ABUSE TRACKER

WASHINGTON
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, Nov. 10, 2016

For more information: David Clohessy 314 566 9790 cell, 314 645 5915 home, davidgclohessy@gmail.com, Barbara Dorris 314 503 0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.ordg

Victims oppose Yakima bishop’s bid for national office
SNAP to prelate: “You shouldn’t even be on child sex abuse panel

The world’s largest group of clergy sex abuse victims wants Yakima’s top Catholic official to withdraw from his bid to head a national church abuse panel next week and instead focus on “protecting the vulnerable and healing the wounded” in Washington.

[Catholic New York]

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests is writing Bishop Joseph Tyson asking him to abandon his race for chair of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People. The election is Nov. 14 in Baltimore.

“You have done virtually nothing to undo the damage that your predecessor did when he protected clergy who abused children. You have also done virtually nothing, above the legally required bare minimum, to safeguard kids.” said,” SNAP in a letter sent today to Tyson (bishop@yakimadiocese.org). It’s also signed by Robert Fontana, who founded the central Washington chapter of Voice of the Faithful.

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MISSOURI
WGEM

ST. LOUIS (AP) – The parents of a young man who killed himself years after sexual abuse by a priest are hopeful that settlement of a lawsuit against the Archdiocese of St. Louis will prompt other victims to come forward.

The suit filed by Dan and Pat Harkins of Florissant, Missouri, was settled in September, but it wasn’t announced until Thursday. Officials with the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests say it’s at least the third wrongful death suit settled by the archdiocese.

Messages left with the archdiocese were not returned.

Alex Harkins committed suicide at age 21 in 2009. His parents say Alex had struggled emotionally since abuse by the Rev. Bryan Kuchar about eight years earlier.

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AUSTRALIA
Australian Jewish News

THE Yeshivah Centre, Melbourne, and Yeshiva College in Sydney have been recalled to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse only one week before the nominations close for the new Yeshivah–Beth Rivkah (YBR) board.

The Royal Commission has announced it will hold a public hearing into the current policies and procedures in relation to child protection and child-safe standards, including how Yeshivah and Yeshiva respond to allegations of child sexual abuse, in February.

“This hearing is expected to include consideration of factors that may have contributed to the occurrence of child sexual abuse in religious institutions and factors that may have affected the institutional response of religious institutions to child sexual abuse,” the commission said in a statement last week.

“This hearing may also examine the responses of named institutions to relevant case study report(s).”

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OSTERREICH
der Standard

Innsbruck / Vienna – On 17 November, the Republic of Austria, together with the Roman Catholic Church, invites the victims of abuse in state as well as church institutions to anhistoric meeting at Parliament.]

STEFFEN ARORA, KATHARINA MITTELSTAEDT
8. November 2016

Republik und Kirche veranstalten kommende Woche einen Staatsakt im Parlament. Doch viele Opfer wollen Taten sehen

Innsbruck/Wien – Am 17. November lädt die Republik Österreich zusammen mit der römisch-katholischen Kirche die Opfer von Missbrauch in staatlichen sowie kirchlichen Einrichtungen zu einem Staatsakt in den historischen Sitzungssaal des Parlaments. Nationalratspräsidentin Doris Bures (SPÖ) initiierte die Veranstaltung unter dem Titel “Geste der Verantwortung” auf vielfachen und seit langem geäußerten “Wunsch der Betroffenen”, heißt es aus ihrem Büro. Doch nicht alle ehemaligen Opfer sind von der Idee angetan, und an der geplanten Umsetzung gibt es viel Kritik.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Zeit

[Between 1950 and 1970, children were not only abused and abused in German children’s homes but drug tests were also carried out on them.]

Von Silke Hoock

Das katholische Franz-Sales-Haus in Essen ist schon im Jahr 2010 für seine Grausamkeit bekannt geworden. Ordensschwestern hatten die jungen Heimbewohner mit und ohne Behinderungen bis in die 1970er Jahre brutal gequält. Nun kam heraus, dass es neben den folterartigen Züchtigungen mit Stromkabeln oder heißen Bügeleisen und neben sexuellem Missbrauch auch regelmäßig “Betonspritzen” oder “Kotzspritzen” gab, wie die Heimkinder sie nannten. Also Medikamente, mit denen sie künstlich ruhig gestellt wurden oder die einen permanenten Brechreiz auslösten.

Doch nicht nur in Essen, bundesweit sollen in Deutschland Tausende Heimkinder zwischen 1950 und 1970 Opfer von Medikamententests geworden sein. Impfstoffe, Psychopharmaka und Libido hemmende Präparate habe man ihnen verabreicht. Zu diesem Ergebnis kommt die Krefelder Pharmazeutin Sylvia Wagner in ihrer Doktorarbeit. Wagner hatte an der Universität Düsseldorf 50 Studien von Pharmaunternehmen sowie historisch, wissenschaftliche Fachzeitschriften ausgewertet. Die meisten Tests seien ohne Einwilligung der Eltern erfolgt, sagt die Forscherin.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

AAP on November 8, 2016

Former Federal Court judge Tony Whitlam has settled a defamation suit against the ABC over a Four Corners report about pedophile priest John Farrell.

Mr Whitlam, son of former prime minister Gough Whitlam, had accused the public broadcaster of portraying him as a “stooge” who took money from the Catholic Church to rig an inquiry and cover up Farrell’s crimes.

A Federal Court order on Tuesday confirmed the two parties had reached a settlement and that a previous referral to mediation would be dismissed.

Mr Whitlam, 72, lodged the defamation suit in response to the Four Corners report broadcast in May when Farrell was jailed for 29 years for 79 child sex offences.

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AUSTRALIA
The Canberra Times

Daniel Burdon

As the light faded from the Canberra sky, the families and friends of victims of past child sexual abuse at Marist College gathered for a long-awaited healing ceremony on Thursday night.

At once an acknowledgement and apology for the abuse suffered by college students during the late 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s, and the failures to act at the time, the ceremony also marked a College plea for forgiveness and a public pledge that such events would “never happen again”.

The ceremony also saw a plaque unveiled in remembrance of the students abused and committing the school to the “healing process”, with a reading from psalm 119:105: “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path”.

It followed calls from survivors of abuse at the college for a permanent memorial, including one as early as 2012 by former student Nicholas Quaine, as well as the findings of the royal commission that the Marist Brothers Catholic order failed to intervene and remove offending brothers John Chute and Gregory Joseph Sutton.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Mark Abrams

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — The appointment of a new leader for the nearby Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey is causing some ripples in church politics as far south as Philadelphia.

Cardinal-designate Joseph Tobin is coming from Indianapolis and he’s the first cardinal to ever lead the Newark Archdiocese – just across the river from New York.

Tobin will be formally elevated to the college of cardinals at the end of November.

But missing from that latest class of cardinals is Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Times-Tribune

STAFF REPORT / PUBLISHED: NOVEMBER 10, 2016

HONESDALE — A New Jersey priest arrested there last month on numerous child pornography charges was extradited Wednesday to Wayne County.

According to an arrest affidavit, The Rev. Kevin A. Gugliotta, 54, Mahwah, New Jersey, uploaded 20 files depicting children engaged in sexual activity to internet chat rooms between July 9 and Aug. 29 from his apartment in Lehigh Township, Wayne County.

He faces 40 felony counts of possessing and disseminating child pornography.

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TEXAS
Amarillo Globe-News

[Statement from Bishop Patrick J. Zurek]

By LAUREN KOSKI
lauren.koski@amarillo.com

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Amarillo has launched an investigation into Father Frank Pavone, a priest belonging to the Diocese who is one of 34 Catholic leaders advising President-elect Donald J. Trump, in response to a Facebook Live video featuring a fetus posted Sunday morning to Pavone’s Facebook page.

“Father Frank Pavone has posted a video on his Facebook page of the body of an aborted fetus, which is against the dignity of human life and is a desecration of the altar,” said Amarillo Diocese Bishop Patrick J. Zurek.

“We believe that no one who is pro-life can exploit a human body for any reason, especially the body of a fetus. The Diocese of Amarillo deeply regrets the offense and outrage caused by the video for the faithful and the community at large. The action and presentation of Father Pavone in this video is not consistent with the beliefs of the Catholic Church.” …

According to Amarillo Globe-News files, Pavone entered into the authority of the Amarillo Diocese in 2005 when Bishop John W. Yanta, Bishop for the Diocese at the time, promised Pavone he could work full-time for the pro-life movement.

In 2011, Bishop Patrick J. Zurek suspended Pavone due to concerns over PFL’s use of financial donations.

The Vatican Congregation of the Clergy ruled against his suspension, but said that Pavone still needed permission from Zurek to participate in pro-life events.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

Marist College in Canberra’s south has held a service apologising to past students who suffered sexual and physical abuse at the hands of staff at the Catholic school.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse heard that several Brothers at the all-boys school had abused students in the 1970s and 1980s.

Other abuse allegations date back decades further.

On Thursday evening the school held a liturgy attended by about 200 people, apologising to students and holding prayer in hope of healing the damage caused.

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TEXAS
Tyler Morning Telegraph

A 26-year-old Bullard man pleaded guilty to a series of sexual assault to a child charges on Wednesday after prosecutors said he used his position in a church and school to lure boys to his home.

Thomas Scroggins, age 26, of Bullard pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 35 years in prison.

The victims, whose names will be withheld, varied in ages but were all younger than 14 years old at the time of the offenses, according to the Cherokee County District Attorney’s Office.

Separate from his plea of guilty, Scroggins also agreed to surrender a vehicle used to transport some of his victims and some remote-controlled airplanes which the state alleged were used to lure his young male victims into vulnerable situations.

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GUAM
KUAM

Updated: Nov 10, 2016

By Sabrina Salas Matanane

Documents filed in the church sex abuse scandal on Guam reveal explosive details – and information about a video that Father Louis Brouillard recorded on October 3 at his home in Minnesota.

Brouillard is one of the defendants accused of sexual molestation when he was a priest in Guam several years ago. The victim is Leo Tudela. According to court documents Fr. Broullard he said that he made the video to reach out to the parishioners of the Archdiocese of Guam and anyone he may have harmed to ask forgiveness for his actions many years ago.

He confessed that sex education talks while at Santa Teresita he touched the penises of some of the boys and some of the boys did perform oral sex on him. Fr. Brouillard added that some of the incidents took place in Mangilao at the church’s rectory. He said that he didn’t’ remember the dates or name of the boys involved, but did say that there may have been 20 or more boys may have been involved. He also confessed that there were other locations where the sexual contact may have happened at the San Vicente and Father Duenas Memorial Schools.

“I did believe that the boys enjoyed the sexual contact and I also had self-gratification as well,” he said. He also acknowledged his abuse of Tudela and apologized on the video.

Additionally Fr. Brouillard said that his actions while on Guam were discussed and confessed to area priests as well as the Bishop Apolinaris Baumgartner at the time. He said the bishop talked to him and told him to try to do better and say prayers as penance. “I believe the Catholic Church should be honest and truthful regarding what happened on Guam during my time there,” he said.

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INDIA
National Catholic Reporter – Global Sisters Report

by Virginia Saldanha Nov. 10, 2016 in Equality

News about the meeting:

• Christian women in India take steps to address clerical abuse cases

Men have been dominant as recipients, interpreters and transmitters of divine messages, while women have largely remained passive receivers of teachings and ardent practitioners of religious rituals. Attitudes developed around patriarchal interpretations of religious belief have defined and shaped the social and cultural contexts of Indian women resulting in their disempowerment and second-class status.

