ABUSE TRACKER

AUSTRALIA
ABC News

There is shock at the arrest of a popular Catholic priest from the New South Wales Riverina, on a child sexual assault charge.

Father Neru Leuea, aged 49, of Narrandera was refused bail in Wagga Wagga Local Court on Thursday on a single charge of aggravated sexual assault of a girl aged under 16.

It is alleged that around 12 or 13 years ago he assaulted a girl who was then aged 10.

Father Neru spent seven years in Griffith and the city’s Mayor, John Dal Broi, said he knew the priest very well.

“I saw him every weekend when I went to church, an extremely popular priest here in Griffith,” he said.

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UNITED STATES
ChurchMilitant

by Christine Niles • November 9, 2015

There’s a new Bishop of Bling in town. Although the latest attempt by liberal media to taint the reputation of Cdl. Raymond Burke involves insinuations of a lavish lifestyle, missing in their crosshairs is their own favorite: Cdl. Donald Wuerl.

On November 4, British journalist Christopher Lamb, Rome correspondent for the left-leaning journal The Tablet, tweeted about the living quarters of various prelates’ apartments, including that of Cdl. Burke.

Others mentioned by Lamb include Cdl. Francis Arinze and Abp. Arthur Roche, among others.

Absent from Lamb’s public shaming was any mention of Cdl. Donald Wuerl, progressive media darling, who has publicly sparred with Cdl. Burke on the issue of Holy Communion to pro-abortion politicians as well as the divorced and civilly remarried. Wuerl, as ChurchMilitant.com has confirmed, lives in a Washington, D.C. penthouse as part of a complex valued at nearly $43 million.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington Examiner

By DANIEL ALLOTT (@DANIELALLOTT) • 11/12/15

A German Catholic bishop was once dubbed the “Bishop of Bling” for spending church funds on first-class air travel and extravagant renovations to his bishop’s residence. Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, the former Catholic bishop of Limburg in Germany, ordered renovations to his residence, including heated outdoor stones and bronze window panes, that reportedly cost nearly $43 million. In 2013, Pope Francis removed Tebartz-van Elst from the exercise of his episcopal office and a year later accepted his resignation as bishop of Limburg.

Now some are accusing Washington’s Cardinal Donald Wuerl of living a similarly lavish lifestyle. According to a report by the website churchmilitant.com, Wuerl resides in a Washington, D.C. penthouse atop Our Lady Queen of the Americas church on Embassy Row in Washington, D.C. Coincidentally, the residence is valued at the same amount that Tebartz-van Elst was spending to renovate his home: $43 million.

Wuerl’s posh living arrangements in D.C. are similar to those he enjoyed for 20 years as head of the Pittsburgh diocese. That home reportedly included a wine cellar, six-car garage, fine art, Oriental rugs and antiques.

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UNITED STATES
BishopAccountability.org

Summary of Case: Eric Middlecamp was a priest of the Society of the Divine Savior (Salvatorians), ordained in 1952. He taught in minor seminaries and high schools, was a boys’ camp director, hospital chaplain, and director of the Order’s foreign missions. His work took him to Wisconsin, Washington DC, Iowa, California and Arizona. Middlecamp was removed from active ministry in the early 1990s after the Salvatorians received allegations that he had sexually abused both boys and girls from the late 1950s through the 1970s. He was kept at the U.S. Province’s headquarters in Milwaukee where he was given the foreign missions job. Middlecamp died March 6, 2011.

Ordained: June 9, 1952
Died: March 6, 2011

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CALIFORNIA
KPBS

Thursday, November 12, 2015
By Maureen Cavanaugh, Peggy Pico, Neiko Will

The new film “Spotlight” chronicles the work of Boston Globe investigative reporters into the priest sex abuse scandal within the Catholic Church. One of the sources the reporters relied on is a San Diego mental health counselor and former priest who spent many years investigating the sexual lives of clergy.

Richard Sipe’s character in the movie isn’t seen on screen, but some of his many real life phone conversations with reporters are dramatized in the film and are voiced by actor Richard Jenkins.

Sipe, along with KPBS Roundtable host Mark Sauer, who reported extensively on the priest sex abuse scandal for The San Diego Union-Tribune, discuss the story told in the movie.

Listen to Midday Edition Now

San Diego Man’s Role In Uncovering Priest Sex Abuse Featured In ‘Spotlight’

GUESTS:
Richard Sipe, author, “A Secret World”
Mark Sauer, Roundtable host, KPBS News

Midday Edition airs Monday – Thursday at noon on KPBS Radio

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WISCONSIN
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2015

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

An ex-seminarian who reportedly tried to circumcise himself and was arrested in Wisconsin now admits he recently molested kids. We urge Milwaukee Catholic officials to publicize the abuser’s admission and aggressively reach out to anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered his crimes in Wisconsin.

[Spokesman-Review]

Kevin Sloniker was arrested in Menomonie WI and reportedly admitted to child sex crimes in Washington and Idaho. In 2005, he attended a Minnesota seminary but was allegedly removed.

For the safety of kids, and to help law enforcement, we call on Milwaukee Archbishop Jerome Listecki to use church websites, parish bulletins, pulpit announcements and personal appeals to reach out to others who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes by Sloniker.

And we call on bishops in Idaho and Spokane, where Sloniker’s crimes happened, to use church websites, parish bulletins, pulpit announcements and personal appeals to reach out to others who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes by Sloniker.

Sloniker was at Immaculate Conception Church in Post Falls, Idaho. He’s part of an arch-conservative Catholic group called the Society of St. Pius X. He’s not the first man with that group to face abuse allegations:

[SNAP]

All too often, when church staff and volunteers are arrested on child sex charges, bishops do nothing. All too often, corrupt church officials refuse to act and thus essentially protect criminals and endanger children. And all too often, secular officials with the power and duty to safeguard society’s most vulnerable pursue only church staff who commit about and ignore church staff who conceal abuse.

Church members and employees in northern Idaho and eastern Washington – especially Idaho Bishop Peter F. Christensen and Spokane Bishop Thomas Daly – have a moral and civic duty to help law enforcement investigate and prosecute Sloniker. They’ll be tempted, of course, to do nothing. But that’s wrong. And their inaction might help enable Sloniker to exploit legal technicalities and escape punishment and hurt more kids.

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CALIFORNIA
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on November 12, 2015

Why would Orange County Catholic parishioners go on a popular review site to voice their displeasure with how their parish is being run? Because no one else is listening. …and because the diocese won’t come clean about who truly manages the property that the parish now “owns.”

A few months ago, I wrote a post about Franciscan Friar Fr. Daniel Barica. Barica is currently the pastor of Sts. Simon and Jude Parish in Huntington Beach, a wealthy and popular parish close to the ocean. On the eve of the September papal visit, Barica devoted a homily and a letter in the parish bulletin to how he “blesses” his body parts (including his sexual energy) in front of the mirror after his daily shower.

But there’s more. At the time, frustrated parishioners had reached out to me for help, because for them, the problem is much more extensive. Barica, they say, is not listening to their concerns, kicking long-time parishioners out of the parish, changing the rules for weddings and funerals, creating a hostile environment in the neighborhood by installing surveillance cameras pointed at neighbors homes, and—most importantly—they say he is bullying employees and church members who disagree with him.

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UNITED STATES
Crux

By Michael O’Loughlin
National reporter November 12, 2015

American bishops will gather in Baltimore next week for their fall General Assembly, where they will elect new committee chairmen, weigh minor changes to their Catholic voting guide, and consider taking action against pornography.

The potential decision to dedicate resources to combatting pornography, a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States, would be a first for US bishops. The viewing of pornography is causing a crisis in marriages and families, they believe, so whatever strategies they develop would be aimed at Catholic leaders and parents, according to Buffalo Bishop Richard J. Malone.

The Church teaches that pornography is a form of spiritual adultery that harms human dignity and immerses users in a perverse fantasy world that can hurt their relationships. Given Pope Francis’ focus on the family through two international bishops’ summits, the US Church could employ priests and bishops in their traditional role as pastoral counselors.

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LOUISIANA
The Times-Picayune

By Michelle Hunter, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune
on November 12, 2015

New Orleans police arrested the pastor of a Marrero church accused of raping a child, WVUE-TV reported.

Reverend Dr. Sherman Smith, 56, of Algiers, was booked Wednesday (Nov. 11) with molestation of a juvenile or a person with a mental or physical disability, aggravated rape of a victim under the age of 13, sexual battery and two counts of indecent behavior with a juvenile.

Smith is a pastor at Second Highway Baptist Church, 1533 block of Haydel Drive, Marrero. NOPD has not released any other details about his arrest.

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LOUISIANA
Fox 8

NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) –
New Orleans police arrested an Algiers man, who is also a pastor at Second Highway Baptist Church in Marrero, for aggravated rape of a child under 13.

Reverend Dr. Sherman Smith, 56, was booked into Orleans Parish Prison on Wednesday at 11:09 a.m. He faces charges of aggravated rape, sexual battery, molestation of a juvenile or person with a mental or physical disability, and two counts of incident behavior with a juvenile.

Smith was taken into custody in Algiers. The NOPD did not release other details of the case.

Smith appeared in magistrate court where his bond was set at $180,000, according to court documents. The court appointed a public defender as his attorney.

His church is located in the 1500 block of Haydel Drive. FOX 8 has reached out other church leaders for comment.

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CALIFORNIA
Santa Barbara Independent

1931 – 2013
The Worst of What We Lived

Thursday, February 13, 2014
by PAUL FERICANO

On November 23, 2013, the Franciscan priest responsible for molesting me and hundreds of other boys at St. Anthony’s Seminary in Santa Barbara during the’60s, quietly passed away in a California hospital at the age of 82. Mario Cimmarrusti committed crimes that made him one of the most notorious perpetrators in the history of the clergy sex abuse scandal. It’s fair to say that he was detested not only by his victims, their families, and the community at large, but by the majority of his fellow friars, most, if not all of whom, chose to ignore and alienate him during the last years of his life.

Many have argued that Mario got off easy. Over the years, and since the scandal first came to light in 1992, the Franciscans have paid out millions of dollars in damages to settle civil suits brought by those who suffered abuse at Mario’s hands. But due to the statute of limitations he never faced criminal charges. Dozens of survivors I know believe they were cheated by the legal system. The best of what they hoped for was stolen from them by a priest who got away with unspeakable sins. “He should have died behind bars rotting in prison,” one survivor told me when he learned of Mario’s death.” This bitterness has been echoed by many others.

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NEW MEXICO
SF Gate

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The upcoming release a movie detailing the Boston Globe’s 2002 investigation into the church’s cover-up of clergy abuse may bring up “horrific memories” for New Mexico victims of sex abuse, Santa Fe Archbishop John Wester said.

In a recent letter to Archdiocese of Santa Fe priests and parishioners last week, Wester said that the movie “Spotlight” is a chance for the faithful to pray for abuse victims.

“The film will undoubtedly touch a raw nerve for those abused by the clergy, opening old wounds and triggering horrific memories that continue to haunt and disturb them,” Wester wrote.

However, Wester said it was up to church leadership to reach out to those who were victimized.

“The Archdiocese of Santa Fe and I are resolutely committed to seeking the forgiveness of those who have been abused by Roman Catholic clergy and at the same time dedicated to the aid in the reconciliation and healing process,” he said.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Get Surrey

A retired vicar and teacher has been found guilty of the historic sex abuse of four boys.

Roger Wakely, a former pastor at The Bishop Wand Church of England School, in Sunbury, had used his position to molest the boys aged from 12 to 15 years.

At Guildford Crown Court, the jury unanimously found him guilty of all 21 charges on Tuesday (November 10).

