ABUSE TRACKER

CANADA
The Globe and Mail

SUNNY DHILLON
VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail
Published Thursday, Jun. 18, 2015

A freelance journalist continued to attack former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong even after her initial article was published, pressuring organizations he was involved with to sever ties and writing a paper that contained untrue allegations, Mr. Furlong’s lawyer argued Thursday.

Laura Robinson wrote an article for the Georgia Straight, a weekly newspaper based in Vancouver, in September, 2012, in which eight people alleged Mr. Furlong physically abused his former students. The allegations stemmed from Mr. Furlong’s previously undisclosed time as a physical-education instructor at Immaculata Roman Catholic Elementary School in Burns Lake, B.C., from 1969-70.

Ms. Robinson is suing Mr. Furlong over comments he made at a news conference the day the story was published. Mr. Furlong vehemently denied any wrongdoing and criticized Ms. Robinson’s reporting, saying she had a vendetta against him.

On Thursday, the defamation trial heard about e-mails Ms. Robinson sent to an aboriginal news website and to a B.C. First Nation in June, 2013. In the e-mails to NationTalk and the Musqueam Indian Band, Ms. Robinson asked questions about a “First Nations evening” that was being held by the Vancouver Whitecaps soccer team. Mr. Furlong is the team’s executive chair

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CANADA
CBC News

By Jason Proctor, CBC News Posted: Jun 18, 2015

John Furlong’s lawyer claims journalist Laura Robinson conducted a “witch hunt” against the former Olympics CEO, which continued long past the publication of a controversial Georgia Straight article in September 2012.

As he wrapped up his cross-examination, John Hunter accused Robinson of being an activist — noting she was described that way in articles and a citation for an honorary degree.

Robinson admitted some might consider her an advocate for equality in sport, First Nations youth and sexual assault victims.

But she said those passions are separate from her professional life.

“I’m also an athlete and a journalist,” she said.

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CANADA
Straight

by Carlito Pablo on June 18th, 2015

Sparks flew on the fourth day of the trial of a defamation suit against former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong.

“How did you expect him to react?” Furlong’s lawyer, John Hunter, asked Laura Robinson, who wrote an in-depth article about the prominent figure’s untold early years in Canada and alleged abuses he committed against First Nations students at an elementary school.

“You expected him to send you flowers?” Hunter said, pressing on with his cross-examination today (June 18) of Robinson, who sued Furlong for allegedly impugning her integrity as a journalist following publication of her article in the Georgia Straight in 2012.

“I expected him not to lie,” Robinson responded.

Hunter reminded her that she had been told by Furlong’s camp that if her article was printed, she would be sued.

Following the publication of her story in the Straight on September 27, 2012, Furlong did sue Robinson and the newspaper. He eventually discontinued the lawsuits.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

BY LIAM CLARKE – 19 JUNE 2015

Stormont must start planning a “redress scheme” for victims of child sex abuse – including those preyed on by paedophile priests such as Fr Brendan Smyth and others assaulted in Kincora Boys’ Home, an international expert has warned.

In Australia and Canada, ex-gratia payments are being made to survivors of child abuse who are now adults.

In Canada it is £28,500 and in Australia it is an average of £14,400.

Criminology professor Dr Kathleen Daly said it was high time politicians started talking seriously about a redress scheme.

“These are considerable sums and victims and survivors are getting older – so we need to start talking now,” she said.

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Pubic Radio

Madeleine Baran
Jun 19, 2015

On April 10, 2014 — seven months into the clergy sex abuse scandal — Archbishop John Nienstedt’s top advisers gathered for a private meeting. They had just received several affidavits from an internal investigation of Nienstedt that had been authorized by the archbishop himself to address damaging rumors.

The sworn statements accused Nienstedt of inappropriate behavior, according to people who read them, including sexual advances toward at least two priests.

Private investigators had even arranged a prison interview with Curtis Wehmeyer, the former priest at the center of the clergy sex abuse scandal. Wehmeyer, who pleaded guilty in 2012 to child sex abuse, told the investigators he couldn’t understand why Nienstedt wanted to spend time with him or why he kept him in ministry. Nienstedt made him uncomfortable, he said, and they never had sex. Wehmeyer said he wasn’t interested in Nienstedt.

Nienstedt had authorized the investigation with the expectation that it would clear his name. Instead, it threatened to ruin it. At the meeting last spring, the advisers went around the room. Each said Nienstedt should resign.

A few days later, Auxiliary Bishops Lee Piche and Andrew Cozzens traveled to Washington to bring that message to the pope’s ambassador to the United States, Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, the apostolic nuncio. It was a brave move that threatened the careers of both men. Piche and Cozzens had hoped Vigano would agree that the future of the archdiocese was more important than the reputation of one man.

What happened at that meeting is unknown. Piche, Cozzens and Vigano did not respond to interview requests.

However, when the bishops returned to Minnesota, everything changed. The investigation, as it was originally ordered, was over.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

NSW Police says it’s disappointed its officers endured the indignity of a royal commission regarding alleged misconduct only to have their commitment and diligence recognised in a final report.

Officers including Inspector Beth Cullen were investigated following a series on ABC’s Lateline in 2013 that asserted she had been a member of the Catholic Church Professional Standards Resource Group (PSRG) from 1998 to 2005 and destroyed evidence of sexual abuse by clergy members.

Another broadcast said the Catholic Church tried to strike an agreement with police to withhold information about paedophile priests.

In the report tabled in NSW parliament on Friday, it was acknowledged that Insp Cullen’s participation in the PSRG was a conflict of interest with her obligations as a police officer.

However it said there were several factors that significantly mitigated this misconduct, including that she had no intention of any misconduct and there was also no evidence she had destroyed any documents.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By the National Reporting Team’s Lorna Knowles

A senior NSW police officer engaged in misconduct by failing to investigate allegations of child sexual abuse raised during regular meetings with the Catholic Church, the Police Integrity Commission (PIC) has found.

In a report tabled in Parliament late yesterday, the PIC concluded that Inspector Beth Cullen had a conflict of interest by sitting on an internal church advisory panel, known as the Professional Standards Resource Group (PSRG).

This was because she had failed to act on multiple allegations of child sexual abuse raised in the group meetings — in breach of her duty as a police officer.

The Commission noted that while Inspector Cullen had acted in good faith, her misconduct was “not trivial”.

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UTAH
ABC 4

Marcos Ortiz

OGDEN Utah (ABC 4 Utah) – Police say a church choir director did more than make music for the ears. The choir director, Jose Zamarippa is now behind bars accused of having sexual relations with a 12 year old girl who police say was a member of his choir.

The 27-year old was a volunteer choir director at the Rios De Agua Vivo church on Grant Avenue in Ogden.

But over the past two months, investigators claim the relationship turned sexual “That relationship evolved into the exchange of sexually explicit text messages,” said Lt. Lane Findlay of the Weber County Sheriff’s Office. “There were some written notes that were also exchanged and also some nude photos that were exchanged.”

Authorities said Zamarippa who is now in jail had sexual relations with the 12 year old at her Washington Terrace home. The church’s pastor says there was no sign of trouble at his church before this happened.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Sun-Times

WRITTEN BY REEMA AMIN POSTED: 06/18/2015

Two men are claiming in a lawsuit filed Thursday that they were abused by convicted child molester and former priest Daniel McCormack while on a basketball team he coached.

The men, identified only as John J. Doe and John Doe 2, filed the suit in Cook County Circuit Court against the Archidiocese of Chicago and the Catholic Bishop of Chicago.

John J. Doe, born in early 1991, played basketball for a team coached by McCormack based out of the parish in June 2004, the suit said. McCormack would repeteadly hug, pat and rub John J. Doe and inappropriately sexually touched him, the suit claims.

John Doe 2, born in 1988, said he also played basketball for the same team between June 2002 and 2003. He claims he was in or near St. Agatha’s Parish on the West Side when McCormack “exerted an inappropriate physical presence” with hugs and pats and rubs.

The suit claims the Archdiocese knew about but did not properly investigate various sexual abuse complaints against McCormack, including claims he sexually touched sleeping seminarians and abused a minor boy in a Mexico seminarian program.

McCormack was arrested in 2006 and later sentenced to five years in prison after he pleaded guilty to sexually abusing five other children at St. Agatha Catholic Church on the West Side.

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AUSTRALIA
Global Times

Source:Xinhua Published: 2015-6-19

A senior Australian police officer failed to investigate allegations of child sexual abuse during regular meetings with the Catholic Church. Local media reported on Friday the New South Wales (NSW) Police Integrity Commission (PIC) found NSW Police Inspector Beth Cullen had engaged in misconduct by not disclosing a conflict of interest.

The investigation was established after Australia’s national broadcaster aired allegations the NSW Police allowed the Australian Catholic Church tried to make an agreement with NSW authorities allowing it to withhold information about pedophile priests.

The investigation showed that while conflicted, Cullen failed to act on multiple allegations of child sexual abuse raised by an internal Catholic Church advisory panel, of which she was a member in breach of her duty as a police officer.

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UNITED STATES
PopeCrimes& Vatican Evils.

Paris Arrow

Idiots Catholics, especially idiots Americans Catholics, are the front-row cheer leaders of Pope Francis in his Vatican Circus acts and the latest one is his new encyclical on Climate Change – what a joke and lots of hypocrisy – and another Emperor’s New Clothes act. Below are the major 8 key points of the new papal encyclical (an official teaching document for members of the Catholic Church), and our rebuttals.

But first, Pope Francis really surpasses King Solomon in wisdom and in wives.

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INDIA
The Hindu

ZUBEDA HAMID

Rev. C.M. Joseph, a Chennai-based expert on canon law, said that while he could not comment on Fr. Jeyapaul’s case without studying it, more than one course of action was open to the Bishop of the diocese concerned.

“The priest could be suspended from exercising his priestly ministry. This could be for a certain time period after which he would return. Another course of action could be his removal from the priestly ministry altogether,” he said.

While there is no monitoring programme as such for these cases, Rev. Joseph said if there was an allegation, the person is first warned to correct his behaviour, transferred if he fails to do so and if the behaviour continues, the canon law procedure is then initiated.

“But while we wait for this process to be complete, many more children could be exposed to abuse,” said Ms. Reddy.

Fr. Jeyapaul had spent some time in his home diocese before the law caught up with him. On his return to India in August 2005, he came back to the diocese of Ootacamund, a spokesperson said. “He was in charge of school education in the diocese for about a year after he came back, and after that he remained in the diocese,” he said.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Elizabeth Mohr
emohr@pioneerpress.com
POSTED: 06/18/2015

By all accounts, the man appointed by the Vatican to help run the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis is a well-liked, capable bishop.

Archbishop Bernard Hebda, 55, named Monday as apostolic administrator for the archdiocese, is known for his smile, his humility and intelligence.

Parishioners in the Twin Cities can expect Hebda, a Pittsburgh native, to approach the current challenges with compassion, said Father Lou Vallone, a Pittsburgh priest who has known “Bernie” for about 30 years.

“People who have been frustrated by not being heard, he will pay attention to them. People who are kind of put off by standoffish attitudes or embattled attitudes will not find that in him. They’ll find him warm and welcoming,” Vallone said.

Hebda’s appointment was announced at the same time the Vatican accepted the resignations of Archbishop John Nienstedt, who had been at the helm of the archdiocese since 2007, and Bishop Lee Piche, who was named auxiliary bishop in 2009.

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OREGON
Mail Tribune

By Thomas Moriarty
Mail Tribune

Posted Jun. 18, 2015

Federal prosecutors allege a Medford youth pastor arrested in January on burglary and privacy invasion charges transported at least three minors across state lines to produce child pornography.

The indictment, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Medford, charges Donald Courtney Biggs with six counts of attempting to use a minor to produce a visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct, three counts of using a minor to produce a visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct and three counts of transportation with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity with a minor.

The indictment identifies by initials nine victims, three of whom Biggs is alleged to have transported to California.

Biggs, 36, was arrested by Medford police Jan. 15 in connection with an alleged burglary three days prior at Mountain Church, 1 E. Main St., where he had been employed as an administrative and youth pastor. Police said they believe Biggs, who previously had been under investigation for inappropriate text messages he allegedly exchanged with a juvenile congregation member, was attempting to steal computer hard drives from the church.

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INDIA
The Hindu

ZUBEDA HAMID

Activists are worried about how his activities will be monitored in India.

The Catholic priest from Tamil Nadu, Joseph Palanivel Jeyapaul, who was convicted of sexually abusing a teenage girl in Minnesota, U.S., after serving sentence, is set to return, sparking concern among activists in the State about how the activities of such convicted offenders will be monitored. Going by reports in the western media, Fr. Jeyapaul will be returning as his sentence of one year and one day in prison has already been served in custody.

