ABUSE TRACKER

RHODE ISLAND
KSWT

Posted: Feb 15, 2013

By MICHELLE R. SMITH and NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) – Documents detailing the dubious fundraising practices of a disgraced Roman Catholic religious order called the Legion of Christ were released to the public Friday, showing how the organization took control of an elderly woman’s finances and persuaded her to bequeath it $60 million.

The records include the first-ever depositions of high-ranking Legion officials. They shed light on the inner workings of a secretive congregation placed under Vatican receivership after the Holy See determined that its founder was a spiritual fraud who sexually abused his seminarians and fathered three children with two women.

A Rhode Island Superior Court judge said last year that the documents raised a red flag because a steadfastly spiritual elderly woman transferred millions to “clandestinely dubious religious leaders.” But they had been kept under seal until The Associated Press, The New York Times, the National Catholic Reporter and The Providence Journal intervened, arguing that they were in the public interest.

Pope Benedict XVI took over the Legion in 2010 after a Vatican investigation determined that its founder, the late Rev. Marcial Maciel, had lived a double life. The pope ordered a wholesale reform of the order and named a papal delegate to oversee it.

The Legion scandal is significant because it shows how the Holy See willfully ignored credible allegations of abuse against Maciel for decades, all while holding him up as a model of sainthood for the faithful because he brought in money and vocations to the priesthood. The scandal, which has tarnished the legacy of Pope John Paul II, is the most egregious example of how the Vatican ignored decades of reports about sexually abusive priests because church leaders put the interests of the institution above those of the victims.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times

Archbishop Jose H. Gomez on Friday sent our a letter urging the faithful to pray for Cardinal Roger Mahony to help select a new pope and reiterated his message that Mahony remains a priest “in good standing” despite new details emerging about clergy abuse cases.

“Having been promoted to the dignity of Cardinal, Cardinal Mahony has all of the prerogatives and privileges of his standing as a Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church,” Gomez wrote.

Gomez announced last month that he had removed Mahony from all public duties amid revelations that he plotted to conceal child molestation by priests from law enforcement.

Gomez wrote in a letter to parishioners last month that newly released priest files were “brutal and painful reading. The behavior described in these files is terribly sad and evil. There is no excuse, no explaining away what happened to these children.”

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times

Before Cardinal Roger M. Mahony boards a plane for Rome to help elect the next pope, he will be questioned under oath about his handling of clergy sex abuse cases.

A judge cleared the way Friday for a Feb. 23 deposition of the former archbishop of Los Angeles by a lawyer for a man who claims that a visiting Mexican priest molested him three decades ago at his Montecito Heights parish.

In a closed-door meeting, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Emilie H. Elias said Mahony could be questioned for four hours about the priest, Father Nicholas Aguilar Rivera, and 25 other clergymen accused of abuse during the same time period, according to lawyers at the meeting.

Mahony has been deposed repeatedly since the late 1990s about his dealings with accused abusers, but the upcoming deposition will be the first since the release of 12,000 pages of internal church records about the abuse.

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UNITED STATES
GlobalPost

Kevin Douglas Grant
February 15, 2013

GlobalPost correspondent Jason Berry today published a story explaining the significance of a trove of documents ordered to be released Friday about Father Marcial Maciel, founder of the powerful, ultraconservative Legion of Christ. The documents are expected to illuminate the way in which the Legion handled accusations of rampant child sexual abuse and the siring of several illegitimate children by Maciel over several decades.

Here is a primer on Maciel and his relationships with Pope Benedict XVI and Pope John Paul II:

Who was Father Marcial Maciel?

Born in Mexico, the Roman Catholic priest founded the powerful, ultraconservative clerical order Legion of Christ in Mexico City in 1941. Dozens of victims in multiple countries made sexual abuse allegations against Maciel over the course of several decades, dating back to the 1950s.

Though he was suspended in 1956 from his leadership of the Legion by Pope Pius XII after being accused of abusing youths in Mexico, Cardinal Clemente Micara, the Vicar of Rome, reinstated him in 1958 after his predecessor’s death and Maciel enjoyed a long and prosperous career despite the claims of as many as 100 victims.

The Legion publicly apologized for Maciel’s alleged actions in 2009, just months after a new set of allegations emerged, including the fact that Maciel fathered several children during his reign as head of the Legion.

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CANADA
Times of Israel

By Renee Ghert-Zand
February 15, 2013

In the wake of a sexual abuse scandal that has rocked Calgary, leaders of the Canadian city’s Jewish community have moved quickly to distance themselves from a local rabbi’s expression of support for a convicted Jewish psychiatrist with a notorious past.

At issue is a letter from Rabbi Yisroel Miller, the leader of House of Jacob Mikveh Israel, an Orthodox synagogue, which was read aloud during the sentencing hearing for Dr. Aubrey Levin. Levin, who had occupied a prominent position in the University of Calgary‘s psychiatry department, was convicted Jan. 31 of sexually assaulting male patients who had been referred to him for assessment and treatment by the province of Alberta’s criminal justice system.

At the hearing, Levin’s attorney characterized the assaults as “minor” and read aloud a letter submitted by Miller, the psychiatrist’s rabbi at House of Jacob Mikveh Israel. Miller wrote that Levin’s “humble manner and complete lack of arrogance endeared him to everyone,” and pleaded for leniency.

“The bad does not erase all the good,” Miller argued. “I know all the goodness within him still remains. A prison term would be a death sentence for him.”

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VATICAN CITY
The Economist

LOOKING as ever on the bright side, the Vatican’s habitually good-humoured spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, averred: “Before Easter, we’ll have the new pope.” But no amount of breezy optimism, nor any amount of praise for the integrity and achievements of Pope Benedict XVI, can detract from the momentous historical significance of his announcement on February 11th—or from the fact that the conclave to elect his successor will be one of the oddest in the papacy’s two millennia. Benedict is one of only a handful of popes ever to resign (see article), and the first for almost six centuries. Father Lombardi could not say what Benedict’s title would be, nor how Christ’s vicar on earth should be addressed in retirement.

Though stubbornly conservative in many respects, Benedict is also a radical (as displayed in his encyclical of 2005 on the theology of love). But he kept his most radical utterance till the end. Speaking in Latin at a routine event, he said: “After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry.” That several of the cardinals present failed to understand must have highlighted for Benedict, an ardent Latinist, how his church has lost touch with its traditions.

By that account, he was giving the papacy a reality check: in the 21st century a vast global organisation is not best entrusted to an octogenarian in failing health. The pope is also a bishop (of Rome); members of the Catholic episcopate normally retire at 75.

If so, the lesson for the 117 cardinal-electors when they meet, probably in mid-March, is to find someone young and vigorous. Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the archbishop of New York, is a feisty 63. Cardinal Peter Erdo, of Budapest, is only 60. Cardinal Odilo Pedro Scherer, who heads the archdiocese of São Paulo, and Cardinal Peter Appiah Turkson, a Ghanaian who runs the Vatican’s development department, are 63 and 64 respectively.

But other interpretations of Benedict’s departure will weigh heavily on the conclave. He was not just tired, but worn out by the conflicts and machinations that have beset the Vatican during his reign. He is to retire to the Mater Ecclesiae convent, founded in 1992 by John Paul II specifically to create a prayerful counterweight to the worldliness of the Roman Curia, the church’s central administration. …

Wolves and weaklings

To his critics Benedict is not a victim, but a weak pope who gave free rein to an ill-prepared and unsuitable secretary of state. The Vatileaks documents cast a bad light on him, too. A report (said to be explosive) by three cardinals on a tendering scandal has yet to be released. The Vatican has also struggled to convince international bodies that its in-house bank is no longer used for money-laundering and tax evasion. The feuds within the Curia will also be central to the selection of Benedict’s successor. Cardinal Bertone will prepare the conclave and be the Vatican’s head of state in the period between February 28th when Benedict steps down and the proclamation of his successor. His arch-rival and predecessor, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, is Dean of the College of Cardinals, which will elect him.

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VATICAN CITY
Reuters

By Philip Pullella

VATICAN CITY | Fri Feb 15, 2013

(Reuters) – Pope Benedict’s decision to live in the Vatican after he resigns will provide him with security and privacy. It will also offer legal protection from any attempt to prosecute him in connection with sexual abuse cases around the world, Church sources and legal experts say.

“His continued presence in the Vatican is necessary, otherwise he might be defenseless. He wouldn’t have his immunity, his prerogatives, his security, if he is anywhere else,” said one Vatican official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“It is absolutely necessary” that he stays in the Vatican, said the source, adding that Benedict should have a “dignified existence” in his remaining years.

Vatican sources said officials had three main considerations in deciding that Benedict should live in a convent in the Vatican after he resigns on February 28.

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RHODE ISLAND
GlobalPost

Jason Berry

Documents released today by a Rhode Island judge provide a new window into the internal workings of the disgraced Legion of Christ, a religious order of priests whose founder was revealed to have sexually abused seminarians and fathered children by at least two women.

The release of the voluminous court records by Superior Court Judge Michael Silverstein came within days of the stunning resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, who ordered an investigation into allegations against Legion founder Fr. Marcial Maciel when Benedict played a powerful prosecutorial role in the Vatican as a cardinal and again in the early years of his papacy.

These documents are expected to shed new light on a scandal Benedict inherited from John Paul II, whose unwavering support of Maciel, even allegations against him were filed in the Vatican in 1998, bolstered Legion fundraising campaigns.

Pope Benedict’s trip to Mexico last year ignited a blaze of negative media coverage due to his failure to meet with sexual victims of the late Father Maciel, who symbolized the global scandal that has cast a shadow on Benedict and his papacy. It remains unclear whether the release of these documents had anything to do with the timing of the pope’s resignation.

The documents first surfaced in a probate case accusing Legion officials of defrauding a wealthy widow, Gabrielle Mee, of tens of millions of dollars. They remained sealed when the suit against the Legion and Bank of America, was dismissed last September by Silverstein. He ruled that Mary Lou Dauray, Mee’s niece, lacked legal standing to bring suit.

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RHODE ISLAND
Fox 29

Posted: Feb 15, 2013

By MICHELLE R. SMITH
Associated Press
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) – Documents related to a disgraced Roman Catholic order called the Legion of Christ were released to the public Friday amid a legal battle over an elderly widow’s bequest of $60 million to the organization.

The Associated Press, The New York Times, the National Catholic Reporter and The Providence Journal sought to unseal the documents. A Superior Court judge agreed but gave the Legion time to ask the Supreme Court to intervene. The Rhode Island Supreme Court on Thursday declined to delay the documents’ release.

Pope Benedict XVI took over the Legion in 2010 after a Vatican investigation determined that its founder, the late Rev. Marcial Maciel, had lived a double life: He sexually molested seminarians and fathered three children by two women. The pope ordered a wholesale reform of the order and named a papal delegate to oversee it.

The will of Gabrielle Mee, who died at age 96 in 2008, is the focus of the lawsuit. Mee’s niece, Mary Lou Dauray, had alleged that Mee was defrauded by the Legion and unduly influenced by its priests into giving away her fortune. Her late husband was a onetime director of Fleet National Bank, which has since been absorbed by Bank of America.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Jonathan Freedland
The Guardian, Friday 15 February 2013

We should not let Benedict XVI go quietly. One hesitates to say so, because he is elderly and frail and, much more importantly, because he is revered by many millions. Outsiders should tread warily, mindful that the papacy is central to Catholics’ faith, even to their very identity. We ought to signal from the start that we mean no attack on Catholics or their beliefs when we say that the departing occupant of that high office has a moral, if not legal, case to answer. But such a case there is.

