ABUSE TRACKER

Five years after allegations of child sex abuse against then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick first surfaced and rocked the U.S. Catholic Church, attorneys for McCarrick, 92, said Monday that he’s no longer mentally competent to stand trial and that the charges should be dismissed.

McCarrick was for decades one of the country’s most connected and powerful Catholic leaders. Now, many Catholics view him as an emblem of a rotten old-boy network in which the people at the top never face justice for their role in crimes involving sexual abuse by clergy.

The three counts of indecent assault and battery, based on allegations that McCarrick molested a 16-year-old family friend at a Wellesley College wedding reception in 1974, are the only criminal charges he faces. Fourteen minors and at least five adults — clergy and seminarians — have accused the former D.C. archbishop of sexual misconduct, according to the abuse-tallying site  View Cache

An old idiom is cited in the bible and often used in common conversation, especially when referring to sexual abuse. The phrase “fall from grace” is defined in the dictionary (in Christian belief) as descending from a state of divine favor into sin. It literally means to sin, yet people often use it as an excuse to lessen the crime, hoping the abuser will rise back up. How about we all agree to stop using the word ‘fall’ or ‘fell’ when discussing sexual abuse? Predators don’t FALL for their victims or FALL from grace; they abuse.  

Journalists should especially avoid those terms. Those words are used in two ways when discussing abuse. Both are very harmful and misleading. First, in the context of kids victimized by clergy, we often see phrases like “the accused minister’s fall from grace.” (If you go to BishopAccountability.org and enter this…

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A group of five demonstrators gathered on Sunday morning in support of abuse victims in the Chickasha community. 

The group’s spokesperson, Christopher Coutts, said the group gathered in support of victims from all walks of life who have been abused.

“We are here today to stand for victims of all kinds, whether it be mental abuse, physical abuse or sexual abuse. We do not care your identify, your age, your race, your sex, your beliefs, your politics,” Coutts said. “It is simply that the citizens of our town deserve better than to be abused in any way shape or form. It is unacceptable in any way for any member of our community to be treated in this way and for others to think it is alright.” 

The demonstrators stood across the street from New Life Christian Church. Last week, the former senior pastor, Matthew Reiber, was charged with three counts…

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Donald Trump’s former Catholic priest religious adviser and head of anti-abortion group Priests for Life has been hit with multiple sexual misconduct accusations, according to reports by the Catholic media outlet The Pillar and the Daily Beast.

Vehement anti-abortionist Frank Pavone was ousted from the priesthood — defrocked — by the Vatican in December after he repeatedly disobeyed orders from his bishop to stop posting unspecified “blasphemous” messages on social media. He often posted incendiary political messages, and posted videos of an aborted fetus on an altar.

Now at least four women have reportedly accused Pavone of sexual misconduct.

The complaints concern “inappropriate workplace” behavior, dating from 1999 to 2018, and allegedly included non-consensual touching, lewd suggestions and unwanted sexual advance, according to The Pillar and the Beast. One of the women who accused Pavone of…

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The Society of Jesus said Feb. 21 it had received 15 credible accusations of abuse against Father Marko Rupnik and would be taking steps to begin an internal procedure against the Jesuit priest and artist.

The process could result in disciplinary actions up to and including the 68-year-old Rupnik’s expulsion from the Jesuit order.

In the Feb. 21 declaration, Rupnik’s superior, Father Johan Verschueren, said, “I feel it is my duty to deal seriously with this case and others like it that have arisen and are arising, out of respect for, and in protection of, truth and justice for all parties involved.”

To other restrictions on the priest’s public ministry, Verschueren added a ban on public artistic endeavors.

But the Jesuit order has admitted to knowing of abuse accusations against Rupnik for years, not only since alleged victims went public in early December 2022.

Here’s a timeline of known facts…

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The school’s code of conduct instructs students to ‘abstain from biblically immoral practices’, including ‘sexual sins’

Patriarchal churches that teach women should “submit” to men are creating a culture where abuse can thrive, experts say.

A News Corp Australia podcast has alleged that some female students at Hillsong College, part of Hillsong Church, were taught to “submit” sexually to their husbands, which one former student described as “kind of a rape culture”.

The podcast also alleges students are quizzed about their “sexual sins” when they start and declared “unsafe” if they admit to having sex or watching pornography.

The college’s code of conduct instructs students to “abstain from biblically immoral practices” including drunkenness, profane language, occult practices and “sexual sins”.

Students are not allowed to date in their first semester and after that they have to seek permission. Relationships with people not at the college should be “prayerfully considered” and discussed…

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Pope Francis said Saturday that Vatican trials for cases of grave financial mismanagement have become unavoidable in recent years.

“The problem is not the trials, but the facts and conduct that determine them and make them painfully necessary,” the pope told a group of Vatican magistrates on Feb. 25.

“In fact,” he added, “such behaviors by members of the Church seriously harm its effectiveness in reflecting divine light.”

Pope Francis addressed the Vatican’s recent legal disputes in a speech to members of the city state’s tribunals for the opening of its 94th judicial year.

The Vatican is in the midst of a trial to prosecute 10 people, including Cardinal Angelo Becciu, on charges related to the institution’s finances. The trial, which began in July 2021, is expected to conclude before the end of the year.

The trial centers on the Secretariat of State’s purchase of a London building, a controversial…

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Pope Francis said Feb. 25 that financial misconduct by Vatican personnel harms the church’s mission and scandalizes the faithful, doubling down on the need for trials in the tiny city state to find justice.

Francis made the comments during an address to prosecutors, judges and employees of the Vatican City State’s civil and criminal tribunal at the start of the judicial year. The tribunal has seen its caseload grow significantly in recent years as the Vatican enforces new financial standards and accountability, most recently with an ongoing trial into the Holy See’s investment in a London property.

Defense lawyers for some of the 10 defendants have flagged shortcomings in the Vatican’s unique legal system over the course of the trial, arguing that the rights of the defense haven’t been respected. Francis didn’t refer to the London case specifically, but he warned against focusing on the nitty-gritty of the Vatican’s legal…

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Two teenage girls have narrated how they were allegedly sexually and physically abused by a pastor, who happens be their biological father, for years.

It is alleged that the clergyman started sexually abusing the elder daughter from 2018 to 2023. According to a statement the minors recorded with the police, the pastor reportedly abused the younger daughter from 2016 to 2018. The teenagers were aged 12 and 13 when the pastor allegedly started sexually abusing them. One of the teenage girls is said to have approached her mother and told her that she was contemplating committing suicide as she could not handle the sexual and physical abuse allegedly by her father, who doubles as a pastor. In the statement, one of the teenage girls detailed how the accused would invite her into his bedroom every morning where he would allegedly hug, kiss and touch her indecently, before proceedings to sexually…

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The Vineyard Church in Duluth, Minnesota had its lead pastor, Michael Gatlin, give his resignation yesterday after his son, another pastor at the church had allegations of sexual misconduct made against him.  

One month ago the church released a statement advising its congregation and the public of the issue. 

Jackson Gatlin, Michael’s son, was suspended as Vineyard’s young adult and online community pastor after the allegation was brought to light. One of the victim’s statements shared that these events occurred several years ago and were sexual in nature.

The church’s Special Committee made an announcement during the church service yesterday stating Michael and Brenda Gatlin might have known about it and chose not to act. 

Two separate parties are investigating all of the allegations at this time, including the local police as well as a company called Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment (GRACE). The latter was hired by the church to do its…

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A national-level group of Catholic women in India has expressed distress about Bishop Franco Mulakkal visiting Pope Francis in the Vatican.

The “Sisters in Solidarity” on February 21 wrote to the Pope that they were distressed to read about Bishop Mulakkal’s February 8 meeting with the pontiff. They said they read in an Indian newspaper dated February 15 that the Pope was “glad to hear that (Bishop Mulakkal) had won the case and consoled him for his suffering.”

Kochurani Abraham, a feminist theologian and a group member, told Matters India February 25 that they could deliver the letter to the Pope’s office and concerned dicasteries only on February 24 through a Rome-based priest. Copies of the letter were also sent to the apostolic nuncio in New Delhi and Church leaders in India, Abraham said.

The letter apprised the Pope that the rape case involving Bishop Mulakkal is not over as…

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The cardinal admitted last November to behaving ‘in a reprehensible way’ toward a 14-year-old girl 35 years ago.

French prosecutors announced Saturday that Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard will not face criminal charges after he admitted to abusing a 14-year-old girl 35 years ago.

Marseille prosecutor Dominique Laurens told AFP that “the case was closed due to the statute of limitations.”

Ricard, the president of the French bishops’ conference from 2001 to 2007, publicly acknowledged Nov. 7 that he had behaved “in a reprehensible way” toward the girl when he was a pastor in the Archdiocese of Marseille in the late 1980s.

On Nov. 11, the Vatican said that Ricard would be subject to an “investigatio praevia,” or preliminary investigation, following the admission. The Vatican probe is believed to be ongoing.

