ABUSE TRACKER

ITALIA
Rete L’Abuso

Strangolato e riverso a terra in una pozza di sangue. Padre Lanfranco Rossi, 55 anni, teologo e autore di numerose pubblicazioni, è stato ammazzato all’interno della comunità religiosa di San Feliciano “I ricostruttori della preghiera” a Zagarolo.

IL RITROVAMENTO – Il ritrovamento è avvenuto nei giorni scorsi in un bosco. Ora sul caso indagano i carabinieri di Palestrina in collaborazione con i Ris di Roma che hanno disposto gli esami del caso. Per il momento si parla di una lite finita male. Pare esclusa, per ora, la pista della rapina finita male visto le condizioni di povertà in cui viveva il religioso.

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MARYLAND
CBS Baltimore

Christie Ileto

COCKEYSVILLE, Md. (WJZ) — Police call it one of the most serious child pornography cases they have ever seen. A Cockeysville man, who comes in constant contact with children, is found with 250,000 illegal images.

Christie Ileto stays on the investigation.

Police say during interviews, Gibson admitted to downloading and sharing child pornography. Some 250,000 images were found on his computer, and police fear there could be more.

Once a trusted church youth leader, now police say Gregory Gibson is behind one of Baltimore County’s worst child porn cases.

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MARYLAND
WBAL

[with video]

COCKEYSVILLE, Md. —A 63-year-old Cockeysville man who is a youth group leader at a local church has been charged with possession and distribution of hundreds of thousands of pornographic images of extremely young children.

Gregory W. Gibson is being held at the Baltimore County Detention Center on $750,000 bail. He was arrested Thursday at his home.

Detectives in BCoPD’s Crimes Against Children Unit said it is one of the most serious child pornography cases they have ever seen.

“Our detectives say is one of the worst child porn cases they’ve ever seen,” Baltimore County police spokeswoman Elise Armacost said.

Police said so far they have discovered about 250,000 pornographic images of extremely young, prepubescent children — mostly girls — on Gibson’s computers and hard drives.

The images depict child sexual abuse and explicit sex acts and erotica involving children, police said.

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MARYLAND
The Baltimore Sun

By Alison Knezevich
The Baltimore Sun

A youth group leader for the Chinese Christian Church of Baltimore in Parkville has been arrested in what Baltimore County police say is one of the most serious child pornography cases they have ever seen.

Gregory W. Gibson, 63, of Cockeysville was charged Friday with possession and distribution of child pornography. County police said they have seized computers and hard drives containing a “massive” amount of images — about 250,000 so far.

The images depict extremely young children, mostly girls, being sexually abused, police said.

Police said they don’t have evidence that Gibson sexually abused the children or that he knows any of the children depicted in the pornography.

He was arrested Thursday at his home on the 10300 block of Malcolm Circle and is being held at the county detention center on $750,000 bail.

Police said that during interviews with detectives, Gibson admitted to downloading and sharing child pornography.

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NEDERLAND
CIP

[An allegation has been made that the Catholic Church in the Netherlands is ignoring reports of sexual abuse and is transferring erring priests to developing countries.]

PvdA en D66 willen een verklaring van minister van Veiligheid en Justitie Ard van der Steur over de situatie omtrent het misbruik in de katholieke kerk. De katholieke kerk negeert meldingen van seksueel misbruik en verdachte geestelijken worden vaak overgeplaatst naar ontwikkelingslanden. Marith Rebel, PvdA-Kamerlid, wil dat het Meldpunt Seksueel Misbruik RKK niet sluit op 1 mei.

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UNITED STATES
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

April 17, 2015

WASHINGTON—The Catholic Church in the United States spent a total of $150,747,387 in costs related to child protection efforts and to allegations of clergy sexual abuse of minors in dioceses and religious orders between July 2013 and June 2014, according to an annual survey conducted by Georgetown University’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) included in the annual audit report on the response of the Catholic Church in the United States to clergy sexual abuse.

The Church spent a total of $31, 667,740 on safe environment training programs, background checks, and other protective efforts, and $119,029,647 on settlements paid to victims, therapy for victims, attorneys’ fees and other costs related to allegations.

Over 80 percent of credible allegations of abuse reported between July 2013 and June 2014 date back over 25 years, with the majority occurring from the 1960s-80s. According to responses gathered by CARA from all but one of the 195 dioceses and eparchies in the United States, two of the 294 credible allegations of clergy sexual abuse of minors made during this time occurred in 2014. The remaining credible allegations date back as early as the 1920s. According to the audit, all new cases were reported to civil authorities.

Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville, Kentucky, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the report clearly shows the need to remain vigilant in the protection of children.

“Though our promise to protect and heal made in 2002 remains strong, we must not become complacent with what has been accomplished. It is my hope and prayer that as we continue to ful¬fill our promise, the Church will help model ways of addressing and bringing to light the darkness and evil of abuse wherever it exists,” said Archbishop Kurtz.

The full audit report is available online: www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/child-and-youth-protection/index.cfm

The full audit showed that all participating dioceses and eparchies were in compliance with the requirement of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, adopted by the U.S. bishops in 2002, to provide safe environment training to children, priests, deacons, candidates for ordination, educators, employees and volunteers. A total of 4,484,609 children (92 percent) were trained in 2014, along with 99 percent of priests (35,319), deacons (16,089) and educators (160,757) and 98 percent of volunteers (1,931,187) and candidate for ordination (6,503) and 97 percent (250,087) of other employees.

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USA
ORF.at

[The Catholic Church in the United States has paid last within a year about 120 million dollars (nearly 111 million euros) to victims of sexual abuse.]

Die katholische Kirche in den USA hat zuletzt binnen eines Jahres rund 120 Millionen Dollar (fast 111 Mio. Euro) an Opfer sexuellen Missbrauchs ausgezahlt. Die Zahl bezieht sich auf den Zeitraum von Mitte 2013 bis Mitte 2014 und geht aus einem gestern von der Bischofskonferenz des Landes vorgelegten Jahresbericht hervor. Sie umfasst etwa Entschädigungen und Therapiekosten.

Zudem wurden demnach 30 Millionen Dollar für Programme zur Bekämpfung von Pädophilie ausgegeben. Wie in zahlreichen anderen Ländern der Welt hatten auch in den USA Missbrauchsskandale die katholische Kirche schwer erschüttert.

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UNITED STATES
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

MARCH 2015

Report on the Implementation of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People

PROGRESS

In every diocese/eparchy audited, individuals coming forward with allegations are treated with respect
and offered assistance in their healing process.

Those making allegations are not required to sign condentiality agreements. Reports of child sexual abuse are reported to civil authorities and priests who were found to have committed sexual abuse of minors are removed from ministry. Dioceses/eparchies are being open and transparent with the faithful, informing communities affected by abuse.

Adults who work around children are being trained to create safe environments and to be attentive to the behavior of others; this includes clergy, employees, and volunteers—even children are being taught to be aware of signs of grooming and to report it.

NUMBERS

The Secretariat receives two sets of numbers each year. One set is from the auditors. These numbers include all the information from both onsite and data collection audits. The numbers from the audit include all allegations reported from a diocese/eparchy during the audit year, not just the allegations that could be substantiated. For the audit, the following denitions are used:

• Substantiated: enough evidence exists to prove the abuse occurred
• Unsubstantiated: enough evidence exists to prove the abuse did not occur
• Unable to be proven: there is not enough evidence to determine whether or not the abuse occurred (generally used when the cleric is deceased or his status or location is unknown)
• Investigation ongoing: still under investigation
• Other: investigation not yet begun or referred to another diocese/eparchy for investigation

During the 2014 audit year (July 1, 2013–June 30, 2014), 620 survivors of child sexual abuse by clergy came forward to make 657 allegations for the first time: 130 cases were substantiated; 62 were unsubstantiated; 243 were still under investigation; 210 were unable to be proven or disproven; and 12 were of Lincoln declining to participate. There was a 75 percent response rate from religious orders.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Written by
Gregory D. Perez

In the latest incident involving a sexual abuse scandal to hit the Catholic Church in Guam, there seems to be a lack of transparency with the leadership of the Church in accepting its responsibility and role in the incident. Once again, our confidence and trust is being shaken and tested.

Archbishop Apuron is the head of the Catholic Church in Guam. It is under his watch that all these problems are cropping up. It is his responsibility to show leadership and “clean up his house” of all these problems — from the lack of financial transparency to its handling of clergy sex abuse. And in this latter case, a mishandling of it could be financially disastrous to our archdiocese.

In the United States alone, billions of dollars in claims have been paid out over the past 50 years in Boston, Los Angeles, Brooklyn, New Orleans, New York and elsewhere because of their denying, running, hiding, lying, concealing, manipulating, deceiving and pretending that all is well and not to worry. Should we wait until lawsuits are brought against the Archdiocese of Agana before any action is taken to clean house?

In the case of Fr. Luis Camacho, we see absence of proper training by the Redemptoris Mater Seminary, or RMS, of its young men to be ordained as priests and sent out into parishes as pastors. We seriously ask: Are the seminary’s “formators” screening these seminarians for the difficult task of being pastors in our parishes — before they are ordained as priests?

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WEST VIRGINIA
Addicting Info

WENDY GITTLESON APRIL 17, 2015

The Mormon Church, much like the Catholic Church, has been embroiled in sex scandals and the church’s coverup. In West Virginia, a judge presiding over one case ordered that the families of victims pay half the legal costs of the convicted abuser.

21-year-old Christopher Michael Jensen was found guilty in 2013 of one count of first-degree sexual assault and two counts of child abuse. The victims were three and four years old in 2007, when the abuse occurred.

Jensen, who is currently serving up to 75 years in prison, is the son of two local Mormon leaders. Since the trial, 12 children and their families have come forward and filed a lawsuit against Jensen’s parents.

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UNITED STATES
The Republican

At Vatican, Cardinal O’Malley raises issue of bishop accountability in reporting sexual abuse, though Chilean bishop remains

By Anne-Gerard Flynn | aflynn@repub.com
on April 18, 2015

This article is a follow on Clergy sexual abuse survivor Marie Collins heads to Rome in protest over bishop’s appointment before Hartford talk.

Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley of Boston has reportedly made known to Pope Francis, in the guise of bishop accountability, the concerns of members of the Vatican’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors over the pope’s appointment of a Chilean bishop who has been accused of covering up abuse.

Clergy sexual abuse survivor Marie Collins, who will be the keynote speaker at the 2015 National Assembly of the Voice of the Faithful in Hartford on April 18, was one of three members who flew to Rome over the weekend to meet with O’Malley. O’Malley heads the Vatican commission and was in Rome for a meeting of the Council of Cardinals that advises the pope on reforming the Vatican bureaucracy.

According to the Catholic news website CruxNow, O’Malley spoke with both Francis and the council on the accountability of bishops who fail to report sexual abuse.

Francis met with six survivors of church sexual abuse last summer, asking their forgiveness for the actions of pedophile priests, and saying in a homily that “all bishops must carry out their pastoral ministry with the utmost care in order to help foster the protection of minors, and they will be held accountable.”

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ROME
Vatican Radio

Vatican Radio) Pope Francis is scheduled to visit the Pontifical North American College on May 2 to celebrate Mass during a Day of Reflection with the title “Fra Junípero Serra: Apostle of California, and Witness to Sanctity.”

Pope Francis has announced he intends to canonize Blessed Junípero Serra during his visit to the United States in September.

The Pontifical North American College is the national seminary for the United States, and is located on the Janiculum Hill, which overlooks St. Peter’s Basilica.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release April 17, 2015

Statement by Barbara Blaine of Chicago, SNAP President and Founder – bblaine@snapnetwork.org; 312-455-1499 (office), 312-399-4747 (cell)

We extend our heartfelt sympathy to Chicago’s Catholics and everyone grieving the loss of Cardinal George, including the many members and supporters of SNAP who are faithful Catholics who relied on George for guidance and prayer.

