ABUSE TRACKER

AUSTRALIA
Daily Examiner

Tim Howard | 12th Jun 2016

THE Bishop of Grafton Sarah Macneil has described her apology to a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of a predecessor as an “attempt to right an ancient wrong”.

Rev Macneil apologised to Beth Heinrich, during her sermon at the 8am service in Christ Church Cathedral this morning.

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PENNSYLVANIA
The Mercury

By Kathleen E. Carey, kcarey@21st-centurymedia.com, @dtbusiness on Twitter
POSTED: 06/12/16

In its efforts to squash a bill allowing victims of sexual abuse more time to seek civil recourse, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia has launched a campaign that some state representatives say includes lies, misinformation and threats.

The church maintains this legislation could have devastating”impacts on parishes and services as it encourages parishioners to lobby against HB 1947, extending the time an abuse victim can file a civil suit from when they turn 30 years old to 50 years old and removing immunity for organizations found to be grossly negligent.

In a fact sheet distributed at churches regarding the bill last weekend, the archdiocese states the church does not oppose the elimination of the criminal statute of limitations, but it does the civil component due to a lower standard of proof and the impact it would have on the archdiocese.

The bill passed the House of Representatives by a 180-15 vote in April and the state Senate Judiciary Committee plans to hold a hearing on the matter Monday. At that hearing state Attorney General Kathleen Kane is expected to make a statement, and state Solicitor General Bruce L. Castor Jr. will testify.

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IRELAND
Church Militant

By Anthony Murphy

Last week I spoke to an Irish bishop about the latest scandal to hit St. Patrick’s seminary in Maynooth. While he himself did not want to go on the record, he did acknowledge that the Irish bishops were aware of some of the concerns about the seminary but were unable to act because the complaints made by seminarians were always anonymous. Is he serious? Does he really expect anything other than an anonymous complaint?

To understand the fear of speaking out openly and why seminarians chose to suffer in silence we first need to visit the Gulag.

Lessons From the Gulag

There is a story told by that great Russian writer and Nobel laureate, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, in his book “The Gulag Archipelago,” about a gathering which was held in 1938 in honor of Stalin. At this gathering there were many speeches. Stalin was not even in the room, but every time his name was mentioned in a speech, the people rose to their feet with thunderous applause. At the end of the evening, there was a call for one more cheer in honor of Stalin. Solzhenitsyn writes, “For three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, the stormy applause, rising to an ovation, continued.”

Who would be the first to stop clapping? Nobody dared — there were guards from the NKVD all around the room keeping an eye out for those who might not be “real” supporters. Thus the applause continued. Solzhenitsyn goes on to say, “It was becoming insufferably silly, even to those who really adored Stalin.” The applause went on, continuing for six, seven, eight minutes. “They were done for! Their goose was cooked! They couldn’t stop now till they collapsed with heart attacks.”

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NEW ZEALAND
New Zealand Herald

The Government is being asked to investigate alleged abuse within the Catholic Church, to give closure to survivors before they die.

Peter Hercock, a former chaplin at Sacred Heart College in Lower Hutt, has admitted two charges of rape, one of attempted rape and four of indecently assaulting a girl aged between 12 and 16.

He was last month sentenced to six years and seven months in jail, four decades after his offending began.

One of his victims, Ann-Marie Shelley, 60, is calling on the Government to set up a Royal Commission of Inquiry into sexual abuse in the New Zealand Catholic Church.

It follows a Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse in Australia, which has looked into child sex abuse reported in the Victorian city of Ballarat.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Raw Story

BETHANIA PALMA MARKUS
11 JUN 2016

Advocates for clergy sex abuse victims in Pennsylvania are claiming that lobbying and intimidation tactics by the Roman Catholic Church will result in lawmakers either diluting or defeating a bill that would let victims sue for crimes that occurred decades ago, Philly.com reports Saturday.

The bill is sponsored by Rep. Mark Rozzi, a Democrat who is himself a victim of clergy abuse.

“It looks like they’re going to remove my amendment,” Rozzi told Philly.com. “Victims, oh my God, they’re going to be devastated.”

The bill, if passed, would allow victims as old as 50 to sue attackers and their employers for violations that occurred as far back as the 1970s. Currently, victims have 12 years to pursue the matter after turning 18. After the age of 30, the statute of limitations prevents them from legal action. Rozzi hopes to give victims more time.

Sources told Philly.com that Solicitor General Bruce L. Castor Jr. is planning to testify Monday in front of the Senate that the legislation is unconstitutional, giving lawmakers an excuse to back away from supporting it. As solicitor general, Castor has the power to make legal calls for the state attorney general’s office.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

MICHAEL O’KEEFFE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Saturday, June 11, 2016

Manny Waks says he was sexually abused as a child in Melbourne, Australia, by a member of the Brooklyn-based Chabad-Lubavitch sect.

And like many other victims around the globe, the activist says, he’s been unable to get justice from the organization because of New York’s statute of limitations. Under New York State law, survivors have to file lawsuits by their 23rd birthday.

Waks, the founder of a group called Kol v’Oz that combats sexual abuse in the Jewish community, wants the Melbourne community where he grew up — and thousands of other Chabad-Lubavitch institutions around the world — to implement programs to detect and prevent sexual abuse. But the Chabad-Lubavitch leadership has refused to push those institutions to take steps to hold predators responsible.

He fears the organization will continue to ignore the danger without the leverage provided by lawsuits.

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NEW ZEALAND
Stuff

[with video]

FLORENCE KERR
June 12 2016

A Catholic Church rape survivor has slammed church policy of not informing police when the church gets a complaint of sexual abuse.

Ann-Marie Shelley, 60, was raped by former Catholic priest Peter Hercock in the 1970s. Hercock was jailed for six years and seven months in May 2016. She was paid $25,000 by the church.

Shelley was horrified that a 59-year-old woman used fake documents to support her claim that she was raped by a priest to gain access to the church’s wealth, receiving $188,190.17, before the church became aware of the fraud.

“What this woman did is despicable,” she said. “She makes it difficult for other survivors to come forward because they will fear they won’t be believed.”

But while she condemned the fraud, she equally believes the church should have reported the abuse allegation to police.

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NEW ZEALAND
Stuff

FLORENCE KERR
June 12 2016

Police only became aware of a woman’s claims she was raped by a Palmerston North Catholic priest who abused her with a knife and a broken bottle when the church learned it had been duped out of the payments it had made to her.

The woman, who has name suppression, appeared at the Morrinsville District Court on Wednesday, June 8, to be sentenced on one charge of obtaining by deception $188,190.17 from the Catholic Church, which paid for various medical operations and psychological tests in relation to the abuse claim.

The woman supplied fake medical reports to the church to support the claim.

The fraud was discovered only when the church queried one of the reports with a health provider.

In 2013, the woman told the Palmerston North Catholic Diocese that a priest had raped her. The alleged rape and sexual abuse were reported to have happened in October 1985.

The complaint was handled in-house by the Palmerston North Catholic Diocese Protocol Committee, which deals with allegations of sexual abuse by clergy.

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IRELAND
Donegal Now

Women and children who may have suffered abuse in care homes are being sought as part of a new investigation.

The investigation centres on four ‘mother and baby homes’ in the Republic, including one in Donegal.

The homes are Stranorlar County Home in Donegal, St Kevin’s Institution in Dublin, Cork City County Home and Thomastown County Home in Kilkenny.

A Commission of Investigation has been set up to look at alleged abuse in the homes.

The commission want to hear from anyone who lived at the homes for any length of period.

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ITALY
Church Militant

By Juliana Freitag

The archdiocese of Brindisi-Ostuni reportedly has a network of homosexual, sexually abusive priests.

The first offense came to public light when the Italian investigative TV show “Le iene” received an anonymous email stating that underage boys in Brindisi had suffered sex abuse at the hands of Fr. Giampero Peschiulli, 73. The program then commissioned youthful-looking actors (one who claimed to be 16) to meet with the priest, and then secretly recorded their actions. Footage shows Fr. Peschiulli caressing the faces of the male actors and aggressively hugging and kissing them — all while wearing his Roman collar. The episode, titled “The Smooching Priest,” aired toward the end of 2014.

The airing led to police inquiries, resulting in several accusations from victims of sexual assault going as far back as 2002. The parents of some of the victims declared they had sought help from the archbishop of Brindisi-Ostuni at the time, Msgr. Rocco Talucci, who “seemed surprised at the fact that the youngsters were talking about the abuse, and invited the victims not to press charges and not share the incidents with anyone else.”

The accusations that eventually led to the priest’s prosecution in January of this year involved two of his altar boys, who revealed they had been suffering abuse since 2012, when both of them were under 14. The boys explained in detail how Peschiulli approached them when he was already in Mass vestments. He had a preference for boys, they claimed, always getting rid of any females in his presence, whom he referred to as “little whores only interested in sex.”

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ITALY
Church Militant

By Juliana Freitag

Read the first part of this series here.

Father Francesco Caramia, the name mentioned in one of Fr. Peschiulli’s conversations with his friend, was the priest in charge of the parish in the neighborhood of Bozzano, in Brindisi, and one of Abp. Talucci’s “favorites.” In December 2015, Caramia left his ministry claiming “health problems,” when in reality he was being investigated — not because of Peschiulli’s accusations against him, but because a pediatrician denounced him for sexually abusing a boy between 2007 and 2010, when the victim was only nine years old.

Last February the victim was heard and his declarations included the threats made by the 42 year-old priest: “He forced me to perform sexual acts with him. It would also happen in the sacristy. Sometimes he would push me hard and threaten me, telling me that if I spoke to anyone he would find a way to make my father lose his job and his house.” He also said Fr. Caramia promised him he could be an altar server in exchange for the acts.

Caramia is denying the charges, and is currently waiting for the conclusion of the investigation in complete liberty, being very active on social media. The archdiocese of Brindisi-Ostuni released a note on the case:

The Archbishop of Brindisi found out with distress about a priest in town facing charges of very serious transgressions. The accused firmly rejects the accusations and claims to be able to defend himself adequately… . Monsignor Caliandro trusts the Judiciary and awaits the results of the inquiries. If the crimes are confirmed to be true, the diocesan authority shall act with determination and the greatest regard for the victims, following the teachings of Pope Francis and his immediate predecessors.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Catholics4Change

JUNE 11, 2016 BY SUSAN MATTHEWS

Supporters for HB 1947 will gather at 8am and noon on Monday at the Capitol steps (3rd Street between Walnut and North) in Harrisburg. Monday is the day senators will meet for hearings on the constitutionality of the bill.

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UNITED STATES
The Guardian (UK)

Amanda Holpuch in New York
@holpuch
Saturday 11 June 2016

To understand Donald Trump’s rise, it is worth considering the emergence of female masturbation courses in China, according to author Frank Browning, whose latest book, The Fate of Gender, was released in the US on Tuesday.

The book, which only gives a brief nod to the presumptive Republican nominee, explores the science behind one of the most prominent movements of our time – the democratization of gender – and the reaction from those in traditional positions of power: men.

“There is a resentment that transfuses western society having to do with this change of a role of authority and power, and Donald Trump responds to that,” Browning told the Guardian in a phone call from his home in France. …

In discussing violence against those repressed groups in predominantly Catholic countries, Browning writes: “The Vatican, of course, regularly denounces any form of domestic violence, but human rights workers argue that it is the underlying teaching of the church in the light of the gender equality movement that continues to fuel what can only be seen as an intensifying gender war.”

The church is also mentioned as a marker for how quickly things have changed – Browning writes that while same-sex couples openly parenting a child 50 years ago could have been imprisoned for child abuse, a priest is more likely to be imprisoned on such charges today, as the clergy sex abuse scandal has shown.

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UNITED STATES
The Catholic Whistleblowers

By: the Catholic Whistleblowers Steering Committee

Passing the Child Victims Act would help to protect children, while bringing into the spotlight the names of perpetrators of child sexual abuse and thus warn the community. Passing this Act also would provide a route to justice for victims who deserve such a route.

Furthermore, on its website, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops says: “Regardless of when the abuse occurred, a cleric against whom there is an established or admitted act of child sexual abuse is permanently removed from the priesthood. There is no statute of limitations for removing a cleric who has sexual {sic} abused a minor from public ministry in the Catholic Church” (emphasis by underscore added).[1]

How did this come to be? In 2003 Pope John Paul II authorized a change in church procedures so that the church’s statute of limitations would never again prevent the church from dealing with an abuser priest, no matter how long in the past the crime occurred. Then, on May 21, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI formalized into church law the authority that Pope John Paul II had granted in 2003.