The heart of the matter is the rape and abuse of children by Catholic priests. The child abuse scandal in the Catholic church has spread to some 65 countries, with victims estimated to be in the many thousands: one survivors’ group has 12,000 members, each with a heartbreaking story to tell. There will be many more victims who have stayed silent. Few would deny that this is the greatest single moral issue confronting the church.

For some, Benedict has proven himself on the right side of this most searching question. They note that he has closed loopholes in canon law, that he has centralised the handling of cases – rather than allowing each diocese to do its own thing – and that he has, above all, apologised on behalf of the church. In 2010, as cases emerged with alarming frequency – not just in the US, where the first major revelations came to light, but in Germany, Switzerland, Holland and elsewhere – the pope sent a message to the Irish victims of abuse: “You have suffered grievously and I am truly sorry.” He acknowledged that their dignity had been “violated” and said the guilty men would “answer before God”.

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VATICAN CITY
ABC News

David Wright

ROME — Today it was more than just a routine personnel matter for Pope Benedict XVI to name a new president of the Vatican Bank: German lawyer Ernst von Freyberg. The appointment may well be the last of the pope’s papacy, filling a vacancy created a year ago in the midst of a money laundering investigation.

The job of “God’s Banker” has long been a tricky one. Conspiracy theorists have always been fond of the Vatican Bank. And with good reason.

The Institute for Works of Religion (as it’s officially called) has been linked to plenty of bad guys over the years, including mobsters, Nazis and Freedom Fighters.

“God’s Bank” (as it’s long been known) has been so fraught with scandal that last month, citing concerns about possible money laundering, Italy’s Central Bank stopped all bankcard payments at the Vatican.

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INDIA
Indian Express

Milind Ghatwai : Bhopal, Sat Feb 16 2013

A priest has accused the archbishop of Bhopal of trying to poison him either to make him mentally unstable or to kill him because he threatened to expose an alleged sex scandal and financial irregularities in the archdiocese.

A magisterial court has registered a case against archbishop Leo Cornelio and two other Catholic Church leaders on a private complaint from Fr Anand Muttungal, the former public relations officer of Madhya Pradesh. CJFM Alok Mishra has ordered that Cornelio be produced before him on March 1. The court will weigh evidence before deciding to order a police probe. If convicted, the accused could face up to 10 years in jail.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

A document prepared by theologians painting the portrait of Ratzinger’s successor has gathered two thousand signatures. “Nationality is not important, just as long as he doesn’t fall slave to the Curia”

GIACOMO GALEAZZI
Vatican City

Church reform plan. How should the next Pope be? Theologians have outlined what Benedict XVI’s successor should be like, in a document which has so far been signed by two thousand theologians across the world. Its first signatories were prestigious theologians such as Paul Knitter, Mgr. Calsaldáliga, Hans Küng, Leonardo Boff, Peter Phan and Paul Collins.

The next Pope is being asked to combat the “current stagnation” and counter resistance from sections of the Church hierarchy that are hindering the implementation of the Second Vatican Council. “The papacy’s role needs to be clearly redefined in line with Christ’s intentions. As supreme pastor, unifying figure and the main witness of the faith, the Pope’s contribution to the good of the universal Church is key, theologians write. But his authority should never obscure, diminish or suppress the authentic authority Christ gave directly to all the people of God.”

Furthermore, “bishops are vicars of Christ, not the Pope’s vicars. They have direct responsibility for the people and the dioceses and a shared responsibility along with other bishops and the Pope for the universal community of the Catholic faith.” The bishops’ central synod, the documents reads, “should play a more decisive role in planning and guiding the conservation and growth of faith in our complex world.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

The 58-year old German lawyer Von Freyberg will only be in Rome three days a week. The nature of his work, as producer of warships, is controversial. Fr. Lombardi denies rumours of internal fighting within the Church

GIACOMO GALEAZZI
Vatican City

The Vatican has hired a new part-time president to head its bank, the IOR. The new president will be in Rome three days a week and in Frankfurt for four days. Details of his salary are being kept secret but what is certain is that he will keep his job outside the Vatican. The man chosen for the job is the German lawyer Von Freyberg (a member of the Order of Malta), who is also president of Blhom-Vhoss Group shipyard in Hamburg. “I don’t know if they make warships or ships in general, what I do know is that Von Freyber organises pilgrimages to Lourdes,” said Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi, who urged the public not to “not to be hasty in criticising him for his line of work – shipbuilding.”

“His appointment – the Vatican spokesman said – was the result of an in-depth research process, led by people who are deeply familiar with the nature and purpose of the Holy See. I don’t think the media should make superficial assessments of the new president, showing a lack of coherence with John XXIII’s Pacem in terris doctrine.” As the Vatican spokesman spoke to journalists, he was handed a note in real time, which contained a clarification: “the company no longer manufactures ships; that se4ction has been sold. Now it only does marine engineering.” Having read the brief note, Fr. Federico Lombardi broke into a liberating smile and commented: “Pacem in terris is safe, all has been resolved.”

But the company’s website still contains information about its work in the design of frigates and armed ships. During his meeting with journalists, the Vatican spokesman gave a detailed description of the selection process that led to the choice of Ettore Gotti Tedeschi’s successor. “The procedure began before last summer, when the Supervisory Council suggested the Vatican hire a manager selection agency to help with the selection process. The agency conducted thorough research into how the IOR works and the kind of qualities a potential candidate would be required to have.” According to Fr. Lombardi, “the agency presented the board with 40 candidates and the board carried out a progressive selection, narrowing the number down to 6 – those it considered to be most suited to the job following a series of interviews with the board. A final list of three candidates was then handed to the Council of Cardinals.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

In the absence of a clear favourite for the papacy, kingmakers will play a decisive role in influencing the result of the vote. In the 2013 Conclave these figures could be Kasper and Bergoglio

Giorgio Bernardelli
MILAN

As is usually the case when a Conclave is just around the corner, the shortlist of potential successors to the papacy has started doing the rounds. But there is another important role within the assembly of cardinals called to elect the new Pope: that of the so-called kingmakers – in other words those individuals who because of their experience and authority and not their alliances – are more able than others to influence the election result.

The kingmaker’s role is key, particularly when complex circumstances surround the choice of a new Pope, as in the case of Pope Ratzinger’s unprecedented and unexpected resignation. Many in recent days have been comparing the current situation with the second Conclave of 1978 which was convened after the unexpected death of Pope Luciani and led to the appointment of Karol Wojtyla. This was one of the circumstances in which the kingmaker’s precise role filtered out of the Holy See: it is widely recognised that the then Archbishop of Vienna, Cardinal Franz König – who was 73 at the time – was responsible for putting the Archbishop of Cracow’s name forward. He did so when there was a voting deadlock because a section of the College which were against Giuseppe Siri being appointed were preventing him from reaching the required quorum.

So the question is, if cardinals enter the Sistine Chapel without a clear favourite (as Joseph Ratzinger was eight years ago) who could the kingmaker cardinals of the 2013 Conclave be? This question is even harder to answer than the one about the potential candidates for the papacy. Unlike the other list, it tends to favour figures who are automatically discarded as potential new Popes because they exceed the acceptable age limit.

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UNITED STATES
Bloomberg

By Ramesh Ponnuru Feb 15, 2013

This week Margaret Carlson and Ramesh Ponnuru are discussing the legacy of Pope Benedict XVI. Margaret’s column started it off, then Ramesh responded, then Margaret did.

Progressive Catholics often portray the pope as a kind of supreme dictator of Catholicism. They resent the pope both for allegedly imposing conservative diktats on such issues as abortion and the ordination of women, and for failing to use his power to clean house.

This is the picture you give us, Margaret, in the opening lines of your latest shot at Benedict XVI: The pope is “close to all powerful”; he can hire and fire whomever he pleases; he is “infallible when he wants to be.”

If I found this this picture of the papacy true to life, I would agree with you that Benedict’s response to the abuse scandals has been grossly and culpably inadequate. But the papacy does not operate like this. It never has.

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VATICAN CITY
Huffington Post

Religion News Service | By Alessandro Speciale Posted: 02/15/2013

VATICAN CITY (RNS) Less than two weeks before he retires, Pope Benedict XVI on Friday (Feb. 15) approved the appointment of a German lawyer and financier as the new head of the scandal-plagued Vatican Bank.

Ernst von Freyberg will take on the role of president of the Istituto per le Opere di Religione, as the bank is formally known, nine months after former president Ettore Gotti Tedeschi was unceremoniously ousted by the bank’s board with a no-confidence vote.

But von Freyberg’s appointment immediately sparked controversy. The lawyer will remain in his current role of chairman of the executive board of German shipyard Blohm + Voss, which was involved in the production of warships under Nazi Germany.

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VATICAN CITY
IOL (South Africa)

Vatican City – The secret conclave to elect a new pope once Pope Benedict XVI has resigned could be held earlier than originally planned to allow the future pontiff to prepare for Easter, sources said Friday.

Benedict steps down on February 28 and the vote for the top job may begin on March 10, sources told Rome-based religious news agency I.Media.

Rules laid down by John Paul II stipulate that between 15 and 20 days must pass after the end of the pontificate before the conclave meets in the Sistine chapel under Michelangelo’s famous ceiling frescoes to elect a new pope.

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VATICAN CITY
The State Journal

By NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press
VATICAN CITY (AP) – The Vatican was drawn into a new controversy Friday after acknowledging that its bank’s new president is also chairman of a shipbuilder making warships – a significant conflict for an institution that has long shunned ties to military manufacturing.

The Vatican announced to great fanfare that Pope Benedict XVI had signed off on one of the last major appointments of his papacy, approving Ernst von Freyberg as president of the Vatican’s bank, officially known as the Institute for Religious Works.

The Vatican spokesman was caught off-guard, though, when a journalist noted that the German shipbuilder von Freyberg chairs, Blohm + Voss, is known for its military ship construction.

The Rev. Federico Lombardi demurred and defended the selection. He later issued a statement saying von Freyberg chairs a civilian branch of Blohm + Voss, which repairs and transforms cruise ships and builds yachts – but that the company is currently part of a consortium that is building four frigates for the German navy.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
The Republic

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 15, 2013

LOS ANGELES — Cardinal Roger Mahony, the former Roman Catholic archbishop of Los Angeles, will be deposed this month for a clergy abuse lawsuit set for trial in April.

A lawyer representing a person claiming abuse by a priest said Friday that an agreement will allow him to question Mahony about his handling of the case on Feb. 23, before the cardinal leaves for Rome to help select a new pope.

Attorney Anthony De Marco says he can also ask questions about up to 25 other priests accused of child molestation.

Recently released files show that Mahony and other archdiocese officials maneuvered behind the scenes to protect the church from scandal.

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CALIFORNIA
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on February 15, 2013

On his blog yesterday, Cardinal Roger Mahony discussed how he has been “called to humiliation.”

Given all of the storms that have surrounded me and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles recently, God’s grace finally helped me to understand: I am not being called to serve Jesus in humility. Rather, I am being called to something deeper–to be humiliated, disgraced, and rebuffed by many.

Then, he has the arrogance to say:

In the past several days, I have experienced many examples of being humiliated. In recent days, I have been confronted in various places by very unhappy people. I could understand the depth of their anger and outrage–at me, at the Church, at about injustices that swirl around us.

Thanks to God’s special grace, I simply stood there, asking God to bless and forgive them. [emphasis mine]

Mahony is a man with no soul.