[ABC7]

We do not know how many children would not have had their innocence shattered by Fr Dan McCormick – and other predator priests- if George had done the right thing. Their preventable pain and suffering will, no doubt, haunt them for years to come.

We hope the lessons learned will be passed to George’s successors. During these difficult days for Chicagoland parishioners, we hope the faith that sustained George will provide consolation and peace to the Catholic community of Chicago.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune

Cardinal Francis George will be buried in the George family plot at All Saints Cemetery & Mausoleum in suburban Des Plaines, where his parents, Francis J. and Julia R. George, were laid to rest.

His funeral arrangements include a public visitation beginning at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday in Holy Name Cathedral, and a funeral at noon Thursday, which will require a ticket to attend, the archdiocese said.

A modest, light gray gravestone marks the burial site of George’s parents and a third relative. Julia George died in 1983, her husband a year later.

All Saints, which was consecrated in 1923, lies west of the Des Plaines River and is divided by River Road south of Central Road. Cardinal George dedicated the cemetery’s Immaculate Heart of Mary Garden Mausoleum on July 30, 2001.

According to the catholiccemeterieschicago.org, the oldest part of the cemetery, All Saints East, opened in 1923. All Saints West was opened in 1954, and in 1961 it became the site of the first interment chapel building in archdiocesan cemeteries. In July, a 30-foot-tall shrine honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe will be dedicated at the cemetery.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago

Tuesday, April 21

1 p.m. Holy Name Cathedral Doors Open
2 p.m. Rite of Reception (Open to the Public)
2:30 to 6:30 p.m. Visitation (Open to the Public)
7:30 p.m. Prayer Vigil for Priests and Seminarians (Attendance by Ticket Only)
9 to 11 p.m. Visitation (Open to the Public)
11 p.m. Holy Name Cathedral Doors Close

Wednesday, April 22

7 to 9:30 a.m. Visitation (Open to the Public)
10:30 a.m. Interfaith Service (Open to the Public)
11:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Visitation (Open to the Public)
7:30 p.m. Prayer Vigil for Women and Men Religious, Deacons and their Wives (Attendance by Ticket Only)
9 p.m. Wednesday, April 22 until 7:30 a.m. Thursday, April 23

Visitation and All Night Vigil Conducted by Lay Ecclesial Movements
(Open to the Public)

Thursday, April 23

7:30 a.m. Prayer Service (Open to the Public)
8 a.m. Holy Name Cathedral Closed for Funeral Mass Preparation
11 a.m. Holy Name Cathedral Doors Open for Funeral Mass (Attendance by Ticket Only)
12 p.m. Funeral Mass (Attendance by Ticket Only)

Immediately following the Funeral Mass, the Committal Service will take place at All Saints Cemetery in Des Plaines. Per the Cardinal’s wishes, he will be buried in the George family plot. (Open to the Public)

In lieu of flowers, donations to the Cardinal’s favorite charities will be appreciated – Priests Retirement and Mutual Aid Association (PRMAA) or To Teach Who Christ Is, a campaign to support scholarships for students in Catholic Schools.

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CHICAGO (IL)
CBS Chicago

(CBS) – Grief at the passing of Chicago’s Francis Cardinal George should not completely overshadow sex abuse that occurred on his watch as archbishop, a frequent adversary said Friday.

George passed away Friday morning after a long struggle with cancer.

Barbara Blaine, president and founder of SNAP, a survivors network of those abused by priests, said she’s sorry about the physical pain the former archbishop endured.

“We feel sadness, not only for his passing but also for the suffering that we know he endured during these last months. We wouldn’t wish that on anyone,” Blaine said. “We are also concerned and want to offer sympathy to the children who were sexually violated by priests and their family members — the children’s whose innocence was needlessly shattered because of Cardinal George’s recklessness.”

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CHICAGO (IL)
Seattle PI

CHICAGO (AP) — Funeral services for Cardinal Francis George will be held Thursday at Chicago’s Holy Name Cathedral.

George, who retired as Chicago archbishop in the fall of 2014, died Friday after a long battle with cancer.

The Chicago archdiocese announced that the funeral arrangements will include a public visitation that begins Tuesday. Interspersed with visitation will be an invitation-only prayer vigil for priests and seminarians on Tuesday, an interfaith service on Wednesday morning and an invitation-only prayer vigil for women and men religious, deacons and their wives.

The funeral service at noon Thursday will require a ticket to attend.

George will be buried in his family’s plot at All Saints Cemetery & Mausoleum in the Chicago suburb of Des Plaines.

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GEORGIA
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month, a time to recognize how important it is for communities and families to work together to prevent all types of child abuse: neglect, physical abuse, psychological abuse and sexual abuse.

Research conducted by the Centers for Disease Control estimates that one in four girls and one in six boys are sexually abused before the age of 18. Only one in 10 children ever tell anyone, and of those who do, over half, 58 percent, delay disclosure for five years or more.

In fact, according to Angela Williams, a Marietta mother of two, and founder of Voice Today, which advocates for victims of childhood sexual abuse, the median age for a victim to disclose childhood sexual abuse is 40.

And so, Williams, an ordinary east Cobb mom, has been on an extraordinary mission to help bring a voice and justice to victims and survivors who are silenced by a legal system that has imposed arbitrary deadlines of inadequately short civil statutes of limitations.

Currently, a victim of child sexual abuse has only five years after they’ve turned 18 to pursue civil legal remedies for the justice they seek. This means that after age 23, survivors of childhood sexual abuse are victimized again by a system that prohibits them from seeking legal recourse against their abusers, and allows these child sexual predators to live freely among us.

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MICHIGAN
WZZM

MUSKEGON, Mich. (WZZM) — Grown men who say they were abused by a former church volunteer decades ago hoped to publicly confront the man during his sentencing Friday.

Randall Doctor was convicted on drug and gun charges and while the men were not allowed to speak, the abuse he has admitted to was taken into consideration.

“I think we are all just feeling relief,” said Brad White of North Muskegon. Last year, he and seven other men told police Doctor sexually abused them when they were teenagers. “I do not ever want anybody to live what we went through,” he said.

The sex crimes could not be prosecuted because the statute of limitations had expired, but the investigation into the abuse turned up drugs and guns at Doctor’s home.

“For all of those years we lived with thinking we were bad people, that there was something wrong with us,” White explained. “Guys do not talk about this.”

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MARYLAND
Patch

By ELIZABETH JANNEY (Patch Staff)
April 17, 2015

A Cockeysville man who has led youth activities at a church off Cromwell Bridge Road and whose wife runs an unlicensed day care is charged in what Baltimore County police say is “one of the most serious child pornography cases“ its detectives have ever seen.

Gregory W. Gibson, 63, was arrested Thursday at his home in the 10300 block of Malcolm Circle in Cockeysville, the Baltimore County Police Department reported. He is charged with two counts of promoting or distributing child pornography and one count of possession of child pornography, online court records show.

Gibson leads a youth group at the Chinese Christian Church of Baltimore, on Cromwell Bridge Road, with participants ranging from 9 years old through college students, police said.

In addition, his wife has been operating a daycare from their home without a license, according to police, who said Friday that the proper authorities have been notified of the illegal operation.

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OREGON
The Oregonian

By Rick Bella | The Oregonian/OregonLive
on April 17, 2015

The state nearly wrapped up its case Friday against Pastor Mike Sperou, presenting seven women who testified that he sexually abused them when they were young girls growing up in his Happy Valley church.

After a Multnomah County jury hears from two more prosecution witnesses, Sperou and his attorney, Steven J. Sherlag, are expected to start putting on their defense Monday afternoon.

Sperou, who leads the North Clackamas Bible Community, has been charged with three counts of first-degree sexual penetration. If convicted on all counts, he would face a mandatory minimum sentence of eight years, four months in prison.

The Oregonian/OregonLive generally does not disclose the names of possible sexual abuse victims. But the seven women connected with the case have come forward, asking that their stories be told.

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CALIFORNIA
Seasons of Grace

April 17, 2015 by Kathy Schiffer

When Fr. Joseph Illo, the pastor at San Francisco’s Star of the Sea Catholic Church, announced his decision to train only boys to be altar servers, some parishioners and others protested. Amidst the hullabaloo, the media jumped at the chance to criticize both Fr. Illo and his beleaguered bishop, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone. …

Some of the outrage directed toward Fr. Illo and Archbishop Cordileone is a straw man argument, intended to discredit the archbishop for his defense of marriage as between one man and one woman. I reported yesterday about an open letter to Pope Francis, demanding Archbishop Cordileone’s replacement as archbishop.

Here’s the thing: One may argue whether Father Illo’s reasoning is correct. One cannot, however, dispute that he is within his rights as pastor to make that decision for the good of his flock. His archbishop approved his decision. Cardinal Burke has expressed the same concern–that the feminization of the Church has been harmful to efforts to attract young men to the priesthood.

But while the San Francisco Chronicle may believe that the 100 signatories on the open letter represent the Catholic population in the city by the Bay, I do not.

And next weekend, we’ll see who’s right. The OTHER Catholics in the San Francisco area–those who are faithful to the Magisterial teaching of the Church–have organized a Mass Mob at Star of the Sea, Fr. Illo’s parish. They are inviting area Catholics to attend the 4:30 p.m. Vigil Mass on Saturday, April 25, and to sign a Spiritual Bouquet, offering prayers for Fathers Illo and Driscoll. The Spiritual Bouquet will be presented after Mass on that day.

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CHICAGO (IL)
The New York Times

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
APRIL 17, 2015

Cardinal Francis E. George, who was the Roman Catholic archbishop of Chicago for 17 years and helped shape the American Catholic bishops’ response to the child sexual abuse scandal and their resistance to the Obama health plan’s contraception coverage, died on Friday at his residence in Chicago. He was 78.

The cause was cancer, the archdiocese said. Discovered in 2006, the cancer originated in his bladder and spread. But Cardinal George continued to work until November, when he stepped down. In December he announced that experimental treatments he had received had failed.

A quiet, cerebral man, Cardinal George was appointed to lead the Chicago archdiocese by Pope John Paul II. He was the first Chicago native to hold the seat.

It was his prominent role in responding to the sexual abuse scandal in 2002 that first made Cardinal George a national figure. Although it would be five years before he was named president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, he helped persuade his brother bishops to adopt a “zero tolerance” policy, barring priests who had been credibly accused of abuse from serving in ministry.

He was credited with then shepherding the policy change through an initially resistant Vatican.

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SCOTLAND
Daily Record

By Sally Hind

DONALD MacNeil walked free from court last year after lawyers said he was too sick to stand trial on sex abuse allegations dating back 40 years – but alleged victims had hoped proceedings might be re-raised.

THE dad of a sex-shame priest has died before facing trial over the alleged abuse of 13 girls.

Cancer-hit Donald MacNeil, 82, walked free from court last year after lawyers said he was too sick to stand trial on allegations dating back 40 years.

Proceedings could have been re-raised against the alleged child rapist at any time but he died in hospital on Wednesday.

Yesterday, a woman who says she was abused by MacNeil from the age of nine said she was devastated she and other women will “never get justice”.

Another of MacNeil’s alleged victims is understood to have confronted the OAP on his deathbed hours before he died.

MacNeil’s son Roddy was dubbed Father Flash after fathering a child with his married cousin and bedding another lover half his age.

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WASHINGTON
KREM

SPOKANE, Wash. – The man known as Father Joe is back at being a priest in the Catholic Diocese of Spokane.

Spokane’s acting Head of the Diocese said Father Joe Weitensteiner is being reinstated in the church.

Father Joe was the former Director of Morning Star Boys Ranch. He was previously suspended and accused several times of sexually abusing young boys.

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CHICAGO (IL)
ABC 7

By Chuck Goudie

CHICAGO (WLS) — Cardinal George has a long legacy in the Chicago area.

But as with anyone in a high profile position, the legacy question depends on who you ask.

