ABUSE TRACKER

UNITED KINGDOM
Jewish Chronicle

By Simon Rocker, November 23, 2012

A leading member of London’s strictly Orthodox rabbinate this week resigned as a dayan after being confronted over allegations of inappropriate conduct with a number of women.

Rabbi Chaim Halpern, who runs a shtibl (house synagogue) in Golders Green, announced that he was stepping down from “public positions”, which include his seat on the presiding rabbinate of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations.

The storm, which has been gathering around him for weeks, broke on Sunday after he attended a meeting at the home of former London Beth Din head Dayan Chanoch Ehrentreu, where six local rabbis examined the allegations.

The rabbis issued no public statement but a copy of Rabbi Halpern’s resignation letter, handwritten in Hebrew, surfaced on the internet on Tuesday.

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CANADA
CBC News

An 83-year-old former Roman Catholic priest, who pleaded guilty to molesting six children decades ago, was sentenced to five and half years in prison in a Yarmouth court on Friday.

Albert LeBlanc pleaded guilty to six counts of indecent assault in May. Some of the crimes date back to when LeBlanc was a priest in Yarmouth County in the 1970s.

Judge Jim Burrill accepted the Crown and defence’s joint sentencing recommendation.

The Crown said at least one case of abuse started when the boy was only 8-years-old. The court heard how Leblanc would entice his underage victims with alcohol and allow them to drive when they were only 13.

Leblanc’s victims have filed victim impact statements, but none of them wished to read them aloud in court Friday.

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CANADA
CBC News

Posted: Nov 23, 2012

Sentencing is underway for an 83-year-old former Roman Catholic priest who pleaded guilty to molesting six children decades ago.

Albert LeBlanc pleaded guilty to six counts of indecent assault in May. Some of the crimes date back to when LeBlanc was a priest in Yarmouth County in the 1970s.

There’s been a joint recommendation from the Crown prosecutor and Lebalnc’s defense lawyer to sentence him to five and a half years in prison.

The Crown said at least one case of abuse started when the boy was only 8-years-old. The court heard how Leblanc would entice his underage victims with alcohol and allow them to drive when they were only 13.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

It is for all of us who make up the church, not royal commissions, to right these wrongs

Angela Shanahan
From:The Australian
November 24, 2012

THIS week, everyone I have met has asked me the same question. What are you, as a practising Catholic woman, going to say about the church and the royal commission into sexual abuse?

Some people have been very insistent. Like every other Catholic person I know, I am depressed and fed up with this scandal. My children and grandchildren are all Catholics and attended Catholic schools; my son-in-law is a Catholic school teacher.

I am a conservative Catholic, as one wit remarked, more pre-Council of Trent than post-Vatican 2, and hearing the likes of Craig “credit card” Thomson on ABC radio saying in outraged tones that a royal commission is needed because “they” can’t just “sweep it under the carpet” is enough to rile up the old church militant in me.

It is obvious to Blind Freddy that the sudden calling of a royal commission over sexual abuse within the church, when the police have convictions and are doing their job, is pretty suspect; particularly when royal commissions should really be looking at the workings of the state child welfare systems in this country, which are in an absolute shambles and have allowed children to die.

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AUSTRALIA
The Daily Telegraph

Cardinal George Pell and senior members of Catholic Church had ‘sociopathic lack of empathy’ towards Foster family, parliamentary inquiry told

CARDINAL George Pell and other leaders of the Catholic Church had “a sociopathic lack of empathy” towards a family whose lives were ripped apart after a priest abused their daughters, a parliamentary inquiry into child abuse has been told.

It comes as victims speak about seizures, substance abuse and relationship difficulties stemming from childhood abuse in the church.

Anthony and Chrissie Foster, whose daughters Katie and Emma were abused after enrolling in a Catholic primary school in Oakleigh in the late 1980s, told the Victorian parliamentary inquiry into church handling of child sex abuse how their family had been torn apart by the “hell” of dealing with the trauma.

Mr Foster said the late Father Kevin O’Donnell had been reported on three prior occasions but was not brought to justice.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Jill Rowbotham
From:The Australian
November 24, 2012

SCRAP it. That’s what Sydney lawyer and sex-abuse survivor John Ellis says the Catholic Church should do with its Towards Healing policy for dealing with sex-abuse victims.

Mr Ellis, who has first-hand experience of Towards Healing, said the main problem with it and the parallel Melbourne Response was an inherent conflict of interest: cases are managed by church-appointed personnel, although complainants are encouraged to go to police.

The policies will be discussed at an Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference meeting in Sydney starting on Monday.

“I think ultimately they are probably going to have to start again,” Mr Ellis said of Towards Healing, introduced in 1997.

Some victims struggled with “a perception and a reality of coming to the body that has been responsible for causing harm to you and asking them to do something about it”.

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IRELAND
Irish Central

By DARA KELLY,
IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Friday, November 23, 2012

Father Oliver Brennan, the former parish priest in Dundalk County Louth who was falsely accused of child abuse, said support from family and friends kept him sane during the two-year ordeal.

Speaking on the Marian Finucane programme on RTE Radio One last Saturday, he said,

“It was the worst thing in the world, to be accused of the worst crime of all.”

According to the Dundalk Democrat, Fr Brennan said that on August 14, 2010, the bishop, who was with a child safe-guarding officer, read out to him the accusation.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC Grandstand Sport

[with audio]

Peter Jackson was a star of rugby league in the 1980s and 90s, representing Australia and wearing the Maroon for Queensland. But in 1997 Jackson described in a letter the mental anguish he couldn’t shake throughout his life: he was sexually abused as a child. His wife Siobhan Jackson has agreed to read from the letter because, she says, his words have extra significance as Australia prepares for the royal commission into child abuse.

Natalie Poyhonen

Transcript

ASHLEY HALL: The widow of the former NRL star Peter Jackson says authorities must learn from the past and provide comprehensive support for victims who come forward at next year’s royal commission into child abuse.

While Peter Jackson was a champion sportsman, off the field he was crippled by the sexual abuse he endured as a schoolboy.

Siobhan Jackson says her husband struggled with memories of sexual abuse memories that were triggered by publicity surrounding the Wood Royal Commission’s investigations into paedophiles.

Natalie Poyhonen has this report. …

SIOBHAN JACKSON: One of the powerful things about Peter’s story is that it’s not about one institution, it’s over institutions. It’s about a Catholic brother who was working in an Anglican boarding school, who was a football coach. So that’s just a few of the institutions where these perpetrators managed to hide.

NATALIE POYHONEN: Siobhan Jackson says the commission is going to be hard for abuse victims and their families but she believes it will be worth it.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

ABC
November 23, 2012

The Catholic Archbishop of Sydney has been accused of trying to do the job of the Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child abuse, as he seeks access to court material.

Cardinal George Pell has applied to the court for material about the case of a boy raped by Christian Brother Robert Best.

It comes after submissions to the parliamentary inquiry heard he was present when the boy detailed what had happened to him to another priest.

Cardinal Pell maintains he was overseas at the time the boy detailed the abuse.

On Friday, lawyers for Best’s victim opposed the court releasing material about the case.

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AUSTRALIA
ZDNet

Summary: The NSW privacy commissioner has said that the Royal Commission into child sex abuse in Australia will test open government.

By Josh Taylor | November 23, 2012

New South Wales Privacy Commissioner Dr Elizabeth Coombs has said that the Royal Commission into child sex abuse in Australia will test the relationship between open government and ensuring privacy.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard last week announced that the government will conduct a broad-ranging Royal Commission inquiry into institutional responses to child sex abuse claims. The inquiry was launched after accusations mounted of cover-ups of child sex abuse within the Catholic Church in Australia. It is expected that the Royal Commission will take years, with the terms of reference not to be finalised until the end of 2012.

Coombs, who was appointed as the commissioner in 2011, told the International Association of Privacy Professionals’ (IAPP) Privacy Summit today that Ireland encountered issues in its inquiry into child sexual abuse in drawing a line between ensuring that the inquiry could do its job and protecting the information of the victims.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

A FEMALE Sunday school teacher who sexually abused a teenage girl in her care was seeking comfort and solace, a court has heard.

The devout Mormon, who cannot be named, repeatedly kissed and touched the girl in the Huntingdale home she shared with her sick husband and three children.

Prosecutor Jeremy McWilliams told the County Court the teacher, now 39, met the victim when she was 11 through the Mormon church, where she led a Sunday school and youth group.

When the girl was 15, she moved in with the woman – who was also a senior school teacher – and her family, following her parents’ separation.

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AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

November 24, 2012

Crispin Hull

The royal commission on child sex abuse is going to face major evidentiary and constitutional problems. In announcing the commission, Prime Minister Julia Gillard stressed the evil not only of the abuse itself, but also the cover-up. Indeed, in her eyes, the cover-up seems to be the core reason for the commission.

She said: ”Australians know … that too many children have suffered child abuse, but have also seen other adults let them down. They’ve not only had their trust betrayed by the abuser but other adults who could have acted to assist them have failed to do so.

”There have been too many revelations of adults who have averted their eyes from this evil. I believe in these circumstances that it’s appropriate for there to be a national response through a royal commission.”

Some immediate questions come to mind. Who did the covering-up? How did they know about the abuse that was covered up? Was that covering-up criminal?

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AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times

November 24, 2012

Robert Van Krieken

Interested parties have until Monday to comment on the terms of reference into the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. Having spent time in Ireland recently reflecting on how the issue was dealt with in the Ryan, Murphy and other inquiries there, there are several problems arising from the proposed terms of reference.

It is still deeply problematic to focus entirely on sexual abuse without paying any attention to physical and emotional abuse. Everyone who works in this field knows how interlinked they are, and it’s invidious to construct a ”hierarchy of abuse”, where some kinds of harm are treated as unworthy of attention.

A second problem with the proposed terms of reference is they are almost entirely forward-looking. It will only be the testimony of witnesses that pulls the royal commission towards looking at how various institutions responded to child sexual abuse in the past.

What’s being proposed is the commission ”identify what public and private organisations and institutions should do to prevent child sexual abuse from occurring in their midst; what should be done by organisations and institutions when allegations are raised, and what can be done by the relevant institutions, organisations and government agencies to alleviate the impact of abuse that has already occurred”.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Annette Blackwell
From: AAP
November 23, 2012

IF you want your say on what the terms of reference should be for the Royal Commission into Child Sex Abuse in Australia you have until Monday to make a submission or comment.

