ABUSE TRACKER

PARAIBA (BRAZIL)
The Independent US

February 9, 2019

By Tom Embury-Dennis

Decree follows court order forcing archdiocese to pay almost £2.5m in compensation over sexual exploitation of minors

A Brazilian Catholic archbishop has banned priests in his district from being alone with children.

Manoel Delson, archbishop of the northeastern state of Paraiba, signed the decree on Wednesday following a court order forcing the archdiocese to pay almost £2.5m in compensation over the sexual exploitation of minors.

Mr Delson’s decree prohibits priests from being in the company of children and vulnerable adults unaccompanied by their parents or guardians.

It also states they are not allowed to offer parish accommodation to minors, while “spiritual care” must be done in confessionals or locations that “ensure safety and visibility”, according to Brazilian newspaper Globo.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

KOCHI (INDIA)
The New York Times

February 9, 2019

By Maria Abi-Habib and Suhasini Raj

When Bishop Franco Mulakkal agreed to personally celebrate the First Communion for Darly’s son, a rare honor in their Catholic Church in India, the family was overcome with pride.

During the ceremony, Darly looked over at her sister, a nun who worked with the bishop, to see her eyes spilling over with tears — tears of joy, she figured. But only later would she learn of her sister’s allegation that the night before, the bishop had summoned the nun to his quarters and raped her. The family says that was the first assault in a two-year ordeal in which the prelate raped her 13 times.

The bishop, who has maintained his innocence, will be charged and face trial by a special prosecutor on accusations of rape and intimidation, the police investigating the case said. But the church acknowledged the nun’s accusations only after five of her fellow nuns mutinied and publicly rallied to her side to draw attention to her yearlong quest for justice, despite what they described as heavy pressure to remain silent.

“We used to see the fathers of the church as equivalent to God, but not anymore,” said Darly, her voice shaking with emotion. “How can I tell my son about this, that the person teaching us the difference between right and wrong gave him his First Communion after committing such a terrible sin?”

The case in India, in the southern state of Kerala, is part of a larger problem in the church that Pope Francis addressed on Tuesday for the first time after decades of silence from the Vatican. He acknowledged that sexual abuse of nuns by clerics is a continuing problem in the church.

At a time when church attendance is low in the West, and empty parishes and monasteries are being shuttered across Europe and America, the Vatican increasingly relies on places like India to keep the faith growing.

“India’s clergy and nuns are hugely important to the Catholic Church in the West. The enthusiasm of Christians in Asia stands in stark contrast to the lower-temperature religion in the West,” said Diarmaid MacCulloch, a professor of church history at the University of Oxford.

But the scandal in Kerala is dividing India’s Catholics, who number about 20 million despite being a relatively small minority of a vast population.

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ALBUQUERQUE (NM)
KOAT-TV

February 8, 2019

A victim says he was raped by Archuleta when he was 6 years old and attending Holy Cross Catholic School.

An 81-year-old priest was arrested by New Mexico State Police on Friday. Marvin Archuleta was taken into custody at the Sun Village Apartments in Albuquerque after a two-year investigation by the New Mexico Office of the Attorney General.

Archuleta faces multiple charges, including sexual penetration of a minor and kidnapping. A victim says he was raped by Archuleta when he was 6 years old and attending Holy Cross Catholic School.

Archuleta served as a priest in the 1970s and 1980s at several churches in New Mexico. Investigators say the crimes allegedly happened in the ’80 in Santa Fe County.

This arrest comes as several cases of child sexual abuse by church officials across the nation are being investigated and victims are coming forward.

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GREEN BAY (WI)
Green Bay Press-Gazette

February 8, 2019

By Paul Srubas

https://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/story/news/2019/02/08/catholics-abuse-norbertines-jason-jerry-green-bay-llama-news-survivor-speaks-out/2747719002/

The problem with Jason Jerry is he makes a lousy victim.

Victims are supposed to be subdued, repressed, sorrowful. It helps if they can look up at us with sad eyes, maybe bite their lower lip a little. Obviously, we don’t want them to be beaten down or crushed, but we’re used to thinking of them as tender and vulnerable, and that’s what we need to get our caring, nurturing instincts kicked into high gear.

Jerry, 44, of Howard, is none of that. He’s an angry victim. He’s mouthy. He can be, let’s face it, kind of abrasive when he talks about how a priest molested him years ago and got away with it.

“What are you going to do about the Norbertines?” he shouted at Bishop David Ricken at a listening session in September. “And for you to sit there and nod? Your silence is deafening.”

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HOUSTON (TX)
Associated Press via Houston Chronicle

February 8, 2019

El Paso – The trial of a former Texas priest accused of sexually abusing an alter server for years has been postponed after Catholic leaders revealed the names of hundreds of priests with links to the state who are credibly accused of child abuse.

Miguel Luna, one of the clergymen identified by the Catholic Diocese of El Paso last week, had his trial delayed on Wednesday, the El Paso Times reported. Luna is charged with molesting and raping a child at an El Paso Catholic church.

Luna’s lawyer, Francisco Macias, said the delay will allow media coverage of the list to calm down and hopefully give Luna a chance at a fair trial. His new trial date is set for April 5, according to court records.

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BUFFALO (NY)
WGRZ-TV

February 5, 2019

By Claudine Ewing

A well known local Catholic priest in Buffalo, who is suspended for allegations of sexual abuse, is now accused by a family member of abuse. For the first time that family member is sharing his story.

Reverend Arthur Smith, known by many in Buffalo, inside and outside the Catholic Church, as Father Art, is accused by his nephew of sexual abuse. Three members of the family tell 2 On Your Side that Father Smith abused someone in his own family.

Ryan Cooley, now 33, says he was 9 years old when he was abused by his uncle. Cooley recalls it happened in a family member’s North Buffalo home in a bedroom. Cooley could not hold back tears while telling a story that has bothered him for nearly his entire life.

“I wanted to crawl under the bed,” Cooley said.

During the one and only encounter, Cooley said his uncle Father Smith sat him on the bed and said, ” ‘You’re growing up so fast.’ He just started like rubbing my back, stuck his hand up my shorts and just kept touching me. He knew that I didn’t want that, and from that moment on he disrespected me.”

Cooley never told anyone about the abuse until a couple of years ago. He was raised in a Catholic family in South Buffalo.

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SPRINGFIELD (MO)
Ozarks First

February 8, 2019

Little Rock, Ark. – The Catholic Diocese of Little Rock is releasing new information in the continuing investigation into allegations of clergy sexual abuse of children. The office is also urging other alleged victims to come forward.

On Friday, Bishop Anthony B. Taylor released a statement to the Catholics in the Diocese of Little Rock following a review by an outside firm, Kinsale Management Consulting, of more than 1,350 files of clergy and religious who served in ministry in the diocese.

The DOLR released these items:
An Updated Clergy Disclosure List,
A Historical Explanation of the Church’s Handling of Allegations of Abuse of Minors Prior to 2002, and
An exit letter from Kinsale Management Consulting (full letter posted below)

The Diocese says Bishop Taylor remains deeply concerned for anyone who has been a victim of sexual abuse, especially anyone who has been abused by a priest, deacon or other representative of the church.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
The New Orleans Advocate

February 8, 2019

By Andrea Gallo and Ramon Antonio Vargas

It was 1959 when priest John Franklin was stripped of his ability to minister to Catholics in the New Orleans area because he had been credibly accused of sexually abusing a minor.

Yet within a few years, Franklin was working as a priest in central Louisiana, holding invocations at prep sports awards banquets, presiding over funerals — and by 1966, allegedly abusing another child.

He was still a priest 20 years later, when he fatally shot himself in the head shortly before he could be tried on charges that he sexually abused a preteen altar boy in Florida

His suicide note said he preferred to be “a dead memory than a living … disgrace.”

Franklin’s story, buried in the balkanized record keeping of the U.S. Catholic Church, has slowly resurfaced following his appearance on last year’s list of credibly accused clergy abusers from the Archdiocese of New Orleans and a listing this week on the release from the Diocese of Alexandria.

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PARIS (FRANCE)
The Local / Agence France-Presse

February 8, 2019

A priest accused of molesting more than 80 boys is trying to block the release of a film about a scandal which has rocked the French Catholic church and put one of its most senior cardinals in the dock.

The acclaimed director Francois Ozon worked for years in secret on “By the Grace of God”, which will be premiered Friday at the Berlin film festival.

But its release in France later this month is threatened, with the accused priest Bernard Preynat going to court to demand that it is not shown until after his trial, which is due to start later this year.

A lay voluntary worker for the Lyon diocese, Regine Maire, has also issued a legal challenge to have her name removed from the film.

The movie’s premiere comes as Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, the archbishop of Lyon, and five others including Maire await the verdict of a court in the central eastern city on charges of covering up the abuse.

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SAN JOSE (CA)
The Mercury News

February 8, 2019

By John Woolfork

State law requires church officials to immediately report suspected abuse

Concerned that church officials took too long to report a priest’s misconduct, abuse victims are asking the Alameda County District Attorney to investigate when the Diocese of Oakland first learned of child abuse allegations involving a priest who was placed on leave last week.

Representatives of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) sent a letter to District Attorney Nancy O’Malley noting that the diocese publicly announced it had placed the Rev. Alex Castillo on leave five hours before notifying Oakland police

Clergy members along with teachers, medical professionals, law enforcement officials and others are required under state law to immediately or as soon as practical report suspected child abuse to police or child welfare authorities when they become aware of it. Failure to do so is a misdemeanor.

“There was obviously a delay in reporting, but whether it was hours, days, weeks, or months, is
not entirely clear,” said the letter to Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O’Malley from Bay Area SNAP representatives Melanie Sakoda, Dan McNevin, Joey Piscitelli and Zach Hiner.

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LOUISVILLE (KY)
Louisville Courier Journal

February 8, 2019

By Chris Kenning

Louisville Archbishop Joseph Kurtz on Friday released the names of 48 archdiocese priests and members of religious orders credibly accused of child sexual abuse dating back 70 years, the first such accounting since the priest abuse scandal exploded in 2002.

The report, prepared by former assistant U.S. attorney and Kentucky State Police Commissioner Mark Miller, follows a growing number of Catholic diocese from Atlanta to Indianapolis issuing similar lists, spurred partly by a 2018 Pennsylvania grand jury investigation that reignited outrage and sparked new priest-abuse investigations.

Kurtz said the list was meant to provide transparency and healing for a “tragic history” and said the list is only a beginning, not a final accounting. The numbers will likely rise, he said, and he said he hoped the report would inspire others to report abuses.

Of the 48 named people, 22 were archdiocese priests with at least one substantiated allegation. Another 14 were priests (including one who became a bishop) and other members of religious orders such as Franciscan Friars, and 12 were priests with credible allegations for which there was insufficient information to fully investigate or confirm.

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LOUISVILLE (KY)
Archdiocese of Louisville

February 8, 2019

By Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz

[Includes links to the Miller report, with its list of accused archdiocesan priests, and a list of accused religious order priests and others.]

Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ:

May God bless you! I have written on many occasions over the last several months about the sexual abuse of children in the Church and how the Archdiocese is responding in a pastoral way.

As part of our response, the Archdiocese of Louisville Sexual Abuse Review Board requested a careful review by an independent investigator of our records involving sexual abuse of minors by diocesan priests with a report of the findings. The investigator is Mr. Mark Miller, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney, former First Assistant Jefferson County Commonwealth Attorney, and former Commissioner of the Kentucky State Police, and he presented his report to the Sexual Abuse Review Board today. This report includes a list of credibly accused diocesan priests. In addition to Mr. Miller’s report, we also are releasing a list of credibly accused religious order priests. Because the personnel records for these priests are maintained by the religious order, we had only limited information for review, and so religious order priests are not included in Mr. Miller’s report. Many religious orders have published a list or are in the process of doing so, and we provided the web page for each religious order involved.

Several weeks ago, Mr. Miller shared his initial findings with the Sexual Abuse Review Board. During that meeting, I confirmed with him that he had received unfettered and independent access to what he needed to complete his work.

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VATICAN CITY
Associated Press via Portland Press Herald

February 8, 2019

The statement by the sisters comes after Pope Francis admitted the problem of priests and bishops sexually abusing nuns.

By Nicole Winfield

The largest association of religious sisters in the United States called Thursday for an overhaul of the male-led leadership structure of the Catholic Church, after Pope Francis publicly acknowledged the problem of priests and bishops sexually abusing nuns.

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious also appealed in a statement for reporting guidelines to be established so abused nuns “are met with compassion and are offered safety.”

The conference’s statement followed Francis’ acknowledgement this week that clergy abuse of nuns was a problem. The pope said the Vatican was working on it but that more needed to be done.

His comments, given in response to a reporter’s question during an in-flight news conference, were the first public acknowledgement by a pope of a long-simmering scandal that is erupting at the same time that the Catholic hierarchy is under siege for its decades-long cover-up of the sexual abuse of minors.

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BATON ROUGE (LA)
The Advocate

February 8, 2019

By Andrea Gallo

The Diocese of Baton Rouge is adding Timothy Sugrue, a priest who served for at least seven years in St. James Parish, to its list of Catholic clergymen who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse.

With the addition of Sugrue, the diocese’s list now includes 38 clerics who served under its umbrella who stand credibly accused of sexual abuse of a minor. The Advocate reported Tuesday that Sugrue had been left off the diocese’s list even though he was targeted by a high-profile lawsuit in Arkansas and was included on a similar list from the Diocese of Little Rock last year.