By virtue of the very issues that Cardinal George focused on, he put himself in the eye of controversy, primarily with gay rights and abortion.

And then there was the issue that dogs Catholic bishops everywhere: sexual abuse by priests. In many cities, Chicago included, how bishops respond to those cases defines a bishop’s legacy.

When Cardinal George struggled into his last Mass as Chicago archbishop, his illness and the years of juggling church conflicts were apparent.

When he was appointed by Pope John Paul II nearly 18 years ago, the church sex abuse scandal was already in full bloom.

Cardinal George vowed transparency in the Chicago Archdiocese and zero tolerance for priest offenders.

Now his sharpest critics look back, including Barbara Blaine from the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP).

“I think it’s very important that we recognize that Cardinal George’s legacy was one of commitments to protecting children and then failing to protect the children, and he admitted that he failed and yet it didn’t seem to us that he was learning from the mistakes he made,” Blaine said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Morning Bulletin

Austin King | 18th Apr 2015

WHEN pedophile priest Father Reginald Durham was charged with sexually abusing children, his leader Bishop Brian Heenan wrote him a glowing character reference.

The former Catholic Bishop of Rockhampton (Fr Heenan) believed it was his role at the time to support his priest, knowing full-well there were child sex abuse allegations against Fr Durham.

In yesterday’s Royal Commission hearing into child sexual abuse at Neerkol Orphanage, it emerged that Fr Heenan wrote the letter of reference to support his priest’s “good” side.

The commission heard Fr Heenan was trying to weigh-up the “incredible amount of good he (Fr Durham) has done against the failings that have also been part of his life”.

In his reference letter, he wrote: “Fr Durham has had a unique life as a citizen of this district, priest to many parish communities, chaplain to service personnel and inspiring friend to young and old alike.”

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Michael Sean Winters | Apr. 17, 2015 Distinctly Catholic

“Pride of being first leads you to want to kill others; humility, even humiliation, leads you to become like Jesus. And this is one thing that we don’t think. In this moment in which so many of our brothers and sisters are being martyred for the sake of Jesus’ Name, they are in this state, they have, in this moment, the joy of having suffered dishonour, and even death, for the Name of Jesus. To fly from the pride of being first, there is only the path of opening the heart to humility, to humility that never arrives without humiliation. This is one thing that is not naturally understood. It is a grace we must ask for.”
Pope Francis spoke those words this morning, and they give every journalist pause. “Pride of being first” is part of our DNA. It is our job to break news. But, the verb “break” has a double meaning, and when that news can “break” the unity of the Church, how do the obligations we have as Christians reconcile themselves with the obligations we have as journalists?

Here at NCR, there is nothing theoretical about such questions. We were pilloried for breaking stories about the sexual abuse of children by members of the clergy. People said we were assaulting the Church’s hierarchy, violating the Christian call to unity, airing our Catholic family’s dirty laundry. All those charges were true – and thanks be to God, Tom Fox and others had the courage to run those stories anyway. Can anyone doubt that the cover-up of the sex abuse would have continued had we not shown the light of day, which is often the light of justice, on the situation?

Yesterday I wrote about the mess in San Francisco. It is hard not to lay the divisiveness in that archdiocese at the feet of Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone. This open fighting on the pages of the San Francisco Chronicle and Twitter did not occur during the tenures of the previous archbishops, one of whom, now-Cardinal William Levada. is not anyone’s idea of a doctrinal patsy. A bishop has a special responsibility to build up the unity of the flock, and in this case, it appears that Archbishop Cordileone has placed other objectives first. In the case of NCR and reporting on clergy sex abuse, the demands of truth and justice trumped the potential harm to unity. I do not perceive in +Cordileone’s statements anything that warrants inviting the kind of divisiveness his leadership has occasioned. The polarization that now characterizes the Church in San Francisco is a thing to be regretted, and it is far from clear how it will be healed. Having the chancery denounce concerned Catholics is hardly the solution.

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UNITED STATES
Religion News Service – Spiritual Politics

Mark Silk | Apr 17, 2015 |

“Yes, it looks like they backed down,” said a learned nun I know. “But some of us had better not be caught saying so!” So much for the huffing and puffing the Vatican has directed at her and her sisters over the past few years.

In December, an “apostolic visitation” of 350 communities of religious women, undertaken amid charges that they were beset by secularism and feminism, ended with a buss on the cheek for a job well done. And yesterday, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) gave its approval to an anodyne “Joint Final Report on the Doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religion (LCWR).

The LCWR, the nuns’ main umbrella body, had come under repeated attack for embracing ideas at odds with fundamentals of the faith. After the roll-out of the “Joint Final Report,” a four-woman delegation from the LCWR spent fifty minutes chatting with Pope Francis.

Over at the Boston Globe‘s Crux, John Allen characteristically minimized the widespread sense that all this was a big deal. “Both the more sweeping investigation of women’s orders and the LCWR investigation were orphans almost as soon as they were born,” he wrote. They’d been pushed “by a handful of well-placed American cardinals in Rome coming to the end of their careers” who “persuaded friends in the right Vatican departments to set the wheels in motion.”

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CHICAGO (IL)
San Francisco Chronicle

CHICAGO (AP) — Cardinal Francis George is being remembered for his role in the clergy sex abuse scandal among other parts of his legacy.

George died Friday at the age of 78 after a long battle with cancer.

Archbishop Blase Cupich praised him for leading a group of U.S. bishops to urge the Vatican to move more quickly to oust guilty priests. The policy was at the core of church reforms on the issue.

But George came under harsh criticism for allowing a local priest to remain in a parish for months despite allegations that he’d molested children. The priest ultimately pleaded guilty and George apologized.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests on Friday said that George could have prevented some of the abuse had he ‘done the right thing.”

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CALIFORNIA
SFGate

By Lois Kazakoff on April 17, 2015

With the publication of a full-page ad in The Chronicle, 100 prominent Roman Catholics launched a full-on campaign to have Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone removed from the San Francisco Archdiocese. The archbishop’s two-year tenure has been rocky from the start but became more turbulent when the archbishop insisted teachers at parochial schools in the archdiocese sign a morality clause that characterizes sex outside marriage and homosexual relations as “gravely evil.”

The request to Pope Francis for a new church leader in San Francisco is unprecedented.

A church leader out of step with the congregation he leads or a pastoral shepherd working to uphold the traditional values of the Catholic faith? What do you think? Weigh in by taking our weekly poll.

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CALIFORNIA
Catholic League

Bill Donohue comments on the latest attacks on San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone:

A motley group of malcontents, dissidents, and outsiders are waging war on Archbishop Cordileone.

Their latest salvo was an ad in yesterday’s San Francisco Chronicle asking the pope to remove the archbishop. They opened fire on him precisely because they were blown off by Vatican officials in their feeble attempt to censure the archbishop.

Those who think that Archbishop Cordileone’s supporters are going to take this lying down are sadly mistaken. Watch what happens next week.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

Discussions That Should Be Placed Side by Side: Abuse Survivors Want Juan Barros Removed as Bishop of Osorno, San Francisco Catholics Want Salvatore Cordileone Removed as Archbishop of San Francisco

William D. Lindsey

Two items I’ve read this morning strike me as a revealing synchronistic fit for one another. The first is Kristine Ward’s editorial in today’s edition of NSAC (National Survivor Advocates Coalition) News.*Kristi is commenting on the recent meeting of Marie Collins, Peter Saunders, and other members of the pope’s abuse advisory commission with Cardinal Sean O’Malley, the pope’s “fixer.” She notes that NSAC members “are appalled that they [the lay members of the abuse advisory commission] are the people who had to initiate the action to speak with the commission chair, Cardinal Sean O’Malley and through him seek to get the attention of Pope Francis.”

The members of the abuse advisory commission wanted to discuss with Pope Francis, of course, his choice to make Juan Barros (and here, here, and here), who has been accused of helping shield a fellow priest abusing minors, in bishop of Osorno, Chile. As Kristi’s editorial notes, it’s obvious that, despite widespread outrage at this appointment both in the diocese itself and in many quarters of the Catholic church, notably among survivors, “it borders on the near impossible that Bishop Barros’ appointment will be rescinded.”

This is true in part, she suggests, because the involvement of the influential and powerful Cardinal Angelo Sodano in the story of Barros’s appointment cannot be discounted. As she points out, Cardinal O’Malley knows this perfectly well.

And so enter O’Malley “the fixer,” through whom members of the papal abuse advisory commission have had to go to approach the pope himself: the NSAC News editorial sums O’Malley and his role vis-a-vis the abuse commission members’ concerns in the following way:

He has finely honed the skill of the appearance of action and empathy.

If you enjoy theater, Cardinal O’Malley’s performance that builds yet another protective tent for hierarchs while continuing to disguise him as a champion of reform is stellar.

Kristi explains what she means with these remarks suggesting that O’Malley has been disguised in a theatrical way as the champion of reform while he’s actually helping to build a protective tent for hierarchs, by noting that the outcome of O’Malley’s meeting with Pope Francis to relay to him the concerns of abuse survivors about Barros’s appointment was the following: Vatican press spokesman Father Federico Lombardi then announced that a “precise and reliable legal text” will be assessed, detailing the duties and responsibilities of bishops and religious superiors vis-a-vis priests abusing minors— something that, as she notes, O’Malley had already discussed at a recent meeting of the pope’s kitchen cabinet, the Council of Nine.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Sun-Times

The day after Cardinal Francis George stepped down as leader of Chicago’s 2.3 million Catholics was a Sunday and Eleanor Franczak, a parishioner at St. Michael’s Church in Orland Park, summed the cardinal’s tenure this way: “He was one of us. He wasn’t any better or worse, just a normal person.”

It was an assessment that Cardinal George, who died Friday morning at home after a nine-year struggle with cancer, would have wholeheartedly endorsed. When he learned that Pope John Paul II had named him as the successor to Chicago’s popular Cardinal Bernardin, the unassuming priest asked in surprise, “Are you sure the Holy Father has considered all the options?”

But that modesty concealed a man who was an accomplished scholar, a skilled writer, and an unyielding defender of the faith. …

George presided over the archdiocese during a difficult period for the church, marked by church closings and the never-ending sex abuse scandal, leading with dignity and efficiency and an emphasis on core Catholic values.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Dan StockmanDawn Cherie Araujo

Catholic women religious and observers reacted with notable – but muted – relief to Thursday’s news that Vatican oversight of their largest leadership group had ended two years earlier than expected.

The Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has accepted a final report of the doctrinal assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), officials said, ending the controversial investigation of the group that represents 80 percent of the roughly 50,000 women religious in the United States.

The Vatican congregation asked its own officials and LCWR not to speak to the media on the topic for 30 days, leaving much of the response to outside observers.

Former LCWR president Benedictine Sr. Joan Chittister was one of the few who would speak on the record. She called the agreement very civil.

“The document on the LCWR seems to me to be pretty even-handed. It’s not attacking anybody. It’s not contentious, and it’s civil,” said Chittister, who is a best-selling author and well-known international lecturer on topics of justice, peace, human rights, women’s issues and contemporary spirituality in the church and in society. (She is also a contributor to National Catholic Reporter and GSR.)

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CHICAGO (IL)
CBS Chicago

CHICAGO (CBS) — After fighting a long battle with cancer, Francis Cardinal George has died, multiple sources reported on Friday afternoon.

Archbishop Blase Cupich, George’s successor, confirmed the cardinal died at 10:45 a.m. Friday at his official residence.

“A man of peace, tenacity and courage has been called home to the Lord,” Cupich said Friday afternoon.

George had battled three bouts with cancer, his most recent diagnosis coming last year.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago

[Espanol]

[Polski]

[biography]

[videos]

A man of peace, tenacity and courage has been called home to the Lord. Our beloved Cardinal George passed away today at 10:45 a.m. at the Residence.