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NEW YORK
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on February 15, 2013

A Brooklyn Rabbi has been arrested in a sting operation after propositioning what he thought was a young girl online.

We are grateful to police in New York for apprehending Rabbi Nathan David Rabinowich. Cases like this illustrate just how dangerous a tool the internet can be for a child predator. We urge parents to be vigilant in monitoring who their young children are speaking with online, and to be diligent in reporting any suspected wrongdoing.

We hope that any families who are members of Rabbi Rabinowich’s synagogue will ask their friends and fellow churchgoers if they ever saw, suspected, or suffered crimes at this rabbi’s hands. It is rare for a child predator to only strike once, and we fear that there may be more victims of his suffering in silence. Only with the encouragement of the community, family, and friends will these victims and whistleblowers find the strength to come forward. We urge them to do so now.

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UNITED STATES
Religion Dispatches

By Mary E. Hunt

The unexpected announcement of the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI is a welcome breath of fresh air. A human being, even a pope, ought to have the option to say enough is enough, I have done what I can do, and now it is time for someone else to take over. I applaud his move and read it as a sign of hope in a dreary ecclesial scene.

Speculation about his health is rampant. As with many elders whose offspring plot to take away the car keys, I suspect there was some backdoor lobbying to make this retirement happen. But I dare to hope that it was at least in part the considered judgment of an octogenarian who saw his predecessor propped up long after his prime and did not want the same for himself.

But before looking for the backstory there’s something in Benedict’s resignation statement that bears noting: “After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry.”

Conscience, Benedict reminds us today, is still primary for Catholics. Examination of conscience: that is just the formula millions of us use to explain why we use birth control, enjoy our sexuality in a variety of ways, and see enormous good in other religious traditions. Conscience is the ultimate arbiter, and the Pope relied on his. Good on him, and good on the rest of us. …

What is news this time around is that rank and file Catholics want a new Church, not just a new pope.

We know that change is in the air because we put it there. Progressive Catholics all over the world are creating new forms of church since the old is so thoroughly discredited. No institution can withstand the onslaught of negative publicity that the Vatican earned over clergy sexual abuse and episcopal cover-ups without major changes. No hierarchy however fortified can hold out forever against spirit-filled steps toward equality and justice. This time, just electing a new pope will not do. Nor will closeting away a group of elite electors responsible to no one but themselves cut it for an election process.

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UNITED STATES
Feminist Studies in Religion

Posted by Mary E. Hunt on Feb 14, 2013

Patriarchy will get unimaginable amounts of free publicity for the next month as the Roman Catholic Church reshuffles the papal deck. Media commentators will fawn over the proceedings triggered by the unexpected resignation of Pope Benedict XVI. Unrivaled displays of kyriarchy will be beamed into our homes as reporters explain piously the ancient rituals of a men’s club cloning its own head. It will be hard to ignore and difficult to make sense of, even though the outcome is clear. When the smoke subsides after the Conclave, there will still be a single man at the helm.

As a media extravaganza full of color and pageantry, the rituals will be hard to beat. The whole package will serve to reinforce the patriarchal patterns of a religious tradition whose billion adherents deserve better, patterns that are alive and well beyond the walls of Rome. No woman will have a voice or a vote in the Conclave. Sisters and consecrated laywomen will care for the elderly pope, but otherwise this is a men’s scene without any questions asked. The explicit—not just implicit, but explicit—message is that men are in charge: men confect the sacred mysteries, men decide whom to elect, men pray, men reflect the divine, men have it all under their control. This carries over into the larger culture as well. It is no wonder violence against women is epidemic.

Sensible feminist friends ask why I worry about such things. I reply that some women’s birth control and abortions are at stake; some young LGBTIQ people will commit suicide because of this crowd. Abuse survivors live with the consequences of acts perpetrated by priests and covered up by these bishops, cardinals, and now popes (plural). Sounds dramatic, but sadly it is true. Moreover, male entitlement in the world, including the violence done to women and girls, is baptized and confirmed by this symbol system. It has the pernicious impact of making the male-only power model seem holy. Ditto for the racist, heterosexist dimensions as well, not to mention the Euro-centrism and moneyed assumptions that underlie the proceedings.

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BBC News

Pope Benedict has led the Catholic Church since 2005, and his papacy has reflected his belief that the Catholic Church should retain its core traditional, conservative values in an era of rapid change.

He rejected calls for a debate on the issue of clerical celibacy, and reaffirmed the ban on Communion for divorced Catholics who remarry. He has also said the Church’s strict positions on abortion, euthanasia and gay partnerships were “not negotiable”.

This outspoken orthodoxy has divided liberals and more traditional Catholics, while the recent leaking of personal documents suggests a lack of control over the machinations of the Vatican.

How has Benedict XVI managed the world’s largest Christian community? We asked six scholars and analysts for their perspective on key areas of the pontificate. …

Sex abuse – David Clohessy

We were never pleased with how Pope Benedict handled the clergy sex abuse and covered up the crisis. That is why we filed suit against him and other Vatican officials in the International Criminal Court.

Since 1981, when he headed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Benedict had primary responsibility for dealing with the clergy sex crimes.

His refusal to decisively address the epidemic – and discipline Church officials who protected predator priests – was exacerbated when he became Pope.

The next pontiff must do more to safeguard children.

He should stop issuing apologies and making gestures, and instead demote bishops who continue to conceal heinous crimes.

And he should insist that prelates work with secular authorities to craft and pass stronger child sex laws across the globe.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

As superficial journalists speculate on the next Pope’s nationality with non-stop nonsense, the Roman Holy Empire is falling before their unseeing eyes. The important issue is not who the next pope will be. If the Catholic Church leadership doesn’t restore, pronto, the accountability that Jesus and his early followers demanded, international prosecutors and regulators will do it for them, and soon.

The Pope’s appointment today of a likely well compensated ex-investment banker, also a German lawyer and Knight of Malta, to “clean up” the Vatican Bank is merely the latest example of incompetent tactics in the futile battles among Cardinals taking place daily on the decks of the Vatican’s Titanic. Whomever is elected next Pope will only get to watch the Church sink rapidly, after having taken on dirty water for decades from the obscene child abuse cover-up iceberg. You cannot try to cover-up the rape of hundreds of thousands of children by priests and expect to get away with it forever. Only clueless celibate males sailing on the rudderless Vatican Titanic could fail to understand this.

Pope John XXIII issued in 1962 the main secrecy order on priest child sex abuse. But he also realized that accountabilty had to be restored to save the Church. He took the first step by trying to get the Vatican Cardinals to share power with the worldwide bishops. He died soon therafter and the Vatican Cardinals’ clique rejected power sharing craftily. Since then, they have installed compliant Popes who like the papal prestige and are happy to do the clique’s bidding. But the democratic rule of law has run out of patience with clerical child abusers and Popes no longer have any effective political power, as the re-election of President Obama just proved.The International Sheriff is on his way and the Pope cannot hide with Georgeous Georg in a refurbished convent. His own Cardinals will help nail him, it appears.

But at this point does any of this matter to most Catholics worldwide? While it may seem overly pessimistic to say so soon that the next Pope will likely fail too, it is just being realistic; and yet there is also room for much optimism. The papal resignation is tantamount to an admission of failure and will lead to de-mystification of the papacy quickly. Pope Benedict XVI, soon to again be non-Pontiff, Joseph Ratzinger, and his Vatican clique led by Cardinal Sodano et al., have already set the stage for the next failure. …

We all have a moral obligation to protect children and signing a petition is a simple, yet potentially effective, way towards meeting that obligation. Please take a minute and sign it at:

[Click here for the petition.]

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

[Final Addendum to the Report to the People of God – BishopAccountability.org]

Posted by Barbara Dorris on February 14, 2013

Archbishop Gomez is behaving exactly like Cardinal Mahony – posturing as a reforming but acting like an enabler. Once again, parishioners and the public learn about potentially dangerous clerics thanks to outside sources.

Earlier this week the organization Bishop Accountability discovered a document naming two dozen clergy predators who have never been publicly named.

Frankly, Gomez’s explanation defies common sense and archdiocesan history. In almost every instance, LA Catholic officials have disclosed information about predator priests only when forced or pushed to do so by external pressures or sources.

Every day Gomez has hidden – and keeps hiding – information about child molesters is a day child molesters are able to keep molesting.

Gomez took over the LA archdiocese on March 1, 2011. So he’s had 716 days to educate himself and warn others about hundreds of proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting clerics. Many of those clerics still work and walk free among unsuspecting families, friends and colleagues. On his first day in office, Gomez should have been poring over abuse files. Within weeks, he should have fully and frankly revealed everything that archdiocesan staff knew about these predators.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 15 February 2013 (VIS) – According to a communique published today, the Commission of Cardinals for the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR) has made an appointment, in accordance with the Institute’s statutes, of a new president of the Supervisory Board, Ernst von Freyberg. The other four members of the Supervisory Board will all remain in office.

“This decision is the result of extensive evaluation and a series of interviews that the Commission of Cardinals has conducted, with the constant support of the Supervisory Board. This painstaking and detailed process lasted for some months, making it possible to assess a number of candidates of professional and moral excellence, with assistance from an independent international Agency that is a leader in the selection of top executives.”

“The Holy Father has closely followed the entire selection process leading to the choice of the new President of the Supervisory Board of the IOR, and he has expressed his full consent to the choice made by the Commission of Cardinals.”

Included in the information is Mr. von Freyberg’s curriculum. He was born in Germany in 1958 and from 1978 to 1985 he studied law at the universities of Munich and Bonn. From 1986 to 1987 he attended the Verwaltungshochschule Speyer. In 1988 he earned admission to the Bar at Landgericht, Ulm and passed the second law exam at Oberlandesgericht, Stuttgart. From 1988 to 1991 he worked for TCR Europe Limited (Bemberg Group), Three City Research Inc., and from 1991 to 2012 he founded and served as CEO of Daiwa Corporate Advisory GmbH. From 2012 to the present he has been with Blohm+Voss Group in Hamburg, Germany, serving as its chairman.

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IRELAND
The Telegraph (United Kingdom)

By Brendan O’Neill
Last updated: February 14th, 2013

The publication last week of the Irish government’s McAleese Report on the Magdalene laundries has proved kind of awkward for Catholic-bashers. For if McAleese’s thorough, 1,000-page study is to be believed, then it would appear that those laundries were not as evil and foul as they had been depicted over the past decade. Specifically the image of the laundries promoted by the popular, much-lauded film The Magdalene Sisters – which showed them as places where women were stripped, slapped, sexually abused and more – has been called into question by McAleese. This has led even The Irish Times, which never turns down an opportunity to wring its hands over Catholic wickedness, to say: “There is no escaping the fact that the [McAleese] report jars with popular perceptions.”

In the Irish mind, and in the minds of everyone else who has seen or read one of the many films, plays and books about the Magdalene laundries, these were horrific institutions brimming with violence and overseen by sadistic, pervy nuns. Yet the McAleese Report found not a single incident of sexual abuse by a nun in a Magdalene laundry. Not one. Also, the vast majority of its interviewees said they were never physically punished in the laundries. As one woman said, “It has shocked me to read in papers that we were beat and our heads shaved and that we were badly treated by the nuns… I was not touched by any nun and I never saw anyone touched.” The small number of cases of corporal punishment reported to McAleese consisted of the kind of thing that happened in many normal schools in the 1960s, 70s and 80s: being caned on the legs or rapped on the knuckles. The authors of the McAleese Report, having like the rest of us imbibed the popular image of the Magdalene laundries as nun-run concentration camps, seem to have been taken aback by “the number of women who spoke positively about the nuns”.