This change in church law is retroactive which explains how the church has been able to deal with very old cases. Moreover, the change concerns both the crime of sexual abuse of a minor or of a vulnerable adult and also the actions to recover compensation for damages incurred because of the crime. Thus, it regards both “criminal” law and “civil” law, as we would say in the United States.

The key to the “civil” component of the change in the church’s statute of limitations is found in canon 1729, §1 of the Code of Canon Law which provides that within the penal (criminal) trial itself an injured party can bring a contentious action (a civil action) to repair damages incurred as a result of the crime.

Thus, the change in the statute of limitations (referred to as “prescription” in Canon Law) applies to both the crime of sexual abuse of a minor or of a vulnerable adult by a cleric and also to the damages incurred because of the crime. The “civil” action gets included with the “criminal” action.

So, while Catholic Church secrecy does not give us all the details of clergy sexual abuse cases as would American courts, clearly church law provides for both “criminal” and “civil” retroactive dealing with sexual abuse of a minor or of a vulnerable adult by a priest.

Hence, Catholic bishops in the United States should support comparable changes to states’ statutes of limitations.
________________________________________
[1] Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, “Did you know … ?“, 2013,http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/child-and-youth-protection/upload/Did-You-Know-2013-2.pdf [See: #13]

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DEUTSCHLAND
Katholisch

[Once a priest is ordained that ordination is never invalid, according to canon law. But what does it mean when a priest is suspended or laicized?]

“Die einmal gültig empfangene heilige Weihe wird niemals ungültig”, heißt es im Kirchenrecht. Was bedeutet es dann, wenn von der Suspendierung eines Priesters die Rede ist? Oder wenn er gar “laisiert” wird? Katholisch.de erklärt die Begriffe.

Suspendierung

Bei einer Suspendierung wird dem Diakon oder Priester die Ausübung von Amtshandlungen untersagt. Sie wird vom Ortsbischof verhängt und ist als vorübergehende Maßnahme gedacht. Als sogenannte Beugestrafe soll sie bezwecken, dass der Betroffene die Verhaltensweisen oder Auffassungen, die mit der kirchlichen Lehre nicht vereinbar sind und zu der Suspendierung geführt haben, aufgibt.

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VATIKAN
kathpress

Vatikanstadt, 10.06.2016 (KAP) Das vom Papst eingeführte neue Verfahren zur Amtsenthebung von Bischöfen schützt die Diözesanleiter nach Ansicht des langjährigen vatikanischen Chefermittlers in Missbrauchsfällen besser vor Denunziationen. Die neuen Vorschriften böten Bischöfen auch “eine gewisse Sicherheit”, sagte der Erzbischof von Malta, Charles Scicluna (57), im “Radio Vatikan”-

Scicluna war vor seinem Wechsel nach Malta in der Glaubenskongregation als eine Art Staatsanwalt für die kirchenrechtliche Ahndung von sexuellem Missbrauch durch Priester tätig.

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VATIKAN
Katholisch

[The new rules in the pope’s directive on holding bishops accountable for covering-up abuse gives certain security to bishops, according to Archbishop Charles Scicluna.]

Das vom Papst eingeführte neue Verfahren zur Amtsenthebung von Bischöfen schützt die Bistumsleiter nach Ansicht des langjährigen vatikanischen Chefermittlers in Missbrauchsfällen besser vor Denunziationen. Die neuen Vorschriften böten Bischöfen auch “eine gewisse Sicherheit”, sagte der Erzbischof von Malta, Charles Scicluna (57), Radio Vatikan.

Die Regelung garantiere eine festgelegte Prozedur, wie im Fall von Anzeigen wegen Vernachlässigung der Amtspflichten vorzugehen sei, erklärte Scicluna. Demnach habe ein Bischof nun das Recht, sich zu verteidigen, wenn eine vatikanische Kongregation Ermittlungen gegen ihn aufnehme. Scicluna war vor seinem Wechsel Ende 2012 nach Malta in der Glaubenskongregation als eine Art Staatsanwalt für die kirchenrechtliche Ahndung von sexuellem Missbrauch durch Priester tätig.

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UTAH
Watson

Nun sind es schon vier mutmassliche Opfer sexuellen Missbrauchs in einem Programm für indigene Pflegekinder der mormonischen Kirche. Ein viertes Mitglied des Volkes der Navajo verklagt die «Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints», da führende Geistliche nicht genug unternommen hätten, um ihn vor dem sexuellen Missbrauch durch seinen Pflegevater zu schützen.

Der Mann, der in den Akten nur als L.K. bezeichnet wird, hatte in einer Klage vor einem Gericht der Navajo Nation im US-Bundesstaat Utah schwere Vorwürfe gegen die Führung der Kirche erhoben. Während seiner Zeit in dem Programm für indigene Pflegekinder in den Siebzigerjahren habe er sich an einen Pfadfinderführer und einen Sozialarbeiter der Kirche gewandt, schreibt die Zeitung «Salt Lake Tribune».

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FRANKREICH
Katholisches

[Cardinal Philippe Barbarin of France was questioned by police on whether he may have covered-up sexual abuse of minors.]

(Paris) Kardinal Philippe Barbarin, der Erzbischof von Lyon und Primas von Gallien, wurde heute von der Polizei einvernommen. Dabei geht es um den Vorwurf, der Kardinal könnte einen 25 Jahre zurückliegenden sexuellen Mißbrauch eines Priesters vertuscht haben.

Seit Wochen steht der Kardinal im Blitzlichtgewitter der französischen Presse. Wegen seines Ranges in der Katholischen Kirche berichten auch internationale Medien. Barbarin wurde als Zeuge gehört. Gegen ihn wurde keine Anklage erhoben.

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VATICAN CITY
Billings Gazette

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican said Friday it has shelved plans to bring in an external auditor for its consolidated financial statements but has kept PricewaterhouseCoopers on for consulting services.

The Vatican announced in December that it had hired PwC as its external auditor, part of financial czar Cardinal George Pell’s march to bring the Holy See’s finances in line with international standards.

But the Vatican suspended the contract in April after questions arose about the contract’s scope and who had signed it: Pell and the head of the Council for the Economy’s audit committee.

The Vatican said Friday only its own auditor general, Libero Milone, is legally responsible for auditing its consolidated financial statements, as with any sovereign state.

The contract has been revised, with PwC assisting Milone and other Vatican offices with consulting services.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Register

by Edward Pentin 06/10/2016

After first suspending accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers’ external audit of Vatican finances in April, the Holy See has now definitively cancelled PwC’s full involvement in the financial inspection.

In a statement released today, the Vatican said the audit would now be executed by the Vatican’s own Auditor General. It added that PwC would henceforth “play an assisting role” and be “available to those dicasteries that wish to avail themselves of its support and consulting services.”

The Register revealed in April that the Secretariat of State had suspended the external audit just four months after it had begun its work. The news came as a surprise to Cardinal George Pell, the prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy, who had not been given advance notice of the suspension which was ordered by the Secretariat of State in a letter sent to all Vatican entities.

Together with the body that oversees the Secretariat — the Council for the Economy headed by Cardinal Reinhard Marx — he had commissioned accountancy giant PwC to carry out the audit in a bid to bring accountability and transparency to the Vatican’s finances and make sure they matched international standards.

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ROME
The Guardian (UK)

Stephanie Kirchgaessner
Friday 10 June 2016

The Vatican has summoned an American nun whose Kentucky-based order has run afoul of the church in the past to come to Rome and respond to “areas of concern”, raising questions about whether the Vatican is embarking on another crackdown on liberal-minded US sisters.

The Congregation of the Sisters of Loretto said in a statement that the Vatican had sent a letter, dated 1 January, in which it said it wanted to discuss issues with Pearl McGivney, the order’s president, that had been raised during a now-closed 2010 investigation into American nuns. That investigation by the Vatican had examined a certain “secular mentality” within some religious groups, as well as a “feminist spirit”, a church official said at the time.

The news, first reported by Global Sisters Report, comes more than a year after Pope Francis made the unexpected decision to end a separate investigation by the Vatican into the Leadership Conference on Women Religious, the major umbrella group of US nuns. That decision, announced in April 2015, was seen as an important shift by the Vatican, which had been accused of being heavy-handed in its treatment of the US sisters based on the concerns of conservatives who feared that many were straying from the church’s core teaching.

The Vatican did not respond to a request for comment.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philly Voice

BRIAN HICKEY
PhillyVoice Staff

“We know in faith that Jesus seeks us out. He wants to heal our wounds, to soothe our feet which hurt from traveling alone, to wash each of us clean of the dust from our journey.”

Those words were delivered by Pope Francis to inmates at Curran Fromhold Correctional Facility during his September visit to the city.

Speaking of which, remember all that goodwill those heady days just nine months ago engendered?

I do, thanks in part to the knee-jerk giddiness that accompanied seeing the pontiff in his Fiat as it cruised up North Seventh Street one afternoon.

Strike that: I did until I read Thursday’s story about the Archdiocese of Philadelphia going full Trump-mode against believers who dare stand up for the rights of sexual-abuse victims. Now, not so much.

At the center of this mess is state Rep. Nick Miccarelli, a Delaware County Republican who the church decided to call out in the weekly bulletin distributed to Mass-goers at his home parish, St. Rose of Lima in Eddystone.

“JUST SO YOU ARE AWARE,” it read (all-caps theirs), “State Representative Miccarelli voted in favor of House Bill 1947 which states that private institutions can be sued as far as 40 years ago for millions of dollars, while public institutions may not be sued for any crimes committed in the past.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service – Bollettino

Vatican City, 10 June 2016 – As previously noted, with respect to the relationship between the Holy See and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) it was deemed useful to suspend auditing activity to examine the meaning and scope of certain contract clauses, as well as to examine the manner in which the contract was executed.

Together with PwC, those issues were duly examined in an atmosphere of serene collaboration, resolving the questions originally identified. In particular, it was recognised that, by law, the task of performing the financial statement audit is entrusted to the Office of the Auditor General (URG), as is normally the case for every sovereign state. Given that, in conformity with the legal framework in force this institutional responsibility falls upon the URG, PwC will play an assisting role and will also be available to those dicasteries that wish to avail themselves of its support and consulting services.

It is important to clarify that, contrary to what has been reported by some sources, the suspension was not due to considerations regarding the integrity or the quality of PwC’s work, nor is it attributable to the desire of one or more entities of the Holy See to hinder reforms. The path towards a correct and appropriate implementation of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) is normally complex and prolonged. That path requires a series of legislative choices as well as the adoption of administrative and accounting procedures, which are presently under development.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

By Phil Lawler Jun 10, 2016

Another scandal is brewing at the Vatican.

This time the subject will not be sex, but that other rich lode of corruption: money.

Shady deals at the Vatican bank, the Institute for Religious Works (IOR), have brought disgrace on the Holy See in the past (if you don’t know what I mean, search on “Roberto Calvi”), and more conventional problems in the past few years (try “Nunzio Scarano”). But now the IOR is under new management, run by lay professionals, and appears fully committed to transparency.

Unfortunately the offices of the Roman Curia are not ready to make the same commitment. Today’s announcement that the Vatican will not proceed with an external audit, but rely instead on internal controls, represents a victory for the sort of halfway disclosure that Richard Nixon characterized as the “modified, limited hangout”—a commitment to (as one high-ranking Vatican official put it) “full accountability, yes, but let’s keep our problems in-house.”

In today’s announcement the Vatican press office took special pains to deny the charges made by some analysts that the audit by PricewaterhouseCooper had been suspended because some Vatican agencies (notably the Secretariat of State) were dragging their feet on financial disclosures. “The commitment to the economic-financial audit of the Holy See and of the State of Vatican City has been, and remains, a priority,” the statement insisted.

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AUSTRALIA
Sky News

A 64-year-old man has been arrested and extradited from NSW to Western Australia to face 64 historical child sex abuse charges.

It will be alleged that between 1978 and 1983, he sexually abused 10 children aged 10 to 16 under his care at the Warminda Hostel in East Victoria Park, Perth, WA police said in a statement on Saturday.

The hostel for Aboriginal children was run by Methodist and Uniting Church agencies at the time.

The man was arrested on Friday by Taskforce Tonalite and is due to face Perth Magistrates Court on Saturday.