Cardinal George’s life’s journey began and ended in Chicago. He was a man of great courage who overcame many obstacles to become a priest. When he joined the priesthood he did not seek a comfortable position, instead he joined a missionary order, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, and served the people of God in challenging circumstances – in Africa, Asia and all around the world.

A proud Chicagoan, he became a leader of his order and again traveled far from home, not letting his physical limitations moderate his zeal for bringing the promise of Christ’s love where it was needed most. When he was ordained a bishop, he served faithfully, first in Yakima, where he learned Spanish to be closer to his people. He then served in Portland, where he asked the people to continue to teach him how to be a good bishop. In return, he promised to help them become good missionaries.

Cardinal George was a respected leader among the bishops of the United States. When, for example, the church struggled with the grave sin of clerical sexual abuse, he stood strong among his fellow bishops and insisted that zero tolerance was the only course consistent with our beliefs

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CHICAGO (IL)
National Catholic Reporter

Catholic News Service | Apr. 17, 2015

CHICAGO Cardinal Francis E. George, the retired archbishop of Chicago who was the first native Chicagoan to head the archdiocese, died Friday at his residence after nearly 10 years battling cancer. He was 78.

His successor in Chicago, Archbishop Blase Cupich, called George “a man of peace, tenacity and courage” in a statement he read at a news conference held outside Holy Name Cathedral to announce the death.

Cupich singled out George for overcoming many obstacles to become a priest and “not letting his physical limitations moderate his zeal for bringing the promise of Christ’s love where it was needed most.”

A childhood bout with polio had left the prelate with a weakened leg and a pronounced limp throughout his life. …

Cupich in his statement also noted that when the U.S. church “struggled with the grave sin of clerical sexual abuse, [George] stood strong among his fellow bishops and insisted that zero tolerance was the only course consistent with our beliefs.”

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune

By Manya Brachear Pashman
Chicago Tribune

Cardinal Francis George, the first Chicago native to serve as the local archbishop and a man who during that 17-year tenure became the intellectual leader of the American church, died Friday morning at his home after a years long struggle with cancer. He was 78.

“A man of peace, tenacity and courage has been called home to the Lord,” George’s successor, Archbishop Blase Cupich, said during a brief announcement Friday afternoon.

He said George died at 10:45 a.m. at his home.

Cupich remembered George as “always choosing the church over his own comfort, and the people over his own needs. …

He also became a point person between the U.S. and the Vatican on the abuse scandal and matters such as liturgy of the Mass, playing a key role in revisions that brought the English translation closer to the original Latin.

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CHICAGO (IL)
WLS

CHICAGO (WLS) — Francis Eugene Cardinal George, Archbishop Emeritus of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, died at his residence at 10:45 a.m. Friday after a long battle with cancer. He was 78.

“A man of peace, tenacity, and courage has been called home,” said Archbishop Blase Cupich at Holy Name Cathedral in the Gold Coast Friday afternoon. “Let us heed his example and be a little more brave, a little more steadfast and a lot more loving. This is the surest way to honor his life and celebrate his return to the presence of God.”

Priests were first informed of his death by the Chicago Archdiocese.

“Today we mourn the loss of an incredible leader, guiding spirit and loyal friend. Cardinal George had compassion for all,” Monsignor Boland, Catholic Charities CEO, said in a statement. “You saw this compassion in his eyes as he visited with the poor and most vulnerable in our communities.” …

Yet, even as his successor was taking the helm of the Chicago Archdiocese, Archbishop Blase Cupich made sure the Cardinal Received credit for laying the foundation against clerical sexual abuse.

“We would not have had zero tolerance when it comes to child protection, if it were not for this man here,” said Archbishop Cupich at his appointment announcement, referring to Cardinal George. “He was the one who made it happen,” he continued.

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CHICAGO (IL)
WBEZ

April 17, 2015
By: Lynette Kalsnes

Chicago’s Cardinal Francis George, who stepped down from his post last year to fight cancer for the third time, died on Friday. He was 78.

George was the leader of 2.2 million Roman Catholics in Lake and Cook Counties for more than 17 years. He retired in November 2014 due to his health.

When asked at the time about his legacy, George told WBEZ:

“I just hope people remember I tried to be a good bishop. It is administrative. You have to take care of the institutions that protect the mission. What I discover now in many letters is truly touching because people write and tell me, ‘You don’t remember me, but 10 years ago or five years ago, I was transformed (or helped anyway spiritually) by something you said or you did.’ And when I hear that, I realize the Holy Spirit is making use of me to make his people holy. And that’s all the legacy I want. It’s an unknown legacy. It has to be because it’s invisible. But if you touch people, your work lasts forever.”

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CHICAGO (IL)
WHTC

By Mary Wisniewski

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Cardinal Francis George, Archbishop of Chicago from 1997 until 2014, has died at the age of 78 after a long battle with cancer, the Chicago Tribune and other media reported on Friday.

Known for his intellectualism and strong defense of church dogma – including sometimes controversial statements against gay marriage – George halted his treatment for bladder cancer early in 2015 and was hospitalized for tests in March.

Pope Francis accepted his resignation in September 2014 and appointed then-Bishop Blase J. Cupich of Spokane, Washington, to succeed him as head of the nation’s third-largest archdiocese.

The Archdiocese of Chicago did not immediately confirm the reports that Cardinal George had died, but Archbishop Cupich was scheduled to give a news conference at 2 p.m. (3 p.m. EDT).

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CHICAGO (IL)
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Associate editor April 17, 2015

During an era under Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI, when Catholicism was trying to swim against an increasingly secular tide in the Western world, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago was the American prelate trusted by those two popes, almost above all others, to spearhead that project in the United States.

George, who stepped down in November 2014, died at 10:45 a.m. Friday at his residence in Chicago of a cancer that originated in his bladder but spread to other parts of his body, rendering treatment ineffective. He was 78.

He had been on home care since April 3 after being hospitalized for hydration and pain management issues, according to the Chicago Tribune.

Widely acknowledged as the most intellectually gifted senior US prelate of his generation, George was once dubbed the “American Ratzinger.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier-Mail

MICHAEL MADIGAN THE COURIER-MAIL APRIL 18, 2015

IT WAS Sister Emile who would clean him up and ensure he had a nappy for the bleeding after he would return, yet again, from being raped by the priest after the evening Mass.

The spirit of Sister Emile, whoever she was, flared briefly this week in the Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse at Rockhampton.

It was the one point of light amid the medieval darkness that appears to have enveloped St Joseph’s Orphanage at Neerkol for much of the 20th century.

“Sister Regis” and “Sister Marcia’’ were given credence for being “nice’’ to children who were allegedly routinely slapped, flogged, starved, sodomised and ridiculed by nuns who would place dunce caps on their heads in this Christian refuge for orphans west of Rockhampton, now looming in the public mind as a charnel house of depravity.

But it was Sister Emile alone who honoured her vows of service to the poor and vulnerable, even if she wasn’t brave enough to stick her neck out and end the serial rape of young David Owen.

Millions of women have taken those solemn vows since Catherine McAuley, still on the Vatican’s slow track to sainthood, established the holy order of the Sisters of Mercy in Dublin in 1831.

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WASHINGTON
The Spokesman-Review

John Stucke The Spokesman-Review

The Rev. Joseph Weitensteiner, the former director of the Morning Star Boys Ranch, has been reinstated into the active Catholic ministry after sex abuse claims against him were denied by a retired federal judge hired to rule on the credibility of the cases.

Referred to as Father Joe by a Catholic community that admired his decades-long service to troubled boys, the allegations against him were shocking. However, Weitensteiner never wavered in his insistence that while he may have been a tough disciplinarian, he never molested boys entrusted to his care.

As the number of people who said they were abused by Weitensteiner or his staff at the boys ranch grew, former Spokane Bishop William Skylstad removed him from ministry in 2006.

The Morning Star allegations were made in lawsuits that paralleled the bankruptcy of the Spokane Catholic Diocese. The Diocese case included more than two dozen clergy, 180 potential victims and ultimately cost more than $50 million to resolve.

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INDIA
Kaumudi

KOCHI: Kerala High Court has sought the stand of the government on the anticipatory bail submitted by Fr Edwin Figarez in connection with a case in which a 16-year-old girl was sexually abused by the church priest.

The complaint regarding the incident was lodged on April 1 by the mother of the ninth standard student. The complaint was filed against Lourde Matha Latin Catholics priest under Kottapuram Catholics church. After the complaint was lodged, the priest had gone into hiding and he later moved a plea for anticipatory bail even as the probe was going on against him.

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UNITED STATES
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

Editorial

The National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) applauds the efforts of the two survivors on the papal commission regarding sexual abuse, Marie Collins of Ireland and Peter Saunders of the United Kingdom along with the two other commission members who supported their efforts to raise the issue at the Vatican of the unacceptability — to put it mildly — of Bishop Barros’ appointment and installation as the head of the Diocese of Osorno, Chile.

Survivors in Chile accuse Bishop Juan de la Cruz Barros Madrid of covering up for the Rev. Fernando Karadima whom the Vatican convicted of abuse in 20011. Three Chilean survivors accuse Barros of witnessing their abuse by Karadima

While we applaud the actions of the commission members, we are appalled that they are the people who had to initiate the action to speak with the commission chair, Cardinal Sean O’Malley and through him seek to get the attention of Pope Francis.

Cardinal O’Malley, who not only is president of the papal sexual abuse comission but is a member of the Pope’s kitchen cabinet, formally known as the Council of Nine, gets a newspaper and has access to radio, television, and Internet – and as a blogging Cardinal he certainly knows how to use the technology of communications.

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CANADA
Mississauga News

By Roger Belgrave
PEEL— A U.S.-based advocacy group for survivors of abuse has blasted Peel’s Catholic school board for its limited disclosure or outright silence when staff members are facing allegations of criminal wrongdoing, such as child sexual abuse.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) is calling on Toronto Cardinal Thomas Collins to discipline top administrators at the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board for the ongoing practice.

This condemnation and demand for public admonishment from south of the border comes after it was learned local school board officials kept quiet about the sexual abuse allegations recently lodged against a priest who had worked in administrative offices and schools since 2008.

Accusations against Father James Roth surfaced last January when the victim reported the allegations.

Roth, who worked as a priest-in-residence with the board, was a member of the Oblates of St. Francis De Sales order based in Ohio. He was on assignment with the Archdiocese of Toronto and worked with the local school board as well as parishes in Mississauga.

The 61-year-old was removed from ministry after the allegations were reported to the Oblates and he was recalled to the U.S.

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WEST VIRGINIA
The Raw Story

West Virginia judge orders victims to pay half of sex abuser’s legal fees in Mormon Church cover-up suit

TRAVIS GETTYS
17 APR 2015

West Virginia judge ordered sex abuse victims to pay half the attorney costs for the Mormon Church in a civil suit alleging that church officials covered up previous claims against their abuser.

Naturally, the victims and their families don’t wish to help the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints defend itself against their claims – so they have asked an appeals court to vacate the Berkeley County Circuit Court judge’s order, reported The Journal-News.

Christopher Michael Jensen, of Martinsburg, was convicted in February 2013 of one count of first-degree sexual assault and two counts of sexual abuse by a custodian, and he was sentenced to up to 75 years in prison.

The 23-year-old Jensen, who is the son of two local Mormon leaders, sexually abused two boys who were ages 3 and 4 at the time while babysitting them in 2007.

Twelve children and their families filed a lawsuit in October 2013 against the church and several local officials, including Jensen’s parents – a high priest and relief society president.

The suit claims church leaders continued to recommend Jensen as a babysitter despite the sex abuse claims lodged against him dating back to 2007.

The victims also claim church leaders tried to silence them and witnesses and failed to report the claims against Jensen to authorities, as required by law.