The Australian Lawyers Alliance (ALA) and the Catholic Conference of Bishops will make their submissions on Friday and advocacy group Broken Rites will be doing so on Monday, November 26 – the official government deadline.

Within six days of the announcement of the royal commission, the government reportedly received 300 emails to its website and 180 calls from people and organisations wanting to make submissions.

Groups such as Broken Rites say there have been significant spikes in calls to their organisations since the announcement.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

The Daily Telegraph
November 24, 2012

AUSTRALIA’S most senior Catholic showed a “sociopathic lack of empathy” in dealing with victims raped by clergy, an inquiry heard yesterday.

Cardinal George Pell, the Archbishop of Sydney, had tried to compel victims into silence when confronted with evidence of wrongdoing by parish priests when he was the Archbishop of Melbourne, the Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child sexual abuse was told.

Anthony Foster recalled meeting Cardinal Pell to discuss a priest who had repeatedly raped two of his daughters when they were at primary school.

He told the inquiry that Cardinal Pell said: “If you don’t like what we’re doing, take us to court,” and did not appear distressed by the incidents.

“In our interactions with the now-Cardinal Archbishop Pell, we experienced a sociopathic lack of empathy, typifying the attitude and responses of the church hierarchy,” Mr Foster said.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

The Church of England should be “deeply ashamed” of its failure to protect children from sex abuse.

Those are the words of Dr Martin Warner – the new Bishop of Chichester – speaking to ITV Meridian today.

The Diocese of Chichester serves both East and West Sussex and the city of Brighton and Hove.

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ZIMBABWE
Nehanda Radio

By Fungai Kwaramba

HARARE – Shocking details have emerged of widespread abuse of orphans at an orphanage and schools which were run by disgraced and dethroned Anglican bishop Nolbert Kunonga, prompting human rights organisations to demand an investigation.

On Wednesday, the Anglican Church Harare diocese convened a press briefing where the dastardly endeavours which happened in the past five years under Kunonga’s watch were revealed.

Kunonga was in charge of the institutions after he seized them from the Church of the Province of Central Africa, often using violence and help from the police.

Chad Gandiya, who is the bishop of Harare, told reporters in Harare that the Anglican Church, which won a landmark court victory on Monday, was carrying out an inventory that will ultimately lead them to their vast properties which had been turned into “lucrative business joints” by the ex-communicated Kunonga.

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AUSTRALIA
Border Mail

By Mark Russell
Nov. 23, 2012

A judge today said he had “a sense of anxiety or discomfort” about a request by Cardinal George Pell for sensitive material relating to the trial of convicted paedophile and Catholic brother Robert Charles Best.

But County Court judge Roy Punshon said he recognised some of the material sought by Cardinal Pell was highly relevant to the allegations made against him.

Lawyers for Cardinal Pell have applied to the County Court for access to the transcript of the trial involving Best and one of his victims.

The victim, known as V2, claims Cardinal Pell was present when the boy had complained of being raped by Best.

Cardinal Pell has described the victim’s claims as “irresponsible, untrue” and said they were “absolutely denied”.

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Kristina Keneally November 22, 2012

‘By their fruits you shall know them,’ says Jesus in his Sermon on the Mount. He is talking about the religious leaders of his time, and reminding people that actions speak louder than words, especially when it comes to discerning holiness and devotion to God.

As a Catholic, I can’t help reflecting on and being challenged by this in light of recent events.

My soul has been wrenched reading the stories of abuse of children, many of them incredibly vulnerable, at the hands of Catholic priests and brothers. It’s utter horror to contemplate such crimes.

Stories of sexual abuse in the Church have circulated for years, and in America and Ireland the systematic horror has been exposed. Perhaps it was naive, but those of us in Australia — Catholic and non-Catholic alike — weren’t forced to face the potential scale and magnitude of the problem here.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

A lawyer for a victim of pedophile brother Robert Best has urged a court not to release the transcript of his trial to Australia’s most senior Catholic – Cardinal George Pell.

Cardinal Pell has applied for a transcript of the case as he prepares for an expected appearance at a Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child sexual abuse.

The inquiry has been told Cardinal Pell was present when a grade three student at a Ballarat school in the 1960s described to another priest his alleged rape by Best.

On Friday, Timothy Seccull, a lawyer for one of Best’s victims, opposed Cardinal Pell’s application, saying the cardinal was in effect trying to do the work of the parliamentary inquiry by investigating the allegation.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC – PM

[with audio]

MARK COLVIN: Victoria’s inquiry into child abuse has been told that Cardinal George Pell showed a sociopathic lack of empathy for a family whose two daughters were raped by a Catholic priest.

Today victims of child abuse by religious organisations gave evidence to the inquiry. They included Chrissie and Anthony Foster, whose two daughters were assaulted in the 1990s by a priest at their primary school in Melbourne’s south east.

Emma Foster eventually committed suicide. Her sister Katie was seriously disabled when she was struck by a car after binge drinking.

The fallout happened when George Pell headed the Catholic Church in Melbourne.

Alison Caldwell reports.

ALISON CALDWELL: After 16 years, Chrissie and Anthony Foster are exhausted but still very angry with the way the Catholic Church handled their daughters’ allegations of abuse at the hands of their parish priest, Father Kevin O’Donnell, in the 1990s.

ANTHONY FOSTER: O’Donnell left few physical scars, instead he left children emotionally tortured and spiritually ruined. O’Donnell and the church stole a part of their souls.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

By Tom McIlroy
Nov. 23, 2012

VICTIMS and family members affected by clergy sexual abuse yesterday used a Victorian parliamentary inquiry to speak of their trauma and fight for justice.

In a packed hearing room, the inquiry heard from parents Chrissie and Anthony Foster about the impact of abuse two of their children suffered from a parish priest in suburban Melbourne.

Their daughter Emma Foster took her own life after being abused by the priest, while her sister Katie was left with a serious disability after being hit by a car while drunk.

The couple said the Catholic Church and former Melbourne Archbishop Cardinal George Pell had failed to adequately deal with their complaints of abuse.

“We fervently hope you have the strength of character to stand up for the rights of children against the might of the Catholic Church,” Mr Foster said.

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PENNSYLVANIA
PhillyBurbs

Sister Pat Kelly concedes it may “seem silly,” but she’s taken to street corners lately to pitch the Catholic faith.

Or rather to re-pitch it.

“Repropose it,” she said. Repropose the faith to those who already are familiar but, for reasons as varied as people and their perspectives, have fallen away from being practicing Catholics — or walked away or run.

You could find her sitting at a table outside First National Bank in Newtown on Mondays this month. And she wasn’t actually sitting at the table, but chatting up the guys painting the building or greeting passersby as she tried not to hover too near the table so people were free to browse it.

Nothing more unnerving than a hovering nun.

“I’ve had some really great conversations,” Kelly said last week. There are books on her table, pamphlets, parish calendars, magnets from St. Andrew Church in Newtown Township.

And a confidential survey, which really is the point of this column.

The deadline for participating is fast approaching. You won’t be asked your name, but can share it if you want.

The survey’s purpose? To learn more about why some of us have stopped attending Mass, stopped receiving sacraments, stopped identifying with the religious tradition in which we were raised.

In this week when we’re giving thanks, I’m kind of grateful someone in the church has finally asked.

Find the survey online at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/standrewchurch or go to the St. Andrew website at https://www.standrewnewtown.com and click on “Welcome to a Confidential Survey.” The deadline is one week from today.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

By Philip Bradfield
Published on Friday 23 November 2012

A VICTIM of clerical sex abuse has questioned why the Office of First Minister and Deputy First Minister (OFMDFM) has approved an inquiry that will only probe institutions which provided residential care.

The Executive’s inquiry into historical sex abuse will examine if there were failings by institutions or the state towards children in their care from 1922-1995 and OFMDFM says the inquiry will probe any organisation which “provided residential accommodation” for children.

But yesterday Michael Connolly, who has set up www.ClericalAbuseNI.com, to campaign for victims, slammed OFMDFM for, as he sees it, excluding clerical sexual abuse outside such institutions.

He said: “It is like they are telling us that only those people who suffered abuse in residential institutions count, while those of us who suffered clerical sex abuse outside of this don’t matter.

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AUSTRALIA
Online Opinion

By Sheleyah Courtney – posted Friday, 23 November 2012

As a social scientist who is interested in calibrations of power, religion and sexuality, my outlook on a discussion of the Catholic Church’s involvement in sexual abuse of Australian children is one that considers such a phenomenon as being situated and operative well within a wider psycho-social context. While there have been very recently published valuable sociological studies of such problems, for example last year Marie Keenan’s important “Child Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church” in Ireland, such works as this one focus especially on the institutional dimensions of the church itself. However, regarding this terrible issue, I view the intersections between the church and our society as seriously warranting greater consideration.

There are several issues that extend beyond the actual church’s internal cultural structures that are especially noteworthy to me. Firstly, child sexual abuse by the Catholic Church has a factuality that has been taken for granted for some time in the public imagination both in Australia and abroad; this knowledge has been reflected in popular culture ranging from tabloid news sensationalism to Hollywood films such as “Sleepers” (1996) starring Brad Pitt and closer to home, “Oranges and Sunshine” which exposed several cases of the thousands of English children who were illegally transported to Australia and who were placed in homes run by the Christian Brothers, were sexually abused and or forced into virtual slave labour (2011).

The 2006 documentary “Deliver Us From Evil” which traces the notorious pedophile priest Oliver O’Grady and the corruption in the Catholic Church that protected him; it was Oscar nominated. In Australia there has been a victim support group, “Broken Rites” operating since 1993, and a book, “Hell on the Way to Heaven” published by Chrissie and Anthony Foster parents of two daughters who died due to sexual abuse by a priest of the Catholic Church.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

By Steve Lillebuen, AAP
Updated November 23, 2012

Australia’s most senior Catholic showed a “sociopathic lack of empathy” in dealing with victims who were raped by clergy, an inquiry has heard.

Cardinal George Pell, current Archbishop of Sydney, had tried to compel victims into silence when confronted with evidence of wrongdoing by parish priests, the Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child sexual abuse was told on Friday.

Anthony Foster recalled meeting Cardinal Pell to discuss a priest who had repeatedly raped two of his daughters when they were at primary school.