According to his official Vatican biography, the cardinal is a member of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican department…

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There’s only one thing Southern Baptist Convention conservatives get more upset about than women serving as pastors: The slightest affirmation of LGBTQ persons.

This truth was borne out in the SBC over the last week as leaders sought to put out a three-alarm fire sparked by decisions made at the SBC Executive Committee. The denomination’s largest church was expelled because it allows women to serve as pastors, and a secular company that cares for its LGBTQ employees was selected to do more work on sexual abuse reform.

Thus, in the current moment, the threefold cord of sexuality, gender and abuse is not easily broken in the SBC. Instead, it’s the talk of the town.

For starters, understand that virtually everyone in SBC leadership is against LGBTQ inclusion or affirmation. The homophobia is so strong that last year a respected former president of the convention was lambasted merely for expressing affirmation of a…

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A judge concluded the children were victims of “parental alienation,” which continues to influence family courts despite being rejected by mainstream scientific groups, and authorized police to use “reasonable force” to remove them from their mother.

This story describes in detail the sexual abuse of children.

Two siblings in Utah have barricaded themselves in a bedroom at their mother’s home in defiance of a judge’s order to return to the custody of their father, despite state child welfare investigators determining that he had sexually abused the children.

The judge has authorized police to use “reasonable force” — including entry into locked rooms — against Brynlee Larson, 12, and Ty Larson, 15. Ty has spent the last month livestreaming on TikTok to call attention to their case.

The showdown is the fallout from the latest family court battle over “parental alienation” — a disputed psychological theory in which one parent is…

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How should faithful Catholics respond to the Pavone Affair, and second, what should Frank Pavone himself do or not do?

The laicization of and sexual harassment charges against Frank Pavone have deeply disturbed faithful pro-life Catholics. Online discussions include armchair analyses of what his religious superiors and the Board of Priests for Life should have done. Some people want to know why these charges are coming up at this particular time. Still others want to know why the Vatican is singling out Pavone for discipline while ignoring other problematic priests. 

Without dismissing these legitimate questions, I would like to focus on two questions. First, how should faithful Catholics respond to the Pavone Affair, and second, what should Frank Pavone himself do or not do?  

But first, let’s recap the facts known to the public as of this writing. 

On December 17, 2022, it was reported that Pavone had been dismissed from the…

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The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) in Aotearoa says the Catholic Church in New Zealand is still failing to properly respond to credible allegations of clerical and religious child sexual abuse.

SNAP says no explanation is given to survivors on how decisions are made when their complaint is not accepted, nor what the standard of proof is for complaints to be credible. They also claim the decision process lacks transparency.

SNAP survivors say witnesses whom they nominated to obtain relative evidence were never contacted and supporting evidential information was never gathered by the church’s investigators.

SNAP believes an overly conservative and excessively high standard on the “balance of probabilities” is being applied to survivor evidence.

Survivors believe that this is deliberately done to ensure no compensation is paid, and the Church as an institution is protected.

This is despite Catholic Church leaders in New Zealand publicly apologizing…

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[Via KJZZ]

Several plans to change state law on clergy reporting of child sex abuse, including one that would remove the “clergy exemption,” seem dead at the Utah State Capitol — though two child abuse victims, one of them a rabbi, urged the measures get a hearing in the waning days of the legislative session.

“In terms of the sex abuse that I endured, I think it gives me perspective on what we’re talking about,” said Rabbi Avremi Zippel, “of the long-term impact of this sort of behavior.”

Zippel’s former nanny was convicted of sexually abusing him when he was a boy.

“It’s my hope they get a hearing,” he said of the bills, adding he supports ending the exemption for clergy, even if the abuse is learned in confessions. “From my perspective as a faith leader, there is nothing more sacred than the life of a child.“

Deondra Brown…

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[See also the full text of Associate Judge Robert Taylor’s order.]

With an order Friday from the courts, Marylanders are bracing for the release of an investigation into the history of child sexual abuse within the Archdiocese of Baltimore. The secrecy around the report could be lifted as soon as next month.

Attorneys had argued over the issue for months in confidential proceedings. Baltimore Circuit Judge Robert Taylor Jr. concluded Friday he would allow redactions and release the report to the public. His 32-page decision brings new insights into the fight that’s happened behind closed doors.

Here’s what to expect from the 456-page investigation.

Will the report name names?

That’s a question on the minds of sexual abuse survivors, their advocates and attorneys. These men and women have pointed to a culture of silence in the church that has allowed abuse to continue and…

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The lid on the Buffalo Diocese’s long-held secrets about clergy molesters was pried open in 2018 when a Catholic priest admitted he had sexually abused dozens of boys.

Five years later, despite promises to do right by abuse victims, the diocese has not paid a penny in damages to an estimated 900 people who filed claims alleging they were sexually abused by priests or other diocese employees. Despite pledges of greater transparency, the diocese has yet to make public internal documents on its handling of abuse cases. And no one connected with the diocese has been charged with any crimes related to child sex abuse or its cover-up in the past five years.

“It seems to me that nothing has changed,” said Michael F. Whalen Jr., who held a news conference on Feb. 27, 2018, to tell the public that the Rev. Norbert Orsolits had abused…

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[Via Catholic Review]

If the goal of a “synodal” church is to have all the baptized recognize their responsibility for the life and mission of the Catholic community, Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet said that necessarily means taking a new look at priesthood.

The cardinal, outgoing prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, organized an international conference on the theology of priesthood in February 2022, which drew some 500 priests, religious and theologians to the Vatican.

Yet one year later, he and other conference organizers said that coming to grips with the clerical abuse crisis and trying to promote a real understanding of the vocation of all the baptized — priests or laity — is an exercise that cannot be limited to priests and theologians.

To that end, the Vatican presented a two-volume book, “For a Fundamental Theology of the Priesthood,” cataloguing the conference’s articles and providing complementary academic documents that contextualize…

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Baltimore Circuit Court Judge Robert Taylor Jr. ruled Feb. 24 that a redacted version of the Maryland Attorney General Office’s report on child sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Baltimore must be released publicly.

The judge ordered the attorney general’s office to redact more than 200 names from the report and submit it to the court by mid-March.

Christian Kendzierski, archdiocesan spokesman, responded to the ruling in a written Feb. 24 statement:

“Ever-aware of the pain endured by survivors of child sexual abuse, the archdiocese once again offers its sincere apologies to the victim-survivors who were harmed by a minister of the church and who were harmed by those who failed to protect them and who failed to respond to them with care and compassion,” Kendzierski said. 

“As we said publicly last year,” he continued, “we respect the court’s decisions in this matter and will continue to cooperate with the…

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A redacted version of the Maryland attorney general’s report into child sexual abuse at the Archdiocese of Baltimore can be released, a Baltimore City Circuit Court judge ruled Friday.

| LINKS: Read the motion | Memorandum and order | Read the archbishop’s response 

Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown released a statement Friday afternoon, saying: “We are pleased with the court’s order today permitting the interim release of a redacted version of the attorney general’s report on the Archdiocese of Baltimore. The office will move expeditiously to comply with the court’s order and prepare a redacted copy of the report to be released upon review and approval by the court.”

Details of the attorney general’s four-year, 456-page investigation weren’t initially made public because much of the material was obtained through a grand jury. Then-Attorney General Brian Frosh sought the court’s permission in November 2022 to waive the grand jury…

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House Speaker Mark Rozzi received applause Friday in the Capitol Rotunda from a large gathering of Democratic colleagues after the legislature took a major step toward his decade-long promise to deliver justice for survivors of childhood sexual abuse.

The Berks County Democrat, a victim of clergy sex abuse as an adolescent, said, “I want to say to all the victims and survivors out there that we have your backs. We will support you.”

The news conference followed a House special session where the chamber approved two measures with bipartisan support to provide a two-year retroactive window for previously time-barred abuse victims to file civil lawsuits against their abuser and any institution, including public school districts, that covered it up.

One measure would accomplish the goal through a constitutional amendment that requires voter ratification and the other achieves it through the regular law-making process.

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Victims would be able to sue over otherwise outdated claims of child sexual abuse under two pieces of legislation passed Friday by the Pennsylvania House, but it’s unclear whether the state Senate will take them up.

The legislation to temporarily waive the statute of limitations for sex abuse crimes had been on the verge of going before voters for the final OK two years ago, when state officials bungled the required advertising of the previous version.

The House voted Friday 161-40 to send the Senate a constitutional amendment that, if senators go along with it, could go before voters for final approval as soon as November. Separately, they also voted 134-67 to make the change as regular legislation that would take effect immediately if passed by the Senate and signed by the governor.

It was a major accomplishment for House Speaker Mark Rozzi, a Berks County Democrat  View Cache

Today, the Pennsylvania House concluded its special session after passing a dual path for victims of childhood sexual assault. Both bills passed would open a two-year civil window for victims to sue abusers and institutions that covered the abuse.  

The window is the only remaining recommendation from the 2018 Grand Jury Report after its two-year investigation into widespread sexual abuse of children within six dioceses of the Catholic Church in Pennsylvania. 

The dual path consists of two approaches: a constitutional amendment and a statutory bill. Both received bipartisan support on their third and final consideration this morning. 