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UNITED STATES
Religion News Service – Rhymes with Religion

Boz Tchividjian | Apr 17, 2015

A couple of years ago, I had the distinct honor of meeting an individual who has literally committed his life to serving the abused and exposing the abusers. David Clohessy is the executive director of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) and has been an influential force in confronting the horrors of child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church and other faith communities. He recently contacted me about a very disturbing situation coming out of a civil lawsuit in West Virginia involving a convicted sex offender. We all need to take a minute to become informed about this disturbing case so that we can use our collective voices to bring an end to such judicial decisions that further traumatize victims. – Boz
_____________________________________________________________________________

Imagine a courthouse with two exits. One is used by 95% of those who leave the building. The other is reserved for those who say they were sexually violated as children and have filed civil lawsuits.

At the abuse victims’ exit, cashiers collect funds for two court-appointed lawyers, one who decide disputes about discovery, and the other who represents the convicted child molester. Victims must pay half of the fees for both lawyers.

That’s no misprint. That’s no exaggeration.

In one child sexual abuse cover up case in West Virginia, this bizarre, hurtful and blatantly unfair situation is already happening. And it could spread across the state unless a West Virginia appeals court judge sides with vulnerable kids and wounded adults. He will have a chance to do so on April 22nd in Charleston, West Virginia.

Please notice that I’m not using words like “accused” and “accusers.” That’s because the child molester in this case, Christopher Michael Jensen, has been convicted and was sentenced in 2013 to up to 75 years in prison for sexually violating two boys -ages three and four.

That same year, families of 12 children who reported being abused by Jensen filed a civil suit against the Mormon church. It accuses Mormon officials of “sending emissaries from Salt Lake City to West Virginia to instruct witnesses not to talk with attorneys representing the children suing the church”. The suit also alleges these same church officials of trying “to intimidate the families (by) directing fellow church members to try to convince them to abandon their claims ‘lest they run afoul of church teachings regarding forgiveness,’” according to a newspaper story and the suit.

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ARGENTINA
Tucuman Noticias

El Arzobispado de Mendoza deberá indemnizar a un joven quiso sumarse a la vida sacerdotal y que, en pleno cursado del seminario, fue abusado por un sacerdote en San Martín. Así lo definió la Suprema Corte de Justicia de Mendoza al convalidar en un fallo lo decidido el año pasado en la Cámara de Apelaciones, y rechazar un recurso de Casación presentado por la jerarquía católica.

Iván González fue abusado por el sacerdote Jorge Luis Morello en 2001 tras una convivencia formativa que se había iniciado en 1998. No quiso que interviniera la justicia penal. Por ello, sólo lo denunció ante las autoridades de la Iglesia. Pero en lugar de actuar en defensa de la víctima en forma inmediata, se esgrimió el Derecho canónico y se actuó en base a sus procedimientos.

González, “que al momento de ser abusado tenía 19 años y era, por lo tanto, menor de edad” (se consideraba menor de edad a quienes tenían menos de 21 años), fue acompañado por el abogado Carlos Lombardi quien reclamó la inconstitucionalidad del abordaje mediante los códigos internos de la Iglesia. Buscó ayuda en el Arzobispado y buscó interiorizarse del avance de las investigaciones, pero ésta fue mantenida en estricto secreto y no se le otorgó una respuesta, a pesar de haber sido la víctima de un sacerdote. La defensa de González reclamó informes a las autoridades religiosas y lo rechazó sin fundamentos. Fue cuando el abogado de la Iglesia, Luis Horacio Cuervo, presentó una carilla en la que negó que su defendido tenga responsabilidad en el hecho denunciado, negó la existencia de abuso sexual y el daño, y también que la justicia pueda inferir en los procedimientos internos de la Iglesia Católica.

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ARGENTINA
El Sol

[Condemn the Church to silence on a complaint of sexual abuse. The Supreme Court ordered the Archbishop to pay 30,000 pesos for not providing information to a young woman who accused a priest for having humiliated for 4 years.]

Tras varias idas, vueltas y reveses en la Justicia local, el Arzobispado de Mendoza deberá indemnizar a un joven que aseguró haber sido abusado sexualmente por un sacerdote. Si bien en el expediente civil que llegó hasta la Suprema Corte de Justicia no se pudo determinar si se cometieron las vejaciones, si se condenó a la institución religiosa por no investigar los hechos.

Iván Rubén González denunció que durante 1998 y 2001 fue abusado sexualmente en reiteradas ocasiones por el clérigo Jorge Luis Morello en una parroquia ubicada en San Martín. En marzo del último año, presentó un escrito al arzobispo para que inicie una investigación interna y se apliquen las normas “eclesiásticas y canónicas”.

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AUSTRALIA
Perth Now

MICHAEL MADIGAN THE COURIER-MAIL APRIL 17, 2015

A RETIRED senior Queensland cleric has admitted the Catholic Church failed victims of sexual abuse in the Rockhampton diocese.

Bishop Brian Heenan made significant admissions during a day on the witness stand at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse in Rockhampton.

Bishop Heenan, in charge of the diocese during the ’90s as the scandal erupted, admitted he put the Catholic Church’s reputation before his duty to listen to victims — including those abused at the notorious Neerkol orphanage.

He admitted to Counsel Assisting Sophie David, SC, that he allowed pedophile priest Reg Durham to continue working with children when he knew he had sexually abused a child.

Bishop Heenan also accepted a proposition at the core of the Commission’s terms of reference: that the Church failed to respond adequately to abuse charges.

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AUSTRALIA
The Canberra Times

April 17, 2015

David Ellery
Reporter for The Canberra Times.

Canberra’s Marist Brothers community is to be disbanded by the middle of the year following the deaths of two members in the past 18 months and the appointment of a third to head a new community in Western Sydney.

Marist Brothers have lived and worked in the ACT since the late 1960s when Marist College Canberra was established.

A spokesman for the order said the decision to close the community would not affect the running of the college which now operates with lay teachers and a lay principal.

“The Marist Brothers stress this decision (to close the community and relocate the remaining brothers) is entirely unrelated to the sad events that were the subject of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse),” the spokesman said.

“This brings to an end nearly half a century of the brothers’ presence in Canberra.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Zeit

[Many priests are dissatisfied with celibacy. Depressing result for the Catholic Church: An in-house study shows that many priests would not opt ​​again for a life without a partner.]

Deutsche Priester sind nach einer neuen Studie mit dem ihnen auferlegten Zölibat unzufrieden. Ein Drittel der Priester gab an, dass sich der Zölibat belastend auf ihren Dienst auswirkt. Ein Viertel würde sich, wäre ein Neustart möglich, nicht noch einmal für ein zölibatäres Leben entscheiden. Ein weiteres Viertel ist unentschlossen.

Dies ergab eine innerkirchliche Untersuchung der Wissenschaftler-Gruppe unter Leitung des Jesuiten Eckhard Frick. Die Studie basiert auf den Antworten von 8.600 Seelsorgern, 4.200 von ihnen arbeiteten als Priester. Als besonders belastend empfindet die Mehrheit der männlichen Geistlichen demnach den Verzicht auf Sexualität, Intimität und eigene Kinder.

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VATIKAN
Katholisch

Missbrauch | 16.04.2015 – Vatikanstadt

Der Bostoner Kardinal Sean Patrick O’Malley drängt darauf, Bischöfe stärker zur Verantwortung zu ziehen, die die Aufarbeitung des sexuellen Missbrauchs in der katholischen Kirche blockieren. Wie der britische “Catholic Herold” und das us-amerikanische Internetportal “Crux” übereinstimmend berichten, hat der Vorsitzende der päpstlichen Kinderschutzkommission das Thema im K9-Rat angesprochen.

Das Gremium zur Vorbereitung einer Kurienreform hatte sich von Montag bis Mittwoch zu Beratungen im Vatikan getroffen. O’Malley habe darauf gedrungen, konkrete Prozeduren zu schaffen, um Bischöfe zur Rechenschaft zu ziehen, die ihrer Verantwortung zum Jugendschutz nicht nachkämen. Es müsse klare Kriterien zur Bewertung und Sanktionierung von bischöflichem Amtsmissbrauchs geben. Kardinal O’Malley ist der us-amerikanische Vertreter im K9-Rat.

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VATIKAN
Blick

[The Vatican is preparing stricter rules for dealing with bishops.]

Der Vatikan bereitet strengere Regeln für den Umgang mit Bischöfen vor. Sie sollen Kindesmissbrauch durch Priester nicht mehr vertuschen können.

Sein Vorhaben diskutierte Papst Franziskus gestern mit Kardinälen in seinem Beraterstab. Demnach beanstandeten die Kardinäle, dass die bisherigen Regeln «nicht genügen klar» seien. Dies teilte Vatikansprecher Federico Lombardi am späten Abend bei einer Pressekonferenz mit.

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CALIFORNIA
American Thinker

By Matt C. Abbott

The libertine left’s bullying of Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco continues (in fairness, the moral climate there isn’t any worse than here in Chicago).

From Catholic World News:

More than 100 prominent Catholics signed a full-page advertisement in the San Francisco Chronicle urging Pope Francis to replace Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone.

The paid advertisement charged that Archbishop Cordileone has created ‘an atmosphere of division and intolerance’ in the city, and his policies seem ‘closer to persecution than evangelization.’….

The complaint against Archbishop Cordileone focused on his effort to ensure that Catholic-school teachers do not undermine the teachings of the Church.

The archdiocese’s official response is a good one:

The advertisement is a misrepresentation of Catholic teaching, a misrepresentation of the nature of the teacher contract, and a misrepresentation of the spirit of the archbishop. The greatest misrepresentation of all is that the signers presume to speak for ‘the Catholic Community of San Francisco.’ They do not.

The archdiocese has met with a broad range of stakeholders. Together, we have engaged in a constructive dialogue on all of the issues raised in this ad. We welcome the chance to continue that discussion.

Of course, the left’s idea of dialogue is “Agree with us or else!” Leftists talk about promoting dialogue and tolerance, but we know their true colors by their actions.

An interesting side note:

A priest gave a homily in recent weeks in which he talked about an incident that occurred when he was in San Francisco some time ago. The priest, wearing his clerical garb, was simply walking on the sidewalk when a man starting yelling angrily at him from across the street.

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CALIFORNIA
San Francisco Appeal

Amid continuing controversy over proposed additions to the faculty handbook for Bay Area-based Catholic schools, a group of prominent Bay Area Catholics has called on Pope Francis to remove San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone.

In a letter to the pope, the letter’s signatories, which includes prominent San Francisco business leaders, teachers and attorneys, wrote, “Upon threat of losing their jobs, he coerces educators and staff in our Catholic high schools to accept a morality code which violates individual consciences as well as California labor laws.”

At issue is proposed language for the faculty handbook warning that homosexual relations and other sexual activities outside of marriage are “gravely evil.”

If adopted for the 2015-16 school year, the handbook would specify, “all extra-marital sexual relationships are gravely evil and that these include adultery, masturbation, fornication, the viewing of pornography and homosexual relations.”

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CALIFORNIA
Box Turtle Bulletin

Timothy Kincaid
April 16th, 2015

Salvatore Cordileone is a bit of a superstar in the anti-gay community. He is considered to be the father of California’s Proposition 8, the man who shepherded its drafting, organized the funding for signature gathering, and championed it within the Catholic Church. He is also a on the board of the ex-gay Catholic group, Courage, and chairman of the U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference’s Ad Hoc Committee for the Defense of Marriage.

Cordileone’s anti-gay activism served him well under former Pope Benedict the Malevolent. He quickly rose from auxiliary bishop of San Diego (2002) to Bishop of Oakland (2009) and then, in a deliberate slap to gay Catholics, to Archbishop of San Francisco (2012).

In his new exalted position, Cordileone has been quick to display his contempt to those who are more welcoming in their theological approach. Among his first acts was to snub the gay-friendly Episcopal bishop of Northern California at his installation. He quickly followed by demanding that teachers at the area’s Catholic schools be held to the strictest “morality” clauses, recruited a priest who then banned girls from serving at the altar, and spent more than a little time advocating for his anti-equality obsession.