He told the inquiry that Cardinal Pell, then the Archbishop of Melbourne, had told him, “If you don’t like what we’re doing, take us to court,” and did not appear to be distressed by the incidents.

“In our interactions with the now-Cardinal Archbishop Pell, we experienced a sociopathic lack of empathy, typifying the attitude and responses of the church hierarchy,” Mr Foster said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

November 23, 2012

Barney Zwartz

CARDINAL George Pell showed a ”sociopathic lack of empathy, typifying the attitude and response of the Catholic hierarchy” to parents whose young daughters were repeatedly raped by a priest, the Victorian inquiry into how the churches handled child sex abuse has been told.

Anthony Foster told on Friday how they met the cardinal – now Archbishop of Sydney – when he was Melbourne archbishop, in a furniture storage room at a Melbourne presbytery. They were squeezed onto a narrow wooden bench, while he sat in a ”grandiose” padded leather chair.

“In our interactions with the now-Cardinal Archbishop Pell, we experienced a sociopathic lack of empathy, typifying the attitude and responses of the church hierarchy.”

He expressed no emotion when shown a picture of the Fosters’ daughter Emma harming herself – she later killed herself – and said expressionlessly: ”Hmmm, she’s changed, hasn’t she?”

”What sort of of people did he mix with, what sort of life did he lead, that he thought this comment was appropriate?” Mr Foster asked.

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ZIMBABWE
ZimEye

Published: November 22, 2012

The Minister of Education, Art, Sport and Culture, David Coltart is moving in to investigate sexual abuses reported to have taken place at schools and other child institutions that disgraced Bishop Nolbert Kunonga seized from the Anglican church.

Shocking details have emerged of widespread abuse of children at an orphanage and other schools by the dethroned Anglican bishop which have prompted human rights organisations to press for police investigations.

Revealing that a cleansing ceremony would actually be required to ‘drive out demons before the church gets to use its defiled sanctuaries’, bishop Chad Gandiya said that he has received information that children at the Shirley Cripps orphanage were abused.

“The children’s home is very dear to us, last week we received information that children were being abused. The matter was referred to the police and we are happy a person was arrested. There is widespread sexual abuse at the orphanage.”

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Geoffrey Robinson
November 22, 2012

Last week, in an interview on ABC radio, I made a statement about the seal of confession and sexual abuse. I have been challenged on that statement, have thought further about it, and wish to make a new statement. The matter is closely allied to the question of the treatment centre run by the Church, and I’d like to start there.

It was a treatment centre, so the clinicians asked only questions directly related to treatment. This did not include seeking admissions of specific offences and, in particular, it did not involve asking the name and address of any victim. To ask such questions would send the client running away from the treatment. The clinicians therefore did not have knowledge of specific crimes.

More importantly, if one single person had been reported to the police, the entire treatment program would have closed down permanently the same day, for no offender would ever again come near it. In gaining information on one single client that may or may not have been useful in securing a conviction, the price to be paid would have been that no offenders into the future would receive any treatment.

If you ask me whether I can give a guarantee that a particular offender will never offend again after treatment, then no, I cannot give it. But if you ask me whether the number of new offences will be significantly, even dramatically less if 100 offenders receive serious treatment, then yes, I can give that guarantee.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
4NI

A former priest has appeared in court charged with sexually abusing a boy more than 20 years ago, a charge he denies.

54-year-old James Martin Donaghy, of Lady Wallace Drive in Lisburn, pleaded not guilty to four charges of indecent assault and one of common assault.

These were alleged to have happened on dates between 1 January 1989 and 5 May 1989.

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UNITED STATES
God Discussion

By Al Stefanelli
On November 21, 2012

Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints leader Warren Jeffs was arrested six years ago and imprisoned for life after being convicted of sexually assaulting children. His incarceration has not stopped him from remaining at the head of the church. Known as ‘The Prophet,’ Jeffs still calls the shots.

His church, which maintains a small commune on the Arizona/Utah border, have been disavowed by the LDS church, which refers to them as a radical splinter group.
ABC news reports journalist Mike Watkiss stating about the community of roughly 8000,

“Anybody who thinks that Warren Jeffs’ incarceration ended his rule in this community has no idea what they’re talking about. He is in many ways more powerful because now he’s martyred.”

Mike Watkiss has covered the FCLDS community for the past 25 years.

The report also refers to a 2008 raid on the ‘Yearning for Zion’ compound in Eldorado, Texas, which brought national attention to the group after it was found to be housing pregnant children/child brides and a lifestyle more indicative of the 19th century than the post-modern world that surrounded them.

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TEXAS
News Channel 10

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) – The attorney of a former high school student who settled an abuse lawsuit says the Fort Worth priest he accused will no longer be able to work with children.

Tahira Merritt tells the Fort Worth Star-Telegram (http://bit.ly/XFZGbd ) that a settlement reached Tuesday requires the Rev. William Paiz to not hold any position that gives him access to children, juveniles or young adults. Paiz will also not be allowed to identify himself as a priest.

A civil lawsuit accused Paiz of abusing the unnamed former student between 1982 and 1987, starting when he was 16. The ex-student is now in his 40s.

A spokeswoman for the Fort Worth Roman Catholic Diocese says people who say they have been abused have several ways within the church to address their grievances.

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ROME
Vatican Insider

The new cardinals’ outfits and the gift lists in Roman tailor shops

Andrea Tornielli
Vatican City

On Saturday Benedict XVI will create six new cardinals, just nine months after last February’s consistory. Addressing the Synod’s bishops, the Pope explained the reasons for this “informed” choice of new cardinals, none of whom are European: this is a way for the Church to show its true universality after the batch of cardinals created during the last consistory, who were mainly Curia members or Italian.

The new cardinals are: James Harvey, the American head of the Papal Household; His Beatitude Bechara Boutros Raï, patriarch of the Maronite Church in Lebanon; His Beatitude Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal, head of the Syro-Mankar Church in India; Archbishop John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan of Abuja; Archbishop Rubén Salazar Gómez of Bogota, Colombia and Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila in the Philippines.

Even though there are only six of them, Rome’s ecclesiastical tailors started work immediately on the vestments for the Church’s newly elected “princes”. When a bishop is created a cardinal, they stop wearing the violet coloured garments they donned previously and replace these with red coloured ones. Taylors prepare a list of all the garments and accessories cardinals will need. Those who wish to make a gift to a cardinal can consult this list.

Here are the current prices for items prepared by Rome’s most renowned tailor, Gammarelli, which has traditionally been the Pope’s tailor. The red mozzetta which cardinals wear with their choral vestments, costs about 200 Euro, but the price goes up if one chooses cord buttons – which are hand made and more sought after (they cost 20 Euro each) – instead of cloth buttons. The red cassock costs approximately 800 Euro, while the three-cornered hat without a bow, which is typical for cardinals, can cost between 80 and 120 Euro. The red and golden cord for the pectoral cross costs around 80 Euro: the price varies according to how elegant it is and the size of the bow on the back. The red fascia which is worn with the red cassock and the black cassock with red piping, costs about 200 Euro. A black cassock with red piping costs approximately 600 Euro, while the cardinal’s red zucchetto is priced at around 40 Euro. Finally, the red socks cost about 15 Euro for a pair.

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AUSTRALIA
Financial Review

Gerard Windsor

The royal commission into child abuse will investigate the failure of all institutions. At the beginning of last week this was far from clear; on ABC TV’s 7.30  Leigh Sales pugnaciously (or was she just throwing a well-disguised Dorothy Dixer?) asked Labor senator Chris Evans, “Why shouldn’t the Royal Commission be restricted to the Catholic Church?” Certainly it was the crimes of Catholics that brought the commission into being, and at least one priest has claimed that his church has been the main offender.

That, of course, remains to be seen. There is a suspicion that this grim honour might go to indigenous communities. Possibly the commission will not go there; if it does it will be treading on eggshells.

For the moment Catholics are the main persons of interest. If the commission is to be not merely retributive, its shaking up and improvement of Australian society will also have to make Catholicism a better institution. At the time of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s, a buzz phrase to describe what was happening was ecclesia semper reformanda – the church always in need of reform.

In the intervening years the phrase has rather fallen into disuse. But it has now punched its way back with a disconcerting new twist to its meaning. A church in need of reform, not just self-administered, but reform forced on it from outside.

Catholicism’s wrongdoing has been twofold – the sexual abuse itself and then the failure to deal with it justly and effectively. Each of these failures is intricately tangled up with defining characteristics of Catholic culture. Perhaps there’s some visibility through the murk if we understand these contexts. The first is the Church’s attitude to sexuality. All human beings can be presumed to have problems with sex, but Catholicism’s are particularly knotty. For two millenniums the model has been virginity, whereas sexuality and its expression is a degradation of the human ideal. If you can emancipate yourself from sex, the thinking goes, you’ve distanced yourself from the animals, and you’ve moved that much closer to the angels, a superior species. This is not hyperbole. The evidence stretches all the way back to Paul’s Epistles, and a rethinking of the theology of it all would require a massive shift.

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TEXAS
WFAA

Associated Press

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — The Fort Worth Roman Catholic Diocese has settled a lawsuit filed by a former high school student who alleged he had been sexually abused by a priest.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports that terms of the settlement reached Tuesday were not disclosed.

The lawsuit accused the Rev. William Paiz of abusing the unnamed former student between 1982 and 1987, starting when he was 16. The ex-student is now in his 40s.

The victim’s attorney, Tahira Merritt, says the lawsuit was filed after the diocese did not take action after the alleged abuse was first reported in 2010.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

November 23, 2012

Andrew West
ABC radio presenter and columnist

George Pell is an easy target for both liberal critics in the Catholic Church and secularist tormentors in the media.

In his recent, defensive press conference, he suggested the church was being singled out as the only institutional offender in the child sex abuse crisis. It was grist to the mill of those who are convinced the cardinal Archbishop of Sydney is making excuses for clerical crime.

His insistence that the rite of confession must remain a secret between confessor and penitent – no matter how evil the offence that is revealed – was seemingly more evidence that he was putting the church’s reputation and customs ahead of abuse victims. As his brother bishop Geoffrey Robinson conceded, it was painful.