Dan Borné, a spokesman for the Diocese of Baton Rouge, said the diocese has yet to receive any credible allegations against Sugrue from his time at St. Michael the Archangel in Convent and St. Joseph Church in Paulina. The Marist priest left the Diocese of Baton Rouge in 1987.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Register

February 8, 2019

By Stephen Beale

A number of U.S. dioceses have already announced new initiatives to deal with the crisis, ahead of this month’s global summit on clerical sexual abuse at the Vatican.

While the hands of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops may have been tied until the Vatican conference on clerical sex abuse later this month, many individual bishops aren’t waiting to usher in sweeping new reforms in their dioceses in the wake of the latest revelations.

“I believe that bishops have sufficient latitude to implement reforms in their dioceses,” Archbishop William Lori of Baltimore told the Register. “As I understand it, canon law affords bishops authority to make certain decisions for the good of the local Churches they serve. In view of the importance of transparency and accountability, it was determined that these additional protocols were warranted and within my authority to implement.”

In mid-January, Archbishop Lori announced a third-party reporting system for accusations of any improprieties, criminal actions or unethical behavior — sex abuse or otherwise — for any bishops actively serving in the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Any allegations will be assessed by an independent review board headed up by two retired judges. The board will also be publishing an annual report on how the archdiocese has dealt with the allegations it has received.

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BUENOS AIRES (ARGENTINA)
Associated Press

February 8, 2019

The Vatican is proceeding with an investigation into an Argentine bishop close to Pope Francis who has been accused of improper behavior with seminarians and sexual abuse.

In a statement posted to its Facebook page, the Argentine Diocese of Oran said Feb. 5 that the Vatican’s Congregation for Bishops had entrusted Tucuman Archbishop Carlos Alberto Sanchez with the next phase of the investigation regarding accusations against Bishop Gustavo Zanchetta.

The development is significant because it signals that a preliminary investigation conducted by the Oran diocese and sent to the Vatican was deemed credible enough to warrant further investigation by an outside party.

The Associated Press reported last month that the Vatican received indications of inappropriate behavior by Zanchetta in 2015 and again in 2017, with reports from his former vicars and the seminary rector.

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BATON ROUGE (LA)
WAFB-TV

February 8, 2019

By Kevin Foster, Nick Gremillion, and Matt Houston

UPDATE – FEB. 8

Another name has been added to the Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge’s list of clergy members accused of sexually abusing minors.

The diocese released the updated list Friday, Feb. 8. It includes a new name, one that was released in a report from the Diocese of Little Rock in September of 2018. The Baton Rouge diocese was reportedly not notified he had served in Louisiana.

Timothy Sugrue reportedly left Baton Rouge in 1987. The Baton Rouge diocese says they have no record of a credible allegation against him while he served in Baton Rouge, but that since he’s listed on the report from Little Rock, his name has been added to their list.

The diocese also noted another change to the list in which an individual accused was misidentified.

“The change involves Myles Joseph Kearney, whose is name No. 17 under Section A of our list. Two individuals named Myles Joseph Kearney served the Diocese of Baton Rouge. The allegation listed is NOT against the Fr. Kearney who was ordained in 1938 and served at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel in St. Francisville. In addition, the Myles Joseph Kearney on our list served as a transitional deacon at St. George Parish in Baton Rouge, and he did not serve at Ascension of Our Lord Parish in Donaldsonville as had previously been reported. (Note: Prior to their ordination to the priesthood, seminarians are ordained to the diaconate. This diaconate is usually called the “transitional diaconate” because it is conferred in anticipation that the man will be ordained to the priesthood. Men who are not anticipating ordination to the priesthood are also ordained as deacons. They are generally called ‘permanent’ deacons. There are no permanent deacons on our diocesan list.)”

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PARIS (FRANCE)
La Croix International

February 8, 2019

By Anne-Bénédicte Hoffner and Céline Hoyeau

The first meeting of the Independent Commission of Inquiry into Sexual Abuse within the Church (CIASE) is being held on Feb. 8 in Paris.

Jean-Marc Sauvé, former Vice-President of the Council of State, explains the philosophy of the Commission, which he was appointed to lead by the bishops of France.

La Croix: You were appointed at the end of November 2018 to preside over the Commission, with the aim of “casting light on the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable persons” in the Church and in order to “study the manner in which these cases were handled.” How are you planning to proceed?

Jean-Marc Sauvé: The starting point of this work is the acknowledgment and understanding of the victims’ suffering. From now on, this must be taken into account and addressed. This will occur through attentive listening.

The sexual abuse of minors and of vulnerable persons constitutes a denial of the foundation of the Church: it is therefore particularly intolerable.

Responding to the suffering of the victims is what has motivated me. Listening to them will therefore be one of the core missions of the Commission

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

February 8, 2019

By Maria Panaritis

On a Jesuit campus in Lower Merion Township, inside a building named for a Delaware County man who would one day become a cardinal of the Roman Catholic church, the answers to clergy sexual abuse seemed, at least to those typically in church pews, perfectly clear.

Major changes are in order, said a group of thoughtful people who call themselves the faithful but who, unlike their bishops, do not wear mitre hats or white robes. Such people gathered at St. Joseph’s University a few nights ago to demand major institutional reforms.

Here’s some of what they had to say:

Force dirty bishops and priests to resign or fire them. Let women become priests. Let priests marry. Let married men and women become priests. Make sure that American leaders of the church return from this month’s Vatican meeting on clergy abuse with substantive orders to fix the rotting architecture of a religious institution that millions of Pennsylvanians turn to for sacred guidance.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Sun-Times

February 8, 2019

By Robert Herguth

Anticipating getting $100 million or more from the sale of a parking lot at Holy Name Cathedral, the Archdiocese of Chicago expects to spend most of that windfall repaying money that was borrowed to cover the financial costs of clergy sex abuse claims.

That’s according to a Chicago Sun-Times examination of the church’s most recent financial reports and interviews that show the archdiocese owes more than $200 million, mostly related to sex abuse claims. And the church estimates it could end up with another $100 million in costs for pending and future claims.

In October 2017, church officials, discussing plans to sell the property across from Holy Name, the seat of the archdiocese, said, “We sought a developer who shared our vision of improving the neighborhood we have been proud to call home for nearly 175 years.”

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GREEN BAY (WI)
Green Bay Press-Gazette

By Paul Srubas

February 8, 2019

The problem with Jason Jerry is he makes a lousy victim.

Victims are supposed to be subdued, repressed, sorrowful. It helps if they can look up at us with sad eyes, maybe bite their lower lip a little. Obviously, we don’t want them to be beaten down or crushed, but we’re used to thinking of them as tender and vulnerable, and that’s what we need to get our caring, nurturing instincts kicked into high gear.

Jerry, 44, of Howard, is none of that. He’s an angry victim. He’s mouthy. He can be, let’s face it, kind of abrasive when he talks about how a priest molested him years ago and got away with it.

“What are you going to do about the Norbertines?” he shouted at Bishop David Ricken at a listening session in September. “And for you to sit there and nod? Your silence is deafening.”

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

MADRID (SPAIN)
Associated Press

February 8, 2019

Spain’s justice minister has asked the country’s Catholic Church leaders to hand over all the information they possess about internal investigations or proceedings related to sexual abuse allegations at church institutions.

The Justice Ministry says in a statement that the request sent by letter Thursday reflects a need to move forward with any criminal proceedings as well as to throw a light on “deeds our society can no longer remain quiet about.”

The Spanish Episcopal Conference replied that it has already provided information about known cases to the Vatican and Spanish judicial authorities, as required by law.

It also expressed “sincere concern” for the victims of “a serious problem which affects the whole of society.”

Only a handful of church-linked sexual abuse cases have emerged in Spain.

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LONDON (England)
Express

February 8, 2019

By Joe Duggan

The Abbot of a Benedictine abbey withheld an allegation of abuse from police about a priest who was later jailed for child sex offences committed while teaching at a leading Catholic school, an inquiry heard this week.

Abbot Shipperlee admitted to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) he failed to report a claim of abuse against Soper to the police when informed of it in 2001.

He said: “Because I simply did not believe that this was possible.

“I was outraged that such an accusation could be made against someone of whom I – well, it did not occur to me that it was possible that this sort of thing could happen.”

In October 2009, Pearce, a former junior school head master at St Benedict’s, was jailed for eight years for abuse at the school from 1972 to 1992, as well as one offence in 2007.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
PBS News Hour

February 7, 2019

Pope Francis is publicly acknowledging for the first time that clergymen have sexually abused nuns. Private reports that were sent to top Vatican officials, but not publicly reported on until much later, indicate the abuse goes as far back as the 1990s. John Yang speaks to Associated Press reporter Nicole Winfield about why it took so long for the accusations to come to light.

Amna Nawaz:

Pope Francis broke his silence on Wednesday, acknowledging for the first time that clergymen have sexually abused nuns.

John Yang has more on the story

John Yang:

Amna, for decades, the persistent allegations of sexual abuse of nuns and religious women by Roman Catholic priests and bishops have been overshadowed by other scandals in the church.

Now decades of silence are ending. Last year, a bishop in India was arrested after a nun told police he had repeatedly raped her between 2014 and 2016. Many priests celebrated when the bishop was released on bail. He faces trail later this year.

This week, for the first time, Pope Francis addressed the issue as he returned to Rome from the United Arab Emirates.

Pope Francis:

It’s not something that everyone does, but there have been priests and even bishops who have done this. And I think it is still taking place because it is not as though the moment you become aware of something, it goes away.

The thing continues, and we have been working on this for some time. We have suspended a few clerics and sent some away over this.

John Yang:

The pope was responding to a question from Associated Press Vatican correspondent Nicole Winfield, who joins us now from Rome.

Nicole, thanks so much for being with us.

You published an investigation last summer that documented abuse going back decades and spreading across at least four continents. Why has it taken so long for this silence to break and for this to surface?

Nicole Winfield:

The first public reports were in 2001. The National Catholic Reporter did a groundbreaking report and provided documentation that had been given to the Vatican a decade before about the situation in Africa.

So, I took that as a starting point and decided that, with the reckoning that was going on in the United States, that it was a time to really look at what was going on around the world as far as the religious sisters were concerned.

And, indeed, we found that really nothing had changed.

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BOSTON (MA)
WBUR – On Point

February 7, 2019

By Meghna Chakrabarti with Nicole Winfield, Sister Kathleen Bryant, Susan Reynolds

[Audio – 45 minutes, interviews and call-in]

Pope Francis publicly acknowledges the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and bishops. Worldwide, nuns are speaking out. We’ll shed light on the newest scandal for the Catholic Church.

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

February 8, 2019

By Elise Harris

Rome – Speaking at a secular conference on child pornography and online threats to youth on Thursday, a Catholic priest said the fight against child abuse isn’t merely a cause for the Church, but for the entire human family and for civilization itself.

During the Feb. 7 panel titled, “Pornography, Minors and Safety on the Internet,” sponsored by the Italian government, Father Aldo Bonaiuto told attendees that “the human family, if we are really civil, we want to fight.”

“We are here because these people belong to us, we feel that they belong to us, we feel that they are our children,” he said, referring to children and adolescents who experience online abuse or who are exposed to harmful content on digital devices.

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ROME
New York Times

February 6, 2019

By Jason Horowitz

The sexual abuse of nuns and religious women by Catholic priests and bishops — and the abortions that have sometimes resulted — has for years been overshadowed by other scandals in the Roman Catholic Church.

That seemed to change this week when Pope Francis publicly acknowledged the problem for the first time.

“I was so happy,” said Lucetta Scaraffia, the author of an article denouncing the abuse of nuns and religious lay women by priests that was published this month in a magazine, Women Church World, which is distributed alongside the Vatican’s newspaper.

Speaking from her Rome apartment, which she said had essentially been converted into a television studio full of international reporters, Ms. Scaraffia said, “Finally, now many women will have the courage to come forward and denounce their abusers.”

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VATICAN CITY
New York Times

February 5, 2019

By Jason Horowitz and Elizabeth Dias

Pope Francis said on Tuesday that the Roman Catholic Church had faced a persistent problem of sexual abuse of nuns by priests and even bishops, the first time he has publicly acknowledged the issue.

Catholic nuns have accused clerics of sexual abuse in recent years in India, Africa, Latin America and in Italy, and a Vatican magazine last week mentioned nuns having abortions or giving birth to the children of priests. But Francis has never raised the issue until he was asked to comment during a news conference aboard the papal plane returning to Rome from his trip to the United Arab Emirates.

“It’s true,” Francis said. “There are priests and bishops who have done that.”

The pope’s admission opens a new front in the long-running scandal of sexual abuse by priests, recognizing nuns who have tried for years to call attention to their plight. With the #MeToo movement going strong, and Francis under pressure for neglecting the victims of child abuse, the nuns’ pleas have gained traction.