At the start of trial he pleaded guilty to an additional six counts of indecent assault involving two of the four victims.

Two of the boys attended Ealing Grammar School and one went to Bishop Wand.

Wakely abused his victims in a period from the 1960s to the 1980s, the jury was told.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Philly

BY BETH GRIFFIN
Catholic News Service

Joseph F. X. Zahra, deputy coordinator of the Vatican’s Council for the Economy, said his group identified dioceses that exercise good financial management, operate in “an open, transparent manner” and have “the right controls in place to avoid misuse of funds.” He is pictured in a 2012 photo. (CNS photo/courtesy Aid to the Church in Need)

RYE, N.Y. (CNS) — The financial reforms established by the Vatican’s new Council for the Economy drew on good management practices of dioceses in the United States and elsewhere and will serve as a model for dioceses throughout the world, according to a Maltese economist tapped by Pope Francis to modernize the church’s obsolete financial structure.

Joseph F. X. Zahra, the council’s deputy coordinator, said his group identified dioceses that exercise good financial management, operate in “an open, transparent manner” and have “the right controls in place to avoid misuse of funds.” He declined to name specific dioceses and also said good management practices were not confined to the United States.

Zahra predicted the new financial “machinery and administration” will position the Curia as a “best practices” benchmark for other dioceses worldwide to follow.

Zahra spoke to Catholic News Service by telephone Nov. 11 from the University of Notre Dame in Indiana where he addressed students, faculty and administrators. His visit there was part of a series of “communications sessions” organized by Centimus Annus Pro Pontifice, a pontifical foundation dedicated to social justice.

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UNITED STATES
Los Angeles Times

Lewis Beale

Sadistic nuns. Pedophile priests. Criminal coverups within the Roman Catholic Church. It seems Catholicism can’t win at the multiplex these days. In based-on-fact films such as 2013’s “Philomena,” 2002’s “The Magdalene Sisters,” last year’s “Jimmy’s Hall” and the don’t-take-it-too-seriously “The Da Vinci Code” from 2006, the Catholic Church comes off as a totalitarian institution sucking the joy out of its parishioners, willing to resort to murder to hide its secrets.

This year, a new film takes the church to task. “Spotlight,” from Open Road Films and starring Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Liev Schreiber and Rachel McAdams, tells the true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered a clergy sex abuse scandal in the local archdiocese. It shows the church as a powerful force willing to do almost anything — transferring priests from parish to parish, covering up out-of-court settlements, pressuring the paper to tone down its coverage — to protect the sexual predators in its midst.

It wasn’t always this way. For years the Catholic Church was portrayed in a highly favorable light. Priests were kindly Bing Crosby types (1945’s “The Bells of St. Mary’s”) or tough but compassionate and socially conscious, a la Spencer Tracy in 1938’s “Boys Town.” And a whole slew of sometimes stern, but generally kindly, nuns were often played by hall of fame beauties like Ingrid Bergman (“The Bells of St. Mary’s”), Audrey Hepburn (1959’s “The Nun’s Story”) and Deborah Kerr (in 1957’s “Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison”).

This disparity is the result of the Motion Picture Production Code, which set moral guidelines for the industry and was in force from the 1930s until the 1960s. Hoping to avoid government censorship of movies, studio heads adopted a set of strictures written by Father Daniel A. Lord, a Jesuit priest, and Martin Quigley, the Catholic editor of the trade paper Motion Picture Herald. The code was then administered for many years by another Catholic, Joseph Breen.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Philly

BY MARK PATTISON
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) — The U.S. church still stands ready to help the victims of clergy sexual abuse, according to Bishop Edward J. Burns of Juneau, Alaska, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Child and Youth Protection.

“Victims of abuse have helped us see the errors of the past,” Bishop Burns said in a Nov. 10 telephone interview from Juneau with Catholic News Service. “It’s important that we assist them in the healing process.”

Bishop Burns added, “We express our gratitude for the way they’ve called us to look at ourselves, and see that there is a need to change, to be contrite, and to assist in the healing process. It’s important that we continue to work together in order to be sure that there is a safe environment within the church, and that we never grow lax in assuring that all our children are safe.”

He cited background checks for close to 99 percent of the diocesan and religious priests and deacons, and safe environment instruction for 92 percent of the estimated 4.4 million children who have been enrolled in Catholic educational programs.

“What needs to be done? We need to get to 100 percent,” Bishop Burns said.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Patsy McGarry

Thu, Nov 12, 2015

And so ends one of the sorriest sagas in the abuse crisis which has engulfed the Catholic Church in Ireland. It first came to public notice with the jailing of Fr Brendan Smyth in 1994.

On March 29th 1975 Fr Seán Brady, later the Catholic primate, was asked by Bishop McKiernan to conduct a canonical inquiry into allegations of abuse against the Norbertine priest.

Fr Brady was then a 35-year-old canon lawyer and teacher at St Patrick’s College, Cavan, but he acted also as part-time secretary to Bishop McKiernan in the Kilmore diocese.

Shortly afterwards, Fr Brady and local canon lawyer Msgr Francis Donnelly, interviewed Brendan Boland in Dundalk. Also present was Fr McShane, who has since left the priesthood.

The latter was there as support for the teenager because his father was not allowed sit in as that was contrary to canon law procedures, despite the seriousness of the allegations that he was making.

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VATICAN CITY
The Seattle Times

By NICOLE WINFIELD
The Associated Press

VATICAN CITY — The Vatican is no stranger to drama, intrigue or scandal. But even by Vatican standards, this has been one hell of a month.

Ever since Pope Francis returned from his triumphant visit to the United States, nearly every day has brought surreal revelations of bishops behaving badly, cardinals resisting reform and ideological battles over everything from the theology of marriage to the Vatican’s cigarette sales.

By Wednesday, the Vatican had had enough and issued a series of statements disputing reports left and right, only to end the day with confirmation that two Italian journalists were now under investigation by Vatican magistrates for their involvement in the latest scandal over leaked documents.

How did we get here?

Francis’ crazy month began with a monsignor from the Vatican’s doctrine office outing himself as gay (boyfriend by his side) and denouncing the “hypocrisy” of the church’s doctrine on homosexuality the day before Francis opened his big bishop meeting on family life.

Then, 13 prominent cardinals penned a (leaked) missive to Francis warning that the Catholic Church risked collapse if he went ahead with his reformist agenda at the synod.

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IRELAND
RTE News

The Court of Appeal has halted three actions for damages brought against the Catholic Church over the failure to stop paedophile priest, Father Brendan Smyth, sexually abusing children.

A man, his sister and a cousin, took actions against the Bishop of Kilmore, Dr Leo O’Reilly in his capacity as representative of the Kilmore diocese.

The appeal court upheld the High Court’s decision to stop the actions.

All three had also sued Cardinal Sean Brady, in his personal capacity arising from his role as part-time secretary to the former Bishop of Kilmore, Francis McKiernan, during a church investigation in 1975 into complaints about Smyth.

Legal sources suggest today’s judgment means Cardinal Brady cannot now be pursued by the plaintiffs either.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 12 November 2015 (VIS) – The Holy Father has appointed Bishop Marcel Damphousse of Alexandria-Cornwall, Canada, as bishop of Sault Sainte Marie (area 265,000, population 436,000, Catholics 239,200, priests 90, permanent deacons 66, religious 174), Canada. He succeeds Bishop Jean-Louis Plouffe, whose resignation from the pastoral care of the same diocese upon reaching the age limit was accepted by the Holy Father.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 12 November 2015 (VIS) – The following is the full text of the communique issued yesterday afternoon by the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples on news relating to its ownership of real estate.

“The Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, also known as ‘Propaganda Fide’, adheres fully to the Holy Father Francis’ line of thought and guidance with regard to the life and reform of the Roman Curia; in addition, it his committed to pursuing the institutional aims set forth in the Apostolic Constitution ‘Pastor Bonus’, as well as respecting the will of donors who over the years have contributed to its missionary work. Therefore, it welcomes all the administrative reforms anticipated by the Secretary for the Economy and submits all the budgets and final accounts to the latter.

Certain insinuations on the part of certain sectors of the media, which circulate news not corresponding to the truth, are therefore unacceptable. It has been written, for example, that the Congregation offers luxury properties for rent at low prices as favours, and even that it hosts a spa or is the proprietor of the Hotel Priscilla.

The real estate belonging to the Congregation, donated for the Missions, is rented at market value; there are exceptions in the case of situations of poverty. The aforementioned properties are rented in accordance with current Italian legislation, to which both the Congregation as the owner and the recipient are subject.

The income deriving from the rent of these properties, for which regular tax is paid in Italy (in 2014 the Dicastery paid IMU – imposta municipale unica, property tax, of 2,169,200 euros in Rome alone) is destined principally for the maintenance of the Congregation, the Pontifical Urbanian University, the Pontifical Collegio Urbano, the missionary institutions and young Churches in the mission territories.

Propaganda Fide is grateful to the benefactors who, with its help, make it possible for the Gospel to be announced and provide support for innumerable educational, social and healthcare initiatives in the poorest countries.

We wish to clarify that, should such dissemination of false or biased information recur, this Congregation will be obliged to protect its image in the appropriate forums”.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 12 November 2015 (VIS) – The Holy See Press Office yesterday issued the following communique:

“Various articles have been published by news agencies and in the press referring in a biased and inaccurate way to the content of a confidential document, based on the assumption that in the past the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See (APSA) has been used for illegal financial activity. The Vatican legal authorities have opened an investigation into the circulation of this document. APSA has always collaborated with the competent bodies, is not under investigation and continues to conduct its activities in accordance with current regulations”.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 12 November 2015 (VIS) – The director of the Holy See Press Office, Fr. Federico Lombardi, S.J., made the following declaration late yesterday afternoon:

“The Vatican Gendarmerie, in their role as judicial police, have informed the Vatican prosecutors that the activity carried out by the journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi may constitute complicity in the crime of disseminating confidential news and documents, pursuant to Law No. IX of Vatican City State, of 13 July 2013 (article 116 bis).

Since the beginning of the investigation the prosecution has obtained pieces of evidence indicating the collaboration in offence by the journalists, who are now therefore under investigation.

The investigators are also examining some other situations regarding persons who, for reasons of office, could have cooperated in the acquisition the reserved documents in question.

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UNITED STATES
Los Angeles Times

The film “Spotlight,” which depicts the Boston Globe’s investigative reporting team — nicknamed Spotlight — uncovering the local Catholic Church’s coverup of sexual abuse within its ranks, was co-written by Josh Singer and director Tom McCarthy. Here’s their take on how the script came together.

Josh: For us, the story of “Spotlight” starts in 2001 with the actual Spotlight team nailing the story of a systematic coverup of clergy sex abuse in Boston. Of course, one might argue that the story began before that, with the [former priest James R.] Porter case in 1992. Or even before that, with Richard Sipe and the research he started doing in the late ‘60s. So, I guess it’s not surprising that as our story moves forward, it also reaches back, pulling up moments from the past in order to shine a light on the present.

Tom: Now you’re going to say that’s what a journalist does.

Josh: Well, it’s kind of what a journalist does. But what I was getting at is that, for me, our story starts on Kosciuszko Circle, the rotary in Dorchester, trying to figure out which turnout was Morrissey Boulevard, the road that would take us to the Boston Globe for the first time.

Tom: We’d both spent time in school in Boston but there we were, totally lost, trying to find the Globe.

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CALIFORNIA
The Bay Area Reporter

by Cynthia Laird
c.laird@ebar.com

Father John Conley, a gay man who entered the priesthood later in life but was castigated by Archdiocese of San Francisco officials after he reported to police a fellow cleric who he suspected of sexually abusing an altar boy, died November 4 at his residence in South San Francisco. He was 71.