But this has not sat well with some San Francisco’s Catholic community. They don’t like the Archbishop’s heavy-handed ideology and don’t find it to be an approach that appeals to local Catholics or which promises appeal among the younger faithful. The students and parents of some Catholic schools have held protests against the Archbishop and his policies were mocked at a local Irish Catholic event where he gave benediction.

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UNITED STATES
GlobalPost

Jason Berry
Apr 16, 2015

The Vatican’s controversial takeover of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious — which represents 53,000 nuns, America’s largest group of sisters — halted in Rome today, ending a four year standoff.

The nuns won.

Both sides have agreed not to give interviews for 30 days, according to an LCWR spokeswoman.

What a difference a papacy makes.

In a photograph circulated by the Vatican City newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, four sisters sit smiling across from Pope Francis, none wearing habits. The pope also smiles, but made no statement and is not quoted in the documents released by the LCWR, and Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the office that polices theologians and church officials on doctrinal disputes.

“Pope Francis met with them for fifty minutes,” FutureChurch co-founder Sister Christine Schenk told GroundTruth. “We’ve never had the leadership meet in a private office with the pope. That is a very significant valuing of the leadership and the role of women in the church. On balance, there are tremendous positives from this resolution.”

Under Pope Benedict, the CDF announced in 2012 that Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain would function as LCWR overseer, approving their literature and vetting conference speakers. It was strikingly blunt, scolding the women superiors for “radical, feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith.” …

“A broad range of Catholic foundations privately expressed to bishops and cardinals their utter dismay and strong opposition to this wholly unnecessary investigation of women religious,” a prominent philanthropist who spoke on background told GroundTruth earlier this year.

A number of foundations offered assistance, either materially or in advisory capacities, to mother superiors whose communities were selling assets to manage long-term elder care as their numbers declined.

The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation — which has provided major support to National Catholic Reporter for its Global Sisters Report coverage — also awarded $2.5 million to the National Religious Retirement Office, which assists religious communities in America in bridging the gap in retirement fund shortfalls.

Meanwhile, Cardinal Levada, Archbishop Sartain and Toledo Bishop Leonard Blair — a key investigator of LCWR — had all been tarnished with media coverage of their giving soft-glove treatment to clergy sex abusers. Levada had the dubious distinction, while San Francisco prelate, of being the only bishop in America to be successfully sued by a priest who claimed whistle-blower status after Levada removed him from his parish for reporting his pastor to police for alleged advances on a youth.

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SPAIN
The Olive Press

Rituals began in 2012 when Valladolid exorcist, Jesus Hernandez Sahagun, was contacted by the girl’s parents who were convinced she was ‘possessed by the devil’.

Dramatic ceremonies which allegedly involved the girl being tied up with crucifixes placed on her head left the girl injured and, on one occasion, she attempted suicide.

Hernandez, who has performed over 200 exorcisms in the past four years, was defended by the Archbishop of Burgos who insisted the suicide attempt was not connected.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Friday, April 17, 2015

Liam Heylin

The jury in the case of a former Christian Brother who denied charges of indecently assaulting a primary school boy in the 1970s reached verdicts of not guilty yesterday after two-and-a-half hours of deliberation.

Louis Morgan, aged 66, of Glenmarian Rd, Portlaoise, denied four counts of indecent assault.

The jury gave their verdicts of not guilty on all four charges of indecently assaulting a boy, aged 8/9, in the mid-1970s at the Christian Brothers primary school on Blarney St, Cork.

In his charging of the jury, Judge David Riordan had referred to a witness who said he had been sexually assaulted by the same defendant when he was a boy in the same school.

“This evidence is not corroborative. He did not give evidence that he saw any of the acts complained of by (the complainant)… It was not produced to blacken the character of the accused. You are not to draw an inference,” the judge said.

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CALIFORNIA
Catholic World Report

Catherine Harmon

The latest installment of the drama currently unfolding in the Archdiocese of San Francisco saw two groups of local Catholics make known their very different opinions of Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone’s leadership, and in no uncertain terms.

“Archbishop Cordileone has fostered an atmosphere of division and intolerance,” declares a full-page advertisement in today’s edition of the San Francisco Chronicle. “The Archdiocese of San Francisco is threatened by Archbishop Cordileone’s single-issue agenda and cannot survive, let alone thrive and grow under his supervision.”

“Our courageous archbishop has made news nationwide for his effort to keep San Francisco’s Catholic schools Catholic,” states a grassroots organization formed to support Cordileone and his efforts. “For properly fulfilling his responsibilities he has come under targeted, coordinated attacks from activists, politicians and the media.”

While Archbishop Cordileone’s vocal defense of Catholic moral teaching—particularly the Church’s view of marriage and family—has made him unpopular with his city’s liberal politicians for a while now, the current furor among the faithful in San Francisco was ignited by the announcement in early February that contracts and employee handbooks for four archdiocesan high schools would include clauses detailing Catholic teaching on sexual morality.

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CALIFORNIA
Marin Independent Journal

By Janis Mara, Marin Independent Journal
POSTED: 04/16/15

Prominent Catholics with Marin ties who signed a full-page Chronicle ad running Thursday asking Pope Francis to replace San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone said they stand behind their decision.

The open letter cited morality clauses Cordileone proposed for a teacher handbook requiring teachers to “affirm and believe” that sex outside marriage and masturbation are “gravely evil,” among other actions.

The open letter stated that the Archdiocese of San Francisco is threatened by Cordileone’s “single-issue agenda and cannot survive, let alone thrive and grow under his supervision” and that San Francisco deserves a leader focused on service and diversity.

“We are really disappointed that the archbishop is extremely conservative and not flexible to meet the needs of the Catholic population he is serving,” said Suzanne Swift of Tiburon, a former member of the board of directors of Catholic Charities CYO of the Archdiocese. She and her husband Brian, also a former board member, were two more than 100 people who signed the letter.

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VATICAN CITY
Headlines from the Catholic World

Vatican City, Apr 17, 2015 / 12:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Already two years into the reform process of the Roman Curia, progress might seem slow. But cardinals on the Pope’s advisory council say efforts – which may soon include new “super” congregations – are moving forward at a normal pace.

“Reform will take time,” stressed Honduran Cardinal Oscar Rodríguez Maradiaga April 15.

Cardinal Maradiaga is part of the nine-member Council of Cardinal Advisors instituted by Pope Francis shortly after his election, to aid him in governing the Church and to reform the Roman Curia.

The Curia is currently ordered by “Pastor bonus,” the apostolic constitution issued by Bl. John Paul II in 1988 which regulates and defines the charges, duties and composition of the offices of the Vatican administration. The Council of Cardinals is now working to prepare a new constitution to govern the body.

Cardinal Maradiaga noted that “Pastor bonus” took several years to implement. “We cannot suppose (a new constitution) is going to be accomplished in short time.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Morning Bulletin

12.30PM: THE commission has heard when criminal action went ahead against Fr Durham, Fr Heenan wrote a letter of reference about his priest’s character.

Fr Heenan believed it was his duty to write a character reference despite the allegations against Fr Durham.

He said in his reference: “he (Fr Durham) has had a unique life as a citizen of this district, priest to many parish communities, chaplain to service personnel and inspiring friend to young and old alike. I ask that the incredible amount of good he has done will be weighed against the failing that have also been part of his life”.

12.10PM: IT took five years, after he was made aware of sexual allegations against his parish priests, for Father Heenan to make a formal apology to the victims of sexual abuse at Neerkol.

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

April 17, 2015

Miranda Forster

A retired Catholic bishop says he deeply regrets dismissing allegations of child sexual abuse against members of his clergy and admits he put the reputation of the church first.

Former head of the central Queensland diocese of Rockhampton Brian Heenan has told a royal commission his response to multiple allegations of child sexual abuse against priests at the Neerkol orphanage was inappropriate and wrong.

Historical allegations of widespread physical and sexual abuse by priests and nuns at the orphanage began emerging in 1993.

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OREGON
The Oregonian

By Rick Bella | The Oregonian/OregonLive
on April 16, 2015

Women who waited 18 years to accuse their former pastor of sexual abuse got their day in court Thursday.

One by one, five women who grew up in the communal North Clackamas Bible Community told a Multnomah County jury that Pastor Mike Sperou regularly took advantage of them in the 1980s and 1990s, when they were as young as 4.

Jessica Watson, now a Southeast Portland photographer, testified that she once fell asleep on Sperou’s bed after the two had watched a movie on his big-screen television, then woke up to him rubbing against her.

Afterward, he inserted his finger into her vagina, said Watson, now 33.

“He talked to me, telling me things like, ‘Doesn’t that feel good?’ ”

In an unusual turn of events, Watson is not the alleged victim in Sperou’s criminal case. Instead, Judge Cheryl A. Albrecht is allowing her and five other women to tell their own tales of abuse — in addition to Shannon Clark, the alleged victim in the case. However, the jury is to consider the six women’s testimony only to decide whether Sperou may have touched Clark accidentally or if it was part of a pattern.

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NEW JERSEY
Courier-Post

Jim Walsh, Courier-Post April 16, 2015

FRANKLIN – A local pastor is accused of sexually assaulting a 21-year-old woman.

James E. Simmons Jr., 64, turned himself in to Franklin police on Wednesday, following an investigation into the alleged offense. The woman claimed the abuse began when she was 17 and continued for several years, police said.

Simmons, a pastor at New Life in Christ Ministries of Franklinville, was held on $150,000 cash bail.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Lebanon Daily News

By Chris Sholly
chrissholly@ldnews.com @cgsholly on Twitter

Mark Rozzi has become an advocate of sexual assault victims

A Berks County state representative shared his personal story Thursday as a victim of sexual abuse.

As a result of his experience, Rep. Mark Rozzi, D-Berks, said he has been an advocate for victims, pushing legislation to reform statute of limitations laws and to better prevent sexual abuse.

Rozzi was the keynote speaker at the Sexual Assault Resource and Counseling Center’s annual dinner at the Lebanon Country Club.

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GUAM
Marianas Variety

17 Apr 2015 By Junhan B. Todiño – junhan@mvariety.com – Variety News Staff

HAGÅTÑA — Officials of the Survivor Network of those Abused by Priests or SNAP is calling on Catholic church officials to be more transparent.

Director David Clohessy, said Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez’s recent reexamination of molestation accusations made against Rev. John Wadeson is part of a growing trend.

“I​t seems to be happening more and more. It’s happened in dozens of Catholic abuse and cover-up cases. We have very little faith in these secretive, cleric-dominated church “investigations” or “examinations” into child sex abuse reports,” Clohessy said.

Instead, Clohessy said the examinations should be done by independent, experienced and unbiased professionals in law enforcement, “not by self-interested, biased amateurs in church offices.”

Clohessy said more transparency is needed to uncover possible predators and bishops should use parish bulletins, websites and pulpit announcements to call on victims or witnesses to contact police and prosecutors in cases of abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
SBS

Source: AAP
17 APR 2015

A retired Catholic bishop described a pedophile priest as having a “unique gift with youth” in a character reference for the man’s court sentence.

Former head of the Catholic diocese of Rockhampton in Queensland Brian Heenan told a royal commission on Friday he regretted parts of the 1999 reference letter in support of the disgraced former member of his clergy, Reginald Durham.

Durham, who is now deceased, was allowed to continue teaching religion to primary school children for more than two years after several people came forward with claims he’d abused them as chaplain at the Neerkol orphanage in the 1960s and 1970s.

But he wasn’t forced to resign as a church employee until he was formally charged in 1997, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard on Friday.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By William Rollo and Marlina Whop

The retired Rockhampton bishop allowed a priest to stay on at a parish even though he knew he was a paedophile, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has heard.

Bishop Brian Heenan also admitted at one point he tried to protect the reputation of the Catholic Church rather than consider the victims of sexual abuse.