“To all the victims and survivors out there, we have your backs,” said House Speaker Mark Rozzi (D-Berks), sponsor of House Bill 2, the statutory bill. 

Rozzi is a survivor of clergy abuse when he was 13 years old. He shared his story and experience on the House floor before his bill received a vote,…

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Jean-Pierre Ricard, a 78-year-old retired bishop, was taken into custody on February 2, and told investigators he had ‘kissed’ and ‘caressed’ a 13-year-old girl.

French prosecutors said on Saturday, February 25, they had closed an investigation into sexual assault charges against a cardinal as the statute of limitations had passed.

The probe was launched in November last year after Jean-Pierre Ricard, a retired bishop made a cardinal by pope Benedict XVI in 2006, admitted in public he had “behaved in a reprehensible way” towards a young girl 35 years ago.

Read more Article réservé à nos abonnés Portuguese Catholic Church shaken by report of 5,000 child-victims of sexual abuse

The 78-year-old was taken into custody on February 2 and told investigators he had “kissed” the girl, who he said was about 13 years old. He said he had also embraced her and “caressed her over her clothes,” but “there…

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Jean Vanier, the founder of L’Arche, is accused of abusing women for decades – even while many Catholics considered him a living saint. How does L’Arche move forward?

When Laura Giddings first shared the news of L’Arche founder Jean Vanier’s abuse with her community in Tacoma, Washington, she felt a mixture of embarrassment, anger, and resentment at having to be the bearer of such a painful message.

It was 2020, less than a year after Vanier’s death at the age of 90, and an independent inquiry commissioned by L’Arche had concluded that the man seen then by many as a spiritual giant sexually abused six women between 1970 and 2005.

A winner of the Templeton Prize and recipient of the French Legion of Honor, the Canadian Catholic was synonymous with L’Arche, a network of 154 communities in 38 countries welcoming people with intellectual disabilities.

For Giddings, the executive director of L’Arche Tahoma…

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The inquiries follow complaints to the papal nuncio, Archbishop Claudio Gugerotti, about the diocese and Bishop Robert Byrne.

Bishop Robert Byrne CO resigned in December 2022, saying that “discernment has caused me to recognise that I now feel unable to continue serving the people of the diocese in the way that I would wish”. Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales/Mazur

The Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle is in turmoil after four inquiries, including one by the Vatican, have been launched into what happened there during the tenure of its former bishop, Robert Byrne.

Archbishop Malcom McMahon of Liverpool, who has taken over as administrator of Hexham and Newcastle, has been asked by the Vatican’s Dicastery for Bishops, to report on what led to the resignation of Byrne who quit in December, citing that the burdens of office were “too great a burden”.

The Vatican review and the other inquiries…

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Sexual abuse task forces have been on the move in the Southern Baptist Convention.

In Nashville this week, denomination leaders got a status update on a planned database of credibly accused church workers. And in late 2022, the Tennessee Baptist Convention’s own task force made recommendations available to the roughly 3,000 churches that form it.

But one challenge remains clear: Southern Baptist Convention leaders said they have basically no authority to ensure churches proactively move to prevent sexual abuse or respond appropriately if and when abuse gets reported.

Under current mandates, leaders said they can study the sexual abuse problem and develop practical tools and resources for churches to draw on. But in their highly decentralized Baptist denomination, the rest, they said, is up to the local church.

The Southern Baptist Convention, despite long-shrinking ranks, remains the nation’s largest Protestant denomination. It has faced close scrutiny in recent years as…

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A teenage boy stood in a courtroom Friday and confronted the youth minister who sexually assaulted him and other boys.

The boy, identified as Victim No. 1 in court, told Keenan Hord he didn’t feel any hatred toward him — only indifference.

Hord, dressed in white and black jail clothing, stood nearby but didn’t look at the teen.

Hord, 33, of Centerton was a youth minister at Bentonville First Baptist Church.

He pleaded guilty to nine counts of sexual assault; three counts of distributing, possessing or viewing matter depicting sexually explicit conduct involving a child; and sexual indecency with a child. Ryan Jewell and Ben Catterlin, Hord’s attorneys, reached a plea agreement with Joshua Robinson, senior deputy prosecutor, to resolve the case.

Hord admitted to sexually assaulting the boys and possessing photographs or videos of nude boys.

Benton County Circuit Judge Brad Karren sentenced Hord to 6o years in the…

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On Friday (Feb. 24), SBC President Bart Barber took to Twitter to respond to criticism regarding the latest developments in the process to reform the denomination in light of systemic failures to appropriately respond to allegations of clergy sex abuse. 

Earlier this week, the Southern Baptist Convention’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force (ARITF) announced that the services of Guidepost Solutions had been retained for the construction of a “Ministry Check” website, which will catalog SBC pastors and leaders who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse. 

The announcement was met with a mixture of affirmation and bitter criticism. 

Guidepost Solutions is the organization that the Executive Committee had previously hired to conduct a lengthy investigation into how it handled sexual abuse allegations brought to its attention between the years 2000 and 2021.

The investigation and subsequent report, which was published in May 2022, revealed that the SBC Executive Committee had…

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One of Rabbi Efraim Tessler’s victims describes how it all happened: The private lessons, touching, accusations, dependence – and the agreement involving the rabbi’s son, deputy minister Yaakov Tessler, to buy his silence

Aryeh has trouble counting the number of times he’s been sexually assaulted. It happened so many times and with such frequency that there is no point trying, he said. For a year and a half it was routine, part of normal weekday happenings at the Damesek Eliezer Vizhnitz Yeshiva in Jerusalem. The serial attacker was the head of the yeshiva, Rabbi Efraim Tessler.

“He would walk around the study hall in the morning and tell me ‘come up’ or ask me to wake him up in the afternoon because he slept in a bed in the office,” Aryeh (a pseudonym to maintain his anonymity) told Haaretz. “He would undress, I would cause him to ejaculate and immediately…

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Jean-Baptiste De Franssu told the Vatican court last week that he had “no other choice” but to refer the London deal for investigation.

The president of a major Vatican Bank told a courtroom Thursday that he reported a suspicious Vatican property deal to investigators, even while senior Vatican officials offered him “protection” to help the deal go through.

Jean-Baptiste De Franssu is president of the Institute for Works of Religion, a Vatican City bank. Amid a sprawling Vatican City criminal trial, De Franssu answered questions Feb. 16 about the Secretariat of State’s 2018 acquisition of a London building at 60 Sloane Ave.

The banker told judges that in 2019, the Vatican Secretariat of State submitted a loan application to his bank – commonly called the IOR – in order to refinance a mortgage it had taken from a Swiss bank when it bought the London building.

De Franssu told judges…

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A convicted killer and rapist revered by millions as a religious guru has temporarily walked free from jail in India for the fourth time in 12 months, angering activists who say it sets a dangerous precedent in a country grappling with violence against women.

Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, head of the spiritual organization Dera Sacha Sauda, was released for 40 days on January 21 and is expected to remain free until early March, Sanjeev Verma, a senior official from the city of Rohtak, in the northern state of Haryana, confirmed to CNN on Wednesday.

In 2017, Singh was sentenced to 20 years in prison for raping two of his followers. Two years later, he received a life term for the murder of a journalist who exposed the sexual abuse of women within his group.

Singh was previously granted temporary leave from prison in February, June and October last…

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[See also the text of the lawsuit.]

The Zalkin Law Firm P.C. has filed a 479-page lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Bishop of San Diego a Corporation Sole ( the Diocese) and every Catholic Parish in San Diego, alleging that in September of 2019, the Catholic Diocese of San Diego fraudulently transferred assets to separate parish corporations it created to avoid paying settlements or judgments in potentially hundreds of lawsuits, when the California legislature had just passed a bill opening a three year window to allow older victims of child sexual abuse to file lawsuits against their perpetrators and institutions like the Diocese.

In a February 9, 2023 letter to parishioners Bishop Robert Cardinal McElroy states “‘The parish assets have been held in recent years by individual parish corporations, and before that they were held by the Diocese in trust for each particular parish community.”

“The statement by Bishop…

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[See also the full text of Associate Judge Robert Taylor’s order.]

The Maryland Attorney General’s Office will be allowed to release much of its 456-page investigation into the history of child sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Baltimore as soon as next month, a city judge ruled Friday.

The report will be redacted to shield the identities of some people who are accused of committing sexual abuse or helping to cover it up, Baltimore Circuit Judge Robert Taylor Jr. decided.

Those people will have the opportunity to review the portions of the report that name them and object to the release of that information because the grand jury investigation did not offer them a chance to defend themselves against the claims.

The people who must be notified include: those who are accused in the report of abuse, covering up abuse, silencing abuse victims or participating in the transfer of…

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Saying “the need for disclosure outweighs the need for secrecy,” a Baltimore judge has ordered the release of a redacted version of the grand jury investigation into a history of child sexual abuse within the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Circuit Judge Robert Taylor Jr.’s order, signed Friday, said he will hear arguments on whether to release the entire report at a later date.