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VATICAN CITY
Women Church World

February 1, 2019

By Lucetta Scaraffia

Touch – as we are taught on the one hand by the commentaries on the Gospels and on the other by psychoanalysis – which occupies a crucial place in Gospel evangelical teaching is an essential factor of our way of knowing the truth and of communicating with others. It is a hidden but most powerful sense that involves the deepest aspects of the human psyche. The fact that for priests and religious touch has become an impracticable form of contact with children and women for some years now as a result of the abuses scandal not only constitutes a new form of etiquette and a form of elementary prudence to avoid (even unfounded) suspicion but is also a real mutilation of relational life and of the apostolate in the Christian community. At a time in history when the Church is going through a serious crisis regarding her capacity for transmitting the Gospel message, the heart of the Christian message, the impossibility of giving a caress to a child or of shaking the hand of a woman who is grieving or upset is a serious wound. By denying the possibility of using touch as a form of communication it becomes almost impossible to understand the ability of the person involved to face the reciprocity of the relationship and the intimacy and identity of the other person – essentially the profound reality of a human relationship.

It cannot of course be denied that it is a question of a deserved mutilation, but nevertheless it is still a mutilation.

Returning to the freedom to bestow a caress, to take someone by the hand, to put an arm round a shoulder – charity also consists of this – some way out of the abuses scandal needs to be found.

Every gesture has become suspect because the simple, good and affectionate meaning of so many gestures has been used not to reassure or encourage someone but to violate the intimacy of a child or a woman, that is, of someone weak.

Pope Francis has given the strongest and most radical interpretation of this crisis: it is not, he says, a question of falling into the temptations of the flesh, of sexual sins, but rather of an abuse of power, an abuse that is born from a perverted interpretation of the priestly role, arising from an evil which he has called clericalization.

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SHREVEPORT (LA)
Diocese of Shreveport

February 6, 2019

By Peter B. Mangum

[Note: This press release includes the list.]

http://www.dioshpt.org/release-of-names-of-priests-who-served-in-the-former-diocese-of-alexandria-shreveport-removed-for-sexual-abuse-of-minors/

RE: Release of Names of Priests Who Served in the Former Diocese of Alexandria-Shreveport Removed for Sexual Abuse of Minors

The following is a statement from the Very Rev. Peter B. Mangum, Diocesan Administrator, on the public release of names of priests accused of sexual abuse of minors in the Diocese of Alexandria, which, prior to 1986, included what is now the Diocese of Shreveport.

In my press release on November 8, 2018, I explained that the Diocese of Shreveport was established in 1986 when the Diocese of Alexandria-Shreveport was divided by the Vatican. When the Diocese of Shreveport was formed, all historical documents and records, including the files related to priests, living and deceased, remained in Alexandria, as per Church protocol. Thus, all records of priests who served in what is now the Diocese of Shreveport before June 1986 are still located in the Diocese of Alexandria’s files.

I reported then that, since June 1986, no allegations of sexual misconduct of a minor by a bishop, priest or deacon have been received in the Diocese of Shreveport. This review of the files of all priests (living and deceased, diocesan priests and those in religious orders, native and foreign born) who have served in the Diocese of Shreveport since its creation, was conducted by a lay professional and local attorney, without the presence of any clergy or employee of the diocese. (To read the Diocese of Shreveport’s complete press release from November 8, 2018, visit: http://www.dioshpt.org/release-of-names-of-priests-removed-for-sexual-abuse-of-minors/)

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SHREVEPORT (LA)
Shreveport Times

February 6, 2019

By Nick Wooten and Ashley Mott

Seventeen priests who served in north Louisiana were accused of sexually abusing minors before 1986. Nearly all of them had ties to the Shreveport-Bossier City area, according to a report released by the Diocese of Alexandria Wednesday.

Prior to 1986, the Diocese of Alexandria included the Diocese of Shreveport, but all files related to priests, living and deceased, stayed in Alexandria due to church protocol. No allegations of sexual misconduct of a minor by a bishop, priest or deacon was received in the Diocese of Shreveport since June 1986, said Rev. Peter B. Mangum, the Shreveport diocesan administrator.

The Shreveport diocese covers 16 north Louisiana parishes — Bienville, Bossier, Caddo, Claiborne, DeSoto, East Carroll, Jackson, Lincoln, Morehouse, Ouachita, Red River, Richland, Sabine, Union, Webster and West Carroll.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

February 7, 2019

The Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh on Thursday said it received an accusation of sexual abuse of a minor against a lay brother teaching at Central Catholic High School who later became a priest.

The allegation against Father John O’Brien, who died in 2004, dates to the mid-1960s.

No details were released about the alleged abuse.

Father O’Brien was a Christian brother known as Brother Firmilian John at the time of the alleged abuse. He was ordained as a priest in 1975.

It’s the first accusation that the diocese or the Christian Brothers have received against Father O’Brien, according to the diocese.

He was not one of the Pittsburgh-area priests whose names were released in last year’s grand jury report about clergy sex abuse in six of Pennsylvania’s eight dioceses.

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

February 7, 2019

A diocese in Illinois added names to their list of publicly accused priests in the wake of new disclosures of credibly accused priests from other states and the hard work of journalists in Illinois.

Three priests total were added to the list previously published by the Diocese of Peoria. One of those priests is Fr. Kenneth J. Roberts. The cleric was added after his name was included on the list of abusive priests in Dallas, TX. Fr. Roberts has been accused of abuse in Dallas, St. Louis, Peoria and Belleville. To date, Belleville Bishop Edward Braxton has yet to add Fr. Roberts to the Belleville list.

We know a brave and persistent survivor who reported his abuse by Fr. Roberts years ago, so it is difficult for us to believe that Peoria Bishop Daniel Jenky only recently learned of Fr. Roberts’ presence in the Peoria Diocese. It is a shame that bishops continue to minimize allegations and hide information related to abusive priests unless they are faced with continued external pressure.

The other two priests in question – Fr. Ron Roth and Fr. Bernard Tomaszewski – were also added to the list of abusive priests from the Diocese of Peoria this week, but apparently only after having been ‘outed’ by the News Tribune.

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

February 7, 2019

Members of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, recently wrote to Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O’Malley asking her to investigate whether or not the Oakland Diocese reported allegations that Fr. Alex Castillo sexually abused a minor to law enforcement in a timely fashion.

Mandatory reporters in California must make an “immediate” phone call to law enforcement when they learn someone is accused of child sexual abuse. Clergy, such as Oakland Bishop Michael C. Barber, SJ, are among those who are required to make that call. Failure to report is a crime punishable by up to 6 months in jail or a $1000 fine.

From media reports it appears that no one from the Diocese made an “immediate” report to the Oakland Police as required by law. Moreover, the Church may have known about the allegations earlier in the month, or even since last fall.

“We know there was a delay in reporting,” said Dan McNevin, Volunteer Oakland SNAP Leader and a survivor of abuse himself. “What we don’t know is if the delay was a matter of hours, days, weeks or even months. We are hoping that the DA can nail down the timeline, and make a determination as to whether the law has been violated.”

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

February 7, 2019

Our hearts ache for the thousands of nuns who have been sexually abused and harassed by priests, bishops and other Catholic clerics. We are glad their plight is finally attracting attention but feel compelled to stress that when it comes to the Church hierarchy, awareness does not guarantee action.

It is worth noting that, once again, a clergy sex scandal surfaces only because of outside pressure on the Vatican. Sometimes, it is a prosecutor or governmental body or an external study that achieves prompt disclosure. This time, it was investigative journalism. We are grateful for all those individuals and institutions who keep chipping away at this ancient, rigid, male-dominated hierarchy that remains so dreadfully committed to secrecy.

We share the view of Anne Barrett Doyle of BishopAccountability who said that she is “bewildered that the pope verifying this should make headlines — it‘s an epidemic problem in certain areas. The Vatican has documentation on likely tens of thousands of cases of sexual violence, and so when a Vatican official or the pope makes a pronouncement as if it’s occurring to them for the first time — as if they’re identifying a problem for the first time — it strikes me as disingenuous.”

Those who have been sexually assaulted by priests, bishops, brothers, seminarians, deacons and yes, nuns, have heard many pledges of reform from Catholic officials over the years, and have witnessed these promises fall short. So we are not in the least encouraged by the pope’s claim that high-ranking church staff has the will to stop this horror.

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SHREVEPORT (LA)
KTBS TV

February 9, 2019

The Catholic church has released the names of 17 priests assigned to churches in North Louisiana who are believed to have sexually abused children before 1986. Thirteen served at churches in Shreveport-Bossier City.

The names were released Wednesday by the Diocese of Alexandria, which oversaw Shreveport until 1986, when Shreveport became a separate diocese. Under church protocol, the files of accused pedophile priests stayed in Alexandria.

The diocese released the names of priests both living and dead, the North Louisiana churches where they served and general allegations against them. The church has paid damages to several of the victims, although it has not disclosed details of the amounts. In each case there were “credible allegations” of sexual abuse of a minor, the diocese said.

The priests identified by the diocese are:
Father Edward Allen; St. Theresa in Shreveport and St. Lucy in Hodge. Allegations of sexual abuse of a boy dating to 1973 was brought before a Permanent Review Board in 2005. Allen resigned from the ministry in 2005 and a settlement with the victim was made in 2012. Allen died in 2018.

Father William Allison; Our Lady of Fatima in Monroe and Christ the King in Bossier City. An allegation of sexual abuse of a boy dating back to 1961 was brought before the review board in 2004. Allison died in 1986.

Father William Bressler; St. Catherine of Siena in Shreveport. Multiple allegations of sexual abuse of boys and girls dating back to the 1960s were brought before the review board in 2004 and 2005. Bressler died in 1990. Settlements were made with victims in 2006 and 2017.

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ALEXANDRIA (LA)
KALB TV

February 7, 2019

By Andrea Finney, Brooke Buford & Allison Bazzle

We are continuing with our coverage of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church involving clergymen within the Diocese of Alexandria. Twenty-seven priests and deacons, both living and dead, are accused of sexual abuse and misconduct. That list was compiled beginning last August.

According to the Diocese of Alexandria, there are five former clergymen still living. And, Thursday morning, with the help of the Rapides Parish Tax Assessor’s Office, we were able to track down one of them – Monsignor Frederick Lyons, who still lives in Alexandria.

He’s accused of multiple allegations of sexual misconduct and abuse of boys dating back to the 1960s. When those allegations were deemed credible, he was removed from active ministry in 2006. But, according to a press release issued by the diocese in 2013, he was not stripped of his priesthood. Instead, the diocese imposed “a life of prayer and penance” on him.

“When he met with the review board, which he did not have to do, he chose to do it. I was not present, but the report they gave me was that he neither admitted nor denied,” said Bishop Ronald Herzog in 2006. “Of course, that is always someone’s option to listen to what is presented without addressing it beyond that.”

According to information provided in 2013, Lyons served as a priest at St. Francis Xavier Cathedral in Alexandria, St. John the Baptist in Cloutierville, St. Anthony Padua in Bunkie, and Our Lady of Prompt Succor in Alexandria. He was appointed monsignor in 1962 and retired in 1989.

On Thursday, we visited his home to find out if he would comment on the list and were met at the door by him and a caretaker. He chose not to comment.

News Channel 5 also requested information on the assignments of the priests and deacons on the list, including specific schools and churches where they may have been placed.

The Diocese of Alexandria gave us this statement:

“The members of the Personnel Review Board (PRB) discussed this aspect of their investigation thoroughly.

Along with not wanting to re-victimize any victims, the PRB understood that communities were also affected in the past, where the rumor of a “bad priest” or rumors of untold behaviors or rumors of a child or teen affected by the behavior of a cleric affected the spirit of the community negatively. Communities (parishes, missions) are not to be re-traumatized about a sad portion of their history (with allegations or convictions of abusive priest(s) ), placing an unwanted spotlight on the community of faith today in 2019.

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ARLINGTON (VA)
USA TODAY

Feb. 7, 2019

By Lindsay Schnell

Pope Francis’ acknowledgement aboard the papal plane this week that nuns have suffered sexual abuse by priests and even bishops — including nuns in the U.S. — caught many offguard with his frankness.

But it wasn’t exactly new information, according to U.S. women leaders within the Catholic Church.

In a statement issued Thursday, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, the largest association representing nuns in the U.S., said that while this problem is prevalent mostly in developing countries — there have been many cases in Africa, and last year a nun in India accused a priest of repeatedly raping her between 2014 and 2016 — it has gone on in the U.S., too.

The conference specifically referenced a 1996 study from St. Louis University that indicated, “there were sisters in the United States who had suffered some form of sexual trauma by Catholic priests. Often those sisters did not share this information even with their own communities.”

Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability, a website that tracks abusive priests, was both underwhelmed and hopeful after hearing the pope’s comments.

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NEW YORK (NY)
America Magazine

February 7, 2019

By Jim McDermott

Eight years ago, the Irish-born artist Trina McKillen returned to Dublin to discover that her elderly mother no longer wanted to go to Mass—the ongoing revelations of clerical child abuse were just too much.

This was a woman who had nine children “because you have as many children as God gave you,” Ms. McKillen told a gathering of over 200 people at Loyola Marymount University a week ago. Her mother had an image of the Sacred Heart across from her bed; “she used to say, ‘The Sacred Heart is my best friend.’”

“For me, she was the church,” Ms. McKillen told the crowd. “And here she was walking away at the age of 84 from her spiritual home. I felt I had to do something. It’s not right for my mother not to have her refuge.”

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ROME (ITALY)
Associated Press

February 7, 2019

By Nicole Winfield

The largest association of religious sisters in the United States called Thursday for an overhaul of the male-led leadership structure of the Catholic Church, after Pope Francis publicly acknowledged the problem of priests and bishops sexually abusing nuns.

