ABUSE TRACKER

The Office of the California Attorney General said Monday night that it will review the Calaveras County district attorney’s decision to dismiss sexual assault charges against a Catholic priest.

In a letter sent to CBS Sacramento, Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office said the victim’s mother requested an official review after District Attorney Barbara Yook dropped all charges against Father Michael Kelly.

The move came after the victim Kelly allegedly abused died in 2016. Bonta’s office will now review that decision.

Kelly was held liable for sex abuse in a separate civil trial back in 2012 when he was with the Stockton diocese. Kelly has since moved to Ireland. 

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Attorney General Rob Bonta is taking an unprecedented step to probe alleged mishandling of a prosecution against a Catholic priest indicted for sex assault.

California’s Attorney General will investigate the decision made by Calaveras County District Attorney to drop charges against Father Michael Kelly, an indicted priest accused of numerous sexual crimes against children.

The investigation comes after news reports highlighted concerns about the handling of the case and the lack of efforts made to extradite Kelly from Ireland, where he currently resides.

The backstory: The charges against Kelly, who served at Our Lady of Fatima in Modesto in the 1970s, were dropped after one of the victims, Trevor Martin, died in a base jumping accident.

• The investigation revealed several troubling findings, including an initial admission that the Calaveras County DA lost of the entire grand jury testimony and paper indictment,
• It also found potential violation of constitutional rights under Marsy’s Law,…

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The recent high court decision concerning the Catholic church’s use of permanent stays in abuse cases has sparked significant concern and prompted the New South Wales attorney general, Michael Daley, to order an urgent briefing on the matter. The court’s judgment highlighted the problematic nature of using permanent stays to permanently halt survivors’ claims, stating that such measures should only be considered as a last resort. This practice has been routinely employed by the church and other powerful institutions, particularly in cases where perpetrators have passed away or when crucial evidence is unavailable.

Survivors of abuse and their legal representatives have widely praised the court’s decision, viewing it as a strong message to institutions that they should not exploit permanent stays to avoid accountability for child sexual abuse cases. However, they are also urging state governments, including NSW, where these stays have predominated, to implement further legislation to limit institutions’…

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Multiple alleged victims have come forward accusing a former Sydney Catholic primary school teacher of indecently assaulting them in incidents dating back almost 65 years.

Peter Mervyn Samuel, who is now aged in his mid-90s, has pleaded not guilty to eight counts of indecent assault and one count of buggery.

The three boys were aged between 10 and 13 years old at the time of the alleged offences between 1958 and 1972.

Samuel allegedly called two of them to the front of the class and touched them beneath their shorts.

It is alleged he confronted the third boy alone in a science room and also fondled him as he tried to escape.

The assaults allegedly took place while Samuel was teaching year-six classes at two Patrician Brothers’ College campuses in Blacktown and Granville, and Marist Brothers Primary School in Mosman.

Due to his advanced age making it difficult for him…

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The Archdiocese of Baltimore dismissed Rev. Paschal Morlino in October after he admitted a $200,000 settlement to The Baltimore Banner

Baltimore’s historic St. Benedict Church will close permanently following the revelation of a second allegation implicating its popular former pastor, Rev. Paschal Morlino.

Church leadership on Saturday confirmed the plan to close the parish near Carroll Park during a late-afternoon Mass, stunning the roughly 30 congregants in attendance. The church is scheduled to end administering the sacraments Nov. 15, but the archdiocese said volunteers will continue to operate community programs at the site.

Following the sacrament of the Eucharist, a member of the clergy read from a prepared statement to confirm the closure of the church and the new allegation. Multiple parishioners shook their heads as they listened. Some whispered to one another, while others sat perfectly still.

Outside the church following the announcement, parishioner Tom Phillips reflected on the…

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California Attorney General Rob Bonta has agreed to investigate the decision by the Calaveras County District Attorney to drop charges against an indicted priest found liable for numerous sex crimes against children.

Bonta’s rare intervention comes on the heels of a Sacramento Bee investigation into the handling of the criminal case against Father Michael Kelly, who fled to his native Ireland, where he remains today.

The Bee investigation found that, despite pledging publicly to do everything in its power to extradite Kelly from Ireland, Calaveras County District Attorney Barbara Yook took few, if any, steps to follow through with that commitment.

Kelly was indicted in 2014 for sexually abusing a 10-year-old boy, Trevor Martin. Kelly and the church had already been held liable in 2012 for sexual abuse in a civil case involving another boy. Kelly previously had served as a priest at Our Lady of Fatima in Modesto in…

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LEICESTER, United Kingdom – President of the England and Wales Bishops’ Conference, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, said Saturday was a “most significant day in the life of the Church in England and Wales, and indeed for the Church more widely” due to the creation a new National Tribunal to apply the church’s criminal law.

Nichols called the new tribunal “a focus of practical love and service”, saying it was established to ensure that the “rights and obligations of all the Christian faithful are upheld, robustly and impartially, and that justice and equality prevail.”

While not its only purpose, the tribunal becomes the primary forum in the country for managing cases of clerical sexual abuse under the church’s own legal system, based on the Code of Canon Law.

The National Tribunal was proposed by the English bishops’ conference at their November 2022 plenary assembly, following recommendations of the Elliott Review into Safeguarding…

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ROME – Both the alleged victims of Slovene Fr Marko Ivan Rupnik and the bishops of his native Slovenia have spoken out about the disgraced artist’s welcome into a new diocese.