Dr Pell is an old-fashioned prelate. He not only toes the Vatican line but, as a key adviser on education, ministry and doctrine, he has helped shape it. One of Dr Pell’s long-standing – but not unquestioning – friends calls him “a company man”. RMIT University professor Des Cahill has known the cardinal for 50 years. Professor Cahill left the Catholic priesthood in the 1970s to marry and begin a distinguished career as an academic psychologist.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

November 23, 2012

Richard Baker

Ross Murrin was one member of the clergy harboured by the church after repeatedly being accused of sexual offences against students.

THE Catholic Church’s little-known treatment clinic for clergy with psychosexual problems harboured known paedophiles and shielded them from police scrutiny.

Whistleblowers closely involved with the now defunct Encompass Australasia program allege paedophile clergy were diagnosed with a ”mood disorder” in order for them to be treated at Sydney’s Wesley Private Hospital and meet private health insurance criteria.

A well-placed source aware of the status of some clergy treated by Encompass Australasia between 1997 and 2008 said he believed several did not have a mood disorder but were ”cold and calculating criminals” who bragged about their exploits with children to others while at the hospital.

”Some of these people were not mentally ill, in my opinion. They were criminals who knew exactly what they had done and were proud of their achievements,” the source, who asked not to be named for fear of being sacked, said. ”People who should have been in Long Bay Jail were still living in the community.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Daily Telegraph

Piers Akerman
The Daily Telegraph
November 23, 2012

THE royal commission announced by the Prime Minister 11 days ago will do nothing for the majority of victims or those most vulnerable to child abuse – poor and Aboriginal children.

With submissions to the government about the terms of reference to be lodged in writing by next Monday, the Gillard government has made it clear that it is not going to address these areas of greatest need.

The discussion paper released this week by Attorney-General Nicola Roxon and acting Families Minister Brendan O’Connor makes it absolutely clear that the commission will focus on sexual abuse in public and private organisations and institutions.

However, the overwhelming evidence makes it plain that the greatest risk of abuse occurs within the family home and increases incrementally if the family is poor or indigenous.

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UNITED STATES
Aljazeera

Cristina LH Traina

It is indeed a difficult and confusing time for American Catholics.

Gathering last week at their annual fall assembly in Baltimore, Maryland, US Catholic bishops failed to pass “The Hope of the Gospel in Difficult Economic Times”.

Spearheaded by Bishop Stephen E Blaire, the document was to “communicate the bishops’ concern for people hurt by the economy, especially the jobless and those living in poverty” and reiterate Catholic social justice teaching at the United States Conference on Catholic Bishops. It is difficult to immediately discern why.

Recent press around Catholic objections to the Health and Human Services mandate that insurance providers for religiously-affiliated hospitals and universities cover contraception might lead to an expectation that socially conservative bishops overruled social liberals.

In fact, the opposite may have been the case. During Tuesday’s discussion, much of the opposition seemed to come from bishops who thought the document was too tame.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

A former priest has denied sexually abusing a boy more than 20 years ago.

James Martin Donaghy, 54, of Lady Wallace Drive in Lisburn, pleaded not guilty to four charges of indecent assault and one of common assault.

These were alleged to have happened on dates between 1 January 1989 and 5 May 1989.

The boy’s age was not disclosed and no details of the case were given in court during the short hearing.

Defence barrister Eugene Grant and prosecution lawyer Amanda Brady told the court there were numerous legal applications to be dealt with before the case came to trial.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Paddy Clancy

Thursday November 22 2012

A woman who has accused her teacher nun of putting her hand beneath her underwear 37 years ago has said she still has nightmares about it.

The 45-year-old mother of three – the fourth to tell of a series of indecent assaults by the nun, a Sister of Mercy – said she was touched on the bottom as a seven and eight-year-old in third class at a primary school in the midlands.

She wept deeply as she told the jury: “As a child I had nightmares. I still do. A big hand, the biggest you could get, figured in my nightmares.”

She said she was called to the desk of Sr Mary Theresa Grogan and as the rest of the class sat with their hands covering their eyes following an instruction in Irish to “sleep”, she had to read her homework.

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SOUTH AFRICA
Sowetan

Nov 22, 2012 | Tebogo Monama

A SOWETO pastor will appear in court tomorrow to face a charge of rape and two counts of sexual assault involving minors

The pastor, who cannot be named until he appears in court, will appear in the Protea Magistrate’s Court.

Warrant Officer Kay Makhubela said the 62-year-old priest had allegedly been abusing the girls aged between 12 and 15 for months.

The 12-year-old was allegedly raped and the other two fondled by the man.

“At his house there is a spaza and when the girls came to buy, that is when he got the chance to abuse them,” Makhubela said.

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UNITED STATES
TheMediaReport

As we have noted many times before, the media’s obsession with decades-old sex abuse in the Catholic Church is more about its hatred for the Church than it is about sex abuse itself.

Not surprisingly, the New York Times has obsessed over the issue. In literally hundreds (if not thousands) of news articles, editorials, and op-eds in recent years, the paper has been pummeling the Catholic Church for its handling of decades-old cases of sex abuse.

Now the Times has hired a new CEO, Mark Thompson, the former chief of the British broadcasting giant BBC, and people are asking what knowledge he had of sickening child sex abuse committed by one of the network’s most popular personalities in its history, the late entertainer Jimmy Savile.

Police in England are now reportedly investigating as many as 300 child abuse allegations against the BBC’s Savile, with one story claiming that his youngest victim may have been as young as eight years old. In addition, one of Savile’s acts of molestation apparently was captured on live television (on “Top of the Pops”) in 1976.

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UNITED STATES
Huffington Post

“Deadly Affairs” told the real-life story of Teresa Stone and her pastor, David Love. Both were married, yet they carried on a secret affair for ten years that ended in murder.

Stone conspired with Love to murder her husband, Randy Stone. Randy had considered David, his pastor too, a trusted friend, which made the betrayal even worse. “If Randy had a spat with Teresa … He’d let David know about that and ask what he should do … It’s the biggest betrayal because Randy trusted David so much that he shared his deepest, darkest secrets with him, and the whole time he’s looking at my uncle knowing he’s sleeping with his wife,” Stone’s niece Shelly Ridge said.

The motive for their murder was that Teresa wanted to collect her husband’s $800,000 life insurance policy. She gave Love the combination to a safe that held Randy’s gun, and Love shot him in the head.

And, unbelievably, KSDK reports Love eulogized Randy Stone at his funeral. After killing him.

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AUSTRALIA
The Conversation

There is great support within the community for the Royal Commission into child sexual abuse. Many people have high hopes it will right the wrongs of the past and help us, as a nation, to eliminate future child sexual abuse.

But how will the Royal Commission affect those who were abused?

Research from Australia and around the world has told us a great deal about the impact of child sexual abuse. We know, for example, that people who have been sexually abused as children are 2.4 times more likely than others to suffer from a mental disorder in adulthood and have a higher risk of addiction.

In adolescence, those who have been sexually abused are more likely to become involved in risk-taking behaviour, and are therefore more likely to be re-victimised in early adulthood and experience difficulties in their intimate relationships.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

Veronica Buck

Victim support groups in Western Australia say they’ve already experienced a spike in demand since the Royal Commission into child sexual abuse was announced and fear their already large workload is only going to intensify.

Dr Philippa White runs Tuart Place, a Fremantle-based centre that helps people who have been abused as children in out of home care such as church run orphanages or juvenile correctional facilities.

“There’s been a steep increase in phone calls and inquiries and a lot of talk about it among people who are regular users of the service, it’s been a hot topic of conversation,” she said.

Once the Royal Commission’s terms of reference are announced, Dr White expects to be flooded with new and existing clients asking for support.

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AUSTRALIA
Catholic Leader

Published: 25 November 2012

Archbishop Mark Coleridge has written a letter to the clergy of the Archdiocese of Brisbane in the wake of the declaration of a Royal Commission into abuse

In the lead-up to the announcement of the Royal Commission and now in its aftermath, Catholic clergy have again been humiliated in a way that spares none of us.

This seems to have gone on for years, and it is hard to gauge accurately the toll it has taken on the ordained.

I suspect it is more severe than we are usually prepared to acknowledge.

In my nearly forty years as a priest, nothing approaches the sexual abuse crisis as a blow to clergy morale.

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PENNSYLVANIA
The Evening Sun

The priest accused of stealing more than $380,000 from his former church, St. Joseph the Worker Parish in Bonneauville, waived his right to a preliminary hearing Wednesday.

Third-degree felony charges of theft by unlawful taking, theft by failure to make required disposition of funds received, and access device fraud are moving on to Adams County court for Caesar Belchez, 52.

Belchez was assigned to the Bonneauville church from 2006 to 20011, and during that time, police say, he stole $384,750.76 from the church in cash, checks and credit cards issued to the parish.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Dearbhail McDonald and Tim Healy

Thursday November 22 2012

THE Director of Public Prosecutions tried three times to prosecute the choirmaster whose bank and pension accounts have been frozen following a record €4.7m damages award for raping and abusing two cousins when they were schoolgirls.

One of Joseph Carrick’s victims, Jacqueline O’Toole, who was raped and then left pregnant at 15, was awarded €4m – the highest award ever for an abuse victim.

The award dwarfs the previous record, reached only last week, when a mother of three who was raped and sexually abused as a child by her godfather was awarded €2.8m damages by a High Court jury.

Ms O’Toole and Geraldine Nolan claim that they were repeatedly raped and sexually abused by Carrick, whom they met after joining a local church choir in the early 1970s.

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IRELAND
RTE News

A woman, who was repeatedly raped and sexually assaulted by a man in her church choir in the 1970s, has been awarded damages of €4m by a High Court jury.

It is the highest award of its kind.

Joseph Carrick, from Carysfort Woods, Blackrock, Co Dublin, was described in court as an “evil paedophile” who preyed on children.

Carrick, who is now in his 70s, did not defend the case taken by Jacqueline O’Toole, 55, from Pearse Street, Dublin 2.

In a separate related case yesterday, another woman, Geraldine Nolan, from Townsend Street, Dublin 2, was awarded €700,000 for rape and sexual assault by the same man.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Porsia Tunzi | Nov. 21, 2012

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious, which represents thousands of American nuns, has been awarded the Herbert Haag Prize for 2013 for Freedom in the Church.

The Catholic-based Herbert Haag Foundation honored LCWR “for their candid stance in this crisis, for their persistent loyalty to the Christian message and for the spiritual energy with which they carry the conflict,” according to a recent press release.