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VATICAN CITY
Boston Globe

By NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press / February 15, 2013

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI signed off on one of the last major appointments of his papacy Friday, approving a German lawyer and financier to head the Vatican’s embattled bank.

Ernst von Freyberg has solid financial and Catholic credentials as a former investment banker and member of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, an ancient chivalrous order drawn from European nobility.

The appointment ends a nine-month search after the Institute of Religious Works ousted its previous president, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, for incompetence. The ouster came just as the Vatican was submitting its finances to a review by a Council of Europe committee in a bid to join the list of financially transparent countries.

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UNITED STATES
Washington Post

Posted by Melinda Henneberger on February 14, 2013

John Patrick Shanley’s “Doubt” is a great play — both sturdy and subtle, and as open to interpretation as the title suggests. Set in a Catholic school in the Bronx in 1964, it never quite spells out whether likable, open-minded Father Flynn is as guilty as fusty old Sister Aloysius suspects he is of taking an inappropriate interest in a particularly vulnerable 12-year-old boy, the only black student in the place. And that ambiguity is the power of the piece.

There’s no such shading in Shanley’s New York Times op-ed this week. In it, he voices at the top of his lungs the popular view that Benedict XVI personally implemented the coverup of predator priests. I understand the anger in his column and others like it; if the rape of children doesn’t make us scream, nothing will. Yet it’s so wrong in the particulars that it misses some of the most important lessons of the scandal.

In our all-or-nothing, right-or-left, with-us-or-against-us opinion culture, taking any issue with the way Shanley and others view Benedict will be seen by some as defending the pope — or, worse, as defending the abuse itself, though I’ve been writing about the horror of it for years.

But it’s because we can’t afford to bungle the takeaway that we shouldn’t pin so much of the blame on Benedict. “Pope Benedict XVI quit,” Shanley begins. “Good. He was utterly bereft of charm, tone-deaf and a protector of priests who abused children. He’d been a member of the Hitler Youth. In addition to this woeful résumé, he had no use for women.”

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CANADA
The Province

By Jennifer Saltman, The Province February 15, 2013

Two teens who accused a former Abbotsford Hindu priest of sexual misconduct were nervous about speaking with police, according to the officer who took their statements.

“It was difficult for them to talk to me,” Abbotsford police Const. Mary Boonstra testified Thursday. “There was a lot of fear there.”

Karam Vir is charged with two counts of touching a young person for a sexual purpose and one count of sexual assault. His trial is under way in B.C. Supreme Court in Chilliwack.

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VATICAN CITY
Financial Times

The Vatican has named Ernst von Freyberg, a German lawyer, as the new head of the Vatican bank, filling a position that has remained vacant since its previous president was abruptly dismissed last May.

The appointment of Mr von Freyberg on Friday was confirmed by a commission of five cardinals that oversees the bank and was fully backed by Pope Benedict XVI, the Vatican said in a statement.

Filling the vacancy was seen as one of the most important acts to be completed by the pontiff before he renounces the papacy at the end of the month. …

Mr von Freyberg, 55, is a member of the sovereign military order of Saint John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta. He speaks four languages. “He is a well introduced person in the Church world, in which he is very active,” said Father Lombardi.

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VATICAN CITY
Reuters

VATICAN CITY | Fri Feb 15, 2013

(Reuters) – The Vatican appointed German lawyer Ernst von Freyberg to be the new president of its bank on Friday, filling a post left vacant since May when the previous head was ousted from the scandal-tainted institution.

The appointment was made by a commission of cardinals and approved by Pope Benedict and is likely to be one of his last major decisions before he resigns at the end of the month.

The Vatican has been trying to shed a reputation for a lack of financial transparency at the bank, officially known as the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR), but has been dogged by scandals for decades.

A Vatican statement said Freyberg brought “a vast experience of financial matters and the financial regulatory process.” Born in 1958, he is on the advisory board of temporary employment agency Manpower GmbH (MAN.N) and of asset management firm Flossbach von Storch AG.

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VATICAN CITY
Straits Times

VATICAN CITY (AFP) – The Vatican on Friday named a German financier as the new head of its scandal-hit bank, saying he would help overhaul the secretive institution to comply with anti-money laundering rules.

Ernst von Freyberg replaces Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, who was unceremoniously sacked by the board on May 24 last year a day after the pope’s butler was arrested for leaking hundreds of confidential papers from the Vatican.

Vatican watchers say Mr Gotti Tedeschi’s ousting could have been linked to his drive to make the bank, the Institute for Religious Works, cooperate with an Italian money laundering inquiry but the circumstances remain mysterious.

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VATICAN CITY
Gazzetta del Sud

Rome, February 15 – The Vatican on Friday appointed German lawyer Ernst Freiherr von Freyberg as head of the embattled Vatican Bank, ending intense media speculation over the nomination. Von Freyberg was appointed by the bank’s commission of cardinals with the pope’s ”full consent”, the Vatican said. However Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi denied that Pope Benedict XVI, who on Monday announced his resignation with effect from the end of the month, knew the new bank chief personally. The bank, otherwise known as the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR), has been under the interim leadership of the vice-president Ronaldo Hermann Schmit since former president Ettore Gotti Tedeschi was fired by the supervisory board in May 2012 amid reported disagreements on moves to join a list of financially transparent countries.

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RHODE ISLAND
Catholic Culture

The Rhode Island Supreme Court has declined a request by the Legion of Christ to delay the release of documents related to the $60 million will of Gabrielle Mee.

Calling the public’s right to know “paramount,” a Rhode Island judge last month had ruled in favor of several media outlets that sought the release of documents related to the widow’s contributions to the Legion of Christ.

“There are yards of documents,” said a spokesman for the Legion after the Rhode Island high court’s ruling. “It’s done. They’re public. This ends the debate.”

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SYRACUSE (NY)
Syracuse.com

Reverend James F. Quinn, 80, was called to the Lord on Friday. Born in Syracuse, Father Quinn was a graduate of Our Lady of Angels Seminary at Niagara University and ordained a Catholic priest on May 24, 1958. He was a pastor, associate pastor or priest-in-residence at eleven churches throughout the Syracuse area and in Whitesboro and Munnsville. Father Quinn was the Director of the Office for Vocation for nine years and published vocational promotional materials now being used by 40 dioceses and 12 countries, including South Africa, Ireland and England. The area director of the Catholic Youth Organization for 12 years and the Syracuse area CCD, he also served on the board of directors for the United Fund and the Diocesan Continuing Education Committee.

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AUSTRALIA
Geelong Advertiser

Danny Lannen | February 15th, 2013

GEELONG parish priest Fr Kevin Dillon has told a parliamentary inquiry into institutional abuse the Catholic Church needs to lose its arrogance dealing with victims.

Fr Dillon said at a hearing in Geelong today the church had focused on denial and protection of material assets rather than protection of human assets.

“The church expands its mission without looking at something which is fundamentally tearing at its heart,” Fr Dillon said.

He said processes for dealing with victims had lost credibility and were beyond repair and the church’s response to victims had been inadequate.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

February 15, 2013

Barney Zwartz
Religion editor, The Age

One of Victoria’s most senior Catholic priests says the church’s abuse procedures have failed and must be closed down.

“Time is up, the church has had more than a fair chance. The Melbourne Response and Towards Healing have lost all credibility and are beyond repair,” Father Kevin Dillon told the Victorian inquiry into clergy sex abuse, meeting in Geelong on Friday.

Father Dillon of St Mary’s Basilica, who was given a standing ovation by the gallery after his testimony, said the church response had been heartless, adversarial, and showed “a culture of denial” about the impact on victims.

A noted campaigner within the church on behalf of victims, Father Dillon said he had consistent contact with 30 victims. “Sadly but importantly, I have yet to hear one victim speak positively of their experience with either church process” (Melbourne or national), he said.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 15, 2013

Rome

Earlier this week, I suggested that because the end of Benedict XVI’s papacy is not occurring in tandem with his death, it may create greater psychological space for cardinals to take a critical look at the pontificate, without fear of speaking ill of the late pontiff.

A small confirmation of that theory has come in the form of an interview given to a German newspaper by Cardinal Joachim Meisner of Cologne, one of Benedict’s closest friends in the College of Cardinals.

In the context of describing what qualities the next pope might need, Meisner revealed that in 2009, he approached Benedict on behalf of a number of cardinals to ask him to dump his Secretary of State, Italian Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.

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VATICAN CITY
Houston Chronicle

By NICOLE WINFIELD, Associated Press | February 15, 2013

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI signed off on one of the last major appointments of his papacy Friday, approving a German lawyer and financier to head the Vatican’s embattled bank.

Ernst von Freyberg has solid financial and Catholic credentials as a former investment banker and member of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, an ancient chivalrous order drawn from European nobility.

The appointment ends a nine-month search after the Institute of Religious Works ousted its previous president, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, for incompetence. The ouster came just as the Vatican was submitting its finances to a review by a Council of Europe committee in a bid to join the list of financially transparent countries.

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AUSTRALIA
Failed Messiah

Being conscious of the fact that there are members of our community who claim to have been subjected to inappropriate sexual behaviour by trusted officials within the community, the RCV wishes to reaffirm its strong position in relation to the matter of sexual abuse.…RCV President, Rabbi Meir Shlomo Kluwgant said “It is essential that when abuse has occurred the police must be informed without delay.”
Media Release

Adar 5773 – February 2013

Being conscious of the fact that there are members of our community who claim to have been subjected to inappropriate sexual behaviour by trusted officials within the community, the RCV wishes to reaffirm its strong position in relation to the matter of sexual abuse.

The RCV policy in relation to the issue of sexual abuse [is posted below.]

RCV President, Rabbi Meir Shlomo Kluwgant said “It is essential that when abuse has occurred the police must be informed without delay”.

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NUEVA YORK
El Diario

Nueva York – El rabino Nathan David Rabinowich, de 59 años, fue arrestado luego de que intercambiara mensajes de texto con contenido sexual con quien creía era una adolescente -de 14 años- pero en realidad se trataba de un detective policíaco.

La fiscalía de distrito de Brooklyn informó que Rabinowich fue arrestado cuando acudió a una cita que había concertado con “la joven” en Queens. El rabino, residente de Brooklyn, enfrentaría cargos por intento de violación, intento de cometer un acto criminal y de poner en peligro el bienestar de un menor.

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NEW YORK
WPIX

[with video]

Rabbi Nathan David Rabinowich and a criminal defense attorney hurriedly walked out of the Queens County courthouse Thursday. Police say the 59-year-old Brooklyn based rabbi thought he was sending sexually explicit instant messages to a 14-year old girl in December and then again over the last two weeks.

It turns out that girl was really an undercover NYPD vice detective.

Investigators say Rabbi Rabinowich used two AOL screen names…”NYC-NORMAL100″ and “NORMALGENTNYC”.

He was arrested last night when he left his Brooklyn home and showed up in Queens to meet with the would be 14-year old.

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NEW YORK
The New York Times

A rabbi has been arrested after sending sexually explicit messages online to a person he thought was a 14-year-old girl and arranging to meet her in Queens for sex, the district attorney’s office said on Thursday. Instead, a New York police detective had impersonated the girl, the authorities said.

The rabbi, Nathan David Rabinowich, 59, of Brooklyn, was arrested Wednesday. He was charged with four sexual offenses, including attempted rape, the Queens district attorney’s office said in a statement.