Mr. Conley was a federal prosecutor when he decided to follow his dream of becoming a priest. According to a news release from the archdiocese, Mr. Conley entered Saint Patrick’s Seminary and was ordained to the priesthood April 17, 1993 at Saint Mary’s Cathedral in San Francisco by then-Archbishop John R. Quinn.

But it was in his role as a whistleblower that he made news, having witnessed what he believed were improper actions by another priest, James Aylward, at a Burlingame church in 1997. Mr. Conley reported the incident to his superiors but was later viewed as an outcast by Aylward’s supporters.

Then-Archbishop William Levada transferred Mr. Conley to a parish in Mill Valley, and ordered him not to discuss the incident he witnessed with nuns assigned to St. Catherine’s parish, where Aylward was pastor, according to a 2004 SF Weekly article.

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UNITED STATES
The Tablet (UK)

12 November 2015 by Sean Smith, CNS

The US church still stands ready to help the victims of clergy sexual abuse, according to the head of the US Bishops’ Committee on Child and Youth Protection.

Bishop Edward J. Burns of Juneau, Alaska, said that the new film about abuse in Boston in 2002 still rightly shine a spotlight on the errors that the church in America has made, and will keep them working to make it right.

“Victims of abuse have helped us see the errors of the past,” Bishop Burns told the Catholic News Service. “It’s important that we assist them in the healing process.

“We express our gratitude for the way they’ve called us to look at ourselves, and see that there is a need to change, to be contrite, and to assist in the healing process. It’s important that we continue to work together in order to be sure that there is a safe environment within the church, and that we never grow lax in assuring that all our children are safe.”

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Mary Carolan

Thu, Nov 12, 2015

The Court of Appeal has halted three actions for damages brought against a Catholic Bishop in a representative capacity over the church’s alleged failure to act to prevent paedophile priest Fr Brendan Smyth sexually abusing children.

The three judge court on Thursday upheld a High Court decision stopping separate actions by a man, his sister and a cousin against the Bishop of Kilmore, Dr Leo O’Reilly, as representative of the Kilmore diocese.

The plaintiffs had also sued Cardinal Seán Brady in his personal capacity arising from his role as part-time secretary to former Bishop of Kilmore, Francis McKiernan, during a church investigation in 1975 into complaints about Smyth.

While Cardinal Brady had not made a similar application to Bishop O’Reilly, legal sources suggest the judgment means he too cannot be pursued by the plaintiffs.

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

November 12, 2015

Jorge Branco

A former headmaster at a Brisbane school that employed two paedophiles says he didn’t believe a teacher touching or fondling students’ genitals would be a criminal act.

Ex-St Paul’s School headmaster Gilbert Case made the admission in 10 minutes of questioning by counsel assisting David Lloyd before the child abuse royal commission adjourned for lunch on Thursday.

Mr Lloyd asked the former teacher a series of questions broadly relating to alleged complaints from a student that paedophile music teacher Gregory Robert Knight had exposed himself to boys during a game of “truth or dare” at a school camp in Caloundra, on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, in 1983.

He asked whether Mr Case would have considered actions like these inappropriate.

“My view was and I presume you know this, that that was a factor in that teacher leaving the school,” Mr Case said.

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VATICAN CITY
DFW Catholic

Vatican City, Nov 12, 2015 / 03:31 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The two Italian journalists who made headlines last week for authoring books on confidential Vatican financial documents are under investigation, and could face criminal charges.

In a Nov. 10 statement, the Vatican announced that journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi are currently being investigated for publishing the books, which contain leaked information from a former Vatican financial reform commission.

The investigation follows the arrest of two former members of the Commission for Reference on the Organization of the Economic Administrative Structure of the Holy See (COSEA).

The commission established by the Pope July 18, 2013, as part of his plan to reform the Vatican’s finances. It was dissolved after completing its mandate.

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

November 12, 2015

Jorge Branco
Journalist

The principal of a prestigious north Brisbane school knew a counsellor – now known to be a paedophile – was seeing students at his own home, a royal commission has heard.

St Paul’s School principal Margaret Goddard told the child sex abuse royal commission on Thursday that Gilbert Case, who preceded her as head of the school, made the admission before she took over in 2001.

She said at a meeting with Mr Case, he spoke about school counsellor Kevin Lynch, who killed himself in 1997 after being charged with sexually abusing a student at the school.

“During that meeting, which took place in Mr Case’s office, he told me a few things about Mr Lynch, and one of them was that he was aware students were seeing – students with St Paul’s were seeing Kevin Lynch at his home,” she said.

In the same meeting, Ms Goddard said Mr Case admitted he had received a complaint while Lynch was still alive from a mother who suspected Lynch had abused her son.

Mr Case denies any knowledge of Lynch’s abuses prior to his death and is expected to give evidence to the commission on Thursday.

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AUSTRALIA
Brisbane Times

[with audio]

November 12, 2015

Jorge Branco

Staff at a Brisbane private school were told former governor-general Peter Hollingworth had “washed his hands” of sexual abuse concerns and the school would be dealing with them “in-house”, a royal commission has heard.

The meeting took place one or two years after the death of Kevin John Lynch, who killed himself in January 1997 after being charged with sexually abusing a student at the Anglican St Paul’s School.

Dr Hollingworth was the Archbishop of the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane at the time.

On Thursday, former St Paul’s teacher Craig Patterson told the child abuse royal commission rumours surrounding Lynch’s abuse of students at the school grew from a “low rumble” to a “torrent” in the years after the counsellor’s death.

He said then-headmaster Gilbert Case addressed a full staff meeting about a year or two after Lynch’s death about how the school was dealing with the rumours.

“Mr Case… announced to the staff that number one because this was circulating, the whole thing about how the Archbishop, Hollingworth, was involved or not involved or what was going on,” he said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier-Mail

MATTHEW KILLORAN THE COURIER-MAIL NOVEMBER 12, 2015

A HANDWRITTEN note by former St Paul’s principal Gilbert Case revealed he was aware of allegations pedophile music teacher Gregory Robert Knight had cupped a boy’s genitals.

The document was referred to at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse, while Mr Case was questioned on his actions while in charge of the school at a time when “scores” of boys were abused by two pedophiles over 16 years.

Counsel assisting David Lloyd asked Mr Case about an undated note, written by the principal around the time Knight was allowed to resign, which listed a number of complaints against the teacher.

One of the allegations was that Knight had cupped the penis and testes of a student, known as BRX.

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NEW MEXICO
Albuquerque Journal

By Olivier Uyttebrouck / Journal Staff Writer
Thursday, November 12th, 2015

When former Gallup Bishop Donald Pelotte apologized to victims of sexual abuse by priests in 2005, he singled out Clement Hageman as among “the most abusive priests in the diocese.”

This week, one of the two insurers expected to provide money to settle the Diocese of Gallup Chapter 11 bankruptcy said that claims filed by 16 of Hageman’s alleged victims are not covered by the diocese’s insurance policies.

If a judge agrees, “then no coverage would exist for approximately 16 claimants where Father Hageman is alleged to have been the abuser,” an attorney for the New Mexico Property and Casualty Guaranty Association said in a motion filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Albuquerque.

Hageman pastored Madre de Dios Church in Winslow, Ariz., until his death in 1975.

The 16 claimants are among 57 alleged victims of clerical sexual abuse who have filed claims in the two-year-old bankruptcy case.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC – PM

TIM PALMER: To the latest from the child abuse royal commission, where former governor-general Peter Hollingworth has been accused of “washing his hands” of sexual abuse concerns at a Brisbane school. That allegation was made by a former teacher at St Paul’s School.

And in a long-awaited appearance, the school’s former headmaster, Gilbert Case, was also questioned about his knowledge of the abuse at the time. He told the hearing he didn’t think the behaviour was criminal.

Thomas Oriti reports, and a warning: this story contains graphic details some listeners may find disturbing.

THOMAS ORITI: It was January 1997 when Kevin John Lynch took his own life. And about 500 people went to the funeral, paying tribute to the man who’d been a staple part of their school.

As the counsellor at St Paul’s in Brisbane’s north, he’d seen countless students for years behind locked doors. A number of them have given evidence at the royal commission this week and there appears to be a common theme.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
KSHB

Dia Wall

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – One week after his installation, Bishop James Johnston presided over a healing service for those impacted by sexual abuse.

It’s one of six services supported by the Office of Child and Youth Protection.

“I hurt and I’m very sorry and sorrowful for anyone in the church, especially children or vulnerable people who were harmed by those who should have protected them,” Johnston said.

“So I’m especially grieved by those who may have been harmed or were harmed by someone in the church that was given a sacred trust.”

People like William Kopp, who was repeatedly molested by Kansas City priest Tom Reardon as a boy.

“He took away my formidable years of creativity, he took away any chance I had of a normal life, what it does to you, you can’t explain it but you feel guilt and shame,” Kopp said.

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UNITED STATES
The Oregonian

By Jeff Baker | The Oregonian/OregonLive
on November 12, 2015

“Spotlight” is a straightforward movie, written, acted and directed in a conventional, old-fashioned way, that tells an extraordinary story: how in 2001-02 a team of investigative reporters and editors from The Boston Globe exposed a pattern of sexual abuse by Catholic priests. The Globe articles showed how the church sheltered pedophile priests and transferred them to different parishes where they could commit the same awful crimes on innocent children.

It is not an exaggeration to say the Globe’s reporting changed the world. The problem of pedophiles within the priesthood was not new or unique to Boston and had been written about elsewhere; it was well-known in law enforcement and among networks of abuse survivors. But the Globe’s reporting, particularly the way it showed a systemic coverup within the church, sparked investigations that have led to billions of dollars in settlements and an apology from Pope Francis, who said the church must “weep and make reparation” for what he called the actions of a “sacrilegious cult” of priests. Title cards at the end of “Spotlight” list hundreds of cities around the world, including Portland, where child abuse scandals within the Catholic church have been uncovered.

The Globe’s Spotlight team did not set out to make history. It took an outsider, new editor Marty Baron, to put fresh eyes on what was considered an isolated incident and asked if there was a connection to other cases. The Globe’s staff was uneasy about Baron’s arrival and worried about rumors of layoffs after the paper’s acquisition by The New York Times. Baron saw a reference in a Globe column about sealed files in a case involving a pedophile priest, John Geoghan, and decided the paper would sue to obtain the files, putting it in direct conflict with the church. Baron directed the Spotlight team leader and self-described “player-coach,” Walter Robinson, and his supervisor Ben Bradlee Jr. to pursue the story. The Spotlight staff, reporters Sacha Pfeiffer, Matt Carroll, and Mike Rezendes, did so in time-tested ways: Pfeiffer began locating and interviewing abuse victims, Carroll dug into documents, Rezendes worked a source, victims’ attorney Mitchell Garabedian.

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GEORGIA
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

By Gracie Bonds Staples – The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Early one morning last week, as a steady drizzle fell from a dull gray sky, dozens of victims of child sexual abuse and the people who love them filed into Victory World Church in Norcross to pray.

The hourlong prayer vigil had been arranged by Voice Today, the Marietta nonprofit with a mission to break the silence and cycle of child sexual abuse, in recognition of their pain and to ease the sense of helplessness that comes with it.

For some, such a gathering might seem inadequate, but it is what people do, especially when they are hurting. Angela Williams, Voice Today’s founder and CEO, was hoping it was happening everywhere.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Jacob Kagi

Statutory time limits preventing victims of sexual abuse from taking civil action many years later could be scrapped, if WA’s Parliament passes legislation to be introduced by a backbench Liberal MP.

Eyre MP Graham Jacobs will this morning introduce a bill seeking to remove the six-year statute of limitations for sexual abuse cases in WA.