In the wake of Pope Francis’s decision on Friday to waive the statute of limitations in canon law, five of Fr Rupnik’s presumed victims signed and released a brief statement that was shared in Italian media, saying they were “very surprised” by the announcement.

They voiced hope that “this is a suitable step towards seeing the truth fully known,” and said they are awaiting “further developments.”

Senior bishops in Slovenia meanwhile expressed dismay at the incardination of Rupnik into his home Diocese of Kloper and reaffirmed their commitment to the protection of children and vulnerable adults.

Fr Rupnik, who has been accused of sexual abuse and misconduct by at least 25 adult women, with the alleged abuse stretching over…

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A Catholic primary school in WA’s north has become the target of a historical child sexual abuse investigation, with allegations two clergymen assaulted a student at the school more than 30 years ago.

Key points:

• There is an appeal for past students at St Cecilia’s Catholic Primary School to come forward
• A man alleges he was assaulted by two priests during the 1980s and 1990s 
• Lawyers say the case is the latest of four allegations made against one man

Maurice Blackburn Lawyers has made a public appeal calling for witnesses who attended St Cecilia’s Catholic Primary School and parish in Port Hedland in the 1980s and 1990s.

The school, with less than 200 students, allies with the parishes of both Port Hedland and South Hedland.

The legal team said the appeal related to a client who alleges to have been sexually abused by two priests while attending the school during the same period.

Principal lawyer John Rule…

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Christopher Bacich, former head of Communion and Liberation, identified as ‘sole perpetrator’ of abuse against multiple victims

An ecclesial movement has just admitted its former U.S. leader has been credibly accused of sexual and psychological abuse against young adults and minors over more than two decades.

Christopher Bacich, who headed up Communion and Liberation in the U.S. from March 2007 until August 2013, was the “sole perpetrator” of abuse against “multiple victims,” according to an Oct. 31 statement issued by Father Michael Carvill, the movement’s current head, and Steve Brown, president of the New York-based Human Adventure Corporation, a nonprofit that coordinates the movement’s activities in the U.S.

Communion and Liberation, launched in 1954 by Italian Catholic educator Father Luigi Giovanni Giussani, fosters small, informal communities in some 90 countries that gather for prayer, charitable works, pilgrimages, and the exploration of arts and culture as a path to deeper faith….

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In 2010, Nevada senatorial candidate Sharron Angle, a right-wing Tea Party stalwart, briefly became a national sensation due to some fairly self-parodying comments about the press. In an interview with Fox News, complaining about the way negative media coverage had damaged her poll numbers, Angle delivered her immortal line.

“We needed to have the press be our friend,” she said. “We wanted them to ask the questions we wanted to answer.”

That reply set off a round of derision, including a memorable lampoon in the HBO series “The Newsroom,” in which fictional anchor Will McAvoy, presented as a lawyer and former prosecutor, quotes her about hoping for only the questions she wanted, and then says: “Don’t laugh, I felt the exact same way about the bar exam.”

While Angle may have been mocked, there’s a sense in which her PR model, of trying to engineer situations in which the press…

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For more than two hours on a Sunday afternoon, the Rev. Gustavo Castillo led the Pentecostal congregation he’s been growing in this Minneapolis suburb through prayer, Scriptures, rousing music, and sometimes tearful testimonials.

But it all may end soon. A sudden procedural change in how the federal government processes green cards for foreign-born religious workers, together with historic highs in numbers of illegal border crossers, means that thousands of clergy like him are losing the ability to remain in this country.

“We were right on the edge of becoming permanent residents, and boom, this changed,” Colombia-born Castillo said as his wife rocked their 7-month-old boy, a U.S. citizen by birth. “We have done everything correctly, from here onward we believe that God will work a miracle. We don’t have any other option.”

To become permanent U.S. residents, which can eventually lead to citizenship, immigrants apply for green cards, generally through…

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Masses and sacramental ministry at St. Benedict Parish in Baltimore will end Nov. 15, according to a joint announcement Nov. 4 to the parish by the St. Vincent Archabbey in Latrobe, Pa., and the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

No new pastor will be named for the parish, the announcement said, limiting the ministries that could continue in the future. “The difficult decision was made based on the limited number of clergy available for this ministry,” the announcement said.

St. Benedict Church is owned and operated by the St. Vincent Archabbey in Latrobe, Pa.

The decision affects Masses, dispensation of the sacraments, sacramental preparation and worship services. 

The action was precipitated by the removal from ministry Oct. 15 of Benedictine Father Paschal Morlino, who had served the Southwest Baltimore parish for nearly 40 years, from July 1984 to October 2023. At the time of his removal from ministry, Father Morlino…

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Ecclesiastic tribunal said priest “could not prove accusations”

The priest who denounced 12 cases of colleagues whom he suspected of having sexually abused children – some of them still priests today – has been punished by Portugal’s Catholic Church.

Joaquim Nazaré took his suspicions to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, and the Independent Commission tasked with investigating child sex abuse within the Church over the last 70 years. 

At a point where this scandal within the Roman Catholic Church was finally being addressed by various countries, Nazaré also gave interviews to Expresso and RTP (at the time, his identity was kept secret).

Among Nazaré’s list of names was that of a priest who for various years has been placed at the Sanctuary of Fátima but who was accused by the parents of a teenager who committed suicide in 1997 of having abused their son.