He has been charged with 12 counts of rape, 23 of indecent treatment of children under 14 years, 11 of indecent practices between males, eight of indecent assault of a female, six of indecent assault of a male, and four of indecent acts.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Bernard A. Hebda
June 10, 2016

Thank you for publishing Zach Czaia’s “An open letter to the new archbishop” (May 29). While I haven’t met him, Zach seems representative of a segment of this local Catholic Church that inspires me: people in the pew who care deeply for those who have been harmed. He’s one of many who have continued to stay engaged, who ask how we as a faith community might more faithfully live out the Gospel, and who challenge me to lead our church in an authentic response to our present situation.

I am praying that there are indeed many more like Zach who want “to do more” so that those who have been harmed in the church may experience true healing. The archdiocese has long been funding counseling for those who come forward to report abuse. Like Zach, however, we’re hoping to do even more. Our Plan of Reorganization commits us to creating a $500,000 fund to assist victims desiring counseling. Individuals or parishes who desire to augment that fund are free to do so.

Like Zach, we acknowledge that the pain of our brothers and sisters is real. In filing for bankruptcy, the archdiocese opted to move beyond contentious relationships. Instead of potentially painful and lengthy litigation with individual claimants, the process enables us to rely on the court to determine how our resources should be fairly allocated to compensate all of those with claims against the archdiocese. As a result, we have been able to invest our legal resources into working with our insurers, overseeing the divestiture of our real estate and marshaling our other financial resources, all in order that we might offer “the most for the most.”

Convincing insurance companies of their legal obligation to pay victims has been a challenging task. The reorganization plan confirms, however, that those efforts have borne results. Not only is there $65 million immediately available for the claimants, but also rights to other insurance coverage that could augment that number.

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KENTUCKY
Tristate Homepage

The Catholic Diocese of Owensboro is set to suspend another priest this year.

Eyewitness News obtains a letter written by Bishop William Medley about an investigation into allegations made against Father Freddie Byrd, the Priest at St. Ann’s Parish in Morganfield.

The Bishop, saying in the letter, that an adult has come forward alleging Father Byrd had inappropriate contact with him back in 1983, when the man was just 17 years old.

According to the letter, Father Byrd was not a Priest at the time.

The Bishop continued in the letter saying:

“Even though this allegation dates back more than thirty years, It is the policy of the Catholic Church in the United States that even one substantiated allegation of abuse is cause for removal from the public ministry. We cannot consider this allegation substantiated, but the Diocesan Review Board believes this allegation to have sufficient merit to act immediately.”

Father Richard Powers will serve as Administrator Pro Tempore at St. Ann’s for the coming months.

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

Nate Leding
Created: 06/10/2016

A former court stenographer claims the Saint Paul Minneapolis Archdiocese may be hiding assets in its bankruptcy case including ancient jewels.

A letter submitted Thursday to the court by the stenographer claims the Archdiocese dropped off three shoe boxes to Bockstruck Jewelers in the mid-1990s.

He claims the boxes were filled with ancient jewels and art from the 19th Century.

He claims each worth at least $130,000.

In late May, the Archdiocese filed a bankruptcy reorganization plan that would set aside at least $65 million to pay clergy abuse victims and other creditors.

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MAINE
Foster’s

PORTLAND, Maine — The Vatican has dismissed from the clergy a priest, who had served in South Berwick, among other Maine communities, because of substantiated child sexual abuse finding against him.

A final decision has been returned from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican regarding Antonin R. Caron, ordained a priest for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, who has been retired since 1994, according to a press release issued Friday by the diocese. Caron had at one time served at St. Michael Parish in South Berwick.

The Holy See has dismissed Caron from the clerical state for a substantiated claim of sexual abuse of a minor. The complaint was received from an individual in November of 2012 who reported that the sexual abuse occurred in the early 1980s.

After receiving the complaint, the Diocesan Office of Professional Responsibility conducted a full investigation and, as with every report of possible sexual abuse of a minor by a church representative, immediately notified public authorities, the press release said. Upon completion of the investigation, the case was referred to the Diocesan Review Board, an independent review entity comprised mostly of lay people, which confirmed the findings of the Office of Professional Responsibility that the claim of abuse was substantiated.

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UNITED STATES
Mennonite World Review

Jun 10, 2016 by Janie Beck Kreider and Mennonite Church USA

ORLANDO, Fla. — The Mennonite Church USA Executive Board affirmed recommendations from a sexual abuse prevention panel and accepted the resignation of board member Isaac Villegas during meetings June 2-4.

Executive director Ervin Stutzman reported that the board of Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Va., Virginia Mennonite Conference and Lindale Mennonite Church in Linville, Va., have agreed to an outside investigation into their responses to abuse allegations against Luke Hartman, former vice president of enrollment at EMU, that will be conducted by an independent team unaffiliated with MC USA.

Stutzman emphasized that it is not a criminal investigation and that outside investigators will have no legal authority to demand documents or collect a body of information that would lead to a legal conclusion. Because of these dynamics, he said the full cooperation of all the institutions is voluntary, yet absolutely necessary.

“We are working together to bring the truth to light,” he said. “This process goes beyond what a criminal investigation can do. Our ultimate concern has to do with healing in our church, so we must address its ethos, how we treat victims of sexual abuse and listen to their stories, and how we treat one another and our church leaders.”

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TEXAS
Baptist Standard

June 10, 2016
By KEN CAMP / MANAGING EDITOR

WACO—David Garland hopes people think about Baylor University in totally different ways by this time next year.

The university’s interim president wants other schools to think of Baylor when they look for an example to follow in terms of compliance with Title IX, the law that prohibits sexual discrimination—including sexual harassment or assault—in educational institutions that receive federal funds.

But when the general public hears about Baylor, Garland hopes sexual violence is the last thing that comes to mind.

“We have implemented all kinds of checks and balances to protect our students,” he said, identifying students’ safety as “Priority One for us.”

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MALTA
Times of Malta

Saturday, June 11, 2016, 00:01 by John Guillaumier, St Julian’s

In 2010, the Times of Malta reported that “a total of 84 allegations of child abuse, involving 45 Maltese priests, were reported to a Church response team over the last 11 years”. Since then, we never heard of those allegations of child abuse involving 45 Maltese priests.

The allegations were swept under the Church’s carpet. Last May 6, this newspaper reported that: “Five people had their pastoral activity restricted by the Church after its so-called Safeguarding Commission investigated 46 people last year following claims of abuse.”

The obvious question needs to be asked: who are these ‘people’? Were the ‘five people’ who had their pastoral activity restricted by the Church priests?

The record shows that in dioceses in Ireland, the US, Canada, Australia, Germany, Austria and The Netherlands, the Catholic Church was more interested in safeguarding its reputation than in safeguarding children from paedophile priests. “We don’t focus on whether the person is guilty or not,” said Andrew Azzopardi, the head of the Church’s Safeguarding Commission.

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CANADA
Ottawa Citizen

ANDREW DUFFY, OTTAWA CITIZEN

Two women who say they were victimized by Rev. Barry McGrory at Holy Cross Parish in the 1970s want the Ottawa Police Service to re-open a criminal investigation of the Catholic priest.

The women have both contacted lawyer Robert Talach, who will formally ask the police to launch a new investigation.

In Canada, there is no statute of limitations on sexual assault.

“They want the justice that was denied them in past,” said Talach, a London, Ont. lawyer who has represented dozens of clergy sexual abuse victims.

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UNITED STATES
Crux

Christopher WhiteJune 11, 2016
CRUX CONTRIBUTOR

What supporters of legislation to extend the statute of limitations for suing the Church are hailing as “reform” actually threatens the institution that is now the very facilitator of responding to sexual abuse in the United States. If passed, these measures would directly imperil the local schools and parishes that have become the safest places for children in the country.

Almost fifteen years after the Boston Globe’s devastating reporting on clerical sexual abuse in the United States, the Church remains under scrutiny for its treatment of minors. Whereas the 2002 coverage exposed cover-up at the highest level of Church authority and provided a spotlight on a much-needed area of reform, today’s headlines should be offering a very different story.

Since then, the Church has enacted a zero tolerance policy for sexual abusers, and, if any priest commits a single act of abuse, he is forever removed from his ministry. On June 4, Pope Francis took an important step to take this policy even further when he outlined a plan for the removal of bishops who have been negligent in their handling of abuse cases.

In the United States, the Church has instituted mandatory background checks for any individual that works with minors-far surpassing the standards of any public institution. Every diocese in the U.S. has also established Safe Environment programs that are responsible for complying with canon and civil law, along with outside monitoring and oversight.

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UTAH
Think Progress

BY RACHEL CAIN JUN 10, 2016

A member of the Navajo Nation filed a lawsuit this week against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) for inadequately protecting him from sexual and physical abuse he allegedly experienced during his participation in a Mormon foster program for Native American children. He is the fourth Navajo in recent months to sue the Mormon church for its neglectful oversight during the program—and more victims may still come forward.

The Indian Student Placement Program began in the 1940s and allowed Native American families to send their baptized children voluntarily to live with white Mormon families during the academic year, where they had access to better education. By the time the program ended in 2000, approximately 40,000 Native Americans from 60 different tribes, though predominantly Navajos, had participated in the program.

The program began at a time when the Mormon church believed it carried a responsibility to bring Native Americans to their faith. Many Mormons believed that Native Americans were the descendants of Lamanites, one of the lost tribes of Israel.

L.K., the latest victim to file a lawsuit, was in seventh grade when he says his now-deceased foster father sexually abused and whipped him. He confided in officials with the Indian Student Placement Program. They told him to stay with the family for the rest of the school year. The abuse continued.

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OREGON
The Oregonian

By Aimee Green | The Oregonian/OregonLive

Attorneys for a girl who was molested by a church youth leader in The Dalles filed a $5 million lawsuit this week against the church — claiming it should have learned how to protect children from sexual predators after a previous church leader molested a child.

First Christian Church failed to develop child-protection protocols that might have stopped Michael Cele Stephens from molesting the girl starting when she was 12 or 13, the lawsuit says.

Stephens was sentenced in April to 15 years in prison for sexually abusing the girl and five other girls, ages 13 to 15, according to a story in The Dalles Chronicle newspaper. The story quotes a prosecutor as saying Stephens met the girls through church or a 4-H Club and that a prosecutor said the girls reacted to the abuse with “cutting, drug abuse, suicidal thoughts.”

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RHODE ISLAND
Providence Journal

By Karen Lee Ziner
Journal Staff Writer

Posted Jun. 10, 2016

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) accused Roman Catholic Bishop of Providence Thomas J. Tobin of “keeping hidden” the names of “at least 95 accused predator priests in Rhode Island.”

At a news conference outside the Cathedral of Saints Peter & Paul, they demanded that Tobin “publicly reveal the names of all accused abusive clerics, and post their names, photos, whereabouts and work histories on his diocesan website.”

The group also said that “five predator priests who abused elsewhere also worked in Rhode Island” have remained “under the radar” in the state.

Bishop Tobin was out of the office and not available for comment, said diocesan spokeswoman Carolyn Cronin. The diocese issued a statement:

“There is nothing new in what SNAP is requesting today. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence has a consistent policy and practice of reporting every allegation of clergy sex abuse of minors to law enforcement. The diocese is not aware of any priests currently in ministry who have credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors against them.”

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IRELAND
The Corkman

PUBLISHED
11/06/2016

A priest in the Diocese of Cloyne falsely accused of child sex abuse has called on the Catholic Church to put proper structures in place to protect priests who have been the subject of malicious and spurious allegations of child sexual abuse.

Fr Tim Hazelwood (57) from Castletownroche in North Cork has spent the past six years fighting to clear his name after he was accused anonymously of child sex abuse.

He spoke this week of how he was left to his own devices to do so with little support from the church.

Fr Hazelwood, who served in Fermoy, Youghal, Banteer, Dungourney, Charleville, Blarney and is now in Killeagh, said he was going public about his own experience as he knew of other priests who had been similarly abandoned by the Church after they were falsely accused of child sex abuse.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Voice of the Faithful, Greater Philadelphia

On Monday, June 13, there is a Judiciary Committee Hearing scheduled at 8:00 am to consider the constitutionality of House Bill 1947.

Archbishop Chaput has stated that HB1947 is targeting private institutions, and the Catholic Church; which is incorrect. Former Montgomery County District County Bruce Castor is scheduled to testify about the bill.