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious also appealed in a statement for reporting guidelines to be established so abused nuns “are met with compassion and are offered safety.”

The conference’s statement followed Francis’ acknowledgement this week that clergy abuse of nuns was a problem. The pope said the Vatican was working on it but more needed to be done.

His comments, given in response to a reporter’s question during an in-flight press conference, were the first public acknowledgement by a pope of a long-simmering scandal. Reporting by The Associated Press and other news media, as well as the reckoning demanded by the #MeToo movement, has brought the issue to the fore.

The LCWR, which represents about 80 percent of Catholic sisters in the U.S., said it was grateful Francis had “shed light on a reality that has been largely hidden from the public and we believe his honesty is an important and significant step forward.”

The group also said some religious congregations had been part of the problem and didn’t support sisters in coming forward to report abuse.

“We regret that when we did know of instances of abuse, we did not speak out more forcefully for an end to the culture of secrecy and cover-ups within the Catholic Church that have discouraged victims from coming forward,” the association based in Silver Spring, Maryland, said.

It made two recommendations: the creation of reporting mechanisms and what it called a “refashioning” of the church’s overall leadership structure to involve laity and to reform the clerical culture that affords all power to the clergy.

“The revelations of the extent of abuse indicate clearly that the current structures must change if the church is to regain its moral credibility and have a viable future,” the group said.

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BONN (GERMANY)
Deutsche Welle

February 7, 2019

As the Catholic Church reels from continued reports of sexual abuse by clergyworldwide, Pope Francis has, for the first time, acknowledged the rape of nuns by clergy, saying the Vatican must do more to prevent assault.

In January, the Austrian theologian Hermann Geissler resigned as chief of staff of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican body that investigates reports of assault within the Catholic Church. The priest’s departure comes after a nun’s accounts of repeated rape by him were made public.

German dioceses have invited Reisinger to address assault in the Catholic Church

The former nun Doris Reisinger, a well-known philosopher, theologian, author and activist, told DW that the hierarchies of many religions and faith communities, such as the Catholic Church, subordinate individuals and often provide the ideal conditions for assault by men higher up in the ranks. She also spoke of her own experiences of assault within the Catholic Church.

Reisinger was born in Germany in 1983. At the age of 19, she joined the Catholic religious community Das Werk, which maintains close ties to the Roman Curia. She says she was subjected to various forms of abuse by Catholic clergy, from spiritual manipulation to rape and assault by priests.

In 2011, Reisinger left Das Werk. In 2014, she completed her theology studies in Germany. As Doris Wagner, her birth name, she has written two books about sexual assault by Catholic clergy and her experiences. Reisinger is currently writing her PhD thesis in analytical philosophy. She is married and has a child.

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[Spanish government asks bishops for information on church abuse cases]

MADRID (SPAIN)
El País

February 7, 2019

By Julio Núñez

La iniciativa del Ejecutivo deja fuera a los casos cometidos dentro de las órdenes religiosas

El Gobierno ha solicitado este jueves a la Conferencia Episcopal Española (CEE) información sobre los casos de pederastia de los que tiene constancia, los que está investigando y los que ha instruido en el pasado con el objetivo de “arrojar luz sobre unos hechos que nuestra sociedad no puede permitirse seguir manteniendo ocultos si desea afrontar el futuro con dignidad”. A través de una carta oficial al presidente de la CEE, el cardenal Ricardo Blázquez, la ministra de Justicia, Dolores Delgado, ha subrayado que los casos de abusos, “sean en el seno de la Iglesia como en cualquier otra institución, no pueden ser ocultados ni considerados como hechos privados”, sino que merecen “la contundente respuesta del ordenamiento jurídico penal”.

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{Archbishop of Tarragona resigns in midst of abuse scandal]

TARRAGONA (SPAIN)
El País

February 7, 2019

By Marc Roviro

Jaume Pujol alega que cesa del cargo por motivos de edad

El arzobispo de Tarragona, Jaume Pujol, presenta ante el Vaticano su renuncia al cargo. La dimisión se produce justo cuando la diócesis de Tarragona está en el punto de mira por una sucesión de escándalos relacionados con abusos sexuales a menores por parte de curas que dependen del Arzobispado. Tras descubrirse las prácticas de los sacerdotes, Pujol compareció este miércoles ante la prensa y calificó los abusos como un “mal momento” por parte de los capellanes. Justificó que no se les expulsara del oficio religioso porque, dijo, no fue un asunto lo suficientemente importante como para alejarles del contacto con los feligreses. “No fue tan grave como para secularizarlos”, dijo Pujol.

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ROM (ITALY)
Crux

February 6, 2019

By Claire Giangravè

Charged with sexually abusing at least six underage girls, the head of a lay Catholic association in southern Italy considered by his devotees to be the incarnation of an archangel, who’s scheduled to go to court Feb. 18 for a preliminary hearing, has asked for an expedited trial.

“Often this is a decision that we can describe as a media strategy,” said Tommaso Tamburino, who represents four of the six alleged victims, in a phone interview with Crux on Feb. 5.

“It’s a decision often made by someone who wants to give the impression to the public opinion to have independently chosen to go to trial,” he said. “It’s a way of saying that [Capuana] himself wants justice and wishes to go to trial quicker.”

Under Italian law, the decision to ask for an expedited trial can only come from the accused party and not from a judge. According to Tamburino, it’s often a way of trying to persuade the public that since an indictment is inevitable, Capuana can act as if the decision to go to trial is his own instead of the judge’s.

Defense sources contacted by Crux said they didn’t want to discuss the case ahead of the trial.

Piero Alfio Capuana, 74, is among the founders of the Catholic Culture and Environment Association (ACCA) near Catania, Sicily, which counts almost 5,000 followers, many of whom consider him to be the reincarnation of the Archangel Michael.

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CORPUS CHRISTI (TX)
Corpus Christi Caller Times

February 7, 2019

By Alexandria Rodriguez

Twenty-six clergy members with ties to the Catholic Diocese of Corpus Christi had “credible” claims of sexual abuse to minors

The diocese was among the 15 in Texas that released names of clergy members with “credible” accusations Jan. 31.

Twelve of the clergy members listed were dead and two received criminal convictions. Bishop Michael Mulvey said no one on the list is active in the ministry.

Here’s what we know about the men on the Diocese of Corpus Christi’s list.

More: These Diocese of Corpus Christi priests were accused of sexual abuse

Bishop Michael Mulvey answers questions from the media after Diocese of Corpus Christi released a list of names of priests accused of sexual abuse of minors on Thursday, Jan. 31, 2019.Buy Photo
Bishop Michael Mulvey answers questions from the media after Diocese of Corpus Christi released a list of names of priests accused of sexual abuse of minors on Thursday, Jan. 31, 2019. (Photo: Courtney Sacco/Caller-Times)

Bishop Joseph Vincent Sullivan
Joseph Vincent Sullivan was ordained in the Diocese of Kansas City in 1946. The Diocese of Corpus Christi said in its list that Sullivan visited the area. He died in 1982.

He was the bishop of Baton Rouge.

In 2009, a Nueces County judge ordered the Catholic dioceses of Baton Rouge and Corpus Christi to hand over records for a civil lawsuit alleging Sullivan abused a boy in Corpus Christi from 1978 to 1982, according to a Caller-Times article.

The man, who was a teenage student in the Baton Rouge minor seminary and the Corpus Christi Minor Seminary, said Sullivan would visit him in Corpus Christi. The lawsuit alleged the dioceses “failed to protect the boy,” the article states.

“The man did not remember the abuse until within two years of the filing of the lawsuit in 2007, according to court documents. Attorney Johnny Garza said memories resurfaced in therapy the man underwent after his second marriage collapsed,” the article reads.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 7, 2019

By John L. Allen Jr.

Twice now, and with ascending levels of authority, we’ve been cautioned not to expect too much from the summit on clerical sexual abuse Pope Francis has called for Feb. 21-24 for the presidents of bishops’ conferences around the world.

First came the Vatican’s new editorial director, veteran Italian journalist Andrea Tornielli, who penned a Jan. 10 editorial complaining of media “hype” over the meeting, quipping that it’s being covered as if it were “halfway between a council and a conclave.”

Then on his way home from World Youth Day in Panama in late January, Francis waded into the fray during an in-flight news conference.

“Let me say that I’ve perceived expectations that are a little inflated,” he said. “We need to deflate those expectations.”

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NAIROBI (KENYA)
Catholic News Service

February 7, 2019

By Fredrick Nzwili

When child sexual abuse scandals involving Catholic priests emerge in Africa, they do not draw a frenzied reaction similar to that witnessed in developed countries, but the continent’s church is affected, said Catholic leaders.

While there is a general view that the scandals are a challenge of the church in Europe and America, African officials confirm the incidents, amid reports of some provinces expelling or defrocking priests.

In Africa, clerics view the issue as too delicate and sensitive for the public, and many remained tight-lipped on the subject. At the same time, the church leaders said they were concerned about the abuses and closely follow any such reports, both locally and globally.

“Africa is also affected like any other continent, but to what extent, I am not sure,” Precious Blood Sister Hermenegild Makoro, general secretary of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference, told Catholic News Service.

In October, the South African church defrocked three priests over sexual abuse of children in the parishes. Since 2003, 35 cases of abuse involving priests have been reported to the church in South Africa.

Sister Makoro said out of the 35 cases, only seven were being investigated by the police, and one has led to a life sentence.

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

February 7, 2019

Leaders from the nation’s oldest and largest advocacy group for victims of clergy and institutional sex abuse delivered a letter today to the papal nuncio, asking for Pope Francis to take five specific actions at his summit in February and requesting a meeting with Pope Francis.

Representatives from SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, delivered the letter today which outlines specific actions that they are asking the Pope to take at the papal abuse summit to be held in Rome from February 21 to 24. They are also asking for a meeting to explain why these requested actions will not only help survivors heal but also protect children by preventing future cases of abuse from happening in the first place.

In their letter, the group calls for Pope Francis to:

Fire any and all bishops or cardinals who have had a hand in clergy sex abuse cover-ups,
Impose “dramatic and punitive consequences” to deter any future cover-ups,
Eliminate any directive for church staff to report abuse to bishops and instead direct all church staff and officials to make reports to law enforcement, and
Compel bishops around the world to turn their files over to law enforcement for independent investigations into their handling of clergy sex abuse cases, and
Order your bishops and other hierarchs to cease lobbying efforts against legislative reform that would benefit survivors.

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LONDON (ENGLAND)
BBC

February 7, 2019

A day after Pope Francis publicly admitted for the first time that clerics had sexually abused nuns, promising to tackle the issue that was “still going on” within the Catholic Church, two former female members of the Church have spoken about their experiences with the BBC.

Appearing on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour on Thursday morning, the women welcomed the pontiff’s acknowledgement of the scandal, saying that for too long there had been a “culture of silence and secrecy within the hierarchy”.

But the descriptions of their experiences will only serve to exacerbate a scandal that continues to rock the Catholic Church.

Dr Rocio Figueroa says she was “very naive”

Dr Figueroa is a theologian and lecturer in Auckland, New Zealand, and a survivor of abuse she says she suffered at the hands of a priest in Lima, Peru.

She told the BBC that she joined the society of apostolic life within the Catholic Church as a teenager living in a “very poor part of the world” because she “needed to do something”.

“I was 15 years old and the founder asked me to begin a spiritual direction with a vicar, who became my spiritual director.

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ROME (ITALY)
LaCroix International

February 7, 2019

By Anne-Bénédicte Hoffner

The presidents of the world’s episcopal conferences as well as the primates of the Eastern Catholic churches in communion with Rome will take part in the Vatican summit from Feb. 21-24.On Sept. 12, the Holy See announced that the pope had decided to call the summit, which will have an unprecedented format, “to discuss the prevention of abuse of minors and vulnerable adults.”Pope Francis will take part as will representatives of victims and religious communities, several members of relevant congregations of the Rome Curia and finally “men and women lay experts in the field of abuse.”

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PEORIA (IL)
Journal Star

February 7, 2019

By Brett Herrmann

A former priest who once served in a leadership role at a Catholic retreat at St. Bede has been listed as “credibly accused” of sexual abuse by the Catholic Diocese of Peoria.

Kenneth J. Roberts, a priest with sexual abuse allegations made against him in multiple states, was listed with 285 other priests in Texas last week, and this week the Peoria Diocese added him to a list of “Incardinated priests in other dioceses/religious orders removed from ministry due to allegations of abuse of a minor.”

The Illinois Valley has ties to a list of priests with abuse allegations, and the list could get a lot longer
It was last month when Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan unveiled that the Catholic Church in Illinois had received allegations against a…

Roberts spent time in a leadership position during the Diocese of Peoria Emmaus Days Retreats in the 1980s, some of which took place at St. Bede. And it was there that one of his alleged abuses took place. Roberts was accused of sexually abusing a boy at one of the retreats in the early 1980s, according to a 2009 article from the Peoria Journal Star.

Roberts also had accusations made against him during his time in the St. Louis, Dallas and Belleville dioceses.

Roberts was ordained in 1966 and suspended from public ministry by the Diocese of Dallas in 1998. He died in 2018.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

February 7, 2019

By Rhina Guidos

The laity may be angry over the most recent revelations of the Catholic Church’s sex abuse crisis, but bishops, particularly younger ones, share in that anger and “want to move with real force” toward solutions and it could yield a new season for the church, said the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo, who is the archbishop of Galveston-Houston, made the comments on Feb. 6 during a day-long conference to address the problem.