The inference was that the youngster’s trauma, having taken place in…

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This series of mergers and consolidations will impact over a dozen parishes in southeast Louisiana.

“There is no doubt that our parishes, in fact our entire area, have been affected by many factors out of our control,” said Archbishop Gregory Aymond.
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That’s the explanation from Aymond when announcing the merger of several church parishes in a video released Sunday.

Citing inflation and skyrocketing property insurance rates are among some of the impacting factors.

There are four instances where two parishes will merge into one and one instance where the merger will include three parishes.

“My kids came here. They were baptized here, you know, confirmed, married. And it’s just isn’t, oh, my home of my church.” said Jeanette LeBlanc, a member of Our Lady of Divine Providence church.

That’s why Jeanette LeBlanc is relieved her church home isn’t among that list of closures.

She has been a member of Our…

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The Diocese of Springfield acknowledged Tuesday new findings against the late Richard Lavigne as part of a regular updating of its list of credibly accused clergy.

Lavigne died in 2021 as police were planning to charge him with the 1972 murder of altar boy Daniel “Danny” Croteau. Lavigne, a prolific child molester who was kicked out of the priesthood in 2003, told police in a series of deathbed interviews that he took the boy to the area of a boat ramp along the Chicopee River, struck him with a rock, shoved him into the water, and returned later to see his lifeless body, clothed in his Catholic school uniform, floating facedown.

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An insurance company that issued primary and umbrella policies to the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate sought declaration from the U.S. District Court that it need not pay out claims stemming from sexual abuse. The U.S. District Court’s decision in TIG Insurance Company v. Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate was a mixed bag, offering victories for both the insurance company and the sexual abuse survivors.

The Rev. James Vincent Fitzgerald was a priest with Oblates, a missionary religious congregation of the Catholic Church, from 1950 to 2009. As an Oblates priest, he was assigned to multiple locations throughout the country, including eight stints in Minnesota. Fitzgerald’s inappropriate behavior was first noticed in 1963, when he tore the bottom of a young girl’s bathing suit. A few years later, after he was moved, he shared a bed with a boy and undressed in front of the child.

Intervenors, who appeared anonymously as “Does,”…

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A deceased priest who served at St. John’s Jesuit High School in the 1990s and early 2000s was placed on a list of established allegations of sexual abuse of a minor.

An allegation was made in 2022 against the Rev. Francis Canfield, who died in May, by a former student of the Toledo school, according to an email sent to an alumnus from the school’s president Mark Swentkofske.

Mr. Canfield’s name was added Monday to the list of Midwest Jesuits with an established allegation of sexual abuse of a minor by the Midwest Province of the Society of Jesus.

St. John’s released a media statement detailing the investigation and the school’s safety process, but deferred additional questions to the province’s communications office.

The Diocese of Toledo said in a statement that “after learning of the allegation in 2022, the Diocese reported the matter to the Lucas County Prosecutor, and…

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The Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield this week acknowledged new credible findings against the late Richard Lavigne, a convicted sex offender and former Shelburne Falls priest believed to have killed a 13-year-old altar boy in 1972.

The diocese issued a statement on Oct. 31 to announce an update on Lavigne, as well as on the late Stigmatine priest Joseph E. Flood and the late Rev. J. Victor Carrier.

“Out of respect for the privacy of the survivor, no further details will be released at this time,” Carolee McGrath, a diocese spokesperson wrote in an email to the Greenfield Recorder regarding Lavigne’s case.

Lavigne and Flood were already listed on the diocese’s “Findings of Credibility of Allegations of Sexual Abuse of a Minor,” and Carrier’s name was recently added based on a credible finding by the diocesan Review Board. The diocese’s statement mentions that an allegation being found credible does not…

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A pernicious phenomenon happens to abuse victims in the Church when additional abuse is added, sometimes unwittingly, to the harm they have already endured. It’s what I and others refer to as “double abuse” and it’s long past time for church leaders to understand what it is and how it works.

Double abuse occurs when a victim’s family, church, or community fails to recognize the original harm and diminish, deny, dismiss or disregard that primary instance of abuse, instead of believing, supporting, and protecting.

Double abuse can also happen when a victim seeks safety but instead of receiving trauma-sensitive help, they receive biased, harmful, uneducated advice that makes their situation worse. 

Often, survivors in the faith community will approach clergy for help. But if your pastor is not educated in the dynamics of abuse, it’s very possible for them to mean well yet do significant harm. 

An example of this is an…

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First part of a series supported by the Pulitzer Center.

Shaelyn Nielsen remembers the door of the large upstairs bedroom opening early that morning and the sound of breathing growing nearer.

The 18-year-old tried feigning sleep as, she said, the man who’d been a father figure to her for more than a year slid into her bed and groped her under her oversized T-shirt and moon-and-star pajama bottoms. As he rubbed himself against her from behind, she said, she resisted and cried muffled tears.

Chiding her, she alleges, Sherdale Green, a father of two, told her the boys living at Boys Town were not what she wanted, saying: “You know only I can give you what you want.”

Nielsen said she now recognizes, at age 25, the inappropriate touching, hugs and grooming leading up to that moment in 2016 with a house parent at Boys Town, the storied 106-year-old Omaha…

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Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, whose show Life is Worth Living made him an unlikely TV star of the 1950s, liked to tell his audience the following story about corruption within the Catholic Church:

Once there was a man who’d decided to convert to Catholicism. But before he could agree to be baptized, he planned to visit Rome. His parish priest pleaded with him to be baptized first, but the man insisted. The priest was sure he’d never see him again. However, the man returned weeks later more eager to be baptized than before. 