Voice of the Faithful/Greater Philadelphia is asking for supporters of HB 1947 to go to the Capitol Building in Harrisburg Monday morning to show solidarity for passage of the bill. It is absolutely essential that as many people as possible attend Monday’s hearing in Harrisburg.

Read House Bill 1947 Here.

Listen to Representative Mark Rozzi’s Video Below:

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CANADA
The Telegram

Barb Sweet
Published on June 10, 2016

A chilling number from the 1957 roster of Mount Cashel was read out in Courtroom No. 2 at Newfoundland Supreme Court this morning.

Among the 10 Christian Brothers serving at Mount Cashel in February of that year, four were ultimately convicted of crimes against children.

Outside court, one of the John Does in the civil lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Episcopal Corp. of St. John’s was not shocked by the number because of what he has said were his experiences with physical and sexual abuse at the hands of certain members of the lay order Christian Brothers. He left the orphanage a couple years before 1957.

“I think it’s old news,” he said.

He reflected on his own disclosure after the scandal that broke in the late 1980s and of subsequently learning the extent of abuse — the boys didn’t talk of it to each while at the orphanage.

“Later on, when I looked back and saw the number, it’s not that there were sexual perpetrators, but that there were so many,” he said. “There’s the thing — it was systemic. It’s not just an odd one, a mutant personality there.”

In court, Geoff Budden, lawyer for former residents of the orphanage during the period late 1940s to early ’60s, and Mark Frederick, a lawyer representing the Episcopal Corp., read into the record the transcript of a current day high-ranking Christian Brothers’ official Anthony Murphy.

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VATICAN CITY
Religion News Service

By Rosie Scammell

VATICAN (RNS) The Vatican has signed a new deal with international accountants, weeks after the unprecedented audit of the Holy See’s finances came to an abrupt halt.

PricewaterhouseCoopers will advise the city-state’s auditor general, the Vatican said on Friday (June 10).

Resumption of PwC’s work comes almost two months after the original audit was suspended. The surprise decision earlier this year followed great fanfare in December when the Vatican announced its first external audit would take place, a move that had been hailed as a new era of transparency in the traditionally secretive Vatican.

The Vatican on Friday denied there were any internal battles or attempts to derail the financial overhaul.

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FRANCE
L’Express

[Pedophilia: A court in France decided Friday afternoon that there are no limitations on allegations of sexual abuse by Father Bernard Preynat.]

Les magistrats de la cour d’appel de Lyon ont décidé que les abus sexuels reprochés au prêtre lyonnais Bernard Preynat, commis il y a plus de 25 ans, n’étaient pas prescrits, selon des avocats des deux parties.

Les magistrats de la cour d’appel de Lyon ont décidé que les abus sexuels reprochés au prêtre lyonnais Bernard Preynat, il y a plus de 25 ans, n’étaient pas prescrits, a-t-on appris vendredi auprès des avocats des deux parties. Ils ont ainsi suivi les réquisitions du parquet général qui avait plaidé le 20 mai pour la non-prescription des faits reprochés à ce religieux dans la principale affaire de pédophilie qui secoue depuis plusieurs mois le diocèse de Lyon.

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RHODE ISLAND
Rhode Island Public Radio

[with audio]

By ELISABETH HARRISON

In the aftermath of the sex abuse scandal at St. George’s School, Rhode Island lawmakers are considering legislation that would close a loophole in the state’s mandatory child abuse reporting law.

The loophole, first reported by Rhode Island Public Radio, seems to allow schools and other institutions to avoid reporting abuse allegations against their employees.

Peg Langhammer pulls up a chair in a conference room at Day One, the organization she runs for survivors of sexual abuse. She is driving an amendment to Rhode Island’s mandatory child abuse and neglect reporting law to make it clear that schools must report employees suspected of abusing students to the State Department of Children Youth and Families, or DCYF.

“This really came to light as a result of all of the St. George’s cases,” said Langhammer. “When St. George’s interpretation of the statute was that they didn’t have to report to DCYF, and therefore there was no investigation after many cases of alleged abuse.”

Those cases include a former athletic director, a choir director and a chaplain, all at the Episcopal St. George’s boarding school. And while the school fired some of the employees, they never reported them to child welfare officials.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Foundation to Abolish Child Sexual Abuse – FACSA

This should be easy for our legislators. Help them hear the message. We need you to take three steps to ensure children will be protected and hope for justice will be restored.

SHOW UP/SHOUT OUT to support passage of HB 1947.
SHOW UP for Survivors and Supporters THIS coming Monday!
SHOW UP for SOL Reform Rally/Press Event
WHEN: Monday, June 13th, at 8:00am and 12:00pm
WHERE: Pennsylvania Capitol Steps, Harrisburg
WHO: Survivors, supporters, good people
WHY: Justice for victims of child sex abuse
Posters and Signs will be available for you to hold
(More info and videos on our website)

SHOW UP for Senate Judicial Committee Hearing on HB 1947
WHEN: THIS Monday 6/13/16 at 10 AM
WHERE: Hearing Room A
North Office Building
Harrisburg, PA
WHO: Survivors, supporters, good people
WHY: Justice for victims of child sex abuse
SHOUT OUT your support for HB 1947
SHOUT OUT TO: Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and key Senate Leadership. Tell them you support HB 1947 with NO changes that would further limit the prohibitive time barriers for adult survivors of child sex abuse to come forward and identify their perpetrators and have some measure of justice. Names and emails listed below. …

PA Senate House Judiciary Committee

Greenleaf, Stewart J., Chair sgreenleaf@pasen.gov
Leach, Daylin, Minority Chair leach@pasen.gov
Rafferty, John C., Jr., Vice Chair jrafferty@pasen.gov
Scarnati, Joseph B., III, Ex‑Officio jscarnati@pasen.gov
Alloway, Richard L., II alloway@pasen.gov
Eichelberger, John H., Jr. jeichelberger@pasen.gov
Gordner, John R. jgordner@pasen.gov
Reschenthaler, Guy greschenthaler@pasen.gov
Vulakovich, Randy rvulakovich@pasen.gov
Yaw, Gene gyaw@pasen.gov
Boscola, Lisa M. boscola@pasen.gov
Farnese, Lawrence M., Jr. lfarnese@pasen.gov
Haywood, Art senatorhaywood@pasen.gov
Sabatina, John P., Jr. jsabatina@pasenate.com

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PENNSYLVANIA
Catholic Philly

By Matthew Gambino • Posted June 10, 2016

The advance of a Pennsylvania bill that would lift the statutes of limitation for civil lawsuits concerning child sexual abuse enters an important new phase next week.

The state Senate Judiciary Committee begins hearings at 10 a.m. Monday, June 13 in Harrisburg to examine the bill’s constitutionality under state law.

HB 1947 passed overwhelmingly in the House, 180-15, in April. The bill would allow individuals up to age 50 to sue private institutions including churches, other religious congregations, youth organizations and sports leagues retroactively for abuse that occurred years or decades ago, and for unlimited damages.

Public institutions such as school districts could also be sued but only for cases in the future, not in the past. Settlement damages would be capped at $250,000 per plaintiff or $1 million in total related claims for state agencies, and $500,000 for local and county agencies, including school districts.

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NEW YORK
National Catholic Reporter

Peter Feuerherd | Jun. 9, 2016

NEW YORK

Editor’s note: This story was updated with new information at 10 a.m., central time.

As the New York state legislature plans to close up shop for its annual session by the end of this month, the Catholic bishops are hoping to run out the clock on a bill that would lift the statute of limitations on sex abuse crimes.

A bill passed by the state Assembly would lift the statute of limitations on future sex abuse crimes against minors, which now prohibits lawsuits five years after victims pass their 18th birthday. In its most contentious provision, the bill would also provide a one-year window allowing for lawsuits in old cases.

Proponents say the measure would balance the scales of justice and provide child sex abuse victims with their day in court. Opponents argue that it would be impossible to fairly judge decades-old cases, that the legislation unfairly exempts public institutions, and that the legal costs would bankrupt the Catholic church in the state. The bishops, while supporting lifting the statue of limitations on future sex abuse, say that lifting it retroactively would open the church to unfair lawsuits. ​

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PENNSYLVANIA
National Catholic Reporter

Peter Feuerherd | Jun. 10, 2016

When it comes to H.B. 1947, it’s personal for State Rep. Mark Rozzi of Pennsylvania, a Democrat who represents the Reading area.

His bill, which would extend the statute of limitations on sex abuse lawsuits, is adamantly opposed by the commonwealth’s Catholic bishops, who see it as a threat which will ultimately bankrupt them.

By contrast, Rozzi says the in-the-pew Catholics are with him.

“The outrage my office hears is unbelievable, especially from the most devout,” he told NCR in a June 8 phone conversation, just days before a pivotal legislative hearing on his bill.

He has been backed by some Catholic groups, including Catholic Whistleblowers, an organization which says it is dedicated to ensuring that the church clean house about sex abuse.

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COLORADO
9 News

DENVER (AP) – Inspired by the Bill Cosby rape allegations, Colorado has doubled the amount of time sexual assault victims can seek charges from 10 to 20 years.

Gov. John Hickenlooper signed into law Friday a bill extending the statute of limitations for pursuing sex assault charges.

Democratic Rep. Rhonda Fields crafted the bill after being approached by two Colorado women who claim Cosby assaulted them decades ago.

Los Angeles attorney Gloria Allred attended the bill signing. She has said such laws empower traumatized victims by giving them more time to come forward.

Cosby has denied abuse allegations made by women around the country. But he faces trial in Pennsylvania, where the comedian is accused of drugging and sexually assaulting a woman at his suburban Philadelphia home in 2004.

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MAINE
Portland Press Herald

The Vatican has defrocked a retired Maine priest after substantiating claims that he sexually abused a minor in the 1980s.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican gave a final decision regarding Antonin R. Caron, who has been retired since 1994, according to a news release from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland. He was stripped of his ability to perform priestly duties after diocese received a complaint in November 2012 about sexual abuse that occurred decades before.

The diocese began investigating Caron for “reported incidents” of abuse between 1982 and 1986, according to a press release issued in 2012.

Caron had a history of disciplinary and legal troubles, the diocese said at the time.

In 1993, he was brought to trial and acquitted of sexually assaulting a woman.

In March 2000, the church suspended Caron for several months for his involvement with a now-defunct website for gay clergymen. After his suspension in 2000, Caron resumed his ministry throughout Maine until 2010.

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WASHINGTON
The Columbian

By Jessica Prokop, Columbian Courts Reporter
Published: June 10, 2016

A Catholic priest who was sentenced last month to four months in jail for trying to lure a 14-year-old girl into his car in Vancouver’s Image neighborhood will now serve a portion of his sentence on a work crew.

Michael T. Patrick, 60, was back in Clark County Superior Court on Friday to review whether he had qualified to serve his four-month sentence through the Clark County Jail’s work-release program. The program allows inmates to work outside in the community and be confined when they’re not at work.

Patrick’s defense attorney, Thomas Phelan, told the court it is still unclear if Patrick will have his job, which would allow him to qualify for the program.

Patrick, the former pastor of St. Wenceslaus Catholic Church in Scappoose, Ore., is not currently assigned to a parish and is being investigated by the Archdiocese of Portland, spokesman David Renshaw previously told The Columbian. Patrick’s status will not change until the investigation is complete, he said.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

EDITORIAL

In recent decades, the Vatican apparatus has found the means to reach deep into the ranks of the faithful to banish, condemn, excommunicate and otherwise impose disciplines on those who advanced a discordant idea or advocated for the wrong cause or dared to question the exclusion of women from any meaningful level of decision-making within the church.

Yet, more than 30 years after the first national exposé of the sex abuse crisis ran in the pages of NCR, we are still waiting for a clear, transparent and workable system for getting rid of bishops who ignore, abet or cover up crimes against the community’s children or fail to abide by rudimentary cautions and procedures for accountability.

We hope the latest iteration of Vatican determination to hold members of the hierarchy accountable, Pope Francis’ newly promulgated universal law, will finally address that long-standing deficiency.

Unfortunately, the motu proprio with which we were presented June 4 raises many questions.

For years, theologians and other thinkers have been banished from Catholic academic grounds, their reputations ruined in a wide swath of the community, for ideas considered out of bounds. We watched as Pope John Paul II engaged in the equivalent of a hostile takeover of the Society of Jesus and replaced its leadership. We watched then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger engineer the removal of an editor of America magazine because he didn’t like some of the topics covered. In the last eight years, at least half a dozen priests have been removed from active ministry for publicly supporting the ordination of women to the priesthood.