The award honors “people and institutions that engage themselves in the spirit of the apostle Paul for freedom in the church and in doing so give witness to the world,” the press release said.

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CALIFORNIA
Courthouse News Service

By WILLIAM DOTINGA

MARTINEZ, Calif. (CN) – A group of sisters whose parents subjected them to 20 years of horrific sexual abuse and torture say they may still have a case against church officials.

Each daughter, now an adult woman, said that church leaders, police officers and social workers stonewalled investigations to protect the parents, Zion and Glenda Lea Dutro, who were prominent evangelical leaders in Antioch, Calif.

Zion Dutro accepted a plea deal and was sentenced to 300 years in prison, while his wife pleaded no contest and received a 15-year prison sentence for her actions.

The original complaint sought punitive damages from the city of Antioch, Contra Costa County, a number of officials, Calvary Open Bible Church and two pastors.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Hull Daily Mail

A VICTIM of horrific abuse at an East Yorkshire care home feels justice can finally be done after a landmark court ruling.

Graham Baverstock was sexually abused as a child by Brother James Carragher at St William’s Community Home in Market Weighton.

Carragher was a member of Catholic organisation the De La Salle Order of Christian Brothers at the time.

An ongoing police investigation is looking into alleged abuse committed by others at the home.

Now the Supreme Court has ruled the Catholic Church and the Brothers are both liable to pay compensation to Mr Baverstock and more than 170 other victims who were abused at the home from the 1960s to the 1990s.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

170 former pupils at St William’s school in Middlesbrough claim that they suffered appalling physical and sexual abuse within the home.

The diocese claimed the Roman Catholic De La Salle Order of Brothers, which it hired to run the school, should share the liability for the cases of abuse.

In a landmark ruling, a judge at the Supreme Court agreed that the liability did not solely lie with the diocese.

Dr Jim Whiston says that the decision made by the Supreme Court has vindicated the diocese’s view.

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Frank Brennan

November 22, 2012

The following is from Fr Frank Brennan’s presentation at the Anglican Church of Australia’s Public Affairs Commission Conference The Nathan Project, University of Melbourne, 19 November 2012. This nationwide forum was named for the biblical prophet Nathan who confronted King David with God’s displeasure over his behaviour.

Introduction — the righteous Nathan and the compromising David

It is always a pleasure to return here to Trinity College to meet with Anglicans committed to social justice. I studied around this Melbourne University Crescent with some of you who were also students at the United Faculty of Theology. Ecumenical studying and working together often equips us better for engagement in the public square, using language and concepts accessible and familiar not just to those of our particular ecclesial tradition within Christianity. Thanks to my ecumenical formation, I learnt early that there was little point in quoting papal encyclicals as if they were trumps even though they might contain many pearls of wisdom. I learnt the value of communicating with concepts backed by authority, restricting myself to concepts and authority affirmed by my listeners.

27 years ago I was ordained priest in St Stephens Cathedral Brisbane. I was privileged to have the Catholic bishops of Queensland joined on the sanctuary by the Primate of the Anglican Church and the Moderator of the Uniting Church in Queensland. Archbishops John Grindrod and Frank Rush had worked together in the regional diocese of Rockhampton before going to Brisbane. John then became Primate of Anglican Church and Frank was President of the Australian Catholic Bishops conference. I worked with them and Doug Brandon, the Uniting Church moderator, in our joint commitment to improving the lives of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders during some testing political times including the Commonwealth Games held in Brisbane in 1982. When it came time for my ordination three years later, it seemed only natural and appropriate that the leaders of the three major Churches in Queensland pray together that the Spirit come upon me in priestly service. It was by doing something co-operative together for the cause of justice that we found our way clear to worship together and that we wanted to pray together in the most formal of liturgical contexts. But for our joint endeavour in the public square for justice, there is no way that we would have all prayed together on that sanctuary that night in Brisbane. We had learnt to communicate with each other and to pray together by committing ourselves in solidarity to action for justice.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Catholic Herald

A religious congregation which provided teachers to an East Yorkshire residential school can be held liable for the sex abuse which took place there, the Supreme Court has ruled.

St William’s, a school at Market Weighton, near Hull, was closed in 1994 after the headmaster, Brother James Carragher, was accused, and later convicted, of sexual offences against boys over 20 years.

Nearly 200 men who say they were abused by Brothers at the school are claiming £8 million in damages from the school’s managers and the Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, known as the De La Salle Brothers, which provided the teachers.

Defending the action, the congregation claimed it could not be held vicariously liable for the actions of the teaching Brothers.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Yorkshire Post

Published on Thursday 22 November 2012

A ROMAN Catholic lay order must share liability for a multi-million pound compensation claim for child abuse at a former children’s home in Yorkshire, the Supreme Court has ruled.

The De La Salle Brotherhood, which provided staff to the St William’s home in Market Weighton, will have to compensate victims of abuse committed by its members, along with the Middlesbrough Diocese, which had overall responsibility for the home’s management.

The Supreme Court ruled in favour of an appeal from the diocese which had previously been held solely liable. The diocese remains solely liable for any abuse committed by staff who were not De La Salle Brothers.

The ruling clears the way for the settlement of up to 170 claims from former residents at St William’s. Their solicitor, David Greenwood, estimates the total value of the claims, which include the most serious sexual abuse, at around £5m.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

November 23, 2012

Richard Baker, Philip Dorling, Nick McKenzie

THE Catholic Church’s little-known treatment clinic for clergy with psychosexual problems harboured known paedophiles and shielded them from police scrutiny.

Whistleblowers closely involved with the now-defunct Encompass Australasia program allege paedophile clergy were diagnosed with a ”mood disorder” so they could be treated at Sydney’s Wesley Private Hospital and meet private health insurance criteria.

A well-placed source aware of the status of some clergy treated by Encompass Australasia between 1997 and 2008 said he believed several did not have a mood disorder but were ”cold and calculating criminals” who bragged about their exploits with children to others while at the hospital.

”Some of these people were not mentally ill, in my opinion. They were criminals who knew exactly what they had done and were proud of their achievements,” said the source, who asked not to be named for fear of being sacked. ”People who should have been in Long Bay Jail were still living in the community.”

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AUSTRALIA
ABC Religion and Ethics

By Des Cahill
ABC Religion and Ethics
21 Nov 2012

Next week, the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference will hold its normal November meeting beside the tomb of St Mary of the Cross, Australia’s first saint. It is noteworthy that the bishops will discuss the holy and unholy mess created by the clerical sexual abuse scandal and the forthcoming Royal Commission into the institutional responses to child sexual abuse, as well as the continuing fallout from the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry.

The Church has already lost the public relations war. The evidence of the Victoria Police has made very sure of that by the evidence of their statistics. These show that between January 1956 and June 2012 in their Victorian jurisdiction, of the 519 “distinct victims,” 71.29% occurred within the Catholic Church system as compared to the Anglican (7.13%), Salvation Army (6.94%) and Jewish (3.47%) figures – although, of course, these figures do not pertain just to ministers of religion.

My own statistical analysis shows that at least one in twenty who graduated as priests from the Corpus Christi seminary which serves Victoria and Tasmania between 1940 and 1972 eventually became child abusers. This in many ways mirrors the study of the John Jay College for Criminal Justice of 105,000 priests, commissioned by the United States Catholic Bishops, which found that 4% became convicted abusers.

Also noteworthy is that it seems that Archbishop Denis Hart from Melbourne and Archbishop Mark Coleridge from Brisbane have taken up the public relations running. The television interview last week by Cardinal George Pell to an overflowing press room was uniformly assessed to be a disaster. He was bumbling, poorly briefed by his advisers and simply wrong in some of his comments, especially in suggesting that clerical sex abuse amongst the Catholic clergy is no higher compared to other cognate professional and religious groups.

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OKLAHOMA
Associated Baptist Press

By Bob Allen

A Southern Baptist pastor in Oklahoma second-guessed himself after the arrest of his former youth pastor on eight counts of sexual abuse of a minor.

Jeff Self, pastor of First Baptist Church in Coalgate, Okla., told CBS affiliate KXII television, which broadcasts in a two-state area covering North Texas and Southeastern Oklahoma, that church leaders dismissed 28-year-old Dustin Werneburg in August after the third allegation of sexual misconduct against the youth pastor in three years.

Dustin WerneburgPolice arrested Werneburg Nov. 14 at Blanchard Middle School in Blanchard, Okla., where he was serving as a teacher’s aide, the station reported. He was jailed in Coal County on three counts of second-degree rape, three counts of forcible sodomy, a charge of lewd or indecent proposals to a child and lewd molestation, all involving a girl under the age of 16.

Police said the girl’s parents found inappropriate text messages and photos exchanged between her and Werneburg. Investigators said the two began texting in November of 2011 and exchanged at least 1,000 messages.

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FORT WORTH (TX)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram

By Mitch Mitchell
mitchmitchell@star-telegram.com

FORT WORTH — The Fort Worth Catholic Diocese settled a lawsuit for an undisclosed amount Tuesday with a former Nolan Catholic High School student who said he was sexually abused by a priest.

The lawsuit states that Rev. William Paiz abused John Doe No. 109 between 1982 and 1987 starting when the boy was 15. Doe, now in his 40s, filed suit in January, saying he was sexually assaulted while at All Saints Catholic Church, St. George Catholic Church and at other locations.

During that period, Paiz was assigned to All Saints and St. George’s Catholic Churches in Fort Worth and taught religion at Nolan Catholic High School, according to the Fort Worth diocese.

The settlement agreement includes provisions that Paiz not work in a position that puts him in contact with any children, juveniles or young adults and not be able to present himself as a priest, said Tahira Merritt, John Doe 109’s attorney.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Press

By Jennifer Bell, Crime reporter

A CATHOLIC brotherhood which supplied teachers to a Catholic children’s home in East Yorkshire can be held legally responsible for the sexual abuse of boys, leading judges have ruled.

About 170 men – including victims from York – are seeking damages after alleging they were abused as children at St William’s in Market Weighton which provided residential care and education for boys, aged 10 to 16, with emotional and behavioural problems.

The home’s former principal, Father James Carragher, was jailed for 14 years in 2004 after admitting abusing boys in his care.

Compensation claims on behalf of former pupils were first submitted in 2004. St William’s was owned by the Diocese of Middlesbrough but many of the staff were members of the De La Salle Brotherhood, a Catholic order of lay teachers.

