul II, whose beatification one-year anniversary will be celebrated in May 1 …

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By JEROME REILLY

Sunday April 29 2012

The BBC has become embroiled in the controversy over the Vatican’s gagging of Father Brian D’Arcy.

The censuring of the 64-year-old, Fermanagh-born cleric by the Vatican led to a direct order from Rome 14 months ago that he submit his writings to a religious superior for clearance.

Fr D’Arcy has been a regular contributor to BBC radio’s Pause for Thought for more than 20 years, sharing a studio with presenters including Terry Wogan, Derek Jameson and Chris Evans.

However, the revelation that he has submitted his writings to higher authorities for vetting for more than a year appears to breach BBC editorial rules though Fr D’Arcy said yesterday he had told both the BBC and the Sunday World of his problems with the Vatican 14 months ago.

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PHILIPPINES
Inquirer

By: Rina Jimenez-David
Philippine Daily Inquirer

I still remember the Maryknoll Sisters. I still remember them walking around the Maryknoll campus in Loyola Heights, in their black-and-white habits with the peaked cap and large rosaries hanging from their waists.

Most of them were Americans, and there was even a rumor circulating that one of the prettiest nuns had won a beauty contest in her home state before she heard the call. They never seemed to age. But a friend, who also grew up among religious women, explained: “Of course they never aged. All the parts that reveal a woman’s age—neck, forehead, hair, knees and hips—were concealed!”

The Second Vatican Council took place just before I stepped into high school, and pretty soon the forever-young nuns in their black-and-white habits were no more. In their place we saw old (or aging) women, their graying hair finally exposed, the monochromatic habits replaced with decorous dresses albeit in colorful prints, but the ugly shoes (or utilitarian sandals) still remained.

What didn’t change was the nuns’ spirit—a combination of daring and openness, even with hard-headed young women, and a devotion to serving the poor and the needy. Maybe this was why before I graduated and left the green and idyllic campus, the nuns had already left the college, choosing to serve the poorest communities in rural areas, and leaving the education and formation of cosseted girls from middle-class homes to the capable hands of lay teachers and administrators. …

Recently, the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a statement saying it was appointing a bishop to oversee the affairs of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), which gathers most of the major women’s religious congregations in the United States. The reason? The nuns’ alleged refusal to “toe the line,” issuing statements that “disagree with or challenge the bishops, who are the church’s authentic teachers of faith and morals.” More on this last statement later.

Anyway, the American Catholic columnist Garry Wills, reacting to the Vatican’s action, wrote in his blog for the New York Review of Books: “The Vatican has issued a harsh statement claiming that American nuns do not follow their bishops’ thinking. That statement is profoundly true. Thank God, they don’t. Nuns have always had a different set of priorities from that of bishops. The bishops are interested in power. The nuns are interested in the powerless. Nuns have preserved Gospel values while bishops have been perverting them. The priests drive their own new cars, while nuns ride the bus (always in pairs). The priests specialize in arrogance, the nuns in humility.”

My sentiments exactly.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
Rome

When Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected to the papacy in April 2005, the popular forecast called for stormy weather ahead. This was, after all, the Vatican enforcer who had been leading a “smack-down on heresy since 1981”, in the words of T-shirts and coffee mugs marketed by a Ratzinger fan club. His rise elicited dread in some quarters and joy in others, but virtually everyone agreed big things were in the works.

During most of the past seven years, however, that anticipated upheaval has seemed a lot like the dog that didn’t bark. Back in February 2006, the late Fr. Richard John Neuhaus famously voiced “palpable unease” among those most elated by Ratzinger’s election, and that disappointment endured in a swath of Catholic opinion which had begun to despair that the pope would ever impose order.

Of late, however, many observers believe the “real Ratzinger” has finally come out to play. Consider the tumult of the past month:

•On April 18, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith decreed a sweeping overhaul of the Leadership Conference for Women Religious, the main American umbrella group for the superiors of women’s orders, to correct what the congregation described as LCWR’s “corporate dissent” on issues such as women’s ordination and homosexuality, and its contamination by “radical feminism.”

•At least five Irish priests have faced Vatican-inspired discipline, with implementation left to their religious orders. Two Redemptorists have seen their writings for a church magazine either withdrawn or limited (one was also dispatched to a monastery for a six-week “reflection”), a Passionist prominent in the English media is now subject to prior censorship, and both a Marist and a Capuchin have been told to stop writing and speaking on certain hot-button topics.

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

Written by
Lorraine Ash
@LorraineVAsh

MENDHAM — A hundred people gathered Saturday at the Church of St. Joseph for the dedication of a new Millstone Memorial, the first in the nation built to remember survivors of clergy sexual abuse.