If the legislation passes, it will allow people who suffered physical or mental injuries as a result of abuse to take civil action seeking compensation, regardless of how long ago it occurred.

Dr Jacobs said Victoria had already moved to implement similar laws and it was only a matter of time before other states followed suit, saying WA should make sure it was not last in line.

“The average latency period from the time of tort, as the lawyers would say, and the victim declaring that it had occurred is 24 years. So well outside the six years,” he said.

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CHILE
Cooperativa

El ex párroco de El Bosque, Fernando Karadima, declaró este miércoles ante el ministro Juan Manuel Muñoz en el Palacio de Tribunales, en el marco de la querella presentada por sus víctimas en contra del Arzobispado al que culpan de encubrir los abusos sexuales.

“No reconozco los abusos, con niños nunca, jamás”, enfatizó el sacerdote en la declaración judicial a la que accedió Cooperativa.

Karadima dijo que “respecto de los actores (los querellantes) sostengo mi inocencia. Con respecto a Hamilton yo fui su confesor, eso ya lo dije anteriormente y tuve un careo en la causa criminal con él, pero no me acuerdo”.

“Nunca tuve relaciones sexuales con los actores”, recalcó.

En esa línea, Karadima descartó que las denuncias de abuso fueran para dañar a la Iglesia. “No lo he pensado nunca. Los denunciantes son católicos y yo no tengo por qué pensar que busquen dañar a la Iglesia”.

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CHILE
Fox News

November 11, 2015
Associated Press

SANTIAGO, Chile – A prominent priest who has been punished for sex abuse by the Vatican proclaimed his innocence in court Wednesday, testifying in a case that three of his alleged victims brought against Chile’s Catholic Church.

Gray-haired and balding, the Rev. Fernando Karadima walked into court wearing a Roman collar and left holding rosary beads, flanked by police officers after being questioned for more than two hours.

Angry protesters waited outside. Some screamed “Pedophile!” and banged on the tinted windows of the dark SUV that drove him back to the convent where he has been living in isolation since the Vatican ordered him to a life of penance and prayer in 2011 for abusing young boys.

“I don’t recognize the abuses, with children. Never, ever,” Karadima testified, according to a court transcript obtained by The Associated Press. “I maintain my innocence … I never had sexual relations with those who accuse me.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

(Vatican Radio) The Vatican’s Secretary of State said the “Vatileaks” case has caused a “heavy atmosphere,” and called some press reports on the case “very emotional, if not hysterical.”

“I do not believe these polemics can create a tranquil atmosphere,” Cardinal Pietro Parolin told Vatican Radio.

“Indeed, it creates a heavy atmosphere,” he said. “If we look at press, we see unreasonable attacks with little meaning, that are ill-conceived and very emotional, if not hysterical.”

However, Cardinal Parolin said “God can write straight with crooked lines,” and said although the leaking of Vatican documents is “an attack on the Church,” the situation can be “turned to the good” if welcomed with a “spirit of conversion.”

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VATICAN CITY
Deutsche Welle

[with video]

The Vatican has put two Italian journalists under investigation for their alleged role in divulging state secrets. The pair wrote books detailing gross financial mismanagement and corruption within the church.

Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi were being investigated on suspicion of “complicity in committing a crime,” Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said Wednesday.

The journalists last week published two books based on classified documents leaked from a committee that was set up by Pope Francis to review the Vatican’s financial affairs.

Their works outline the mammoth challenge Pope Francis faces in reforming the Catholic Church and include revelations of theft, wasteful spending and greed within the secretive city-state.

The investigation by Vatican magistrates has already led to the arrest of two members of the commission who had access to the documents. Lombardi said he expected more Holy See officials to be placed under investigation.

In the Italian and Vatican legal systems, it is not unusual for magistrates to carry out such probes without charges ever being filed. It may also be difficult for the state-city to investigate the two Italian nationals if they were given the documents outside Vatican territory.

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ROME
The Local

Rome properties owned by the Vatican are being used as saunas and massage parlours, according to the latest leaks in the Italian press.

The buildings are also allegedly being rented out for cheap to powerful friends and allies, the reports said.

The revelations come a week after the Vatican arrested a priest and a former employee on suspicion of leaking documents, which formed the basis of two new books, detailing the murky world of the Vatican’s finances.

Luxury homes were rented out at knock-down prices, and hotels and beauty centres managed by private companies became places “to meet secretly”, the reports said.

Some of the properties listed include premises close to the Italian Parliament and a solarium near Piazza Barberini.

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CONNECTICUT
Norwalk Daily Voice

by Amy Maciaszek 11/11/2015

NORWALK, CONN. — A panel discussion Nov. 17 at Norwalk Community College about clergy sex abuse news in Connecticut features three area journalists who’ve covered it.

It also includes a viewing of the trailer for the newly released film “Spotlight” that focuses on Catholic clergy sex abuse coverage in the Boston area.

Norwalk Community College is partnering with the Connecticut chapter of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) to host the panel discussion that features Dave Altimari, Tom Connor and Dan Tepfer, three Connecticut journalists who have spent years writing about the problem of sex abuse, college officials said.

Titled “Spotlight on Investigative Journalism: Covering the Clergy Sex Abuse Crisis,” the event takes place from 1:30-3 p.m., Nov. 17, in the college’s East Campus Glen Re Forum.

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METHUEN (ma)
St. Monica Parish

This weekend a movie was released in the cinemas called Spotlight. It is a dramatic portrayal of a very real and painful scandal in the life of the Church in the Archdiocese of Boston. It depicts the work of The Boston Globe Spotlight Team in breaking the story of the sexual abuse of minors by priests in the Archdiocese in January, 2002. The scandal was amplified by the failure of bishops to remove priests from ministry and in some cases moving them to other parishes and even other parts of the country where they abused more children. Though the number of abusive priests was small as a percentage of the total number of priests, sadly many of these priests had a large number of victims. I am aware that St. Monica Parish suffered tremendous pain, particularly at the hands of one notorious priest. It brings me great sadness to know that parishioners, and their families, have suffered such pain. To my knowledge, St. Lucy Parish
thankfully did not suffer the same trauma.

My second year in the seminary 2003-2004, a family friend, roughly my age, called me. He knew I had entered the seminary and he trusted me. He told me that he had been abused by a priest as a pre-teen. I did the best I could to convince him that what happened was not his fault, as he seemed to think it was. I knew he needed far more help than I could provide. I convinced him to go to the office the Archdiocese had established in Newton to help victims and I went with him that day. As we met the staff in the lobby and exchanged greetings I thought I’d be merely waiting for him in the lobby. To my surprise, he insisted that I stay in the meeting with them. Of course I complied with his request as the counselors advised whatever would put him most at ease. He then described very vividly what was done to him, in far more detail than when we had spoken before. It remains, even after seven years of priesthood, by far the most painful and difficult pastoral experience I have ever encountered. It is hard to describe his pain which you could see so vividly in his shaking as he spoke. Knowing that some of you, and your loved ones, have experienced the pain that I saw this man enduring is heartbreaking and something of which I am keenly aware.

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VATICAN CITY
Reuters

VATICAN CITY | BY PHILIP PULLELLA

A leaks scandal rocking the papacy widened on Wednesday as the Vatican put two Italian journalists under investigation and said it suspected other Holy See officials had helped two arrested for stealing documents.

The latest twist in the scandal came in a statement about the two journalists who wrote books based on the leaks. It said they were being investigated on suspicion of “complicity in committing a crime.”

The leaks are one of the biggest internal scandals to hit the papacy of Pope Francis and were reminiscent of the “Vatileaks” furor that preceded the resignation of former Pope Benedict in 2013. The Italian media has dubbed the latest episodes “Vatileaks II”.

“Investigators are also looking into the role of people who, because of their office positions (in the Vatican) may have cooperated in obtaining the confidential documents,” spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said in the statement, indicating that the scandal looked set to widen soon.

On Nov. 2, the Vatican announced the arrests of a high-ranking Holy See official and an Italian woman who works in public relations for allegedly leaking the documents to the authors of two new books.

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CALIFORNIA
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on November 11, 2015

A priest who worked for six years at Orange’s St. Joseph Hospital has been accused of improper conduct” in numerous assignments. The conduct was so bad, in fact, that he was “dismissed” from his home diocese and the US Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a warning to dioceses nationwide.

What did Orange Bishop Kevin Vann do with this warning? Not much. Same with San Bernardino’s Bishop Gerald Barnes.

So here’s the scoop: Fr. Peter Balili worked at Orange’s St. Joseph’s hospital as a part of his studies in “pastoral ministry.” The priest also had assignments in the San Bernardino and San Francisco dioceses. But in 2014, the Diocese of Belleville, IL, DISMISSED him from his duties after they learned of (what they vaguely describe as) “improper conduct.”

They also believe that he engaged in this conduct in his other assignments, including California. How did I find out about this? The Diocese of Cleveland actually does as they promise and is transparent about these warnings.

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NEW JERSEY
Road to Recovery

The Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, refuses to acknowledge, validate, and settle the claims of a man who was sexually abused repeatedly as a minor child by a repeat pedophile priest, Fr. John P. Nickas, at St. Rocco’s Parish, Newark, New Jersey

The Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, has acknowledged, validated and settled at least one other public claim against Fr. John P. Nickas but is stalling and foot-dragging regarding the credible claims of a man who was sexually assaulted repeatedly as a minor child by Fr. John P. Nickas, causing the clergy sexual abuse victim to be re-victimized

What
A press conference and demonstration alerting the media and general public that the Archdiocese of Newark is stalling and dragging its feet by not acting fairly and justly toward a man who was repeatedly sexually abused as a minor child by Fr. John P. Nickas, now deceased, at St. Rocco’s Catholic Church and Rectory in Newark, New Jersey

When
Thursday, November 12, 2015 at 11:00 am

Where
On the public sidewalk in front of the headquarters of the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, at 171 Clifton Avenue, Newark, New Jersey 07104

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

Why
When “John Doe” was approximately seven years old, he attended St. Rocco’s School in Newark, New Jersey, for his elementary school education. His family attended St. Rocco’s Church in Newark and “John Doe” became an altar server at approximately age seven. Fr. John P. Nickas, a Newark Archdiocesan priest assigned to St. Rocco’s Parish, Newark, caught “John Doe” stealing communion wafers, brought him to the basement of St. Rocco’s Church, and sexually assaulted the little boy. Sometime later, Fr. John P. Nickas brought “John Doe” into the rectory of St. Rocco’s Parish and sexually assaulted him again. After that, Fr. John P. Nickas brought “John Doe” and a friend of a similar age to St. Rocco’s Rectory and made both boys simulate a sex act with each other while Fr. John P. Nickas watched.

Sometime after these events, Fr. John P. Nickas left St. Rocco’s Parish but returned when “John Doe” was approximately fourteen years of age. Fr. John P. Nickas resumed his sexual abuse of “John Doe” as a minor teenager and sexually abused him in St. Rocco’s Rectory again.

Demonstrators will call on the Archdiocese of Newark to stop its stalling and foot-dragging, acknowledge and verify the claims of “John Doe,” and help him heal so he can gain a degree of closure.

Contacts
Dr. Robert M. Hoatson, Road to Recovery, Inc., Livingston, NJ – 862-368-2800
Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, Boston, MA – 617-523-6250

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CHILE
La Tercera

Carlos Reyes y Angélica Baeza
11 de noviembre del 2015

Sorpresa causó la llegada tres horas antes de lo estipulado, de Fernando Karadima al Palacio de Tribunales.

La declaración del ex párroco de El Bosque en el marco de la demanda civil interpuesta contra el Arzobispado, comenzó puntualmente a las 15.30 horas en la Quinta Sala de la Corte de Apelaciones, frente al ministro de fuero Juan Manuel Muñoz.