The “Healing the Breach of Trust” conference, the second such meeting at The Catholic University of America in Washington, addressed the need of more involvement by lay women and men – one inspired by the teachings of the Second Vatican Council – in building what the cardinal called in the morning part of the conference a new “season” for the church, and one that may not be accidental.

“Think about what the Spirit might be doing in all of this,” Cardinal DiNardo said. “In saying this, I am in no way trying to deny or dodge the issues of the episcopal responsibility and accountability that this crisis has raised,” but added it’s worth it to ponder St. Augustine’s principle “that God can bring good even out of evil.”

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LONDON (ENGLAND)
The Tablet

February 7, 2019

The Vatican summit which Pope Francis has convened for 21 February could be a watershed moment in the history of the Catholic Church’s response to the scandal of child sexual abuse within its ranks. There is no quick fix available, but there is a deep appreciation within the Church of how profoundly serious the issue really is, and a growing consensus about what needs to be done. The summit, to which presidents of bishops’ conferences throughout the world have been invited, is aimed at solidifying that consensus and drawing into it those parts of the Church not yet fully on board. Bishops’ conferences, of which there are more than a hundred, have been required by the Vatican to implement local guidelines for dealing with safeguarding issues. So far as many as a quarter of them have failed to do so. The religious orders, too, must no longer be allowed to escape the net.

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HOUSTON (TX)
Houston Chronicle

February 7, 2019

Regarding “What you need to ask about Catholic scandals” (Outlook, Sunday): Not much frustrates me more than lines such as this one in the opinion piece: “The world has been aware of systemic sexual abuse in the U.S. Catholic Church since 2002, when the Boston Globe […] exposed the breadth of this crime epidemic.”

No! Read Jason Berry’s “Lead Us Not Into Temptation” for details on the early 1970s abuse scandal in Lafayette, La., with charges continuing into the early 1980s, and look at the mid-1980s for Father Tom Doyle’s comprehensive report on priests’ sexual abuse, the early 1990s for abuse charges in Providence, Fall River and Boston, and the late 1990s for abuse lawsuits in Dallas, and then 2001 in Tucson — all before the powerful Boston Globe reporting. Note that this list is not comprehensive, and it includes only cases within the United States.

Catholics and their church must stop wringing their hands and pretending that this is a new aberration that they were somehow unaware of before 2002. That damaging illusion simply continues the abuse.

Sarah Jenkins, The Woodlands

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WAUSAU (WI)
Wausau Daily Herald

February 7, 2019

By Laura Schulte

Nearly nine years after victims first told police that Thomas Ericksen molested them when they were children, the former Wisconsin priest is behind bars as four sexual-assault cases against him make their way through the legal system.

The allegations were initially met with inaction and delays by law enforcement, but there have been many new developments in recent weeks as more victims have come forward.

Here’s what we know so far about Ericksen:

Police knew about Ericksen’s actions in the town of Winter since 1983
Ericksen was ordained in the early 1970s and served as a priest in Eagle River, Merrill, Winter and other parishes. The Sawyer County Sheriff’s Department first investigated the priest in 1983, but ended up releasing him to then-Bishop of Superior George Albert Hammes after Ericksen confessed to investigators that he “had a problem.”

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MUMBAI (India)
Crux

February 7, 2019

By Nirmala Carvalho

Bishops in India’s most Christian state have declared a “zero tolerance” policy for the sexual abuse of children.

The Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council issued safe environment guidelines this week, sending them to every Catholic institution in the state.

Kerala has 6.1 million Christians – over 18 percent of the population of the southern state – and 60 percent of them are Catholic, divided into Latin, Syro-Malabar, and Syro-Malankara rite jurisdictions.

Kerala’s Catholic Church is highly influential throughout India, since many priests and religious in other parts of the country come from the state.

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EUREKA (CA)
North Coast Journal

February6, 2019

By Jennifer Fumiko and Thadeus Greenson

While the Roman Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal has been widely known and reported on the North Coast going back 25 years, the Santa Rosa Diocese’s recent release of a list of 39 accused priests illuminates the systemic nature of the problem. These were not the isolated incidents of a few bad actors. As you’ll see in this week’s cover story, this was a case of widespread predation by a significant portion of the diocese’s clergy that its leaders worked to conceal and allowed to continue with horrendous consequences, especially for Humboldt County families.

While we can all hope the days of the diocese turning an indifferent eye to priests molesting children, and then simply moving them to another community when parishioners refused to do the same are over, it’s important to recognize the ripple effect of this abuse continues to sprawl. People’s faith has been broken. Lives have been shattered, consuming families and, in turn, communities. Studies have repeatedly shown that sexual abuse perpetrators are more likely than the general population to have experienced sexual abuse themselves as children, meaning some of the church’s victims have themselves likely grown up to victimize, continuing a devastating cycle.

There is no salve that can heal this wound, nothing that can stop the ripples. The best we as a community — and the Catholics among us, especially — can hope for is atonement.

The Santa Rosa Diocese took a marked step in that direction this week, releasing the list of the accused and devoting much of the January issue of its newspaper to the subject, with a lengthy apology from Bishop Robert Vasa, an urging for additional victims to come forward and an explanation of the diocese’s revised “policy for the protection of children and young people,” which makes clear that clergy should be considered mandated reporters and that anyone who hears an abuse allegation should report it to police. While these are all positive steps, they are also woefully inadequate — and decades late. The idea that in 2019 an institution that asks parents to entrust it with their children should be applauded for making clear it has a zero -tolerance policy toward sexual predators would be laughable if it didn’t expose the horrid depths from which we have come.

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EUREKA (CA)
North Coast Journal

February 7, 2019

By Thadeus Greenson

Earlier this month, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Santa Rosa took an unprecedented step — for the church, anyway — releasing a list naming 39 of its priests who have been accused of sexually abusing minors. While the North Coast began publicly grappling with predatory clergy earlier than most communities — the arrest of Rev. Gary Timmons, a former St. Bernard priest who founded Camp St. Michael in Leggett, on 17 counts of child molestation came more than six years before the nation became aware of the growing crisis in the church. But the diocese’s list — which critics charge is an incomplete effort at damage control — reveals that the extent of such abuses in Humboldt County was far beyond what anyone outside the church likely knew.

Consider this: Of the 39 priests on the diocese’s list, at least 10 worked in Humboldt County, together comprising an almost consistent 45-year stretch when a priest who had been or would face allegations of abuse was working in a local church. Five of them worked at St. Bernard, four at St. Mary’s in Arcata, three at Humboldt State University’s Newman Center. And, coupled with the Santa Rosa bishops’ history of extensive efforts to protect and even enable the accused, that’s led some advocates to draw a very dark conclusion.

“Humboldt County and Eureka, unfortunately, was one of the ‘dumping grounds’ for abusive clergy, and the church is not going to reveal the true depths of depravity that has existed there,” says Joey Piscitelli, who was abused by a priest in the Bay Area and is now a member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP). “What I can say without reservation is that the Catholic Church in Northern California was inundated with child rapists, pedophiles and depraved molesters for decades, and depraved bishops who harbored them, shuffled them, shielded them and enabled them without any regard for children’s safety.”

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SANTA FE (NM)
Santa Fe Reporter

February 6, 2019

By Matt Grubs

Jim Field loved going to church.

As a kid, he remembers waking for morning mass.

“The sun might just about be coming up. And I’d get in the bathtub, I’d clean myself up, I’d hop on my bike and ride to Sacred Heart Church in Farmington,” he says. “And I would sit and wait for mass. I just loved being there.”

It was around 1960 and the service, he recalls, was in Latin. He didn’t understand a word, but something about the ceremony—the quiet, the reverence—resonated with him.

He was 8 years old, getting ready to turn 9 in 1961, when the abuse happened. It was summer. Father Conran Runnebaum, a Franciscan priest, had only been a cleric since 1955. Farmington was his second assignment, starting in 1958.

Field is not sure how many times the priest abused him. Once for sure. Maybe three times, he thinks.

“Conran had me pull down my pants and he pulled up his habit, like a cassock,” Field begins. He had no idea what was happening.

“How would I know what was going on? Except, I do remember at one point, enters Miguel … and he’s horrified,” Field says of another priest, Miguel Baca. Horrified—but also the same man who would later expose himself to, and further abuse, Field.

“I have a memory of later, in the bathroom, which you accessed from outside the church in those days … but it was in that bathroom where those …” Field trails off.

It would be 40 years before the memories, in terrifying flashes, started to come back to him. “My knees went weak and I fell to the floor and began to sob and cry. … It was like lava in a volcano coming up through me,” he says.

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SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
San Francisco Chronicle

February 6, 2019

By Thomas G. Plante

Catholic bishops from across the globe will meet Feb. 21-24 at the Vatican for a much anticipated conference to discuss global clerical sexual abuse. While clerics might know a lot about theology, church history and church law, they aren’t experts on research and best practices in child protection, child abuse or pedophilia. Those experts aren’t invited to the conference. And it is a shame.

Without experts in attendance and actively involved, we can expect that the most conservative voices in the church will try to blame the clergy sexual abuse crisis on homosexual clerics or liberal approaches to church teachings that began to get traction after Vatican II. The most liberal voices may blame the problem on mandated clerical celibacy or the fact that only men can be priests in the Roman Catholic Church.

Both groups would be wrong. And their views may lead to unproductive or counterproductive directions for interventions and resolutions of this problem that have plagued the institution for too long.

What the experts might say, if invited and allowed to speak, would be that best practices in child protection and screening adults who work with children are readily available and can be enlisted to make the church and other organizations much safer than they are now. Among the most commonsense solutions: incorporate careful screening and training of those who work with children and teens into any plan to protect minors both in and outside of church communities.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
KDKA TV

February 6, 2019

By Brenda Waters

A local priest accused of molesting a 10-year-old boy will stand trial, but his attorney is raising some objections to the way his client was treated on Wednesday.

Once a priest at Saint Therese Catholic Church in Munhall, Father Hugh Lang is now accused of sexual abuse of a child and indecent assault and exposure.

The 88-year-old left his preliminary hearing on Wednesday afternoon after his attorney, Kerry Lewis, told the magistrate judge, Thomas Terkowsky, he objected to the hearing and found his attitude toward him and his client to be disgraceful.

Lewis wanted Terkowsky to recuse himself, and the judge refused.

The 29-year-old accuser, who was 10-years-old at the time of the alleged incident, claims Lang took him away from other boys during alter training, He alleges Lang took him to the basement of the church, had him take off his clothes and took a Polaroid picture and committed a sexual act.

“He is charged with an act that is a pedophile,” Lewis said. “This kind of conduct when he was 72 years old, there’s never been any complaint against him before and there hasn’t been one since. He just didn’t become an abuser, a pedophile, one day in June in 2001.”

The accuser, who now lives in another country, said in court his mother told him about indictments against priests who had abused children and he called the attorney general’s office in August of last year.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
KSDK TV

February 6, 2019

By Chris Davis

Pope Francis has acknowledged for the first time that nuns have been sexually abused in the Catholic Church.

The pope admits the abuse at the hands of priests and other clergy has been going on for decades.

Some had even been subjected to sex slavery in a French order.

This comes as the pope prepares to convene a summit of bishops from around the world to address the crisis of sexual abuse in the church.

A local advocate wants even more from the pontiff.

“I was abused from the time I was about 6 until I was 12-13 by my best friends uncle, who was a priest at our parish,” Barbara Dorris said.

Her abuse was constant. Her priest had access to her far beyond the St. Louis parish walls.

“He could call my mother, she’d send me. He could call the nuns at school, they’d send me to his bedroom,” Dorris said.

When the abuse finally ended, she blocked the memories and moved on.

It wasn’t until 1991 while she was teaching at the same parish, that she revisited her own pain by witnessing someone else’s.

“And I caught the associate pastor molesting a child, and that’s what brought me into the movement,” she said.

Ever since, she’s dedicated her life to helping other victims and putting pressure on the church the change their practices.

“It’s not that there are abusive priests, it’s the fact that when they’re caught, they’re protected, enabled and moved to a new parish,” Dorris said.

While Dorris celebrates the pope’s acknowledgment, she fervently believes he must do more.

“Women and girls have been fairly ignored in this process so to finally acknowledge that I believe women are almost equally abused as the men, is important,” she said.

Barbara no longer seeks the church as a place of comfort, but still holds on to her faith.

“I believe in what I was taught as a child, and I try to live by it,” she said.

Her prayer: that the church will finally address this problem head-on.

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AUSTIN (TX)
Austin Chronicle

February 8, 2019

By Mike Clark-Madison and Sarah Marloff

Along with its fellow Roman Catholic dioceses throughout the state, the Diocese of Austin last week published the names and clerical assignments of priests who have been “credibly accused” of committing sexual abuse against minors. A total of 22 ordained religious who had ministered in the diocese, which includes Austin, Waco, Temple/Killeen, Bryan/College Station, and surrounding counties, were identified “with a contrite heart” by Bishop Joe Vásquez, who said he’d commissioned an outside review of 70 years of church archives to compile the list. Half of the men on the list have died; only one is apparently serving as a priest, in Jamaica, the rest having retired or been defrocked.