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UNITED KINGDOM
AO Advocates

Posted by: A.Dean on Nov 21 2012

A landmark judgment in the Supreme Court today has pushed forward the law on vicarious liability, in a way that may help survivors of child abuse hold responsible parties accountable, and obtain the compensation they deserve. The ruling in Catholic Child Welfare Society & Ors v Various Claimants and The Institute of the Brothers of the Christian School & Ors concerns a dispute between the Catholic Diocese of Middlesbrough and the De La Salle Order (the “Christian Brothers”) over who should pay compensation to victims of child sexual abuse committed at the St William’s School a number of years ago.

The St William’s School was managed by the Diocese, but many of its teachers and staff were members of the Christian Brothers. A number of abuses were committed by members of the Christian Brothers; these abuses occurred over decades, and one of the former Christian Brothers headmasters, James Carragher, was convicted of numerous sexual offences against boys and jailed in 2004 for 14 years. Over 170 men brought the original claim against the Christian Brothers and the Diocese for redress.

The crux of the appeal related to whether the Diocese alone is vicariously liable for the abuses of these men, or whether liability is mutually held by both the Diocese and the Christian Brothers. In 2010 the Court of Appeal held the Diocese solely liable for the abuse, and for paying £8 million in compensation to the many victims. The Diocese appealed, claiming that the Christian Brothers ought to share liability for what happened, in light of their close involvement with the day-to-day activities of the school and the numerous abuses by Christian Brothers staff. Today’s ruling has allowed the Diocese’s appeal, and in the process made new and powerful law for claimants. Writing for the Court, Lord Philips summarised the decision by stating:

This is not a borderline case. It is one where it is fair, just and reasonable, by reason of the satisfaction of the relevant criteria, for the Institute to share with the Middlesbrough Diocese vicarious liability for the abuse committed by the brothers.

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IRELAND
National Catholic Reporter

by John C Seitz | Nov. 21, 2012

CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE AND THE CATHOLIC CHURCH: GENDER, POWER, AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE
By Marie Keenan
Published by Oxford University Press, $62.50

If we want to understand sexual violence, we have to get to know its perpetrators and the worlds in which they were formed. In the particular context in which Marie Keenan is interested — clerical sexual abuse and its cover-up in the U.S. and Ireland since the middle of the 20th century — such an adage goes from truism to nonstarter. Pressure not to get to know clerical abusers and the institutional, educational and social worlds of their formation comes from many angles of varying validity.

A posture of attentiveness to abusers may strike some abuse victims and their advocates as excusing the abuse and losing sight of the harm it may have inflicted. For their part, media outlets have helped uncover abuse, but they have also contributed to the vilification of clerical offenders, fixating on the category of pedophilia (at the expense of other abusive scenarios), and fomenting moral panic.

Church officials, on the other hand, want to isolate abusers and officials complicit in cover-up. They would have us pay attention to abusers only as aberrant pathological individuals. The theological or institutional context for their production as clergy is more or less off-limits.

Keenan, a researcher and lecturer in applied social science at University College Dublin and a registered psychotherapist, plunges into these taboo waters, taking her readers into the theological, moral and institutional contexts for abuse and cover-up. Working with the ever-present caution that to “understand all is never to forgive it all,” Keenan makes this journey in part through analysis of extensive conversations with nine Catholic men — all retired or laicized Irish priests and brothers — who admitted to having sexually abused minors in the past.

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UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on November 21, 2012

A Columbia University professor is siding with a twice-accused child molester who is the voice for the character Elmo and is hurting gays and lesbians in the process.

In today’s New York Times, professor Katherine Franke defends Kevin Clash as “the most recent victim” of “a ‘sex panic,’” adding that “At precisely the moment when gay people’s right to marry seems to be reaching a positive tipping point, sexuality is being driven back into the closet as something shameful.”

These callous remarks seem to equate gay sex with pedophilia, which is wrong, hurtful, and irresponsible. They play into and help perpetuate the most archaic and discredited notions about sexuality. Franke owes a deep and public apology to gays, lesbians and child sex abuse victims. And the Columbia administration should discipline her for such harmful comments which rub even more salt into the already deep wounds of many people.

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PENNSYLVANIA
WHTM

Updated: Nov 21, 2012

By Myles Snyder

BONNEAUVILLE, Pa. (WHTM) –
The case against a parish priest charged with embezzling more than $384,000 from a central Pennsylvania church is bound for trial.

Father Caesar A. Belchez, 52, of New Freedom, waived his right to a preliminary hearing Wednesday morning when he appeared before District Judge Daniel Bowman.

Belchez is accused of taking the money between 2006 and 2011 while he was pastor at Saint Joseph the Worker Catholic Church in Bonneauville, according to prosecutors. He allegedly embezzled nearly $312,000 in cash and made an additional $72,766 in unauthorized purchases with credit cards issued to the parish.

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MILWAUKEE (WI)
WSAU

MILWAUKEE (WSAU) Milwaukee’s Catholic Archdiocese says it will fight in court to prevent its local churches from having to pay anything toward the Chapter-11 bankruptcy in the archdiocese. Judge Susan Kelley will hold a hearing December 6 on a request by creditors – including those sexually abused by priests – to be compensated with assets from the more than 200 parishes in the 10-county archdiocese. About 575 sex abuse victims are seeking compensation from the archdiocese as part of the nearly two-year-old bankruptcy case. The church says it wants the judge to throw out 62 more claims, because those victims had previously signed settlement agreements in their cases. And it will ask Judge Kelley to let the church’s insurance carrier pay about 270 of the sex abuse claims.

Civil courts previously refused to let the Milwaukee Archdiocese use insurance to pay sex abuse victims – but the church said a different policy applied in that case.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

November 22, 2012

Sean Nicholls
Sydney Morning Herald State Political Editor

THE Premier, Barry O’Farrell, has announced the special commission of inquiry into the handling of allegations of child sexual abuse by Catholic priests in the Hunter will proceed and will report by next April.

Mr O’Farrell revealed plans for the NSW inquiry before the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, announced a national royal commission into child sexual abuse, raising questions about whether it would go ahead.

In Parliament on Wednesday, Mr O’Farrell confirmed the NSW inquiry would proceed and released its terms of reference.

He said it was important to investigate the claims that prompted the inquiry by a senior police officer, Detective Chief Inspector Peter Fox, that his investigations into paedophile priests had been hampered by police and the church.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Hill Dickinson

“Not just a borderline case” – Hill Dickinson success as Supreme Court hands down judgment in The Catholic Child Welfare Society & others –v- Various Claimants & The Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools & others.

Kari Hansen, partner, and Hayley Riach, solicitor, are celebrating as the vicarious liability arguments upon which this action has been fought for the past seven years have finally been determined. The Supreme Court has clarified the law as to vicarious liability of unincorporated associations and emphasised that where there is an argument for dual vicarious liability each individual ’employer’ / ’employee’ relationship should be considered on its own merits. This is the first time that the Supreme Court has confirmed that it is possible for there to be dual vicarious liability.

In recent years, the principles of vicarious liability have been considered by Courts at all levels, particularly in the context of the sexual abuse of children. Today, the Supreme Court unanimously found that it was fair, just and reasonable for an unincorporated association of lay religious Brothers (“the Institute”) to share vicarious liability for abuse committed by some of its members.

The claims and parties

A group, presently consisting of 170 claimants, allege that they were subjected to physical and sexual abuse whilst they were residents at St William’s, an Approved School and later a Residential Care Home (‘the school’) in Market Weighton, Yorkshire, between 1958 and 1992.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Independent

Brian Farmer

Wednesday 21 November 2012

A Catholic brotherhood which supplied teachers to a residential school can be held legally responsible for sexual abuse of boys, leading judges ruled today.

Around 170 men are seeking damages after alleging they were abused as children at St William’s in Market Weighton, East Yorkshire, and a former head was convicted of numerous serious sexual offences, the Supreme Court heard.

A panel of five Supreme Court justices today concluded that legal responsibility should be shared between a welfare society which managed the school and a brotherhood which provided teachers.

St William’s was founded in 1865 by Catholic benefactors and run locally as a “reformatory school” for boys, Supreme Court justices had been told at a hearing in London.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Pocklington Post

Published on Wednesday 21 November 2012

A CATHOLIC diocese has won its appeal against a ruling it was solely liable for abuse at St William’s Home for Boys in Market Weighton.

Claims of abuse between the 1960s and 1990s are being made by more than 170 ex-pupils of the former home.

The Court of Appeal ruled in 2010 that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Middlesbrough was responsible for an £8m compensation claim.

The Supreme Court agreed with the diocese that an organisation which supplied teachers was also liable.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Dan Box
From:The Australian
November 22, 2012

A NSW government inquiry into the alleged cover-up of child abuse within the Catholic Church will focus solely on abuse committed by one former priest.

By concentrating on claims about the late Denis McAlinden, the inquiry would not duplicate the work of the national royal commission into institutional responses to child abuse, NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell said.

The inquiry, to be led by one of the state’s most senior prosecutors, Margaret Cunneen SC, was set up after a serving NSW detective, Peter Fox, claimed senior officers told him to stop investigating McAlinden.

Detective Chief Inspector Fox also said a network of priests in the NSW Hunter Valley conspired to conceal their abuse.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

Traditional Unionist leader Jim Allister wants to see the Stormont Executive’s inquiry into the historic abuse of children in care homes and other institutions extended to include abuse by members of the clergy.

In September the retired judge Sir Anthony Hart said he was opposed to any widening of his remit.

Mr Allister has suggested amendments to the bill setting up the inquiry.

He said this would extend its scope to include clerical abuse.

Mr Allister has tabled a series of amendments and the Speaker William Hay must decide whether to allow them to go forward for debate next Tuesday when the assembly reaches the consideration stage of the bill.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

Published on Wednesday 21 November 2012

Costs for an inquiry into historical institutional child abuse in Northern Ireland could reach £19 million, the Assembly has heard.

Ulster Unionist MLA Mike Nesbitt, who chairs Stormont’s OFMDFM committee, said MLAs had been informed, in September, that predicted costs had doubled from initial estimates.

Speaking on Tuesday the Strangford MLA added: “On the estimated costs of the inquiry the committee sought clarification from the department whether the figures in the financial and explanatory memorandum of between £7.5 million and £9 million remained accurate.