The original monument, dedicated in 2004, was destroyed by sledgehammer in an act of vandalism last November.

Among those gathered were some of the men who were abused as boys in the rectory of the church from 1972 to 1982 when James Hanley was pastor. Hanley, who has since been defrocked, has admitted molesting about a dozen children there and at other area parishes decades ago.

“Close to 20 men disclosed they had been abused by Father Hanley,” said retired Monsignor Kenneth Lasch, who was the pastor after Hanley.

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

Re-dedication at St Joseph’s Church in Mendham of the Millstone Memorial, the nation’s first memorial in remembrance of clergy sex abuse survivors destroyed by a vandal in November 2011. Staff Video by Bob Karp

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ALASKA
Juneau Empire

By BISHOP EDWARD J. BURNS

The bishops of Alaska have been in Rome for the past week meeting with officials of the Vatican. This visit is referred to as the “ad limina apostolorum”, meaning, “at the threshold of the apostles”. Every five years bishops are called to the Vatican to give an account of their work within their diocese. First and foremost, this is a pilgrimage to pray at the tombs of St. Peter and St. Paul. We celebrated Masses at the sites where both of these men were martyred for their profession of the faith. While the details of St. Paul’s martyrdom are a bit sketchy, it is understood that St. Peter was crucified upside down.

The bishops of Alaska are part of Region XII of the U.S. Bishops which make up the northwest section of the country including the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana. We met with the Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, at the beginning of the week. During this meeting, each bishop gave the Pope a description of our life and ministry.

The bishops agreed to present different topics to the Holy Father, and I accepted to share with him the work that has taken place in creating a safe environment within our dioceses and parish communities. This June we will mark 10 years since the U.S .bishops have promulgated the ‘Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People’. Since this Charter was put into place, the Catholic Church in the US has trained more than 2.1 million clergy, employees and volunteers in how to create a safe environment. This work has also prepared more than 5.2 million children to recognize abuse and protect themselves. Background checks have been conducted on more than 1.8 million volunteers and employees, 166,000 educators, 52,000 clerics and 6,000 men preparing for ordination. We were pleased to be informed by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that the Church in the U.S. has taken the lead in addressing the issue of sexual abuse which has permeated all of society. Nevertheless, I mentioned to our Holy Father that much more needs to be done. First and foremost in being pastorally present to those who have been abused, to increase our collaboration and communication with others about this issue and to continue to restore trust among the members of the Church.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Sunday April 29 2012

The Vatican’s silencing of highly respected Irish priests can only distress many believers, writes Ulick O’Connor

Recently two Irish priests were silenced by the Vatican for their views on priests marrying and opening up the church to the laity. On Thursday it emerged that the Vatican had also censured Fr Brian D’Arcy, the highly respected broadcaster.

The sense of rebellion among clergy here had already reached the grass roots. The Association of Catholic Priests, which has 800 members here, had previously issued a statement reproving the Vatican for its stance towards the Irish clergy, and asked them “to go up and treat people with dignity and due process. We are not a small cohort of Catholic priests; we are at the heart of the church committed to putting in place the reforms of the Second Vatican Council”.

An essential factor in enabling Irish clergy to make such a statement was the Taoiseach’s remarkable speech in the Dail in November when he threw down the gauntlet to the Vatican on the subject of the clerical abuse revealed by the Cloyne Report.

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

Sunday, April 29, 2012

By MIKE KELLY
RECORD COLUMNIST

They carried flowers and photos and their own silent history of abuse.

But the object of their attention was a rock.

As church bells chimed and a piper played “Amazing Grace,” more than 70 people gathered Saturday outside a Roman Catholic church in Mendham to rededicate a vandalized memorial to children who have been sexually abused by priests.

The crowded North Jersey landscape is dotted with all manner of local shrines and monuments in town squares or parks, often commemorating war veterans or heroic police and firefighters. But the tire-shaped stone that sits at the western edge of the parking lot at the Church of St. Joseph in downtown Mendham may be one of the most unusual memorials anywhere.

“The Millstone,” as the memorial is called, is believed to be the only monument to victims of sexual abuse on Catholic Church property in the world. Its centerpiece — a hunk of charcoal-gray Columbia River basalt cut in the shape of a millstone — was destroyed last November allegedly by a local man who police say got drunk and smashed the memorial with a sledgehammer.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

A high-profile Catholic priest censured by the Vatican for his writings has warned that the creation of a “veil of secrecy” worked against efforts to prevent clerical child abuse.