The bishop’s list gives no indication of whether the “credible” allegations had been substantiated, or when the acts of abuse may have occurred, or to whom, or how many times, or whether those acts constituted criminal offenses, or whether these or other clergy had also been accused of misconduct with adults. The coordinated effort by the Texas bishops, which had been announced last fall, follows the November raid by local and federal agents of the offices of Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, archbishop of Galveston-Houston, who also serves as president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, in connection with the case of a priest arrested in September on four counts of indecency with a child. “It is my prayer and hope that publishing this list will help to bring healing from the hurt and anger caused by the lack of accountability and transparency on the part of church leadership,” said Vásquez. One of the priests on the list, the now-deceased Fr. Milton Eggerling, was the subject of a 2016 lawsuit regarding alleged abuse in the Seventies of a teen altar boy at St. Louis King of France Catholic Church in North Austin (“Austin Diocese Implicated in Child Abuse Suit,” April 1, 2016).

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KIRKSVILLE (MO)
Kirksville Daily Express

February 6, 2019

An advocacy organization for the victims of abuse by Catholic priests has claimed that a newly accused priest worked in 11 parishes throughout Missouri, including two in Shelby County.

The Diocese of Jefferson City, which covers 38 counties in northeastern and central Missouri, released a list of priests “credibly accused of sexual abuse” which included Fr. Eric A. Schlachter, who the diocese said had been deemed “unsuited for ministry out of concern for the safety of our youth.”

The organization Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests said in a press release Monday that the diocese has refused to provide work histories for Schlachter or the other priests and religious brothers publicly accused of misconduct in the diocese; the list currently includes 38 names.

SNAP released a list of parishes where it found Schlachter to have worked in the past, including St. Mary’s in Shelbina and St. Patrick’s in Clarence, as well as parishes in Jefferson City, Hannibal, Boonville, Chamois, Morrison, Pilot Grove, Clear Creek, Kahoka and Wayland.

“The group suspects Fr. Schlachter may have molested kids in some of those places and feels that Catholic officials have a moral and civic duty to warn and alert parents, police, prosecutors, parishioners and the public about him,” SNAP said in a press release.

Helen Osman, director of communications for the diocese, said the diocese does not provide work histories of accused priests in order to protect victims’ privacy, at the request of some victims. She confirmed that Schlachter did work in parishes in Shelby County.

SNAP’s information is drawn from the Official Catholic Directory and the website bishopaccountability.org, which maintains a database of priests accused on abuse and their work assignments.

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BUFFALO (NY)
WGRZ Channel 2

February 6, 2019

By Steve Brown and Dave Harrington

‘Am I the only one?’

For years, Christopher Szuflita wondered.

He didn’t think so. But now, he knows.

He is not the only child in the late 60’s who says they were sexually abused at the hands of Father Joseph Friel.

Szuflita’s encounters with Friel happened after the then-teenager had completed his elementary education at the parish school at Fourteen Holy Helpers in West Seneca.

He returned to attend religious instruction classes. That’s where Friel made his move, pulling Szuflita from class and leading him to the parish rectory.

“We were taught to respect priests and nuns,” says Christopher Szuflita.

“It was in his own room, up the stairs,” recalled Szuflita, “I guess he played some music. I don’t remember if there was alcohol served but I remember smelling alcohol on him… and he tried to kiss me. Sat me on the bed and… and from there things progressed.”

After pausing, Szuflita continued, “And then it happened again.”

…and again.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
The Advocate

February 6, 2019

By Ramon Antonio Vargas

A Catholic priest allegedly masturbated while lotion was being rubbed on his feet by a New Orleans altar boy — an act which the cleric called “the best hand job” his feet had ever gotten.

Another priest would allegedly fondle the genitals of that same altar boy and other children while play-wrestling with them at that cleric’s family’s summer home in Mississippi.

Both priests, Michael Fraser and Paul Calamari, were named Nov. 2 on a list of Archdiocese of New Orleans clergy who had been stripped of their ministries years earlier after facing credible allegations of sexually abusing minors. And both were named in a lawsuit filed Wednesday in Orleans Parish Civil District Court that accuses them of previously unreported sexual molestation that was unrelated to the abuse that landed them on the archdiocese’s list.

The unnamed plaintiff’s lawsuit is the latest legal volley fired at the local Catholic Church involving clerical abuse allegations dating back decades.

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AUSTIN (TX)
American-Statesman

February 6, 2019

The Roman Catholic dioceses’ release last week of roughly 300 names of clergy members across Texas who were credibly accused of abusing children was overdue, unprecedented — and still, sadly, not enough.

Those who endured unspeakable abuse, often decades ago, at the hands of trusted religious leaders deserve more than names. They deserve an explanation.

Seeking to promote healing and rebuild trust amid sexual abuse scandals that have roiled the church for years, Texas dioceses took the exceptional step of opening their files to outside reviewers, then publicly sharing the names of credibly accused clergy.

The Archdiocese of San Antonio made an exemplary effort with its 25-page report, giving a short narrative account of when and where each victim was abused, specifying the number of allegations against each clergy member, and disclosing when supervisors reported incidents to police — or when they failed to take action or alert other parishes.

Such transparency is badly needed. We are dismayed it is lacking in the minimal lists posted by most other Texas dioceses, including the Diocese of Austin, which simply provided the names of credibly accused clergy, their dates of service and a list of their parish assignments — with a disclaimer noting the abuse may not have happened at any of those locations.

Austin Bishop Joe Vásquez told Statesman reporter Asher Price that “out of respect for the victims,” he wouldn’t say how many accusers the diocese knows about or how many cases it had reported to law enforcement. After we pressed the matter, diocese spokesman Christian González told us the review team found the church properly notified law enforcement when credible allegations surfaced against living priests.

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ALEXANDRIA (LA)
Opelousas Daily World

February 6, 2019

By Jeff Matthews

Twenty-seven priests incardinated or serving in the Diocese of Alexandria were found to have credible accusations of sexual abuse against minors in an investigative by the diocese.

The names of the priests were released Wednesday in a letter from Bishop David P. Talley. The cases, which were discovered through a review of hundreds of files of priests who have served in the diocese, date back to the 1940s.

In the letter, Talley calls the accusations an “evil chapter in the life of our diocese.” He said the entire diocese extends “our heartfelt sorrow for all the pain and anguish caused to our children and youth by this evil. Please know that I am ready to meet with any victim in this healing process.”

“In publishing this list, it is not our intent to re-victimize those who have already been so wounded by the actions of some clerics who served in our diocese over the past one hundred sixty-five years,” the letter read. “This evil can only be purged through a vigilant process that is transparent to the public. Our response must demonstrate the highest levels of honesty and scrutiny.”

The Diocesan Permanent Review Board reviewed 535 files of clergy who have served in the diocese since its establishment in 1853. Both clergy and lay people were part of the investigative team.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

February 6, 2019

By Peter Smith

Criminal charges against the Rev. Hugh Lang, an 88-year-old retired Catholic priest of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, were held for trial at a contentious preliminary hearing Wednesday in Munhall that featured graphic testimony by a 29-year-old man who alleged an episode of sexual abuse in 2001, when he was 11 years old.

The accuser, who now lives overseas, appeared in a dark suit, and answered questions from both prosecutor Thomas Kelly and defense attorney J. Kerrington Lewis readily and without emotion. The young man said that he was punished for a comment he made while in training to be an altar server at St. Therese Parish in Munhall in 2001. He described in detail how, he said, Rev. Lang brought him to a basement room, had him undress, and sexually assaulted him.

During the hearing, Mr. Lewis became frustrated with District Judge Thomas Torkowsky’s rulings on objections and even on the arrangement of the courtroom. Mr. Lewis asked the judge to recuse himself from the case. The judge refused.

Mr. Lewis then said that when the case proceeds to the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas, he will ask that the assigned judge order a new preliminary hearing.

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GAYLORD (MI)
Petosky News

February 6, 2010

By William T. Perkins

A top-ranking vicar in the Diocese of Gaylord and at St. Francis Xavier Catholic Parish in Petoskey has continued to be active approximately six months after having been accused of sexual harassment against a younger priest.

The Rev. Dennis Stilwell is alleged to have initiated unwanted physical contact with the Rev. Matthew Cowan during the summer of 2015, when Cowan, then 30 years old, was newly assigned to the Diocese of Gaylord. He filed a complaint of the behavior in late August last year.

Stilwell is pastor of St. Francis Xavier Parish in Petoskey.

Candace Neff, spokeswoman for the diocese, said Tuesday that Stilwell had not been suspended from his duties. She said she preferred more time to answer some of the News-Review’s questions and would be following up with additional information over email.

“Following the independent investigation, the Diocesan Review Board (which is also an independent body composed primarily of laity from throughout the diocese) met and concluded that the allegation did not reach the level of credible and substantiated sexual misconduct,” she said in that followup email Wednesday.

A press release Wednesday from Gaylord Diocesan Watch, a newly formed activist group, claimed that Bishop Steven Raica “suspended” Matthew Cowan, the accuser. That group is calling for Cowan to be reinstated. Neff told the News-Review that Cowan had been placed on administrative leave — not suspended — and that his faculties for ministry were withdrawn on Jan. 7, and that the decision was not based on his harassment complaint.

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ALEXANDRIA (LA)
KALB TV

February 6, 2019

The Diocese of Alexandria released a list of clergy members, both living and dead, with credible allegations of sexual abuse on Wednesday afternoon.

A team of eight laypersons and seven clergy members reviewed over 500 files of clergy who served the Diocese of Alexandria since 1853 when it was established.

“I believe, together with all the members of the Permanent Review Board, that we have done what we can to present as truthful and as thorough a record of the alleged instances of sexual abuse by clerics against minors during our long history,” said Bishop David Talley. “I know that this list may be incomplete, not because we have held anything back, but because this kind of evil is perpetrated in secret and out of fear and shame some may not have been able to come forward.”

Talley also encouraged victims to come forward with any information.

“If you are a victim of sexual abuse, please contact your local law enforcement agency,” Talley said. “Sexual abuse is a serious crime and must be treated as such. If you would like more information or are in need of assistance, please contact our Victims’ Assistance Coordinator, Dr. Lee Kneipp, at (318) 542-9805.”

The full document, along with Bishop Talley’s letter, can be found in the Related Documents section of this page.

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BUFFALO (NY)
Buffalo News

February 6, 2019

By Jay Tokasz

A lawyer for the Buffalo Diocese defended retired Bishop Edward U. Kmiec’s handling of a case of alleged clergy sex abuse from Kmiec’s time as bishop of the Nashville Diocese.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests of Tennessee said this week that Kmiec allowed the Rev. James A. Rudisill to retire as a priest in good standing and remain in ministry, despite the priest’s alleged admission in 1994 that he had molested a 12-year-old girl in the 1950s.

But diocesan attorney Lawlor F. Quinlan III said that Kmiec did remove Rudisill from ministry and forbade him from presenting himself as a priest. A lawyer for the Nashville Diocese also notified governmental authorities in Tennessee about the case, Quinlan said in a letter emailed to The News late Tuesday.

“It is unfair and wrong to criticize Bishop Kmiec in this case when he correctly removed the offender from ministry,” said Quinlan.

Quinlan also suggested that The News did not provide the diocese with enough time to respond to the criticisms of Kmiec.

The News called Kmiec last week Friday and he referred the query to Buffalo Diocese spokeswoman Kathy Spangler, who provided no comments. The News also asked Rick Musacchio, spokesman for the Diocese of Nashville, for details about the handling of the Rudisill case and Musacchio said he did not know any additional details.

The News published its story online Monday afternoon and in print editions on Tuesday. No one from the Buffalo Diocese got back to The News to comment until Quinlan’s letter Tuesday evening.

Kmiec was Nashville bishop from 1992 to 2004 and Buffalo bishop from 2004 until his retirement in 2012.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 5, 2019

By Claire Giangravè

Just a few weeks before bishops from around the world convene in Rome to discuss the clerical sexual abuse crisis, an Italian victim peacefully protesting in front of the Vatican Feb. 4 was escorted away by police officers.

“Police agents escorted him to the station after he handcuffed himself to a pole,” Carlo Grezio, the victim’s lawyer, told local reporters.

“He was treated with regard and respect. Some agents know his story and expressed solidarity, but regardless, a formal charge will be made against him for wasting police time,” he added.

Arturo Borrelli, 40, claims to have been sexually abused by Father Silverio Mura, who was his religion teacher, about thirty years ago in the peripheries of Naples, Italy.

“I ask for justice and that all victims have justice because it’s essential to heal,” Borrellli told Crux in a phone interview Feb.4. “I will continue my fight until the end.”

The victim said he had informed the Vatican’s Secretary of State that he was coming to Rome to denounce his abuse. He claims that when he arrived Monday morning at the St. Anna entrance of the Vatican, about twenty police officers and journalists were awaiting him.

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SALT LAKE CITY (UT)
Deseret News

February 5, 2019

By Gillian Friedman

From behind the witness stand, Utah Rabbi Avrohom (“Avremi”) Zippel gazes out into the sea of faces and prepares to speak.

It’s a dreary Tuesday morning, and normally, public speaking doesn’t intimidate the 27-year-old. Since he was a child — the precocious and prized eldest son of a prominent rabbi — he has revelled in the attention of a crowd.

But today, sitting in a courtroom in downtown Salt Lake City, the confidence that usually comes so easily evades him.