The issue raises serious questions of monitoring and supervision of convicted sexual offenders, especially those who work with children, said Vidya Reddy of Tulir – Centre for Prevention and Healing of Child Abuse. “I am not saying people should not be given a second chance, but what is the monitoring system that is put in place to ensure they do not work with children and young people again,” she asked, adding, “the biggest societal blind spot we all have is the repetitiveness of most abusers.”

Criminal charges were filed against Fr. Jeyapaul, 60, in December 2006 for an offence dating back to the time he served as a priest in the diocese of Crookston, Minnesota in 2004 and 2005. He was held in Erode in Tamil Nadu in March 2012 and extradited to the U.S. in November 2014.

The diocese of Ootacamund, to which Fr. Jeyapaul has been attached since 1982, is yet to decide on the action to be taken against him. A.S. Selvanathan, a spokesperson for the diocese, said, “The diocese will take a decision in the matter only after we get confirmed facts about the judgment.”

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CANADA
CTV

The Canadian Press

Published Thursday, June 18, 2015

VANCOUVER — The freelance journalist suing John Furlong for defamation says she knew that a man who accused the former Olympics boss of sexual abuse had conflicting claims of abuse.
The trial has heard that the man and two women filed lawsuits alleging Furlong had sexually abused them while they were students at a Roman Catholic school in Burns Lake, B.C., in 1969 and 1970.

Laura Robinson testified under cross-examination that she presented a paper at a 2013 sports conference in Denmark that the included allegations of sexual abuse against Furlong by the three accusers.

One woman dropped her suit while the other two were dismissed earlier this year — and the man was found to have received $138,000 in compensation for abuse he alleged to have suffered at a different school during the same time period.

Robinson told the trial that she knew of the man’s compensation claim, but added that it wasn’t unusual for First Nations students to be ferried between schools even during the same year.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

By Michael D. Sorkin0

Monsignor Joseph D. Pins was pastor of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis and his funeral Mass will be celebrated there next week.

He died this week of cancer at age 70, the Archdiocese of St. Louis announced Thursday.

The Cathedral, 4431 Lindell Boulevard, is still known as the “New Cathedral,” although the first Mass was celebrated there in 1914. It is the seat of the archbishop and is considered the spiritual center of the archdiocese.

Monsignor Pins was named rector there in 2004. …

A spokesman for the Archdiocese said he could not answer any questions about Monsignor Pins or his accomplishments that weren’t included in a news release about his death.

Monsignor Pins is named in a pending civil lawsuit accusing the Archdiocese and the archbishop of covering up for a priest, the Rev. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang. The priest was accused of molesting a teenage girl in Lincoln County. The suit claims the archbishop and the monsignor ignored Jiang’s requests to reassign the priest from the New Cathedral, where he met the girl. Criminal charges in the case have been dropped.

In 2004, Monsignor Pins was named to a newly created post of episcopal vicar at the St. Louis Review. That put him in charge of the archdiocesan newspaper, representing the archbishop.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Nick Murray, CBC News

Convicted sex­ offender and former priest Eric Dejaeger will plead guilty to three Alberta­-based charges that date to the mid-1970s.

Dejaeger is charged with two sexual offences and failure to appear in court. The offences were allegedly committed in the period between 1975 and 1978 when he was studying at the Newman Theological College in Edmonton.

Dejaeger had applied to have his Alberta charges heard in Nunavut. He’s in the process of having those charges “waived” from Alberta to Nunavut, which means he’s agreed to plead guilty to them and will be sentenced in Nunavut.

The Alberta Crown prosecutor’s office said Dejaeger had signed the waiver shortly after being convicted last year in Iqaluit of sex-­related charges involving Inuit children when he was serving as a priest in Igloolik between 1978 and 1982.

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CANADA
Nunatsiaq Online

DAVID MURPHY

Crown prosecutors are still waiting on the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench to send information to Nunavut regarding three outstanding charges against ex-priest Eric Dejaeger.

That’s what court heard June 18 at the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit.

According to the NCJ criminal court docket, which lists the names of accused people and the charges they face, the three charges against Dejaeger include: one sex assault, one sexual interference with someone under the age of 16 years, and another charge of failure to comply with a summons.

Those charges stem from incidents alleged to have occurred in Alberta from 1975 and 1978.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

SNAP to Archbishop “Take priest’s passport”
Twice-accused cleric is a flight risk, victims say
Group urges that he NOT be put back on the job
Catholic officials should “come clean” about two cases
“Carlson should say where predator priest is living now,” SNAP says

What:
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims will prod St. Louis’ archbishop to

–keep a twice-accused cleric on suspension,
–disclose his whereabouts,
–take his passport so he can’t flee overseas, and
–publicly answer troubling questions about the cleric and his relationship to the archbishop.

They will also urge anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered the twice-accused priest’s crimes to call “independent sources of help, like therapists, police, prosecutors or support groups.”

When:
TODAY, Thursday, June 18 at 2:00 p.m.

Where:
Outside the St. Louis Cathedral on Lindell at Taylor in the city’s Central West End

Who:
Three-four members of a support group called SNAP (the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests)

Why:
Yesterday, prosecutors dropped child sex abuse charges against a twice-accused archdiocesan priest with close ties to St. Louis’ top Catholic official but said they hope to re-file the case later. Even though a civil child sex abuse case against the priest is pending, church staff have hinted that the suspended cleric may be put back to work in a parish. SNAP opposes that potential move and wants church staff to take the priest’s passport to prevent him from fleeing the US.

Despite an official national church policy mandating “openness” in pedophile priest cases, Archbishop Robert Carlson refuses to reveal where Fr. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang is living, why he had a bedroom in Carlson’s home and why Fr. Jiang followed Carlson from city to city (a highly unusual arrangement in the Catholic church). Carlson also refuses to address an allegation that Fr. Jiang admitted to a girl’s parents that he’d molested their daughter and that Carlson tried to get the parents to give him the $20,000 check that the priest reportedly left on their car windshield. SNAP wants Carlson to honor his pledges to be “transparent” and publicly disclose this information.

Carlson only real response to these accusations was an eight-page civil legal filing in which he calls “baseless” the charge that he tried to tamper with evidence. On five other charges, however, Carlson basically argues that he can’t be held responsible even if the allegations in the case are true. Carlson’s lawyers want the entire civil case tossed out.

The civil suit charges that Carlson “knew (Fr. Jiang) was dangerous to children before (a girl) was abused,” last summer, asked the alleged victim’s parents for a $20,000 check the priest had given them, committing “the criminal offense of attempted tampering with evidence,” because he reportedly suggested that the girl’s parents “return to him the check.” (The parents, however, had given it to police.)

SNAP says that Carlson is “opting to fight on the technicalities, not on the merits” and “ignoring his promises of openness while adopting maneuvers of defense that cloud, rather than clarify the situation,” as he has in dozens of other, older clergy sex abuse and cover up cases.

Fr. Jiang was arrested in June 2012 for repeatedly molesting a Lincoln County girl numerous times in 2012 (mostly in her home). He was charged with alleged child sex crimes and “victim tampering.” Those charges were dismissed in November 2013. In April 2014, he was arrested on charges of repeatedly molesting a St. Louis city boy between 2011-2012 (at a Catholic school). SNAP notes that it’s possible Fr. Jiang abused the boy while out on bond on charges of molesting the girl.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By JOANNE McCARTHY June 18, 2015

TERRY Skippen was 13 in 1960 when he was sexually abused in his classroom by Hunter Marist Brother Romuald, and 65 in 2012 when he became the first of Romuald’s victims to make a statement to police.

He told a judge last week he wanted to be identified to send a message to other victims of child sexual abuse – whether decades ago in institutions like the Catholic Church, or now, by a family member.

“I’m speaking to the media to plead with people who are victims of abuse not to live in silence,” Mr Skippen said.

“Please come forward, speak to someone, for the sake of yourself to get peace of mind and your families who have to live with the consequences of the abuse.”

Mr Skippen worked for Maitland-Newcastle diocese for decades, as a St Vincent de Paul Society finance committee member, parish administrative associate and diocesan finance committee member.

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UNITED STATES
Gallup

PRINCETON, N.J. — Americans’ confidence in the church and organized religion has fallen dramatically over the past four decades, hitting an all-time low this year of 42%. Confidence in religion began faltering in the 1980s, while the sharpest decline occurred between 2001 and 2002 as the Roman Catholic Church grappled with a major sexual abuse scandal. Since then, periodic improvements have proved temporary, and it has continued to ratchet lower.

Confidence Steadies Among U.S. Catholics

U.S. Protestants’ confidence in the church and organized religion also hit a new low this year, with 51% now saying they have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in it. While confidence among U.S. Catholics is also at 51%, this represents a steadying after more than a decade of varying confidence during which their ratings reached as low as 39%.

Although confidence among Protestants has been sliding since 2009, Catholics’ has remained above 50% each of the last two years, the first time it has achieved this since 2003-2004. The leadership of the popular Pope Francis, including his recent initiative to hold high-ranking leaders of the Catholic Church accountable for their role in past child sex abuse scandals, may be a factor.

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UNITED STATES
WTSP

(USA Today) Americans have less confidence in organized religion today than ever measured before — a sign that the church could be “losing its footing as a pillar of moral leadership in the nation’s culture,” a new Gallup survey finds.

“In the ’80s the church and organized religion were the No. 1″ in Gallup’s annual look at confidence in institutions, said Lydia Saad, author of the report released Wednesday.

Confidence, she said, “is a value judgment on how the institution is perceived, a mark of the amount of respect it is due.” A slight upsurge for Catholic confidence, for example, parallels the 2013 election and immense popularity of Pope Francis.

Overall, church and organized religion is now ranked in fourth place in the Gallup survey — behind the military, small business and the police — while still ahead of the medical system, Congress and the media, among 15 institutions measured.

“Almost all organizations are down but the picture for religion is particularly bleak,” said Saad.

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UNITED STATES
Church and State

By Betty Clermont | 7 June 2015
Daily Kos

The UN Committee against Torture “found that the widespread sexual violence within the Catholic Church amounted to torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.” After Vatican officials were called to Geneva in May 2014 to respond to tough questions like why the pope believed his responsibility for protecting children against torture only applied on Vatican property, the committee issued its report.

The members “ordered the Vatican to hand over files containing details of clerical sexual abuse allegations to police forces around the world, … to use its authority over the Roman Catholic Church worldwide to ensure all allegations of clerical abuse are passed on to the secular authorities and to impose ‘meaningful sanctions’ on any Church officials who fail to do so.” With the exception of a couple of staged PR events, the pope has refused to take any of these measures.

The Vatican had issued an “Initial Report” preparatory to the hearing. “Nowhere in the Holy See’s [the name of the Church’s global government] Initial Report under the Convention does it make any mention of the widespread and systemic rape and sexual violence committed by Catholic clergy against hundreds of thousands of children and vulnerable adults around the world. There is no mention of acts that have resulted in an astonishing and incalculable amount of harm around the world – profound and lasting physical and mental suffering – with little to no accountability and access to redress … [T]he Vatican has consistently minimized the harm caused by the actions of the clergy, through both the direct acts of sexual violence and Church officials’ actions which follow, such as cover-ups and victim-blaming. … The Holy See’s Initial Report to this Committee is itself evidence of the minimization of these offenses and the resulting harm.”

The Committee against Torture report came “after senior officials sought to distance the Vatican legally from the wider Church … saying priests were not legally tied to the Vatican but fell under national jurisdictions. But the committee insisted that officials of the Holy See – including the pope’s representatives around the world and their aides – have a responsibility to monitor the behavior of all under their ‘effective control.’”

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VATICAN CITY
Bolletino

[Laudato Si]

Your Eminences, Your Excellencies, distinguished guests, distinguished representatives of the media, all who are following by radio and television and on internet, ladies and gentlemen, dear friends,

First of all, I greet all of you warmly on behalf of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, which is honoured to have been called to assist the Holy Father in his teaching ministry by helping to prepare the Encyclical Letter Laudato si’.

A very cordial welcome to the presenters, who are:

– His Eminence, the Metropolitan of Pergamo, John Zizioulas, representing the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Orthodox Church, who will speak to us of the theology and spirituality with which the Encyclical opens and closes.

– Prof. John Schellnhuber, founder and director of the Postdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. He represents the natural sciences, with which the Encyclical enters into in-depth dialogue. Congratulations on his nomination as a full member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences which also contributed significantly to the Encyclical.

– Prof. Carolyn Woo, President of Catholic Relief Services and former dean of the Mendoza College of Business at Notre Dame University. She represents the economic, financial, business and commercial sectors whose responses to the major environmental challenges are so crucial. …

The various issues treated in the Encyclical are placed within this framework. In the different chapters, they are picked up and continuously enriched starting from different perspectives (cf. n. 16):

* the intimate relationship between the poor and the fragility of the planet;
* the conviction that everything in the world is intimately connected;
* the critique of the new paradigm and the forms of power that arise from technology;
* the value proper to each creature; the human meaning of ecology;
* the need for forthright and honest debates;
* the serious responsibility of international and local policy;
* the throwaway culture and the proposal for a new style of life; and
* the invitation to search for other ways of understanding economy and progress – this last point being the topic of Prof. Carolyn Woo.