“Officials advised the committee that the estimated costs had been revised upwards – doubled in fact to £15-£19 million to take into account the complexities of the inquiry and the associated legal costs.”

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Irish Times

A Stormont inquiry into institutional child abuse has created a hierarchy of victims, it has been claimed in the Northern Ireland Assembly.

TUV leader Jim Allister yesterday described a decision not to widen the scope of the investigation to include victims of clerical abuse as a missed opportunity.

“Right as it is that we certainly address the issue of institutional abuse, I think it is unfortunate that in the addressing of it, we create a hierarchy of abuse victims: those abused within institutions and those abused outside institutions who were predominantly the object of clerical abuse. That issue cannot be forgotten about or swept aside,” said the North Antrim MLA.

“The reality of this Bill is that it does forget about them. This was an opportunity to address all abuse, including clerical abuse, and I very much regret that has not been taken.”

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AUSTRALIA
The National

Australian inquiry into child sex abuse ‘should have focused on Catholic Church’, former priest says

Kathy Marks

Nov 21, 2012

SYDNEY // Stephen Woods was 11 when he was first abused by a teacher at his Roman Catholic primary school in Ballarat, Victoria. Robert Best, from the Christian Brothers religious order, would take him to his office and molest him, “while all the time telling me that I was bad and it was my fault”.

Another Christian Brother, Edward Dowlan, abused him at a boys’ boarding school and when Mr Woods, troubled and confused, later sought advice from the Catholic Church, he was introduced to Gerald Risdale, who raped him in a public toilet by Lake Wendouree, in Ballarat. He was 14.

All three men, who had multiple victims, were eventually jailed by the Australian authorities, but Mr Woods, now 51, remains furious at the way the Church concealed their actions. Risdale was moved from parish to parish, and Victoria police later concluded that the bishop of Ballarat, Ronald Mulkearns, had known about his behaviour as far back as the 1970s. Despite that, Risdale was allowed to continue in the ministry until his arrest in 1993.

It is this type of systemic failing that a royal commission, announced last week by Julia Gillard, the Australian prime minister, is to address. It will focus not only on the Roman Catholic Church – which, as in other countries such as Ireland and Germany, has been plagued by child-abuse scandals – but on other religious and state institutions, such as schools, orphanages and Scout groups.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

AAP
November 21, 2012

ARCHBISHOP George Pell will be given the power to appoint fellows to the governing council of Sydney University’s beleaguered St John’s College, after a mass resignation in the wake of a scandal over student behaviour.

NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell on Wednesday introduced an amendment bill to the 1857 laws that set up the Catholic residential college, saying the resignation of all but one of 18 governing fellows had left it in “limbo”.

Disgusted by loutish behaviour at the college, and having lost confidence in the governing council, Cardinal Pell earlier this month asked the council’s six priest fellows to resign.

The new bill will render all positions on the council vacant and give Cardinal Pell the power to appoint all 18 fellows for up to three years.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Joshua J. McElwee | Nov. 20, 2012

The circumstances surrounding the Vatican’s removal of longtime peace activist and priest Roy Bourgeois from the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers are unclear, several canon lawyers say.

Additionally, it is ambiguous under what authority the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was able to dismiss the priest, the lawyers say.

Bourgeois, a member of Maryknoll for 45 years who had come under scrutiny for his support of women’s ordination, was dismissed from the order by the Vatican’s doctrinal congregation in October, the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers announced in a press release Monday.

Central questions about the dismissal include whether Bourgeois was dismissed both from the order and the priesthood; if there are any options for appeal; and why his dismissal came from the doctrinal congregation and not the Vatican congregation that deals with religious orders.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

Wednesday, 21 November 2012

A paedophile priest awaiting sentence for sexually abusing a brother and sister has died, a court has been told.

Cases against 71-year-old Joseph Steele were listed for mention at Belfast Crown Court yesterday.

But Recorder, Judge David McFarland, said he understood the priest had died, so the case cannot go any further.

Judge McFarland listed the case to be heard again today so that it can be officially closed once the death certificate has been produced.

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MILWAUKEE (WI)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

By Annysa Johnson of the Journal Sentinel

Nov. 20, 2012

The Catholic Archdiocese of Milwaukee is firing back at creditors in its bankruptcy, vowing to fight their plans to pursue the assets of its 200-plus parishes and calling their proposed lawsuit “frivolous and a waste of time and money.”

At the same time, lawyers for the archdiocese have moved to throw out 62 of the 575 sex abuse claims filed in the bankruptcy, its largest group of claims objections yet. And the church has filed a complaint aimed at recovering what could be tens of millions of dollars from its insurers.

“I have few options left,” Archbishop Jerome Listecki told local Catholics in a letter last week, explaining the church’s legal strategy. “We will continue to examine every possible legal avenue that moves us toward a resolution of the Chapter 11.”

James Stang, lead attorney for the creditors committee, said the archdiocese’s legal theories are flawed, and would be proved so in court.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Owen Bowcott, legal affairs correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 21 November 2012

A Catholic diocese has successfully forced a Christian Brothers order to share the cost of compensating more than 170 victims of alleged physical and sexual abuse who attended a Yorkshire children’s home.

The landmark decision in the supreme court confirms advances in the legal doctrine of “vicarious liability” under which religious bodies are deemed responsible for the criminal actions of their priests.

Churches have repeatedly attempted to evade liability by claiming that the relationship between a priest or monk and their diocese or religious order is not that of employee and employer.

The supreme court decision related to St William’s residential school in Market Weighton, east Yorkshire. It involved a dispute between the diocese of Middlesbrough and the De La Salle order of Christian Brothers over who should pay compensation.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Shannon Deery
From:Herald Sun
November 21, 2012

CONVICTED pedophile Christian Brother Robert Best has failed in a bid to have his convictions overturned.

Robert Charles Best, 70, was jailed for a minimum of 11 years and three months in August last year for molesting young boys during a 20-year period at three Victorian schools.

The shocking history of abuse related to 11 boys he taught at St Alipius Primary School in Ballarat, St Leo’s College in Box Hill, and St Joseph’s College in Geelong between 1969 and 1988.

Among them was a nine-year-old disabled boy who was raped by Best.

The former school principal was found guilty at trial of 21 charges and later pleaded guilty to a further six.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

November 21, 2012

Melissa Iaria

AAP

Pedophile Christian Brother Robert Best has lost an appeal against his convictions for abusing a schoolboy in the 1970s.

Best, 71, was jailed last year for a minimum 11 years and three months for sexually abusing young boys during a 20-year period at three schools.

On Wednesday, Victoria’s appeals court rejected his appeal on seven of his convictions for indecently assaulting a schoolboy between 1971-74 while Best was principal of St Alipius Primary School in East Ballarat, when the pupil was aged between eight and 11.

In their unanimous judgment, Justices Chris Maxwell, Pamela Tate and Robert Osborn found Best failed to show a miscarriage of justice had occurred during his trial.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC Rural

[with audio]

By Jessica Swann

Wednesday, 21 November 2012

In rural Australia the Church still plays an important role in bringing the community together, but when the Church is under intense scrutiny, rural parishioners question their faith in God and in the Catholic Church.

This week the Australian government has called for public help to shape the terms of reference of a Royal Commission into child sex abuse in Australia.

The investigation will be broad including schools, community groups and religious institutions.

It also announced there will be consultations with stakeholders including victims of abuse, community leaders and religious groups.

It’s the Catholic Church however that is the feeling the heat the most.

For one small parish in rural New South Wales, the pews were full last Sunday but the parishioners expressed a deep sense of disappointment and confusion at what is shaping up to be an avalanche of accusations against members of the clergy within the Catholic Church.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Cassandra Wilkinson
From:The Australian
November 21, 2012

AUSTRALIA has never been a place where religion has been a cause of protracted violence or political disorder.

A country founded by jailers who worshipped at St James and convicts who worshipped at St Mary’s has gone on to include Asian Buddhists, European Jews, Greek and Russian Orthodox Christians, Bosnian Muslims and Serbian Christians, Indian Hindus and Muslims, and a generous buffet of other faiths from Baha’i to Scientologists.

By and large we get along because the secret to religious tolerance is common respect for a non-religious state.

The royal commission into child abuse has at its heart a single worthy mission: to ensure that all citizens enjoy state protection from individuals or groups who would harm them. Sadly it has also already become a blunt instrument with which to belt religion. Self-righteous atheists have leapt to pour scorn not only on abusers and their protectors but also on the foundations of religious belief. The ABC’s resident national treasure, Phillip Adams, claimed last week that religion twists sexuality. Yet rape is inflicted on adults and children of all classes, on all continents, among all religious groups and ethnic communities; it does no service to victims to pretend the problem is not endemic.

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IRELAND
Kilkenny People

Published on Wednesday 21 November 2012

A KILKENNY-BASED priest, who was previously convicted of indecently assaulting children, appeared before Cork District Court last week charged with sexually assaulting a minor over an eight-year period.

Fr Vincent Mercer (66), from the Black Abbey in Kilkenny City, is facing 39 counts of sexual assault against a teenager over 20 years ago. He was remanded on bail last Thursday, to appear again in court in January. The alleged abuse began when the juvenile was aged 11, in 1986, and continued until February of 1994, in a number of locations in Cork and Limerick. A statement from the Dominican Order said it is understood that Fr Mercer intends to plead guilty.

Fr Mercer is a serving member of the Order, but is not presently in ministry. He was moved to the Black Abbey a number of years ago, following his conviction in 2005 of a string of indecent assault offences against young boys in the 1970s, when he was headmaster of Newbridge College.

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UNITED STATES
Huffington Post

Erica Abeel

Many American filmmakers have the bad habit, in my view, of taking an impartial stance when it comes to stories about the behavior of borderline criminal characters. Consider such feature films as Margin Call by J.C. Chandor and, more recently, Arbitrage by Nicholas Jarecki, which follow the toxic maneuvers of financial miscreants yet fastidiously refrain from passing judgment, as if the directors were mesmerized, mental functions on hold, by the mere sight of a senior partner at Goldman Sachs who flies to an Asian tailor for fittings of handmade suits.

That’s why documentaries have become essential. Like the blessedly biased MSNBC, they’re not afraid to stake out positions, offer outrage a bullhorn. Most crucially, perhaps, hard-hitting documentaries air abuses by the powerful that mainstream media lacks the cojones to expose. Now Alex Gibney, preeminent documentarian and a specialist in the abuse of power, weighs in with the superb Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, which tackles the subject of child sex crimes and cover-up in the Catholic church.