“You’ve been to Rome?” the priest asked. 

“Yes.”

“And you’ve seen how things work?”

“I have, and I’m convinced that the Catholic church is the one true church.”

“You are?” 

“Yes. Only a truly divine institution could survive that level of corruption and immorality.”

The story would draw big laughs from crowds of committed Catholics who knew a thing or two about corruption among the…

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Sarah Stankorb interviews sexual abuse advocate Christa Brown at a free public event November 11 at Wyoming Baptist Church.

Wyoming resident and journalist Sarah Stankorb spent years reporting on abuse within evangelical communities, focusing on how survivors used the internet to call out abuse and to connect with each other. Her work culminated in the publication of Disobedient Women: How a Small Group of Faithful Women Exposed Abuse, Brought Down Powerful Pastors, and Ignited an Evangelical Reckoning (Worthy Books/Hachette). You might have heard about the book, which was featured at the Mercantile Library and on Cincinnati Edition in addition to receiving strong reviews and recently becoming a national bestseller.

A unique event at Wyoming Baptist Church at 7 p.m. Saturday, November 11 brings Stankorb into conversation with Christa Brown, a clergy abuse survivor and retired attorney who is a…

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Diamonds and emeralds, marble busts and oil paintings, sterling silver flatware and an ivory crucifix — these are just some of the things the Archdiocese of Baltimore possesses in its treasure chest of valuables.

The items, including rings, precious gemstones, gold and silver chains, and antique furniture, were disclosed as part of the archdiocese’s most recent court filing in its ongoing Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Attorneys for the church declined to provide a value for most of the items (they’re listed as collectibles), instead describing their value as “unknown.”

Among the possessions:

•A cross made of gold set with 36 emeralds.

•A gold ring set with an amethyst in the center surrounded by 28 diamonds.

•A locket with a profile of St. Peter surrounded by 16 sapphires and eight pearls.

The full list of collectibles spans 11 pages and is one of many insights into the finances and operations of the…

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A committee representing clergy abuse survivors is asking a federal bankruptcy judge to reconsider her order barring lawsuits against Catholic schools and parishes as part of the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Parishes and schools are technically not assets of the archdiocese, despite Archbishop William E. Lori having control over whether they can be bought or sold, but were granted protection from lawsuits because the archdiocese insures them.

In early October, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Harner issued an interim injunction on lawsuits against entities covered by archdiocesan insurance policies (known as covered parties). Harner determined those policies are assets of the corporation that makes up the archdiocese, meaning any lawsuit would inevitably draw down on insurance monies in order to pay legal fees and settlements.

Whenever any entity files for bankruptcy it is automatically protected from lawsuits so its assets can be preserved to pay creditors. Sometimes those protections can…

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A first-term Democratic lawmaker wants to enact an exception to state laws that allow clergy to refuse to disclose what was told to them in confession or similar confidential communication.

But Rep. Stacey Travers of Phoenix has so far run into a procedural wall. Rep. Quang Nguyen, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, where her bill was assigned earlier this year, refused to even give it a hearing.

And the Prescott Republican told Capitol Media Services that he’s not prepared to allow the bill to proceed in 2024, even if it deals only with cases of child abuse and neglect.

“The seal of confession is a sacred, sacred part of the Catholic church,” said Nguyen who is Catholic.

“The seal of confession is never to be broken,” he said. “And priests will go to jail for it.”

Still, Nguyen acknowledged that there are difficult issues to be addressed. And he…

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The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a request by the Archdiocese of Miami to take up a dispute involving allegations that a priest sexually abused a child. 

Justices, as is common, did not explain their reasons for declining to hear the case. 

The archdiocese wanted justices to review a decision by the 3rd District Court of Appeal that allowed the alleged victim to pursue a claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress against the archdiocese. 

The lawsuit alleges that the plaintiff, identified as John Doe 1, was sexually abused dozens of times between 1999 and 2001, when he was 7 to 9 years old, according to a March 22 decision by a three-judge panel of the South Florida appeals court. 

The case names as a defendant the archdiocese and not the priest. 

The appeals court rejected part of the lawsuit alleging negligence by the archdiocese, citing a four-year statute…

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The Catholic community in Wales has spent a week standing in prayerful solidarity with victims and survivors of abuse at the country’s first LOUDfence event. It took place in Cardiff from 21-28 October 2023.

LOUDfence is a survivor-led initiative, open to everyone, that gives a voice to those who have experienced abuse within a faith-based setting or have been affected by it.

At a Mass to mark the opening of the initiative, on Saturday, 21 October, Archbishop Mark O’Toole, Archbishop of Cardiff and Bishop of Menevia, offered a sincere apology and called for reparation – not just though words but, more importantly, through actions:

“We know of the betrayal of the innocent who have suffered at the hands of those from whom they should have experienced only life and love. If you have suffered in any way like this, within the life of the Church, I offer my profoundest apology……

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Father Marko Rupnik’s former superior in the Society of Jesus, Father Johan Verschueren, denied that the Jesuits facilitated the incardination of the priest, who is accused of sexual abuse, in the Diocese of Koper, Slovenia, and said that the order warned the local bishop about the serious complaints against him.