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UNITED STATES
Skip Shea

[Laudato Si]

Today the New York Times published an article titled Pope Francis, in Sweeping Encyclical, Calls for Swift Action on Climate Change by Jim Yardley and Laurie Goldstein which outlines a “radical transformation of politics, economics and individual lifestyles to confront environmental degradation and climate change” by Pope Francis in the latest papal encyclical (an official teaching document for members of the Catholic Church)

The article states:

Francis has made clear that he hopes the encyclical will influence energy and economic policy and stir a global movement. He calls on ordinary people to pressure politicians for change. Bishops and priests around the world are expected to lead discussions on the encyclical in services on Sunday. But Francis is also reaching for a wider audience when in the first pages of the document he asks “to address every person living on this planet.”

Even before the release, Francis’ unflinching stance against environmental destruction, and his demand for global action, had already thrilled many scientists. In recent weeks, advocates of policies to combat climate change have expressed hope that Francis could lend a “moral dimension” to the debate, because winning scientific arguments was different from moving people to action.

Francis believes, being the Pope and all, will add a moral dimension to help stir a global movement. There seems to be a real sense of urgency here.

Which is one of the best closing techniques of any good salesperson. For instance if you don’t buy the house now that other couple is about to put in an offer, if you don’t put on sunscreen you will die of skin cancer or if you don’t come to our church and worship our God you will spend eternity in Hell. Things like that.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

Please consider reading Pope Francis’ final Climate Encyclical here.

After a two year “honeymoon period”, more Catholics are increasingly questioning the actions of the media magnified Pope Francis. This is especially the case as the pope’s ongoing deeds continually fall short of his earlier words. Recent polls show US Catholics are less positive increasingly toward the pope on the environment and the priest sex abuse scandal. A global poll last year showed that most Catholics oppose the pope’s position on contraception and actually support birth control. And Irish Catholic voters recently overwhelmingly rejected the pope’s position on same sex civil marriage. Some see the pope’s “over-hyped” new encyclical on climate change (Climate Encyclical) as the pope’s desperate way of trying positively to change the subject from so much of the negative reporting he now steadily faces.

Pope Francis knows that in a few months he will make a critical visit to the USA, followed by his final “all celibate male bishops” Family Synod on updating the Catholic Church’s positions on sexual morality. Francis should know by now that the Synod will likely once again strongly oppose contraception and same sex marriage. Banning contraception contributes to global warming obviously, despite Pope Francis’ disingenuous efforts in the Climate Encyclical in effect to deny this. Pope Francis also seems to know that he must continue to try to avoid any US presidential or Congressional investigations into the Vatican’s longstanding priest child abuse cover up, as are presently underway in Australia, the UK and elsewhere.

Pope Francis faces many unfolding scandals, including those related to the priest child abuse and to bishops who appear to cover up the abuse, such as Cardinal George Pell of Australia, Archbishop John Nienstedt of Minneapolis (USA) and Bishop Juan Barros of Chile, and even to the scandal of alleged child abuse by former US House Speaker, Dennis Hastert , as well as to the pope’s major defeat by Irish voters.

The pope’s basic message in the Climate Encyclical, and in currently reaffirming therein the earlier encyclical of Pope Paul VI, Humanae Vitae, that banned the birth control pill in 1968, is that the world, especially Catholics, need to increase the number of humans by avoiding effective contraception, and then, to reduce global warming by having this resulting larger number of humans consume even less. That makes little sense, for the poor or anyone else. Once again, despite papal pontifications to the contrary, the Vatican is in effect sacrificing the poor, especially many millions of children and women, to maximize papal power and wealth tied to the papal claim of infallibility.

Pope Francis cleverly in his “over-hyped” Climate Encyclical seeks to preserve pro-actively and premptively the unique cornerstone of papal power since 1870 — infallibility. In the minds of millions of Catholics, infallibility has been essentially linked, after Pope Pius XI’s 1930 geo-politically motivated ban on birth control, to all subsequent popes’ opposition to effective family planning, including contraception, as “sinful”.

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UNITED STATES
PopeCrimes& Vatican Evils.

Paris Arrow

Concerning the resignations, below are our 3 REBUTTALS to the official letters of
– Archbishop Nienstedt
– Bishop Lee A. Piché, Auxiliary Bishop of Saint Paul and Minneapolis
– Archbishop Bernard A. Hebda, Apostolic Administrator of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis

Vatican Empire PR campaign: Make Nienstedt and Piché disappear like chameleons

A chameleon changes color and blends in with its environment to deceive its captor’s eyes, and by making itself seemingly invisible, it avoids getting caught and gobbled up. Becoming chameleons are what Archbishop Nienstedt and Auxiliary Bishop Lee A. Piché are doing by resigning days after the Ramsey County Office of the Attorney laid criminal charges against the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for which (as everyone already know) they are part of the guilty leaders responsible for the crimes.

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MINNESOTA
Legal Examiner

Posted by Joe Crumley
June 16, 2015

Hopefully no one will miss the approaching deadline for claims against the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, August 3rd. In the confusion following the resignation of Archbishop John Nienstedt and his Adjutant Bishop yesterday, people may miss the August 3rd deadline. Almost none of the big stories mentioned this very important date.

Nationally renowned priest abuse attorney Jeff Anderson’s website details instructions. There are a number of key points:

• You must file a claim by August 3rd.
• Your privacy and confidentiality can be protected.
• Filing your claim can help you and help protect children.

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MINNESOTA
KTTC

Presbyteral Assembly gives Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis priests a chance to discuss current pressing issues, notably sex abuse scandals

ROCHESTER, Minn. (KTTC) — Just two days after Archbishop John Neinstedt’s resignation, and two weeks after word the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis would face criminal charges for allegedly failing to protect children against sexual predator priests, Neinstedt’s interim replacement came to Rochester to celebrate mass with the priests of the Archdiocese.

Pope Francis himself named Archbishop Bernard Hebda to the position of the Apostolic Administrator of Twin Cities diocese.

Hebda celebrated mass just after 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning with priests gathered at the Church of St. John the Evangelist in Rochester. Most priests, both active in the ministry and retired, gathered for the Presbyteral Assembly of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. This assembly happens every two years in Rochester, and it runs through Thursday.

The assembly is a time of fellowship, and a chance to discuss issues facing priests and their ministries. Reporters weren’t allowed inside the mass on Wednesday morning, and the priests we spoke with preferred not to talk specifics about their meetings.

It’s no question that there’s a lot of pain among leaders of the Church and the priesthood. The lingering question for so many is as follows: How do we move forward in the wake of the sex abuse scandals?

Thanks to the writings of two Minnesota priests in their church bulletins, just this past weekend, we have a better grasp of their thoughts and feelings in this Presbyteral Assembly.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Telegraph

Sydney’s Jewish community taking action to detect child sex abuse in wake of Royal Commission findings

ROBBIE PATTERSON WENTWORTH COURIER JUNE 18, 2015

TWENTY prominent rabbis from across Sydney attended a seminar on child sex abuse at Jewish House in Bondi on Monday.

Rabbi Mendel Kastel, chief executive officer of Jewish House, said it was a direct result of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

At the commission, disgraced Rabbi Yosef Feldman came under fire for his comments regarding child sex abuse “hype” and the need for paedophiles to receive greater leniency.

The former director of the Yeshiva Centre at Bondi also told the commission that he did not know it was illegal for a man to touch a child’s genitals when he had to deal with an abuse complaint in 2002.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Money Week

By: Chris Carter
18/06/2015

The discovery of the body of Roberto Calvi dangling from scaffolding beneath Blackfriars Bridge by a passer-by on the morning of 18 June 1982 had all the hallmarks of a Hollywood thriller.

Nicknamed ‘God’s banker’, Calvi was the chairman of Italian bank Banco Ambrosiano, in which the Vatican bank was a major shareholder. But the bank had been engaged in some very unholy activities, and by 1982, it was on the verge of collapse. The bank was £800m in the red, and owed money to the Sicilian mafia among others.

Calvi was “a brilliant financier”, The Independent wrote in 2005. “And though shy and socially gauche, he combined a lightening accountant’s brain with recklessness in a very Italian fashion”.

It was while in custody for illegal foreign currency dealings that Calvi tried to kill himself by slashing his wrists and taking an overdose. But he lived to be released on appeal, and on 11 June, a week before his death, he fled to London, taking with him a briefcase stuffed with incriminating documents.

Clearly not wanting to be found, he shaved off his moustache and checked into a nondescript £40-a-night hotel in Chelsea. Meanwhile, back in Italy, his secretary threw herself from a fourth-floor window. In her suicide note, she blamed Calvi for the bank’s demise, and Calvi was relieved of his duties as chairman.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Chronicle Live

BY WILL METCALFE

George Granville Gibson is accused of eight sex charges, some of which are said to have taken place in Consett, in the 1970s and 1980s

A former County Durham archdeacon has denied a string of historic sex offences dating back to the 1970s and 1980s.

George Granville Gibson, often known as Granville, appeared before Newton Aycliffe Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday facing eight allegations of historic sex abuse which are said to have taken place in Newton Aycliffe and Consett from 1977 to 1983.

The 79-year-old former Archdeacon of Auckland wore a charcoal suit with a blue shirt and pink tie and spoke to confirm his name, and enter not guilty pleas to all charges.

Gibson is alleged to have carried out four sexual assaults against a man aged 16 or over in Newton Aycliffe and Consett between 1977 and 1978.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Emily Laurence

Former Marist Brother Francis Cable has been sentenced to at least eight years’ prison for sex offences against 19 students at schools in Sydney and New South Wales’ Hunter region in the 1960s and 1970s.

The 83-year-old, also known as Brother Romuald, was given a maximum sentence of 16 years.

He had pleaded guilty to crimes against 17 boys in March, after a jury earlier found him guilty of 13 offences against two other boys.

More than 30 abuse survivors and supporters clapped and cheered as Judge Peter Whitford handed down the sentence in Sydney’s District Court.

Judge Whitford said Cable’s “abhorrent” and “cruel” offences over 15 years were motivated by sexual gratification.

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AUSTRALIA
Sky News

A Marist Brother has been sentenced to at least eight years in prison for sexually assaulting 19 schoolboys in NSW over a 15-year period.

Francis William Cable, known as Brother Romuald, was found guilty over four counts of buggery and 21 counts of indecent assault at Catholic schools where he taught in the Hunter region and Sydney between 1960 and 1974.

Victims and their supporters cheered and clapped in a Sydney court as Justice Peter Whitford handed down the sentence on Thursday.

In sentencing Cable, Judge Whitford said the 83-year-old systematically abused his position of power as a teacher and schoolmaster to prey on the schoolboys.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

June 18, 2015

Paul Bibby
Court Reporter

One of the state’s worst Catholic school paedophiles, who brutally raped and assaulted at least 17 vulnerable boys over the course of 15 years, is set to die in jail after being sentenced to a maximum of 16 years’ jail.

The victims of Francis William Cable and their relatives let out a cheer of vindication as the 83-year-old was sentenced in the Downing Centre District Court on Thursday.

Cable used his position as a technical drawing teacher and class master at the Marist Brothers Catholic school in Maitland and its sister school in the Sydney suburb of Pagewood to repeatedly abuse vulnerable students under his authority between 1960 and 1974.

The boys were repeatedly fondled, anally raped and forced to give the teacher oral sex.

Cable, known at the schools by his religious name, Brother Romuald, would threaten the students with physical violence, expulsion and social isolation if they reported his crimes, which he frequently justified by reference to quasi religious doctrine.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Mail

The frail monster with a walking stick: Victims cheer as Catholic teacher is jailed for at least eight years for horrific abuse during 15-year reign of terror

By Belinda Grant Geary For Daily Mail Australia and AAP

A former Marist Brother has been sentenced to at least eight years in prison for sexually abusing 19 schoolboys in Catholic schools across New South Wales.

Francis William Cable, also known as Brother Romuald, was found guilty on four counts of buggery and 21 counts of indecent assault.

The 83-year-old preyed on school boys he taught at Marist colleges at Maitland, located in the Lower Hunter Valley, and Pagewood, located in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, between 1960 and 1974.

Victims cheered as Judge Peter Whitford handed down the sentence in Sydney’s District Court on Thursday.

According to the ABC, Judge Whitford said Cable’s ‘abhorrent’ behaviour was fuelled by a need for sexual gratification and that his ‘predatory conduct’ persisted because he failed to understand the impact his ‘cruel’ actions had on his young victims.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Paedophile Francis William Cable: Victims speak out about horrific abuse at Marist Brothers schools

June 18, 2015

Paul Bibby
Court Reporter

From the top of the steps at Sydney’s Downing Centre court complex the past two-and-a-half years seemed “like an eternity” to Terry Kippen.