“It is disturbing that a man who is supposed to be held in high esteem by the community in which he lives would allegedly try to lure a child to meet him for sex,” the district attorney, Richard A. Brown, said.

Rabbi Rabinowich runs a tour company and a synagogue from his home in the Midwood section, according to the statement. He exchanged online messages, some sexually graphic, with the detective in December and this month, the statement said.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

By Kerry Burke , Joe Stepansky AND Daniel Beekman / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Published: Friday, February 15, 2013

A Brooklyn rabbi and travel guide exchanged sexually explicit online messages with an undercover cop he thought was a 14-year-old girl, then set up a date with her in Queens, prosecutors charged Thursday.

Nathan David Rabinowich, 59, was arrested Wednesday night when he showed up for the pervy rendezvous, police said. He faces up to four years in prison if convicted of attempted rape and other counts.

“It is disturbing that a man who is supposed to be held in high esteem by the community in which he lives would allegedly try to lure a child to meet him for sex,” Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said.

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NEW YORK
NBC News

NEW YORK — A Brooklyn rabbi is being accused of trying to lure an undercover detective posing as a 14-year-old girl to meet for sex.

The Brooklyn district attorney’s office says Nathan David Rabinowich was arrested Wednesday after he showed up at a pre-arranged meeting in Queens.

He’s being held pending arraignment on charges of attempted rape, attempted criminal sexual act and attempted endangering the welfare of a child. A telephone message left with his attorney was not immediately returned.

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VATICAN CITY
Asia One

AFP
Friday, Feb 15, 2013

VATICAN CITY – What would appear at first glance to be a cakewalk for a staunch conservative, to follow in the footsteps of Pope Benedict XVI, will be anything but Vatican experts say.

Of the 117 cardinal electors, 67 were named by the outgoing pontiff, and the other 50 by his beloved predecessor and ideological soulmate John Paul II.

More than half of them are European including 28 Italians, which points strongly to a successor in the same mould as Benedict, who yearned for a rebirth of Christian faith on the Old Continent.

But the arithmetic is misleading, given the water that has flowed under the bridges of the Tiber since the 2005 conclave that elevated the Polish pope’s German protege after just four voting sessions.

The gaffes and scandals that came to characterise Benedict’s papacy, combined with unflattering comparisons between the introverted German and the charismatic Pole, have laid the foundations for divisions and dissent.

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ROME
The Daily Beast

by Barbie Latza Nadeau Feb 15, 2013

Whispers of late-night helicopter trips to the hospital and another sex scandal have Rome buzzing. Barbie Latza Nadeau on the conspiracy theories about why Benedict resigned.

Now that the shock of Pope Benedict XVI’s surprise resignation has settled in, conspiracy theorists are having a heyday trying to figure out if there is more to the story than meets the eye. With no papal funeral to prepare for and the pope’s final appearances fairly routine, Vatican watchers and bored reporters have been fleshing out a number of theories on why the pope may have really resigned.

While the Catholic Church sex-abuse scandal was obviously a huge weight on the pope’s shoulders, Vatican watchers say it was actually the VatiLeaks butler saga and allegations of impropriety at the Vatican Bank that played more important roles in his resignation. “Benedict may not have quit because of the pedophilia scandals or any other specific controversy,” says Vatican expert John Allen. “But it’s hard to believe they didn’t play a role, at least as background.”

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VATICAN CITY
Sky News

Tim Marshall
Foreign Affairs Editor

Whoever takes over from Pope Benedict next month has an almighty financial mess to clear up.

Most coverage of the Pope’s achievements, or lack of, centred on matters of faith and doctrine. He came out with a mixed score partially dependant on judgement of those slippery concepts. If you measure the success of his tenure in a financial way, the balance sheet is more negative.

The Vatican is a state and a business as well as a religious organisation. The state has investments, GDP, and a bank with 33,400 accounts. If you were generous you might describe its accounting system as opaque. The European Parliament has called for it to be more transparent.

Four years after he came to power, Benedict XVI, the de facto CEO of the Vatican, reacted to a string of accusations of financial irregularity by its bank, the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR). He created a supervisory body – the Financial Information Authority.

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AUSTRALIA
Bunbury Mail

The chaplain of an elite Claremont boys’ school has denied claims he advised a former student and victim of sexual abuse at his school to “forget about it”.

Canon Frank Sheehan has spoken out after allegations of a cover-up emerged during the child sex trial of Christ Church Grammar’s former music teacher Lindsay Hutchinson, 63.

Hutchinson was yesterday found guilty of 12 sexual abuse offences concerning students at the school, after a two-week Perth District Court trial.

The offences took place in the mid-1980s and largely concerned one student, then aged 13, who went on to testify against Hutchinson at trial.

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AUSTRALIA
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn

15 February 2013

Archdiocesan Administrator Mgr John Woods has joined with the NSW bishops in co-signing a pastoral letter which addresses the Church’s strategic and spiritual response to the royal commission into child sexual abuse.

Mgr Woods has urged priests to ensure the letter to clergy, religious and laity, entitled “Sowing in Tears”, is drawn to the attention of parishioners.

Against the backdrop of the Lenten paradox of tears and joy, cross and Resurrection, the Church in Australia has been rocked by child sexual abuse, the bishops say. “We must not put our heads in the sand about any of this, or try to minimise or explain it away,” they say. “The fact is our dioceses have all known cases of child abuse.

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ROME
All Voices

If you suspected there was more to the story behind the historic resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, there may be emerging evidence to support that suspicion.

The International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State (ITCCS) reported on Thursday that Pope Benedict became the first pope to resign in nearly 600 years in order to avoid criminal prosecution for concealing knowledge of “documented crimes of child torture, trafficking and genocide,” connected to the Roman Catholic Church.

The ITCCS report cites a letter from Rev. Kevin Annett to Italian President Giorgio Napolitano, written a week before the pope officially resigned.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

A Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child sexual abuse has been granted an extension due to the number of victims who have come forward.

The inquiry into child sexual abuse within religious organisations began early last year and was due to finish in April.

But the committee has received close to 400 submissions, many from victims who want to share their stories at public hearings.

The committee requested a time extension and will now hand in its report at the end of September.

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Neil Ormerod February 17, 2013

Benedict’s announcement that he would resign from the papacy came two days before Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent and a day on which many Catholics go to mass to be anointed with ashes as a sign of repentance. How providential that the new pope will be elected in the midst of this Lenten season, born in ashes but looking forward to resurrection.

And there are plenty of ashes to go around, not least of which are the ‘ashes’ of the pain and humiliation of the survivors of clergy sexual abuse. While the Church is currently in the midst of a sexual abuse ‘crisis’, the issue is decades old. It will be one of the major challenges for the new pope to find creative and compassionate ways of addressing this issue.

We saw some of this creativity at work with the move by Pope John Paul II to publicly seek forgiveness for the sins of the Church, including sins against ‘minors who are victims of abuse’. Many local bishops conferences echoed this act of repentance. But words are cheap, and actions speak louder.

There is a world of difference between a global apology to ‘victims’ and how an individual cleric faces the pain of a survivor standing in front of him. The entrance into that world is through conversion, a change in heart and mind, to begin to see the world through the eyes of the poor, the suffering, the humiliated.

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CALIFORNIA
Valley News

Friday, February 15, 2013

Eleven Americans will be among the 117 cardinals of the Catholic Church heading soon to Rome to select the next pope. One of them, Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, for a quarter-century the archbishop of Los Angeles, is lucky not to be in prison, for there is no dispute that he orchestrated what amounted to a cover-up of clerical sexual abuse in Los Angeles.

By now it is familiar news, though no less stomach-turning, that top officials in the Catholic Church protected pedophile priests for decades — impeding criminal investigations, shuffling offenders to new parishes or abroad, and resisting disclosure. In so doing, they exhibited little concern for victims of sex abuse, usually boys.

Still, the scale of the misdeeds in Los Angeles, the largest archdiocese in the United States, counts as a particular disgrace. And it is Mahony, who resigned as archbishop two years ago, who oversaw the whole dirty business. For that he has been publicly censured by his successor.

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AUSTRALIA
SBS

Source: AAP

A priest has told a Victorian inquiry there is extraordinary denial within the Catholic Church hierarchy about sexual abuse.

The Catholic Church is in extraordinary denial over child sex abuse and its absolute mess of a system for dealing with victims has lost all credibility, a priest says.

Geelong-based priest Father Kevin Dillon says the church lacks accountability, is more interested in protecting its name and assets and needs to overhaul the way it deals with abuse victims.

The church hierarchy has been in denial on the issue of sexual abuse, Fr Dillon told a Victorian parliamentary inquiry into sexual abuse within religious organisations during a hearing in Geelong on Friday.

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AUSTRALIA
Big Pond News

Friday, February 15, 2013

A Catholic priest says the church has a culture of denial and asset protection in dealing with victims of sexual abuse.

Geelong-based priest Father Kevin Dillon has told the Victorian parliamentary committee into sexual abuse within religious organisations that there is ‘extraordinary denial’ within the church hierarchy about sexual abuse.

‘I think of the riding instructions to protect the church’s good name … (and) protect their assets,’ he told the inquiry on Friday.

‘I think often the church works with a lack of accountability.’

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
ABC News

By DAVID KLEPPER Associated Press

PROVIDENCE, R.I. February 15, 2013 (AP)

Documents related to a disgraced Roman Catholic organization called the Legion of Christ could soon be unsealed and available to the public following a decision Thursday by the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

The state’s high court issued an order declining to delay the release of the sealed documents, which are related to a lawsuit contesting the will of a woman who left $60 million to the Legion. The Legion had argued that the records should remain under court seal because their contents could taint a future jury.

The documents could be available as early as Friday.

The Associated Press, The New York Times, The Providence Journal and the National Catholic Reporter had asked a Superior Court judge to unseal the documents, saying there was no justification to withhold documents that could shed light on the Legion’s operations. Last month, the judge ordered the documents to be unsealed, but he gave the Legion until Friday to ask the Supreme Court to intervene.

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CANADA
Sun News

MEGAN GILLIS | QMI AGENCY

OTTAWA – A suspended priest and former school trustee was freed on bail Thursday after promising to stay away from schools and kids amid charges he had “a series of inappropriate contacts” with a seven-year-old boy in the early 1970s.

Hours before, the Archbishop of Ottawa announced he had suspended Fr. Jacques Faucher, 76, and banned him from representing himself as a Catholic priest.

He’s back in court March 12 to face charges of gross indecency and indecent assault that no longer exist in the Criminal Code but were in place at the time of the alleged offences dating back to 1971 to 1973.

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UNITED STATES
Bloomberg

By Margaret Carlson Feb 14, 2013

This week Margaret Carlson and Ramesh Ponnuru are discussing the legacy of Pope Benedict XVI. Previously, Ramesh responded to Margaret’s column.

The thing about the pope, Ramesh, is that he’s as close to all-powerful as we have in this vale of tears. He’s the president without Congress holding him down. He’s infallible when he wants to be. He has no H.R. department telling him whom he can and cannot fire.

As head of the euphemistically named Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, charged with handling the sex-abuse scandal, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger knew the magnitude of the problem. According to the U.S. Conference of Bishops, since 1950, there have been 6,100 accused priests and religious and 16,000 victims.

As head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI could have dramatically cleaned house.

As the spiritual leader of the world’s Catholics, he let us down.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Archbishop of Canterbury

Thursday 14th February 2013

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has issued the following statement after the sentencing of Robert Coles at Brighton Crown Court today.