In a statement to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, Verschueren, delegate for the Interprovincial Houses and Works of the Society of Jesus, assured that in March the Jesuits “exhaustively” informed the bishop of Koper, Jurij Bizjak, about the cases and complaints of abuse against Rupnik.

The Jesuit official revealed that the Slovenian bishop “informed us on his own initiative that he would offer incardination to MIR [Marko Ivan Rupnik] if we would give him the indult to leave the Society of Jesus.” However, the priest was not released but expelled from the Jesuits on June 15.

An Oct. 25…

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Christianity has a knack for resurrecting careers that should be as dead as Lazarus pre-miracle. It’s like a magic trick, only the rabbit pulled out of the hat is an abusive pastor. The routine is old but somehow still gets applause: a scandal erupts, the leader puts on a public performance worthy of an Oscar—complete with insincere sobbing and rehearsed humility—and poof! After a “season of healing,” they’re back, front and center.

Mark Driscoll, Perry Noble, Matt Chandler, Johnny Hunt, Carl Lentz—sounds like a guest list for a Narcissists Anonymous meeting. They’re the beneficiaries of a twisted inheritance from spiritual OG abusers like Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart. In a world where a Google search can immortalize your worst moments, it’s impressive, really, how these guys find their way back to the pulpit and…

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Members of the Points-Coeur association still wear habits, live like a religious community and promote vows of consecrated life.

The Vatican’s secretary of state Cardinal Pietro Parolin has warned French bishops that two groups stripped of their canonical status in 2020 are pretending to be Church-approved religious communities.  

Members of the Points-Coeur association, whose male wing is known in English as Heart’s Home and female wing as Servants of the Presence of God, still wear habits, live like a religious community and promote vows of consecrated life, he said in a letter to the French bishops’ conference, but added that this was deceptive.

“They…have no more canonical link to the Church, even if they often continue to work civilly with NGOs,” he said. “This attitude cannot fail to arouse scandal among the faithful and among victims.” 

Parolin’s letter, addressed to the bishops’ conference president Archbishop Éric de Moulins-Beaufort of Reims, Parolin warned bishops…

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The Christian youth camp claims the insurer withheld information during settlement negotiations with sex abuse survivors

Kanakuk Kamps is suing its insurance carrier, ACE American Insurance Company, for breach of contract and fiduciary duty and for bad faith refusal to defend Kanakuk over the lawsuit brought against the camp by a sexual abuse victim.

Kanakuk alleges the insurance carrier withheld information from victims and threatened to deny coverage to the camp during the years immediately following the sexual abuse scandal.

Logan Yandell, a Kanakuk camp sexual abuse victim, filed a lawsuit against the camp in November 2022. The lawsuit asserts a fraud claim against Kanakuk Ministries, Kanakuk Heritage, and Joe White, president of Kanakuk.

In 2010, Yandell agreed to a settlement for an undisclosed amount and signed a nondisclosure agreement, but now claims those were based on false and fraudulent representations by the Kanakuk defendants.

Between 2005 and…

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The Sauvé report “proposed structural changes in Church governance” which have not been implemented.

Jean-Marc Sauvé, whose commission estimated 330,000 sexual abuse cases in the French Church – two-thirds by priests – since 1950, said little had been done to prevent further abuse since its report came out two years ago.  

The bishops accepted the report and began compensating victims, he told Le Parisien, but have not implemented the reforms it suggested.

“Maybe the Church considers the work of the Ciase [abuse commission] was both the diagnosis and the remedy,” he said. But the report also “proposed structural changes in Church governance” such as including lay people, especially women, much more in ecclesial decision-making.

Among its reform ideas, it proposed ordaining women as deacons and older married men – the so-called viri probati – as priests.

Sauvé said the bishops’ plenary in Lourdes last spring was the occasion to consider these reforms, but the meeting…

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Outrage Canada is a newly formed group of outraged Canadians committed to holding leaders of the Roman Catholic church publicly accountable for sexual abuse crimes past and present.

Sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic church of Canada is well documented with a growing number of civil and criminal cases surfacing each year. Given the response to date however, Outrage Canada believes that the Roman Catholic church is more concerned with avoiding scandal and protecting their reputation than ending sexual abuse and finding justice for victims.

With the launch of their new website on November 2nd, All Souls’ Day, Outrage Canada, a national, secular, non-partisan organization raises the question – Where is the Outrage? – with the intent that like-minded Canadians, including practicing Catholics, will join them in their mission.

Outrage Canada is committed to ensuring justice for victims of abuse and to putting practises in place that will prevent other people from…

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Advocates of the victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church issued a detailed letter to the Archdiocese of San Francisco on Wednesday requesting the Catholic Church sell some unused properties to compensate victims.

The letter, sent by the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, was addressed to Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone on Nov. 1.

The document details the SF Archdiocese’s net worth of more than $6 billion in real estate, some of which could serve as reparations.

The SF Archdiocese filed for bankruptcy on Aug. 21, claiming it was because of the 500 lawsuits stacked against them.

Instead of bankruptcy, they said the Catholic Church could look at its assets, like millions of dollars’ worth of property not in use.

“There’s enough money in the Diocese and enough property for it to continue its mission and still sell property to address the needs of these victims,” said…

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Attorney general Michael Daley requests urgent briefing on high court’s damning judgment on use of permanent stays

The New South Wales attorney general, Michael Daley, has ordered an urgent briefing on the landmark high court decision over the Catholic church’s tactics in abuse cases.