Karadima, quien fue condenado canónicamente por abusos en febrero de 2011, y obligado a llevar una vida de “oración y penitencia”, cumple su castigo en el convento de las Siervas de Jesús de la Caridad, ubicado en Providencia.

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CHILE
Yahoo! News

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — A prominent priest who has been punished for sex abuse is testifying in a court case that three of his victims brought against Chile’s Catholic Church.

Grey-haired and balding, the Rev. Fernando Karadima walked into court wearing a Roman collar on Wednesday. He was expected to be questioned for at least three hours and reporters were not allowed to be present.

The Vatican ordered Karadima to life of penance and prayer in 2011 for abusing young boys. A local judge later determined the allegations were truthful but said the time limit had expired for prosecution.

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UNITED STATES
WNPR

By LYDIA BROWN

Listen live at 9:00 am on Thursday.

In the early 2000s, a unit of Boston Globe reporters known as the “Spotlight” team uncovered child sex abuse in one of Boston’s most powerful institutions: the Catholic Church.

Now, their story is being told on the big screen, in a new film called “Spotlight.” This hour, we learn more about the movie with former Globe columnist Eileen McNamara. We also find out how the clergy abuse scandal has been — and continues to be — covered in other U.S. cities.

GUESTS:

Eileen McNamara – Journalism professor at Brandeis University; former columnist for The Boston Globe
Dave Altimari – Reporter on the Hartford Courant’s investigative desk
Jim Hackett – Childhood victim of clergy sex abuse; member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP)
Madeleine Baran – Investigative reporter at Minnesota Public Radio

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VATICAN CITY
GlobalPost

Agence France-Presse on Nov 11, 2015

The Vatican on Wednesday said its judicial authorities had launched a probe against two Italian journalists over confidential documents that were leaked to the media, revealing gross financial mismanagement at the heart of the secretive city-state.

Journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi are being investigated for possible complicity “in the offence of divulging confidential news and documents”, Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said.

The reporters last week published two explosive books shedding an unflattering light on corruption, theft and uncontrolled spending at the Vatican, basing their claims on leaked classified documents.

As part of the investigation into the disclosures the Vatican last week arrested an Italian PR expert, Francesca Immacolata Chaouqui, and Spanish priest Angel Vallejo Balda for allegedly stealing and leaking the classified documents to the media.

Both served on a special commission set up by Pope Francis to advise him on economic reform within the Vatican to clamp down on unbridled spending.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Liverpool Echo

An inquiry into institutional child sex abuse is to launch in Liverpool.

The first stage of the independent inquiry, the Truth Project, will pilot in the city next week with the view to expanding across the country.

The project allows victims and survivors to share their experience with the Inquiry during private sessions or via written statements.

Information received will be turned into anonymous summaries to inform the inquiries reports and recommendations.

Some of the institutions involved are the armed forces, local authorities, the media, schools, the NHS , religion organisations and voluntary and private organisations.

The inquiry aims to identify organisations and institutions that have failed in their duty to protect children from sexual abuse.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

11 November

The Chair of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, Hon Lowell Goddard DNZM is today announcing the start of the Inquiry’s Truth Project Pilot in Liverpool. She will visit organisations supporting victims and survivors of child sexual abuse to talk about the Truth Project and to hear about their hopes for how the Inquiry can provide an opportunity for victims and survivors to share their experiences.

The Truth Project will allow victims and survivors of child sexual abuse to share their experience with the Inquiry during a private session with a member of the Inquiry or via a written statement.

Inquiry chair Hon. Lowell Goddard DNZM said:

“I would like to thank the Merseyside Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre and Stepping Stones North Wales for meeting with me today. The work of organisations such as these is incredibly important in helping support victims and survivors of child sexual abuse. I am grateful for the time they have taken today to talk to me about their work and about some of the challenges faced by those whom they support.

It brings home to me the importance of the work of the Inquiry in identifying organisations and institutions which have failed in their duty to protect children from sexual abuse. And it highlights that this Inquiry must, as I have said before, shine a light on the failings of organisations and institutions across the breadth of England and Wales – and not simply within the Westminster context.

Next week, here in Liverpool the first phase of the Truth Project that I announced in July will begin. The Truth Project will enable victims and survivors of child sexual abuse to contribute to the work of the Inquiry. It will help us gain a better understanding of the patterns of abuse, and will assist in explaining why many crimes went unreported and undetected for so long, often leaving other children at risk of abuse in later years.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Sandra Laville
Wednesday 11 November 2015

An ambitious project to take testimony from thousands of victims of child abuse across the country will begin within days as part of an independent inquiry into institutionalised abuse.

The Truth project, set up by the Goddard inquiry into child abuse, will begin pilot hearings in Liverpool next Tuesday, where it will take evidence in private from victims in the north-west and north Wales. The commission said regional offices elsewhere in the country would be set up afterwards to take testimony from other victims.

It is hoped that the project – which is similar to one undertaken by the Australian Royal Commission – will provide a broader picture of the scale and nature of institutional child abuse. Anonymised accounts of the hearings will be published when the inquiry reports.

Justice Lowell Goddard, the chair of the inquiry, travelled to Liverpool on Wednesday to open the Truth project. She met staff from Merseyside Rape and Sexual Abuse support centre (Rasa) and Stepping Stones, based in north Wales, which support victims of child sexual abuse and will be providing support and advocacy for victims at the hearings.

“The Truth project will enable victims and survivors of child sexual abuse to contribute to the work of the inquiry,” Goddard said. “It will help us gain a better understanding of the patterns of abuse, and will assist in explaining why many crimes went unreported and undetected for so long, often leaving other children at risk of abuse in later years.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

The independent inquiry into child sexual abuse is to begin hearing directly from victims and survivors.

A pilot phase of the Truth Project, part of the inquiry headed by New Zealand judge Lowell Goddard, will begin in Liverpool next week.

Victims and survivors will be able to share their experiences in a private session or via a written statement.

Justice Goddard said it would help the inquiry understand why many crimes went unreported and undetected for so long.

The pilot scheme is part of the independent inquiry launched by Home Secretary Theresa May, looking at how institutions and organisations, including the BBC, police, armed forces, schools and children’s homes, handled abuse claims.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

(Vatican Radio) A communiqué released on Wednesday by the Holy See Press Office said that in the past few days partial and imprecise information has appeared in the secular press regarding the content of confidential documents pertaining to APSA, the Office that administrates the patrimony of the Holy See.

Reiterating that APSA continues to and always has collaborated with the competent authorities, the communiqué explains that leaked information appears to suggest that the institution has been used for illegal financial activities.

The Vatican Judiciary Authority – it continues – has opened an investigation into the leaking of these documents, and that APSA, which is not under investigation, continues to carry out its activities within full respect of the rules and regulations in force.

Also on Wednesday, a press release published by the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples describes the insinuations proffered by some media as “unacceptable.”
The Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples – also known as Propaganda Fide – says it is perfectly in line with Pope Francis’ reform of the Curia and it is committed to respect the will of donors who throughout the years have contributed to the funding of its missionary mandate.

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VATICAN CITY
Washington Post

By Nicole Winfield | AP November 11

VATICAN CITY — The Vatican said Wednesday it had placed two Italian journalists under investigation in its probe over leaked documents that revealed waste, greed and mismanagement at the highest levels of the Catholic Church hierarchy.

Journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi wrote two bombshell books detailing the uphill battle Pope Francis is facing in reforming the Vatican. Their books, released last week, were based on leaked documents from a reform commission Francis named to get a handle on the Vatican’s finances and propose reforms.

Already, two members of the commission who had access to the documents have been arrested.

Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi said Wednesday that Nuzzi and Fittipaldi had been placed under investigation by Vatican magistrates for their alleged role in dealing with the leaked documents. He said other officials were being looked at for having possibly cooperated in the scandal.

Reached in Berlin, Nuzzi said he knew nothing of the investigation. Fittipaldi was quoted by his L’Espresso magazine as saying the investigation is the price he has to pay for doing his job.

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UNITED STATES
Contra Costa Times

By Tim Stier, Oakland Tribune My Word © 2015 Bay Area News Group

The movie “Spotlight” opens in Bay Area theatres on Friday. It tells the story of the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigation team’s reporting in 2001 and 2002 on the clergy sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Boston and its cover-up by Cardinal Law.

To many, this movie will draw unwanted publicity to the Catholic Church. As a priest of the Roman Catholic diocese of Oakland in voluntary exile since 2005, I welcome this publicity.

I hope this movie shines the spotlight on Oakland and San Francisco so the full extent of abuse and cover-up right here in the Bay Area may be known.

For the truth is that if the same spotlight were to shine on the Catholic Church in San Francisco and Oakland, the news would be just as heartbreaking and horrifying as in Boston.

The reason the Boston Globe Spotlight team of journalists was able to shine such light on the Catholic Church in Boston was due to the courage of abuse survivors, journalists and a judge who forced the Archdiocese of Boston to open its secret files on scores of criminal priests.

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CANADA
Nunatsiaq Online

THOMAS ROHNER

Convicted of dozens of sex crimes against mostly Inuit children over a span of two decades, the former Roman Catholic priest, Eric Dejaeger, made a brief appearance at the Nunavut Court of Appeal in Iqaluit Nov. 10 to try to get at least some of those convictions overturned.

Dejaeger, appearing before Justice Robert Kilpatrick in baggy navy blue sweatpants and sweatshirt, with his head and beard recently trimmed, had filed a notice of appeal earlier this year, on March 26.

That notice lists six convictions that Dejaeger, now 69, is appealing, but contains so little detail that it’s not clear which incidents these convictions relate to.

But it remains likely that Dejaeger is appealing at least some of the 32 sex crimes against Igloolik children on which Kilpatrick convicted the former priest in September 2014.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Kirchen Zeitung

[The news of the abuse allegations against Bishop Heinrich Maria Janssen has caused consternation in the Hildesheim diocese. Many people doubt whether the allegations are correct.]

Die Nachricht von den Missbrauchsvorwürfen gegenüber Bischof Heinrich Maria Janssen hat im Bistum Bestürzung ausgelöst. Viele Menschen zweifeln, ob die Vorwürfe stimmen. Weihbischof Heinz-Günter Bongartz beantwortet die Fragen von Matthias Bode:

Die Menschen fragen sich, wie stichhaltig die Vorwürfe sind. Was spricht für die Glaubwürdigkeit des Opfers?

Dafür spricht einiges. Der Betroffene konnte zahlreiche Details wie Umstände, Zeit und Orte des Missbrauchs benennen. Wir haben diese Angaben, so weit möglich, geprüft und sind zu dem Schluss gekommen, dass sich die Dinge so abgespielt haben könnten. In den Gesprächen, die Domkapitular Martin Wilk und ich mit dem Mann geführt haben, war eine große persönliche Betroffenheit zu spüren. Darüber hinaus legt der Lebensweg des Mannes nahe, dass er eine solche Geschichte nicht einfach erdichtet hat. Schließlich hat er seine Angaben durch eine Eidesstattliche Erklärung untermauert, ein ganz wichtiger Faktor für uns.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Jesus.de

[Catholic theologian Wolfgang Beck has called for better control of German bishops because of the abuse allegation against a former bishop in Hildesheim. Strong clericalism still exists in the higher levels of the church, he said. The basic problem is the structures that favored child abuse and other scandals were not changed until now. It is necessary for independent control for the higher clergy, he said.]

Der katholische Theologe Wolfgang Beck hat angesichts des Missbrauchsvorwurfs gegen einen ehemaligen Bischof in Hildesheim eine Kontrolle aller deutschen Bischöfe gefordert. In den höheren Ebenen der katholischen Kirche gebe es immer noch einen ausgeprägten Klerikalismus, sagte Beck der in Hannover erscheinenden “Neuen Presse”.