In India, where politics uses religion as a tool to manipulate the masses, women bear the brunt of the consequences of cultural attitudes and the impact of religion and politics in their particular milieu. Recognizing the influence of religion and culture on Indian women’s lives, Streevani (which means “voice of women”) took the initiative to organize a national consultation on the theme “Impact of Religion and Culture on Women’s Empowerment – An Indian Perspective.” About 50 people — women and men religious, theologians, professionals and a diocesan priest — attended the September 23-26 meeting in Hyderabad, India.

Within the overarching framework of patriarchy in the religious and social sphere, the core issues that emerged were: one, violence against women and, two, sexuality and the politics of gender.

“Women have internalized patriarchal Christianity. They are comfortable with just a little space that is given to them,” said Presentation Sr. and theologian Shalini Mulackal. The language, symbols and culturally conditioned interpretation of religious scriptures have evolved a practice that alienates women and even influences exploitation and violence towards them.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

[with video]

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com November 10, 2016

Guam’s Catholic church leadership has known for decades about clergy sex abuses that happened as early as the 1950s, a retired priest said in a signed statement released Nov. 1. He said his only form of punishment for molesting at least 20 boys at the time was to say prayers.

Retired priest Louis Brouillard, now 95 and living in Minnesota, said his sexual contacts with children when he was on Guam were known to other priests, including Bishop Apollinaris Baumgartner, the highest Catholic leader on Guam from 1945 to 1970. Brouillard served as a priest on island from the late 1940s to 1981.

Brouillard said Baumgartner approached him to talk about the “situation.” Baumgartner, who died in 1970, is Guam’s first residential Catholic bishop.

“I was told to try to do better and say prayers as a penance,” Brouillard said. “I believe the Catholic Church should be honest and truthful regarding what happened on Guam during my time there.”

Brouillard made a video at his Pine City, Minnesota, residence and signed a written statement dated Oct. 3 in support of a former altar boy’s Nov. 1 lawsuit against him for allegedly sexually abusing him six decades ago.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

10 November, 2016

The Royal Commission will continue its public hearing into the Anglican Diocese of Newcastle (Case Study 42) in Sydney on 16 November 2016.

It will sit from Wednesday 16 November to Friday 18 November and from Wednesday 23 to Thursday 24 November. The hearing commenced in Newcastle in August 2016.

This hearing is inquiring into the experiences of survivors of child sexual abuse perpetrated by clergy and lay people involved in or associated with the Anglican Diocese of Newcastle.

Continuation of public hearing into Anglican Diocese of Newcastle:

* Dates: Wednesday 16 November – Friday 18 November 2016, Wednesday 23 November – Thursday 24 November 2016
* Hearing times: 10:00am – 4:00pm AEDT
* Location: Hearing Room 1, Level 17, Governor Macquarie Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney
Hearing times may be subject to change.

The hearing will be streamed live via webcast on the Case Study 42 page.

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FLORIDA
Orlando Sentinel

Christal Hayes
Orlando Sentinel

A youth pastor was arrested Tuesday after Orange County sheriff’investigators said he raped and kidnapped a young girl.

Samuel Pierre, 35, works at Tabernacle of Prayer and Miracles International church on South Rio Grande Avenue.

The girl’s mother told police Samuel picked up her daughter, who is younger than 12, to go to the youth group in August. He was also supposed to pick up several other kids, an arrest report states.

Several months later, she confronted her daughter because “she had been acting different” ever since she went with Samuel, according to the report.

Deputies said the girl told her mother Samuel never picked up any other children and instead drove to a home where Samuel and his aunt live.

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FLORIDA
Click on Orlando

An Orlando youth pastor has been arrested on charges of sexual battery and kidnapping, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said.

The mother of the child involved told police that her child had been acting different since after her first attendance at the Tabernacle Prayer and Miracles International youth group under youth pastor Samuel Pierre.

She confronted her child about the incident, and deputies came to speak with the child on Nov. 3.

The mother said Pierre told her that he would come to pick up her daughter along with other youth group kids to go to the church and that Pierre would bring back her daughter to her grandmother’s home after it was done.

The child told her mother about an incident on Aug. 8 where Pierre did not pick up any other children for youth group and the pair went to Pierre’s aunt’s home, the report said.

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KANSAS
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release, November 9, 2016

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 566 9790, 314 645 5915 home, davidgclohessy@gmail.com)

Catholic officials now admit that a Kansas priest engaged in sexual misconduct. But that’s not enough.

[Kansas City Star]

Catholic officials recruited, educated, ordained, hired, trained and brought Fr. Anthony Kiplagathere. The police are investigating him. So it’s not enough for Archbishop Joseph Naumann to say “Well, he flew back home,” act powerless and clam up.

Naumann must use church bulletins, parish websites and pulpit announcements to seek out anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes by Fr. Kiplagat or cover ups by his supervisors. He must remind his flock that women in Kenya, where Fr. Kiplagat reportedly is now, are even more vulnerable. And he must insist that anyone with knowledge or suspicions about his wrongdoing have a civic duty to help law enforcement investigate him.

If Naumann won’t do this, his staff and his priests should do this.

Fr. Kiplagat was in Kansas for years. Common sense says he likely has other victims. Common decency says they need help. Yet Naumann refuses to use his vast power and resources to find and help them. That’s shameful.

Months ago, Naumann admitted that two of his priests are accused of sexually exploited adults: Fr. Kiplagat and Fr. George Seuferling, who faces multiple allegations, was suspended more than four years ago, and now is reportedly being defrocked (a process that involves the Vatican and often takes years).

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Philly

By Rhina Guidos • Catholic News Service • Posted November 9, 2016

WASHINGTON (CNS) — The Diocese of Amarillo, Texas, said in a statement it is investigating the incident of a pro-life priest who placed “the body of an aborted fetus” on an altar and broadcast it on Facebook Live to get people to vote for Republican Donald J. Trump, causing “the desecration of the altar.”

“We believe that no one who is pro-life can exploit a human body for any reason, especially the body of a fetus,” said Amarillo Bishop Patrick J. Zurek in a Nov. 8 statement. Its use for political purposes by one of the diocese’s priests was “against the dignity of human life,” he added.

Pro-life supporters in the Catholic Church denounced activist Father Frank Pavone for what he said was an “emergency situation” on the eve of the U.S. presidential election.

“What did he do?” wrote Ed Mechmann, a public policy director whose areas of concern include pro-life issues, in a blog for the Archdiocese of New York. “He used a dead aborted baby, laying naked and bloody on an altar, as a prop for his video.”

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UNITED STATES
Irish Times

James Smith in Boston

Earlier this year, I wrote for The Irish Times about the passing of a Magdalene survivor who lived here in the United States. She suffered ill health in her final years. Friends had lobbied on her behalf for health care entitlements offered through the State’s Magdalene restorative justice scheme. Unfortunately, those benefits never materialised.

But, in her last months she appreciated the help received from a social worker affiliated with an Irish immigration centre in the mid-west. I had reached out to Boston’s Consul General, who in turn contacted her colleague in Chicago, who in turn reached out to that city’s Irish Immigrant Support group, who made the social worker available, despite the fact that the she lived out of state.

He helped the survivor to identify a supplementary health insurance policy. And, that insurance policy proved crucial in covering significant end-of-life medical expenses and protecting her modest nest-egg-the balance of the lump-sum redress payment she had received from the Irish State, and ear-marked to pay for the repatriation of her ashes for burial in her mother’s grave back home.

Not long after she passed, I was invited to speak about the Magdalen Laundries to the Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers’ (CIIC) social services subcommittee, comprised of social workers with vast experience serving Irish immigrant communities in Chicago, San Francisco, Boston and New York. Two facts stand out from that conversation.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

November 10, 2016

DAN BOX
Crime reporterSydney
@DanBox10

The Catholic Archbishop of ­Adelaide, Philip Wilson, has been ordered to give evidence in court about his knowledge of child abuse committed by one of the church’s worst pedophile priests.

Senior cleric Brian Lucas, who was recently ­described before a royal commission as one of “the architects of the church’s ­response” to child sex abuse, has also been issued with a similar subpoena by the NSW Supreme Court.

Both men have been ordered to attend a hearing this month and to provide documents relating to discussions with or about the late Denis McAlinden, a priest of the diocese of Maitland-Newcastle who abused dozens of children between the 1950s and 1980s.

Both have also been the subject of recent police inquiries ­relating to their knowledge of other pedophile priests.

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GUAM
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Agana

November 8, 2016

Congratulatory Message from Archbishop Savio Hon Tai Fai, SDB

At the vigil of All Saints’ Day, the Holy See made public that His Holiness, Pope Francis, appointed the Most Reverend Michael Jude Byrnes, Coadjutor Archbishop, with Special Faculties, of the Archdiocese of Agaña. The Catholic faithful are grateful to the Holy Father for this appointment and also to Archbishop Byrnes for his acceptance.

I have spoken by phone with Coadjutor Archbishop Byrnes and on behalf of all the Catholic faithful in Guam, the clergy, religious, and laity, I convey our heartfelt congratulations on his appointment as well as our warmest welcome, assuring that he will certainly be in our prayers.

As instructed, Archbishop Byrnes has all the Faculties, Rights, and Obligations of the Archbishop of Agaña, civilly and ecclesiastically, without any exception.

One is never a bishop on one’s own, but always and only in the College of Bishops. Moreover the latter cannot be enclosed in the time of a single generation. The interweaving of all generations, the living Church of every epoch, is part of collegiality. It is the mission of a bishop to preserve this Catholic communion. In this regard, the Lord made St Peter and his Successors responsible for being the visible foundation and center of this communion.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Haidee V Eugenio , heugenio@guampdn.com November 9, 2016

Archbishop Savio Hon Tai Fai said newly appointed coadjutor archbishop for Guam’s Catholic church, the Rev. Michael Jude Byrnes, should never be considered an “outsider” as some people consider him to be.

“Archbishop Byrnes may not be given, in one instance, ‘infused’ knowledge of every detail of our island but he is generally informed about the current situation of the local Church and is ready, as expressed humbly by himself, to learn more from the people of God on Guam, whether they be clergy, religious, or lay,” Hon said in a Nov. 3 congratulatory message to Byrnes.

As coadjutor archbishop, Byrnes has rights to succeed Archbishop Anthony S. Apuron, who is facing a canonical trial at the Vatican over multiple allegations of sex abuse of altar boys in Agat in the 1970s.

Pope Francis appointed Byrnes on Oct. 31. Up until his appointment as coadjutor archbishop, Byrnes was auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Detroit.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Timna Jacks

Geelong Grammar valued its reputation over the welfare of students, according to a blistering submission to the Royal Commission.

“There was a culture at Geelong Grammar which valued the reputation of the school over the welfare of the students,” said David Lloyd, counsel assisting the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in findings published on Wednesday.

Stephen Meek, principal of Geelong Grammar since 2004, told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexua Abuse that he was contacted about a sexual assault allegation on his first day in the job.

“The system did not protect and promote the interests of the students.”

The prestigious school has been accused of allowing Philippe Trutmann to work as a live-in boarding house assistant from 1985 and 1996, even though school authorities were told about allegations of improper conduct in 1985.

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MEXICO
Prensa Libre Chiapas

[To kick off the campaign against child sexual abuse, activists and Patricia Cristina Sada Salinas Chandomí they presented the documentary “Silvestre” which is about the clerical pederast priest in Oaxaca.]