I have read details of this case sent to me by the Diocese of Chichester and the Commissaries who were appointed by Bishop Rowan. My first concern is always for those whose lives have been affected in any way by cases of abuse within the Church of England and I am appalled by the details of today’s case. The systems designed to protect the survivors clearly failed, their vulnerability was taken advantage of, and their lives have been deeply and in some cases permanently affected, as have the lives of those who love them.

I believe that the safeguarding of children and vulnerable adults should be the highest priority of all parts of the Church, and that any failings in this area must be immediately reported to the police. There are no excuses for shortcomings.

I repeat what I have said before and, on behalf of the Church, apologise with deep grief for the betrayals and failings that occurred.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Right Rev Justin Welby, has apologised for “betrayals and failings” in the Church’s handling of child-abuse allegations after it emerged that senior clergy failed to tell police about a priest who was later jailed for sex offences.

Archbishop Welby issued a statement after Robert Coles, 71, a retired Church of England priest, was jailed for eight years yesterday. He had admitting ten counts of indecent assault and another serious sexual offence against three boys aged between 11 and 16.

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VATICAN CITY
The Times (United Kingdom)

Philip Willan
Rome

Pope Benedict was pushed towards resignation by a shocking report on Vatican infighting that was handed to him at the end of last year, according to the Italian magazine Panorama.

The voluminous document was the second instalment of a report prepared by a committee of three cardinals into the source of leaks of sensitive Vatican papers blamed on the Pope’s butler, Paolo Gabriele.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Xan Brooks
The Guardian, Thursday 14 February 2013

Alex Gibney’s righteous, exhaustive investigation into child abuse inside the Catholic church arrives in UK cinemas as a kind of unintentional leaving gift for the outgoing Pope Benedict, though it is not one he is likely to relish. In his former role as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Joseph Ratzinger stands accused of knowing everything and doing nothing. On the rare occasions he was forced to publicly acknowledge the scandal lapping at his ankles, his concern was more for the fate of the priests than the children themselves.

The film’s starting point is the case of Father Lawrence Murphy, a serial abuser at a school for the deaf in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, who was eventually called to account by the boys in his care. Murphy’s defence is described as “noble cause corruption”, in that he attempts to spin his abuse into a holy act, casting molestation as a form of sacrament. Or, as he puts it: “There was rampant homosexuality among the boys at that school. And I took their sins upon myself.”

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
The Republic

[Final Addendum to the Report to the People of God – BishopAccountability.org]

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 14, 2013

LOS ANGELES — The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles has added the names of two dozen men to the publicly released list of priests and brothers alleged to have molested children.

The names were in a two-page report posted on the archdiocesan website last month without fanfare at the same time that 12,000 pages of internal records were posted, according to BishopAccountability.org, a nonprofit group that tracks public release of clergy abuse documents.

BishopAccountability.org President Terry McKiernan sent a letter to Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez this week saying it is essential to make public the nature of the allegations “because some of them may still pose a danger to children in Los Angeles, elsewhere in the United States, and in other countries.”

The report said none of the men currently have ministries in the archdiocese. Among them, five have died, three have been defrocked, three are on inactive leave, one was excommunicated and one was suspended.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Digital Journal

[Final Addendum to the Report to the People of God – BishopAccountability.org]

By Brett Wilkins
Feb 14, 2013

Los Angeles – The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has quietly added two dozen priests and other clergymen to the list of individuals suspected of raping or sexually assaulting children in what was already a major part of a massive worldwide Catholic sex abuse scandal.

The Los Angeles Times reports that the 24 names were disclosed in a report posted on the archdiocese’s website last month along with 12,000 pages of internal records detailing how the church dealt with abuse claims. BishopAccountability.org, a non-profit group that researches and archives documents related to clergy sex abuse, originally uncovered the list and published the names of the suspected offenders.

The Catholic Church readily admits that the allegations against the 24 men are “credible.” But the archdiocese will not release any further information about the accusations against them, including how many accusers there are, when the alleged sex abuse occurred or the parishes where the alleged abusers worked.

Terry McKiernan of BishopAccountability.org told the Times that the disclosure of such information is “essential.”

“It is essential for everyone to know the nature of the allegations against these priests and brothers, because some of them may still pose a danger to children in Los Angeles, elsewhere in the United States, and in other countries,” he said.

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AUSTRALIA
CathNews

Pope Benedict’s shock resignation should usher in a new understanding of the role in the modern world, according to Geelong Catholic priest Fr Kevin Dillon, reports The Geelong Advertiser.

The St Mary’s parish priest said on Wednesday that he hoped a cardinal with strong pastoral experience would become successor and that he believed the time might be right to consider limiting papal reigns to set periods.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 14, 2013

Rome —
In what has become a daily exercise in rumor control, the Vatican spokesperson on Thursday shot down one hot bit of speculation about the resignation of Benedict XVI and confirmed another one about his life after the papacy.

Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi denied that an accident suffered by Benedict XVI during his trip to Mexico in March 2012 led to his decision to renounce the papacy, as was suggested in a piece today by a leading Italian Vatican writer.

Journalist Andrea Tornielli wrote this morning that while Benedict was staying in a residence of Capuchin sisters in León, Mexico, he got up during the night to use the bathroom and, because he couldn’t quickly find the light switch, made his way in the dark. He hit his head on the sink, hard enough to cause bleeding. …

On another front, Lombardi confirmed that Benedict will be accompanied to Castel Gandolfo on Feb. 28 and later to the monastery on Vatican grounds where he plans to live by Archbishop Georg Gänswein. The 56-year-old Gänswein is the pope’s longtime personal secretary, and Benedict recently also made him the Prefect of the Papal Household, a position previously held by American Cardinal James Harvey.

Lombardi said Gänswein will continue to hold that position into the next papacy, presumably living in the monastery and going to work each day once Benedict gets settled.

That news led to an interesting question during the briefing. The Vatican has repeatedly said Benedict will not have any role in the next papacy, but a reporter asked Lombardi if the fact that his closest aide will also be running the papal household doesn’t create an obvious channel to wield behind-the-scenes influence.

Lombardi’s response was one of those rare moments when a Vatican official says something out loud that insiders know to be true but rarely dare to acknowledge publicly. In essence, Lombardi said being the Prefect of the Papal Household isn’t that big of a deal.

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VATICAN CITY
Portland Press Herald

Victor L. Simpson / The Associated Press

VATICAN CITY — For an institution devoted to eternal light, the Vatican has shown itself to be a master of smokescreens since Pope Benedict XVI’s shock resignation announcement.

On Thursday, the Vatican spokesman acknowledged that Benedict hit his head and bled profusely while visiting Mexico in July. Two days earlier the same man acknowledged that Benedict has had a pacemaker for years, and underwent a secret operation to replace its battery three months ago.

And as the Catholic world reeled from shock over the abdication, it soon became clear that Benedict’s post-papacy lodgings have been under construction since at least the fall. That in turn put holes in the Holy See’s early claims that Benedict kept his decision to himself until he revealed it.

Vatican secrecy is legendary and can have tragic consequences — as the world learned through the church sex abuse scandal in which bishops quietly moved abusive priests without reporting their crimes.

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Huffington Post

By Cavan Sieczkowski Posted: 02/14/2013

After Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation, those familiar with a 12th-century prophecy claiming the next pope will be the last questioned if Judgment Day is quickly approaching. Scholars, theologians and churchmen, however, all treat this “prediction” as fiction passed off as reality.

The “Prophecy of the Popes” is attributed to St. Malachy, an Irish archbishop who was canonized a saint in 1190, according to Discovery News. In his predication, dated 1139, Malachy prophesied that there would be 112 more popes before Judgment Day. Benedict is supposedly the 111th pope.

The foretelling offers brief descriptions about each pope, and some of them appear to align with reality in some way. For example, Benedict is apparently denoted as the “glory of the olive,” and the Olivetans are affiliated with Benedictine Order, NBC News notes. …

However, although Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana might bear the same name as the person mentioned in the prophecy, there are no Roman-born cardinals in the running to be Benedict’s successor.

“There are no Pietros among the living cardinals; two Pierres (as second name): Nasrallah Pierre Sfeir and Jean-Pierre Ricard; and one Pedro: Rubiano Sáenz,” according to librarian Salvador Miranda, creator and producer of the website The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church.

Like any good conspiracy theory, there are many holes in the lore of St. Malachy, according to Father James Weiss, a professor of church history at Boston College.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Tom Gallagher | Feb. 14, 2013

Simply put, no U.S. cardinal has the chops to be the next pope, whether it’s due to depth of theological writings, expert managerial capability, the facility of languages, or a global presence, among other reasons.

My NCR colleague, John Allen, has done his level best to introduce into the mainstream media the notion that Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York and Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C., are contenders for the papacy at next month’s conclave. To be sure, Allen has as much, if not more, experience covering the Vatican as any U.S. journalist.

From CNN on Monday:

Wuerl is a top American contender for the papacy, according to Allen. Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the archbishop of New York, could also be considered, but both Americans would be on the “C or D list” of candidates, Allen said.

With no disrespect to either of His Eminences, I respectfully disagree.

Let’s start with Cardinal Dolan.

His pluses include his happiness as a priest and his desire to use the media to advance his goals on behalf of the church. After an introverted pope, the thinking goes, the universal church needs an extroverted pope. With Cardinal Dolan, one gets an extrovert.

But upon review, what do we really know about Cardinal Dolan?

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
San Bernardino Sun

By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer
dailynews.com
Posted: 02/13/2013

[Final Addendum to the Report to the People of God – BishopAccountability.org]

[FINAL ADDENDUM
To view the final addendum to the 2004 Report to the People of God, click here.]

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has quietly added the names of two dozen priests and brothers to its list of clergy accused of sexually abusing children.

In a two-page “final addendum” to its 2004 Report to the People of God, which was the church’s response to the growing sex-abuse scandal, the archdiocese said the newly released names included those found during a follow-up review of its files. Some also were named in a lawsuit against the archdiocese, which resulted in a 2007 settlement of $660 million to more than 500 victims.

As part of the settlement, the archdiocese recently released some 12,000 documents detailing allegations of molestation against children, some going back decades. The files also revealed a cover-up of the abuse by Cardinal Roger Mahony, which led to an unprecedented public rebuke of the retired archbishop by his successor.

The list was posted on the archdiocese website at the same time the files were released, although no mention was made of it. The list of 49 names includes two dozen who were not previously known to be accused, according to BishopAccountability.org, which has been tracking sex-abuse in the Catholic Church and discovered the addendum.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Eastbourne Herald

Paedophile priest Robert Coles has been jailed for eight years.

Coles, 71, of Upperton Road, Eastbourne, appeared at Brighton Crown Court yesterday (Thursday) and was sentenced to a total of eight years for sexual offences against young boys.

At a hearing on December 14 last year at Chichester Crown Court, Coles had pleaded guilty to 11 offences.

These included one offence of buggery and seven indecent assaults against three victims back in the 1970s and 1980s.

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UNITED KINGDOM
London Evening Standard

14 February 2013

A paedophile retired Church of England priest has been jailed for eight years after pleading guilty to historic sex offences against young boys dating back to the 1970’s.

In December, Robert Coles, 71, admitted buggery and four indecent assaults on one victim and three indecent assaults against two other boys.

The offences took place in West Sussex and elsewhere in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s against boys aged between 10 and 16 at the time.

Coles, of Upperton Road, Eastbourne, East Sussex, was due to face trial on June 10 on seven further alleged sex offences suspected to have been committed against the victims.