Moments before he had watched as Francis William Cable – one of the state’s worst Catholic school paedophiles – was slowly taken away by prison officers to serve a maximum 16-year prison term.

For decades Cable had quietly gone about his daily life as Mr Skippen and 18 other men struggled to cope with the consequences of the horrific abuse he had inflicted on them at Marist Brothers schools in Newcastle and Sydney between 1960 and 1974.

But at the beginning of 2013 Terry broke his silence and went to police.

“I had to do something,” Terry said after Cable, 83, was sentenced on Thursday.

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NEW YORK
Albany Times Union

Chris Churchill

Colonie

Retired Archbishop Harry Flynn was supposed to be sunshine amid the dark clouds of the pedophile priest scandal.

The Schenectady native — a former pastor at St. Ambrose Parish in Latham and emeritus head of the Minneapolis-St. Paul Archdiocese — emerged decades ago as a national leader in reforming how the Catholic Church dealt with potentially dangerous priests.

But Flynn’s reputation has been tainted by a criminal complaint claiming that he and other leaders of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis did too little to shield victims from predator priests.

“We are alleging a disturbing institutional and systemic pattern of behavior committed by the highest levels of leadership of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis over the course of decades,” said Ramsey County Attorney John Choi as he announced the criminal charges filed against the Minnesota diocese earlier this month. “The archdiocese’s failures have caused great suffering by the victims and their family and betrayed our entire community.”

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Jun. 18, 2015

VATICAN CITY
Pope Francis has clearly embraced what he calls a “very solid scientific consensus” that humans are causing cataclysmic climate change that is endangering the planet. The pope has also lambasted global political leaders for their “weak responses” and lack of will over decades to address the issue.

In what has already been the most debated papal encyclical letter in recent memory, Francis urgently calls on the entire world’s population to act, lest we leave to coming generations a planet of “debris, desolation and filth.”

“An outsider looking at our world would be amazed at [our] behavior, which at times appears self-destructive,” the pope writes at one point in the letter, titled: “Laudato Si’, on Care for Our Common Home.”

Addressing world leaders directly, Francis asks: “What would induce anyone, at this stage, to hold on to power only to be remembered for their inability to take action when it was urgent and necessary to do so?”

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By JOANNE MCCARTHY June 17, 2015

UP TO 30 perpetrators over four decades have molested children – including the children of priests – within the Anglican diocese of Newcastle, an emotional Bishop Greg Thompson said in an extraordinary interview after apologising to victims and the community on Wednesday.

Bishop Thompson marked his 500th day as head of the church in the Hunter by telling clergy ‘‘We can’t have mates looking after mates any more’’, and revealing some of the dark secrets being investigated by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

‘‘Some of our photos of clergy on the walls are going to be difficult to hang on the walls after the royal commission,’’ he said.

‘‘What is being revealed is the shadow lives of some.

‘‘They had this sense of self-entitlement that meant they had sexual relations with children as if that was a part of the role.’’

Bishop Thompson spoke of the shock he experienced after hearing ‘‘how things were done’’.

‘‘It told me it wasn’t just about bad apples, but about how the system failed the victims,’’ he said.

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VATICAN CITY
Chiesa

Pages selected from the letter “Laudato si’” addressed by the pope to “every person living on this planet.” In parentheses, the numbers of the paragraphs from which the passages were taken

Selected by Sandro Magister

THE INCIPIT (1 and 2)

“Laudato si’, mi’ Signore” – “Praise be to you, my Lord”. In the words of this beautiful canticle, Saint Francis of Assisi reminds us that our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us:

“Praise be to you, my Lord, through our Sister, Mother Earth, who sustains and governs us, and who produces various fruit with coloured flowers and herbs”.

This sister now cries out to us because of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Jason Proctor, CBC News

John Furlong’s lawyer claimed Wednesday journalist Laura Robinson tried to destroy the former Vancouver Olympics CEO’s reputation with a 2012 story about allegations of abuse at a Burns Lake Catholic school.

John Hunter’s cross-examination of the freelance reporter began in B.C. Supreme Court with a testy exchange.

“Your whole intention was to bring down Mr. Furlong, wasn’t it? he asked Robinson.

“That’s incorrect,” she replied.

‘Had the goods’

Robinson is suing Furlong for defamation in relation to statements he made in several responses to her Georgia Straight article. She says he implied she was unethical, cruel and motivated by a personal vendetta.

She claims to have suffered financial, emotional and physical damage.

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UNITED STATES
Sticking the Corners

June 17, 2015 by Jennifer Fitz

In yesterday’s installment in this series on preventing and stopping sexual abuse, I created three pairs of fictional scenarios. Scene A was a typical case of ordinary parish life mishaps; Scene B was covert sexual abuse. Today I want to explain how I crafted those pairs, and what the hallmarks of covert abuse were that I put into all the Scene B’s.

Let’s pause here and encourage you to read up on this subject elsewhere. My analysis below isn’t based on statistical modeling, and I don’t have academic credentials to hand you. This is just me taking what I’ve seen and heard, both from my own experience with sexual abuse cases (limited) and reading and listening to the accounts of others. I’m writing what I am not because I’m the world’s expert, but because this topic is so important that you can’t just sit around hoping someone more impressive will come along and answer all the questions. I hope they will. But meanwhile, we who’ve been in the trenches just share what we know.

So I write this because I know how difficult it is to put your finger on why something is not right when you are presented with a case of covert abuse, and how important it is to step in and act at this stage, before the child porn and the sodomy and the rape get going.

This is me explaining the ingredients I put into my scenarios yesterday that, in my experience, are common characteristics of covert abuse:

1. Inappropriate Intimacy: Behavior Doesn’t Match Context

Covert abusers use normal situations as their cover-story for why they are so physically close to their victims. We know of many situations in which we come into close physical contact with another person, whether it’s in sports, or medicine, or day-to-day childcare. Physical touch in the form of a chaste hug, appropriate hand-holding, or other gestures of affection or solidarity are normal and healthy. Very young children need diapers changed or assistance potty-training, and often need to be held or carried. As a teacher or caregiver, you may have situations where you have to address sexual issues, such as finding sanitary pads for a student who’s surprised by her period or telling a young man to pull up his pants (underwear showing at the waist) or zip his fly.

The difference between abuse and normal care is that the abuser uses the excuse of a normal situation as a cover-up for abnormal behavior. Comparing the pairs of scenarios I wrote:

* It’s normal (though hopefully rare) for a teacher to have to respond to a fashion accident. It’s not normal for a teacher to physically touch a student’s chest or groin as part of “checking the dress code.”

* Normal physical contact in sports or games might involve holding hands, locking wrists, helping someone get up from the floor, correcting an athlete’s posture or position — but it doesn’t involve copping a feel.

* Normal first aid includes washing cuts or checking for other injuries, but if a kid comes to you with an ordinary scraped knee, you don’t need to do an inspection of the pelvis.

When you say goodnight to a child, your hands don’t go under the covers. When you are holding a child in the pool, your hands don’t go inside the swimsuit.

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CANADA
The Province

BY KEITH FRASER, THE PROVINCE JUNE 17, 2015

Freelance journalist Laura Robinson denied a suggestion by John Furlong’s lawyer on Wednesday that her intention in investigating him was to bring down the former Vancouver Olympic CEO.

Under questioning from lawyer John Hunter, Robinson also denied a suggestion that she was on a “campaign to discredit” Furlong when she investigated allegations Furlong had physically abused students more than 40 years ago.

The suggestions came during Hunter’s cross-examination of Robinson during her defamation trial against Furlong. She is alleging that Furlong defamed her after her story was published in the Georgia Straight newspaper in September 2012 outlining the physical abuse allegations. Furlong has denied those allegations.

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CANADA
Straight

by Carlito Pablo on June 16th, 2015

John Furlong sat in the back row as freelance journalist Laura Robinson told a courtroom how she suffered from the “unrelenting attack” unleashed by the former Vancouver Olympics CEO.

Her earnings dropped and her health weakened, the B.C. Supreme Court heard at the start of Robinson’s testimony in her defamation suit against the prominent figure.

“We felt that we needed to let the people know that Mr. Furlong had been conducting a campaign of untruths,” Robinson testified today (June 16).

Based on financial statements read out by Robinson’s lawyer, Bryan Baynham, in court, the writer had an income of more than $23,000 in 2012, including the fee she received from the Georgia Straight for an in-depth article on Furlong in that year.

In that piece, Robinson wrote about the omissions made by Furlong about his early years in Canada in his autobiography Patriot Hearts.

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CANADA
Owen Sound Sun Times

By Rob Gowan, Sun Times, Owen Sound
Wednesday, June 17, 2015

A high-profile trial that started in British Columbia earlier this week is of particular interest to some in Grey-Bruce.

The civil trial for journalist Laura Robinson, who lives in Southampton, began at B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver on Monday and is scheduled to run for 10 days. The defamation case — in which Robinson is alleging that former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong’s comments about a 2012 newspaper article she wrote damaged her reputation, career and health — has garnered national media attention.

“Certainly she is very well supported here,” said Maryann Thomas, who is owner of the Ginger Press Bookstore in Owen Sound and has known Robinson for decades. “Her work is very important work and there is a lot of local support for the work she has done in the past and is doing.”

Thomas said she has known Robinson for about 30 years and considers her both a friend and a professional acquaintance. Robinson, who once cycled and rowed at the national level and also competed in cross-country skiing, has been active locally with cross-country skiing and cycling groups, including teaching young athletes at Cape Croker.

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CANADA
The Province

Freelance journalist Laura Robinson denied a suggestion by John Furlong’s lawyer Wednesday that her intention in investigating him was to bring down the former Vancouver Olympic CEO.

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CANADA
Ladysmith Chronicle

By The Canadian Press

VANCOUVER – A freelance journalist says she exchanged scores of emails with John Furlong’s lawyer in the spring of 2012 but received no answers to her questions about Furlong’s past in Burns Lake, B.C.

Laura Robinson is suing the former Vancouver Olympics CEO for defamation over public comments Furlong made after she published an article alleging he abused students while teaching at a B.C. residential school over four decades ago.

She told the civil trial that Furlong’s lawyer, Marvin Storrow, issued a flat denial of the allegations but didn’t answer questions and instead demanded all the information she had collected on Furlong’s past.

Robinson says she eventually sent Storrow six of eight sworn affidavits from former students alleging abuse.

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CANADA
Ladysmith Chronicle

By The Canadian Press

VANCOUVER – A journalist who is suing former Vancouver Olympic CEO John Furlong for defamation says she was devastated and shocked after he implied she tried to extort money from him.

Laura Robinson has told a civil trial that she was deeply disturbed over remarks made by Furlong after her article was published in the Georgia Straight newspaper about his past in Burns Lake, B.C.

The story included allegations by former aboriginal students that Furlong had beaten them and used racial taunts while working as a physical education teacher in the late 1960s and 1970s.

At a news conference after the article was published in September 2012, Furlong said he had not received a single phone call from the newspaper and had also been told at one point that for a payment he could make it go away.

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MASSACHUSETTS
The Herald News

Brian Fraga
Herald News Staff Reporter
June 17, 2015

STATEMENT OF THE FALL RIVER DIOCESE IN RESPONSE TO THE LAWSUIT FILED AGAINST FORMER BISHOP DANIEL A. CRONIN

June 16, 2015

A lawsuit has been filed in a Massachusetts Court against Hartford Archbishop Emeritus Daniel A. Cronin alleging negligence on his part while serving as Bishop of the Fall River Diocese for failure to supervise a priest against whom allegations of abuse have recently been made.

In July 2012 two adult males alleged that they were abused as minors by the Reverend Monsignor Maurice Souza during the late 1970s and early 1980s while they were parishioners of St. Anthony Parish in East Falmouth where Monsignor Souza served as pastor from 1977 to 1986. Monsignor Souza died in 1996 at 83 years old.

Archbishop Cronin was Bishop of Fall River from December 1970 through January 1992 when he was transferred to the Hartford Archdiocese. He retired from that post in 2003.

As noted previously the claims of abuse against Monsignor Souza were first brought to the attention of the Fall River Diocese in July 2012; this was 20 years after Bishop Cronin had left the area. No other allegations of abuse or inappropriate conduct against Monsignor Souza had ever been brought to the attention of the Fall River Diocese nor have any other claims been made since then.

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

By: Cassie Hart

The man named interim leader of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis in the wake of John Nienstedt’s resignation has met with Catholic priests in the state.

Archbishop Bernard Hebda joined several hundred priests in Rochester Wednesday. The Star Tribune reports he celebrated Mass with the priests, but didn’t address the media as he walked to a downtown Rochester hotel.