Bishop Heenan was cross-examined over the Church’s responses to the abuse allegations at St Joseph’s Orphanage at Neerkol, west of Rockhampton, from the 1940s to the 1970s.

He allowed one of the main offenders, Father Reg Durham, to continue working for the Catholic Church for three years despite a woman alleging in 1994 he sexually abused her since she was a child.

Father Durham was the administrator for the parish of Neerkol and had resided in the presbytery.

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UNITED STATES
PopeCrimes& Vatican Evils.

Paris Arrow

It usually takes a month and a half for the Vatican to accept an envoy’s credentials but its prolonged silence usually means a rejection. French President François Hollande has appointed – last January – his chief of protocol and a senior diplomat Laurent Stefanini to the Holy See. But since Laurent Stefanini is openly gay, the media is now exposing Pope Francis’ refusal to accept Stefanini because of his open homosexuality. At the same time, the Vatican is reeling with scandals in Italy because of infamous gay Italian priests and by the way, have idiots Catholics forgotten the Vatican Gay Lobby that caused the downfall resignation of Benedict XVI-RATzinger – and the Vatican’s poster gay Cardinal O’Brien of Scotland?

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AUSTRALIA
news.com.au

Retired Rockhampton bishop Brian Heenan knew about at least one sexually abusive priest in his parish

RETIRED Rockhampton Bishop Brian Heenan knew about at least one sexually abusive priest who had worked in his parish as early as 1994.

But he had no training on how to handle child sex abuse allegations when he was made Bishop in 1991.

Bishop Heenan has appeared as a witness at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Rockhampton, answering questions on the Church’s responses to the abuse allegations at St Joseph’s Orphanage at Neerkol west of the city.

Counsel Assisting Sophie David, SC, asked Bishop Heenan whether, prior to becoming Bishop in 1991, he had any training in how to handle allegations of child sexual abuse related to the church.

“No specific training, no,’’ he said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Australian Associated Press
Thursday 16 April 2015

A retired Catholic bishop has admitted that he failed to protect Queensland children from a priest who was later convicted of child sexual offences.

The former bishop of the Rockhampton diocese, Brian Heenan, conceded at the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse that his response to multiple allegations of historical child sexual offences against members of his clergy was inappropriate and inadequate.

Heenan was head of the Rockhampton diocese when former residents of the notorious Neerkol orphanage came forward in the 1990s with claims they had been sexually abused by priests.

One of those at the centre of the allegations, Reginald Durham, was allowed to continue working in an administrative role in church, including alongside primary school students.

Durham was later convicted of indecently dealing with a child resident of the Neerkol orphanage.

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MINNESOTA
Fox 9

by Paul Blume

(KMSP) –
A U.S. bankruptcy judge in Minneapolis put a firm August 3 deadline on victims and others owed money by the St. Paul-Minneapolis Archdiocese to file their claims.

Today’s news comes as the archdiocese tries to reorganize financially.

Jeff Anderson, attorney for 175 clergy abuse victims, says, “We are going to engage in the most rigorous and vigorous effort to reach those survivors to let them know, there is time and there is a chance. The doors are open to come forward.”

In January, the archdiocese filed for bankruptcy protection, overwhelmed by the number of lawsuits and financial damages sought by victims.

The parties at that time vowed to work through the complex issues without the acrimony and bitter fighting that has erupted with other church battles across the country.

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CALIFORNIA
SFist

“Holy Father, please provide us with a leader true to our values and your namesake,” begins the text of a full page ad in today’s edition of the Chronicle imploring Pope Francis to “Please replace Archbishop Cordileone.”

Signed by 100 local catholic leaders including alumni of San Francisco Catholic schools, church volunteers, and former board members of Catholic Charities, the open letter is the latest indictment of the gay-hating, drunk driving Archbishop and his move to include “morality clauses” in the contracts of teachers and staff at Catholic high schools.

To recap, Cordileone has instructed the almost 500 employees of archdiocese high schools to “affirm and believe” that actions like “homosexual relations,” birth control, and masturbation are “gravely… intrinsically” evil. In other words, it’s a ban on teachers engaging in any of the “behaviors” themselves or expressing — let’s call them “more nuanced” views in their classrooms.

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LOUISIANA
KATC

By Tina Macias

A retired priest is being investigated over decades-old allegations of sexual abuse during his time in Lafayette Parish, according to the Youngsville Police Department.

Roy Lee Touchet, 65, of New Jersey is accusing Gerard Smit, 91, of Newark, Delaware, of abusing him in the 1960s when Touchet was an alter boy. The Youngsville Police Department is in the beginning stages of the investigation, said Chief Rickey Boudreaux.

Smit worked for St. Anne in Youngsville and St. Joseph in Milton in the early 1960s. He’s listed as a former assistant pastor of St. Anne on the St. Joseph website.

In 2006, he was among several priests named by the Diocese of Wilmington as a priest with “substantiated allegations of sexual abuse, molestation and rape of minors” on the Diocese of Wilmington website. It’s noted that his allegations came while working in another diocese.

Smit served in Wilmington from 1987-1996, but spent the majority of his career in South Louisiana, working for the Diocese of Lafayette and a new Diocese that was carved out of the Diocese of Lafayette in 1980 — the Diocese of Lake Charles.

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AUSTRALIA
The Morning Bulletin

ALTHOUGH he will never quite get justice, Allan Allaway wants to see the State Government take some responsibility for the misconduct at Neerkol Orphanage.

“If it wasn’t for those so-called authorities at the State Children’s Department (at the time), there wouldn’t be any physical or sexual abuse at Neerkol,” he said.

“Some of those authorities who were supposed to be doing their jobs were never fired over these incidents (of alleged sexual and physical abuse).”

Today the Royal Commission panel will hear responses from the former Bishop of Rockhampton Brian Heenan and Sister Berneice Loch, from the Sisters of Mercy.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By William Rollo and Marlina Whop

A retired bishop who dismissed child sex abuse claims made by former residents at a Rockhampton orphanage says he regrets not reading a book written by a victim.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which began hearings on Tuesday in the central Queensland city, was told that for more than three decades, children at St Joseph’s Neerkol Orphanage were raped, molested and beaten.

It heard victims describe abuse carried out by a groundsman and a group of priests.

The inquiry has heard the Sisters of Mercy who ran the orphanage not only overlooked the abuse but were complicit in it being carried out during a period stretching from the 1940s to the1970s.

One witness says she was raped when she was 14 by a worker at the orphanage in 1965, another was sexually abused by a priest and forced to drink her own urine to stay hydrated.

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AUSTRALIA
The Morning Bulletin

10AM: BRIAN Heenan has stated he did not read a book published by a Neerkol Orphanage resident, detailing the sexual abuse at the institution, because he didn’t want to believe it.

The Royal Commission has heard prior to the former Rockhampton Bishop moving to the region in 1991, he did not have any training in respect of allegations of sexual assault.

“Sadly sex abuse was rising at the time and there was no adequate preparation until the reality began to dawn,” he said.

Mr Heenan was ordained in 1962. He assisted other priests in the archdiocese in Brisbane before becoming the parish priest of Zillmere.

He has told the Royal Commission one of the alleged assailants of sexual abuse at Neerkol Orphanage, Father Reginald Durham (deceased), retired in 1993.

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CALIFORNIA
National Catholic Reporter

SAN FRANCISCO The signees of an open letter to Pope Francis in today’s San Francisco Chronicle are the “bedrock of the archdiocese,” said one of them at a press conference this morning.

The full-page ad asking the pope to replace Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone “was intended to speak for itself,” said Michael Kelly, president of Walkup Melodia Kelly & Schoenberger, a prominent law firm in San Francisco. But when the archdiocese released a statement Wednesday that the 112 Catholics whose names appeared on the ad do not speak for the Catholic community, the signees announced a press conference Thursday morning in the city’s financial district.

The signees, Kelly said, “are the hardworking men and women, moms and dads of the archdiocese.” Noting that many of them have received awards from the archdiocese, he added, “The notion that the signees of this document are a fringe group … is complete folly and balderdash.” He added that since the ad appeared, dozens more Catholics have contacted him in support.

The ad, which ran in the main section of the paper and reportedly cost in the tens of thousands of dollars, is titled “A Respectful Appeal to Pope Francis from the Catholic Community of San Francisco.”

“Holy Father,” it reads. “Please Replace Archbishop Cordileone.” It goes on to list complaints with Cordileone, including a morality code required for high school teachers, isolation from the community and use of the words “gravely evil” to describe the behavior of parishioners.

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NEW JERSEY
Asbury Park press

Shannon Mullen, Asbury Park Press April 16, 2015

TRENTON – The jury in the federal conspiracy and kidnapping trial of three rabbis – including Rabbi Mendel Epstein, of Lakewood – and a fourth defendant, Epstein’s son and alleged enforcer, deliberated throughout the day Thursday without reaching a verdict.

The panel of six men and six women are scheduled to resume deliberations Monday.

Epstein, 69, is the alleged mastermind behind a series of assaults on men who refused to grant their wives divorces in accordance with Jewish law. He could face life in prison if convicted of kidnapping.

Some of the men testified during the trial that they were hooded, handcuffed, beaten, stomped and shocked into submission with a stun gun or cattle prod.

The attorneys for Epstein and his co-defendants – his son, David Epstein, of Lakewood, and two other rabbis, Jay Goldstein and Benyamin Stimler – say the government over-reached in trying the men on kidnapping-related charges.

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NEW JERSEY
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — The first full day of jury deliberations has ended without a verdict in the federal case of an Orthodox rabbi accused in New Jersey of using brutal tactics to force unwilling Jewish men to divorce their wives.

The jury began deliberations Wednesday afternoon and resumed Thursday. They asked U.S. District Judge Freda Wolfson two questions, but did not reach a verdict. Deliberations continue Monday.

Rabbi Mendel Epstein faces charges of conspiracy to commit kidnapping and attempted kidnapping with his son and two other Orthodox rabbis.

Prosecutors say the rabbi’s team used brutal methods and tools, including handcuffs and electric cattle prods, to torture the men into granting divorces.

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NEW JERSEY
NJ.com

By MaryAnn Spoto | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
on April 16, 2015 at

TRENTON — Jurors in the trial of a Lakewood rabbi accused of arranging the kidnapping and torture of husbands to extract religious divorces completed their first full day of deliberations without reaching a verdict on Thursday.

In deciding the fate of Rabbi Mendel Epstein and three others, jurors briefly interrupted their deliberations to ask two questions of U.S. District Judge Freda Wolfson in Trenton, but ultimately did not come to a conclusion.

Epstein, a prominent rabbi who specializes in divorce proceedings, is on trial along with his son, David “Ari” Epstein, and two other rabbis, Binyamin Stimler and Jay Goldstein, on conspiracy and kidnapping charges that grew out of a federal undercover sting.

A couple hours into their deliberations, jurors sent a note asking whether knowledge of someone’s confinement against his will constitutes kidnapping.

In a written reply, Wolfson told them it does not constitute kidnapping but that they should ask for clarification if they need to know how that relates to the other charges.

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NEW YORK
Times Newsweekly

BY ROBERT POZARYCKI
rpozarycki@ridgewoodtimes.com @robbpoz

Four times since 2006, Assemblywoman Margaret Markey’s Child Victims Act — which extends the criminal and civil statute of limitations to punish sexual predators — passed the Assembly, but never made it to the state Senate floor for a vote.

The Maspeth lawmaker, however, isn’t giving up her efforts to make her bill a law.

Markey announced on April 13 a renewed effort to make the Child Victims Act a reality, which includes meeting in Albany on April 22 with colleagues and advocates of sexual abuse victims. She also secured the support of state Senator Brad Hoylman of Manhattan, who is sponsoring a companion bill in the state Senate.

The Child Victims Act amends the statute of limitations to prosecute — and for victims to sue —alleged sexual abusers. Current state law requires that victims must present criminal or civil charges within five years of their 18th birthday.