The report could be released as soon as next month, but the judge must first approve an attorney general’s list of those individuals affected by its public release, and those individuals must be notified. They include priests accused of abuse, and those who hid abuse, enabled it or assisted in a cover up. The list must be presented to the judge on or before March 13.

“Keeping this report from the public is an injustice,” Taylor wrote. “The only form of justice that may now be available is…

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A Baltimore judge has ordered the public release of a heavily redacted version of the Maryland Attorney General’s Office report detailing the history of child sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Circuit Judge Robert Taylor issued his written ruling Friday, directing the attorney general’s office to redact 208 names from the report so it can be released sometime in March.

“Keeping this report from the public is an injustice,” Taylor wrote.

Former Attorney General Brian Frosh’s office finished its report in mid-November, and asked the court’s permission to make public its investigative findings on how 158 priests and other church employees sexually abused and tortured at least 600 people, with examples of abuse going back at least eight decades. The report also shows how the church, in that time period, sought to cover up the abuses and, in some cases, enabled them.

The…

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‘I was told at the orphanage I’d amount to nothing, but I defied them,’ says survivor

The railway tracks ahead of him seemed endless but they offered a human connection for a 16-year-old alone in the woods outside of St. John’s in the 1950s.

Each step he took was one more away from the horrors of the sexual and physical abuse he had endured at Mount Cashel Orphanage — the “holy hell” he had run away from just hours earlier.

When darkness started to close in that first night along the lonely rail line, John (not his real name, which cannot be published due to a court-imposed ban), who is now 80, says that at the time he knew he would rather risk death alone in the woods over one he felt certain would come to him if he stayed at the orphanage any longer.

“I had it in my…

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A 57-year-old priest has been found dead this week, 500 kms from home, following a complaint made by the family of a “vulnerable” man. José António Gonçalves ran a parish in Évora. His body was discovered not far from his car on Tuesday in Terras de Bouro. Say reports: “This was the first formal complaint against the priest, there being no record in the diocesan archives or witness statements made to the Independent Commission which studied abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church” – and released its damning report very recently. The commission meantime (now no longer active) has called for another structure to be set up so that any further abuses within the Church can be properly dealt with.

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I have interviewed dozens of clergy abuse victims. And as they lay out the grooming behaviors of their abusers, a clear pattern has always been evident. Yet until recently, when I read the testimony, published in The Pillar, of a woman who was groomed by Frank Pavone over 20 years ago, I never realized that I had also experienced some of the same boundary violations by his hand. Recently, another woman has come forward with similar allegations. My story is not the same as the other brave women who have stepped forward and shared that they were sexually harassed by Mr. Pavone, a former priest who was laicized by the Vatican in December 2022 for “blasphemous communications on social media” and “persistent disobedience” of his bishop.

But in hindsight, I see that I experienced grooming and inappropriate behavior that I now wish someone had spoken out against.

I…

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[Via Malaysia Herald]

A few months ago, a book with an eloquent title was published: Heillose Macht — literally, “Power empty of salvation.” Many priests and laypersons, both Church employees and volunteers, relate here the abuse of power that they have personally suffered in the Catholic Church, which they have experienced “as a place of despotism and humiliation”.

Numerous reactions to these accounts show that they are talking about something with which many people in the Church are familiar — but something they don’t dare to talk about except in a “safe space”. The stories are about the abuse of power, about contempt for persons, about a lack of respect in the Church. Such experiences are not limited to the German-speaking area, but occur everywhere in the world, as I myself know from my involvement in international projects and worldwide networks.

Something is fundamentally wrong if people need safe spaces…

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The Catholic religious order that runs Marmion Academy in Aurora is acknowledging for the first time that one of its members had “established allegations” of child sex abuse in the 1970s and remained at the school for years.

During that time, Brother Jerome Skaja was accused of more sexual misconduct involving minors.

The Benedictines long hid the fact that Skaja, who died in 2016, had been accused of repeatedly sexually abusing a Marmion student in the 1980s, as the Chicago Sun-Times reported in October — and also that they reached a secret financial settlement with the accuser when he threatened to sue when he turned 18.

In December, the Rev. John Brahill, a Marmion leader, said the order planned to post its first public list of “established offenders,” as the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago has done and as many other Catholic religious orders have. Now,…

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[Via Los Angeles Times; see also a video of the news conference.]

A sweeping lawsuit filed in San Diego Superior Court accuses the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego of a scheme to fraudulently transfer hundreds of properties to avoid potentially large payouts stemming from a new wave of lawsuits alleging abuse by clergy members.

The suit was filed on Tuesday, less than two weeks after the diocese held a news conference warning it might have to file bankruptcy for the second time since 2007, because of the threat from potentially large payouts to approximately 400 people who have sued alleging they were abused years ago.

The latest lawsuit said that the diocese transferred 291 properties into real estate holding companies in late 2019, just after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill that opened a three-year window for people who claimed they were victims of past sexual abuse to file…

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The Diocese of Buffalo has received a child sexual abuse complaint regarding a retired priest in the diocese. As a result, Bishop Michael W. Fisher has placed Father Joseph Vatter on administrative leave as an investigation continues. Prior to being placed on leave, Father Vatter was occasionally celebrating Masses at various diocesan churches.

Please note that this administrative leave is for the purpose of investigation and does not imply any determination as to the truth or falsity of the complaint. 

If you have any information specific to clerical sexual abuse you would like to share, please contact Jackie Joy, victim assistance coordinator for the diocese, who may be reached at 716-895-3010.

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A Buffalo Diocese priest has been put on leave over an allegation that he sexually abused a child, the diocese announced Thursday.  

The Rev. Joseph E. Vatter, 71, who retired in 2022 as pastor of St. Paul Parish in Kenmore but continued to occasionally celebrate Mass at various churches, will be on leave while the diocese investigates the allegation.

Diocese officials declined Thursday to disclose when the alleged incident occurred, but said they had notified the Erie County District Attorney’s Office about the allegation.

In September, a Rochester area man, Robert Kapal, told The Buffalo News that Vatter had abused him when he was a 9-year-old altar boy at St. Christopher Church in the Town of Tonawanda in 1980. 

Diocesan records obtained by The News show the church in 2004 received an abuse complaint about Vatter, but the diocese determined in 2005 that there was “no basis” to the…

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The Vatican has been dismissed from a sexual abuse lawsuit filed by an alleged victim of disgraced former archbishop Anthony Apuron.

The Guam District Court found that the Holy See is absolved of certain responsibilities by the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act.

But the 35-page decision and order does provide explicit details of the allegations against the now-defrocked Apuron.

The Holy See, also commonly referred to as the Vatican, was one of several Catholic Church defendants in the lawsuit, which alleged that it was aware of numerous similar sexual abuse acts by then-Archbishop Apuron, and should share in the responsibility.

But Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood granted the Holy See’s motion to dismiss citing among other things, lack of subject matter jurisdiction and personal jurisdiction under the foreign sovereign immunities act.

The order with prejudice means the Vatican can’t be sued again for damages by the plaintiff. But contained in the court…

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A proposal to do away with clergy exemptions for reporting child abuse and neglect got a first look Wednesday from a Vermont Senate committee. 

Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee took no action on the bill, S.16, after listening to several witnesses speak about it. The senators said they wanted to hear from more witnesses, including constitutional scholars.

Vermont law says members of the clergy are obligated to report abuse and neglect, but the law adds exemptions for what they learn while hearing a confession or acting as a spiritual adviser.

According to current law, the exemptions include information received in a communication that is:

• Made to a member of the clergy acting in the capacity of a spiritual adviser.
• Intended by the parties to be confidential at the time of the communication.
• Intended to be an act of contrition or matter of conscience.
• Required to be confidential by religious law, doctrine…

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A lawsuit was announced Wednesday alleging the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego fraudulently transferred real estate to dummy corporations in order to avoid paying out pending legal settlements to hundreds of victims of childhood sexual abuse.

The suit alleges that due to the impending passage of a bill that extended the statute of limitations for alleged sex abuse victims to file lawsuits, the diocese transferred at least 291 real estate parcels to its parishes in a bid to conceal assets. The suit, which seeks to undo those transfers, states the total assessed value of the transferred property exceeds $450 million.

The lawsuit follows an announcement from the diocese that “the staggering legal costs” of hundreds of sex abuse lawsuits it faces could force it to file for bankruptcy.

Earlier this month, Cardinal Robert McElroy wrote in a letter to parishioners that most of the diocese’s assets were “depleted” due…

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The suit, which seeks to undo those transfers, states the total assessed value of the transferred property exceeds $450 million.

A lawsuit was announced Wednesday alleging the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego fraudulently transferred real estate to dummy corporations in order to avoid paying out legal settlements to hundreds of victims of childhood sexual abuse.

The suit alleges that due to the impending passage of a bill that extended the statute of limitations for alleged sex abuse victims to file lawsuits, the diocese transferred at least 291 real estate parcels to its parishes in a bid to conceal assets. The suit, which seeks to undo those transfers, states the total assessed value of the transferred property exceeds $450 million.