But bishops who covered up abuse, kept secret files and shuffled predatory priests from parish to parish and sometimes to other dioceses and even other countries to avoid detection? Nothing.

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UNITED STATES
BishopAccounability.org

Summary of Case: Kevin J. Downey was ordained for the Franciscan Friars of the Holy Name Province in 1982. He went on to parish assignments in the dioceses of Buffalo NY, Butler NJ, Raleigh NC, Paterson NJ and Arlington VA. Through much of the 1980s until 1991 he worked in the Springfield IL diocese, at the Franciscan’s Quincy College. In May 2016 the Arlington diocese quietly announced that Downey had been placed on leave, pending the investigation of an allegation of sexual misconduct toward a male minor in 1990, “in another state.” Downey was working at Quincy College during the year in question. At the time of his suspension he was serving as pastor of a Triangle VA parish.

Ordained: 1982

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MAINE
Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland

PORTLAND—A final decision has been returned from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican regarding Antonin R. Caron, ordained a priest for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, who has been retired since 1994. The Holy See has dismissed Caron from the clerical state for a substantiated claim of sexual abuse of a minor. The complaint was received from an individual in November of 2012 who reported that the sexual abuse occurred in the early 1980s.

After receiving the complaint, the Diocesan Office of Professional Responsibility conducted a full investigation and, as with every report of possible sexual abuse of a minor by a church representative, immediately notified public authorities. Upon completion of the investigation, the case was referred to the Diocesan Review Board, an independent review entity comprised mostly of lay people, which confirmed the findings of the Office of Professional Responsibility that the claim of abuse was substantiated. Subsequently, Bishop Robert P. Deeley sent Caron’s case to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith which has competence to determine the course of action to be taken in such cases. The diocese investigates all allegations of sexual abuse of minors by clergy. The removal of any church personnel from ministry due to such complaints is always publicized.

Inasmuch as the decision of the Congregation has been confirmed by Pope Francis, it does not allow for any possibility of appeal. Dismissal from the clerical state means that Antonin Caron can no longer function or present himself as a priest. Caron retired from active ministry due to medical reasons in 1994 and stepped down from all public ministry in 2010.

Antonin R. Caron was born in Lewiston and ordained to the priesthood in 1969. During his time in active ministry, he was assigned to Notre Dame Parish in Waterville; St. Margaret Parish in Old Orchard Beach; St. Mary Parish in Lewiston; St. Mary Parish in Presque Isle; St. Michael Parish in South Berwick; Cathedral Parish in Portland; St. Ignatius Parish in Sanford; Our Lady of Ransom Parish, Mechanic Falls; St. Gregory Parish, Gray; St. Mary Parish, Eagle Lake; and St. James Parish, Woodland.

Bishop Deeley encourages anyone who may have information about this or any case of sexual abuse of a minor by a church representative to contact civil authorities as well as Michael Magalski, Director of the Office of Professional Responsibility for the Diocese of Portland, at (207) 321-7836 or at michael.magalski@portlanddiocese.org.

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MAINE
Sun Journal

PORTLAND —The Portland Diocese announced Friday that the Vatican has dismissed former Lewiston priest Antonin R. Caron from the priesthood following a complaint of sex abuse.

According to a written statement from the diocese, Caron was ordained a priest for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland but has been retired since 1994. Following an investigation of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican, “the Holy See has dismissed Caron from the clerical state for a substantiated claim of sexual abuse of a minor,” according to the statement.

According to the diocese, the complaint was received from an individual in November of 2012 who reported that the sexual abuse occurred in the early 1980s.

After receiving the complaint, the Diocesan Office of Professional Responsibility conducted a full investigation and, as with every report of possible sexual abuse of a minor by a church representative, immediately notified public authorities, according to the diocese.

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MAINE
Bangor Daily News

By Judy Harrison, BDN Staff
Posted June 10, 2016

PORTLAND, Maine — A retired Catholic priest who was found not guilty in 1994 by a Washington County jury of sexually abusing a 13-year-old girl has been stripped by the Vatican of his ability to function as or to present himself as a priest, the Roman Catholic diocese of Portland announced Friday.

“The Holy See has dismissed Antonin R. Caron from the clerical state for a substantiated claim of sexual abuse of a minor,” the diocese said in a news release. “ The complaint was received from an individual in November of 2012 who reported that the sexual abuse occurred in the early 1980s.”

In the 1994 trial, according to a previously published report, Caron was accused of sexually assaulting the girl with a pencil and his hands on May 9, 1992, in the sacristy — a small, open room behind the altar — in St. James the Greater Catholic Church in Baileyville, where he was parish priest, moments before the start of a Saturday afternoon Mass.

The girl, who is not being identified, waited a year before reporting the incident to a teacher, who then notified authorities. Despite parishioners being seated only a few feet away from the room, there were no witnesses to corroborate the girl’s story.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Barb Sweet
Published on June 09, 2016

Updated story:

Three of four John Does involved in the Mount Cashel civil trial in Newfoundland Supreme Court don’t suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), says an American psychiatrist testifying for the Catholic Church.

Dr. Robert Toborowsky said the fourth John Doe does have PTSD “that can be traced — along with the associated angst — reasonably to various experiences he had prior to, during and after the years he spent in Mount Cashel.”

Those experiences include losing his mother — the man’s father, a Second World War double-amputee, couldn’t take care of his sons — as well as later life events such as the death of a beloved grandchild, financial struggles, various medical problems — including cancer — and the litigation itself, Toborowsky said.

There were other mental diagnoses that Toborowsky ruled out in his opinions on the John Does’ cases. And in the case of a man who says his marriage and career were ruined, Toborowsky concluded there was an alcoholism disorder and recurrent depression, but didn’t link those problems directly to Mount Cashel.

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WASHINGTON
KOMO

CLYDE HILL, Wash. – A longtime teacher at Bellevue Christian School has been charged with child molestation after he made sexual contact with a 13-year-old girl in his classes, according to court papers that also say school officials took no action when they first learned of the allegation four years ago.

Documents filed Wednesday in King County Superior Court also show that school administrators knew of at least two similar incidents involving the same teacher and other young girls as far back as 1999, but never reported any of the incidents to law enforcement officials.

The teacher, identified as Edward T. Sloan, 45, has been employed with the school since 1997. He was recently placed on administrative leave through the end of the school year and will not return in the fall, school officials said.

“The defendant has a clear pattern of inappropriate behavior with female students and should not be teaching minors, particularly minor females,” say charging documents filed by the King County Prosecutor’s Office.

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WASHINGTON
Seattle Times

By Sarah Jarvis
Seattle Times staff reporter

A Bellevue Christian School teacher has been charged with one count of second-degree child molestation, accused of molesting a 13-year-old student during a field trip in 2012.

Edward Sloan, 45, of Seattle, was placed on leave by the private school in January after the incident was reported to Clyde Hill police, according to charging documents filed Wednesday. Sloan has been a teacher at the school since 1997.

In addition, King County prosecutors say student complaints to the school about Sloan’s inappropriate touching date as far back as 2001.

In a statement, Interim Bellevue Christian School Superintendent Tim Krell said the school is reviewing its safety guidelines and protocols following the allegations against Sloan.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Catholic League

Bill Donohue comments on Pennsylvania Catholic lawmakers:

They are crying foul. What is really foul is the basis of the complaint made by Pennsylvania Catholic lawmakers: they are upset that priests are calling them out for working against their own religion.

In Pennsylvania, as in virtually all states, if a bill to lift the statute of limitations on offenses involving the sexual abuse of minors does not specifically say that it covers the public sector, it means that kids raped by public school teachers are treated like second-class citizens. To be exact, because of the antiquated doctrine of sovereign immunity, public school students have a very short window—usually 90 days—to press charges, otherwise they are out of luck.

The bill being considered by the Pennsylvania legislature gives the public schools a pass—the reform does not affect them. Which means that kids who are sexually abused in a public school, or were abused by a public school employee in the past, have less rights than private school students; the latter, under the proposed bill, could now sue for alleged offenses that took place decades ago.

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RHODE ISLAND
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

FACT SHEET: Five “under the radar” who abused elsewhere but spent time in RI

—Fr. Joseph Rocha OP, ordained: 1966

He appears on the most recent list of “new” priests added to Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian’s website. Rocha worked quite a few years in the Providence diocese and even held a diocesan post (on the diocesan tribunal). There’s been no publicity about him since 2001 when a small article mentioned he had been arrested, but it didn’t mention that he was a priest.

He worked in Providence and Warwick. His assignment history:

[BishopAccountability.org]

His status as an accused cleric was first made public by Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian in March 2016:

[BishopAccountability.org]

—Brother Shawn McEnany, S.C., ordained: 1983

He was criminally convicted in Maine in 1988 and appears to be working now as a counselor in RI.

His Linked In page:

[Linked-In]

His Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/shawn.mcenany

His assignment history:

[BishopAccountability.org]

According to BishopAccountability.org, “McEnany is last known to be living in the Order’s Pascoag, RI community and working as a clinical social worker.”

—Fr. Dennis P. Murphy, ordained: 1974

Suspended: 2004 due to complaints about his interaction with teenage youths. Murphy was on loan to the Military Archdiocese, working in Providence RI at the VA hospital for nine years. In 2007, he was listed as “retired from ministry” on the diocesan website but he is also shown as affiliated with the Univ. of Virginia in Charlottesville. Murphy also worked in Boston. He also worked in Cumberland RI.

[BishopAccountability.org]

—Fr. Donald E. Messier, ordained: 1968

His name appeared on a list of 21 priests accused of abuse which District Attorney released 2002. In 1973, Messier left the Fall River diocese to work in Providence Diocese.

[BishopAccountability.org]

—Br. Roger B. Argencourt, ordained: 1965

He belonged to the Brothers of Sacred Heart and was also known as Br. Odillon. Placed on leave Jan. 2002 and sued April 2002 for abuse in 1973-1974 at Bishop Guertin High School in Manchester, NH. He admitted abuse in court records. Also admitted abuse of another student. Second suit filed at a later date. One case settled 2003. Authorities in RI were preparing to file charges re abuse at Mount Saint Charles Academy when Argencourt died in 2002. Several other abusers at Bishop Guerin. He worked in Pascoag and Woonsocket.

[BishopAccountability.org]

(SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims. SNAP was founded in 1988 and has more than 20,000 members)(www.SNAPnetwork.org) Contact – David Clohessy (314-566-9790 cell,davidgclohessy@gmail.com), Barbara Dorris (314-503-0003 cell, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org). At BishopAccountability.org, contact Anne Barrett Doyle 781-439-5208.

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RHODE ISLAND
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Victims prod RI bishop on accused priests
He’s keeping names of at least 95 accused clerics hidden
Five other predators abused elsewhere but worked in RI
Support group discloses their identities & pushes for “openness”
It says Catholic officials “endanger kids” with “continued secrecy”
Bishop should also post child molesting clerics’ names, victims say
SNAP: “Roughly thirty other bishops across the US have done this”

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will disclose that at least

–95 accused predator priests in Rhode Island remain hidden, and
–five predator priests who abused elsewhere also worked in RI but have attracted little or no public or media attention here.

They will also beg Providence’s Catholic bishop to

–publicly reveal the names of ALL accused abusive clerics, and
–-post their names, photos, whereabouts and work histories on his diocesan website.

And they will beg anyone who saw, suspected or suffered clergy sex crimes or cover ups to call secular authorities, not church staff, and “protect kids, expose wrongdoers and start healing.”

WHEN
Friday, June 10 at 1:30 p.m.

WHERE
Outside the Cathedral of Saints Peter & Paul, 30 Fenner St (corner of Pond St.) in Providence

WHO
Three child sex abuse victims who belong to a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (including a Missouri man who is the organization’s long time executive director)

WHY
For almost a decade, Rhode Island Catholic officials have kept hidden the names of 125 accused predator priests. SNAP wants Bishop Thomas Tobin to “protect the vulnerable and end continuing cover ups by honoring his pledges of ‘transparency’ and disclosing these names. And the group is disclosing the identities of five child molesting clerics who abused kids elsewhere but quietly worked in Rhode Island but attracted little or no attention or media coverage here.

1.Thirty five RI Catholic clerics have been publicly accused of molesting kids. (See BishopAccountability.org) But in 2007, the Providence diocese admitted in a court filing that 125 clerics have been accused overall.