Fr Brian D’Arcy, a broadcaster and newspaper columnist, said he had not challenged church doctrine but was censured for articles on a number of issues, including criticism of the church response to sex abuse scandals.

The priest, from Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh, who is a regular broadcaster on BBC Radio 2 and Radio Ulster and writes a religious column for the Sunday World newspaper, was censured by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).

The four articles by Fr D’Arcy concerned how the Vatican dealt with the issue of women priests; why US Catholics were leaving the church; why the church must take responsibility for clerical child sex abuse; and homosexuality.

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UNITED STATES
The New York Times

By MAUREEN DOWD

Published: April 28, 2012

WASHINGTON

IT is an astonishing thing that historians will look back and puzzle over, that in the 21st century, American women were such hunted creatures.

Even as Republicans try to wrestle women into chastity belts, the Vatican is trying to muzzle American nuns.

Who thinks it’s cool to bully nuns? While continuing to heal and educate, the community of sisters is aging and dying out because few younger women are willing to make such sacrifices for a church determined to bring women to heel.

Yet the nuns must be yanked into line by the crepuscular, medieval men who run the Catholic Church.

“It’s not terribly unlike the days of yore when they singled out people in the rough days of the Inquisition,” said Kenneth Briggs, the author of “Double Crossed: Uncovering the Catholic Church’s Betrayal of American Nuns.”

How can the church hierarchy be more offended by the nuns’ impassioned advocacy for the poor than by priests’ sordid pedophilia?

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MADISON (WI)
Wisconsin State Journal

[letter from Bishop Morlino]

DOUG ERICKSON | Wisconsin State Journal | derickson@madison.com

Madison Catholic Bishop Robert Morlino has moved to quell a backlash against a group of conservative priests in Platteville by warning parishioners they risk formal church censure unless they stop spreading “rumors and gossip.”

The action by Morlino, which two Catholic scholars called highly unusual, appears to include the possibility of offenders being prohibited from taking part in church sacraments such as communion, confession and burial.

The warning came in a five-page letter Wednesday from Morlino to St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Platteville. The congregation has been roiled by opposition to the traditionalist priests, who began serving the parish in June 2010.

Within months, church donations fell by more than half, and about 40 percent of the church’s 1,200 members signed a petition seeking the priests’ ouster. The church’s 77-year-old school is set to close June 1, a loss many parishioners tie directly to the collapse of donations.

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IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

The Silent Vigil outside the Papal Nuncio’s Residence will take place tomorrow, Sunday, April 29th, beginning at 3.30pm sharp. It would be good if as many as possible would attend.

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IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

With the disciplining of Fr. Brian D’Arcy (The Tablet 28th April) Ireland now has six priests asked to be silent on several issues. Early in 1995, a group of U.S. bishops submitted a document to the Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Mission and Structure. It appeared in ORIGINS (19/6/1995), a publication of the U.S. Bishops’ Conference.

‘The need to find ways to have more open discussion in a climate of trust is best illustrated by considering current issues in the church that seem not to be addressed openly. These include the priest shortage, priest morale, ecumenical issues, school funding, women and equality in the church, the relationships of youth, Hispanics in the church, better preaching, better liturgy, better relationships with the poor, the relationship of the conference with Rome, the public face of the church on abortion, the annulment process, the loss of Eucharist, alliance of the right wing with some fundamentalist leaders, contraception, sexual ethics, the kind of candidates being attracted to priesthood, anticatholic feeling surfacing in the United States, the ordination of married men, rumours of a high percentage of homosexual men in the seminaries and in the priesthood. In particular, the issue of paedophilia among priests continues to create a very serious credibility problem for the U.S. bishops because of our perceived unwillingness to fully address and explore the reasons for this terrible tragedy.’

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MICHIGAN
MLive

By Heidi Fenton | hfenton@mlive.com

GRAND RAPIDS, MI — In the weeks since the Diocese of Grand Rapids announced a dramatic restructuring plan affecting churches across West Michigan, parishioners have shared mixed reactions of hope, surprise and sadness.

For many, the neighborhood churches are part of the very fabric of their lives. Memories of weddings, baptisms and funerals are tied to them. The familiar walls have been a shelter for Sunday morning greetings between friends and celebrations of newborn children.

It’s hard to imagine those things happening anywhere else than their long-time church home, many say.

They fear what could happen if that aspect of shared familiarity is gone.