Para dar inicio a la campaña contra el abuso sexual infantil, las activistas Cristina Sada Salinas y Patricia Chandomí, presentaron el documental “Silvestre”, el sacerdote pederasta clerical en Oaxaca.

Documental que fue presentado ante estudiantes universitarios, en el centro cultural “Museo Café”, en donde recalcaron que es necesario prevenir este problema para evitar se sigan cometiendo más abusos contra niños y niñas.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

1233 ABC Newcastle

By Robert Virtue

Peter Russ

Peter Russ was abused as a child in the 1970s.

He said he originally intended to speak to the Royal Commission under a pseudonym, but later changed his mind.

“Usually I’m the sort of person that just sits in the corner and doesn’t say anything,” he said.

“But for some reason [there was a] bolt out of the blue and I thought that was the way I want to go, and I’m glad I did do that.

“I’d got over the whole ‘shame’ thing.

“When I walked up there, I certainly wasn’t at all afraid; it was really powerful … it was the best thing I ever did.”

Mr Russ has been a teacher in the Catholic school system for over 35 years, and has only recently returned to work.

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AUSTRALIA
Catholic Leader

TOOWOOMBA Bishop Robert McGuckin has returned from Monaco after representing Federation of Catholic Bishops’ Conferences of Oceania at an international conference.

Bishop McGuckin spoke at the Council of the Conferences of the European Bishops.

“Unlike our plenary assemblies, on the whole it was mainly the presidents of European bishops’ conferences that are involved in the plenaries,” Bishop McGuckin wrote in address to the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference. …

“The issue of sexual abuse by clergy and religious has been highlighted in Australia with the present Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse,” he wrote.

“This has not only done great damage to the lives of the many victims, but calls for positive steps to put our house in order. This is happening but great damage has been done.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

“Hi, I’m LawBot, a robot designed to help victims of crime in England.”

While volunteering at a school sexual consent class, Ludwig Bull, a law student at the University of Cambridge, was inspired to build a chatbot that offers free legal advice to students. He enlisted the help of four coursemates, and Lawbot was designed and built in just six weeks.

The program is still in beta, but Bull hopes it will help victims of crime, at Cambridge and beyond, to get justice. “A victim can talk to our artificially intelligent chatbot, receive a preliminary assessment of their situation, and then decide which available actions to pursue,” he says.

Sexual harassment at university: ‘I felt terrified to say anything’
Read more
Bull explains that he was motivated by the alarming figures on sexual assault in the UK, where it is estimated that two thirds of offences go unreported, according to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN). The problem is especially urgent at universities, with the scale of abuse recently likened to the cases of Jimmy Savile or the Catholic church.

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AUSTRALIA
Border Mail

Melissa Cunningham
@MeljCunningham

The Catholic Diocese of Ballarat has publicly declared its support for the federal government’s national redress scheme for clergy sexual abuse victims.

Ballarat Catholic diocese vicar-general Father Justin Driscoll said the diocese would fully participate in the scheme.

“We welcome the many components of the scheme, including the monetary redress payments, but also other areas of psychological and emotional and well-being trauma informed counselling,” he said.

However, unanswered questions remain on whether the Ballarat diocese would continue to provide ongoing care for victims, including reimbursement of medical and other critical living expenses, after survivors received redress.

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KANSAS
The Kansas City Star

BY JUDY L. THOMAS
jthomas@kcstar.com

A Kenyan priest on assignment in the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas has engaged in unprofessional conduct with an adult, the archdiocese has revealed.

In a statement issued in the Nov. 4 edition of The Leaven, its official newspaper, the archdiocese said it made the finding after completing an internal investigation of the Rev. Anthony Kiplagat, who left the country earlier this year.

The investigation found that Kiplagat “had engaged in unprofessional conduct and violated clerical continence,” the statement said.

Kiplagat, a priest of the Diocese of Eldoret in Kenya, since July 2012 had been assigned to St. Patrick Catholic Church in Osage City, Kan., and St. Patrick Catholic Church in Scranton, Kan. The woman who lodged the complaint was not a member of either parish, the archdiocese has said. Kiplagat’s previous assignments included St. Agnes in Roeland Park and Prince of Peace and St. Paul in Olathe.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

AAP on November 9, 2016

There was a culture at the prestigious Geelong Grammar School that valued its reputation over students’ welfare, the child abuse royal commission has been told.

Counsel assisting the royal commission said the school knew about an allegation of improper conduct by live-in Highton boarding house assistant Philippe Trutmann in 1985 and failed to take any action.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

9 November, 2016

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has published the written submissions for the public hearing into the experiences of former students of Geelong Grammar School, Victoria.

The public hearing inquired into the response of the Geelong Grammar School Council, Principals and other members of staff to concerns of inappropriate conduct and child sexual abuse related to the behaviour of teaching and non-teaching staff towards students.

The public hearing also examined the past and current practices, policies and procedures in place at Geelong Grammar School in relation to raising and responding to concerns and complaints about child sexual abuse.

The public hearing took place in September and October 2015 in Melbourne and Sydney.

The submissions can be found on the Case Study 32 page.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic Standard

By Richard Szczepanowski, Catholic Standard
Tuesday, November 08, 2016

The Archdiocese of Washington has further strengthened its child protection efforts by creating a new outreach for teachers, educators and others on how to identify and promptly report suspected child abuse.

“With this (new program), we are getting the message out that everyone in the Archdiocese of Washington has the ability to be informed on how to protect your children and your community,” said Courtney Chase, the archdiocesan director of Child and Youth Protection.

The new initiative is a discussion and question and answer presentation developed with a law enforcement officer that outlines the archdiocesan Child Protection Policy, educates participants on how to recognize child abuse, and outlines the process for reporting suspected abuse to civil authorities.

“We were asked by the cardinal to put together educational training for new priests and seminarians, and to strengthen the importance of this initiative, we brought in a law enforcement expert,” Chase said. “And, now we offer it to everybody.”

Tony Giovacchini, a retired detective who investigated child abuse and sex crimes for the Montgomery County Police, has joined with Chase in presenting the program.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Times

Sean O’Neill, Chief Reporter
November 8 2016
The Times

The former head of the public inquiry into child abuse has refused to appear before a Commons select committee in a move described as “astonishing” bythe chairwoman of the committee.

Dame Lowell Goddard, who resigned from the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse in August and has been accused of serious misconduct during her 18 months in charge, told the home affairs committee she would not give oral evidence in person or via videolink.

The New Zealand judge said she had been subjected to “malicious defamatory attacks” in the British media and did not want to appear before a hearing where some of those “false allegations” could be repeated under parliamentary privilege.

Dame Lowell said she was “disappointed that there has been no government defence of me in England”. She said she had provided detailed written evidence to the committee and she was “not aware of any matter which remains unanswered”.

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MICHIGAN
Catholic Philly

By Mike Stechschulte • Catholic News Service • Posted November 8, 2016

DETROIT (CNS) — Ever since Archbishop Michael J. Byrnes was a newly minted associate pastor at St. Joan of Arc Parish in St. Clair Shores, Deacon Tom Strasz knew he had the qualities of a natural leader: good listener, excellent teacher, calm under pressure.

But more than any of those traits, Deacon Strasz said one thing stands out when he thinks about his longtime friend and mentor.

“He has the heart of an evangelizer,” said Deacon Strasz, who is in ministry at St. Joan of Arc and who for the past five years has been Archbishop Byrnes’ secretary at his regional office at St. Francis of Assisi-St. Maximilian Kolbe Parish in Ray Township. “He wants you to have the Lord and he wants you to see the Lord and hold the Lord in your heart. Everything he does goes toward that.”

Even still, Deacon Strasz — nor anyone else, for that matter — could have guessed those qualities would take Archbishop Byrnes halfway around the world as he takes on his next assignment as coadjutor archbishop of Agana, Guam.

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NEW JERSEY
Jersey Journal

By Rev. Alexander Santora/For the Jersey Journal
on November 08, 2016

As cardinal-elect Joseph W. Tobin entered the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart for his press conference on Monday, you couldn’t help but notice that he is a hulk of a man akin to a fullback with a broad, strong face. And this physical trait might have served him well as the oldest of 13 children.

It might also have convinced his high school homeroom teacher back in Detroit not to recommend him for entrance into the Redemptorists because he believed he was a “hoodlum,” according to Tobin. And that’s more incredible knowing that he rose to become the General Superior of the worldwide community in Rome from 1997 to 2009 with over 6,000 priests and brothers serving in 77 countries.

Now he has become the sixth Archbishop of Newark and the first ever as a Cardinal, which is quite intriguing since usually New York and Philadelphia always overshadowed New Jersey. Until now. He is certainly cut from the same cloth as Pope Francis, and Tobin admitted they had become friends for over ten years when they both served on a Vatican Synod back in 2005.

Admitting that Francis did not talk with him before the appointment, he did say of Francis, “He is a bishop. He is my teacher.” And, one of the key reasons he may have come to New Jersey is because it is part of the media capital of the world. He can and will certainly articulate Francis’ policies and vision, especially to a U.S. hierarchy mostly reluctant to embrace Francis’ ecclesiology.

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ISRAEL
Jewish Journal

by Eliana Rudee
Posted on Nov. 7, 2016

As Rabbanit Malka Puterkovsky addresses members of the press, her smile lights up the room and one almost forgets the dark subject about which she speaks. Puterkovsky is the founder and director of Takana, a forum that provides alternative ways to report sexual assault within Israel’s religious community. While Israel’s mainstream victims of sexual assault report directly to the police, religious victims prefer more discretion in reporting sexual crimes so that their names and photographs are not attached. To many in small and close-knit communities, anonymity is more important than reprimanding the attacker, as being assaulted and raped is often stigmatized, sometimes even more for the victim than the attacker. While in the general public, an estimated 15 percent of sexual harassment cases are brought to the police, for the religious community, the figures are drastically lower. While Takana may succeed in supporting Modern Orthodox victims of sexual assault, some argue that they also protect the abusers by taking a “soft” approach.

Puterkovsky, with other Torah scholars, religious educators, jurists, and social workers, founded Takana in 2003 within the Orthodox feminist framework that is growing in Israel. “All of the deep stream changes happening in Israeli society have to do with Orthodox feminism,” says Member of Knesset Rachel Azaria, an Orthodox feminist herself. “This is a real revolution that is happening, and one of the first issues that started Orthodox feminism is realizing that there is sexual abuse in the schools and places nobody [previously] thought.” However, mainstream politicians are slow to follow suit. Azaria claims she is one of the only Israeli political leaders calling for the resignation of Etzion Bloc Mayor Davidi Perl, who was accused of sexual abuse over the past few years. Many followers of sexual abusers deny that their leader is capable of abusing children and students. Some associates of accused individuals have even gone so far as to threaten Takana members. In 2010, Takana Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein received death threats from an associate of Rabbi Mordechai Elon, saying he would “hurt him in any way he could.”

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AUSTRALIA
Manny Waks

8 November 2016

Manny Waks

​I welcome the recent announcement by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that Yeshivah Melbourne and Yeshiva Bondi will be called to a further public hearing in February 2017.

This public hearing will focus on the current policies and procedures of these institutions in relation to child protection and child-safe standards, including responding to allegations of child sexual abuse. This hearing is also expected to include consideration of factors that may have contributed to the occurrence of child sexual abuse in religious institutions and factors that may have affected the institutional response of religious institutions to child sexual abuse. This hearing may also examine the responses of these institutions to relevant case study report(s).