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UNITED STATES
The Garden of Roses: Stores of Abuse and Healing

Virginia Jones

I read what others are writing about the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI; sometimes with interest, sometimes with eyes glazed over from reading the same thing being said over and over. Two articles, however, caught my attention — one New York Times op-ed written by Jason Berry and one about Paolo Gabrielle, the pope’s butler. Thank you to Abuse Tracker for posting one article and Frank Douglas for drawing my attention to the other.

First, Jason Berry, who is very well researched, wrote about a detail that should be well known but had not been catalogued in my brain before. In his New York Times op-ed he wrote about Cardinal Sodano. Apparently Pope Benedict XVI, when he was still Cardinal Ratzinger, wanted to investigate Marcel Maciel, the founder of the Legionnaire’s of Christ and legendary, chronic abuser of boys and women and girls and men. Cardinal Sodano pressured Pope John Paul II to end this investigation, and he did. The former Cardinal Ratzinger attempted other positive steps concerning the clergy abuse issue, only to be opposed by the powerful Cardinal Sodano. Pope Benedict XVI has slime on his hands too. He knew about abuse and covered it up too, but we should give credit for what he did do — namely investigate and punish Marcel Maciel as well as meet with some clergy abuse survivors to hear their stories and a few other positive actions.

Why I am so concerned is that Cardinal Sodano was elected dean of the College of Cardinals which will elect the next Pope. This cannot be good news for anyone who wants to end abuse and care for survivors wounded in our Catholic Church.

When the clergy abuse scandal burst forth in 2002, pressured by media stories and legal action, the Church made some genuine progress in it’s handling of the issue. As the lawsuits and the bankruptcies and media coverage of the issue abated, the Church seems to be regressing. It appears we are in for much more regression. In my opinion this means even less support for survivors and increased likelihood for more abuse in the present and the future. It we want to end abuse, we have to talk about it; we have to tackle it head one. We can and should try new approaches, but we must not sweep the issue under the rug. We must act on our moral convictions.

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SCOTLAND
Association of Catholic Priests (Ireland)

Brian Fitzpatrick, a former Labour MSP, offers the thoughts of a Scottish Catholic on upcoming conclave (first published in the Scottish Review on Ash Wednesday).

‘Turn to me and be saved’, says the Lord, ‘For I am God, there is none other, none beside Me, I call your Name’. Hopefully, without being unduly and prematurely maudlin, I can share that those versified simple words of scripture resonate with me. I have asked for them to be included in my requiem mass come the day my family and friends will gather to pray for the passing of my soul and, God willing, perhaps celebrate my life.

Like many 21st-century western Catholics, in falteringly answering that call I have the contradictory sensation that it has never been easier but, at the same time never harder, to cling to the barque of Peter. Certainly, as Scottish Catholics, we now no longer suffer the unjust fates of our forebears. Most of the often still heated anti-Catholic rhetoric flows from an aggressively secularist body of opinion challenging Catholicism as its most robust opponent in the public square rather than the crazier, if equally bitter, sectarian rantings of yesteryear.

Yet my greatest anxieties for the future of the Catholic Church flow more from the antics of some inside our church rather than any enemy without. The church my parents raised me in, and which I doubt I could ever leave, often is an uncomfortable place for a liberal Catholic (not yet an oxymoron). There is an air of shrillness and fundamentalism to much of the monologue emanating from elements of the episcopacy.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Midhurst and Petworth Observer

Published on Thursday 14 February 2013

A RETIRED priest was sentenced to eight years in prison today (February 14), for 11 child sex offences.

Robert Coles, 71, of Upperton Road, Eastbourne, appeared at Brighton Crown Court and was sentenced for sexual offences against young boys.

At a hearing on December 14, at Chichester Crown Court, Coles pleaded guilty to 11 offences against a boy in Chichester between 1982 and 1984 and offences against two other boys, aged ten at the time.

The offences were: one offence of buggery and four indecent assaults against the first victim and three indecent assaults against each of the other two victims between 1978 and 1979.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 14 February 2013 (VIS) – In a previous story about the future conclave to elect Benedict XVI’s successor it was erroneously stated that the number of cardinal electors could vary according to the date that the conclave commences.

In fact, this number is independent of the date that the conclave begins because John Paul II’s Apostolic Constitution “Universi Dominici Gregis”, which will regulate the conclave, establishes in no. 33 that cardinals who have reached their eightieth birthday before the day when the Apostolic See becomes vacant will not be cardinal electors.

For that reason, for example, Cardinal Walter Kasper, who turns 80 on 5 March will be an elector, as is also the case for Cardinal Severino Poletto, who turns 80 on 18 March.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 14 February 2013 (VIS) – The Governorate of Vatican City State and the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Italy have signed, at the ministry’s offices, a memorandum of understanding regarding use of the “Passetto di Borgo”, that is, the covered corridor atop the walls joining the Vatican to Castel Sant’Angleo, and the Watchtower of that monument.

Signing for the Holy See was Cardinal Giuseppe Bertello, president of the Governorate of Vatican City State, and, on behalf of the Italian Republic, Lorenzo Ornaghi, Italy’s Minister of Culture.

The memorandum―following in line with the Exchange of (Diplomatic) Notes between Italy and the Holy See in 1991 regarding the ownership and use of the “Passetto di Borgo” and taking into account the common interest in cooperating for the care and appreciation of the historic and artistic patrimony―defines the usage of the Watchtower for the purpose of authorizing the movement of the public within and outside of the monument and of preparing the adequate infrastructures to allow access for persons with disabilities.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 14 February 2013 (VIS) – Archbishop Georg Ganswein, Prefect of the Prefecture of the Papal Household and secretary to Benedict XVI, will continue to carry out both roles and will thus accompany the Pope during his stay at Castel Gandolfo and at the monastery that he will retire to after his resignation from the papacy. The papal household, or “memores”, which has served the Holy Father during these past eight years will also move to the same monastery. This was among the information given by Fr. Federico Lombardi, S.J., director of the Holy See Press Office in today’s press briefing.

Fr. Lombardi also clarified that the cardinals arriving in Rome before 1 March, the official start of the Sede vacante, will not reside in the Casa Santa Marta residence until that date. At the same time he commented that the pontiff’s fall during the trip to Mexico last year was not a determining factor in his decision to renounce the Petrine ministry, nor was the report of the commission of three cardinals (Julian Herranz, Jozef Tomko, and Salvatore De Giorgi), which the Pope instituted last April to carry out an internal investigation on the leak of documents.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 14 February 2013 (VIS) – Yesterday at 5:00pm, the Holy Father presided over the rite of blessing and imposition of ashes. Traditionally, the celebration is held in the Roman Basilica of Santa Sabina but, given the large influx of persons and the desire of the cardinals and bishops of the Roman Curia to accompany the Pope in the final acts of his pontificate, it was moved to St. Peter’s Basilica. Before the ceremony, Cardinal Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone, S.D.B., address a brief greeting to the pontiff, expressing the “emotion and respect not only of the Church, but of the entire world” for Benedict XVI on the news of his decision to renounce the Petrine ministry. Following are ample excerpts from the Holy Father’s homily.

“Today, Ash Wednesday, … we have gathered to celebrate the Eucharist following the ancient Roman tradition of Lenten station Masses. This tradition calls for the first ‘statio’ Mass to take place in the Basilica of Santa Sabina on the Aventine Hill. Circumstances, however, have suggested that we gather in the Vatican Basilica. We are great in number around the tomb of the Apostle Peter, also to ask for his intercession for the Church’s journey in this particular moment, renewing our faith in the Supreme Pastor, Christ the Lord. For me, this is a opportune occasion to thank everyone, especially the faithful of the Diocese of Rome, as I prepare to conclude my Petrine ministry, and to ask for special remembrance in your prayers.”

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CANADA
CBC News

A 76-year-old retired Roman Catholic priest facing charges related to the alleged sexual assault of a boy in the early 1970s has been released on bail after appearing in court Thursday.

Ottawa police arrested Jacques Faucher of Gatineau, Que., on Wednesday and charged him with gross indecency and indecent assault on a male. The incidents are alleged to have occurred in Ottawa between 1971 and 1973.

The complainant was seven years old in 1971, police said.

Faucher was released after posting a $3,000 bail bond. Faucher is not allowed to frequent pools, libraries, parks, schools —and other places where there are children — as one of the conditions of his release.

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ROME
National Catholic Reporter

by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 14, 2013

Rome —
As fate would have it, 82-year-old Cardinal Theodore McCarrick was in Rome on Monday, the day Benedict XVI made his historic abdication announcement, having arrived from a wedding in Malta. He actually planned to attend that morning’s consistory of cardinals, having no idea what was to come, but arrived late enough he didn’t make it.

Obviously, he now wishes there had been an earlier flight.

Despite his age, McCarrick, the former archbishop of Washington, keeps up a hectic travel schedule and has a wide network of friends among senior churchmen on every continent, giving him a firsthand sense of the thinking in various corners of the world. Although he won’t vote in this conclave, he took part in the election of Benedict XVI in 2005, giving him a unique perspective on the differences this time around. He’ll also participate in the daily General Congregation meetings of cardinals before the conclave begins.

In terms of the politics of the American church, McCarrick is sometimes seen as a leader of the more liberal wing of the American bishops, though he generally likes to talk about the importance of the “center.”

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VATICAN CITY
Reuters

By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

VATICAN CITY | Thu Feb 14, 2013

(Reuters) – With passing phrases and striking images, Pope Benedict is assembling a last testament to his Roman Catholic Church, urging its leaders to put aside their rivalries and think only of the unity of the faith.

The message, slipped into statements both before and after his shock resignation announcement on Monday, reads like a veiled rebuke to leading cardinals jockeying for influence in the upcoming conclave and in the papacy that it will produce.

His vague comments could also be hints that it was internal Vatican power struggles, such as those which led to the Vatileaks scandal involving Benedict’s butler last year, that prompted him to take the almost unprecedented step of quitting the leadership of the world’s largest church.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Agency

Vatican City, Feb 14, 2013 / 08:40 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Archbishop Georg Ganswein will move with Pope Benedict XVI when he retires on Feb. 28, but he also intends to retain his role as head of the Papal Household.

“The Pope will be accompanied to Castel Gandolfo and also to the monastery by Archbishop Georg and the Memores Domini, because this is the fundamental nuclear group of the pontifical family.”

“He will also remain the head of the Papal Household. And the future, the future is in God’s hands,” Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi told the press on Feb. 14.

The Memores Domini are four consecrated women in the Communion and Liberation movement who assist in running the Papal Household.

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VATICAN CITY/ROME
Gazzetta del Sud

Rome, February 14 – Italy and the Vatican on Thursday signed an agreement to complete the restoration of a secret walkway used down the years as an escape passage for popes and fictionally employed by the villains and heroes of Dan Brown’s blockbuster Angels and Demons The deal was inked by Cardinal Giuseppe Bertello, head of the Vatican City’s ‘governorate’, and Italian Culture Minister Lorenzo Ornaghi. They said the Vatican Corridor, also known as the Passetto del Borgo, would be “virtually completely open to visitors” after the restoration. The corridor, famous as the avenue of escape for Pope Clement VIII during the 1527 Sack of Rome, has been partially reopened in two stages, first in 1999 and then in 2005. The last restoration made about two-thirds of it visitable. “We expect it to become an even bigger tourist draw when the restoration is over, while the passage will get much-needed structural bolstering,” Bertello and Ornaghi said.