In an interview Monday with the archdiocese’s newspaper, The Catholic Spirit, Hebda says he’ll split his time between the archdiocese and his current assignment in New Jersey, but the archdiocese is suffering so intends to give it the bulk of his energy.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Herald

Wednesday, June 17, 2015

By: Bob McGovern

A former Bay State bishop is being sued by two men who say he negligently oversaw a priest who allegedly sexually abused them repeatedly for nearly a decade.

Former Bishop of the Fall River Diocese Daniel A. Cronin is being accused of failing to appropriately supervise the late Rev. Monsignor Maurice Souza. Paul Andrews and Daniel Sherwood, the two men who brought the suit, say they were abused as minors by Souza while they were parishioners of St. Anthony Parish in East Falmouth more than 30 years ago.

Cronin went on to become the Hartford Archbishop before retiring from the position in 2003.

“Archbishop Cronin failed to protect innocent children and as a result these children, who are now adults, have suffered life-lasting serious harm,” attorney Mitchell Garabedian said. “One has to wonder how many children were sexually abused by Monsignor Souza and why proper supervision did not take place.”

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CANADA
CKNW

Vancouver, BC, Canada / (CKNW AM) AM980
Marcella Bernardo
June 17, 2015

The defamation trial between journalist Laura Robinson and former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong went into its third day on Wednesday.

Robinson continues her testimony, explaining how she mapped out a story suggesting Furlong abused teenagers more than four decades ago.

She is still under direct examination by her lawyer Bryan Baynham. Her cross-examination is slated to start later Wednesday.

Her 2012 article in the Georgia Straight newspaper claimed Furlong beat First Nations students when he taught at a private Catholic school in Burns Lake.

Furlong responded with his own accusations the story was not true and Robinson was a shoddy reporter with a personal vendetta.

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FLORIDA
WFTV

[with video]

SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. — Channel 9’s Tim Barber was in court Wednesday where a Winter Springs pastor dodged up to five years in prison.

Deputies said the Rev. Cesar Chin accepted a plea deal after investigators said he covered up years of sexual abuse by one of his church members.

“Mr. Chin will withdraw his previously entered plea of not guilty and enter a plea of guilty,” Chin’s defense attorney said in court.

Chone admitted to covering up the sexual abuse, but he will not serve prison time.

Deputies said Chin knew for more than a year that one of his church members was sexually abusing several kids. Instead of calling 911, the pastor tried counseling the member, authorities said.

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MINNESOTA
Minnesota Public Radio

Jon Collins Jun 17, 2015

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis is seeking to hire a former federal prosecutor to fend off criminal and civil charges filed against the archdiocese in Ramsey County earlier this month.

The hiring of Joseph Dixon III of the Fredrikson & Byron law firm would cost the cash-strapped archdiocese about $400 an hour, which Dixon said in an engagement letter “represents a substantial discount” over his normal rates. The assistance of a second associate at the firm would cost the

The archdiocese is asking the bankruptcy court to allow the expenses in order to protect its assets from repercussions of the Ramsey County charges.

“The County Attorney Actions are directed against the Archdiocese as an entity, rather than against any individuals within the Archdiocese organization, and require immediate response by the Archdiocese,” according to documents filed by the archdiocese Tuesday. “The County Attorney Actions may affect the availability to the estate of insurance coverage for claims based on the same facts.”

The archdiocese is also arguing that a conviction in the criminal case could increase the archdiocese’s liability in claims related to clergy abuse.

“The criminal action against the Archdiocese could have serious repercussions on the estate’s finances, which relies on the goodwill and support of parishioners,” the archdiocese argues in the court filings.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

By Lilly Fowler

Criminal charges against the Rev. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang – a Roman Catholic priest with close ties to Archbishop Robert Carlson who has been twice accused of sexual abuse – have been dismissed.

In a statement, prosecutors within the St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office said they had on Tuesday dismissed the charges against Jiang, saying only that “the state is unable to proceed at this time.”

“The statute of limitations in this case does not run (out) for another 35 years. The office remains hopeful that charges will be refiled in the future,” read the statement.

Prosecutors had charged Jiang with two felony counts of first-degree statutory sodomy. The case involved a young boy at St. Louis the King School, the elementary school at the St. Louis Cathedral Basilica.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

Associated Press JUNE 17, 2015

ST. PAUL, Minn. — In a story June 16 about the resignation of Archbishop John Nienstedt of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, The Associated Press reported erroneously that Jennifer Haselberger was an archivist in the church. Haselberger, who accused church leaders of covering up allegations of clergy abuse, was a canon lawyer for the archdiocese.

A corrected version of the story is below:

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DEUTSCHLAND
Berliner Morgenpost

[Jesuit Father Mertes: Church must consistently enlighten on abuse]

Der Jesuitenpater Klaus Mertes hat die katholische Kirche aufgefordert, Fälle von sexuellem Missbrauch in den eigenen Reihen weiter konsequent aufzuklären.

„Prävention setzt voraus, dass aufgeklärt wurde“, sagte er am Montag bei einer Fachtagung zu sexualisierter Gewalt in der katholischen Kirche in Hannover. „Erst die Aufklärung deckt Fehler auf.“ Wenn hier nicht weitergearbeitet werde, verliere die Prävention ihre Glaubwürdigkeit.

Mertes, heute Direktor des Internats St. Blasien im Schwarzwald, hatte 2010 als damaliger Leiter des Canisius-Kollegs in Berlin die Aufklärung von Missbrauchsfällen in der katholischen Kirche ins Rollen gebracht. Die Berliner Morgenpost hatte die Missbrauchsfälle damals publik gemacht. An dem Gymnasium hatten sich zwei Padres hundertfach an Schülern vergangen. Danach waren zahlreiche weitere Fälle ans Licht gekommen, weil sich immer mehr Betroffene meldeten, die von Priestern oder Ordensleuten in Deutschland sexuell missbraucht worden waren, teilweise bereits vor Jahrzehnten.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Katholisch

[“Sunlight is the best disinfectant” – as described at the beginning of the last century Louis Brandeis, Judge at the United States Supreme Court, the benefits of transparency and openness for the community. This is an insight that has taken a long time to catch on in the church.]

Bonn – 17.06.2015

“Sonnenlicht ist das beste Desinfektionsmittel” – so beschrieb am Anfang des letzten Jahrhunderts Louis Brandeis, Richter am obersten Gerichtshof der USA, den Nutzen von Transparenz und Öffentlichkeit für das Gemeinwesen.

Das ist eine Einsicht, die in der Kirche sehr lange gebraucht hat, bis sie sich durchsetzen konnte. In der Aufdeckung sexuellen Missbrauchs in der Kirche taucht ein Motiv immer wieder auf: Den Opfern wurde nicht geglaubt, Kritik von außen war Angriff, Kritik von innen “Nestbeschmutzung”. Kurz: Man glaubte, die Institution durch “Diskretion” zu schützen. Heute nennt man die Dinge auch in der Kirche beim Namen und spricht selbstverständlich von “Vertuschung”. Selbst Bischöfe und Nuntien sind nicht sakrosankt und müssen sich verantworten, wenn sie im Verdacht stehen, selbst Täter zu sein oder Täter gedeckt zu haben, weil sie den Ruf der Institution über den Schutz von Opfern gestellt haben.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Katholisch

[Bishop Stephan Ackermann of Trier said the Catholic Church must emphasize the importanceof prevention work regarding sexual abuse of minors.]

Bonn – 17.06.2015

Fast tragisch-prophetisch muten seit vergangener Woche einige Sätze an, die der Trierer Bischof Stephan Ackermann Anfang des Jahres formulierte. Zur Bilanz von fünf Jahren Missbrauchsaufarbeitung in der katholischen Kirche betonte der Bischof, wie wichtig die Präventionsarbeit sei.

Experten mahnten, dass dabei ein Aspekt besonders berücksichtigt werden müsse: Die Vorbeugung von Gewalt von Kindern untereinander. Das werde künftig eine viel stärkere Rolle spielen, so der Missbrauchsbeauftragte der Deutschen Bischöfe.

Inzwischen ist sein Satz von der Realität eingeholt worden. Wie in der vergangenen Woche bekannt wurde, kam es in einer katholischen Kindertagesstätte im Mainzer Stadtteil Weisenau über einen längeren Zeitraum zu sexuellen Übergriffen, Androhung von Gewalt und Erpressung unter Kindern. Fast alle der 55 Schutzbefohlenen waren betroffen. Die Einrichtung wurde vorübergehend geschlossen, allen Erziehern gekündigt. Generalvikar Dietmar Giebelmann entschuldigte sich bei den Eltern.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Belleville News-Democrat

BY JIM SALTER
Associated Press

ST. LOUIS

The St. Louis circuit attorney’s office has dismissed charges against a priest accused of sexually abusing a boy in a Catholic school bathroom, but it left open the possibility that it could refile the charges in the future.

Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce’s office released a statement Wednesday announcing the dismissal of two felony counts against the Rev. Xiuhui Jiang. He was charged last year with twice abusing a boy under the age of 14 between July 2011 and August 2012 at a school in St. Louis.

Jiang’s attorney, Paul D’Agrosa, said the allegations were false and the charges never should have been filed. He said Jiang is hopeful that the Archdiocese of St. Louis will reinstate all of his priestly privileges, which were suspended after the allegations surfaced.

A spokesman said the archdiocese will have a statement later.

The statement from Joyce’s office said charges were dismissed “for reasons that the state is unable to proceed at this time.” But it noted that the charges wouldn’t reach their statute of limitations for 35 years.

“The Office remains hopeful that charges will be refiled in the future,” the statement said. A spokeswoman for Joyce declined to comment further.

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CANADA
APTN

Julien Gignac
APTN National News

Residential school survivors continue to battle federal lawyers who failed to provide documents which could potentially validate claims of abuse at the hands of school staff.

This comes on the heels of the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions report released earlier in the month.

Two groups of survivors who attended separate Indian residential schools allege Ottawa is still not living up to the terms of the settlement agreement which set out a process for determining compensation for abuses suffered by survivors at Indian residential schools. The groups say federal lawyers continue to withhold documents from the Independent Assessment Process.

Justice Canada has not carried out its legal obligation of recovering documents in relation to crimes of abuse committed against people who attended Bishop Horden residential school in Moose Factory, Ont., according to the Ontario Superior Court.

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

06/17/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

As many of you know by now, the announcement that Archbishop Nienstedt and Bishop Piche had resigned their offices as Archbishop/Auxiliary of Saint Paul and Minneapolis was made on a day when two other things of possible significance were scheduled to occur. One of those things was my second interview with investigators from the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office. The other was the biannual assembly of the priests of the Archdiocese.

When Ramsey County investigators called me to schedule Monday’s interview, they were very clear about what they wanted to talk about. They informed me that they were still working towards a determination of whether Archbishop John Nienstedt, Bishop Lee Piche, and perhaps other Chancery officials would be criminally charged as individuals for their role in abuse committed by Curtis Wehmeyer. To that end, they wanted to know what I had been asked when I was interviewed for the Greene Espel investigation, and what information I had provided.

The County Attorney’s Office is not alone in being interested in that investigation. Many priests, lay Catholics, and journalists have called for a public release of the investigative report. However, I think it is important to point out that my impression is that the County Attorney’s interest in the investigation’s conclusions are different from your and my interest, that of the general public, or even that of the Church. To be blunt, I believe the County Attorney is not interested in whether Archbishop Nienstedt is homosexual, heterosexual or, like Miley Cyrus, ‘open to anything’. I don’t think he is interested in whether Archbishop Nienstedt was faithful to his promise of celibacy or his obligation of chastity. He is not- as far as I can tell- particularly interested in what may or may not have occurred in Detroit, Rome, or New Ulm. His interest is purely in how the Archbishop’s personal conduct impacted his decision making when it came to Curtis Wehmeyer and the safety of children and young people in this Archdiocese.

This was also a concern of Greene Espel, and something that I believe they investigated as thoroughly as they were able. In fact, when I was originally approached by the firm’s investigators for an interview in the spring of 2014 the specific reason for the request was to discuss what I knew or might know about the relationship between Nienstedt and Wehmeyer. Of course, the Greene Espel ambit was not as limited as that of the County Attorney. Nienstedt’s January 29, 2014, letter authorizing the investigation (which I was shown at the time of my interview) stated the mandate was to ‘investigate allegations in my [Nienstedt’s] past’. That same letter instructed Bishop Piche to see that the results of the investigation were provided to the Archdiocese and to Nienstedt himself.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Marcus Howard Star Tribune JUNE 17, 2015

ROCHESTER, Minn. – New interim Archbishop Bernard Hebda was in Minnesota Wednesday morning saying mass at an annual meeting of the state’s Catholic priests.

About 200 priests attended the mass at St. John the Evangelist Church. Afterward, one priest who asked not to be named said Hebda’s message was one of healing. It was, he said, “a meeting of brothers.”