[BishopAccountability.org]

SNAP wants these 95 names disclosed to parents, police, prosecutors, parishioners and the public.

2.According to court records or mainstream news outlets in other states, at least five Catholic clerics are proven, admitted or credibly accused child molesters – having hurt children outside RI but having also worked in RI. They remain largely or totally “under the radar” in Rhode Island. SNAP wants Tobin to “aggressively reach out to anyone else who may have seen, suspected or suffered their crimes” using church bulletins, parish websites and pulpit announcements.

They are Fr. Joseph Rocha, Brother Shawn McEnany, Fr. Dennis P. Murphy, Fr. Donald E. Messier and Brother Roger B. Argencourt. (See Fact Sheet on Hidden RI Predator Priests at SNAPnetwork.org)

3. For “the safety of kids, the healing of victims and the recovery of the church,” SNAP also wants Bishop Tobin to release the identities of ALL child molesting clerics (proven, admitted and credibly accused) who live/lived or work/worked in the Providence diocese (which covers the whole state) and post them permanently on his web page (along with their photos, whereabouts and work histories).

Over the past three years, about 15 bishops have done this. And since 2002, a total of roughly 30 US bishops have taken this step over the past decade.

[BishopAccountability.org]

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IRELAND
The Tablet

02 June 2016 | by Sarah Mac Donald

An Irish priest falsely accused of sexual abuse calls for the Church to rethink the way it treats clergy who are placed under investigation

The Church “cut me loose, hung me out to dry, and disowned me,” says Fr Tim Hazelwood, who has been a Catholic priest for 34 years. He has recently won a six-year struggle to clear his name after being falsely accused of sexual abuse. He is deeply concerned at the way in which the Church handled his case, and he warns that the Irish hierarchy must rethink its treatment of accused priests and its policy on anonymous accusations.

Fr Hazelwood says there is a climate in both church and society which presumes priests are guilty unless they prove their innocence. The 57-year-old parish priest of Killeagh in the Cloyne diocese, a qualified psychotherapist, believes it is time for priests in Ireland to establish a national body which will lobby the bishops and the current safeguarding structures on their behalf to ensure that natural justice is not undermined.

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VATIKAN
Radio Vatikan

[The pope’s motu proprio issued last Saturday has attracted attention. A bishop can be removed if he has not fulfilled his duties in protection of children and young people from abuse. Are the bishops trembling everywhere in the world? No, says Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta who worked for many years at the Vatican. The procedure set down by the pope also give bishops a certain security, he said. They are guaranteed a particular procedure wihen it comes to neglect of their duties, the archbishop said.]

Es hat einige Aufmerksamkeit erregt: das Motu Proprio von Franziskus vom letzten Samstag. Damit legt der Papst fest, dass ein Bischof auch dann seines Amtes enthoben werden kann, wenn er seinen Amtspflichten beim Schutz von Kindern und Jugendlichen vor Missbrauch nicht genügend nachgekommen ist. Zittern jetzt überall in der Welt die Bischöfe? Nein, sagt Charles Scicluna. Der 57-Jährige ist Erzbischof auf der Insel Malta und hat sich zugleich jahrelang an der vatikanischen Glaubenskongregation mit kirchlichen Missbrauchsfällen beschäftigt.

„Als Bischof einer kleinen Diözese sehe ich vor allem, dass die Prozedur, die der Papst mit diesem Motu Proprio festlegt, uns auch eine gewisse Sicherheit gibt. Wir werden nicht einfach nur zu großer Wachsamkeit in unserem pastoralen Dienst angehalten, sondern wir bekommen auch die Garantie einer bestimmten Prozedur, wenn es zu Anzeigen wegen Vernachlässigung unserer Amtspflichten kommt. Der Papst will eine Untersuchung – und dass dann auch in der Gemeinschaft Gerechtigkeit einkehrt. Es geht hier also um Verantwortung; gleichzeitig sehen wir, dass der Papst der jeweiligen (christlichen) Gemeinschaft mit ihren Schwierigkeiten sehr, sehr nahe sein will, wenn er feststellt, dass da einige sehr wichtige Dinge nicht respektiert werden.“

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VATICAN CITY
Crux

ROME – In the latest twist to the saga of Pope Francis’s financial reform, the Vatican announced Friday it has entered into a new contract for auditing and consulting services with the global firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), this time as a resource for its own in-house auditing agency as well as other departments.

“PwC will play an assisting role, and will also be available to those [departments] that wish to avail themselves of its support and consulting services,” a Vatican statement released Friday said.

The new contract, according to the statement, “provides for a broader collaboration with PwC that is adaptable to the Holy See’s needs,” and means the Vatican will “promptly resume its collaboration with PwC.”

The statement also says that by law, primary responsibility for performing the Vatican’s annual audits “is entrusted to the Office of the Auditor General (URG), as is normally the case for every sovereign state.”

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MASSACHUSETTS
MassLive

By Lindsay Corcoran | lindsay.corcoran@masslive.com

WORCESTER — Charges have been dropped against one of two former Santeria priests suspected of involvement in the theft of eight skeletons from Hope Cemetery in Worcester last year.

Felix Delgado, 40, of 518 Hallett St., Bridgeport, will no longer face charges of disinterment of a body after authorities say the bones found in his apartment were determined not to match those missing from Worcester.

A joint investigation by Massachusetts and Connecticut authorities found the human remains discovered in Delgado’s Bridgeport apartment in February are not consistent with the remains stolen from Hope Cemetery in Worcester, according to Tim Connolly, spokesperson for the Worcester County district attorney’s office.

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NEW YORK
PIX 11

[with video]

BY JAMES FORD

WOODSIDE, Queens — He’s the pastor of a church with a major outreach to young people, but now Rev. James E. Love is charged with repeatedly sexually assaulting a 6-year-old girl.

Love posted bail Monday night and on Tuesday his friends, neighbors and congregation tried to cope with the accusations.

“I’m still in shock,” said family friend Regina Jennings.

She’d shown up Tuesday afternoon at the pastor’s apartment in the Woodside Houses public housing complex to offer support to Love and his wife.

Love’s wife regularly babysat the girl in the couple’s first floor apartment. According to the criminal complaint from the Queens district attorney’s office, between March and last week, Love exposed himself to the girl, made her touch his genitals and he touched her inappropriately, multiple times.

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LOUISIANA
Louisiana Record

Dawn Brotherton Jun. 9, 2016

BATON ROUGE—State Sen. J.P. Morrell (D-District 3) has requested a state inquiry into allegations of child abuse at a Shreveport Episcopal school for not following mandated reporting laws, but the head of one advocacy group says mandated reporting, while well-intentioned, doesn’t address the real needs of the children.

A mother is suing St. Mark’s Cathedral School (SMCS) because she believes her son, identified only as M.R. was wrongfully expelled from the school. According to the lawsuit, her 6th-grade son stayed in a cabin with four other male students at Pine Cove when they were on a weekend trip in 2014. After the trip, one of the other students who stayed in M.R.’s cabin accused him of inappropriate behavior, and the student’s mom filed a complaint with the school. According to news reports, the chaperones did not witness the behavior and reported that M.R.’s conduct was appropriate.

Two days after the field trip, SCMS Head of School Chris Carter expelled the young boy. The Withdrawal Certificate states that he was expelled for “inappropriate touching of other students when not in the presence of adults.”

In October 2015, the mother sued Carter and SCMS for disability discrimination, breach of contract, disparate treatment, defamation, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and violation of the family educational rights and privacy act.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

KENNETH LOVETT
DAILY NEWS ALBANY BUREAU CHIEF
Thursday, June 9, 2016

ALBANY — Despite criticism from those on both sides of the issue, the state Assembly still intends to take up a bill dealing with child sex abuse victims.

“The plan is still to do the bill next week,” Assembly Democratic spokesman Michael Whyland said Thursday. “Nothing has changed.”

Introduced Tuesday night, the bill designed to make it easier for victims to bring lawsuits was assailed by survivors for not going far enough while the Catholic Church opposes a provision that would allow for old cases to be revived.

Whyland said he doesn’t expect any changes to the Assembly bill unless a deal on the issue is reached with Gov. Cuomo and the state Senate.

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UNITED STATES
Father Lasch

Rev. Kenneth Lasch

Monday June 6, 2016

Website Editor’s Note: As you will read below, this is the third in a series of four articles by Mary Gail Frawley-O’Dea, noted psychologist She has expressed sentiments that I have felt for a long time. As most of you know, I have been an‘active’ perhaps even an aggressive advocate for victim of clergy abuse. Having been engaged in that initiative for over thirty years, I have experienced the highs and lows – mostly the lows of that ‘ministry.’ At one point in anger I initiated a website ‘blog’ entitled, ‘The Harvey Interviews’ as a vehicle to expose the issue on a local level. That endeavor was costly on many counts. Though the content was factual, the blog did not have the desired effect – dialogue did not occur nor was the situation described therein remedied. The personal trauma that resulted from this effort was heavy and lasting.

I have been involved intermittently with SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) for several years. St. Joseph in Mendham that as you may recall, became the epicenter of sexual abuse in New Jersey. St Joseph hosted a weekly meeting of SNAP in the parish center. It was very helpful in enabling victims of clergy abuse to name what happened to them and to have their stories validated. In essence it was a significant step forward for many victims. However, there were no ‘next steps’ provided by the group. As a result, victims who already had their story validated were not offered an opportunity to move on to the next level of healing. I felt then and feel even more so now that once victims of abuse have told their story, they need professional help to begin the long painful journey toward healing and recovery. The memory of what took place during their childhood, teen or young adult years may never be permanently erased but they can learn to turn their trauma around and it can actually become a source of growth for many, perhaps for most. In essence they can learn to disallow their trauma to control their lives.

One of the difficulties with the Bishops’ Dallas Charter of 2002 is that it did not provide for the proper response to the clergy abuse of ‘vulnerable adults.’ This category pertains to anything from sexual harassment to sexual assault of an adult who may be permanently or temporarily impaired, e.g., a person with a disability or someone who was given alcohol or drugs with the intention of obtaining a sexual favor or worse, sexual assault, i.e., the imposition of unwanted sexual contact. An example of the later occurs when a victim 18 years of age or more is ‘groomed’ with favors, e.g., alcohol over a period of time and then sexually assaulted. We certainly have any number of examples in the press these days. Sexual intimidation, harassment or assault by clergy or religious is particularly damaging because it effects not only the emotional and psychological aspects of a victim’s life but also the spiritual.

The Pope’s Motu Proprio pertains not only to the cover-up of the sexual abuse of minors but also the cover-up of the abuse of “vulnerable adults.”

Accountability for such cover-ups has not been forthcoming and remains to be adjudicated by the Holy See. Many advocates are skeptical that the Vatican will indeed follow through on the procedures that are being established. However, we need to move from an adversarial posture to one in which the principles of ‘Restorative Justice’ can be applied evenhandedly. Unfortunately neither church officials nor victims’ advocates are willing to promote this viable path toward healing – healing not only of victims but also treatment for predators.

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NEW YORK
Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn

Posted on June 7, 2016

What follows is Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio’s response to Assemblywoman Margaret Markey’s accusations, published in The New York Daily News on June 7, 2016.

Download the Complete Letter

Read Bishop DiMarzio’s letter to the faithful.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Sarah MacDonald
PUBLISHED
10/06/2016

The head of the watchdog for clerical sex abuse has warned there is “no room for complacency” as it emerged 116 new allegations or concerns were reported last year.

Another 37 allegations of physical and emotional abuse were also reported to the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church (NBSCCCI), bringing the total complaints dealt with over that period to 153.

The figures represent a significant reduction in allegations, down by 112 compared to 2014 when 265 new allegations were reported.

The most recent incident of abuse reported to the National Board occurred in 2015.
The watchdog’s CEO Teresa Devlin warned: “They do, however, still demonstrate a significant number of new allegations during the period under review.

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TEXAS
OA Online

By Silvio Panta spanta@oaoa.com

A former Odessa youth minister was among the six suspects state and federal authorities arrested in a sting operation last weekend targeting suspected sexual predators who solicited minors online.

Matthew Holman, 35, who directed the youth ministry program at Westwood Baptist Church for the past six months, was arrested on a state charge of second-degree felony online solicitation of a minor younger than 15.

Holman’s name, along with the names of two other Odessa residents, was disclosed Thursday during a press conference by the Texas Department of Public Safety in Midland. Fabian Ray Galindo, 20, and Chad Alan Potts, 46, were also among the six suspects arrested on the online solicitation charge for which they were all booked in Midland County Jail.