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VATICAN CITY
Gazzetta del Sud

Vatican City, February 14 – Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, Archpriest emeritus of the papal basilica of St Paul’s Outside the Walls in Rome, on Thursday said a “young pope” was needed to steer the Roman Catholic Church through its present difficulties following the shock announcement by Pope Benedict XVI of his resignation earlier this week. “Vigour and youth are needed to tackle the various tasks at hand,” said the prelate who, at 88, is too old to vote in the upcoming conclave to elect a new pope, adding that geographical provenance is not important. “There are certainly many things that need changing, reforming and improving, the unresolved problems undoubtedly concern the need to bring the Church up to date in its inner workings and structures, problems that are related to its need to be better inserted in the present time,” said Cardinal Montezemolo.

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CANADA
CFRA

Sarah Anderson and Alison Sandor
Thursday, February 14, 2013

A retired Roman Catholic priest is scheduled to appear in court Thursday morning on charges of gross indecency dating back to the early 1970’s.

In November, Ottawa police began investigating a series of alleged incidents involving a retired priest and a seven-year-old boy. The incidents allegedly occurred in Ottawa between 1971 and 1973.

Jacques Faucher, 76, who know lived in Gatineau is charged with one count each of gross indecency and indecent assault.

Faucher has a long history in the City of Ottawa and was ordained in 1960, serving in four separate parishes, according to a profile on the archdiocese website.

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CANADA
CBC News

The Archdiocese of Ottawa has suspended a 76-year-old retired Roman Catholic priest facing charges related to the alleged sexual assault of a boy in the early 1970s.

Ottawa police arrested Jacques Faucher of Gatineau, Que., on Wednesday and charged him with gross indecency and indecent assault on a male. The incidents are alleged to have occurred in Ottawa between 1971 and 1973.

The complainant was seven years old in 1971, police said.

Terrance Prendergast, the Archbishop of Ottawa, said in a statement issued Thursday Faucher has been suspended from all ministry and prohibited from representing himself as a Catholic priest.

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CANADA
Edmonton Journal

By Zev Singer and Teresa Smith, Ottawa Citizen February 14, 2013

OTTAWA — The Archbishop of Ottawa has suspended a Catholic priest who was to appear in court Thursday morning on charges of sexually abusing a seven-year-old boy in the 1970s.

The priest, 76-year-old Jacques Faucher of Gatineau, was charged Wednesday with gross indecency and indecent assault on a male for a “series of inappropriate contacts” with the boy that are alleged to have occurred between 1971 and 1973. He was to have a bail hearing Thursday morning.

In a statement released Thursday, Archbishop Terrence Prendergast said: “On learning that Fr. Jacques Faucher has been charged with criminal misconduct in relation to a minor, I want to advise our Catholic faithful, and the wider community, that I have suspended him from all ministry and prohibited him from representing himself as a Catholic priest.”

Police say the investigation, which began in November 2012, is ongoing and detectives are asking anyone with information to come forward.

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CANADA
Edmonton Journal

By Archbishop Terrence Prendergast, The Ottawa Citizen February 14, 2013

The Most Reverend Terrence Prendergast, S.J., Archbishop of Ottawa, on learning that Fr. Jacques Faucher, a retired priest of the Archdiocese of Ottawa, has been charged with criminal misconduct in relation to a minor in the 1970’s, made the following statement:

“On learning that Fr. Jacques Faucher has been charged with criminal misconduct in relation to a minor, I want to advise our Catholic faithful, and the wider community, that I have suspended him from all ministry and prohibited him from representing himself as a Catholic priest.

Our diocese is committed to creating a safe environment in the Church for minors and other vulnerable persons. We are also committed to a process of justice and reconciliation for
the victims of clergy abuse.

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VATICAN CITY
NBC News

By Alastair Jamieson, Staff writer, NBC News

VATICAN CITY — As the Catholic church prepares to choose its second leader in a decade, the world’s eyes are once again focused on the complex and secretive ways of the Vatican.

In mid-March, 117 cardinals will be locked inside its walls until they decide who should next attempt to govern one of humankind’s most enduring, yet bewildering, institutions.

Their new pope must not only provide spiritual leadership to followers in more than 180 countries around the globe, but also reconcile deep divisions within the two-and-a-half square miles of the Vatican itself, on the left bank of Rome’s Tiber river.

In his homily at Mass late Wednesday, Pope Benedict XVI spoke of “sins against the unity of the Church,” hinting at the office politics of an organization worth at least $8 billion but which features a switchboard operated by nuns.

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VATICAN CITY
San Francisco Chronicle

By NICOLE WINFIELD, Associated Press

Updated 7:00 am, Thursday, February 14, 2013

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI’s emotional farewell took an intimate turn Thursday as he held off-the-cuff reminiscences with Roman priests. In the background, questions kept mounting about the true state of Benedict’s health and his influence over the next pontiff.

For a second day, Benedict sent very pointed messages to his successor and to the cardinals who will elect that man about the direction the Catholic Church must take once he is no longer pope. While these remarks have been clearly labeled as Benedict’s swansong before retiring, his influence after retirement remains the subject of intense debate.

Benedict’s resignation Feb. 28 creates an awkward situation — the first in 600 years — in which the Catholic Church will have both a reigning pope and a retired one. The Vatican has insisted that Benedict will cease to be pope at exactly 8 p.m. on the historic day, devoting himself entirely to a life of prayer.

But the Vatican confirmed Thursday that Benedict’s trusted private secretary, the 56-year-old Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, would remain as his secretary and live with Benedict in his retirement home in the Vatican gardens — as well as remain prefect of the new pope’s household.

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UNITED STATES
The Nation

Greg Mitchell on February 12, 2013

When Pope Benedict suddenly announced yesterday that he was stepping down—charmingly, he gave the classic “two weeks notice”—few major media account gave much play, in their accounts, to Benedict’s role the tragic sex abuse scandals that have swept the Catholic Church in recent years, and may have been a factor in his shocking abdication.

Yes, he had been ill, and at age 85, certainly past retirement for most professions—but many previous popes were in the same straits and none have resigned over the past, oh, several centuries.

Just last week, HBO aired the excellent new Alex Gibney documentary Mea Maxima Culpa, which focused on priestly abuse and cover-up at a Wisconsin school for the deaf, but also exposed the former Cardinal Ratzinger as the man in charge of the abuse files for years (and other failures of omission or commission). I joked yesterday that the pope had announced that he was resigning “to spend more time with his family… of priestly abuse documents.”

And Gibney tweeted, “Grim Reminder: LA’s Cardinal Mahony, who did so much to shield sex abusers, is part of conclave to elect new Pope.” (Story here.)

Most major media accounts did mention the sex abuse scandals in passing—how could they not?—but few made any mention that Benedict/Ratzinger may have contributed to them via inaction. The New York Times’s front-page story today, for example, runs for twenty-three paragraphs without mentioning a word of it. The media may not have focused on all this, but advocacy and victims’ organizations did. In Wisconsin, SNAP (Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests) declared that a new pope must do what Benedict did not:

Pope Benedict, who announced today he will resign on February 28, will leave his tenure as Pope without having made the one, simple moral and executive decision that would have, in a single stroke of his pen, protected potentially millions of children from harm, brought justice to hundreds of thousands of victims, and finally turned the church on a path towards true recovery and reform: worldwide zero tolerance of child sex abuse by priests.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

Now is the time for Bishop Robert Finn of the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph to follow his leader and resign, renounce, and depart.

This moment affords him a saving grace.

Out of the ashes of a criminal conviction could be built a measure of redemption.

Out of the failure to protect the child and not the perpetrator could come course correction.

Out of the wandering in a personal desert, out of the stumbling block of the criminal conviction that trips up any reach to teach moral principle, out of the shroud of shrunken authority could come life – and life abundantly.

This moment, this thin space before 8 PM February 28, if seized, can offer resurrection to a diocese, its people, and the office of bishop.

The drama of a papal resignation, the questions that swirl around it, the building chorus of comment, chatter and clatter about who will emerge from a conclave in the white soutane on front façade of St. Peter’s is a tent of cover for a bishop clinging to the old ways.

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CALIFORNIA
Orange County Weekly

By Gustavo Arellano
Thu., Feb. 14 2013

Last month, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles released thousands of pages of documents pertaining to its long, proud history of protecting pedophile priests. Yesterday, Terence McKiernan of BishopAccountability.org, which archives documents pertaining to the Catholic Church’s sex-abuse scandal going back to the 1950s, discovered that LA Archbishop Jose H. Gomez had also sneaked in a list of 49 priests accused of child rape, including 24 previously never publicly acknowledged. Sneaky!

Orange County has been well-documented in this document dump, given parishes here were under the domain of the archdiocese until 1976, so it’s no surprise that an OC priest would be among those listed for the first time.

We’re going to have to hop onto the wayback machine for this one, but the pedo-priest’s name is William Hollinger, and he served at Our Lady of Fatima in San Clemente from 1966 through 1969. You gotta remember that in those days, San Clemente was the end of the Earth in Southern California, and that Hollinger’s assignment report had him bouncing from parish to parish most of his life (including two stints in the Long Beach area), so Hollinger accused mostly likely translates as Hollinger a monster.

BishopAccountability.org has yet to go through the assignments of all these new pedo-priests, so I wouldn’t be surprised if more OCers pop up. “In a letter to Archbishop Gomez, this organization urged him to make public the allegations against the priests and brothers, as well as their career histories,” McKiernan wrote. Such information has been provided by the archdiocese when they released lists of names in the past. We also expressed concern that this list, which has apparently existed since October 2008, has not been made public in a proper way, and that children have been put at risk as a result.”

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

by Sasha Aslanian, Minnesota Public Radio
February 13, 2013

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Childhood victims of sexual abuse would no longer face a time limit to sue their abusers under a proposed bill announced at the Capitol Wednesday.

The Minnesota Child Victims Act would eliminate the requirement that victims file civil suits within six years of becoming an adult. It would not affect the statute of limitations in criminal cases.

Proponents of the Minnesota Child Victims Act say that it can take decades for people who were sexually abused as children to overcome the shame and secrecy surrounding those events to come forward. By then, it’s too late.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

It didn’t take long. Already reportedly some in the Vatican want the Pope to live elsewhere and John Paul II’s former secretary expresses criticism of the resignation decision. Meanwhile, the most many offer is faint praise for Joseph Ratzinger’s writings that evidentally took essential time away from his main duty to manage, for which many knowledgeable observers give him an “F” grade. Have Vatican Cardinals outfoxed the German Shepherd? He cannot “unresign”. Surely the Spirit has a sense of humor! The man responsible for exiling many scholars arbitrarily now has risked arbitrary exile himself.

But at this point does any of this matter to most Catholics worldwide? While it may seem overly pessimistic to say so soon that the next Pope will likely fail too, it is just being realistic; and yet there is also room for much optimism. The papal resignation is tantamount to an admission of failure and will lead to de-mystification of the papacy quickly. Pope Benedict XVI, soon to again be non-Pontiff, Joseph Ratzinger, and his Vatican clique led by Cardinal Sodano et al., have already set the stage for the next failure.

The sudden call for a quick election conclave substantiallly diminishes any chance of a real opposition being mounted by non-Vatican Cardinals. Since the Pope apparently knew for some time he would resign, the suddenness seems well planned. Ratzinger will soon be living a few hundred yards away from the new Pope in his refurbished retirement base, hardly a monastery.

Ratzinger and Sodano already likely know who will be the next Pope and one would be foolish to bet against them. Perhaps Cardinals might save some money by just mailing in blank proxies to Sodano. …

We all have a moral obligation to protect children and signing a petition is a simple, yet potentially effective, way towards meeting that obligation. Please take a minute and sign it at:
[Click here for the petition]

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