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UNITED STATES
Democracy Now

[with video]

The Vatican has reprimanded the largest group of Catholic nuns in the United States, saying they have focused too heavily on issues of social justice, while failing to speak out enough on “issues of crucial importance,” such as abortion and same-sex marriage. In a report issued last week, church leaders accused the nuns of promoting “radical feminist” ideas and challenging key teachings on homosexuality and male-only priesthood. An archbishop and two bishops — all of them male — have been appointed to oversee the nuns. “To me, it’s quite puzzling that our work with the poor, which Jesus told us to do in the gospels, would be the source of such a criticism,” says Sister Simone Campbell, head of the Catholic social justice group NETWORK, which was harshly criticized in last week’s report.

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IRELAND
The Press Association

A high-profile Irish priest censured by the Vatican for his writings has warned that the creation of a “veil of secrecy” worked against efforts to prevent clerical child abuse.

Father Brian D’Arcy, a broadcaster and newspaper columnist, said he had not challenged church doctrine but was censured for articles on a number of issues, including criticism of the church response to sex abuse scandals.

The priest, from Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh, who is a regular broadcaster on BBC Radio 2 and Radio Ulster and writes a religious column for the Dublin-based Sunday World newspaper, was censured by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

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IRELAND
Herald

Saturday April 28 2012

Fr Brian D’arcy is the fifth Irish priest to be told that he must submit his writings and broadcasts to the Vatican for vetting and censorship. A certain generation will react to that news with a ‘Brian who?’ But for those who know something of Brian D’Arcy, it will be seen as a stunning leap back to the 1950s.

D’Arcy was of a new generation of Catholic priests in Ireland in the early 1970s. Then as now, it was anachronistic to find a priest possessed of a love of, expertise in, and willingness to talk about youth culture.

At that historical nexus of rock, country and jive, Brian D’Arcy lived as chaplain to the stars. The music is now old-fashioned. Then it was cutting-edge. It was then as Bressie and LMFAO and Jessie J and One Direction are now. And D’Arcy was at the heart of it.

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MALTA
The Malta Independent

In the space of just over a week, there have been two cases where the judiciary were forced into clearing people accused of crimes, supported by evidence and testimony, due to errors in the charge sheets drawn up against them.

This newspaper published a leading article last week, calling for changes to the law, whereby any errors in charges pressed against an accused may be changed at any time in proceedings. The leading article was published in the wake of an Appeals Court ruling which cleared Fr Godwin Scerri (since defrocked) of rape. The court had cleared him of raping a young boy in his care because of an error which stated that the crime took place in Marfa, rather than Santa Venera.

The Attorney General appealed the decision, but the law is the law and the court upheld the original decision. Let us be clear – the judiciary’s hands were tied, the law is what it is and there was no other ruling that could be given.

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UNITED STATES
Philly Burbs

Throughout the centuries, and even in today’s world, Catholic nuns — those dedicated religious women who have devoted their entire lives to helping others while expecting very little in return — have always been (and still are) treated by many leaders of their church as second-class citizens.

Traditionally, they rank well behind the priests, monks, brothers and other male members of a paternalistic hierarchy.

Throughout most of church history and well into the past century, nuns (because they were women) could not even step onto the altar during Mass or other religious services.

This gender bias was not only found in religious matters, but in the basic differences in the day-to-day lives of both nuns and priests.

A typical example was a convent I clearly remember from my youth. It was a converted run-down building on the edge of the Kensington section of Philadelphia that had previously been a street-corner saloon.

In that dilapidated facility, a dozen sisters (our elementary school teachers) had to sleep on torn mattresses stuffed with old newspapers because they couldn’t afford to buy decent bedding. Much of their furniture was secondhand and donated by parishioners.

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NEDERLAND
L1

Op seminarie Rolduc in Kerkrade zijn 180 oud-Rolduciëns aanwezig bij een reünie; allemaal mannen die ooit les kregen op het jongensinternaat.

Het is de eerste reünie sinds de bekendwording van het misbruik binnen de katholieke kerk. Tijdens het uitgebreide programma was er daarom ook aandacht voor seksueel misbruik.

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IRELAND
RTE News

Fr Brian D’Arcy, the popular journalist who is being censured by the Vatican, has said he has never questioned the defined doctrine of the Catholic Church.

Fr D’Arcy claimed he had been told by his provincial in Ireland that the move by the Vatican 14 months ago was prompted by a headline on an article he had written for the Sunday World, a letter on homosexuality which he had published in his column and criticisms of the Catholic Church’s response to clerical child sex abuse scandals.

Asked about the Vatican ban on the ordination of women priests, he dismissed Rome’s argument that Jesus had never ordained a woman.

Fr D’Arcy pointed out that Jesus had not ordained a black man either, but that black men are allowed to be priests.

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