At a previous public hearing held in February 2015, victims and survivors gave evidence of their sexual abuse and the cover-ups perpetrated by the Yeshiva/h institutions. Evidence was also given of the bullying, harassment and demonisation which we, and our families, experienced at the hands of Yeshivah Melbourne and the Chabad community – in Australia and beyond – as a result of seeking justice for the crimes committed against us. It was shown that the religious and lay leadership of Yeshivah Melbourne were responsible for the failures which led to the sexual abuse of dozens of children in their care and that the more recent attacks against us were led by some of those leaders and members of their families. Members of the Orthodox Rabbinate and the Rabbinical Council of Victoria were also involved in attacks against us and our families.

I acknowledge that there are good people within Yeshivah Melbourne who are doing what they can to effect change. In some cases, they too have come under attack by Yeshivah Management. I also acknowledge and appreciate the recent personal apology that I received from Yeshivah. It is also important to note that Yeshivah has made some changes in response to the Royal Commission, although I consider that these have been mostly superficial and intended to address public perceptions as opposed to genuine reform.

Regrettably, in the two years since that public hearing, victims have continued to experience bullying, harassment and ostracism within Yeshivah Melbourne. Despite several incidents having been reported to Yeshivah Management, the institution has failed to deal with the perpetrators.

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CONNECTICUT
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release, November 8, 2016

Statement by Joelle Casteix, western regional director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org), (949) 322-7434, jcasteix@gmail.com

The second-in-command of a Connecticut-based scandal-plagued religious group has been accused of child sexual abuse in a local civil lawsuit filed last week.

[The Daily Beast]

The priest, Fr. Luis Garza, has been accused of sexually abusing a child and trafficking the teen across international borders.

It is time for the George Jepsen and the Connecticut State Attorney General’s Office to take action and investigate the Legionnaires. No organization that cares for children and teens and enjoys nonprofit status should also be allowed to facilitate international child sex trafficking and cover up. The cult-like group has also been accused of financial misdeeds. It is time for law enforcement to use the power of the tried-and-true criminal justice system to stop these crimes.

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GEORGIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release, November 8, 2016

Statement by Joelle Casteix, western regional director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org), (949) 322-7434, jcasteix@gmail.com

A priest who worked in Atlanta in 2012 and was the second-in-command of an influential international religious group—founded by another priest who molested up to 100 children—has now also been accused of child sexual abuse in a lawsuit filed in CT last week.

[The Daily Beast]

We are sad, but not surprised. The Legionnaires of Christ was a religious order founded by a man, Marcial Maciel Degollado, who devoted his career to molesting children. It makes perfect sense that he would attract and recruit men like his second in command, Father Luis Garza.

Garza spent years defending Maciel. Now, he has been accused himself. Garza traveled the world forcing Maciel’s victims into silence with “private vows”—telling them is was a mortal sin to tell anyone that Maciel had sexually abused them. We fear that there could be more Garza victims worldwide forced into the same kind of vows of shame and silence.

Atlanta Archbishop Wilton Gregory must immediately reach out to every parish, home, retreat center, and organization where Garza worked and stayed. There may be victims in Atlanta who have no idea where to turn for help and accountability now that Garza is out of the country. Garza has been sent to the Philippines.

We applaud the brave victim in this case. Coming forward to talk openly about child sexual abuse and demanding accountability is never easy, but it is the only way to ensure that sex crimes against children and the cover-up of those crimes stop. We encourage anyone who has been sexually abused to come forward and get help. It is safe to report and find healing.
We also urge anyone who has seen or suspected abuse by Father Garza or anyone to call law enforcement immediately. We fear that there may be men and women in Atlanta who have information about Fr. Garza, but may not have known whom to tell. Even the smallest of information can help a victim and save a child.

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PENNSYLVANIA/NEW YORK
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2016

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 566 9790, 314 645 5915 home, davidgclohessy@gmail.com )

A Philadelphia-based group of nuns is refusing to admit that it ran an orphanage where a man says he was both sexually and physically abused as a child. We call on these nuns to stop ducking and dodging and start helping this victim. If they continue to stonewall, we call on Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput and New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan to insist that they step up, “come clean” and help this struggling survivor.

[New York Daily News]

New York City Catholic officials insist that St. Michael’s Home for Children on Staten Island was run by the Philadelphia-based Sisters of Mercy (Mid-Atlantic branch). That’s where an unnamed man charges he was beaten and molested years ago.

But the nuns’ group refuses to confirm or deny they operated the orphanage, or even respond to a reporter’s phone call about this, leaving the victim in a painful limbo. That’s mean-spirited. And it contradicts the hundreds of promises by hundreds of Catholic officials to be “open” about child sex crimes in the church.

Shame on Sister Patricia Vetrano, the president of the Sisters of Mercy Mid-Atlantic Community (610-664-6650, http://www.sistersofmercy.org/mid-atlantic/) and on every other nun, defense lawyer or public relations staffer in the church who is stonewalling this brave, wounded victim, especially now during Pope Francis’ supposed “Year of Mercy.”

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AUSTRALIA
Washington Post

By A. Odysseus Patrick
November 8

SYDNEY — Like many of their brethren around the world, Catholics in Australia have been rocked in recent years by evidence of systemic child abuse in the church.

One big question remains, though, for the country’s 5 million Catholics: Was one of their top clerics complicit?

Last month, George Pell, now a cardinal and senior Vatican official, was questioned in Rome by Australian police after public allegations in July by two former students that he had inappropriately touched them in a swimming pool back in the 1970s.

“The cardinal does not wish to cause any distress to any victim of abuse,” his office said in July. “However, claims that he has sexually abused anyone, in any place, at any time in his life are totally untrue and completely wrong.”

Pell had faced earlier allegations that he had failed to act on reports of child abuse when he was an up-and-coming priest in the 1970s in the regional city of Ballarat.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian
..
MICHAEL MCKENNA
ReporterBrisbane
@McKennaattheOz

Child abuse victims forced into meagre compensation settlements will have the chance to launch new legal action for the first time in Australia under legislation passed in the Queensland parliament.

Opposition and crossbench MPs secured passage last night of the pioneering reforms to abolish time limits on child abuse legal action.

The minority Palaszczuk government had introduced the legislation in response to recommendations of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse to allow people to sue regardless of when alleged abuse happened.

In Queensland, victims have had until their 21st birthday to sue institutions over their abuse.

But the Labor government had refused calls to extend the bill to children outside institutions, those who suffered physical and psychological abuse, or to pave the way for victims to take legal action if they had already ­received compensation.

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

Felicity Caldwell

Victims of child sexual abuse will be able to pursue civil legal action in Queensland, regardless of when or where it happened, after new laws passed in parliament.

Previously, survivors could only pursue civil action within three years of their 18th birthday.

The LNP also had a win during the debate, with one of their amendments passing – despite the government opposing it.

Labor MPs did not call a division after losing a vote to amend the bill, meaning victims will be able to apply to courts to reopen past deeds under the amendment proposed by the LNP.

It is understood the government may not have had the numbers in the House to win a division to oppose the amendment to the bill.

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MALTA
The Malta Independent

Neil Camilleri
Tuesday, 8 November 2016

A well-known priest who was dismissed from a Franciscan order says this was the result of dislike harboured against him by the Provincial Minister.

Fr Adrian Cachia, 71, was told by the church authorities that he was being dismissed by the Order of Friars Minor and that he is not allowed to celebrate mass in the archdiocese of Malta. The friar is still currently tied to the OFM and has appealed the decision.

Contacted by The Malta Independent yesterday, Fr Cachia said the Provincial Minister, Fr Richard Stanley Grech, “had it in for him” ever since he was appointed to the post two years ago. “He just doesn’t like my way of doing things. I have always acted out of initiative instead of waiting for someone to tell me what to do.”

The priest said he has been helping troubled youths for over three decades. Rather than staying in some convent, he has spent many years providing shelter, food and company for homeless youths at a Rabat home he converted for the task with his own hands. He says he has lately been helping youths who are discharged from Mount Carmel Hospital but have nowhere to stay. “This is how I have always worked. I have always been close to people and lived with them. I take care of these youths, cook and clean for them and help them find a job or go back to school.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Editorial

The royal commission into child sex abuse has been a gruelling though enormously important process. It has been shocking and disturbing to learn the extent of institutional abuse of children. But we look back at history to learn from it, and it must be hoped that the work of the commission will lead to systemic changes and checks and balances that ensure this appalling abuse can never happen again.

Another crucial goal is of course support and justice for the survivors of abuse, and with this in mind it is welcome news that the federal government is launching a compensation fund for child victims of abuse. But there is a glaring flaw in the scheme.

The national scheme, a key recommendation from the royal commission, will compensate victims of child sexual abuse with payments of up to $150,000, cutting much of the existing red tape. But it will be opt-in only. Those states, churches and charities that do not want to contribute financially won’t have to, dodging their responsibilities.

Spruiking the news last week, Social Services Minister Christian Porter said important features of the scheme included that it would offer specialist psychological support to victims as well as allowing them, if they wish, to have direct contact with senior representatives of the institutions that were responsible at the time of their abuse. These initiatives have been welcomed by abuse survivors and advocacy groups. Having the truth of their experiences validated is a powerful part of the process of working towards healing.

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DEUTSCHLAND
NDR

[In Germany another allegation of sexual abuse has been made against the late Bishop Heinrich Maria Janssen. The abuse, which involved immoral touching, is said to have happened in the late 1950s to the beginning of the early 1960s.]

Das Münchner Institut für Praxisforschung und Projektberatung (IPP) untersucht im Auftrag des Bistums Hildesheim die Missbrauchsvorwürfe eines ehemaligen Messdieners gegen den verstorbenen Bischof Heinrich Maria Janssen. Janssen soll Ende der 1950er- bis Anfang der 1960er-Jahre den Jungen regelmäßig sexuell missbraucht haben. Nun hat sich ein mögliches zweites Opfer an die Forscher gewandt. Ein Sprecher des IPP in München bestätigte dem NDR, dass sich ein Mann gemeldet habe, der in dem Fall Angaben machen wolle. Man werde mit dem Mann Gespräche führen. Was der Mann den Gutachtern bei der ersten Kontaktaufnahme gesagt hat, wollte das IPP nicht kommentieren. Die “Hildesheimer Allgemeine Zeitung” berichtet in ihrer Ausgabe vom Montag, dass sich der Mann auch an die Redaktion gewandt habe.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee Yvette Cooper MP has called Dame Lowell Goddard’s refusal to give oral evidence about her resignation from the national sexual abuse inquiry “disgraceful.”

Dame Lowell, 67, wrote in a letter which appeared in the media this morning, that she had volunteered detailed written reports instead of oral testimony in a bid to “maintain judicial independence.”

Dame Lowell also wrote: “I am disappointed that there has been no government defence of me in England, despite the fact that information refuting some of the more serious allegations has been held by the Home Office and your committee since the time of my initial recruitment.”

Responding to the letter, Ms Cooper said this was unsatisfactory and an “astonishing response” from a public servant. She added that child abuse survivors “have been let down by the extremely rocky start to this inquiry.”

“Dame Goddard has been paid significant amounts of public money to do an extremely important job which she suddenly resigned from, leaving a series of questions about what has been happening over the last 18 months and why the inquiry got into difficulties,” Ms Cooper said.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sky News

Dame Lowell Goddard has refused to give evidence about her resignation from the child abuse inquiry and rounded on the Government for failing to defend her.