He fidgets nervously, his fingers playing with his long dark beard, adjusting his black suit and yarmulke, the traditional garb of observant Jewish men.

Time seems to slow to a stop, and all he can hear is the sound of his heart pounding in his ears. But then, one message rings clear in his head, as if from on high: you are doing the right thing.

He clears his throat, and in a voice barely above a whisper, begins to share a story that has haunted him for decades.

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JENKINTOWN (PA)
Dr. Diane Landberg blog

February 5, 2019

Like any other institution churches are susceptible to the twin plagues of the abuse of power and sexual misconduct. How should a church respond when such things are alleged or exposed?

GENERAL PRINCIPLES
We need to acknowledge to ourselves and publicly that the problems of abuse (child sexual abuse, rape, physical abuse and clergy sexual abuse) are not just out there; they are also in here with us.

We need to approach this work carefully and with great humility. Churches often have little to no education about these matters. Most seminaries never speak about abuse. We have not invited victims to tell us their stories and learned from them. We have not been taught about offenders and how they work. We have not developed policies and safeguards for the children under our care. We teach about God, marriage, sex and parenting but we do not usually include the topics of sexual abuse, rape or domestic violence.

We often assume that when sin occurs in a relationship it is always a 50-50 proposition. We have assumed that with rape, domestic violence, verbal abuse and with clergy or counselor sexual abuse. We look for an external cause for sin. “I hit her because she…”

The Bible does not support the assumption of an external cause. Jesus said that it is out of our hearts that evil proceeds. Abuse is an exposure of the abuser’s heart, not the victims.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Gay City News

February 6, 2019 l

By Matt Tracy

By his own admission, Aaron Bianco was a “nobody” until he was discovered by the alt-right.

An out gay former pastoral associate at St. John’s the Evangelist Catholic Church in San Diego, Bianco was long treated with respect in the workplace and largely accepted by parishioners and church leaders alike.

But everything went downhill in June of 2017 when the parish’s priest left, forcing Bianco to assume more responsibilities and play a more visible role in the absence of a permanent replacement pastor.

The alt-right news sites LifeSite News and Church Militant started attacking him, first when Bianco’s role expanded and again in August of last year when the Pennsylvania Supreme Court named at least 300 Catholic priests in an investigation of child sex abuse.

The news articles written about him were followed by a barrage of horrifying events: Bianco started receiving death threats laced with homophobic slurs, found his car’s tires entirely punctured, and saw someone creepily stalking him outside of his house. He arrived at the church one day to find the doors had been lit on fire and “NO FAGS” spray-painted on a wall.

Bianco recalled the time he had to dodge a punch from a man who walked up to him following Mass and demanded to know if he were married. In a fit of rage, the man had to be restrained by others nearby, and a police investigation followed, according to Bianco.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
The Washington Times

February 6, 2019

By Cheryl K. Chumley

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, SNAP, is holding a summit this week to press Pope Francis into taking stronger action against clergy members who commit acts of sexual abuse.

Well and good. Stronger action is definitely warranted.

But a better course of action would be for the Catholic Church to open its priestly ranks to marriage.

Yes, Jesus was chaste. Yes, Paul, one of the apostles, recommended celibacy as a means of moving closer to God. But Peter, the first pope, was married

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ATLANTA (GA)
CNN

February 6, 2019

By Daniel Burke

A day after Pope Francis created an international uproar by saying Catholics nuns had been subjected to “sexual slavery” by the founder of a French order, the Vatican sought to clarify his remarks.

“When the Holy Father, referring to the dissolution of a Congregation, spoke of ‘sexual slavery,’ he meant ‘manipulation,’ a form of abuse of power which is reflected also in sexual abuse,” said Vatican spokesman Alessandro Gisotti.

The Pope’s shocking comments were the first time he has publicly acknowledged the sexual abuse of nuns by Catholic bishops and priests. To date, much of the clergy abuse scandal has focused on minors, who represent the vast majority of cases.

But many Catholics say abuse of vulnerable adults, including nuns and seminarians, has long been a problem in the church. Some hope the church will address the issue at the upcoming meeting on the abuse crisis to be convened by Pope Francis from February 21 to 24 in Rome.

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WARSAW (POLAND)
Agence France-Presse

February 6, 2019

Polish Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki on Wednesday said he had met with several victims of church sex abuse ahead of a Vatican meeting on the issue later this month.

Pope Francis has called senior bishops from around the world to Rome on February 21-24 to provide them with concrete measures to deal with widespread clergy sex abuse of children and young people.

“A couple of weeks ago… I invited victims of clergy sexual abuse in childhood or youth to meet with me,” Gadecki said in a video message on the episcopate’s website.

“I am grateful to all 28 individuals who accepted the invitation. I have already met with some of them. The rest of the meetings will be scheduled bit by bit.”

It is difficult to pinpoint the extent of sex abuse by clergy in the devout Catholic country of 38 million people.

But Marek Lisinski, head of a Polish foundation for its victims, told AFP that around 700 victims had disclosed clergy abuse to the organisation.

Polish courts have convicted 62 priests of the crime.

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CHANDIGARH (INDIA)
India Tribune

February 6, 2019

Pope Francis’s public admission that priests have used nuns as “sexual slaves”—and may still be doing so—marks a new chapter in the abuse crisis rocking the Catholic Church.

“It is the first time that the pope, but also the church as an institution, has publicly admitted this abuse is taking place, and that’s hugely important,” Lucetta Scaraffia, editor of the Vatican’s women’s magazine, told AFP on Wednesday.

The pontiff on Tuesday said Catholic priests and bishops had been sexually abusing nuns, and that his predecessor Benedict XVI had dissolved a religious order of women because of “sexual slavery on the part of priests and the founder”.

The Church has “suspended several clerics” and the Vatican has been “working (on the issue) for a long time”, he said.

The abuse was “still going on, because it’s not something that just goes away like that. On the contrary”, he added.

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LONDON (ENGLAND)
Daily Mail

February 6, 2019

By Sara Malm

The editor of the Vatican’s women’s magazine has accused the Catholic Church of ignoring complaints of rape and sexual abuse made against priests by nuns.

Lucetta Scaraffia is now calling for a commission to be set up by the Vatican to investigate historical and contemporary allegations.

This came after Pope Francis’s public admission that priests have used nuns as ‘sexual slaves’ – and may still be doing so.

‘It is the first time that the pope, but also the church as an institution, has publicly admitted this abuse is taking place, and that’s hugely important,’ Ms Scaraffia, editor of ‘Women Church World’, told AFP.

‘Many complaints have been filed with the Vatican and have not been followed up.

‘I very much hope that a commission will be set up to investigate, and that nuns expert in the issue will be called to take part,’ she told AFP.

‘They could move quickly with trials, and above all raise awareness because silence is what allows rapists to continue to rape,’ she added.

The pontiff on Tuesday said Catholic priests and bishops had been sexually abusing nuns, and that his predecessor Benedict XVI had dissolved a religious order of women because of ‘sexual slavery on the part of priests and the founder’.

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LITTLE ROCK (AR)
Bilgrimage

February 6, 2019

By William Lindsey

As more and more U.S. Catholic dioceses — but not the diocese of Charlotte, North Carolina, which remains “one of the least transparent” dioceses in the nation — release names of priests credibly accused of sexual abuse of minors, I am following those lists to see if I spot names of priests with connections to my diocese of Little Rock, Arkansas. I’m doing this, in part, because I think it’s important that we inform ourselves of what’s happening in our own back yard as we talk about bigger problems that manifest themselves in more than one place in the world. I also want to note that others who are monitoring these lists have been very generous in pointing me to important Arkansas-themed information in them: this is not a project I’m undertaking all on my own, but a collaborative one.

In several lists of credibly accused priests released by dioceses other than the diocese of Little Rock, I do, in fact, see the names of priests with Arkansas ties, all of whom also seem to have had pastoral positions in Arkansas in addition to the ones they had in other states that have resulted in their listing in those states. Spotting these names — not all of which are on the list released by the bishop of Little Rock, Anthony Taylor, last year — makes me recall three things I told you last November as I commented on how more and more dioceses are releasing lists of credibly accused priests, and that I was being told by people with reason to know that some names of credibly accused priests in Arkansas had not been included in the list the Little Rock diocese released in September. I wrote:

1. There appears to be very strong reason — survivors and others tracking the abuse situation in the Catholic church across the U.S. are reporting this all over the place — to conclude that even now, with law enforcement officials breathing down their necks and as they claim to be providing complete information about abusive priests within their dioceses, one bishop after another is hiding information as he discloses names of credibly accused priests.

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DALLAS (TX)
Dallas Morning News

February 6, 2019

For twin sisters raised in Dallas’ historic St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church, the release of the names of priests “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of minors only twisted the knife in wounds that the two have lived with for more than 30 years.

Myrna Dartson and Micaela Dartson Hicken were 19-year-old college sophomores in 1986 when, they say, Father Czeslaw “Chester” Domaszewicz began to behave inappropriately toward them. They describe a priest who sexually harassed them, grabbed at their breasts and buttocks, pulled on their bras and made vile, suggestive comments.

Through the Florida diocese where he is now assigned, Domaszewicz has strongly denied the allegations.

But those accusations and others prompted a pastoral council meeting about the priest’s behavior in 1989 or 1990. The diocese’s notes indicate the priest apologized, but don’t say for what.

The Dartsons had hoped to see Domaszewicz’s name on the Dallas diocese’s list of 31 “credibly accused” clergy members since 1950. The list, released last week, likely provided a bit of closure to some victims and Catholics, but the diocese’s transparency effort focused only on victims 18 and younger.

By a mere one year, the Dartson twins missed their chance at justice. And as of now, the Dallas diocese doesn’t plan a formal release of names related to young adults’ cases.

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

February 6, 2019

West Virginia Catholic officials have taken a small step forward in healing for survivors by removing an accused bishop’s name from a gym named after him.

Former Bishop Michael Bransfield’s name has been taken off Wheeling Central Catholic High School, by the school’s board of directors. Given that Bishop Bransfield has faced multiple allegations of sexual harassment and abuse, we believe that this was the right move by administrators at Central Catholic High School.

The very least church officials can do is remove honors for clerics who commit or conceal sexual wrongdoing. We hope that this step will bring some comfort to those whose abuse happened on Bransfield’s watch and to those who may were hurt by Bransfield.

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[Constantí parish priest resigns after pedophilia investigations]

CONSTANTI (SPAIN)
El País

February 5, 2019

By Marc Rovira

El arzobispado de Tarragona reaccionó al sospechar de la conducta de dos párrocos

El actual cura de Constantí (Tarragona), Francesc Xavier Morell, estuvo apartado del servicio religioso durante dos años mientras el Vaticano investigaba si había incurrido en un delito de pederastia. Morell fue citado a declarar antes en una investigación civil por estar en posesión de pornografía, que fue sobreseída por el juez. A pesar de ello, la Santa Sede abrió diligencias para aclarar la conducta del sacerdote a instancias del Arzobispado de Tarragona, que reaccionó al tener conocimiento de prácticas poco ortodoxas llevadas a cabo por dos curas de la diócesis. En concreto, a Morell se le aisló del oficio religioso mientras se comprobaba si había cometido actos de naturaleza sexual con menores de edad. La investigación religiosa concluyó que el párroco no había incurrido en ningún delito de naturaleza civil.

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[Spain’s government asks Prosecutor’s Office for information about open cases of pedophilia in the Church]

MADRID (SPAIN)
El País

February 5, 2019

By Julio Núñez

El Ejecutivo no ha solicitado a la Conferencia Episcopal datos sobre denuncias o quejas conocidas o instruidas

El Gobierno ha solicitado este martes a la Fiscalía General del Estado que le informe sobre las diligencias abiertas en los tribunales por casos de pederastia cometidos en el seno de la Iglesia, tanto en las parroquias que dependen de las diócesis como en los colegios de las congregaciones religiosas. La información que remite la Fiscalía nunca será el grueso de estos delitos, porque la mayoría de ellos no llegan a la justicia civil sino que se instruyen en procesos eclesiásticos. Son los obispos y los superiores de las órdenes religiosas los que se han encargado de juzgarlos y, en algunas ocasiones, de dictar indemnizaciones o bien de encubrir lo ocurrido.

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[Trial begins for friar accused of abuse along the Camino pilgrim route]

LUGO (SPAIN)
El País

February 5, 2019

By Pepe Seijo

Ataca en el juicio a la menor a la que supuestamente pagaba tras el sexo: “Era una persona independiente”, “sacaba dinero de estar con otras personas”

El juicio contra un fraile franciscano José Q.A., acusado de supuestos abusos sexuales y elaboración de material pornográfico, por lo que la fiscalía pide 17 años, ha comenzado con la declaración del procesado y, a puerta cerrada, la de sus dos supuestas víctimas, una joven que en el momento de los hechos tenía 16 años y su primo discapacitado. En la sección segunda de la Audiencia Provincial de Lugo, el religioso mantuvo en su declaración que las relaciones fueron consentidas y que en aquella época padecía una “profunda depresión” y perdió “el norte”.

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[Archbishop of Tarragona removes priest of Arbeca and Lleida for abuse of minors]

LLEIDA (SPAIN)
El País

February 6, 2019

Josep Maria Font ha pedido disculpas en una carta publicada en la web del Arzobispado

El arzobispo de Tarragona, Jaume Pujol, ha cesado este miércoles al rector de la parroquia de Arbeca (Lleida) y otras poblaciones leridanas, Josep Maria Font, un día después de apartar de sus funciones al párroco de Constantí (Tarragona), Francesc Xavier Morell, ambos presuntamente involucrados en tocamientos a menores.