You may think you’ve been there before — sexcapades of the clergy have received ample exposure in the press; and Amy Berg’s 2006 docu Deliver us from Evil fired the opening salvo. But Gibney (awarded a 2007 Oscar for Taxi to the Dark Side) takes you places you won’t have have imagined. His new film (translated as “My Most Grievous Fault”) winds its way from the heartland of Milwaukee, through the churches of Ireland — all the way to the highest offices of the Vatican.

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VATICAN CITY
International Business Times

By Erik Pineda | November 21, 2012

The battle to win those Catholics to be faithful to the Church and to make them remain as such remains for Pope Benedict as he and the other heads of the Catholic congregation grapple with allegations of sexual, physical and other forms of abuse of some members of the clergy.

The head of the Catholic Church, which counts more than five million faithful in Australia, has released on Wednesday the latest installment of a three-part book series that reflect on the life of Jesus Christ. …

The new book is released as Australia grapples with allegations of sex abuses that compelled the local Catholic Church leadership to rethink the manner it reacts and handles such controversies, impacts of which is absorbed mostly by the church, ABC said in a report.

The church’s sexual abuse complaints policy will likely “be revised again as the commission progresses and of course when final recommendations are made,” The Australian quoted a statement issued by the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference on Wednesday.

It refers to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which is set to be fully established following a consultation process spearheaded by the federal government.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By MARK GRIFFITHS
Nov. 21, 2012

THE bravery of Hunter police officer Peter Fox has finally helped lift the lid on the widespread nature of the sexual abuse of children in Australia.

Within days of his interview in this newspaper and subsequent television appearance, the federal government called for a Royal Commission with almost unanimous community support.

Much media attention has focused on the abuse in institutions, in particular the Catholic Church, including what has happened within this region.

It is appropriate to spend time and money trying to uncover the extent of abuse within such institutions and the ways in which they did, or did not, confront the issue.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Stuart Rintoul
From:The Australian
November 21, 2012

VICTIMS advocates have called for the federal government to be centrally involved in administering a sex abuse compensation fund, similar to Ireland’s, even though Attorney-General Nicola Roxon says compensation is not the government’s prime focus.

Helen Last, director of clergy abuse advocates In Good Faith, said compensation was a vexed area because of the arbitrary response of the churches to compensation claims.

She said compensation offers ranged from significantly more than the Catholic Church’s Melbourne Response $75,000 cap to “paltry” amounts of several thousand dollars, while large orders including the Christian Brothers and Good Shepherd Sisters had recently cut their standard payments to $5000 where abuse was committed by brothers and $2000 where it was committed by nuns.

“These figures are an insult and they cause so much despair for the victims,” Ms Last told The Australian. “The victims are walking away from that and saying, ‘You can keep it.’ ”

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AUSTRALIA
CathNews

The Catholic Church will review its national sexual abuse complaints policy at next week’s meeting of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, reports The Australian.

ACBC president Archbisghop Denis Hart (pictured) confirmed both Towards Healing and the church’s other complaints process, the Melbourne Response, would be on the agenda at next week’s Sydney meeting of the church’s peak body.

“I am sure the bishops will discuss the two present responses in the light of their inherent value, as well as any criticism, to assess the best way forward for all,” Archbishop Hart said.

A spokesperson for Cardinal Pell’s archdiocese of Sydney said the sexual abuse complaints policy had been reviewed since it was introduced in 1997. “We would expect procedures to be revised again as the commission progresses and of course when final recommendations are made,” the spokesperson said.

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WASHINGTON
Bothell Reporter

By RAECHEL DAWSON
Bothell Reporter Reporter
November 20, 2012

A child sex abuse claim, which involved a Kirkland church, has been settled. A trial was scheduled to begin against the Seattle Archdiocese next Monday but the parish district settled for $635,000 on Thursday.

Former youth minister Jim Funnell at St. John Vianney Church in Kirkland allegedly sexually abused the plaintiff, identified by his initials D.E., in the mid-1980s for more than one year. It is said others were abused as well.

D.E. was living in Kirkland at the time of the abuse but now resides in Bothell.

Funnell was hired, which the plaintiff claims, during the time when former Seattle Archbishop Raymond Haunthausen and other Catholic bishops were collaborating on how to address the emerging sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic church.

However, the Archdiocese failed to adequately warn its employees and timely adopt the policies regarding child sex abuse, and Funnell slipped through the cracks because church officials failed to conduct a proper background check, said the victim.

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TULSA (OK)
Christianity Today

Melissa Steffan

An Oklahoma county judge denied a motion to dismiss charges against two Victory Christian Center (VCC) youth pastors after staff at the Tulsa megachurch failed to report child abuse for two weeks.

John and Charica Daugherty, the son and daughter-in-law of VCC’s head pastor, are not themselves accused of any sexual misconduct. Rather, charges against them assert that the Daugherty’s, along with three other VCC employees, violated the law by failing to report a 13-year-old girl’s rape allegations against another VCC employee, Chris Denman.

Denman already pleaded guilty last month to six felony sex crimes against children, including the rape.

The Daughterys argue that Oklahoma’s anti-child-abuse statutes legally do no require them to have reported the crime, and that such laws apply only to those who are responsible for the care or well-being of the child, which they were not.

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WASHINGTON
Patch

By Greg Johnston

A victim of sexual abuse by a former youth minister at Kirkland’s St. John Vianney Church, who recently settled a case against the Archdiocese of Seattle, says he buried the issue for some two decades, but that finally confronting the abuse has allowed him to begin the healing process.

Rolfe Eckmann of Bothell, 41, also said he knows of 10 to 12 other victims and believes there were more — and that those who have not come forward are not being honest with themselves.

“I think a lot of people might ask, ‘Why now, after all these years?’” he said. “People who haven’t come forward really aren’t being honest with themselves. I feel good I came forward. I would never have gone to counseling for it if I hadn’t.”

Last week Eckmann and his attorney settled a lawsuit with the Archdiocese of Seattle for $635,000 over the sexual abuse, which occurred in the mid-1980s, when he was 13 and 14 years old, and went on for about a year. The youth minister, James R. Funnell, was fired by the archdiocese and was charged with sexual assault in 1989, pleading guilty to a lesser charge.

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OREGON
KATU

[with video]

By Thom Jensen KATU News

HILLSBORO, Ore. – Parents have been fighting for years without success to get a church near a public grade school to move its meetings for sex offenders.

They say they’ve run into roadblocks trying to get this sex offender meeting to move. They say they’ve been trying for at least three years to convince Sonrise Church, where these registered offenders meet, to move the meeting far away from any schools.

Additionally, some of these sex offenders will actually start living at the church within the next month, KATU News has learned.

The motto at the church is “A safe place to hear a life changing message.” But parents who have children right next door at Quatama Elementary School question that message.

The church holds a service every week and as many as 120 registered sex offenders attend.

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OREGON
KATU

[with video]

By Thom Jensen KATU News and KATU.com Staff

HILLSBORO, Ore. – A local pastor stuck up for the sex offenders and ex-convicts Tuesday who attend a special service at his church next to an elementary school.

But James Gleason, lead pastor at Sonrise Church, said he’d consider moving the service after parents of children at the school complained and KATU aired a story about the controversy last week.

Every Sunday evening 120 people, mostly ex-cons, meet at the church, which is right next to Quatama Elementary School. Some of the felons are sex offenders. But Gleason said he won’t tell neighbors exactly who these people are and what crimes they committed.

“I would never put a picture of John Smith up and say here’s his sexual crime, and he attends this Light My Way service,” he said.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Amnesty International

Clerical child sex abuse victims face exclusion from Institutional Abuse Inquiry

Amnesty International and victims of clerical child sex abuse have joined forces to call for the Northern Ireland Executive to set up an inquiry into clerical child sex abuse in the region.

The call comes as the Northern Ireland Assembly prepares to consider the Historic Institutional Abuse Inquiry Bill, which will establish an inquiry into child abuse carried out in institutions but, crucially, will exclude victims of clerical abuse outside residential settings.

Patrick Corrigan, Northern Ireland Programme Director of Amnesty International, said:

“Last year the National Board for Safeguarding Children published diocesan reviews which gave a glimpse into the horror of abuse suffered by children in parishes across Northern Ireland. But internal reviews are no substitute for a proper, independent investigation into clerical child sex abuse throughout Northern Ireland.”

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AUSTRALIA
CathNews

BY BISHOP BILL WRIGHT

It is a week since Prime Minister Gillard announced the Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse, and some people have seen it as the worst week the Catholic Church in Australia has ever had.

So much of the talk has been about the Church’s slow and inadequate response to allegations of abuse over a long period. In all honesty, though, I’ve been feeling quite positive and relieved ever since the announcement.

Here is the occasion when the nation as a whole can come to grips with one of its greatest issues. It is the beginning of a most important, purifying process.

I am delighted for those victims of abuse who have struggled so hard to get their story told. It may be that there are those for whom the Commission will again bring up things that they would rather not have to relive, and I hope they will be considered and helped through it all.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

The Supreme Court has ruled that two Catholic organisations are jointly responsible for physical and sexual abuse at a children’s home.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Middlesbrough and the De La Salle Roman Catholic Order, who supplied teachers, have both been held liable.

More than 170 victims came forward to report abuse at St William’s care home and school in Market Weighton, near York. Abuse dating back to 1958.

The school came under the jurisdiction of the Middlesbrough diocese, but the De La Salle order was in day-to-day charge of running the place.

The Middlesbrough Diocese did not contest its responsibility for what happened. But it insisted the De La Salle order should also be held responsible for compensating victims.

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AUSTRALIA
Advertiser

By Megan Gorrey
Nov. 20, 2012

PETER Ingham, the Catholic bishop of Wollongong diocese that covers Campbelltown, has loudly welcomed Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s announcement of a royal commission into child sex abuse in institutions — including the Catholic church.

In a statement that was read out at local Sunday Masses, Bishop Ingham said he would co-operate fully with the investigation and be open to its suggestions.

He apologised to sexual abuse victims and insisted they and their families “must receive respect, justice and compassion”.

“The protection of children is of prime importance, not the protection of any organisation,” he said.

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