The New Zealand judge has refused to speak in front of the Home Affairs Select Committee because it would be “unacceptable” for allegations against her to be aired in public, where those who make them are protected from prosecution.

In a letter to the committee, Dame Lowell said she had been the “subject of malicious defamatory attacks” in the UK media and had informed the committee of “the falsity of these and their apparent purpose”.

She added that were she to give evidence via video link from New Zealand she would not be afforded freedom from prosecution in any allegations she might need to make in her defence.

She also heavily criticised the Government for failing to robustly defend her against the allegations of racism and poor treatment of colleagues. Dame Lowell has always denied all the claims made against her.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

Michael Wilkinson, political correspondent
8 NOVEMBER 2016

Dame Lowell Goddard, the former chair of the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse, is refusing to answer questions from MPs about her resignation.

The former High Court judge from New Zealand resigned from the beleaguered inquiry on August 4, less than 18 months into the role.

In her post, Dame Goddard received £360,000 a year plus allowances and flight homes to New Zealand, while a committee of MPs heard that she had also secured an £80,000 pay-off.

She is now refusing to answer MPs’ questions about her departure, either by flying back to London or by videolink.

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NEW ZEALAND
Stuff

JOHN EDENS

Kiwi judge Dame Lowell Goddard says it was disappointing there was “no government defence of me in England” when she resigned as chair of the historical sex abuse inquiry.

Goddard quit in August as head of the United Kingdom inquiry (IICSA) into cases of historical sex abuse.

In a letter sent to the UK Home Affairs Committee, Goddard effectively ruled out appearing in person before British MPs and referred to “malicious defamatory attacks” by some media.

In a foreword from her husband Christopher Hodson QC, he said the letters and documents were being released as a final step.

The cache of letters and correspondence was sent to media on Tuesday. The most recent relates to the committee’s oral evidence hearing request to Goddard, who has been providing written correspondence after leaving London and returning to New Zealand.

In a letter dated November 7 to the head of the select committee, Yvette Cooper MP, Goddard writes:

“I wish to make it very clear that I have never declined to provide oral evidence to your committee.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Eleanor Ainge Roy in Dunedin and Alan Travis
Tuesday 8 November 2016

The former chair of the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse has accused the British government of failing to defend her when she was accused in the press of racism.

Dame Lowell Goddard, a former high court judge from New Zealand, resigned from the inquiry on 4 August after less than 18 months.

In her resignation letter, Goddard cited the inquiry’s “legacy of failure” in her decision to step down. Goddard was the inquiry’s third chair to resign since it was established in July 2014.

However, in a letter to the chair of the home affairs select committee, Yvette Cooper, Goddard went further, saying she was “disappointed” the British government had not defended her against “malicious defamatory attacks in some UK media”.

But her refusal to appear before the committee prompted further criticism, with Cooper saying it was “disgraceful” and an “astonishing response” from a paid public servant.

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

Felicity Caldwell

The Queensland government has flagged its support for changes that would remove the statute of limitations for children sexually abused outside of institutions.

Parliament is debating two bills on Tuesday that would remove limitation periods for victims to seek civil legal action.

Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath said she noted the non-government members of the parliamentary committee which considered the bills recommended the limitation period also be removed for child sexual abuse in non-institutions.

“Subject to considering the wording of that amendment, the government indicates its in-principal support,” Ms D’Ath said.

Ms D’Ath said it was important to have bi-partisanship when it came to tackling the issue of child sexual abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier-Mail

Jessica Marszalek, The Courier-Mail
November 8, 2016

NEW laws to make it easier for victims of child sexual abuse to sue their attackers will likely be extended after the Palaszczuk Government indicated its in-principle support for Opposition amendments.

A Bill introduced by Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk was to drop the three-year statute of limitations for victims of institutional abuse, as recommended by the Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse.

It will amend current laws that mean a victim has only three years until after their 18th birthday to commence proceedings.

But Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath today indicated the Government was willing to go further following calls from the Opposition and survivors to extend the laws to victims of all child sexual abuse in all settings, including by family.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Joshua Robertson
@jrojourno
Monday 7 November 2016

A child abuse victim named by the Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, as a friend and key inspiration for her government’s push to end time limits on civil claims has attacked her proposed legislation as a betrayal of many victims.

Allan Allaway says he is “absolutely livid” the the bill, which is due to be voted on in parliament on Tuesday, excludes survivors of physical and psychological abuse.

When introducing the bill to parliament in August, Palaszczuk singled out Allaway for thanks and acknowledged his advocacy, describing him as “a friend for many years and whose personal stories have touched my life”.

But Allaway, 76, who suffered serious physical abuse at Neerkol orphanage near Rockhampton after being taken from his mother as a baby, said the legislation abandoned him and thousands of other victims because their abuse was not sexual.

The bill would retrospectively abolish the need for victims of institutional child sexual abuse to file lawsuits by the age of 21.

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Francis Sullivan | 07 November 2016

The announcement late last week by the Turnbull government that it will establish and run a national redress scheme for the survivors of institutional child sexual abuse is a great decision that has the potential to be one of the most significant social policy reforms in recent history.

Child with teddy bear observed by threatening adultFriday’s announcement has the potential to benefit tens of thousands of people now and into the future who have suffered the most damaging and tragic abuse — institutional child sexual abuse.

The estimates are jaw dropping, more than 60,000 children abused in hundreds of different institutions across Australia for many decades into the past.

But the new scheme will only be truly effective if all institutions and all governments accept their responsibilities and commit to participating.

The Catholic Church has a lot to answer for. For decades up to the 1990s and in some cases beyond, it systematically covered up child sex abuse by members of our clergy. It consistently put the interests of the church as an institution ahead of the welfare and safety of children. Their suffering has been compounded and for many, their lives shattered.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Express and Star

A disgruntled traveller who drove a gypsy pastor to kill himself after a two-month online smear campaign has been jailed for 26 months.

Jamie Jones, 42, uploaded 23 menacing videos to YouTube targeting head minister Davey Jones (no relation) of the Life and Light Christian gypsy church in Union Street, Willenhall, Wolverhampton Crown Court heard.

The clips, posted between May and July last year, accused Davey Jones of covering-up a child sexual abuse scandal at a Romanian orphanage, of corruption over charitable funds, and of being homosexual, Mr Howard Searle prosecuting said.

The pastor, 60, was later found dead in a hotel car park in Walsall on July 11 last year after a ‘meltdown’ caused by abuse attributed to the videos, the court was told.

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FRANCE
Deutsche Welle

The French Catholic Church pleaded for forgiveness after months of revelations of sexual abuse by priests. A commission has been set up to determine the extent of abuse.

French priests and bishops took part in a day of prayer and fasting Monday to plead for forgiveness for the “sexual abuse scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church over the previous months.

Bishop Luc Crepy, who gave the homily during a Mass at the Rosary basilica, said his fellow members of the church will play their part in “this fight against scandalous and criminal actions.”
Crepy, who was appointed as the head of a church panel regarding pedophilia earlier this year, announced a series of measures to fight sexual child abuse in the church. “We had to end the guilty silence, which lasted too long, of both the church and wider society and hear the suffering of the victims…we must have the courage to take every measure possible so that the church becomes a safe place,” said Crepy.

Included in the measures passed by the French Catholic Church was a dedicated, secured email address for victims to report abuse. About 100 emails have been received since the email address was set up in April. Some emails detail abuse dating back as far as the 1960’s. The church said meetings about pedophilia would be held in Lourdes, as well as Masses around the country.

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FRANCE
Inquirer (Philippines)

AFP

LOURDES, France — French bishops pleaded for forgiveness Monday for the “guilty silence” of the Catholic Church following months of damaging revelations over the sexual abuse of children by priests.

The church has been rocked by allegations that the Archbishop of Lyon, Philippe Barbarin, covered up the abuse of scouts and failed to remove a priest despite being aware he had sexually abused the boys a quarter of a century ago.

The scandal was the worst to hit the Church in France since 2001, when a bishop was given a three-month suspended jail sentence for failing to inform authorities about a pedophile priest.

Barbarin, who has protested his innocence, remains in his post, but the scandal has tarnished the image of one of the church’s most media-friendly figures.

Archbishop of Paris Andre Vingt-Trois told worshippers at a “time for prayer and penitence” during the bishops’ autumn conference in the southwestern pilgrimage town of Lourdes on Monday that the Church had failed in its duty to victims of abuse.

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CANADA
The Sudbury Star

By Harold Carmichael, The Sudbury Star
Tuesday, November 8, 2016

A $4.25-million lawsuit filed against a former St. Charles College teacher, the Basilian Fathers of Toronto and the Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie has been settled.

A now 67-year-old man brought the case against the Roman Catholic Episcopal Corporation of Sault Ste. Marie, the Basilians and the now-deceased William Hodgson Marshall.

It dismissed without costs at a Superior Court of Justice pre-trial meeting.

Had the case not been settled, it would have started Monday at the Sudbury Courthouse, said Rob Talach of Beckett Litigation Lawyers in London, Ont.

“The family was involved,” he said in an interview. “There was a lot of fatigue, psychological fatigue. It was resolved at the pre-trial.”

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PENNSYLVANIA
Erie Times-News

Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General agents descend on offices of Erie-based diocese

By Dana Massing Erie Times-News

Special agents from the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General descended Monday on the offices of the Catholic Diocese of Erie, serving a search warrant related to a state probe of clergy sex abuse.

The Erie-based diocese, which covers 13 counties in northwestern Pennsylvania, issued a three-sentence statement: “The Diocese of Erie was served with a search warrant by the Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General this morning. Attorney General police were on the premises of St. Mark Catholic Center in Erie just before noon. Bishop Lawrence Persico asked all employees to cooperate with the search, which is part of an ongoing statewide grand jury investigation into past cases of sexual abuse in several Catholic dioceses across Pennsylvania.”

A diocese spokeswoman read the statement, which was handwritten because employees at the center weren’t being allowed access to computers at the time.

An Attorney General police truck and an SUV were parked in front of St. Mark Catholic Center, 429 E. Grandview Blvd., as men in shirts proclaiming them to be a “special agent” or “police” went in and out of the building Monday shortly before noon. None was available for comment.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Go Erie

[with video]

Published 11/07 2016

ERIE, Pa. — The Diocese of Erie was served a search warrant by the Pennsylvania office of the attorney general on Monday.

Attorney General police were on the premises of St. Mark Catholic Center in Erie just before noon, according to a news release by the diocese.

Bishop Lawrence Persico asked all employees to cooperate with the search, which is part of an ongoing, statewide grand jury investigation into past cases of sexual abuse in several Catholic dioceses across the state.

Persico was subpoenaed on Sept. 1 to give any information related to past and present allegations of sexual abuse of children in the Diocese of Erie.

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CALIFORNIA
San Francisco Examiner

By Jonah Owen Lamb on November 7, 2016

An Archbishop Riordan High School assistant football coach arrested on suspicion of murder last week is set to appear in court Wednesday for allegedly killing a man in Visitacion Valley last month, according to the District Attorney’s Office.

Salevi Levi, 22, was booked into San Francisco County Jail on Thursday along with co-defendant Dennis Paulo-Tufono.

Levi was hired earlier this year to work as an assistant coach for the private Catholic school’s football team, but Levi did not come to work Oct. 31 and as of last week, he “no longer” works for Riordan, Mike Brown, a spokesperson for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, previously told the San Francisco Examiner

Levi and Paulo-Tufono are accused in the killing of 36-year-old Giovanni Hernandez, a San Francisco resident, who was shot around 4 p.m. Oct. 1 near 26 Burr Ave.