The high court on Wednesday delivered a damning judgment against the church over its use of permanent stays to permanently halt survivors’ claims, finding that such a measure should only be used as a last resort.

The church and other powerful institutions have been using stays routinely where perpetrators have died, or where other witnesses or documentary evidence do not exist, allowing it to defeat active claims before courts or low-ball survivors during settlement negotiations.

The tactic effectively uses a survivor’s delay in coming forward to defeat their claim, an approach criticised as immoral, given the church’s own role in delaying justice and the vast barriers that complainants…

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Some decades-old credible accusations of sexual abuse by priests who worked at Boys Town didn’t become public until two years ago.

Over the years, Boys Town programs have been associated with some high-profile suspected or documented cases of sexual abuse and rape. Here are some cases that have made headlines:

Rape by three youth shuts down New York program

In 2017, Boys Town shut down three large residential programs for youth in California, Texas and New York, announcing in a news release that regulatory and environmental issues made it too difficult for employees to adhere to its model of care.

Those closures came after leaders at the Omaha, Nebraska, headquarters invested millions trying to build up residential programs across the country. But they also came after one of the most alarming cases of rape and employee neglect in Boys Town’s history.

In June 2015, three teens in a…

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A first-term Democratic lawmaker wants to enact an exception to state laws that allow clergy to refuse to disclose what was told to them in confession or similar confidential communication.

But Rep. Stacey Travers of Phoenix has so far run into a procedural wall. Rep. Quang Nguyen, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, where her bill was assigned earlier this year, refused to even give it a hearing.

And the Prescott Valley Republican told Capitol Media Services that he’s not prepared to allow the bill to proceed in 2024, even if it deals only with cases of child abuse and neglect.

“The seal of confession is a sacred, sacred part of the Catholic church,” said Nguyen who is Catholic.

“The seal of confession is never to be broken,” he said. “And priests will go to jail for it.”

Still, Nguyen acknowledged that there are difficult issues to be addressed. And…

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North Attleboro — A former altar boy at St. Mary’s Church in the 1960s has reached a financial settlement with the Diocese of Fall River for sexual abuse he suffered form now notorious Catholic priest James Porter.

The 72-year-old man, who now lives on the North Shore of Boston, recently reached a financial package in the “mid-five figures,” Boston lawyer Mitchell Garabedian said during a press conference Wednesday.

Garabedian, who has represented more than 30 victims of the disgraced Father Porter and numerous other victims of Catholic priests worldwide, declined to disclose the exact amount of the settlement.

He said the victim was 11 around 1961 when Porter forced him to accompany him from the World War II Memorial Pool to the church rectory, where the boy was sexually abused.

Porter, who admitted to sexually abusing at least 200 children in three states, used the guise of needing to go…

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An abuse survivor group has just chosen several patron saints as “heavenly friends” and guides on the journey to recovery.

“Many people find great comfort and strength in developing a relationship with particular saints who they turn to for inspiration and intercession,” said Sara Larson, executive director of the independent nonprofit Awake Milwaukee, which works to raise awareness of and heal sexual abuse in both the Milwaukee Archdiocese and the Catholic Church as a whole.

In a message posted to its website Oct. 25, Awake announced it had named as its patrons:

• St. Charles Lwanga, a 19th-century court page in what is now Uganda, who was martyred for his faith and for defending royal pages from the king’s sexual advances; 
• St. Catherine of Siena, a 14th-century Italian mystic, church reformer and one of only four female doctors of the church; 
• St….

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WHAT TO KNOW

• A bankruptcy judge has offered a new strategy to reach a settlement between Long Island’s Catholic Church and hundreds of clergy sex abuse survivors.
• Judge Martin Glenn said he has discussed the possibility of having several clergy sex abuse cases go to trial as “test cases” to help set guidelines for a settlement.
• Lawyers for the Diocese of Rockville Centre said the church opposes the proposal while attorneys for survivors voiced support.

A bankruptcy judge Wednesday offered a new strategy to reach a settlement between Long Island’s Catholic Church and hundreds of clergy sex abuse survivors, a day after the deadline to resolve the case.

Judge Martin Glenn of U.S. Bankruptcy Court said he has discussed the possibility of having several of the 600 clergy sex abuse cases against the diocese go to trial as “test cases” or “bellwether cases” to help set guidelines for a settlement.

Otherwise, Glenn warned, he might become the first…

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The Communion and Liberation ecclesial movement acknowledged on Tuesday that the movement’s former U.S. leader has been accused of sexual and psychological abuse against young adults and minors, and that the movement’s officials initially failed to respond appropriately to allegations. 

“[W]e believe the moment has come for a more public account of a situation that deeply wounded some of our communities,” said an Oct. 31 letter posted to the Communion and Liberation website.

“We sincerely apologize to the victims, families and community members harmed by these evil acts. We are truly grateful to the victims, families and community members who had the courage to bring these events to light.”

The open letter is signed by Fr. Michael Carvill, the North American Responsible for Communion and Liberation, and by Steve Brown, president of the Human Adventure Corporation (HAC), a non-profit which coordinates the activities of CL in the United States.

The…

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Survivors of decades-old sexual assaults may soon get a two-year period to bring civil cases against their alleged abuser while also seeing the actionable window for bringing a claim expanded under moves made by House lawmakers Tuesday.