Hebda’s appearance comes days after he took over the leadership of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Monday following Archbishop John Nienstedt’s resignation, along with Auxiliary Bishop Lee Piché. Their departures came days after the Vatican announced the creation of a new tribunal to hold bishops accountable for the abuse of minors by priests under their jurisdiction, and little more than a week after the Ramsey County attorney’s office charged the archdiocese for failing to protect children from an abusive priest.

Hebda is assigned to the archdiocese in Newark, N.J., where he is expected to succeed Archbishop John J. Myers.

While Hebda has yet to speak publicly, he issued a statement referring to his experience as bishop in northern Michigan, “where I first came to know the vibrancy of the faith shared by Catholics of the upper Midwest. I am hopeful that there will be opportunities to meet many of you in the weeks ahead.”

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

By Phil Lawler Jun 15, 2015

Last week in this space, I argued that by setting up a tribunal to judge bishops accused of neglect in sex-abuse cases, the Vatican has finally addressed the second of three related scandals. Now let’s address the third scandal.

The first scandal, as you may recall, was the sexual abuse of young people by clerics. That scandal was addressed by the Dallas Charter, which established a “zero tolerance” policy for abusive priests. But the implementation of that policy has been marred by the second scandal: the negligence of many bishops. A “zero tolerance” policy has little value if the Church leaders ultimately responsible for enforcing that policy are not reliable. Thus the need to hold bishops accountable, as the Vatican tribunal will do. But the third scandal has not yet been addressed.

The third scandal, as I explain in The Faithful Departed, is the widespread homosexual activity within the clergy.

For more than a decade now, we have been incessantly reminded that homosexuality and pedophilia are not related. That’s true if you’re talking about true pedophilia: the disorder characterized by an attraction to young children. But the scandal that has ripped through the Catholic Church has not been, primarily, a matter of pedophilia. True, there have been some priest-pedophiles, and their cases understandably drew the greatest publicity. But the vast majority of the cases that emerged from diocesan archives involved priests who preyed on adolescent boys.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Public Radio

By RACHEL LIPPMANN

St. Louis prosecutors have dropped criminal charges against a priest in the St. Louis Archdiocese accused of abusing a student at St. Louis the King School.

Father Xihui “Joseph” Jiang was charged in 2014 with two counts of sodomy for allegedly assaulting the boy in a bathroom at the school, near the Cathedral Basilica in the Central West End. A judge was scheduled to rule on Thursday whether prosecutors could use statements that the victim, identified in court documents only as A.M., made to investigators at the Children’s Advocacy Center.

(St. Louis Public Radio has redacted Father Jiang’s address and Social Security number from the charging documents linked above. No other changes have been made.)

But prosecutors on Tuesday dismissed the charges “for the reason that the state is unable to proceed at this time,” the circuit attorney’s office said in a statement. “The statute of limitations in this case does not run out for another 35 years. The office remains hopeful that charges will be refiled in the future. For this reason, we are unable to provide any additional information or discuss the case further.”

“It’s about time,” said Paul D’Agrosa, Jiang’s attorney. “This case should never have been brought to begin with. It was a false allegation from the beginning.”

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By GABRIEL WINGATE-PEARSE June 17, 2015

THERE are more than 40 witnesses named in a brief of evidence against former Hunter priest, Adelaide Archbishop Philip Wilson, who is accused of concealing child sex abuse in the Catholic church.

The brief is more than 2000 pages long, Magistrate John Chicken was told in Newcastle Local Court on Wednesday.

Archbishop Wilson was not in court, having been excused if legally represented.

Magistrate Chicken asked Mr Wilson’s barrister, Simon Buchen, if the list of 40 witnesses could be ‘whittled down’.

“Yes, we hope to whittle it down significantly,” Mr Buchen said.

Both the prosecution and defence counsel agreed to a five-week adjournment to consider the brief and a reply.

The matter was scheduled for another mention on July 22 and Mr Wilson was again excused from attending on that occasion.

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UNITED STATES
Pew Research Center

BY MICHAEL LIPKALEAVE A COMMENT

Pope Francis RatingsAlthough Pope Francis is no stranger to headlines, he has drawn an unusually large amount of media attention in the past week for two reasons: He approved a new tribunal to address bishops involved in the sex abuse scandal, and he is set to release a new encyclical on environmental issues and climate change.

It is unclear what impact these new developments might have on views of the pope. But before these actions, U.S. Catholics did not rate Francis’ performance in addressing the sex abuse scandal and the environment as highly as they did for other issues.

To be sure, at least half of U.S. Catholics think Francis is doing a “good” or “excellent” job on the sex abuse issue and the environment. Over half (55%) of Catholics rated Francis positively on addressing sex abuse (19% “excellent,” 36% “good”), and 53% gave him high marks on environmental issues (18% “excellent,” 35% “good”), according to our survey conducted in May and early June. But out of nine areas where respondents were asked to rate the pope, these were the two in which Francis drew the least positive ratings.

For example, far more Catholics say Francis is doing a good or excellent job addressing the needs of the poor (79%, including 42% who rate Francis as “excellent” on this topic). Fully, 84% of American Catholics say Francis has done well at spreading the Catholic faith. Similarly about eight-in-ten give him high marks on addressing the needs of families, promoting good relations between religions and standing up for traditional values.

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UNITED STATES
The New York Times

JUNE 17, 2015

Ross Douthat

The conversation about Catholicism and Pope Francis is about to be dominated by the topics of the environment and climate change, thanks to tomorrow’s (official; there have been leaks) release of the pontiff’s ecological encyclical, Laudato Si. But let me sneak in a belated comment on last week’s news that the Vatican is setting up a tribunal to handle accusations of negligence by bishops in sex abuse cases, with coincided, probably not coincidentally, with the resignations of the archbishop of Minneapolis-St. Paul and his auxiliary over their handling of a now-defrocked predator priest.

When the Francis era began, I wrote a column and then a blog post arguing that nothing in his pontificate would matter nearly as much as the restoration of moral credibility, the lifting of scandal’s shadow, and that Bergoglio/Francis would be judged above all on whether he took concrete steps to bring accountability not only to abusive priests (where the church had taken most of the necessary steps under Benedict) but to those bishops and cardinals who protected them (where it conspicuously had not). I’m not sure if the sweep of my judgment quite holds up given all the other issues that this very active pontiff has stirred up or may stir up soon. But the basic point still holds: The reason the sex abuse issue was a crisis for the church rather than just a scandal was that it exposed systemic failures of governance within the Catholic hierarchy, systemic culpability on the part of the episcopate, and neither Rome nor the bishops themselves seemed to have any kind of response that wasn’t ad hoc, situational, and self-protective.

So for the sex abuse crisis to actually end, as opposed to just sort of gradually petering out as offending bishops aged and died and disappeared, something needed to be done to insure that nothing so systematic could happen again. And the mechanisms established under the last pope, while appropriate and admirable, were not sufficient to this task, because they only applied to abusive priests rather than encompassing the blindness and arrogance and fecklessness that kept those priests in the ministry.

Now, though, it seems like the church will finally have a mechanism fitted to those sins. Francis had already moved personally to remove a handful of bishops, but those moves probably personalized the process unduly, turning the pontiff into a kind of one-man supreme court, and inspiring talk of enemies’ lists among (mostly traditionalist) Catholics skeptical of his choice of targets. Such talk will accompany the operations of the tribunal, too, no doubt, but a formal process will at least minimize it, and hopefully lend some transparency to the path from complaints to resignations.

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AUSTRALIA
Courier-Mail

Opinion: Tim Carmody’s child protection credentials make him right man for Chief Justice role

HETTY JOHNSTON THE COURIER-MAIL JUNE 18, 2015

JUSTICE Peter McClellan AM, chair of the Royal Commission into Institutional Child Sexual Abuse, stated in his very first public speech in the role that he thought he knew about child sexual assault. That was, however, before he was assigned to his current post, where he quickly realised how much he didn’t know or understand and the impact this crime has on victims, families and entire communities.

He pledged that all judges would be trained so they, too, could garner a better understanding.

In Queensland, Chief Justice Tim Carmody knows more about child protection than any other judge in the state because, like McClellan, he has dealt at close quarters with the victims and their families. This is why he is so valuable, and why his appointment is so widely supported – except by a few disgruntled peers.

He knows what some of his detractors do not, understands what they don’t – even if they think they do. He is a grassroots operator who can mend the divide between the courts and the people. He can rebuild confidence. He is an innovative reformist with a brilliant legal mind and extensive broadscale experience, and that is exactly what Queensland needs right now.

Carmody has served his community as a police officer, public defender, barrister, legal officer and special prosecutor in the Fitzgerald inquiry into police corruption.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release Wednesday, June 17

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314-503-0003, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org )

For the second time in two years, Fr. Joseph Jiang, who has followed Archbishop Robert Carlson to several cities, has escaped criminal prosecution.

We’re heart-broken for the two families who have been devastated by Fr. Jiang’s crimes. Twice he’s faced criminal child sex abuse charges and successfully exploited legal loopholes and used legal maneuvers to escape consequences for his hurtful and illegal misdeeds. By doing so, he’s also helped keep a lid on the complicity of his boss, St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson.

We applaud these two brave families. And we’re grateful that one of them is now pursuing a civil abuse and cover up lawsuit against Fr. Jiang and Archbishop Carlson.

Now more than ever, it’s crucial that anyone who saw, suspected or suffered Fr. Jiang’s crimes speak up. And it’s crucial that they seek independent help – from police, prosecutors, lawyers, family, friends or support groups like ours, instead of calling Catholic officials.

It’s very frustrating, but time and time again in St. Louis, shrewd lawyering and archaic statutes enable those who commit and conceal clergy sex crimes to dodge responsibility for their horrific wrongdoing.

–In the first-ever civil pedophile priest trial in St. Louis city, a jury said Fr. James Gummersbach and the archdiocese guilty and ordered that the victim be paid $1.2 million. But that verdict was later overturned because Catholic officials exploited the statute of limitations.

–In the first-ever criminal pedophile priest trial in St. Louis city, a jury found Fr. Thomas Graham guilty of sexually assaulting Lyn Woolfolk. But Catholic officials later overturned that verdict on a technicality.

–In the first-ever criminal pedophile priest trial in St. Louis County, Fr. Bryan Kuchar walked free after a hung jury. (Luckily, prosecutors re-tried the case and Kuchar was sent to jail.)

–In a first, Fr. James Beine (a.k.a. Marr James) faced two sets of criminal charges: indecent exposure in St. Louis city AND child porn in Illinois federal court. But he exploited technicalities and escaped prosecution completely (and moved to Nevada where he tried to get a teacher’s license).

Thankfully, none of these four clerics has been put back on the job by Catholic officials. That of course strongly suggests that church bureaucrats know these priests are guilty of assaulting kids. But it’s dreadfully hurtful and disillusioning to victims, witnesses and whistleblowers when popular and powerful predators and their allies evade justice using loopholes.

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MINNESOTA
Wall Street Journal

By TOM CORRIGAN

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis has asked a bankruptcy judge for permission to hire a criminal defense team, after prosecutors in Minnesota filed charges against the archdiocese for allegedly failing to protect children from abusive priests.

In court papers filed Tuesday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in St. Paul., Minn., the archdiocese asked Judge Robert Kressel to approve its application to employ two attorneys from Fredrikson & Byron P.A., a Minneapolis-based law firm.

The two attorneys are Joseph T. Dixon and Chelsea Brennan DesAutels, who will charge $400 per hour and $320 per hour respectively. Mr. Dixon’s fee represents a “substantial discount,” according to court papers.

For corporations in bankruptcy, expenses outside the ordinary course of business are typically subject to bankruptcy-court approval because those expenses could eat into limited resources that might one day be used to repay creditors or, in the archdiocese’s case, compensate alleged victims.

The archdiocese, home to 187 parishes and 825,000 parishioners, filed for chapter 11 protection in January in the face of mounting abuse-related lawsuits. The bankruptcy stemmed largely from the passage of the Minnesota Child Victims Act in 2013, which eliminated the statute of limitations for child sexual-abuse cases and opened a three-year window during which alleged victims can file civil lawsuits demanding compensation.

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TEXAS
WRIC

TARRANT COUNTY, Texas (WRIC) — The trial for a former Richmond mega church pastor continues Wednesday in Texas.

The prosecution began to present its case against Geronimo Aguilar yesterday.

Kelly Ortiz was the first witness on the stand Wednesday. Ortiz was part of “Set Free Ministries,” a church that Geronimo Aguilar’s dad founded in California. She is also a former member of Aguilar’s church, the Richmond Outreach Center, who came to Richmond in 1998 with her husband help start up the ROC.

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MINNESOTA
Post-Bulletin

When John Nienstedt was appointed archbishop of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, it was noted that his outspoken management style would be a contrast to his predecessor, Harry Flynn, a decidedly low-key personality.

“Much ink has been spilled in the press over speculation about how (I) will differ from the present archbishop,” Nienstedt said during his welcome Mass nearly eight years ago at the Cathedral of St. Paul. “But frankly, I believe that speculation is misplaced.”