The lawsuit follows an announcement from the diocese earlier in February that “the staggering legal costs” of hundreds of sex abuse lawsuits it faces could…

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Plaintiffs’ attorneys say 1500 new lawsuits have been filed against the Roman Catholic Church in Northern CA alone. The Investigative Unit has independently reviewed nearly 700 of them.

An NBC Bay Area analysis of nearly 700 lawsuits filed against Catholic institutions across Northern California over the past three years suggests the church’s child sexual abuse scandal in the region is significantly worse than the public previously knew.

More than 200 of the clergy and lay employees of the Catholic Church named in the wave of lawsuits have never been publicly accused of being sexually abusive towards children and teenagers until now, NBC Bay Area’s investigation found. Some of the newly accused continue to work as priests.

Other alleged perpetrators named in the civil filings have faced previous accusations but now face new claims, some of them dozens.

NBC Bay Area is in the process of reaching out to those accused…

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The lawsuit claims the Diocese transferred its properties so that those assets weren’t reachable by its creditors, namely survivors of sexual abuse.

A new lawsuit claims that the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego transferred ownership of 291 real estate holdings and parcels across San Diego and Imperial counties to parish corporations in order to conceal the Diocese’s true assets to avoid paying settlements of suits brought by survivors of childhood sexual abuse.

The lawsuit, filed in San Diego County Superior Court by The Zalkin Law Firm on behalf of more than 100 plaintiffs who say they were sexually abused by Catholic priests or employees of the Diocese in either San Diego or Imperial county, claims the Diocese began to transfer its property after the passage of Assembly Bill 218. That California law, passed in 2019, significantly extended the statute of limitations for survivors of childhood sexual assault to file…

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A convicted killer and rapist revered by millions as a religious guru has temporarily walked free from jail in India for the fourth time in 12 months, angering activists who say it sets a dangerous precedent in a country grappling with violence against women.

Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, head of the spiritual organization Dera Sacha Sauda, was released for 40 days on January 21 and is expected to remain free until early March, Sanjeev Verma, a senior official from the city of Rohtak, in the northern state of Haryana, confirmed to CNN on Wednesday.

In 2017, Singh was sentenced to 20 years in prison for raping two of his followers. Two years later, he received a life term for the murder of a journalist who exposed the sexual abuse of women within his group.

Singh was previously granted temporary leave from prison in February, June and October last…

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A former youth minister from Anna has been locked up for the rest of his life after being convicted for producing child pornography at multiple locations, including at a church.

Federal investigators got onto the trail of 49-year old Chad Michael Rider of Anna while they were investigating a Denison man for child pornography offenses.

The Homeland Security agents were able to trace illicit videos back to the Denison Church of the Nazarene, where Rider was a youth minister.

There on a hard drive in the church, they found videos of Rider and the other man, identified as David Pettigrew, setting up cameras to film children who were bathing at the church. More videos were found of Rider recording children at two other residences.

“One of the sacred safe havens for children is the church and all it stands for.  Yet Rider and his conspirators purposefully used it as a lure…

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Christian-majority East Nusa Tenggara province is the largest hub of human trafficking, campaigners says

Indonesian Cardinal Ignatius Suharyo Hardjoatmodjo has called on Catholics to fight the scourge of human trafficking during the upcoming Season of Lent.

Hardjoatmodjo termed human trafficking as “one of the greatest crimes against humanity, which directly contradicts the ideals of the common good” in a pastoral letter issued ahead of Lent that begins on Feb. 22.

“Our poorest, most vulnerable and disabled sisters, as well as women of all ages and children, migrants, refugees and our sisters who come from disharmonious families, are very vulnerable to being exploited by human trafficking practices,” the prelate stated in the letter read throughout the archdiocese Sunday Mass on Feb. 19.

He wanted Catholics to fight the crime and said poverty causes many to become victims of human trafficking.

“Help our less fortunate brothers and sisters,” the cardinal said.

…

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Jean-Baptiste De Franssu told the Vatican court last week that he had “no other choice” but to refer the London deal for investigation.

The president of a major Vatican Bank told a courtroom Thursday that he reported a suspicious Vatican property deal to investigators, even while senior Vatican officials offered him “protection” to help the deal go through.

Jean-Baptiste De Franssu is president of the Institute for Works of Religion, a Vatican City bank. Amid a sprawling Vatican City criminal trial, De Franssu answered questions Feb. 16 about the Secretariat of State’s 2018 acquisition of a London building at 60 Sloane Ave.

The banker told judges that in 2019, the Vatican Secretariat of State submitted a loan application to his bank – commonly called the IOR – in order to refinance a mortgage it had taken from a Swiss bank when it bought the London building.

De Franssu told judges…

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A former Methodist pastor, scheduled to stand trial next week on charges that he sexually abused three boys, is considering a judge’s offer of three to four years in state prison if he pleads guilty by Thursday.

Russell W. Davis, 70, of Seabrook, New Hampshire, who until 2015 was a church-licensed but not ordained pastor for the United Methodist Church, was first charged in 2018 after one of the boys went to Newbury police with an account of years of sexual abuse.

But eight years earlier, in 2010, another boy had also reported that Davis had been abusing him since he was 11. Due to the boy’s emotional state, police did not pursue that case at the time, prosecutor Kate MacDougall said in court Tuesday.

Both boys came from what a prosecutor said on Tuesday were unstable and difficult living situations that “made them vulnerable.” Both were brought to the…

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A former St. Olaf Church staff member accused of sexual misconduct with a young parishioner pleaded guilty to a single count of child enticement in a Feb. 20 hearing, with sentencing to be decided in April.

Rajnal Rehmat, 31, entered the plea in a hearing in Dane County Circuit Court on Monday. As part of a plea agreement, a separate charge of sexual assault was dismissed, but read into the record. Prosecutors agreed not to seek additional charges, while seeing a sentence of two years in prison and three years of extended supervision. Sentencing will be decided in an April 5 hearing.

Rehmat, who is originally from Pakistan, was in the country as a part of the Catholic organization Canons Regular of Jesus the Lord (CJD), according to a statement released by the Diocese of Madison. Rehmat had been working in parishes in DeForest and East Bristol.

The DeForest Police…

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Fr. Marko Rupnik will face an internal Jesuit process addressing allegations of spiritual and sexual abuse.

The Society of Jesus has announced a new canonical process against Fr. Marko Rupnik, SJ, the priest and well known religious artist accused of sexually abusing dozens of women religious over decades.

The canonical process is internal to the Jesuits, and could result in the priest’s expulsion from the order, the Jesuits have explained.

The new legal process, announced Feb. 21 in a statement from the society’s interprovincial house in Rome, follows new allegations against the priest.

Those accusations were made after the Jesuit order asked for any additional victims of Rupnik to come forward in December last year, after news broke that the priest had been found guilty of a crime against the sacrament of penance and briefly excommunicated in 2020.

Since then, the society said Tuesday, the internal team responsible for handling…

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The future Pope John Paul II allowed a priest to return to priestly duties after he had served a prison sentence for self-confessed multiple cases of sexually abusing 10- and 11-year-old girls, according to archival documents and interviews published in a new book.

The revelations come amid debate in Poland over the legacy of John Paul II – a national hero not only for his spiritual leadership but also for the role he played in inspiring opposition to the communist regime – with regard to historical abuse cases in the Catholic church.

The claims emerged from a book, Maxima Culpa, by Ekke Overbeek, a Dutch journalist who is the Warsaw correspondent for the Trouw daily. It will be released next month, but an extract has been published by news magazine Duży Format.

The article focuses on the case of Józef Loranc, a priest who abused a number of girls in the village of Mutne in 1969…

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An NBC Bay Area analysis of nearly 700 lawsuits filed against Catholic institutions across Northern California over the past three years suggests the church’s child sexual abuse scandal in the region is significantly worse than the public previously knew.

More than 200 of the clergy and lay employees of the Catholic Church named in the wave of lawsuits have never been publicly accused of being sexually abusive towards children and teenagers until now, NBC Bay Area’s investigation found. Some of the newly accused continue to work as priests.

Other alleged perpetrators named in the civil filings have faced previous accusations but now face new claims, some of them dozens.

NBC Bay Area is in the process of reaching out to those accused in the lawsuits and anticipates publishing a complete list of names at the conclusion of that process.

While most local dioceses have released internal lists of suspected child…

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As the shockwaves of last week’s revelations about child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in Portugal subside somewhat, it is worth remembering that Catholicism has been at the forefront of atrocious behavior towards children for centuries.

The Catholic Church has certainly not been the only religious or political entity involved in inhumane activity, and historical records are just a backdrop to the moral misconduct in recent decades that has at last been highlighted by those Catholics who have courageously lifted the veil of silence on abuse.

Catholic Crusaders slaughtered hundreds of Muslim and Jewish men, women and children on entering Jerusalem in 1099. The so-called ‘Children’s Crusade,’ initiated supposedly by a divine instruction, sent children to march along with women and elderly people from Europe towards the Holy Land in 1212.