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NEW JERSEY
Religion News Service

By David Gibson

NEWARK, N.J. (RNS) New Jersey’s first cardinal knew he was walking into the global media spotlight and, as Pope Francis’ personal choice for the next archbishop of Newark, into a post that has suddenly taken on unusual significance for the future of American Catholicism.

But at a news conference on Monday (Nov. 7) introducing him to his new flock, Cardinal-designate Joseph Tobin, 64, handled it all with the grace, straight talk and self-deprecating humor that have characterized his varied church career and made him beloved in the places he has served.

“Sometimes I think Pope Francis sees a lot more in me than I see in myself,” Tobin, who has been archbishop of Indianapolis, told reporters who repeatedly asked him why Francis had chosen him last month to be a cardinal and then promoted him to the Newark archdiocese.

Tobin repeatedly said he wasn’t sure why he was moved from his relatively small Midwestern diocese to this more prominent East Coast post, but it became apparent during his inaugural news conference — he took every question and stayed long afterwards to accommodate any interview requests — why he could be such a breath of fresh air.

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FRANCE
France 24

French bishops pleaded for forgiveness Monday for the “guilty silence” of the Catholic Church following months of damaging revelations over the sexual abuse of children by priests.

The Church in France has been rocked by allegations that the Archbishop of Lyon, Philippe Barbarin, covered up the abuse of Scouts and failed to remove a priest when he became aware he had sexually abused the boys a quarter of a century ago.

The scandal was the worst to hit the Church in France since 2001, when a bishop was given a three-month suspended jail sentence for failing to inform authorities about a paedophile priest.

Barbarin, who has proclaimed his innocence, remains in his post, but the image of one of the French Catholic Church’s most media-friendly figures has been tarnished by the scandal.

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

BY MONSY ALVARADO AND MARY JO LAYTON
STAFF WRITERS | THE RECORD

NEWARK — The newly appointed spiritual leader of The Archdiocese of Newark said Monday he will promote joy, transparency and freedom.

“I intend to be in regular and effective communication with people of this Archdiocese, city and state,” said Cardinal-elect Joseph W. Tobin, during a press conference before a throng of reporters, priests and nuns at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark. “I will promote policies that recognize that we preach the Gospel not only with words but with actions.”

Pope Francis on Monday appointed Tobin to succeed retiring Archbishop John J. Myers.

Tobin said he grew up in a multicultural neighborhood of southwest Detroit and was little jealous of classmates who spoke different languages at home.

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NEW JERSEY
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, Nov. 7, 2016

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

There are 50 publicly accused Newark predator priests. Warning parishioners and the public about them – and keeping kids away from them – should be the top priority of newly-appointed Cardinal Joseph Tobin.

Retiring Newark Archbishop John Myers has been among the very most reckless, callous and deceptive Catholic officials in the US. As recently as three years ago, he withheld information from prosecutors about a predator.

[NJ.com]

But kids won’t necessarily be safer with Myers’ retirement. Tobin has shown no leadership whatsoever in the church’s continuing abuse and cover up scandal.

Just last year, we begged him to do outreach about an Indianapolis predator, Oscar Vasquez-Guzman. We see no sign that he responded or took any helpful action. http://www.snapnetwork.org/in_victims_push_indy_archbishop_to_act_on_abuse

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FRANCE
Washington Post

By Associated Press November 7

LOURDES, France — France’s Roman Catholic Church is trying to make amends for years of silence surrounding pedophilia among priests with a day of prayer and fasting for victims of sex abuse — and to fix the problem, notably with a prevention program for priests.

Bishops who gathered in the town of Lourdes, a leading pilgrimage site, for their biannual plenary assembly prayed on Monday “for forgiveness for the sins committed by clergy members.”

During a Mass at the Rosary basilica, Bishop Luc Crepy gave the homily, exhorting his peers to play their part in “this fight against scandalous and criminal actions.”

Crepy, who was appointed earlier this year as the head of a church panel targeting pedophilia, announced a series of measures to fight child sexual abuse, including giving victims a voice and an ear, and a means to confide an act of pedophilia against. A prevention program starting in seminaries where young men are being trained for the priesthood and extending into individual dioceses is in the process of being set up. Legal procedures in the event a priest is accused of pedophilia are to be taught.

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MARYLAND
Inside Baltimore

Payment Also Requires Recipient To Relinquish Any Future Claims

By Tom Nugent

November 2016 – Reading, Pa. – After more than 40 years of struggling to get the Catholic Church to “acknowledge the crimes” that were committed against her, a Pennsylvania woman who says she was raped by two priests and a policeman while attending a Catholic high school in Baltimore was recently awarded more than $40,000 from an Archdiocese of Baltimore funding program aimed at “promoting healing for . . . victims of abuse.”

The $40,000-plus payment was accompanied by a letter of apology from an Archdiocesan official who wrote to the victim: “I am sorry for the pain you have experienced.”

Most of the money paid to the victim by the Archdiocese of Baltimore came via a check drawn on the PNC Bank of Baltimore. The check number was 313504634, and it was signed by Archbishop William E. Lori.

“This is a huge step forward for dozens of women who have been trying to get the Catholic Church in Baltimore to publicly acknowledge sex crimes that were committed against them during the past several decades,” said the reported childhood rape victim, Donna Wallis VonDenBosch, a nurse practitioner with a master’s degree who is now working on her doctorate. “For the first time that I’m aware of, the Archdiocese is validating our nightmarish experience by confirming on the record that it actually took place.”

In a statement released via email on November 1, Archdiocesan Executive Director of Communications Sean T. Caine said that the money was paid to VonDenBosch as part of a “longstanding practice of promoting healing for victims by offering therapeutic counseling assistance to victims of abuse for as long as it is helpful. . . .

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service – Bulletin

The Holy Father has appointed:

– Archbishop Joseph W. Tobin, C.Ss.R., metropolitan of Indianapolis, United States of America, as metropolitan Archbishop of Newark (area 1,328, population 3,157,000, Catholics 1,459,000, priests 730, permanent deacons 162, religious 1,092), United States of America. He succeeds Archbishop John J. Myers, whose resignation from the pastoral care of the same archdiocese was accepted by the Holy Father.

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NEW JERSEY
NJ.com

By Kelly Heyboer | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

NEWARK — A month ago, Joseph Tobin learned Pope Francis was promoting him to cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. Two weeks after that, he learned the pope was appointing him head of the Archdiocese of Newark.

“I am not sure that my central nervous system can take much more news,” Tobin said as his appointment was announced Monday. “So, you will forgive me the occasional stutter or facial tick.”

Signaling a new era for New Jersey Catholics, Pope Francis officially announced Cardinal-designate Tobin as the new head of the Archdiocese of Newark early Monday. NJ Advance Media first reported Friday that church sources said Tobin was slated to get the job.

Church officials made the announcement at a morning press conference at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark before members of the media and several hundred priests, church officials and parishioners.

Standing at a podium at the foot of the altar, Tobin said he accepted his appointment with “both shock and sadness” as he leaves his current job as the archbishop of Indianapolis. The relaxed Detroit native stood with a hand in his pocket as he cracked jokes, answered questions and showed off his ability to speak Spanish in a 47-minute press conference.

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NEW JERSEY
Inside Indiana Business

By Alex Brown, Multimedia Journalist

NEWARK, N.J. –
Indianapolis Archbishop Joseph Tobin says while he is saddened to leave Indiana, he is ready to begin his journey as the new Archbishop of Newark. Tobin has served as Archbishop of Indianapolis for the last four years after being appointed to the position by Pope Benedict XVI.

Tobin announced his new position Monday morning and, at a press conference in Newark, said he learned of his appointment two weeks ago. He joked about being named a Cardinal by Pope Francis two weeks prior to that, saying, “I’m not sure that my central nervous system can take much more news.”

Tobin says the phone call he received informing him of his appointment to the Archdiocese of Newark invoked shock and sadness.

“I recently marked four years as the Archbishop of Indianapolis and have come to love deeply the people of central and southern Indiana,” said Tobin. “It is gut-wrenching to think of leaving those wonderful clergy, religious and faithful as well as the many friends I have among peoples of other faiths and those of no faith.”

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NEW JERSEY
San Antonio Express-News

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — The Latest on Pope Francis selecting a new leader of the Archdiocese of Newark (all times local):

12:20 p.m.

The new archbishop of the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, is asking Catholics not to fall prey to the political polarization that has overtaken the country.

Archbishop Joseph Tobin made his first public comments Monday after being chosen to replace Archbishop John Myers, who has reached the mandatory retirement age of 75.

Tobin says he was surprised when he returned to the U.S. after being away since the 1990s by what he termed the “red-state, blue-state stuff” he saw in the country.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Register

BY ELISE HARRIS/CNA/EWTN NEWS 11/07/2016

VATICAN CITY — The Vatican announced Monday that recently nominated Cardinal-elect Archbishop Joseph William Tobin of Indianapolis will soon be taking over as the new head of the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, Archdiocese.

Born in Detroit May 3, 1952, Cardinal-elect Tobin has served as the sixth archbishop of Indianapolis since 2012. He was ordained a Redemptorist priest in 1978 and served as the order’s superior general from 1997 to 2009.

On Oct. 9, Pope Francis named him as one of three Americans on his list of 17 new cardinal-elects, who will be elevated during a special Nov. 19 consistory set to coincide with the end of the Jubilee of Mercy.

Other Americans getting the red hat are Archbishop Blase Cupich of Chicago and Bishop Kevin Farrell, former head of the Dallas Diocese but who recently moved to Rome to carry out his new role as prefect of the Vatican Congregation for Laity, Family and Life.

As head of the Newark Archdiocese, Cardinal-elect Tobin will be taking over for Archbishop John Myers, who will retire after having reached the age limit of 75 in July.

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

BY MARY JO LAYTON AND MONSY ALVARADO
STAFF WRITERS | THE RECORD

Pope Francis on Monday appointed Indianapolis Archbishop Joseph Tobin, a staunch supporter of social justice as the next spiritual leader of the Newark Archdiocese to succeed retiring Archbishop John J. Myers.

Myers is scheduled to hold a press conference, along with Tobin, at 10:30 a.m. today at the Newark Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

Tobin, the oldest of 13 children, is due to be elevated to cardinal in two weeks, which would make him the first cleric of that exalted rank in the 163-year history of the archdiocese, serving 1.2 million Roman Catholics in Bergen, Essex, Union and Hudson counties.

Archdiocese spokesman Jim Goodness said Tobin will likely start in January.

Related: As he exits, Newark Archbishop Myers opens up; criticizes secular culture

Cardinals usually preside over the nation’s largest and most important cities, including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.

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INDIANA
Indianapolis Star

Kaitlin L Lange and Vic Ryckaert, IndyStar November 7, 2016

Cardinal-designate Joseph W. Tobin, the archbishop of Indianapolis who tangled with Gov. Mike Pence over Syrian refugees, announced Monday that he has been chosen by Pope Francis to lead the Archdiocese of Newark, N.J.

“I immediately thought of you, the people of this great Archdiocese whose pastoral care was entrusted to me four years ago,” Tobin said in a statement posted on the Indianapolis Archdiocese website.

“The thought of leaving you devastated me,” Tobin said. “I have had many sleepless nights and shed more than a few tears.”