It turns out it wasn’t. Nienstedt called for unity when he celebrated his first Mass in St. Paul, but instead, he presided over the most turbulent period in the diocese’s history. He resigned Monday, 10 days after criminal charges were filed against the archdiocese by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office for its “role in failing to protect children and contribution to the unspeakable harm” in priest sex-abuse cases.

“My leadership has unfortunately drawn attention away from the good works of his church and those who perform them. Thus, my decision to step down,” Nienstedt said in a statement posted by the archdiocese.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, June 16

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314 566 9790, davidgclohessy@gmail.com )

Archbishop John Nienstedt’s replacement should immediately disclose more information about Fr. Gerald Dvorak, the latest Twin Cities archdiocesan cleric to be accused of child sex crimes.

Last month, allegations against Fr. Dvorak surfaced publicly but Catholic officials refused to say

–when Nienstedt learned of the allegation
–how Nienstedt learned of the allegation
–which church official allegedly told law enforcement about it
–which law enforcement agency was allegedly told about it
–when church officials allegedly told law enforcement and
–where the abuse allegedly happened.

So much for “openness and transparency.”

It’s possible, therefore, that Nienstedt and other Twin Cities Catholic officials have known of and concealed this abuse report for years.

It’s especially outrageous that Twin Cities church officials refuse to say which police department they allegedly told of this abuse report. Lacking that, others who might help prove or disprove this allegation don’t know who to call to share what they may know about this case. That’s very self-serving and irresponsible.

Catholic officials should make it easier, not harder, for victims, witnesses and whistleblowers to be helpful. Church staff know know this. For their own selfish reasons – protecting their careers, comfort and reputations – they are deliberately making it harder for police and prosecutors to build a case against a credibly accused child molester. Hebda should take action on this case immediately.

We call on every Catholic employee and parishioner in Minnesota who has suspicions or knowledge of crimes by this cleric or church cover ups by any cleric to call police, expose wrongdoing, protect kids and start healing. And we call on Bishop Hebda to disclose more information about Fr. Dvorak immediately.

(NOTE: Fr. Dvorak worked in Hopkins, St. Paul, and Minneapolis.)

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release Monday, June 15

Statement by Megan Peterson survivor of Fr. [Joseph] Jeyapaul, 218-689-9049

I was going to wait until I felt I had become centered again. Waiting for myself to be able to approach this in a very formal and graceful manner for you all. To erase all hints of anger and discomfort. To be a put-together, well-oiled machine. But the truth is, life is messy. Our emotions are messy. We cannot always carry ourselves with the grace we have envisioned.

I want to be as honest with myself and with you as possible to show that you don’t have to be put together. We all deserve the opportunity to hurt, to be messy, and to mourn. Myself included. Maybe by being a little more vulnerable and messy we can give one another a better opportunity to connect and understand each other. Because the truth is, this hurts. There are moments when it doesn’t feel fair or right at all. Moments when it is hard to swallow and even harder to breathe. When the full weight of this comes barreling at me like a freight train, hits and knocks me down. And then I breathe again. I see the positives, I see the differences that we have made. I have known all along, through each emotion I endured, that every step was worth it.

Justice is not always black and white. Although I would have loved to see Joseph Jeyapaul criminally prosecuted for what he did to me, that was not what this ten-year journey was ultimately about. It was and remains about the children and doing everything in my power to keep them safe from what I know to be harmful. Which I believe I have done and will continue to do. I believe protecting children is everybody’s responsibility. For all of society loses when a child is harmed. It is my hope that individuals, in the Crookston Diocese and elsewhere, will continue to come forward with information about any suspected abuse and/or cover-up.

I was advised shortly before Jeyapaul was to be extradited back to drop the charges, as it could cause too much harm and potentially be damaging to myself. I was told the likelihood of his being prosecuted, for various reasons, would be slim to none. But I didn’t drop the charges. It is a decision I did not make lightly. As hard as it was, I would make the exact same decision one thousand times over again. There were a few things in particular that weighed on my mind. One, it was my understanding that if I decided against his extradition the other brave individual he harmed would lose the opportunity to see him criminally prosecuted. Two, as painful as the process was expected to be and was, I knew at the very least we could keep him incarcerated and away from children this way— if only for a little while longer.

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UNITED STATES
The Financial

Wednesday, 17 June 2015 03:23
Written by Michael Lipka

The FINANCIAL — Although Pope Francis is no stranger to headlines, he has drawn an unusually large amount of media attention in the past week for two reasons: He approved a new tribunal to address bishops involved in the sex abuse scandal, and he is set to release a new encyclical on environmental issues and climate change.

It is unclear what impact these new developments might have on views of the pope. But before these actions, U.S. Catholics did not rate Francis’ performance in addressing the sex abuse scandal and the environment as highly as they did for other issues, according to Pew Research Center.

To be sure, at least half of U.S. Catholics think Francis is doing a “good” or “excellent” job on the sex abuse issue and the environment. Over half (55%) of Catholics rated Francis positively on addressing sex abuse (19% “excellent,” 36% “good”), and 53% gave him high marks on environmental issues (18% “excellent,” 35% “good”), according to our survey conducted in May and early June. But out of nine areas where respondents were asked to rate the pope, these were the two in which Francis drew the least positive ratings.

For example, far more Catholics say Francis is doing a good or excellent job addressing the needs of the poor (79%, including 42% who rate Francis as “excellent” on this topic). Fully, 84% of American Catholics say Francis has done well at spreading the Catholic faith. Similarly about eight-in-ten give him high marks on addressing the needs of families, promoting good relations between religions and standing up for traditional values.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Wednesday, June 17

Statement by Frank Meuers, Minnesota SNAP leader, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 952-334-5180, frankameuers@gmail.com )

Some are talking of “moving on” and “turning the page” in the Twin Cities abuse and cover up scandal. . .

Such thoughts are misplaced. They show a callous disregard for vulnerable kids.

Job one is not “recovering” or “healing.” Job one is safeguarding kids. That means every single cleric who committed or concealed clergy sex crimes musts be exposed, ousted and prosecuted.

It means that the names of all child molesting clerics – priests, nuns, bishops, seminarians and brothers – must be permanently and prominently posted on church websites and in church bulletins.

It means that predator-friendly laws must be reformed. It means that former Twin Cities clerics – men like Duluth Bishop Paul Sirba and St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson – must be disciplined too.

Adults can heal regardless of what church or secular officials do or don’t do. Kids, however, cannot protect themselves without active, proven prevention steps by church and secular officials. So let’s keep the focus where it belongs — on

Let’s let “healing” and “turning the page” come later.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Nick Murray, CBC News

Former Roman Catholic priest Eric Dejaeger, who is serving time for sexually abusing children in Igloolik, was in an Iqaluit courtroom yesterday expecting to hear an update on whether his outstanding charges from Alberta will be heard in Nunavut.

Instead, Dejaeger will return Thursday morning because his lawyer didn’t call in to the court in time due to a misunderstanding.

Dejaeger, who in February was convicted of 24 sex-related charges involving children more than 30 years ago, had applied to have his three outstanding Alberta-based sex-related charges heard in the Nunavut Court of Justice.

The charges stem from a period in the mid-1970s, when he was studying at the Newman Theological College in Edmonton.

The 68-year-old Dejaeger appeared wearing the standard-issue navy blue sweats from the Baffin Correctional Centre, where he’s serving a 19-year sentence. He wore a pair of glasses with brown frames, and his white beard had become long and puffy.

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MINNESOTA
Washington Times

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis wants to hire former federal prosecutor Joseph Dixon III to defend it against accusations that it failed to protect children from abuse.

An application filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court by the archdiocese says it needs to hire Dixon as special counsel because the criminal charges could affect the availability of insurance to cover mounting claims filed by accusers.

The Star Tribune (http://strib.mn/1fgBG9c ) reports court documents show Dixon plans to charge a reduced rate of $400 an hour given that the archdiocese is in bankruptcy. Dixon says that’s a substantial discount.

The former assistant U.S. attorney is now with the law firm Fredrikson & Byron. As a prosecutor, Dixon sent Ponzi scheme convict Tom Petters to prison.

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SAN FRANCISCO
Catholic San Francisco

June 17th, 2015

Archbishop Salvatore J Cordileone has appointed Michael Brown the Director of Communications for the archdiocese, the archdiocese announced June 15. A longtime resident of and parishioner within the archdiocese, Brown has an extensive background in communications, and he has professional experience in media, both with the Catholic Church and also institutions in the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors.

For the past seven years, Brown has been responsible for communications in the Diocese of Oakland. In that capacity, he provided important service to three bishops, including Archbishop Cordileone, who, prior to coming to San Francisco, was bishop of Oakland for three years.

Mike joins the archdiocese with over 40 years of successful communications and media experience. Before working for the Catholic Church, Brown held the position of Partner at Brown and Raleigh LLC, a full-service public relations counsel to corporations and associations whose clients included St. Mary’s College and the California Province of the Society of Jesus. He also served as the Director of Corporate Communications for Consolidated Freightways Corp., a Fortune 500 company, and Director of University Communications at the University of San Francisco for 10 years. His early career in communications began as staff editor for a senior columnist at the San Francisco Chronicle.

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NEW YORK
Broadway World

Tom Ebert, an 80 year old widower, has completed his new book “Abuse”: a gripping and powerful look into the world of child abuse.

Published by New York City-based Page Publishing, Tom Ebert’s tale begins with the death of a Catholic priest and the detective that believes it is more than a simple heart attack.

Detective Pat Handel has a hunch there is foul play afoot when Father Bello dies during the consecration of mass. Further investigation proves fruitful when he finds a history of threatening calls and letters.

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CANADA
The Province

BY KEITH FRASER, THE PROVINCE JUNE 15, 2015

A lawyer for freelance journalist Laura Robinson argued Monday that former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong employed a “media strategy” to attack his client and never seriously intended to follow through with his defamation lawsuit against her.

After Robinson wrote an article in the Georgia Straight in September 2012 alleging that Furlong had abused some former students in northern B.C. more than 40 years ago, Furlong filed a defamation suit against her.

Robinson counter-sued him for defamation. In March, after three lawsuits alleging Furlong had sexually abused students had been dismissed, Furlong dropped his lawsuit.

Robinson decided to proceed with her suit, and in his opening statement to a judge Monday her lawyer, Bryan Baynham, argued Furlong did little to advance his lawsuit.

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CANADA
The Globe and Mail

SUNNY DHILLON
VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail
Published Tuesday, Jun. 16, 2015

A freelance journalist who is suing former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong for defamation says she was shocked when he accused her of shoddy reporting, implied she tried to extort money from him, and said she had a vendetta, she testified Tuesday.

Laura Robinson wrote an article for the Georgia Straight, a weekly newspaper, in September, 2012, in which eight former students of Mr. Furlong’s alleged he physically abused them. The allegations stemmed from Mr. Furlong’s time as a physical-education instructor at Immaculata Roman Catholic Elementary School in Burns Lake, B.C., in 1969-70.

Mr. Furlong held a news conference the day the story was published, denying the allegations and criticizing Ms. Robinson, who later sued Mr. Furlong for defamation.

Ms. Robinson testified that as she prepared her story, Mr. Furlong had many opportunities to respond to her questions through his lawyer. She said she also approached Mr. Furlong in person in April, 2011, and August, 2011. The first time, she said, Mr. Furlong told her to “stop it” as she asked questions and he walked away.

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CANADA
The Province

BY KEITH FRASER, THE PROVINCE JUNE 16, 2015

Laura Robinson says she was shocked and devastated by the reaction of Vancouver Olympic CEO John Furlong to an article she wrote alleging he’d physically abused former students in northern B.C. more than 40 years ago.

The Ontario freelance journalist began her testimony Tuesday at the trial at which she is alleging Furlong defamed her following the September 2012 story in the Georgia Straight newspaper.

A day after the article was published, Furlong held a press conference at which he said he was “very disappointed” by the “shocking lack of diligence” that Robinson had done in researching the article.

“I was completely shocked,” Robinson said of her own reaction to Furlong’s statement.

“It affected me in a very devastating way that someone would say those things about me.”

Under questioning from her lawyer, Bryan Baynham, Robinson said that from the very beginning she and Charlie Smith, the editor at the Georgia Straight, knew it was going to be “ very difficult” story to research and tell.

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CANADA
CBC News

By Laura Kane, The Canadian Press Posted: Jun 16, 2015

A journalist who is suing former Vancouver Olympics CEO John Furlong for defamation says she was devastated by his response to an article she wrote alleging he abused students at a northern British Columbia school more than 40 years ago.

Laura Robinson began her testimony Tuesday in her civil trial, where she is alleging that Furlong’s public comments after the story was published in the Georgia Straight newspaper have damaged her reputation, career and health.

Furlong held a news conference the day the story was published in September 2012, where he absolutely denied any wrongdoing and accused Robinson of “a shocking lack of diligence” and a “personal vendetta.”