This was during the Crusader wars (1095 to 1291) in which European Catholics made a series of violent…

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The story of an unusual apostasy.

For the fourth week in a row, a white ex-Catholic Buddhist sits down to teach us about humility. We, a group of six or seven teenagers, roll our eyes at each other. It’s 2013, and we’ve just left the gompa—the shrine room—of a Buddhist center in Raleigh, North Carolina, to attend youth group. The mostly white adult members will stay in the gompa to listen to the teachings of the Nepalese geshe (an advanced title earned by high-level Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns). A different parent teaches youth group every week, but a surprising percentage of them grew up Catholic and converted to Buddhism in young adulthood.

Being raised Buddhist from birth put me in a unique position among white Americans. I’ve heard white peers, professors, and Uber drivers praise Buddhism for being the only “unproblematic” religion—Buddhists typically don’t proselytize, the religion tends to accept and incorporate scientific discoveries,…

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As the shockwaves of last week’s revelations about child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in Portugal subside somewhat, it is worth remembering that Catholicism has been at the forefront of atrocious behaviour towards children for centuries.

The Catholic Church has certainly not been the only religious or political entity involved in inhumane activity, and historical records are just a backdrop to the moral misconduct in recent decades that has at last been highlighted by those Catholics who have courageously lifted the veil of silence on abuse.

Catholic Crusaders slaughtered hundreds of Muslim and Jewish men, women and children on entering Jerusalem in 1099. The so-called ‘Children’s Crusade’, initiated supposedly by a divine instruction, sent children to march along with women and elderly people from Europe towards the Holy Land in 1212.

This was during the Crusader wars (1095 to 1291) in which European Catholics made a series of violent…

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State Senate GOP leaders say they already passed childhood sexual abuse measures as part of a package of amendments. Speaker Mark Rozzi told The Inquirer the Senate should “Stop bulls—ing people.”

The Pennsylvania House will return Tuesday for the first time in more than a month to vote on two measures to help childhood sexual abuse survivors seek justice from their abusers and the institutions that protected them.

In what House Speaker Mark Rozzi (D., Berks) called “a week for the victims,” he called the House back into a special session where they’ll be tasked with voting on only two bills: one that would propose an amendment to the state constitution and another that would change state law; both would create a two-year window for adult victims of childhood sexual assault to file civil lawsuits against their abusers or the institutions that protected them.

Childhood sexual abuse survivors have View Cache

Diogenes Unveiled: A Paul Mankowski Collection
Edited by Philip F. Lawler
Ignatius Press
294 Pages, $19.95

Paul Mankowski, S.J., who died unexpectedly in 2021, was a rare ecclesiastical commodity. He pursued expertise in philology because, as he put it, the meanings of words form the battle lines in the Church. He was an old-fashioned Jesuit with an extraordinary gift for raucously intelligent satire. His literary talents ranked alongside those of his exemplar, Evelyn Waugh. Diogenes Unveiled is a compilation of Mankowski’s internet posts, gathered by Philip Lawler. This book should be required reading in seminaries everywhere.

Although Mankowski was always upright and obedient, his superiors considered him a problem child. Today’s Jesuits—with some notable exceptions—rarely make a compelling defense of Catholic orthodoxy. Mankowski’s “transgressions” included his stands on such hot-button issues as abortion, homosexuality, women’s ordination, and celibacy—all covered in this book. His Jesuit authorities found his dissent…

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Thousands of children have been sexually abused by priests and others within the Catholic Church in Portugal since the 1950s, an independent commission announced Monday.

The commission’s final report, authorized by Portugal’s bishops’ conference, marks the first study of its kind in the overwhelmingly Catholic country and paints a grim picture of clerical abuse dating back decades.

The commission, which began its work in January last year, received a total of 564 testimonies, of which it validated 512. Many of the victims who testified said they knew of other children who also had been abused.

Taking these references into account, the commission arrived at “a more extensive network of victims, estimated at a minimum number of 4,815 children,” the group’s coordinator, psychologist Pedro Strecht, explained to journalists during a news conference Monday.

As for the total number of crimes, “it is not possible to quantify, because most of the children…

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When I learned that Auxiliary Bishop David G. O’Connell had been shot to death in his home, I felt as if I had been turned to stone. I was standing in the house he had blessed, about to head out on a long-planned trip with my youngest daughter.

Years ago, when I told him I was pregnant with her, he had laughed. “A third, at your age? Sure, you’re still a Catholic at heart.”

Over the years, O’Connell had done his best to coax me back to the church. Though it never quite worked, he achieved something more miraculous: He restored my faith in faith.

I don’t know many people who have lived a life of loving service without that love at some point becoming bitter. Or without turning away from service and toward power. But I did know David O’Connell. Not well enough to begin to understand why someone would…

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Prosecutors describe ‘lavish lifestyle’; amorous relationship and purchase of a Porsche

Following on from the ignominy of last week’s dossier into child sex abuse within the Portuguese Catholic Church, the institution has been visited by new ‘scandal’ – again, very close to home.

This time it centres on a priest in charge of two Greater Lisbon parishes (Greater Lisbon being one of the mainland areas worst affected by the endemic sexual deviances of priests). 

But Father Arsénio Isidoro is not accused of molesting children: his alleged crime is diverting funds destined for children (in need/ at risk) and the elderly, for his own personal delectation. 

Say reports, public prosecutors have accused him of plundering €800,000, with a ‘female accomplice’ with whom he was having an amorous relationship.

The money is understood to have been lavished on various luxuries, including a Porsche motorcar costing €167,000.

To be fair, the popular press is often peppered with alleged misdemeanors of the…

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[Google translation followed by original Italian text]

In recent months the Referent Team for cases of complaints against Jesuits of the Delegation for Roman Interprovincial Houses and Works of the Society of Jesus ( DIR ) has received several new testimonies and complaints regarding Fr. Marko Rupnik. All the people involved who expressed a desire to be met by the Referent Team were listened to. The Father Delegate, Johan Verschueren, S.J. he is extremely grateful to all the people who have had the strength to tell their experiences, sometimes with the inner suffering of having to bring out many painful episodes again. People are really gods and “ survivors (and ” given the harm they told they had suffered.

Many of these people have no knowledge of each other and the facts narrated concern different periods ( Loyola Community, single people who declare themselves spiritually abused in conscience, psychologically or sexually harassed…

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The Society of Jesus said Tuesday it will open a new internal procedure on Jesuit Father Marko Rupnik after receiving abuse accusations with a “very high” degree of credibility against the artist.

According to a Feb. 21 statement on the Jesuit website, the accusations the religious order received span from 1985 to 2018, and include claims of spiritual, psychological, and sexual abuse, and abuse of conscience.

Rupnik, 68, has been informed of the accusations, but has refused to meet to discuss them with the order, the statement said.

The order said the internal procedure is in the beginning stages, but possible results could include further restrictions on Rupnik’s ministry up to and including his dismissal from religious life.

During the internal procedure, the Slovenian priest’s ministry will remain under restrictions, the Society of Jesus said. Going forward, Rupnik also is barred from performing any public artistic activity, especially…

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Pope Francis’ Jesuit religious order has decided to prohibit a prominent Jesuit artist whose mosaics decorate churches around the globe from pursuing his artistic activity after 15 more people came forward with fresh accusations against him of spiritual, sexual and psychological abuse.

The Jesuits told The Associated Press that they are weighing further disciplinary measures against the Rev. Marko Ivan Rupnik following a third church investigation into allegations he used his exalted status as one of the Catholic Church’s preeminent religious artists to manipulate adult women into sexual activity.

While defrocking technically remains an option, alternative measures could include removing him from the art community he founded in Rome and isolating him in a monk-like life of penance and prayer so he is no longer a threat to women, said Rupnik’s superior, the Rev. Johan Verschueren.

“Naturally the first thing for me to be vigilant about is to do everything…

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The Roman Catholic religious order of Jesuits said on Tuesday that accusations of sexual, psychological and spiritual abuse against a prominent member of the order were highly credible and that restrictions on him had been tightened.

The order said on its website that it would start an “internal procedure” against the priest, Father Marko Ivan Rupnik, 69, a well-known religious artist.

About 25 people, mostly former nuns, have accused Rupnik of various forms of abuse, either when he was a spiritual director of a community of nuns in his native Slovenia about 30 years ago, or after he moved to Rome to pursue his career as an artist.

Rupnik has not spoken publicly of the accusations, which have rattled the worldwide order, of which the pope is a member, and the Vatican since breaking into the open in November.

His superior in the order, Father Johan Verschueren, said Rupnik had…

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Pope Francis revealed a slightly wary take on papal resignations in a candid conversation with his fellow Jesuits during a recent trip to Africa, saying he believes the papacy is for life and that stepping down should not become a habit in Catholicism.

The pope was in Africa Jan. 31-Feb. 5, visiting both the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan. He was originally supposed to make the trip last summer but was unable to do so due to his ongoing knee troubles.

During the trip, he met privately with Jesuits serving in both the DRC and South Sudan. In each meeting, he was asked about his thoughts on papal resignation and whether he was considering it himself, and in each meeting, he said no.