Markey’s bill would eliminate all criminal and civil statutes regarding future child sex abuse cases, meaning that victims who are abused after the act becomes law may come forward and press charges or file a lawsuit at any time after the abuse took place.

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CALIFORNIA
Huffington Post

By Carol Kuruvilla & Antonia Blumberg

A group of Catholics in San Francisco is asking the pope to replace their archdiocese’s spiritual leader, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, with someone “true to our values.”

More than 100 Catholics signed a full-page ad in Thursday’s San Francisco Chronicle asking Pope Francis to name a new church leader more closely aligned with San Francisco’s progressive ideals. In their open letter, the petitioners argue that Cordileone has “fostered an atmosphere of division and intolerance” and “isolated himself from our community.”

The letter follows months of protests against the archdiocese’s leadership. Frustrated local Catholics have spoken out, in particular, against Cordileone’s efforts to add language to the moral guidelines laid out for teachers at Catholic high schools that reaffirms the church’s stances on same-sex marriage, artificial insemination and other controversial matters. …

James Martin, a Jesuit priest and editor at large of the Catholic magazine America, told HuffPost that although these types of grassroots campaigns have arisen before, they rarely have any influence on the Vatican.

“The decision to remove a bishop is made by the Vatican, specifically the Congregation of Bishops advising the Pope,” Martin told HuffPost in an email. “The only time that a petition might influence the Vatican is if it seems that the bishop is unable to lead the diocese because of widespread opposition. But normally these campaigns do not serve to sway the Vatican. Sometimes they may have the opposite effect, and raise sympathy for a bishop — that is, if he’s seen to being ‘attacked.'”

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

Martin Moylan Apr 16, 2015

The federal judge overseeing the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis’ bankruptcy case indicated Thursday that he will shorten the window for sex abuse victims to file claims against the church.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Kressel signaled that he will concur with the archdiocese and set an Aug. 3 date for filing claims, though he said he would consider giving victims more time if needed.

August is much earlier than the filing deadline allowed under a Minnesota law that gives abuse victims until May 2016 to file lawsuits over abuse that happened long ago. The archdiocese said the earlier date could mean a quicker resolution for claims and reduced bankruptcy costs, leaving more assets available for victims.

Victims attorney Jeff Anderson argued unsuccessfully that the 2016 deadline should hold.

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MINNESOTA
Seattle PI

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A federal bankruptcy judge has indicated he will shorten the window for clergy sex abuse victims to file claims against the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Kressel signaled Thursday that he will agree with the archdiocese and set an Aug. 3 date for filing claims. However, Kressel said he would consider giving victims more time if needed.

Minnesota Public Radio News (http://bit.ly/1IjgyYm ) reports August is much earlier than the filing deadline allowed under a Minnesota law that gives abuse victims until May 2016 to file lawsuits over abuse that happened years ago. The archdiocese said the earlier date could mean a quicker resolution for claims and reduced bankruptcy costs, leaving more assets available for victims.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Elizabeth Mohr
emohr@pioneerpress.com
POSTED: 04/16/2015

The judge handling the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis bankruptcy case said Thursday he would approve its request to set an Aug. 3 deadline for victims of clergy sexual abuse to file claims, despite a state law allowing them until May 25, 2016.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Kressel said he wasn’t convinced that allowing more time for victims to come forward would change anything.

Kressel said he wanted to keep court proceedings moving forward and said that by August most claims and the circumstances around them will likely already be known.

He noted that the deadline could be changed if needed.

“We’re not closing a window on anybody,” Kressel said. “We’re setting a date for timely filing of claims.”

He indicated he would approve the church’s request, but called for several edits to the proposed order. The revised order is expected to be submitted for his signature soon.

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MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

April 16, 2015 | Author: berger

The Joliet diocese has settled 14 predator priest cases for $4.1 million. Two of the clerics worked in our town. One is Fr. Fred Lenczycki, the first U.S. priest to be deemed a “sexually violent predator.” He was at two local hospital (DePaul and Deaconess) and three local parishes (St. Blaise Parish in Maryland Heights. North American Martyrs in Florissant and St. George’s in south St. Louis county). The other is Fr. Lawrence M. Gibbs, who has been called “Joliet’s most notorious” and “savage” predator priest. Ironically, in 2002, when he was first sued, Gibbs was a state social worker in St. Louis investigating abuse allegations against the elderly.

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NEW JERSEY
South Jersey Times

By Matt Gray | South Jersey Times
on April 16, 2015

A Franklin Township pastor has been charged with sexually assaulting a teenager, township police reported.

James E. Simmons Jr., 64, is accused of assaulting the victim, now 21 years old, beginning when she was 17, according to a release issued by the police department.

The victim told police the alleged abuse continued for several years, authorities said.

Simmons, pastor at New Life in Christ Ministries in Malaga, turned himself in to police on Wednesday.

He was charged with several counts of second-degree sex assault, criminal sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child.

Bail was set at $150,000 full cash.

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OREGON
The Oregonian

By Rick Bella | The Oregonian/OregonLive
on April 16, 2015

Two women who grew up in Happy Valley Pastor Mike Sperou’s communal church confronted him in court for the first time Thursday, accusing him of sexually abusing them in the 1980s and 1990s.

One woman, 35-year-old Amy Robinson, said that while she was in middle school, she awoke after she was invited to spend the night with Sperou, to find his fingers in her vagina.

“He also would put my hand over his penis, over his underwear,” said Robinson, now a mother of four in Saugus, Massachusetts.

Robinson is one of seven women accusing Sperou of abuse in the cluster of homes the North Clackamas Bible Community rents in Happy Valley and Southeast Portland. However, Robinson is not the victim in Sperou’s criminal case.

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GEORGIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, April 16, 2015

For more information: Rich Darr cell phone: 815 370 4703, rsdarr@earthlink.net

Abuse victims to hold meeting in Atlanta
“Missionary kids” were molested overseas
Their parents proselytized in developing nations
Children were put in ill-prepared boarding homes

Adults who were sexually, physically and emotionally abused overseas in Christian settings are holding an international conference this weekend (Apr 17-19) in Atlanta, GA.

The group, MK Safety Net, provides support to those who suffered while their parents were Christian missionaries in developing nations across the globe.

Their plight was detailed in an award-winning documentary film called All God’s Children.

[All God’s Children]

Led by a minister, the group will hold a service of lament, called “A Time to Mourn. A Time to Grieve.”

One of the speakers will be Boz Tchividjian, a former prosecutor who is Rev. Billy Graham’s grandson. He heads a group called GRACE, Godly Response to Abuse in Christian Environments and blogs for the Religion News Service.

Other speakers include attorneys and mental health professionals.

“It’s an amazing group of people: men and women who were taken abroad as children when their devout parents became missionaries in developing nations,” said David Clohessy of St. Louis. He’s the director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “These youngsters lived away from their moms and dads and were often treated brutally and abused repeatedly by ‘dorm parents.’”

“As adults, in the early/mid 1990s, these brave and courageous victims began to organize, reach out, support each other and expose the horrors they endured in these isolated settings,” said Barbara Dorris of SNAP. “We know MKSafety Net has given comfort and guidance to hundreds of adults who still struggle with the life-long impact of such horrific betrayal.”

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UNITED STATES
First Things

by Robert P. George
4 . 16 . 15

Your Holiness:

I recall with pleasure and gratitude my visit to the Vatican in November and your moving address to our Colloquium on the Complementarity of Man and Woman in Marriage. There, gathered with leaders of the world’s great religious traditions, East and West, you reaffirmed the Church’s doctrine of marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife and spoke movingly of the right of every child “to grow up in a family with a father and mother.”

Here in the United States we are blessed with many bishops who join you in bearing witness to these profound and indispensable truths. Even in the face of social and economic pressure on them to yield or go silent, they boldly and joyously proclaim the Church’s teachings on marriage and chastity. None has been more fearless or ardent in upholding these beautiful and liberating teachings than Salvatore Cordileone, the Archbishop of San Francisco.

Faithful Catholics in his archdiocese and throughout our country have been edified by his labors—particularly those addressed to ensuring that the Catholic schools under his care teach and model fidelity to Catholic doctrine in all matters of faith and morals. Unsurprisingly, however, these labors have drawn the antagonism of many who despise the Church’s moral teachings, especially those concerning marriage and sexual morality.

This morning, a group of people published an open letter to you in a San Francisco newspaper urging you to remove Archbishop Cordileone from his office. They identify themselves as Catholics and plead with you to send them a new archbishop that will be true to what they describe as “our values.” But their values, unlike the values proclaimed and upheld by Archbishop Cordileone, are not the values of the Catholic faith. Their complaint against the Archbishop finally comes down to his refusal to bow down before the values of contemporary secularist sexual morality and gender ideology. For this, however, he should be applauded and encouraged, not condemned, much less ousted.

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CALIFORNIA
New York Daily News

BY DEBORAH HASTINGS NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, April 16, 2015

Scores of Catholic leaders in the San Francisco Bay Area have signed an open letter to Pope Francis calling for the removal of controversial Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, who calls homosexual relations “gravely evil.”

In a full-page ad in the San Francisco Chronicle, more than 100 donors and church members asked the pontiff to replace Cordileone for encouraging “an atmosphere of division and intolerance.”

The signers included Brian Cahill, retired executive director of Catholic Charities, Tom Brady Sr., father of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, and Adobe Systems chairman Charles Geschke.

The petitioners’ complaints include: the appointment of a parish pastor who banned altar girls from church services; an elementary school pamphlet that asked children if they masturbated or engaged in sodomy, and a hardline stance by the archbishop against same-sex marriage and same-sex relationships.

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CALIFORNIA
Boston Globe

By Michael O’Loughlin GLOBE STAFF APRIL 16, 2015

A group of San Francisco Catholics threw a Hail Mary Thursday, asking Pope Francis to fire their archbishop. Among those calling for a replacement of Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone is the father of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.

Tom Brady Sr. joined about 100 other Bay Area Catholics in signing a full-page advertisement in the San Francisco Chronicle Thursday, in which they ask Pope Francis to remove Cordileone as archbishop because of what they say is “an atmosphere of division and intolerance” in the archdiocese.

“Holy Father,” the ad reads, “please provide us with a leader true to our values and your namesake.”

Cordileone has been under assault from some Catholics since news broke in February that teachers in archdiocesan-run schools would be required to sign a contract that states they “accept the Church’s teaching that all extra-marital sexual relationships are gravely evil and that these include adultery, masturbation, fornication, the viewing of pornography and homosexual relations.”

Blowback was swift, with lawmakers, teachers, and now major donors voicing opposition.

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CALIFORNIA
San Francisco Chronicle

By C.W. Nevius
April 16, 2015

Ever since he arrived in San Francisco more than two years ago, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone has courted controversy. He attended rallies against anti-same sex marriage unapologetically, imposed “morality classes” on teachers at local Catholic schools and supported the extreme views of Star of the Sea pastor Joseph Illo.

Through it all Cordileone has maintained a serene equanimity. Illo, his surrogate, said in a January interview with Catholic World Report that when there was a backlash to Illo’s decision to ban girls from becoming altar servers the Archbishop told him, “the negative press coverage was par for the course for this kind of announcement, and we expect it to just be a flash in the pan.”

It’s now clear that was a naive miscalculation. Thursday’s full page ad in The Chronicle, signed by over 100 prominent Catholics, that called on the Vatican to replace Cordileone was just the latest volley. These people aren’t going away.

It is important to note that these aren’t cliché San Francisco radical activists — who, by the way, have been conspicuous by their absence in this discussion. These are parents, teachers and families. These are everyday people galvanized to action.

It can be said that Cordileone has gotten exactly what he wanted. As Illo gleefully said in the January interview, courting controversy with extreme views serves as “a poke in the eye of the liberal culture of San Francisco.”

So if the archbishop wanted a fight — mission accomplished.

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