Holman, Galindo and Potts were all being held Thursday at the Midland County Jail on $75,000 bond.

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TEXAS
Newswest 9

By Eric Onyechefule, Reporter

MIDLAND-ODESSA, TX (KWES) –
On Thursday, Dr. Weeks DuBose pastor, of the church where Matthew Holman was the youth minister described how hard the arrest has been on his church who has 60 congregants and over a dozen kids who attend.

“Matthew Holman who has been an employee of the church, a youth minister since mid-January, was dismissed from his position as of Sunday morning June 5th,” said DuBose.

DuBose said Holman was in charge of the youth programs that were being run at the church. He added they do their due diligence on potential employees including Matt who he’s known since he was a little kid.

“We do background checks on our employees. Matthew was known to us,” said DuBose.

Holman was one of the six men arrested after a two day sting where authorities said they tried solicit sex from minors.

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CANADA
CTV

Rachael D’Amore, CTV Toronto
Published Thursday, June 9, 2016

A Mississauga teacher has been charged with sexual assault in connection with an investigation into four GTA schools over the last four years, a spokesperson with the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board confirmed.

According to the spokesperson, the teacher was a long-term occasional teacher with the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board.

The teacher had been teaching a Grade two and three class at St. James Catholic Global Learning Centre for the last two school terms.

On Tuesday, the teacher was arrested and faces several charges, including sexual assault, sexual interference and making sexually explicit material available to a child.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Sarah Hawke

A Catholic brother found guilty of indecently assaulting 18 boys at a boarding school in southern New South Wales has been sentenced to more than nine years in prison.

William Peter Standen was sentenced on 18 charges in the District Court in Sydney over offences that occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

In March, he pleaded guilty to the offences, which happened when he was a year seven boarding-house master.

In sentencing the 67-year-old, Judge Anthony Blackmore described what the victims, who were mostly 12, had suffered.

The court heard Standen repeatedly asked the victims to go to his room after dark where he slapped and rubbed their naked buttocks, in another case he rubbed the genitals of a boy on a camping trip.

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SCOTLAND
Scottish Catholic Observer

Tina Campbell, head of safeguarding, reacts to Pope Francis’ latest Apostolic letter, issued motu proprio, and speaks of Scottish progress

POPE Francis has established new legal procedures to remove bishops who mishandle sex abuse cases, saying they can be removed from office if the Vatican finds they were negligent in doing their jobs.

In an Apostolic letter published last Saturday, the Holy Father answered a long-running demand by victims of abuse and their advocates to hold bishops accountable for failing to prevent clerical sex abuse. Victims have long accused bishops of covering up for abuse, moving rapists from parish to parish rather than reporting them to police.

In Scotland, the Church’s national safeguarding co-ordinator, Tina Campbell (above) said the motu proprio letter was another sign of ‘serious and ongoing commitment’ to tackling the scourge of clerical child abuse.

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GUAM
KUAM

By Krystal Paco

A mass for healing was held at the Father Duenas Boys Chapel in Mangilao earlier today. In Father Jeff San Nicolas’ homily, he agreed with the apostolic administrator Archbishop Savio Tai Fai Hon who on Thursday asked that we address the church’s ongoing issues in the right climate.

“He said we want to address the issues. There’s no doubt about it. He said it’s important for us to do it in the right climate. A climate of a church. A climate of peace. A climate of sincerity. A climate of serenity,” he detailed. “And it thought that was so wise. Because you and I know that when we have attitude in our hearts and we want to solve a problem, that attitude just oozes out. And we’re not coming with the right disposition.”

In attendance were Archbishop Anthony Apuron’s accusers – Walter Denton, Doris Concepcion, and John Toves. All are former Agat residents have returned on island to address allegations of molestation and rape made against Apuron.

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GUAM
KUAM

By Sabrina Salas Matanane

Former Guam resident John Toves is back on island. Toves was the first person to come forward making allegations of sex abuse against Archbishop Anthony Apuron. In 2014 he arrived on island accusing the Archbishop of abusing his cousin when he was a seminarian. His relative however never came forward and the allegation was never investigated.

Toves attended a mass held on Thursday by the Apostolic Administrator Archbishop Savio Tai Fai Hon. The Archbishop was appointed by the Pope sede plena to take temporary control of the Archdiocese of Agana.

During his homily the Archbishop outlined his task assigned by the Pope while here on Guam. He told those in attendance at St. Anthony Church in Tamuning that Archbishop Apuron keeps his title but he will not make any decisions about the diocese and should cooperate in total serene and fulfillment of the Apostolic Administrators mandate.

He also explained that when an Apostolic Administrator is appointed “sede plena” it means that the Holy Father and a particular diocesan bishop have decided together that for whatever reason is no longer available or fit for the function and will take leave. The diocesan bishop is then relieved of pastoral responsibility and all administrative authority of their Church. The Pope then takes over the church and appoints an Apostolic Administrator to act on his behalf.

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KANSAS
Kansas City Star

BY LAURA BAUER
lbauer@kcstar.com

A lawsuit filed this week alleges that a Lenexa church allowed a teen member to volunteer around children even though officials knew he had a history of sexual abuse.

Officials of Westside Family Church deny the allegation, a lawyer for the church said.

Kessler Lichtenegger pleaded guilty last year to attempted rape and attempted electronic solicitation involving two girls under age 14 who attended Westside. The lawsuit, filed Wednesday by lawyers Rebecca Randles and Antwaun Smith on behalf of the two victims, alleges the church knew of Lichtenegger’s extensive past sexual conduct and crimes involving children.

“But nevertheless (the church) allowed him to have unsupervised and dangerous access to all children in the congregation,” the lawsuit says. “Plaintiffs’ parents believed their children were safe while attending Westside and trusted (the church) to protect their children and not put them in harm’s way.”

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Friday, June 10, 2016

Joyce Fegan

A total of 116 new allegations of sexual abuse were reported to the Catholic Church’s National Board for Safeguarding Children from last April to March 2016.

There were 65 allegations made against diocesan priests and 51 were reported in relation to religious priests and Brothers and Sisters.

Separately, there were 37 allegations of emotional and physical abuse against one religious congregation.

The majority of the abuse reported in this period of April 2015 to March 2016, related to incidences that took place in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.

There was also an incident of alleged abuse that took place in 2015.

“This one case [2015] deserves particular mention as it happened so recently, demonstrating that a risk to children still exists,” the report published said.

Overall, there was an increase in allegations made against diocesan priests from 58 in the last report to this year’s 65.

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GUAM
Daily Reporter

By GRACE GARCES BORDALLO Associated Press
First Posted: June 09, 2016

HAGATNA, Guam — Members of the Catholic church in Guam are reacting with devastation to the accusations that Archbishop Anthony Apuron sexually abused young boys decades ago, but they’re saying they’re still resilient in their faith.

“Everybody’s talking about it. It’s causing a lot of mistrust, anger, and pointing fingers. It’s devastating,” said Patricia Perry, 73.

“We’re neighbors. We grew up together. It’s very conflicting to believe anything,” Perry said. “I just can’t see the archbishop doing those things.”

Pope Francis on Monday named Archbishop Savio Hon Tai-Fai to take over the Hagatna archdiocese after abuse allegations against Apuron resurfaced in recent weeks. A church deacon publicly accused Apuron of keeping the archdiocese’s sex abuse policy weak to protect himself.

In a prayer meeting with clergy and faithful in a packed church on Thursday, Hon sought cooperation and said he was following the Holy Father’s instructions to restore unity, harmony and stability in the local church. Apuron will continue to hold his title, but any decisions are removed from him, Hon said.

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ROME
Crux

Inés San Martín
June 10, 2016
VATICAN CORRESPONDENT

ROME- A leading Catholic expert on the fight against child sexual abuse says Pope Francis has just fired a shot across the bow to Catholic bishops across the world, the substance of which is, “They have to follow the rules.”

The pontiff recently issued a legal document laying out a process for removing bishops who are negligent in responding to abuse allegations. German Jesuit Father Hans Zollner said that while it “doesn’t clarify everything,” it nonetheless “gives a clear signal to bishops: they have to follow the rules.”

Zollner, a member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors created by Francis in 2014, is academic vice-rector of the Jesuit-run Gregorian University in Rome and head of its Institute of Psychology, home of the “Center for Child Protection,” which runs a one-of-a-kind seminar on preventing and responding to sexual abuse.

Next Tuesday, the first 19 students in the “Safeguarding of Minors” program will graduate, and the quota for next year’s course is already full.

Of the new graduates, 11 come from African countries, a continent where, according to Zollner, “sensitivity for the issue of safeguarding children’s rights is very underdeveloped,” and not only within the Church but in society at large. …

Speaking of his decades-old experience fighting clerical sexual abuse, he admitted to being “frustrated” at the fact that in some Eastern European countries, as well as parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America, there are still priests who see this as a “Western problem.”

“That’s frustrating, because this is an obvious denial of reality by people who should know better,” he said.

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UNITED STATES
Philly.com

JUNE 10, 2016

By Thomas G. Plante

The Boston Globe Spotlight team that reported on the clergy abuse crisis in the Catholic Church in 2002, and whose efforts were highlighted in an Academy Award-winning movie, recently uncovered widespread sexual abuse perpetrated by teachers and other employees against children under their charge at many of the nation’s elite private schools.

According to the Globe’s recent report, 67 private schools, including Phillips Exeter, Deerfield, Taft, Thayer, and, most famously, St. George’s School, had more than 200 sexual abuse victims and 90 family lawsuits over sexual victimization during the past 25 years. Their data is based on responses from more than 200 schools at a 10 percent rate, so we are left wondering what the other 90 percent might be hiding.

When these crimes came to light, the perpetrators often were protected and transferred to other schools, and efforts were made by administrators to silence and intimidate victims and to protect the image and reputation of these prestigious educational institutions. Sound familiar?

A quick review of the news last month:

In Western Pennsylvania, a grand jury found “systematic failures” to protect students from several teachers in the Plum School District. The teachers, news articles stated, engaged in both sexual abuse and witness intimidation. Sadly, only so much can be done to the perpetrators due to the statute of limitations.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Advertiser

Ken Grimson
June 10, 2016

BETH Heinrich’s fight for recognition of the immense damage done to her life by a senior Anglican Church cleric takes another step forward on Sunday when she receives an apology from the Bishop of Grafton.

The apology for the former Wagga and Temora woman will be delivered by Bishop Sarah Macneil in Christ Church Cathedral in front of her congregation.

Ms Heinrich is driving more than 1200 kilometres in a small car from her home in north-eastern Victoria to receive the apology more than 10 years in the making.

She went public in 2005 to reveal she had been sexually abused as a 14-year-old girl in a Forbes Anglican Church hostel in the 1950s by then assistant priest and hostel warden, Donald Shearman.

Shearman rose to become the Bishop of Grafton and the pair had an on-and-off adult relationship which Ms Heinrich puts down to the cleric having an emotional hold over her as a result of the earlier abuse.

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OKLAHOMA
The Duncan Banner

By Christian Betancourt The Duncan Banner

Jody Hilliard, a 71-year-old retired assistant pastor accused of molesting an out-of-town 10-year-old female relative while she visited Duncan, will see a special district judge at 1:30 p.m. Aug. 16 for a preliminary hearing.

The hearing will qualify the evidence of the case in order to proceed to a higher court. Court documents state the mother of the victim and the investigating detective will be called as witnesses.

Hilliard faces two counts of lewd or indecent acts with a child under 12, a felony.

If convicted, court document state he could face a minimum of 25 years imprisonment and would have to serve 85 percent of his sentence.

The charges stem from an incident that allegedly occurred while the minor visited and stayed with Hilliard.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

Archivist comes forward with details about boys’ home records thought to be missing

By Giselle Wakatama

A retired police officer has alleged decades of documents have been destroyed or gone missing from a New South Wales Anglican boys’ home, which is expected to be the focus of an upcoming royal commission.

The St Albans boys’ home is expected to be part of a Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse case study looking at abuse allegations in Newcastle’s Anglican diocese.

The lack of documentation has raised alarm bells with retired 20-year police veteran Greg Harding.

Mr Harding pursued convicted paedophile and ex-St Albans board member James Michael Brown, who abused 20 boys.

Brown is currently serving a minimum 12-year jail sentence.