Das Grundproblem sei, dass die Strukturen, die Kindesmissbrauch und andere Skandale begünstigten, bis heute nicht verändert worden seien. Notwendig sei eine unabhängige Kontrolle auch für die hohe Geistlichkeit: “Ab Domkapitularen aufwärts, auch für den Bischof.” Früher habe sich ein Kind, das missbraucht worden sei, möglicherweise nicht getraut, etwas zu sagen, “weil ein alter Mann gottgleich auftritt”, betonte Beck, der auch das “Wort zum Sonntag” in der ARD spricht.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Australian Associated Press
Wednesday 11 November 2015

A victim of a pedophile counsellor wore a wire to a meeting with his abuser in a bid to catch him out.

The victim recalled St Paul’s School counsellor Kevin John Lynch told him that headmaster Gilbert Case had called during the meeting to check the teen hadn’t beaten Lynch up.

The man’s brother read his testimony to the child sex abuse royal commission in Brisbane on Wednesday.

In the testimony, he recounted the moment, at 19, he realised the depravity of sexual abuse he suffered at the hands of Lynch at the prestigious Brisbane school in the 1990s.

“It came out of nowhere and hit me like a bomb that I must to go to the police,” he said of his epiphany.

He subsequently went to the Boondall police station and was able to organise a meeting with Lynch at the counsellor’s home.

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UNITED STATES
Religion News Service – Spiritual Politics

Mark Silk | Nov 11, 2015

Yesterday Pope Francis traveled to the heart of Renaissance Italy and conjured up the image of a Christian Humanism threatened by ancient heresies. Speaking in Florence’s famed Duomo at the Fifth National Ecclesial Congress of the Italian church, the pontiff seized on this year’s theme of “Jesus Christ, the new humanism” to warn against the “temptations” of Pelagianism and Gnosticism.

Christian Humanism, according to Francis, is all about humility, selflessness, and beatitude. “These features tell us that we must not be obsessed with power, even when this assumes the appearance of a useful or functional power in the social image of the Church,” he said.

Pelagianism takes its name from a fourth-century British monk who taught that human nature is untainted by original sin and thus it is within the power of the unaided mortal will to choose good over evil. This, said the pope, “leads the Church not to be humble, selfless and blessed. … Often it leads us even to assuming a style of control, of hardness, normativity. Rules give to the Pelagian the security of feeling superior, of having a precise orientation.”

Gnosticism, from the Greek word for knowledge, is the name given by historians to dualistic views held by a range of heretical groups in late antiquity. For Francis, it “leads us to place our trust in logical and clear reasoning that, however, loses the tenderness of our brother’s flesh.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 11 November 2015 (VIS) – The Holy Father has:

– appointed Fr. Karel Choennie as bishop of Paramaribo (area 163,829, population 505,580, Catholics 115,221, priests 18, permanent deacons 4, religious 16), Suriname. The bishop-elect was born in Suriname in 1958 and was ordained a priest in 1985. He holds a licentiate in pastoral theology from the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, and has served in a number of pastoral roles in the diocese of Paramaribo, including parish priest, episcopal vicar, member of the diocesan curia and vicar general. He is currently pastor of the St. Clement parish.

– accepted the resignation from the office of auxiliary of the archdiocese of Detroit, United States of America, presented by Archdiocese Francis R. Reiss, upon reaching the age limit.

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WASHINGTON
KING

John Langeler, KING 5 News November 10, 2015

As darkness set on St. Mary’s in Marysville Monday night, Fr. Dwight Lewis was hustling away in a caravan – the parish’s 5th leader in six years was gone.

“Right now, to tell you the truth, I want a revolt against the Archdiocese,” said Jovi Estella of the Parish Council.

Parishioners said the news blindsided them.

Fr. Lewis explained he’d been told to leave Monday morning and had to be gone by the end of the day.

“We want to know why they removed… just like this,” said parishioner Adriana Maldanado.

Supporters say Fr. Lewis helped unify St. Mary’s, bringing together different threads of the congregation, expanding help for the homeless, and was one of many to help after the Marysville-Pilchuck shooting.

But according to the Archdiocese, concerns were raised. A review found serious “administrative issues.”

Nothing illegal, the church said, but something that had to be dealt with “so parishioners know things are being handled responsibly.”

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

A Catholic priest, now working as a NSW Police Force chaplain, has been charged over the alleged sexual assault of a 10-year-old girl in 2002 and 2003.

The 49-year-old man was arrested about 8.30am today in Narranera, a town in the Riverina region of southern NSW.

He was charged with aggravated sexual assault of a victim aged under 16, and has appeared in Wagga Wagga local court.

Police alleged he assaulted the then 10-year-old girl between September 2002 and January 2003.

He was remanded in custody and is expected to appear in the same court tomorrow.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

A NSW Catholic priest has been arrested over an alleged historical child sexual assault.

The 49-year-old priest and police chaplain has been charged with the aggravated sexual assault of a 10-year-old girl between September 2002 and January 2003.

He was arrested in Narrandera about 8.30am on Wednesday and faced Wagga Wagga Local Court, where he was remanded in custody.

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ITALIA
Corriere della Sera

di FIORENZA SARZANINI

Case di lusso affittate a prezzi stracciati, alberghi e centri estetici gestiti da società private e divenuti luoghi di incontro segreti, operazioni di compravendita con plusvalenze occultate: c’è anche questo trai documenti trafugati dai «corvi» del Vaticano. Elenchi con migliaia di nomi e indirizzi raccolti in vista di una «revisione» dei criteri per l’amministrazione del patrimonio immobiliare, in particolare quello di proprietà di Propaganda Fide. Liste di «clienti» eccellenti che fanno aumentare la preoccupazione di chi indaga per l’utilizzo di questi atti riservati che potrebbero diventare strumento di minacce e ricatti. Anche perché era stata proprio la Cosea, la commissione referente per lo studio dei problemi economici e amministrativi, a stilare l’elenco delle case di proprietà di ben 26 istituzioni. Sono almeno quattro gli alti prelati ascoltati negli ultimi giorni e la convinzione è che la resa dei conti all’interno della Santa Sede sia tuttora in corso. Ecco perché non si esclude che nuovi provvedimenti possano essere presi nei prossimi giorni. E che l’inchiesta possa coinvolgere altri religiosi dopo monsignor Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda – ancora in stato di arresto – e Francesca Chaouqui, rilasciata dopo aver iniziato a collaborare, entrambi accusati di aver «venduto» materiale che doveva invece rimanere riservato.

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ITALY
Corriere della Sera

di FIORENZA SARZANINI

Luxury homes rented at rock-bottom prices, hotels and beauty centres run by private companies used as secret meeting places, property sales listed at lower prices than those actually paid: these all feature in the documents stolen by Vatican moles. There are also lists with thousands of names and addresses collected in order to “review” the criteria used for the management of real estate, especially that owned by Propaganda Fide. These lists of exclusive “clients” have attracted the interest of investigators looking into the use of confidential documents as the potential basis for blackmail and threats. This is also because it was Cosea, the commission set up to study the Vatican’s economic and administrative problems, that drew up the list of houses owned by no fewer than 26 institutions. At least four senior prelates have been interviewed in recent days, and it is believed that there are still scores waiting to be settled within the Holy See. Consequently, further arrests may be made in coming days, and the investigation may involve other priests in the wake of the arrest of Monsignor Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda – who is still being held in custody – and Francesca Chaouqui, released after she began to cooperate. Both have been charged with having “sold” material that should have remained confidential.

Saunas and hotels

Judicial investigations have revealed that buildings in Rome’s historic centre were converted into sauna and massage centres, often frequented by priests looking for sexual encounters. Inquiries also brought to light the identity of businessmen to whom Propaganda Fide leased entire buildings to use as hotels. A case in point is Mauritius Stornelli, brother of former Finmeccanica executive Sabatino Stornelli, whose company Burcardo in 2013 signed a contract for the lease of an entire building covering hundreds of square metres, converted into ultra-luxurious suites. Other properties were also involved, less prestigious but equally suitable for a highly select clientele. There are dozens of similar cases. Moreover – in addition to the list of private individuals who benefited from long-term leases at knock-down prices –, Propaganda Fide has relationships with dozens of companies which often served as covers for their real owners. Suffice it to say that the institution owns around 800 apartments covering a total of over 180,000 square metres. Checks carried out by the Gendarmerie revealed that the stolen documents include lists of all the tenants and the amounts they paid monthly. Further inquiries are focusing precisely on this, also because another religious institution has ended up “under observation”, namely the Pio Sodalizio dei Piceni, which owns a large number of properties and became famous for renting a house in the historic centre of the capital to the former finance minister, Giulio Tremonti.

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NEW MEXICO
KOB

Two of the most notorious alleged pedophile priests in New Mexico are still making headlines years after their deaths after a lawsuit was recently filed against the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.

In the past few days, two adult men have come forward after their child trauma triggered Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and a need for help.

Brad Hall is the new attorney for the alleged victims. He says the two new cases join 50 other cases his laws firm has filed over the past few years.

“They are alleging that the Archdiocese of Santa Fe and…in one of these cases, the Servants of the Paraclete, together put pedophile priests out into New Mexico parishes,” Hall said.

The suit names two priests: Father Bernard Bissonette and Father James Porter. Both are dead but are named in multiple suits against the Archdiocese.

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VATICAN CITY
Daily Mail (UK)

By SIMON TOMLINSON FOR MAILONLINE

Vatican-owned properties are being used by priests as brothels and massage parlours, according to the latest claims to emerge from the Vatileaks scandal.

The properties implicated in a report, leaked by a Vatican mole, include premises close to the Italian Parliament and a solarium near Piazza Barberini.

A Vatican department, the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, owns hundreds of exclusive properties in central Rome, was also singled out in the document.

It claimed that Vatican officials were allowing buildings to be leased out at peppercorn rents as favours to powerful colleagues.

The document also alleged that they would allow dodgy property deals that would see addresses being used as brothels and illicit saunas, it was reported by The Independent.

The claims come two years after the Church was embarrassed by revelations that several priests shared an apartment block with Europe’s largest homosexual sauna.

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CANADA
CBC News

Former Catholic priest Eric Dejaeger is appealing 24 of his convictions for sex crimes against children in Igloolik, Nunavut, that took place more than 30 years ago. He hasn’t indicated yet on what legal grounds he’s appealing.

Dejaeger was convicted of 32 counts of child sex abuse and sentenced to 19 years in prison last February. He was found guilty on 24 of those counts following a trial, and had previously pleaded guilty to another eight.

He’s appealing the guilty verdicts from the trial, which were handed down on Sept. 12, 2014, the Crown’s office confirmed.

Dejaeger was in an Iqaluit courtroom today to speak to the matter. He has applied for funding through Nunavut’s Legal Services Board to get a lawyer.

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ARKANSAS
Arkansas Online

By Brandon Riddle

A former youth minister charged with 50 counts of video voyeurism earlier this year now faces additional rape charges related to the case, Jonesboro police said.

Anthony Waller, 39, of Marion was arrested Tuesday on two counts of rape of children believed by police to be 10 or 11 as part of an ongoing investigation into “a very large amount of child pornography” on his computer.

Evidence included “thousands of images of prepubescent girls either completely nude or scantily clad,” according to authorities.

Waller was arrested in Marion about 11 a.m. Tuesday, police said. Craighead County jail records show a booking time of about 12:45 p.m. He is being held at the jail pending a probable cause hearing Thursday.