“I was completely shocked,” Robinson testified. “It affected me in a very devastating way that someone would say those things about me.”

The Ontario-based journalist said the most shocking part was when Furlong implied she tried to extort money from him. He told reporters at the news conference that before the 2010 Winter Games, he was contacted and told that “for a payment it could be made to go away.”

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NEW YORK
The Jewish Voice

WEDNESDAY, 17 JUNE 2015 08:21 BY: TOM DEMARCO

Before taking its annual summer recess, lawmakers in the New York State Senate and Assembly are working to wrap up several important legislative matters, rather than leaving them for resolution when they return.

On Friday, it was reported that despite a record number of sponsors, the initiative to revamp the state’s statute of limitations for minors who were victimized in sexual abuse cases has met resistance in the state house.

Under current statutes, those who were sexually abused as legal minors are given up to five years after they reach the age of 18 to file charges against their alleged abuser.

The bill say advocates would afford alleged victims the opportunity to file civil suits against people or institutions in older cases and would begin 60 days after Governor Andrew Cuomo would sign the bill.

For approximately a decade, attempts have been made to modify the statue currently on the books. Several incarnations of the bill have seen passage at least four times in the Assembly but did not come to a vote in the Senate and this floundered. The legislative session ends on June 17th.

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UNITED STATES
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

By David G. Clohessy

It was a hot June in a Midwestern city, during a meeting of 250 U.S. Catholic bishops, that the new, unprecedented church panel was announced. It was hailed as a ground-breaking move that would herald a new era in the church’s continuing clergy child sex abuse and cover-up scandal. More specifically, the panel was to address whether bishops were — or were not — following church abuse policies.

I’m not talking about St. Louis in 2015, when the church hierarchy’s latest shiny new reform plan was a new tribunal to consider whether bishops endangered kids by concealing crimes.

I’m talking about Dallas in 2002, when the church hierarchy’s latest shiny new reform was the creation of a National Review Board. The NRB was to be a watchdog. It was to ride herd on recalcitrant prelates. It was to be a mechanism that would ensure accountability.

But quickly, it became — and remains — a lapdog, not a watchdog. Our fear, of course, is that the new papal tribunal will do so as well.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By JASON GORDON June 17, 2015

THE Anglican Bishop of Newcastle has admitted that church leaders knew about a culture of bullying and child abuse within the diocese and worked to conceal those offences.

In an emotional media conference at Lambton on Wednesday, Bishop Greg Thompson conceded that the church had failed abuse victims, and that he is now working with police and the Royal Commission to right the ‘‘wrongs of the past’’.

Today marks 500 days since he became the Bishop of Newcastle, he said, but during that time he had ‘‘discovered that our culture allowed bullying and abuse but was mostly silent about it’’.

‘‘Our culture allowed people to conceal what had happened,’’ he said.

‘‘I have heard these stories first hand. I believe we will hear recollections of anguish and harm for many years to come.’’

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SCOTLAND
STV

A former university lecturer who founded his own church and sexually abused members has avoided jail after a sheriff said he had “already suffered a spectacular fall from grace”.

Walter Masocha, who called himself “The Prophet”, was made subject to a community payback order with the condition that he performs 250 hours unpaid work.

The 51-year-old was also placed on supervision and the sex offenders register for 12 months.

The “Archbishop” of the Stirling-based Agape for All Nations Church, who put his hand down the trousers of a schoolgirl saying he was trying to remove demons, was assessed by social workers as at “moderate risk” of re-offending.

Masocha, who also groped a young deaconess while he was supposed to be praying for a problem she had with her stomach, was told by Sheriff Kenneth McGowan his conduct must have left his victims “hurt and bewildered”.

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TEXAS
WRIC

By Kerri O’Brien

TARRANT COUNTY, Texas (WRIC) — One of the alleged victims in Geronimo Aguilar sex abuse trial took the stand Tuesday.

She broke down in tears when she was asked to point out the former Richmond Outreach Center pastor.

The woman alleges Aguilar began touching her inappropriately when she was just 11-years-old.

She told the jury, “Geronimo would lay next to me and he would be hard.”

Aguilar was the youth pastor at her church in Texas back the 1990s.

The alleged victim says her parents allowed Aguilar to live with her family, even share a bedroom with her and she claims the touching turned to sex on Halloween night in 1996 when she was 13.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

Jon Tevlin

One was a gregarious Irishman who focused his ministry on social justice, racism and poverty. The other was a stern, hierarchical leader bent on returning orthodoxy to the church and blocking same-sex marriage.

Archbishops Harry Flynn and John Nienstedt couldn’t be further apart in beliefs and style, but now they are inexorably linked in the sex scandals and criminal charges that have rocked the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Nienstedt has suffered the spectacular public fall after resigning on Monday, and many are happy to see him go. But charges filed by Ramsey County Attorney John Choi suggest that many of the bungled cases of priests accused or convicted of child abuse began under Flynn and his right-hand man at the time, vicar general Kevin McDonough.

Flynn is retired and has kept a low public profile, refusing interviews. McDonough remains pastor at St. Peter Claver Catholic Church in St. Paul, which also runs a school. Others who have been complicit in a failure to protect children and/or a coverup, serve on nonprofit boards and generally go on with their public lives.

But that does not mean their legacies will not also be seriously tainted.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

(Vatican Radio) In the words of its founder, Dr Theresa Burke, Grief to Grace is a psychological and spiritual programme which aims to heal the wounds of anyone who has suffered degradation or violation through physical, emotional, sexual, or spiritual abuse, whether in childhood or as an adult.

Whilst other programmes are available, Grief to Grace differs in that it aims to help victims of abuse to discover a spiritual healing. Abuse sufferers often experience a considerable sense of isolation which Grief to Grace endeavours to combat, notably within the wholesome context of a spiritual retreat which is fully centred upon the Person and transforming presence of Jesus Christ, the Divine Physician.

This is an intimate and powerful journey during which participants are gently invited to unite their own suffering with those of Christ’s Passion. By walking the way of the Cross with Christ, and by experiencing intimately the Paschal mystery, it is hoped they will also share in the Resurrection to new life.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

Fr John McCullagh sex abuse cover-up should be investigated by Pope Francis’ tribunal, says Amnesty

BY DONNA DEENEY – 17 JUNE 2015

A cover-up of the sexual abuse of an eight-year-old girl by pervert priest Fr John McCullagh exposed by the Belfast Telegraph is part of a call by Amnesty International for a government inquiry in Northern Ireland.

The human rights organisation reacted to the Vatican’s announcement that it would set up a tribunal to investigate bishops who failed to protect children by saying the Northern Ireland Executive must do likewise.

In 2010, this paper revealed how McCullagh, now deceased, had sexually abused a Londonderry girl for 10 years.

It was further revealed that the former Bishop of Derry, Seamus Hegarty, was party to an out-of-court settlement by McCullagh, which included forcing his victim to sign a document forbidding her to make public the abuse or the meagre payment she received in compensation.

Similar deals drafted by former Cardinal and Archbishop of Armagh Sean Brady in 1975, and signed by two victims of the notorious paedophile Fr Brendan Smyth, also need to be examined, according to Amnesty.

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NEDRLAND
Volkskrant

Door: Peter de Graaf 17 juni 2015

Tot dusver heeft de klachtencommissie van het Meldpunt Seksueel Misbruik RKK ruim 250 klachten ongegrond verklaard. In de meeste gevallen is dat gebeurd wegens gebrek aan ‘steunbewijs’: er hadden zich geen andere slachtoffers van de aangeklaagde priester gemeld. De klachtencommissie gaat uit van het rechtsbeginsel dat niemand veroordeeld kan worden op grond van ‘één enkele verklaring’.

‘Dat is een enorme klap, een drama voor het slachtoffer’, zegt Guido Klabbers, woordvoerder van Klokk, de koepel van slachtofferorganisaties.

De nieuwe regeling wordt de ‘slotactie’ genoemd in de jarenlange procedure voor erkenning, genoegdoening en compensatie voor slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik. Aanleiding zijn de verklaringen twee jaar geleden van voorzitter Wiel Stevens van de klachtencommissie tijdens een hoorzitting in de Tweede Kamer. Hij zei geen twijfel te hebben dat ‘het overgrote deel’ van de afgewezen klagers wel degelijk is misbruikt. ‘Maar de regels laten niet toe hun klacht gegrond te verklaren’, aldus Stevens.

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NETHERLANDS
Dutch News

The Dutch Catholic church plans to offer other victims of sexual abuse, whose cases have not been formalised, some form of compensation, the Volkskrant reports on Wednesday.

The committee investigating the abuse has determined that 250 cases are not proven, mainly because there were no other complaints about the priest concerned.

The new ruling has been prompted by a statement in parliament by the head of the complaints commission two years ago. Wiel Stevens said at the time he had no doubt that most of the rejected complaints were also true. The rules then did not allow any compensation payments to be made to those victims.

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NETHERLANDS
NL Times

Posted on Jun 17, 2015 by Janene Van Jaarsveldt

Victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests are critical about the Catholic church’s plans for a scheme to pay compensation to victims whose complaints were were judged unfounded. Victims feel that the scheme is too much like a quick payoff.

“Many victims are very upset that their complaint is not honored. They can not be fobbed off with a few thousand euros. They want recognition, not just a cash register receipt.” Guido Klabbers, spokesperson for victims’ association Klokk, told the Volkskrant.

So far the complaints committee of the Reporting Point Sexual Abuse RKK has found 250 complaints unfounded, according to the newspaper. In most cases this was due to a lack of “supporting evidence” – no other victims had filed a complaint against the accused priest. The committee works on the legal principle that no one can be convicted on the basis of a single statement.

This new scheme follows a statement made by Wiel Stevens, the president of the complaint committee, in the Tweede Kamer, lower house of parliament, two years ago. He said that he had no doubt that the vast majority of the rejected complainants were indeed abused. “But the rules do not allow us to declare their complaint well-founded.” he said.

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MINNESOTA
Pioneer Press

By Joe Soucheray
jsoucheray@pioneerpress.com

A friend of mine who has always been useful to the Catholic Church as a volunteer in his parish told me upon the arrival of John Nienstedt as archbishop that I had best not call him “Arch.”

“Why?”

“He is not the ‘Arch’ type,” I was told.

I had called Nienstedt’s predecessor Harry Flynn “Arch” when I saw him out and about. I think I was being cautioned to understand that Nienstedt was possibly a bit more stern than Flynn, a bit more officious, more formal and standoffish. I do not know that to be the case. I never had the chance to find out, because I never saw Nienstedt out and about. Never. Flynn worked the room, meaning the whole archdiocese, and maybe Nienstedt did, too, but I never saw him, so I never had the chance to hail him as “Arch” and discover the consequences of such informality.

It was with great sadness that I learned that Flynn developed memory loss when he was grilled about abusive priests. He got so lawyered up that I’m not sure he would have remembered the time of day if he had just glanced at his watch.

Nienstedt got lawyered up, too. For the past couple of years, it felt like the archdiocese was run by the lawyers and that there was no room for these guys to practice what they were supposed to preach. The allegations of a cover-up struck to the very core of cowardice. Every day — OK, not every day, but maybe every time you went to Mass — you kept waiting for the dam to break and for some leader, most principally the archbishop, to grab this horrid mess by the scruff of the neck and throw it out into the open, into clear air and sunlight. That didn’t happen.

Well, it has been thrown out into the open. John Choi, not the church officials, patiently saw to that. Through the bankruptcy proceeding, the victims will get compensated, which might be small consolation. The church will sell off properties and will have to humble itself financially just to pay the bills for years of cover-ups.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Jean Hopfensperger Star Tribune JUNE 16, 2015

Ramsey County authorities are investigating personal ties between former Archbishop John Nienstedt and the Rev. Curtis Wehmeyer, a former priest now serving time in prison for sexually molesting two boys in his parish, say sources familiar with the investigation into the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

The inquiry is part of the county attorney’s ongoing probe into the archdiocese’s alleged lax handling of Wehmeyer, a priest known for sexual misconduct and alcohol problems. The criminal complaint filed earlier this month against the archdiocese cited multiple examples over years of Nienstedt’s failure to act on troubling information about Wehmeyer.

Nienstedt resigned Monday.

Jennifer Haselberger, a former chancery canon lawyer who warned Nienstedt about Wehmeyer, said she was interviewed Monday by the county attorney’s office “regarding their ongoing investigation into potential criminal charges against Nienstedt, [former bishop Lee] Piché and/or other Chancery officials.”

She said she was asked about any connections between Nienstedt and Wehmeyer, in particular about the questions she may have been asked by the Greene Espel law firm. The firm was hired in 2014 by the archdiocese to investigate allegations of sexual improprieties between Nienstedt and seminarians and priests before he became archbishop.

That report was never made public, and key sources told the Star Tribune that the archdiocese halted the inquiry while investigators were still pursuing leads.

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