Speaking to 82 Jesuits gathered for his Feb. 2 meeting in Kinshasa, Francis said, as he has in past interviews, that he wrote a letter…

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Paedophile priest Gerald Francis Ridsdale has been charged with indecently assaulting a boy during the late 1980s.

Ridsdale, who has sexually assaulted dozens of child victims, was excused from appearing in Horsham Magistrates Court on Monday.

The 89-year-old is facing one charge over an allegation he indecently touched the child at St Brigid’s College in Horsham between July 1987 and May 1988.

Ridsdale, who is behind bars, is due to face Ballarat Magistrates Court on March 2.

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A priest who kept a stack of child porn in the vicarage and was about to adopt a set of twins has been banned from the Church of England for life. 

Tom Donaghey was banned from the church for life after police found thousands of indecent images during a raid at his former marital home in Baxenden in Blackburn Diocese, Lancashire. 

The 56-year-old, who was about to adopt young twins with his wife, was suspended from his duties at Baxenden St John Church after the raid and subsequent arrest in November 2020. 

In 2021, he was spared a prison sentence and handed down a community order after admitting three counts of making indecent images of children and one of possessing extreme pornographic images. 

Donaghey, who was also chaplain at St Christopher’s High School in Accrington, admitted his guilt to officers before any of his devices were examined. 

Police found…

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Inside real-life ‘religious’ boarding schools where Native Americans were ‘conditioned’ to be white – and where Hundreds died amid rampant abuse – as Yellowstone prequel brings horrors to life

• The drama 1923 details the abuse that went on within church and government-run boarding schools
• In 2012, the U.S. Interior Department launched an investigation to look at what happened decades ago
• It uncovered that between 1819 and 1969 more than 500 students died at US operated Indian schools

The Yellowstone prequel spinoff 1923 offers insight into one of the darkest periods of Indigenous American history, during a time when horrific government-sanctioned abuse took place under the guise of education and religion.

While the plotline of the Montana-set drama might be fictional, the physical and emotional abuse that is witnessed at a Catholic boarding school for Indigenous American youth and attended by Teonna Rainwater – played by Aminah Nieves – is based on real-life…

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Both priests are retired

Allegations of sexual abuse of a minor were substantiated against two Catholic priests in the Diocese of Buffalo Friday.

Rev. Daniel Palys and Rev. Msgr. Ronald Sciera were previously removed from ministry following allegations of abuse, according to the diocese. Both priests are now retired.

Rev. Palys was removed from ministry in 2018 as result of an allegation of abuse that had been substantiated. Msgr. Sciera was placed on administrative leave in September 2021.

The decision comes following an investigation and report by the Diocesan Review Board, a group of clergy and lay Catholics appointed by the bishop to review sexual abuse cases for the diocese.

Both men were named in Child Victims Act lawsuits. Palys faces three suits while Sciera faces one.

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Priests and others within the Portuguese Catholic Church sexually abused more than 4,000 children over the past 70 years, and more than 100 priests suspected of child sexual abuse are still active in church roles, investigators estimate.

An investigation report published this month by the Independent Commission for the Study of Child Sexual Abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church found that priests and others have likely sexually abused 4,812 children within the church since 1950.

Through an online survey, investigators validated 512 victim witness statements and “estimate that the 512 victims knew of or were in contact with close to 4,300 other victims.”

“[T]he vast majority of cases took place on more than one occasion against the same child, to many thousands of instances of abuse,” the report states.

In a statement, Bishop Josè Ornelas apologized for the church’s failure to grasp the extent of the problem, promising…

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Why I’m not engaging with the SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force

The Southern Baptist Convention’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force (whew, that’s a mouthful) has asked for my “input.” Here’s why, at least for now, I’m choosing NOT to engage with them in any direct or formal way.

They’re asking for survivor “input” on how to plug the holes in a system that is designed to have holes. At best, that’s an exercise in frustration. The holes aren’t a bug; they’re a feature.

Although I believe some individuals are well-intentioned, I see little reason to believe the institution is truly committed to doing what’s right and what’s needed. For starters, if it were truly committed to accountability for abusers and care for survivors, it would be spending a lot more money and acting much faster. But they’re trying to address this on the cheap.

“Without transformation, there’s no repentance. There’s only the same…

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KEY POINTS

1. The priest, Ilya Spirov, was given only 120 hours of correctional labor
2. The pedophile admitted guilty to his relationship with the child
3. He had sex with the child at least six times between 2021 and 2022

A Russian Orthodox priest has been sentenced to only 120 hours of correctional labor after having a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old girl.

The priest, however, continues to pursue the girl and seeks to deprive the victim’s mother of parental rights, according to a report by Insider Russia.

Ilya Spirov, an active priest of the Russian Orthodox Church, fully admitted his guilt and reportedly repented, resulting in a lighter sentence under Article 134.1 of the Criminal Code.

“Considering the nature and degree of social significance of the crime committed, […] to impose on him a penalty of 120 hours of correctional labor,” the Aug. 23 verdict said, as quoted by…

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A Florida church being targeted by the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) Credentials Committee for platforming disgraced pastor Johnny Hunt is now threatening legal action against the SBC.

The church—Hiland Park Baptist Church in Panama City, Florida—was recently placed under inquiry by the Credentials Committee for actions allegedly out of step with the SBC’s stance on sexual abuse. Hunt, a former SBC president who’s accused of sexual assault, joined Hiland Park Baptist last summer, after leaving his longtime church in the Atlanta area, First Baptist Woodstock.

In a letter dated Wednesday, Hiland Park leadership stated it is discussing the inquiry with legal counsel “in pursuance of all our legal recourses.” The church added that there is “no proof whatsoever” that Hunt has “committed sexual abuse.” And it claimed the inquiry “violates every historic norm” about Southern Baptist church autonomy.

Hiland Park’s leadership argued that the Credentials…

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Was I guilty of ­negligence in the conspiracy of silence that allowed the abuse to ­continue?

The presence of the monks, once considered Ampleforth’s greatest asset, has become its greatest handicap, says a former head boy. The irony is that the college’s disastrous response to its abuse crisis was rooted in a distortion of the merits that in other ways made the place so special.

 When the first stories about abuse at Ampleforth began to surface in the press – in the early 2000s – I had a call from Dom Dominic Milroy, who had taught me French (inspiringly) during my schooldays, and later became headmaster. I had always got on well with him, and he said he wanted some advice, suggesting we meet in a discreet restaurant near King’s Cross before he hopped on his train back north. Over lunch he asked whether I had any ideas about how…

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Alleged victims claim they were assaulted in the dark basement of an orphanage in the 1960s

Two men have sued the Catholic Diocese of Dallas and a charity in Texas over the alleged cover-up of their sexual assault.

The victims, who have not been named in the lawsuit filed last week, say they were sexually assaulted by Reverend Henry McGill at the Dunne Memorial Home for Boys orphanage between 1962 and 1971, the Dallas Morning News reported.

They claimed a nun by the name of Sister Mary Bridgette would give them alcohol before leaving them in a dark basement, where they were then assaulted.

McGill died at the age of 84 in 1996. His name was included in a list of priests credibly accused of sexual assault released by the diocese in 2019.

The men are now seeking more than $1m in damages. They argue in the lawsuit…

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The Diocese of Knoxville says that documents emerging during a cover-up lawsuit could prejudice a jury against Bishop Rick Stika.

The Diocese of Knoxville asked a judge last week to shield documents from the public record, as the diocese fights back against a lawsuit which claims that Bishop Rick Stika covered up an allegation of sexual assault against a seminarian, while defaming the seminarian’s alleged victim.

In a motion filed Jan. 31, the diocese asked the court to seal from public access any subpoenaed documents that pertain to the diocesan review board, to priest meetings of the diocese, and to a Vatican-ordered Vos estis lux mundi investigation in the Tennessee diocese.

Those documents would include diocesan documents, and those which might be subpoenaed from other sources, including the Knoxville clerics who made the Vos estis complaints

The diocese argued that a protective order is needed for a fair outcome to the lawsuit, because of…

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CIUDAD DEL VATICANO (AP) — The Associated Press tuvo una larga entrevista con el papa Francisco el martes 24 de enero. A continuación la transcripción:

Francisco: Disponga usted, disponga usted. Usted es la que sabe el tiempo del programa, ¿no?

AP: Santo Padre, le entregamos más tarde unos regalos. Pero antes de comenzar, quería entregarle esta imagen de uno de nuestros fotógrafos en Ucrania, puesto que resume muy bien lo que hacemos nosotros, Associated Press. Esa foto que le entrega la colega fue tomada en la ciudad de Mariúpol en las primeras semanas de la guerra. Nuestros compañeros permanecieron allí cuando el resto de la prensa se marchó. Y las imágenes del bombardeo de ese hospital de maternidad que dieron la vuelta al mundo mostraban la brutalidad de lo que ocurrió. Y cómo muchos civiles inocentes estaban siendo asesinados.