Tobin will be officially introduced during a news conference in Newark that starts at 10:30 a.m. Monday and will be live-streamed on the Archdiocese of Newark’s Facebook page. He will be installed in the new post on Jan. 6.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has named the Archbishop of Indianapolis, Joseph W. Tobin, C.Ss.R., to be the new Metropolitan Archbishop of Newark, New Jersey, USA. Archbishop Tobin succeeds Archbishop John J. Myers, whose resignation the Holy Father accepted on Monday.

BIOGRAPHY OF ARCHBISHOP JOSEPH TOBIN, C.Ss.R.
(From the Archdiocese of Newark)

The Most Reverend John J. Myers, fifth Archbishop of Newark, was born in Ottawa, IL on July 26, 1941 to M. W. “Jack” and Margaret Donahue Myers. He is the eldest of seven children.
The Archbishop’s family traces its roots to Ireland, England and France; relatives settled in northern Illinois in the late 1800s.

Earlier ancestors of Mrs. Myers (Spaulding was the family name) served in the Revolutionary War.

The Myers family farmed near Earlville, IL, a town of 1,400 located 20 miles north of Ottawa. The Myers children all worked with their father and shared the family chores; prayer was very much a part of their everyday routine. Young John Myers was an altar server in his parish, St. Theresa, from an early age.

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NEW JERSEY
NJ.com

By Mark Mueller | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

Archbishop Joseph W. Tobin was upending the apple cart, and he was making no apologies for it.

It was 2010, and Tobin was a new archbishop hand-picked by Pope Benedict XVI to serve as secretary of the Vatican congregation overseeing religious orders.

In that role, he had inherited an investigation into U.S. nuns, criticized by conservative theologians as too secular and too quick to steer away from established church orthodoxy. The investigation, Vatican observers said, was meant to send a message to the American sisters to fall in line with Rome.

And then Tobin did the unthinkable. He sided with the nuns, angering his superiors and making his Vatican assignment a short-lived one. Two years into a five-year term, he was reassigned to the Archdiocese of Indianapolis.

“As a result of that dispute, he made a lot of enemies, and he was basically chased out of Rome and given Indianapolis just as a way to exile him,” said the Rev. Thomas Reese, author of the book “Inside the Vatican” and a senior analyst for the National Catholic Reporter.

Six years later — and three years into a new papacy — Tobin is about to become a cardinal and was named Monday as the new leader of the Archdiocese of Newark, a dizzying reversal for the 64-year-old Detroit native.

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VATICAN CITY
CBS 4

NOVEMBER 7, 2016, BY ASSOCIATED PRESS

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis is pressing his campaign to remake the U.S. church more in his likeness, tapping one of his new cardinals, Joseph Tobin, to replace the Newark archbishop criticized for mishandling sex abuse cases and spending lavishly on his retirement home.

The Vatican on Monday announced Tobin would replace Archbishop John Myers, who reached the mandatory retirement age of 75 in July.

Tobin, currently archbishop of Indianapolis, is one of three Americans whom Francis will formally elevate as cardinal Nov. 19.

His new assignment cements evidence of Francis’ high esteem and marks a transition away from an archbishop focused on drawing hard lines about Catholic orthodoxy.

The leadership change also provides a fresh start for an archdiocese that has been battered recently by controversies over Myers’ leadership.

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UNITED STATES
New York Times

By SYDNEY EMBER and GRAHAM BOWLEY
NOV. 6, 2016

Lise-Lotte Lublin started a petition and testified before lawmakers in Nevada last year, part of a successful effort to extend that state’s statute of limitations for sexual assault.

In Colorado, where lawmakers made a similar change this year, legislators had been lobbied hard on the bill by Beth Ferrier and Heidi Thomas.

In California, it was Lili Bernard, Victoria Valentino, Linda Kirkpatrick and Janice Baker Kinney who helped organize a campaign, EndRapeSOL, and rallies as part of a movement that this fall eliminated that state’s statute of limitations for rape altogether.

The seven women live in different places and have different lives. But they were all stirred to activism, they say, by a shared history: They all say they were sexually assaulted by Bill Cosby. And in each case, by the time they decided to come forward, many years after they say they were attacked, their ability to press for criminal charges was precluded by a statute of limitations.

None of the women will benefit directly from changes in the laws, but they said they still felt compelled to get involved.

“If I’m going to be attached to him the rest of my life, then I would like something good to come out of it,” said Ms. Ferrier, who says Mr. Cosby drugged and assaulted her in the mid-1980s.

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FRANCE
Fox News

Published November 07, 2016
Associated Press

LOURDES, France – French bishops are holding a day of prayers and fasting for victims of sex abuse within the Catholic Church.

The bishops, who have gathered in the city of Lourdes for their biannual plenary assembly, prayed Monday “for forgiveness for the sins committed by clergy members.”

During a Mass at the Rosary basilica, Bishop Luc Crepy gave the homily, exhorting his peers to play their part in “this fight against scandalous and criminal actions affecting the smaller ones.” Crepy was appointed earlier this year as the new head of a church panel targeting pedophilia acts.

Following a call from Pope Francis to hold a worldwide day of prayers for victims, the church says meetings about pedophilia will also be organized in Lourdes, as well as Masses across the country.

Several French church officials have been accused in recent months of failing to report pedophile priests to judicial authorities. In August, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin was cleared of allegations he shielded a priest charged with sexual aggression and rape of a minor.

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VATICAN CITY
Crux

Inés San Martín November 7, 2016
VATICAN CORRESPONDENT

ROME- The past month has been a whirlwind for Joseph Tobin: on Oct. 9 Pope Francis surprised the world by including him on the list of the 17 new cardinals he’ll create later in the month. And on Monday, the Vatican announced his new destination: Newark, New Jersey.

“One of my favorite descriptions of the experience of faith is ‘a willingness to be surprised by God’,” Tobin said in a statement on Monday.

“By that standard, the last weeks have been exceptionally ‘faith filled’.”

As of Nov. 19, when the pontiff formally elevates Tobin, 64, to the Church’s most exclusive club in a ceremony held in Rome known as a consistory, the US prelate will become Newark’s first cardinal, in the diocese’s 163-year history.

His fluent Spanish will come useful for leading the city’s 1.2 million Catholics, an estimated half of whom are Hispanic.

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VATICAN CITY
America

Gerard O’Connell

In yet another decisive move to reshape and give a new direction to the church in the United States, Pope Francis has appointed Cardinal-elect Joseph (“Joe”) Tobin, 64, a man of simple lifestyle, committed to dialogue, encounter and the poor, as the new archbishop of Newark.

The Vatican announced this at midday, Nov. 7, confirming the news that was broken some days earlier in the United States. It said the pope accepted the resignation presented by Archbishop John J. Myers and appointed Archbishop Tobin of Indianapolis to succeed him

At the time of his appointment, the Detroit-born archbishop was the leader of the archdiocese of Indianapolis with its 250,000 faithful, which he had served since Oct. 2012. He now moves to the much larger Archdiocese of Newark, whose 1.2 million faithful have suffered many trials in recent years during the leadership of Archbishop John Myers, who now retires having reached the age of 75 last July.

Francis understood well that this diocese needed a new style of leader, and he found the man in Joseph Tobin, C.Ss.R., a member of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, better known as the Redemptorists, a Catholic missionary order of priests and brothers founded by St. Alphonus Maria de Liguori in 1749.

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TEXAS
Stop Baptist Predators

Christa Brown

The media coverage of Baylor University’s sexual assault scandal continues, and I give thanks that the outside world is keeping the world’s largest Baptist university in the spotlight.

In one of the more recent news accounts, the headline proclaims that Baylor’s scandal is “far worse than previously disclosed.” This “far worse” reality should come as no surprise to anyone who read the Pepper Hamilton investigatory report, released last May, because the horror of the scandal’s scope was always right there, both in the lines and between the lines. As one Dallas radio host recently said: “We knew it was all going to come out someday. It was a matter of time.”

With multiple legal claims now pending against Baylor, I predict that still more of the ugly truth will come out via the slow drip of revelations from depositions and discovery. Here are a few common misconceptions that I expect will be completely debunked in the coming months.

Baylor’s failure in dealing with sexual assault is not a recent anomaly.

Many have talked about the Baylor scandal as though it were an anomaly of recent years coinciding with Baylor’s push toward becoming a football powerhouse. This is a mistaken assumption that is not supported by the Pepper Hamilton investigatory report.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Freethinker

Cardinal Vincent Nichols, above, head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales has apologised for its part in the ‘hurt’ caused to young unmarried women who were pressured into handing over their babies for adoption in the 1950s, 60s and 70s.

Nichols acknowledged the “the grief and pain caused by the giving up of a child through adoption”, adding:

Sadly for unmarried mothers, adoption was considered to be in the best interests of the mother and child because of the associated stigma and the lack of support for lone parents.

A documentary telling the stories of some of the women – who gave up an estimated half a million children during a period when the Catholic Church, the Church of England and the Salvation Army ran “mother and baby homes” and adoption agencies in the UK – is to be broadcast on ITV on 9 November.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

7 November, 2016

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has released a research report which suggests that up to 14 per cent of children with disability are likely to experience sexual abuse.

The report – Disability and child sexual abuse in institutional contexts – was written by Professor Gwynnyth Llewellyn, Dr Sarah Wayland, and Ms Gabrielle Hindmarsh from the Centre for Disability Research and Policy at the University of Sydney.

The extent of sexual abuse of Australian children with disability is not known and internationally research on prevalence and risk of sexual abuse of children with disability is in its infancy. The researchers also drew attention to the relative absence of children with disability from Australian child protection frameworks and policy documents.

The researchers found the most reliable prevalence data suggesting that between nine and 14 in every 100 children with disability are likely to experience sexual abuse.

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FRANCE
France Inter

[The bishops of France have set aside today, Nov. 7., as a day of prayer and penance for the victims of sexual abuse. About 120 bishops have been invited to fast and will gather at Lourdes for their traditional autumn plenary assembly. Elsewhere in France, dioceses and parishes will join the event.]

C’est une des réponses de l’Eglise aux scandales de pédophilie. La Conférence des évêques de France (CEF) organise ce lundi 7 novembre une “journée de prière et de pénitence” pour les victimes d’abus sexuels. Les quelque 120 évêques français, invités à jeûner, seront réunis à Lourdes pour leur traditionnelle assemblée plénière d’automne. Ailleurs en France, diocèses et paroisses pourront s’associer à cet événement.

Cette idée d’une journée mondiale de prière pour les victimes d’abus sexuels de la part de membres du clergé avait été annoncée le 12 septembre par le Vatican, à l’initiative du pape François. Sa déclinaison en France prend une dimension particulière, alors que l’Église est touchée depuis plusieurs mois par des révélations d’affaires de pédophilie ou d’abus sexuels impliquant des prêtres.

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AUSTRALIA
The Educator

by James Reid
07 Nov 2016

The former principal of a north Queensland school allegedly discouraged the parents of a girl who was raped by four boys from reporting the matter to police, the Royal Commission into Child Abuse has heard.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is investigating how Townsville’s Shalom Christian College handled the sexual assault of a 14-year-old female student in 2006.

Last week, the school’s former principal, Christopher Shirley, told the Commission that the school – which he said dealt with about 20 sexual assaults a year – was “very under-resourced”, having been forced to divert money from its education budget to health and wellbeing programs to try to look after its students.

However, the parents of the girl told the Commission they believed the school tried to cover up the 2006 rape and that they were treated like “dumb black people” by Shirley.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Wendy Squires

As someone who has followed the child sex abuse royal commission with horror and fury, my desire (make that demand) has been consistent – make them pay!