Members of the House Criminal Justice Committee voted along party lines to advance legislation – HB 4482 through HB 4487, referred to as the “Justice for Survivors” package – which seeks to primarily allow victims of childhood sexual abuse the ability to bring forward their claims long after the act has occurred.

Under the package, the statute of limitations for when a survivor of sexual assault can bring civil action in court would be increased from age 28 to 52 – the average age a sexual assault victim discloses if they’d been sexually abused. It would also, once enacted, allow for a…

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Survivors and advocates have written to Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of the Archdiocese of San Francisco, asking him to reconsider bankruptcy. SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, has researched the real estate portfolio of the Archdiocese, and believes that it has ample non-essential assets to care for those survivors who filed lawsuits in the recently closed civil window without resorting to this extreme measure. 

A copy of the letter sent earlier today by email is linked below, as are the attachments to the letter.

CONTACT: Dan McNevin, SNAP Board of Directors Treasurer (dmcnevin@aol.com, 415-341-6417), Melanie Sakoda, SNAP Survivor Support Director (msakoda@snapnetwork.org, 925-708-6175),   Joey Piscitelli, SNAP Northern California (caljoey1@aol.com, 925-262-3699), Mike McDonnell, SNAP Interim Executive Director (mmcdonnell@snapnetwork.org, 267-261-0578), Shaun Dougherty, SNAP Board of Directors President (sdougherty@snapnetwork.org, 814- 341-8386)

(SNAP, the Survivors Network,…

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It took 10 months for the Vatican to reopen Fr. Marko Rupnik’s case — from the first reports on the case of Slovenian mosaic artist in December 2022 and the first alleged victims’ testimonies at that time, to dismissal of the priest from the Jesuit order in July, to public outrage after his incardination into a Slovenian diocese.

A victim of another well-known charismatic priest said the reason the church neglected the Rupnik case for so long is simple: It still doesn’t listen to vulnerable adults.

“It didn’t surprise me at all, because that’s how it works. Unfortunately, in the church, where we already have some procedures worked out regarding harmed children, … it feels like we don’t have any procedures worked out regarding adults harmed in the church, and it’s still such a taboo topic,” said Weronika (whose name has been changed to protect her identity), who was repeatedly…

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Following the close of last month’s Synod of Bishops, a leading Latin American cardinal has signaled openness in some cases to ordaining women deacons and also called for swift justice in sexual abuse cases, including the potential dissolution of a lay community in his own country currently under Vatican investigation.

Cardinal Pedro Barreto made the comments in an Oct. 30 exclusive interview with Crux, prior to leaving for Rome’s Fiumicino airport to return to Peru following the close of the synod.

The Archbishop of Huancayo and President of the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon (CEAMA), Barreto also spoke of the growing influence of Latin America in the Church and the fact that Catholicism’s center of gravity has shifted from the west to the global south.

On the topic of women, one of the biggest themes of the pope’s Oct. 4-29 Synod of Bishops on Synodality and among the most divisive issues…

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At one end of the spectrum, generally speaking, there’s SafeSport. After just six years in operation, it now lists more than 1,900 child molesters in its disciplinary database. SafeSport deals with abuse cases in Olympic-related sports down to the grassroots level — a scope that covers more than 11 million athletes. At the other end of the spectrum, there’s the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), which promised to set up a public database of abusive preachers almost a year and a half ago but has yet to name even one.

In between are most US Catholic bishops. As a general rule, bishops whose dioceses are in states where victims have some legal rights have posted names of child molesting clerics on their websites. But for the most part, prelates whose dioceses are in states where victims have FEW legal rights…

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Imagine that after decades of silence, inspired by a groundbreaking royal commission, you finally pluck up the courage to come forward to tell your story that as a young teenager, you were abused by a priest — a man you then thought to be God’s representative on earth.

Imagine you then go to court to argue that the Catholic diocese should have done more to stop that priest, whom it knew had multiple other victims, from abusing you.

But imagine the diocese then argues because the priest is dead, that places it at a dreadful and inconvenient disadvantage — it can’t ask the priest if he abused you, it says, even though he refused to cooperate in relation to other allegations.

A court finds you shouldn’t even have the right to stand before a judge and make your case. You can’t be heard. What’s known as a permanent stay is granted and your…

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Thirty-three-year-old Corey White, who according to members of the congregation was a youth minister at Redeemer Midland, has been charged with access with intent to view child pornographic materials. 

To preface, what’s described can be seen as graphic. 

According to court documents, the charges were stemmed from an investigation in Nassau County. New York. The Nassau County Police Department initiated an investigation after receiving 15 National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) cybertips from 2018 to the present. 

These tips involved the upload of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) videos and images via “Skype” from an IP address in Seaford, New York. 

A search warrant was executed which resulted in the seizing of this material from electronic devices. Upon further investigation, a New York man had been communicating with numerous adults and minors using the video chat site “Omegle”. During these interactions, the New Yorker used a screen sharing…

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A group of alleged victims of Father Marko Rupnik said Monday that Pope Francis’ decision to lift the statute of limitations on the case and order the opening of a new process against the priest accused of sexual abuse “is an appropriate step for the truth to be recognized.” 

Gloria Branciani, Mirjam Kovač, Vida Bernard, Mira Stare, and Jožica Zupančič are the authors of a news release shared with ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, commenting that they were “very surprised” by the statement from the Holy See.