Speaking for publicly for the first time, Mr Harding told the ABC his investigations showed decades of documents were either missing or destroyed.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Shocktivist

June 9, 2016 by Fred Clark

So this waiting for parents, aunts and uncles, on every seat of a local Catholic-school, eighth-grade graduation ceremony this week:

That’s a postcard intended to be signed and sent to state legislators by every parent of every child at this school. “Oppose H.B. 1947” the postcard says, referring to a Pennsylvania bill that would eliminate the statute of limitations for sexual crimes against children.

So what we have here is a school — an elementary school — assuring every parent of every child there that school officials actively support shorter statutes of limitations for sexual crimes against children. “We want to make it harder for the state to prosecute those who prey on children sexually,” school officials are telling the parents of the children in their care. “And we’d like you to help us do it.”
This is, quite simply, reprehensible.

I understand why these school officials, along with the entire Catholic Diocese of Philadelphia, are doing this. To be clear, they’re not fighting to make it harder to prosecute criminals who prey on children because they like criminals who prey on children. They’re not fighting to create a context in which more children will be sexually assaulted and abused because they want that to happen. But they’re still working to make that happen. They’re still taking sides with sexual predators and taking sides against the protection of Pennsylvania’s children.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philly.com

BY KRISTEN DE GROOT
Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA — Roman Catholic legislators say they have been publicly shamed during Mass, called out in church bulletins and disinvited to parish events as the Philadelphia Archdiocese campaigns against a bill that would give victims of child sexual abuse more time to sue the church.

Rep. Nick Miccarelli, a Delaware County Republican, said he was shocked to learn that the weekly bulletin at his church mentioned that he had voted for the bill.

“I’ve been to Iraq and back and there’s very little that makes my jaw drop, but seeing that in parish bulletin, my jaw hit the floor,” said Miccarelli, who served two tours in Iraq in the Army National Guard. “I was in disbelief.”

Under the headline “JUST SO YOU ARE AWARE” the announcement reads, “State Representative Miccarelli voted in favor of House Bill 1947, which states that private institutions can be sued as far as 40 years ago for millions of dollars, while public institutions may not be sued for any crimes.”

Last weekend, a letter by Archbishop Charles Chaput was given to all 219 archdiocese parishes urging parishioners to ask their senators to vote against it.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Giselle Wakatama

Records from a boys’ home that is set to be the focus of a case study at a royal commission into child sexual abuse are being held at the University of Newcastle, it has emerged, after it was believed the records had been destroyed or had gone missing.

The ABC earlier today reported on claims by a retired police detective, who said he had found no records, minutes or other documents from the St Albans Anglican boys’ home, despite a “relentless pursuit” for the records.

An archivist has come forward, saying records are being held in the university’s Archives of the Anglican Diocese of Newcastle.

The archivist has passed that information on to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

The previous lack of documentation had raised alarm bells with retired 20-year police veteran Greg Harding, who had pursued convicted paedophile and ex-St Albans board member James Michael Brown, who abused 20 boys.

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FRANCE
Reuters

By Paul Taylor June 10, 2016

French police questioned the Roman Catholic cardinal-archbishop of Lyon on Wednesday for over 10 hours in an inquiry into the activities of a pedophile priest in the early 1990s and why they were not reported to the civil authorities, lawyers said.

Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, 65, who has denied covering up the activities of Father Bernard Preynat, was questioned as a witness by officers of the child and family protection brigade at a police station in the central city.

“He’s been dragged in the mud for numerous months and he wanted to respond,” Barbarin’s lawyer Jean-Felix Luciani told journalists after the cardinal emerged from questioning.

Several victims of alleged pedophile abuse have filed complaints against the prelate, who holds the honorific title of Primate of the Gauls, for failing to report the incidents to the justice authorities and leaving the accused priest in place.

Preynat was placed under judicial investigation in January for alleged sexual abuse of Catholic boy scouts in 1991 and released on bail. His lawyer said he had admitted the facts of “sexual abuse on minors under 15 years old by a person in a position of authority” to an investigating magistrate.

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PENNSYLVANIA
PennLive

By John L. Micek | jmicek@pennlive.com

As they work their way through the thicket of complicated legislation that routinely comes before them, state lawmakers face constant pressure from the legion of clout-wielding lobbyists and impassioned advocates who prowl the halls of the state Capitol.

But what happens when one of those lobbyists also, theoretically, has the power of the Creator of the Universe on their side?

Roman Catholic lawmakers who supported a state House bill that eliminates the statute of limitations for criminal cases of child sex abuse and extends the window for civil lawsuits until the victim is 50 years old, are finding out firsthand.

Take, for example, Rep. Nick Miccarelli, a Delaware County Republican, who was called out by name in the parish bulletin for St. Rose of Lima church in Eddystone, Pa.

“JUST SO YOU AWARE,” the update tucked among the routine church notices read, “State Rep. Nick Miccarelli voted in favor of House Bill 1947 which states that private institutions can be sued as far as 40 years ago for millions of dollars, while public institutions may not be sued for any crimes committed in the past.”

Miccarelli, who’s been attending the church for years, said he was shocked by the very public scolding.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philly.com

by Maria Panaritis, STAFF WRITER

Bruce L. Castor, Jr., the former Montgomery County prosecutor now serving as the highest-ranking lawyer in the state Attorney General’s Office, plans to testify next week in a key Senate hearing on a bill that has pitted child sexual abuse victims against the Catholic Church.

In an interview Thursday, Castor confirmed his appearance Monday before the Judiciary Committee to discuss the constitutionality of a measure to let victims sue attackers and the institutions that employed them decades after the abuse occurred.

Castor wouldn’t say if he will argue for or against the bill. “I’d just as soon people find out my opinion when I testify,” he said.

He said, however, it seemed less clear-cut that such a law would be allowed by the Pennsylvania constitution than by the U.S. Constitution.

“All of us who are in law enforcement want there to be opportunities to catch criminals whether civil or criminal,” said Castor. “But there are constraints that the constitution imposes upon executive officers in carrying out those duties.”

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MICHIGAN
Central Michigan Life

By Johnathan Hogan

A motion hearing to dismiss a lawsuit filed by a former Central Michigan University student against the former priest at St. Mary’s University Parish is scheduled for 9:45 a.m. June 10.

Megan Winans is suing Father Denis Heames for alleged abuse that occurred while the two had a sexual relationship between 2012 and 2014.

The lawsuit was filed January 14. A new lawsuit was submitted after Heames was removed as a defendant from the original lawsuit, said a courthouse official.

The lawsuit claims Heames committed battery, defamation, breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The lawsuit names the Roman Catholic Dioceses of Saginaw as a defendant, alleging negligent supervision and retention. The diocese and St. Mary’s, are also being sued for vicarious liability. The lawsuit also names Trudy McCaffery.

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ISRAEL
Haaretz

Yair Ettinger Jun 09, 2016

A 15-page indictment filed last month against a well-known ultra-Orthodox rabbi included detailed descriptions of sex crimes he allegedly committed against female relatives over many years. The indictment, filed in the Jerusalem District Court, caused an earthquake in ultra-Orthodox society.

The affair has been covered with unprecedented intensity on news sites for the Haredi community, but most of the ultra-Orthodox media – newspapers and radio stations – haven’t even hinted that such an affair exists.

The indictment has been shared on Haredi Facebook pages and in internet forums. It has been sent out via email and WhatsApp, and has penetrated the layer that has thickened in the ultra-Orthodox community over decades, if not generations.

The dissemination of the indictment hasn’t just broken down conspiracies of silence, it has ended the automatic lack of trust against the complainants and the accuser – the Israeli government.

Everyone is talking about it on the street and in synagogues. Teachers and parents are talking about it at schools. No one can ignore it, and many people are terrified.

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NEW YORK
The Journal News

Steve Lieberman, slieberm@lohud.com

Two state legislators from Rockland are urging the state Education Department to strictly review new fire safety inspections reports done at dozens of private schools or order new, independent reviews of the buildings.

The county, at the state’s behest, had sought to inspect many of the schools itself only to have the schools secure required inspections and certifications elsewhere. Ramapo also did 23 re-inspections of schools after its then fire inspector was accused of filing false inspection reports.

Assemblyman Kenneth Zebrowski, D-New City, and state Sen. David Carlucci, D-Rockland, both wrote to Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia questioning the circumstances surrounding both sets of inspections – including whether it was right to have Ramapo re-inspect the work of its own tainted inspector.

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NEW YORK
National Catholic Reporter

Peter Feuerherd | Jun. 9, 2016

NEW YORK
As the New York state legislature plans to close up shop for its annual session by the end of this month, the Catholic bishops are hoping to run out the clock on a bill that would lift the statute of limitations on sex abuse crimes.

A bill passed by the state Assembly would lift the statute of limitations on future sex abuse crimes against minors, which now prohibits lawsuits five years after victims pass their 18th birthday. The bill would also provide a one-year window allowing for lawsuits in old cases.

Proponents say the measure would balance the scales of justice and provide child sex abuse victims with their day in court. Opponents argue that it would be impossible to fairly judge decades-old cases, that the legislation unfairly exempts public institutions, and that the legal costs would bankrupt the Catholic church in the state.

Similar measures enacted elsewhere eventually resulted in the Wilmington, Del., diocese filing for bankruptcy and for an increase in liabilities for dioceses in California and Minnesota.

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ROME
National Catholic Reporer – Global Sisters Report

by Joshua J. McElwee

The Vatican’s congregation for religious life has summoned to Rome the superior of one of the major orders of U.S. Catholic sisters, asking her to “report on some areas of concern” following the controversial six-year investigation of the country’s communities of women religious.

The head of the Sisters of Loretto, a Kentucky-based community founded in the early 19th century to educate pioneer children but now known for strong stands on social justice issues, has been asked to explain alleged “ambiguity” in the order’s adherence to church teaching and its way of living religious life.

While the summons from the Vatican’s Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life is directed specifically at the Sisters of Loretto, it may raise questions for other U.S. women religious communities of apostolic life, who were subject to an unprecedented Vatican inquiry, known as an apostolic visitation, starting in 2008.

Although the congregation formally closed that visitation in December 2014 with the release of a report on the state of religious life in the U.S., it has in at least this instance used material gathered in the investigation to inquire into the life of the order.

Loretto President Sr. Pearl McGivney announced her summoning to Rome in a short June 1 letter to her order’s members. In her letter, a copy of which was obtained by GSR, McGivney says she has been asked to visit the Vatican Oct. 18 to report on five so-called “areas of concern.” …

One of the order’s members has however drawn the Vatican’s interest several times in the past.

Sr. Jeannine Gramick — who was a member of the School Sisters of Notre Dame before joining the Loretto community in 2001 — was first criticized by the Vatican’s religious congregation in 1984 for cofounding New Ways Ministry, a Maryland-based group that advocates for LGBT Catholics.

In 1999, the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a public notification about Gramick’s work.

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NEW YORK
The Island Now

It is hard to believe that in 2016 New York State law still prohibits victims of child sex abuse from bringing criminal charges or civil claims against abusers after their 23 birthday.

The trauma of a child sexually abused by an adult, usually one in a position of authority, can last for decades and coming forward to seek justice is often a gut-wrenching decision.

To then deny the victims — children assaulted by adults — the chance for justice is unimaginably cruel.
North Shore residents were recently reminded of this when the Catholic order that runs Chaminade High School suspended its former president from serving as a priest after finding allegations that he sexually abused a former student “were credible.”

The current Chaminade president, Brother Thomas Cleary, said the prestigious Mineola parochial school did not learn about the alleged abuse in 2011 until February 2015.

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GUAM
Guam Daily Post

Louella Losinio | Post News Staff

The Vatican’s newly appointed apostolic administrator of the Archdiocese of Agana, Archbishop Savio Hon Tai Fai, addressed the island’s Catholic community and clergy at St. Anthony Church in Tamuning for the first time yesterday, saying that “he will not work alone” in his duties, hinting that a team will help him accomplish his ministry on Guam.

Hon also called on those who were there to “contribute something for the unity of the island.”

Hon was named apostolic administrator sede plena for the Archdiocese of Agana by the Vatican on Monday following an announcement that Pope Francis had relieved Archbishop Anthony Apuron of his duties and appointed an interim administrator for the archdiocese.

During his address yesterday, Hon said “Apuron will still bear the title as the archbishop of Agana but from this appointment on, he will not take on any decision about the archdiocese.”

He added that Apuron should also cooperate in the fulfillment of the apostolic administrator’s mandate.

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