Tras el ataque, nuestro equipo tomó muchos riesgos para localizar a…

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A Jonesville man who fled to the Philippines to avoid prosecution on dozens of child sex abuse charges last summer is back in custody in Michigan after being extradited back to the United States. 

Tye Braxton Stiger, 36, made his initial appearance in the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan in Grand Rapids on Tuesday, Feb. 14, after a federal grand jury indicted him on charges of two counts of sexual exploitation of a child, two counts of attempted sexual exploitation of a minor and one count of possession of child pornography. 

“These sexual exploitation and child pornography allegations are extremely disturbing and serious,” said U.S. Attorney Mark Totten. “My office is committed to protecting our youngest and most vulnerable citizens – our children.”

The Hillsdale County Prosecutor’s Office referred the matters to the U.S. Attorney’s Office last summer after issuing a 34-count warrant for his…

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An Indiana Baptist pastor, Benkert played a key role in setting up an investigation into how SBC leaders have responded to the issue of abuse. He also reported a church that had platformed former SBC President Johnny Hunt, who has been credibly accused of sexual assault.

Todd Benkert, a Southern Baptist pastor who helped force reforms in the nation’s largest Protestant denomination’s sexual abuse policies, has stepped down from a task force he was appointed to last year to implement those reforms.

Benkert’s role on the committee became controversial this week due to a public dispute involving a Florida megachurch that restored SBC President Johnny Hunt to active ministry after he had been credibly accused of sexual assault.

Hunt was one of a number of SBC leaders named in a 2022 report from the investigative firm Guidepost Solutions hired by the denomination in 2021 to resolve long-running conflicts over sexual abuse. The report…

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When popes talk about sex, it tends to make headlines.

This was certainly true when Pope Francis told the Associated Press last month, “Being homosexual isn’t a crime.” He said the Catholic Church opposes criminalizing homosexuality and that, “We are all children of God, and God loves us as we are.” The pope then noted that homosexual activity is “not a crime. Yes, but it’s a sin.”

The pope immediately responded to questions from Outreach.faith, a website serving LGBTQ Catholics. Francis explained: “I was simply referring to Catholic moral teaching, which says that every sexual act outside of marriage is a sin. … This is to speak of ‘the matter’ of sin, but we know well that Catholic morality not only takes into consideration the matter, but also evaluates freedom and intention; and this, for every kind of sin.”

The timing was striking since the AP interview ran on Jan….

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Pennsylvania’s top House Republican on Wednesday warned of chaos when legislators reconvene next week, six weeks after representatives elected a Democrat as House speaker and left Harrisburg without conducting any other business.

Republican Minority Leader Bryan Cutler of Lancaster County said the chamber’s 102-101 Democratic majority may not be able to solve the gridlock that has so far prevented lawmakers from so much as adopting operating rules for the 2023-24 session. Cutler himself served as House speaker before deciding in November not to seek the leadership post again.

Cutler spoke to reporters in the Rotunda Wednesday, down the corridor from a lengthy, closed-door meeting about the rules being held among Democratic House members. By sweeping three special elections last week, Democrats cemented a tiny majority, their first in 12 years. Republicans had kept a tight grip on the chamber for more than a decade, with rules that largely prevented Democrats from…

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House Minority Leader Angela Romero confirmed to FOX 13 News on Friday she’s been told her bill and others mandating clergy report abuse disclosures to law enforcement will not be advancing in the legislature. There were four bills introduced in the legislature on the topic following reports of sexual abuse within The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints not being handed to law enforcement.

The Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City has been vigorously opposed to it, arguing it breaks the seal of confession. Rep. Romero, D-Salt Lake City, said she had been told the LDS Church was neutral on her bill. But she planned to bring the bill back again and again.

“There’s strong concerns from the Catholic church in particular, and I’ll still continue to move forward with these bills because I really fell like it’s important we hold people accountable if they’re harming children,” she told…

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Across Australia child sexual abuse survivors have to contend with church memorials to their abusers and those who protected them

For the past 10 years, on the grounds of one of Canberra’s most prominent Catholic schools, a small plaque has paid tribute to the service of a man named Brother Jerome Hickman. Under the school sigil of Marist College Canberra, the plaque commemorates the work of the late Hickman, honouring him along what is known as “the Brothers Way”, a walk of appreciation for past clergy and staff.

The plaque, quietly removed in recent weeks, gave no hint of his darker past.

Hickman was the subject of multiple complaints of child sexual abuse and violence spanning his career in the Marist order.

The church has long held knowledge of complaints about him and has offered payouts and apologies to survivors in out-of-court settlements, according to Kelso Lawyers, a firm specialising…

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Father Joseph ‘Jack’ Baker was church pastor in Wayne and Oakland counties

Sentencing has again been delayed for a Catholic priest convicted last October of raping a child in 2004.

The sentencing hearing for Joseph “Father Jack” Baker, 61, has been moved from Feb. 17 to March 1 in Wayne County’s 3rd Circuit Court in Detroit. Sentencing will be handed down by Judge Bridget Hathaway.

Baker is held in the Wayne County Jail, denied bond. His sentencing hearing has been rescheduled multiple times since his trial concluded Oct. 13, 2022 with a guilty verdict for first-degree criminal conduct – sexual penetration with a person less than 13 years old.

The assault happened while Baker was pastor of St. Mary Catholic School in Wayne. His victim was a second-grade student there who came forward a few years ago, saying Baker raped him in the church sacristy.

Baker was pastor of St….

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A CATHOLIC Church Commission has concluded after only six months of investigating child sexual abuse by priests in Portugal that only 4,815 victims were identified, but said it was the tip of a great iceberg of abuse that is yet to be revealed. The report of the commission was published on Feb. 13, 2023. Critics and supporters of clerical child abuse victims said there were many thousands more victims, not given the opportunity to come forward. The victims were mostly boys 10 to 14 years old.

Several bishops and priests in Portugal who have been accused of child abuse are still in their church duties and positions, and allegedly flout the Vatican law supported by Pope Francis, whereby the civil authorities should investigate and prosecute such allegations. A shocking report in France in January 2022 found approximately 3,000 Catholic priests and religious authorities had sexually abused over 200,000 children since…

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Insisting the case against Rock Church International Pastor John Blanchard remains strong enough to convict him of prostitution charges, Chesterfield County Police Chief, Col. Jeffrey S. Katz of Virginia, publicly disagreed with the decision of Commonwealth Attorney Stacey Davenport to drop the charges against the pastor, arguing that the case should have gone to trial.

Blanchard was among 17 men accused of solicitation of prostitution after an online sting operation by police on Oct. 29, 2021. The married father of two was charged with solicitation of prostitution of a minor and use of a vehicle to promote prostitution which are both felonies. He was arrested at a hotel where he was supposed to meet a detective posing as a 17-year-old girl.

After almost a year of legal maneuvering, the charges against Blanchard were withdrawn or nolle prossed ahead of a criminal trial in…

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A special prosecutor has been appointed in the case against John Blanchard, pastor of Rock Church International in Virginia Beach, who previously saw charges against him dismissed by prosecutors a year after his 2021 arrest during an undercover child sex crimes sting.

This move comes after the Chesterfield County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office in Virginia decided to unseal documents in the case after emails emerged shedding new light on the reason for dropping the charges in 2022 and revealed previously unknown evidence, according to media reports.

William Blaine Jr. is the special prosecutor to review the case, NBC’s Richmond affiliate WWBT reported. 

Republican state Delegate Tim Anderson, who represents the Virginia Beach area where Rock Church Internation is located, obtained emails through a Freedom of Information Act request with Chesterfield Police that revealed why Blanchard’s case was treated differently from others arrested for soliciting prostitution from a minor, according…

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An Indiana pastor who reported two congregations to the Southern Baptist Convention’s Credentials Committee for platforming accused sexual abuser Johnny Hunt has resigned from the SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force.

Todd Benkert’s sudden resignation from the task force came just two days after one of the reported congregations, Hiland Park Baptist Church in Panama City Beach, Fla., declared it would not be accountable to the Credentials Committee and cast doubt on the report of an independent investigation that found credible evidence Hunt abused a pastor’s wife shortly after ending his term as SBC president.

Despite Hunt’s fall from grace in the SBC and his resignation as executive vice president of the SBC’s North American Mission Board, there remains a group of Hunt allies and friends in the SBC who have denied the documented allegations against him or downplayed their significance.

Benkert is not among those. Instead, he has been a fierce…

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In August 2022, AP News released a story detailing how a bishop in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints knew about child sexual abuse and didn’t report it to authorities. The child abuse continued for seven years. That story spawned reactions of “dismay, disgust and anger.” It also prompted discussion of the role of clergy and if they should be mandatory reporters of child abuse.

This legislative session, three bills have been introduced on the topic of clergy mandatory reporting. While all these bills have good intentions, only one — H.B. 115 — does enough to combat child abuse.

Child Sex Abuse and the LDS Church

In Utah, mandatory reporting laws make everyone responsible for reporting child abuse, with just a few exceptions. Those exceptions exists for clergy who learn about child abuse or neglect from a perpetrator while acting in a ministerial role. The goal of this exception in Utah, and…

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