My greatest fear was that those innocents, whose dignity, self-esteem and human rights were ripped away by those they trusted, would be abused all over again in their quest for justice. The retelling of their stories would be mere fodder for a news cycle, and then once the hearings concluded, we would all tut tut and go our merry way, grateful that “times have changed” and the culpable institutions had “learnt a lesson”.

But justice has arrived, for living victims at least. Last Friday, the Social Services Minister, Christian Porter, announced a national compensation scheme with payments to victims of up to $150,000. One entity would process claims, with federal backing, thus cutting red tape.

I was jubilant. But I kept reading and my anger returned. Not only is the maximum amount $50,000 lower than the commission’s suggested cap, but a clause allows the (mostly religious) institutions and the states to opt out of contributing.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY MICHAEL O’KEEFFE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, November 7, 2016

The beating took place 70 years ago, but the pain is still fresh.

When “Don” told the priest who ran St. Michael’s Home for Children on Staten Island that one of his employees had molested him repeatedly over the previous two years, the clergyman gave the boy a lecture about damaging another man’s reputation.

Then he told Don, who asked the Daily News to withhold his last name, to report to the employee who allegedly sexually abused him for his punishment.

“When he (the employee) got a hold of me, he beat me with a paddle that was three inches wide and about one inch thick,” said the 80-year-old Florida resident, his voice quivering as he recalled the beating during a recent telephone interview.

“He beat the back of my legs like he was really mad. I thought he would never stop.”

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UNITED STATES
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) –- Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Archbishop John J. Myers of Newark, New Jersey, and named Cardinal-designate Joseph W. Tobin of Indianapolis to succeed him.

Archbishop Myers, Newark’s archbishop since 2001, is 75, the age at which canon law requires bishops to turn in their resignation to the pope.

The 64-year-old cardinal-designate, who is a member of the Redemptorist order, has been the archbishop of Indianapolis since 2012 and was named a new cardinal by Pope Francis Oct. 9. He also is former archbishop-secretary of the Vatican Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. As secretary, he was credited with helping change the tone of a Vatican-ordered apostolic visitation of U.S. women’s religious communities from an investigation into a dialogue.

The changes were announced in Washington Nov. 7 by Archbishop Christophe Pierre, apostolic nuncio to the United States.

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INDIANA
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indiana

November 7, 2016

Statement of Cardinal-designate Joseph W. Tobin on his appointment as the Archbishop of Newark, N.J.

(Related: A news conference from Newark will be live-streamed this morning, Nov. 7, at 10:30 a.m. EST at this link.)

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

One of my favorite descriptions of the experience of faith is “a willingness to be surprised by God.” By that standard, the last weeks have been exceptionally “faith-filled.” The first jolt came on October 9, when I learned that Pope Francis had named me to the College of Cardinals. The second tremor arrived on October 22, when I received a phone call from the ambassador of the Holy See to the United States, the papal nuncio, who informed me that Pope Francis had appointed me as the Archbishop of Newark, New Jersey. This assignment was announced publicly today and I will be installed in Newark on January 6, 2017.

Receiving that second shock, I immediately thought of you, the people of this great Archdiocese whose pastoral care was entrusted to me four years ago. I remembered how you welcomed me, offered your support in so many ways, forgave my mistakes and limitations and always assured me of your love and the precious backing of your prayer. The thought of leaving you devastated me. I have had many sleepless nights and shed more than a few tears.

I had always understood my vocation as that of a missionary disciple, one whom Jesus called to be with Him so that He might send me out to preach and heal. Becoming your archbishop, I realized that this missionary also had to become a pastor. The model for all pastoral ministry is Jesus the Good Shepherd, who “knows his own” and his “own know him” (Jn 10, 14). Since October 18, 2012, all of you, the beloved People of God, became “my” people. God created among us bonds of love, mercy, forgiveness and joy. Together we accepted our call to work together to respond in love to God, who loved us first. We are an outward-looking Church, asking where God was opening a door.

Now Pope Francis has asked me to become a missionary disciple and pastor in another local Church. I hope that you will commission me—send me forth with your blessing to preach and heal in the Archdiocese of Newark. I know that I will leave a considerable chunk of my heart here in the Catholic communities of central and southern Indiana. I trust that God will fill that void with overflowing gratitude for the gift of sharing a portion of the pilgrimage with you.

The Archdiocese is not helpless in the face of this change. Just as what happened after the resignation of Archbishop Daniel, the Church will provide stable leadership for the Archdiocese until the new Archbishop is named. I believe you will receive a good pastor and you will not have to wait as long as you did before I was named.

You may know that the Archdiocese had already planned a special celebration on Saturday, December 3, to celebrate the feast of our patron, St. Francis Xavier, and to ask a blessing on a new cardinal. Now, that celebration will also be a moment for us to say good-bye in faith. We will remain united in the communion of saints as well as in the breaking of the bread.

Your brother in Christ the Redeemer,

+ Joseph W. Tobin, C.Ss.R.

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VATICAN CITY
Religion News Service

By David Gibson

(RNS) Pope Francis had already delivered the Catholic Church’s version of an October surprise when he included Indianapolis Archbishop Joseph Tobin in the batch of new cardinals he announced last month – promising a red hat to the leader of a relatively small Midwestern diocese of 230,000 Catholics that had never before had a cardinal, nor would ever expect one.

Then on Monday (Nov. 7) the pontiff doubled down with a November stunner as the Vatican announced that Francis was moving Tobin to head the Archdiocese of Newark in New Jersey.

In a statement release early Monday after the Vatican announcement was official, Tobin compared these last few weeks to an earthquake, saying the news on Oct. 9 that he would become a cardinal was his “first jolt” and the phone call on Oct. 22 informing him that he would be going to Newark was a “second tremor.”

Never before has a cardinal been moved from one diocese to another, and church observers across the board also expressed shock at the unprecedented transfer, which seemed to signal a new stage in Francis’ effort to revamp a U.S. church that had become increasingly conservative under the pontiff’s two predecessors.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Nov. 7, 2016

VATICAN CITY

Pope Francis has moved Cardinal-designate Joseph Tobin from Indianapolis to Newark, N.J., giving the New York area two cardinals for the first time and assigning him to take over for an archbishop who has been sharply criticized in recent years for his handling of clergy sexual abuse.

Tobin, 64, was named by Francis as one of three new U.S. cardinals last month and will officially take up that role in a ceremony in Rome Nov. 19. He replaces Archbishop John Myers, 75, who has led the Newark archdiocese since October 2001.

The appointment comes a week before the U.S. bishops’ annual meeting, which will be held in Baltimore Nov. 14-17.

Tobin was the first cardinal in history chosen from the Indianapolis archdiocese and will be the first Cardinal archbishop of Newark. In an NCR interview shortly after his appointment as a cardinal, Tobin reflected at length on Francis’ focus on mercy and said his wish is that the church would become “a sacrament of mercy” in our world.

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NEW JERSEY
New York Times

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
NOV. 7, 2016

In his latest move to reshape the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, Pope Francis on Monday named a moderate known for standing up for refugees and nuns to be the next leader of the Archdiocese of Newark, a large and troubled diocese.

Francis’ pick is Joseph W. Tobin, currently the archbishop of Indianapolis. He made national headlines last year when he rebuffed Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana, now the Republican vice-presidential nominee, by refusing to stop Catholic Charities from resettling a family of Syrian refugees.

Archbishop Tobin is so clearly in the pope’s favor that he is among 17 churchmen being made cardinals in Rome later this month. The Archdiocese of Newark has never before been led by a cardinal, the rank of those entrusted to select new popes.

His transfer to New Jersey places a second cardinal in bridge-and-tunnel proximity of the nation’s media capital, where Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York is now the undisputed spokesman on Catholic matters.

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VATICAN CITY
Herald Malaysia

VATICAN CITY: The Vatican announced Monday that recently nominated Cardinal-elect Archbishop Joseph William Tobin of Indianapolis will soon be taking over as the new head of the Newark, N.J. Archdiocese.

Born in Detroit May 3, 1952, Tobin has since 2012 served as the 6th Archbishop of Indianapolis. He was ordained a Redemptorist priest in 1978 and served as the order’s superior general from 1997 to 2009.On Oct. 9 Pope Francis named him as one of three Americans on his list of 17 new cardinal-elects, who will be elevated during a special Nov. 19 consistory set to coincide with the end of the Jubilee of Mercy.

Other Americans getting the red hat are Archbishop Blase Cupich of Chicago and Bishop Kevin Farrell, former head of the Dallas diocese but who recently moved to Rome to carry out his new role as prefect of the Vatican Congregation for Laity, Family and Life.

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NEW JERSEY
Road to Recovery

The Cardinal Archbishop-designate of Newark, New Jersey, Joseph Tobin, will be called upon to reach out to victim/survivors of sexual abuse by Archdiocese of Newark clergy and other clergy, religious men/ women (such as those in religious orders) and personnel who have worked in the Archdiocese of Newark, settle their claims in a fair and timely manner, release all information about cases of sexual abuse by Archdiocesan clergy and other clergy and religious men and women (such as those in religious orders) and other personnel, and pledge to be honest and transparent about ALL sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey

In particular, the Cardinal Archbishop-designate of Newark, New Jersey, Joseph Tobin, will be called upon to fairly settle six claims of childhood sexual abuse in a timely manner against Fr. Michael “Mitch” Walters who allegedly sexually abused children at St. Cassian’s Parish, Upper Montclair, NJ and St. John Nepomucene Parish in Guttenberg, NJ

Road to Recovery, Inc. will call on the Cardinal Archbishop-designate of Newark, New Jersey, Joseph Tobin, to support the passage of statute of limitations legislation in the State of New Jersey that will give victims of sexual abuse their day in court

What
A press conference calling on the Cardinal Archbishop-designate of Newark, New Jersey, Joseph Tobin, to treat victims of sexual abuse by Archdiocesan clergy and other clergy, religious men/women (such as those in religious orders) and personnel who have worked in the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, with fairness, honesty, and transparency by settling their claims in a timely manner. In addition, demonstrators will call on the Cardinal Archbishop-designate of Newark, New Jersey, Joseph Tobin, to support statute of limitations legislation in New Jersey that will give victims of sexual abuse their day in court

When
Monday, November 7, 2016, following the 10:30 am press conference announcing the appointment of Joseph Tobin as Cardinal Archbishop-designate of Newark, New Jersey

Where
On the public sidewalk in front of the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart, 89 Ridge Street, Newark, New Jersey 07104

Who
Members of Road to Recovery, Inc., a non-profit charity based in New Jersey that assists victims of sexual abuse and their families, including its co-founder and President, Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D., a sexual abuse victim and former priest of the Archdiocese of Newark

Why
The Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, has been wracked by allegations of sexual abuse by archdiocesan clergy and by clergy, religious men/women (such as those in religious orders) and personnel who have worked in the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey. To this day, information about cases of sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Newark has been withheld from the victims, their advocates, and the general public. Archbishop John Myers has been secretive about allegations of sexual abuse, the names of the abusers, and the documents associated with the cases that are in the possession of the Archdiocese of Newark. This practice must end. The Cardinal Archbishop-designate, Joseph Tobin, must treat victim/survivors of sexual abuse with compassion, honesty, and transparency. Information about sexual abusers must be made public, and a list of abusive clergy and other personnel must be placed on the Archdiocese of Newark website.

Contact
Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D., Road to Recovery, Inc. – roberthoatson@gmail.com
Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, Boston, MA – 617-523-6250 – garabedianlaw@msn.com

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