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[Archbishop of Tarragona on abuses in his diocese: “It was a bad time”]

SPAIN
El País

February 6, 2019

By Marc Rovira

Jaume Pujol afirma que “todo el mundo puede cometer errores” tras conocerse tres casos de pederastia. El párroco de Arbeca renuncia tras descubrirse su implicación

El goteo de revelaciones sobre abusos sexuales a menores y casos de pederastia presuntamente cometidos por curas del Arzobispado de Tarragona ha provocado un nuevo cese. El sacerdote Josep Maria Font ha confirmado su renuncia y, en un comunicado, pide disculpas “a todas las personas a las que haya podido ofender o decepcionar”. Font oficiaba actualmente en el municipio leridano de Arbeca y en otras pequeñas parroquias de la provincia de Lleida, pero los abusos que han trascendido presuntamente los cometió cuando ejercía en la zona de Tarragona, donde Cambrils fue su último destino. Se da la circunstancia que Font, de 65 años, nació en Constantí, el pueblo donde se destaparon los primeros episodios de esta serie de casos de abusos sexuales a menores. El arzobispo de Tarragona, Jaume Pujol, ha valorado los episodios de pederastia como un “mal momento” por parte de los sacerdotes y niega que los actos descubiertos sean “tan graves” como para forzar su secularización. “Todo el mundo puede cometer errores”, ha añadido.

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WHEELING (WV)
The Intelligencer

February 6, 2019

By Heather Ziegler

Central Catholic High School’s gymnasium in East Wheeling no longer bears the name of former bishop Michael J. Bransfield, as the school’s board of directors recently voted to have it removed.

Bryan Minor, delegate for administrative affairs for the Catholic Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, said the decision to remove Bransfield’s name also has the approval of Archbishop William E. Lori, who has been serving as apostolic administrator of the diocese since being appointed by Pope Francis in September.

Lori is overseeing the Wheeling-Charleston diocese after the Vatican appointed him to investigate allegations that Bransfield sexually harassed adults.

Bransfield ended his tenure Sept. 13 after serving the diocese for 13 years. Bransfield, 75, had just turned the age of retirement when canon law dictates bishops must submit their resignations to the Pope. The Pope then decides when to accept the resignation.

Bransfield’s resignation was accepted immediately.

Lori, who is from the Baltimore Diocese, has been overseeing the lay-led investigation into the allegations against Bransfield. Minor said the investigation could be finalized this month.

As for removing Bransfield’s name from Central’s gymnasium, Minor said Lori accepted the board’s decision. The name was placed on the gym last spring.

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GREENVILLE (TX)
Herald Banner

February 6, 2019

By Travis Hairgrove

It began more than a half-century ago: the trail of lawsuits, settlements, internal Catholic Church documents and public reports of sexual abuse allegations against Patrick J. Lynch.

Lynch is one of 31 former Diocese of Dallas priests whose name was released last week on a list of priests with “credible allegations of sexual abuse” against them. The accusations against the priest date back to 1966 and include several lawsuits and settlements, records show.

Now deceased, Lynch was never removed from service; instead, he was reassigned to new parishes at least 12 times over the course of his 36 years in the priesthood.

He retired in 1997, after the Diocese of Dallas “discovered a church memo” dated 1966 in his personnel file revealing the sexual abuse had been known and documented even then.

Since Lynch’s retirement from St. Joseph Catholic Church in Richardson in 1995, the diocese has paid out several settlements to individuals alleging that Lynch sexually abused them as children.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

February 5, 2019

By Kurt Jensen

Permanent solutions to the church’s sexual abuse crisis are going to require a greater level of lay participation and more legal muscle.

These were conclusions discussed at two events in Washington: a lawyers’ panel at the Catholic Information Center, sponsored by the Thomas More Society Jan. 31, and a media conference Feb. 2 following the Leadership Roundtable’s Catholic Partnership Summit Feb. 1-2.

The summit, which included three cardinals, university and college presidents and canon lawyers representing 43 dioceses, is expected to issue a document with recommendations in a couple of weeks.

The key term at both discussions was “emerging best practices” for identifying abusers and bringing them to justice.

Some of the participants in the summit spoke to the press in a teleconference afterward.

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PLAINIEW (TX)
Plainview Herald

February 5, 2019

By Ellysa Harris

Catholic Diocese throughout the state released lists of clergy accused of sexual abuse of minors on Thursday and a former priest at a Plainview church made the list.

The Lubbock chapter of the Roman Catholic Diocese identified the late Robert Patrick Hoffman, who served at Sacred Heart Catholic Church from 1983 to 1986 as a clergy member with a credible allegation.

Hoffman died in 2005.

According to his obituary, which was published in the March 21, 2005 edition of the Amarillo Globe-News, he was ordained to priesthood on May 25, 1968 and served the Catholic Church until December 2000 when a bout with bone marrow cancer resulted in a request for medical retirement.

Hoffman was assigned to four different parishes, in addition to his stint in Plainview. The Diocese of Lubbock was formed June 17, 1983. Prior to that date, many of the parishes now within its geographic boundaries were a part of the Amarillo Diocese, according to news releases from both the Lubbock and Amarillo Catholic Dioceses. That’s why Hoffman’s name and the five parishes he served are on lists for both of the dioceses.

An official from the Lubbock Diocese told The Herald an allegation was made against Hoffman while he was serving Sacred Heart in Plainview. The church took action and the Lubbock Diocese stepped in and removed Hoffman from the church.

The Lubbock Diocese lists him as removed from the ministry in 1987.

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LAWRENCEVILLE (NJ)
The Rider News

By Lauren Minore

In light of multiple allegations of child sex abuse in the Roman Catholic Church, a former Rider priest has been recognized as having credible accusations of sexual abuse of a minor against him.

Andrew Dittrich, who served at Rider from 1977 to 1989, was one of 50 clergy members on the list of credibly accused child sex offenders in New Jersey and nearby states. The list was released by the USA Northeast Province of the Jesuits, which represents Roman Catholic priests in parts of New Jersey.

According to the USA Northeast Province of the Jesuits website, the regional organization represents eight states, including New York, northern New Jersey and Connecticut, among others.

The allegations against Dittrich surfaced in 2002 and resurfaced in 2018. According to the report from the organization, Dittrich was accused of sexual abuse of minors between 1966 and 1976 — one year prior to his involvement with the university.

Dittrich also served at Rutgers University from 1970-1977, six years during the time which he was accused of sexual abuse.

In a letter from Fr. John J. Cecero, Provincial of USA Northeast Province, said, “Hoping to contribute to healing from the pain and anger caused by clergy sex abuse and the lack of accountability and transparency on the part of church leadership, I am making public a list of any Jesuit in the USA Northeast Province who has had a credible allegation of abuse against a minor or vulnerable adult since 1950.”

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SAGINAW (MI)
WGSW Radio

February 6, 2019

The Administrator of the Saginaw Catholic Diocese says addressing sexual abuse allegations involving priests will require greater transparency. Bishop Walter Hurley promised that lines of communication will remain open with law enforcement.

Hurley added retired Judge Michael Talbot who had been an intermediary between the Diocese and authorities was dismissed following the recent death of Bishop Joseph Cistone. Hurley explained Cistone had requested Talbot’s assistance while struggling with health issues, but that with Cistone gone, Talbot’s services will no longer be required.

Hurley says he’ll take on Talbot’s responsibilities and pass on any new abuse reports directly to authorities. Hurley says it’s unclear how long it will take to resolve investigations involving the Saginaw County Prosecutor’s Office and Michigan Attorney General.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

February 5, 2019

by Peter Feuerherd

First comes baptism, then comes holy orders, a Boston College report about forming new priests reminds seminary educators and others in a study released in December 2018. The paper, titled “To Serve the People of God: Renewing the Conversation on Priesthood and Ministry,” argues that sacramental doctrine is a starting point in transforming seminary formation.

Priests in today’s church need skills in forming communities and working with all the baptized faithful, particularly women, the study proposes.

It warns against priests placing themselves above laypeople.

“If priesthood becomes a path to power, priests can understand themselves as gatekeepers of ‘discipline, rules and organization,’ rather than as disciples among disciples,” it says. The document, created out of a series of meetings of a dozen religious educators, theologians and church ministers, both men and women, cautions against “a concentration on functions unique to priests” which can “appear to create a gulf” between them and the laity.

For Thomas Groome, professor in theology and religious education at Boston College and a member of the panel who authored the report, the future of seminary formation could be seen in his classroom when a grandmother took a fellow student and Jesuit scholastic under her wing, becoming a spiritual mentor. Priesthood, the study says, is not an excuse to rule over laypeople but should provide an opportunity to be part of collaborative ministry, through which priests and laypeople learn from each other.

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NORTHHAMPTON (ENGLAND)
Northhampton Chronicle

February 6, 2019

Francis McDermott, a 75-year-old retired Catholic Priest from the Northampton Diocese, has appeared at court accused of sexually assaulting six children in the 1970s.

A complainant, now in his 50s, who alleges he was sexually abused by the defendant, described Father McDermott as having a very high sex drive, saying: “He was sex mad. He was always talking about it.”

In 2004, the witness was contacted by the Priest after the latter had been accused of sexually assaulting a young girl be-known to the witness. She believed the witness had knowledge of her assaults, which also took place in the 1970s.

Before meeting McDermott, the witness purchased a tape recorder and recorded their conversation.

The witness said: “I just wanted to record what he said as I sensed panic. I guessed it was about the sexual abuse.”

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RUTLAND (VT)
Rutland Herald

February 6, 2019

By Gordon Dritschilo

Discussion of abortion and sexual abuse scandals dominated a forum Bishop Christopher Coyne held at Christ the King Church on Tuesday.

The talk, part of a listening tour bringing Coyne to churches around the state, also touched on how the church can win back parishioners it has lost and what the diocese can do for local parishes. Coyne said this was the sixth such meeting, and common themes from the previous ones included sex abuse scandals in the Catholic church, a decision to lower the age of first communion and calls for the ordination of female priests.

Preaching respectful listening, Coyne opened the floor to the roughly 100 in attendance, saying people who came forward would get 2 minutes each for questions or comments. The first came from a man who began by proclaiming his love for the church and his belief in literal transubstantiation.

“I am very angry at the hierarchy of our church,” he said. “I am angry at your brother bishops and the Bishop of Rome.”

The man said when news of sexual abuse coverups broke more than a decade ago, parishioners were assured that reforms had been implemented and such abuse would not happen again. Then the public learned of more abuses last year.

“Now, I realize the bishops did not do what they said they would do, and I am angry about it,” he said.

The man said his anger was compounded because the scandals robbed the bishops of their moral authority, which they need to argue against measures like H.57, the bill that would preserve abortion rights in Vermont. The man said the bill “borders on infanticide,” while later speakers outright called it infanticide.

“There’s a lot there,” Coyne said. “I can only be responsible for myself. … I can’t answer for some of the bishops.”

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New York (NY)
Fordham Ram

February 6, 2019

By Erica Scalise

A number of priests living in Murray-Weigel Hall, a retirement home on campus, have recently been included on lists of priests accused of sexual abuse. The university has claimed that it did not have access to information listing who lives in the retirement homes on campus, operated by the Jesuit Northeast Province.

Bob Howe, director of communications for the university, did not respond to questions on the existence of a list of Jesuits in residence at Fordham.

He said the university “does not generally know the histories” of those living in the Jesuit retirement homes on campus.

A list of Jesuits in residence at Murray-Weigel has been available to anyone with access to Walsh Library, even as allegations against Catholic priests continue to make headlines.

Murray-Weigel said they could not provide The Ram with these lists, and the Northeast Province said they are not available to the public. These catalogs, known as “Curia,” available from the 19th century to 2018, detail the names of Jesuit priests, their dates of birth, when they entered the Society of Jesus and when they left. They also include information on where these priests live, including those accused of sexual abuse.

Bob Howe said the university’s statement from a Jan. 30 article in The Ram remains the same.

“The University has never had control over Murray-Weigel Hall or a regular flow of information concerning its tenants and any allegations of misconduct that may have been made against them,” said Howe.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Crux

February 6, 2019

By Christopher White

Two state attorneys general that have issued reports on the Catholic Church’s handling of clerical sexual abuse cases doubled-down on Monday, defending their efforts and saying the Church cannot be responsible for policing itself.

Former Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan and Josh Shapiro, Attorney General of Pennsylvania, took part in a panel discussion at the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics, where Madigan said the Church “failed to react properly, they haven’t put in place the policies, they haven’t put in place procedures, they haven’t admitted what has happened,” when it came to its handling of clerical abuse.

In December, Madigan released a report saying that the state’s six dioceses had not released the names of more than 500 priests accused of abuse. The report was a preliminary look into Illinois’ handling of sex abuse cases that is now being carried on by her successor, Kwame Raoul.

Madigan’s report follows a wave of state investigations into the Catholic Church set off by Shapiro’s August grand jury report, which he described as “the largest scope in this country…maybe in the history of the world.”

On Monday, Shapiro sharply criticized what he described as the Church’s efforts to minimize or hide cases of abuse.

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