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ARKANSAS
KAIT

JONESBORO, AR (KAIT) – A longtime children’s pastor in Jonesboro has been charged with computer child pornography, according to documents filed in Jonesboro District Court Wednesday afternoon.

Tony Waller, 39, had tens of thousands of files of nude or scantily clad pubescent girls in his possession, according to the Jonesboro Police Department.

Detective Brandon King, who is investigating Waller’s case, said it is one of the largest child pornography cases he has ever seen.

According to the affidavit, Waller’s wife told police she found child pornography on a laptop she and her husband shared. She told police while looking for a file, she stumbled across folders she did not recognize, which turned out to be thousands of videos and pictures of little girls.

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CALIFORNIA
Jewish Journal

by Haley Fox
Posted on Nov. 10, 2015

A rabbi arrested on felony charges of sexual abuse of a child entered a plea of not guilty at his arraignment Nov. 10 at the Airport Courthouse in Los Angeles. Sholom D. Levitansky, 39, of Sherman Oaks arrived at court wearing a suit and yarmulke, flanked by a handful of other men in similar dress, and one woman.

At the arraignment, Judge Keith Schwartz issued two oral orders restricting Levitansky’s behavior while he’s out on $370,000 bail. Schwartz told the rabbi that he’s prohibited from having contact with the two alleged female victims in the case, and that he is also forbidden from any contact in general with females younger than 18 years old.

The only condition Levitansky may make contact with female minors is if there’s another adult present who is aware of the charges against Levitansky.

“They’re going to watch you to make sure nothing else allegedly happens,” Schwartz said.

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CANADA
Windsor Star

SARAH SACHELI, WINDSOR STAR

Deborah Kloos believes in the power of prayer.

The Windsor woman was abused by her parish priest more three decades ago. She left the church for years, but with counselling and reflection, returned. Now she wants Catholics around the world to pray together once a year for people wounded by abuse.

“The only real hope is to pray together for healing to help restore a person’s broken spirit and give them hope,” Kloos said. “We can’t undo that pain, but we can at least show that we care by praying for them.”

Survivors of all kinds of abuse, not just those preyed on by clergy, should be included in the church’s intentions, Kloos said. Prayers should also be offered for all the good priests tainted by the scandal.

Kloos has been lobbying for a day of prayer for more than two years.

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AUSTRALIA
Independent Australia

For decades Nicky Davis was one of the silent majority of clergy abuse victims who believed no one would ever face responsibility for the many crimes against her. She finally reported her abuse after the appalling treatment of Australian survivors by Pope Benedict at World Youth Day 2008 in Sydney. Nicky’s perpetrator was arrested, despite the best efforts of church officials to hide the truth and she and the multiple eyewitnesses to her abuse prepared themselves for trial, until Australia’s predator friendly court system denied Nicky access to justice. Thanks to one of many convenient legal loopholes, another dangerous predator with dozens of victims walked free without a trial, unsupervised and is now being hidden by the church officials who helped him evade responsibility for his thousands of child sex crimes.

As a result, Nicky became a SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) Australialeader and a vocal advocate for justice for survivors, dedicated to ensuring sweeping law reform. Nicky was one of many who worked hard to achieve the announcement of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. Recently Nicky was one of a small group of international survivors who protested the cannonisation of JPII in Rome and forced the international media to address the issue of his refusal to take action against known child sex predators. In 2014 Nicky spoke of her personal experience to the UN Committee Against Torture in Geneva, during the reviews of both the Holy See and Australia, supplementing the extensive documentary evidence prepared by human rights lawyers, and finally convincing the entire Committee that the sexual violation of children is indeed a most damaging form of torture.

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AUSTRALIA
The Conversation

Chris Goddard
Adjunct Professor, Child Abuse Prevention Research Australia, Monash University

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is shifting its attention from Brisbane Grammar to St Paul’s School. In two weeks’ time, the commission will return to issues in Melbourne and Ballarat. Anglican, non-denominational and Catholic institutions in different states are being scrutinised.

The adults who survived the abuse finally get the opportunity they were denied as children: to describe the abuse, after years of being silenced, and to identify the perpetrators and those who failed to listen and protect them.

Other adults are called to explain what they did, if anything, to protect the children and to stop the offenders. They will be asked about what was done to silence the children and to protect the institution. Some of these people are important – for example, Cardinal George Pell and former governor-general Peter Hollingworth.

The silencing of children has as long a history as child abuse itself. So many myths are used to silence children and minimise crimes: children were said to lie, fantasise and be seductive.

Neerosh Mudaly and I wrote a 2006 book about children’s experiences of abuse and professional interventions, The Truth is Longer Than a Lie, which has now been adapted for a play of the same name. Its premiere is in Melbourne on November 11.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Australian Associated Press
Wednesday 11 November 2015

Drugged and vulnerable in a paedophile counsellor’s office, the student pleaded “Please don’t do this”, the child sex abuse royal commission has heard.

But it didn’t stop Kevin John Lynch, an infamous abuser of boys at two Brisbane schools, from sadistically molesting him.

Now 33, the victim told the child sex abuse royal commission he endured a horror session with Lynch in 1996 where the counsellor sprayed an immobilising drug into his mouth, put “unbearable” pressure on his body and inserted a hypodermic needle into his penis.

Lynch then briefly performed oral sex on the boy, at that time a student at St Paul’s school.

But when, alongside another victim, the student went to then-headmaster Gilbert Case to complain about their treatment, their concerns were swatted away, he said.

“In his opinion [we] were lying,” he told the commission on Wednesday.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Conversation

John Pollard
Fellow and Director of Studies in History at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge

For the second time in four years, the Vatican has been plunged into crisis by the publication of books exposing not only the battles for power within its hallowed walls, but also the misbehaviour of staff members of the Roman curia, the governing bureaucracy of the Roman Catholic Church.

In his latest book, Merchants in the Temple: Inside Pope Francis’ Secret Battle Against Corruption in the Vatican, investigative journalist Gianluigi Nuzzi lays bare the resistance which the Argentinian pope has encountered in his efforts to clean up not only the Vatican Bank (Istituto per le Opere di Religione) but also the wider financial mismanagement that has been endemic in the Vatican for years.

The first claims about financial mismanagement, this time in the Vatican City of which the pope is head of state, came from Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganó who was head of its administration. After his claims were made public, Viganó was packed off to Washington as papal envoy to the US. But the “Vati-leaks” scandal really broke in January 2012 with programmes on Italian television that revealed the goings-on behind the scenes in the Vatican of Benedict XVI.

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INDIA
UCA News

A bishop has refuted charges that a jailed priest from his central Indian diocese raped a nine-year-old girl.

Father Joseph Dhanaswami, 44, a priest from Ambikapur Diocese in Chhattisgarh state, was arrested Sept. 11 on charges of sexually abusing a fourth-grade student at Jyoti Mission High School where he was principal.

“The priest has been put in jail through no fault of his own,” Bishop Patras Minj of Ambikapur told ucanews.com. The case was fabricated in a bid to defame the church, “which is popular among poor people because of its services,” he said.

The state’s top court rejected a bail application by Father Dhanaswami on Oct. 26 after prosecutors told the court that a chemical analysis found “semen and human spermatozoa” in the girl’s undergarments.

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UNITED STATES
The New Yorker

BY RICHARD BRODY

The fine points of journalistic investigation are often thrilling to observe in the new movie “Spotlight,” nowhere more so than in the document-centered work by which reporters coax information from the government. Set mainly in 2001, the movie unfolds the work done by a quartet of reporters at the Boston Globe (called the Spotlight team) who revealed that many local priests had been sexually preying on minors, that the church had been doing its best to cover up their crimes, and that the local government was also complicit in that cover-up.

Yet, despite the movie’s stirring depiction of the vital societal role played by fearlessly independent newspapers, and despite its vision of horrific but essential truths revealed by deeply committed journalists, “Spotlight” ultimately leaves behind the numbing satisfaction of familiar emotions and the dull thud of familiar gratifications. What the movie needed to do was to spark curiosity and fascination about the psychology of the people involved in the investigation (including those involved against their will).

That investigation involves personal sources and academic research, and it gets its emotional fury from the testimonies of victims. But the movie’s McGuffin, the very pivot of the story, is a court motion made by the newspaper seeking the release of hitherto-sealed documents related to suits brought by victims against the Archdiocese. The moment of triumph involves a judge whose ruling frees up another batch of documents and a court clerk who controls access to a photocopy machine.

The judge before whom the newspaper and the Archdiocese plead, Constance Sweeney (who is played in the film by Laurie Heineman), is a former Catholic-school student who is believed to be favorable to the Church. As it turns out (no spoiler here), Sweeney rules in the Globe’s favor, which helps the Spotlight team push their investigation forward. As I watched the movie, I was utterly frustrated—I wanted the camera to be a fly on the wall in Judge Sweeney’s chambers as she discussed the case with her law clerk, or perhaps with a colleague, so that her reasoning would become part of the film. No such luck; the ruling is delivered, and the journalists get back to work.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Christian Today

Ruth Gledhill CHRISTIAN TODAY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR 10 November 2015

A top politician in Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands, has condemned the Church of England and the Bishop of Winchester for the way a safeguarding inquiry in connection with the island’s Dean has been handled.

In correspondence seen by Christian Today, Senator Sir Philip Bailhache, former Bailiff of Jersey, has written to the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby complaining that the Anglican church on the island is “in limbo” as a result of a failure to publish a report into the incident.

In his strongly-worded letter, Sir Philip describes the situation as “intolerable” and warns that unless the Bishop of Winchester Tim Dakin grasps the nettle and publishes the report, “irreparable damage” will be done to relations between the Church of England and the church in Jersey.

The Bailiwick of Jersey is a self-governing democratic Crown dependency with its own financial and judicial systems. The Anglican church was part of the Winchester diocese but was moved to Canterbury by Archbishop Welby as a result of the row over the case.

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UNITED STATES
News 10

By Andrew Murphy
Published: November 10, 2015

BOSTON (AP) – High-ranking leaders of the Catholic church have sent talking points to U.S. dioceses in advance of the wide release of “Spotlight,” a movie detailing the Boston Globe’s 2002 investigation into the church’s cover-up of clergy abuse.

The Boston Globe reports the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops formulated the guidance, complete with statistics, in September in anticipation of the film’s Nov. 20 nationwide release.

A spokesman for the group, Don Clemmer, says church officials wanted to prepare clergy members for speaking with victims who might be experiencing pain coinciding with the movie’s release, and to show that the church has changed.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

by Saskia Edwards

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is still in Brisbane.

Amanda Gearing is a Walkley Award winning journalist who has been helping hundreds of victims for over a decade.

Her submission to the Royal Commission in 2012 suggested that Brisbane Grammar, St Paul’s and the Brisbane Anglican Diocese be looked at as part of the inquiry.

Steve spoke to Amanda who has been sitting in on the Royal Commission hearings.

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AUSTRALIA
Courier-Mail

MATTHEW KILLORAN THE COURIER-MAIL NOVEMBER 11, 2015

THE MAN who blew the whistle on serial pedophile Kevin Lynch said it: “It hit me like a bomb that I must go to police”.

The former St Paul’s School student went to police and wore a wire to get evidence against him.

Police later arrested Lynch in 1997 on nine counts of sexual abuse. The school counsellor killed himself the next day.

But the former student, known as BSE, then faced a battle against the school when he took legal action against them for what happened.

BSE told the story of how he brought down Lynch to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse this afternoon.

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UNITED STATES
Mercury News

By Randy Myers
San Jose Mercury News Correspondent
POSTED: 11/09/2015

Gracefully understated yet undeniably powerful, “Spotlight” not only captures what it feels like to be a pack of journalists hot on the trail of a clergy abuse scandal, but richly re-creates the Boston setting and the shocking culture of silence within the Catholic Church hierarchy and beyond. It rivals “All the President’s Men” in a portrayal of journalism so crisply executed by director and co-screenwriter Tom McCarthy,you’re likely to hear even more about it at Oscar time.

Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo and Rachel McAdams headline a top-notch ensemble cast in a taut drama that exactingly conveys a place and time when old-school investigative reporting held sway — the sort that exposes malfeasance in high places and makes heads roll.

In 2002, reporters on the Boston Globe’s Spotlight regional investigative team dug up a shocker. At the urging of a new executive editor who saw something they had not, the reporters uncovered 70 pedophile priests the Catholic Church had protected over decades — in the heart of a city where the church was sacrosanct and a vital part of many lives. The series earned the Globe a Pulitzer for public service reporting in 2003 and triggered numerous investigations.

“Spotlight” is likely to stir your outrage, but McCarthy and co-screenwriter Josh Singer (TV’s “West Wing”) go beyond mere provocation. They put us into the worn-out shoes of a motley team of reporters, nailing all the details of what a newsroom looks and feels like just as the newspaper industry was preparing to take a big hit from the internet.

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UNITED STATES
East Bay Express

By Kelly Vance

For most Americans, especially those in law enforcement and news gathering, the public opinion tipping point on the issue of child sexual abuse by adult authority figures came on January 6, 2002, when the Boston Globe published a bombshell investigation of pedophilic crimes committed under the nose of the Roman Catholic church in that city. Tom McCarthy’s Spotlight tells the story and the story behind the story in a brisk, businesslike fashion from the newspaper’s point of view, buoyed by sharp performances from a large cast of character actors.

Ask anyone who has ever worked in one — there’s no place in the world quite so alive as a newsroom an hour before deadline. A flurry of activity but also of ideas, people pinging off each other, a clatter of opinions, the talk of the town. Of course, print publications are not what they used to be, and today’s broadcast and online media offer a degree of heat but little light. With that in mind, the central subplot of Spotlight — the title refers to the Globe’s hush-hush squad of investigative reporters — functions as a tribute to the time-consuming, old-fashioned business of developing sources, knocking on doors, asking the same questions day after day, boiling down mountains of hearsay and random information, and either coming up with a usable story, or throwing it all away and going after something else. A romantic concept? Yes, but in its way a microcosm of democracy.

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AUSTRALIA
New South Wales Police Force

Wednesday, 11 November 2015

Police from Griffith Local Area Command have charged a Catholic priest over an alleged historical sexual offence.

The 49-year-old man was arrested in Narrandera about 8.30am today (Wednesday 11 November 2015).

He has been charged with aggravated sexual assault of victim under the age of 16 years.

The man appeared in Wagga Wagga Local Court today, where he was remanded in custody to face the same court tomorrow (Thursday 12 November 2015).

It is alleged the man sexually assaulted a then 10-year-old girl between September 2002 and January 2003.

A process is underway to suspend the man from his duties as a police chaplain.

The investigation continues.

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AUSTRALIA
Sky News

A NSW Catholic priest has been arrested over an alleged historical child sexual assault.

The 49-year-old priest and police chaplain has been charged with the aggravated sexual assault of a 10-year-old girl between September 2002 and January 2003.

He was arrested in Narrandera about 8.30am on Wednesday and faced Wagga Wagga Local Court, where he was remanded in custody.

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CALIFORNIA
Al Jazeera

At least 16 states have no statute of limitations for rape cases in face of rape kit backlog, delays in reporting crimes

November 10, 2015
by Marisa Taylor @marisahtaylor

A California lawmaker plans to introduce legislation that would eliminate the statute of limitations on rape and some sexual assault cases, joining a handful of other U.S. states that have made the same move.

State Senator Connie M. Leyva, a Democrat from Chino, California said Monday that when the new legislative session begins in January, she will propose scrapping the 10-year statute of limitations on rape cases. The proposed bill would also apply to sexual assault cases involving lewd or lascivious acts, child sexual abuse, oral sex and sexual penetration.

“A sexual predator should not be able to evade legal consequences in California for no other reason than that the time limits set in state law have expired,” Leyva said Monday in a release. “Victims should have the opportunity to prove their accusations in a court of law, even if it is over a decade after the offense was committed.”

The issue of expired statutes of limitations in sex crimes cases has been up for public debate in recent months after reports of allegations by more than a dozen women accusing comedian Bill Cosby of raping or sexually assaulting them. Many of the women’s cases date back to the 1970s and 1980s, meaning that the statute of limitations for criminal suits has expired, although the accusers can — and have — since filed civil suits against him. Cosby has denied the charges.

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MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

Following a 2.5 week trial, a Minnesota jury has awarded $8 million to a victim of predator priest Fr. Vincent Fitzgerald, who spent 13 years in Belleville (and shorter stints in Alton, Godfrey and Peoria until his death in 2009). He also worked in Mansfield in the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese. .

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

11/10/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

If you have ever wondered what Dante’s hell would look like if populated by the former leaders (and I use that word loosely) of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, I suggest that you pick up Saint Paul poet Zach Czaia’s slim new book of poems Saint Paul Lives Here (In Minnesota).

In his poem ‘If Dante Were Alive Today’, the one feasting on heads and brains is not Count Ugolino but Archbishop John Nienstedt, and the treasonous one providing who makes up the meal is none other than the former Vicar General, Father Kevin McDonough.

There are several other poems in the collection that refer explicitly to the sexual abuse crisis in our Archdiocese, while others offer poetic reflections on Zach’s experiences teaching in the Minneapolis public school system, his days as a high school quarterback, and his Catholic faith. All are extremely accessible and intriguing, and, as the jacket cover suggests, ‘present a mode of healing in a difficult hour’.

Amen.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Yorkshire Evening Post

Tuesday 10 November 2015

A retired Roman Catholic priest is set to appear in court accused of historic sexual abuse offences at a West Yorkshire children’s home.

Roy Lovatt, 70, from Redcar, has been charged with five counts of indecent assault and seven counts of a serious sexual offence. He will appear at Leeds Magistrates’ Court on December 9.

In a statement today, West Yorkshire Police said the charges against Lovatt relate to alleged abuse at the former Thorp Arch Grange Children’s Home, in Wetherby, in the 1970s and 1980s.

The force has also revealed that two men and a woman have been charged over alleged historic sexual abuse at the former Shadwell children’s home in Leeds in the 1980s and 1990s. …

A spokesman for the Diocese of Middlesbrough said: “The Roman Catholic Diocese of Middlesbrough can confirm that it is aware that a retired priest in the Diocese has been assisting West Yorkshire Police with their enquiries into allegations of historic offences and that on November 9 2015 he was formally charged.

“The offences with which he is charged relate to a time before he was ordained as a Catholic priest.

“The Diocese can further confirm that the priest concerned has not exercised any ministry since the inquiries began and will not be doing so for the time being.

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MILWAUKEE (WI)
National Catholic Reporter

Marie Rohde | Nov. 10, 2015

MILWAUKEE
It took less than two hours for a federal judge to approve a plan that will allow the Milwaukee archdiocese to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy after nearly five years of legal battles.

Archbishop Jerome Listecki spoke briefly Nov. 9 in a courtroom packed with sexual abuse survivors and more than 20 lawyers. Listecki praised the abuse victims for coming forward, saying they had raised the consciousness of the archdiocese and elsewhere.

“There is no resolution that will bring back what they have lost,” said Listecki, adding that he hopes the confirmation of the plan will turn the corner for the archdiocese, allowing it to focus on charitable, educational and spiritual work. “When we have a strong church, we have a strong community.”

One survivor, Mark Atkinson, stood up in court and questioned why it took so long for the archdiocese to deal with the issue.

“I went to the archdiocese in 1993 and nothing changed until 2002,” Atkinson said, adding that the archdiocese was covering up the scores of allegations that had come forward. “Why did we have to wait until 2002?”

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UNITED STATES
Catholic League

Bill Donohue comments on a story in today’s Boston Globe

On the front page of the Metro Section in today’s Boston Globe, there is a story about the movie “Spotlight” that smacks of bias and gullibility; the former is driving the latter.

Lisa Wangsness relies on Terence McKiernan of Bishop Accountability for her data. She writes that he told her that “the bishops could have agreed to make lists of abusive priests available nationwide.” Referring to him again, she writes that “More than 2,400 abusive priests nationwide have never been named.”

First, McKiernan is known for making up figures on the fly. A few years ago, after he told a sympathetic audience he was going to “stick it” to New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, he accused him of “keeping the lid on 55 priests.” That is a lie. Several times I have personally challenged him to name the names and every time he runs.

Second, the term “abusive priests” is meaningless. Were they simply accused or was there a credible accusation made against them? Were the accusations substantiated or unsubstantiated? Was there a finding of guilt? Wangsness never tells us because it obviously doesn’t matter to her.

Third, what institution, including the Boston Globe, publishes the names of employees who have had an accusation made against them?

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UNITED STATES
Fort Worth Star-Telegram

BY CARY DARLING
cdarling@dfw.com

The new film Spotlight, opening Friday in North Texas, would seem to have it all.

It boasts a stellar cast that includes Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber and Stanley Tucci. It’s directed and co-written by Tom McCarthy, who earned plaudits for such earlier films as The Station Agent and the Oscar-nominated The Visitor. Co-writer Josh Singer spent many years writing for such TV series as The West Wing and Fringe.

To top it off, it has the kind of loud, award-season buzz that could translate into big box-office.

But Spotlight, based on the journalistic investigation that exploded into the Roman Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal in the early 2000s, came close to never seeing the light of the multiplex.

“This movie almost fell apart three times. And when I say almost fell apart, it did fall apart,” says McCarthy by phone from Washington, D.C. “That just speaks to the environment of the industry right now and how difficult it is to get movies like this made — adult movies that are about something.”

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ITALY
RTE News

Pope Francis has called for a Catholic Church that is not cosseted, self-centred and obsessed with power and money.

His landmark statement, delivered in Florence to Italy’s bishops, comes ten days after leaks from a papal commission prompted the Vatican to arrest commission members, Fr Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda, and public relations executive, Francesca Chaouqui.

Today’s plea for a different type of global Church comes two days after Pope Francis vowed to forge ahead with reforms despite evidence in the leaked documents that he is meeting resistance from the Vatican’s old guard.

The reforms have included an overhaul of the scandal-plagued Vatican bank to make its operations transparent, giving autonomy to its Financial Intelligence Authority in order to avoid interference by top cardinals, and urging Church officials to shun extravagant lifestyles.

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CALIFORNIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Statement by Joelle Casteix of Orange County California, SNAP Southern California director (949-322-7434, jcasteix@gmail.com)

We applaud a California legislator’s move to reform the state’s predator-friendly statute of limitations in sexual violence cases.

[Los Angeles Times]

To us, this bill is about prevention, not justice. If passed, more predators will be exposed and more crimes will be prevented. It’s just that simple.

Every single person who has been sexually traumatized should have his or her “day in court.” Every single offender should be exposed and punished. But even more, every single adult and child in California should be protected from rapists and molesters. If only one man, woman or child avoids decades of devastating pain because of this proposal, it will have all been worth it.

This notion, raised by defense lawyers, of “balancing rights” in rape cases is bunk. The privacy rights of criminals are secondary. The safety rights of kids and adults are primary.

Statutes of limitations are archaic and dangerous. They give people who commit and conceal sexual violence incentives to silence victims, intimidate witnesses, discredit whistleblowers, destroy evidence, fabricate alibis and sometimes flee the area or the country. They enable and encourage more crimes and cover ups. They must be repealed or radically relaxed.

The measure is sponsored by State Sen. Connie M. Leyva (D-Chino).

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