The five women, former sisters of the Loyola Community, were referring to the Oct. 27 statement by the Holy See Press Office that reported that Pope Francis had decided to lift the statute of limitations on the Rupnik case, allowing a canonical process to take place. The priest is accused of having sexually abused women for decades.

According to the Holy See,…

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Revelations of a scandalous amicus brief raise the question: Who’s driving the SBC?

here’s a story my family has told since before I was born about my great-uncle Johnny. When his four daughters were teenagers, the family took a long trip in which they had to stop in a familiar town for dinner.

About 30 minutes out, Aunt Betty Jane and the girls started talking through the variety of eating options and, after 10–15 minutes of deliberation, they agreed upon the best restaurant. But when they arrived in town, Uncle Johnny, who hadn’t said a word, pulled into a different restaurant, got out of the car, and walked silently inside, leaving five dumbfounded women looking at each other and wondering what had just happened.

That story—at least, a sinister reading of it—came to mind as I tried to process last week’s revelation of View Cache

Who’s actually responsible for the positions and actions taken by entities of the Southern Baptist Convention?

This is a pressing question now, as controversy flares over the SBC and three of its entities signing an amicus brief in a Kentucky Supreme Court case, taking a position against a sexual abuse survivor who was, herself, a member of a Southern Baptist church and whose youth pastor allegedly did not report her abuse.

Abuse survivors and advocates were outraged to learn the SBC, the SBC Executive Committee, Lifeway Christian Resources and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary all signed the friend of the court brief against abuse victim Samantha Killary. Their brief urges the state Supreme Court not to allow a retroactive expansion of the statute of limitations for filing sexual abuse claims and not to allow third parties to be held liable for knowing about abuse but not acting.

Trustee officers of the Executive Committee have said…

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Two women are accusing Hillsdale College, a private Christian school in Hillsdale, Mich., of silencing them and “blaming” them for their rapes, instead of their assailants, according to a lawsuit filed last week.

The women, Grace Chen and Danielle Villarreal, told USA Today they began attending Hillsdale because they thought it would be safe. But their suit, filed in the Western District of Michigan, claims that Hillsdale “fostered a campus environment that exposes students to an unacceptable and unusually high risk of sexual assault.”  

The suit adds, “When brave students report their experiences of sexual assault to school officials, they are met not with support, but with sham investigations, arbitrary decisions, and punishments,” the lawsuit said. “In response to calls for transparency and accountability, Hillsdale instead silences and threatens survivors, blaming them, not their assailants for their assaults.”

The suit claims Hillsdale failed to respond appropriately…

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Guardian investigation found the church routinely uses deaths of paedophile priests to avoid paying or to reduce amount of settlements

The Catholic church has lost a landmark case over its controversial use of the deaths of paedophile priests to thwart survivors’ attempts at justice.

The high court on Wednesday delivered a significant blow to the church’s use of permanent stays in historical abuse matters, where it has sought to argue that delay, the death of perpetrators, and the loss of records render it unable to receive a fair trial.

Earlier this year, a Guardian investigation found that the church was now routinely using permanent stays in cases where perpetrators have died, either to defeat active claims before the courts or to low-ball survivors in settlement negotiations. The tactic is causing profound harm to an already vulnerable group.

Critics say the tactic is immoral, given the church’s own role in delaying justice…

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A former priest at St. John’s Jesuit High School has been added to a list of those with established allegations of sexual abuse toward minors.

According to a statement from SJJ, Father Francis Canfield died in May of 2023. He was a faculty member at St. John’s from 1990 to 2005.

The school said in a statement that a former student told the Church in 2002 about alleged sexual abuse that occurred during the 1999-2000 school year. The claim was investigated by the Church and determined to be “established”.

The full list kept by the Jesuit Midwest Province can be found here. Read the full statement from the school leadership below:

St. John’s Jesuit High School has been notified by the Midwest Province of the Society of Jesus that Fr. Francis E. Canfield, SJ has been placed on the public list of Jesuits with an established allegation…

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Following the publication of an ombudsman’s report on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church in Spain, the country’s bishops renew their apology to abuse victims, saying some media estimates are not true and affirming that the “shadow of suspicion” should not extend to all clergy and religious.

On Tuesday, the Spanish Bishops’ Conference (CEE) held a press conference on the Extraordinary Plenary Assembly that took place on 30 October to discuss an official public report released last week on sexual abuse in the Church in Spain.

The “Gabilondo Report”

The report is the result of an investigation conducted by Ombudsman Ángel Gabilondo, and was presented to the Spanish Congress of Deputies on Friday, 27 October.

Included in the report is a survey based on 8,000 phone and online responses. The poll found that 1.13% of the Spanish adults questioned said they were abused as children either by priests or lay…

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Father Francis Canfield, who died in May, was accused last year by a former student who said the abuse happened during the 1999-2000 school year.

A priest who taught at St. John’s High School in the 1990s and early 2000s has been added to the list of Jesuits with “established allegations” of sexual abuse of a minor, according to a letter from the school.

St. John’s officials said Father Francis E. Canfield, who died in May, was accused by a former student who said the abuse happened during the 1999-2000 school year.

The former student reported the abuse in 2022, the school’s letter said. School officials then notified civil authorities, the letter said.

While no criminal charges were filed the Midwest Province of the Society of Jesus conducted its own investigation.

“Following required ecclesiastical procedures, the Midwest Jesuits engaged the services of an independent firm to investigate…

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