ABUSE TRACKER

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
KYW Newsradio

February 13, 2019

By Steve Tawa

The parents of a man who won what may be the largest payout to date from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in a clergy abuse case are donating a chunk of it to CHILD USA to track the Statute of Limitations reform movement.

University of Pennsylvania Law School professor Marci Hamilton, a nationally-recognized advocate for survivors of clergy sex abuse, believes that 26-year-old Sean McIlmail, a former student in a northeast parish, died of a heroin overdose in 2013 because he was unable to cope.

“He was under tremendous pressure, because he was the only victim who could go after a prosecution of a priest,” Hamilton said.

She says that was due to Pennsylvania’s exceedingly short limit to file a lawsuit. He was about to testify against a now-defrocked priest, Robert Brennan.

Hamilton says public pressure is forcing state legislatures to allow child abuse victims to go after the Roman Catholic Church.

“Over half of the states this year have already introduced legislation to expand or eliminate the criminal and civil statutes of limitations. That’s a record,” she said.

Sean’s father, Michael, a former Philadelphia police officer, recalls the church approaching the family to donate part of their settlement to the church to deal with abusive priests. They decided instead, to give it to Hamilton’s CHILD USA.

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

February 13, 2019

By Christopher White

Following a trend throughout the country, New Jersey’s five Catholic dioceses released on Wednesday the names of its priests credibly accused of sexual abuse.

In total, 188 names were included on the five lists: 63 from Newark, 56 from Camden, 30 from Trenton, 28 from Patterson, and 11 from Metuchen.

While the majority of the priests named are deceased, one name appearing on two lists remains the subject of intense controversy: Theodore McCarrick.

Earlier this summer, McCarrick, the former bishop of Metuchen and later archbishop of Newark (and then Washington, D.C.), was credibly accused of abusing an altar boy while serving as a priest of the archdiocese of New York during the 1970s.

McCarrick would go on to become one of the most prominent members of the U.S. Church, and the scandal surrounding him led Pope Francis to accept McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals last summer, along with removing him from ministry.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), the powerful Vatican body that investigates abuse against minors, is expected to issue a decision on whether to laicize McCarrick in the coming days. Should the Vatican make such a move, McCarrick would be permanently removed from the priesthood.

The archdiocese of Newark included McCarrick in its full listing, noting: “Archbishop Theodore McCarrick has been included on the list based on the findings of the Archdiocese of New York that allegations of abuse of a minor against then Father McCarrick were credible and substantiated.”

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TORONTO (CANADA)
The Catholic Register

February 13, 2019

By Michael Swan

Ever since Pope Francis announced in September that he was calling the heads of the world’s bishops’ conferences to Rome for an unprecedented summit on sexual abuse, expectations have been mounting.

He called for the summit as the Church was reeling from several abuse scandals that had implicated priests, bishops and even cardinals. Nine months into 2018, it was already a horrible year for the Church and it would get worse. More than just a Pennsylvania grand jury report on 70 years of clerical abuse and cover-ups, or lurid tales of sexual predation by former Washington Archbishop Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, or having every single bishop in Chile tender his resignation — beyond these ghastly headlines was a relentless drip of revelations of abuse, negligence and concealment.

Then in November the Pope instructed the American bishops to postpone a vote on stringent new abuse protocols that included creation of a phone line to report misconduct by bishops. He wanted them to wait until the abuse crisis was discussed by bishops from around the world. His intervention further fuelled anticipation of major developments when the three-day summit convenes Feb. 21 in the Vatican.

But as the date approaches, the Vatican has been trying to dampen anticipation.

“I’ve perceived a bit of an inflated expectation,” Pope Francis told reporters on the plane as he returned to Rome Jan. 26 from World Youth Day in Panama. “We need to deflate the expectations.”

That doesn’t mean the Pope is having second thoughts about his own summit. But his ambitions differ from the thousands of Catholics worldwide who may be expecting dramatic announcements or the immediate imposition of new measures to combat abuse.

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NEW YORK (NY)
America Magazine

February 13, 2019

By James M. Dubik

When Pope Francis said in a 2015 interview, “I am a sinner,” he reminded us of a fundamental truth: We are all imperfect. Even those striving for both moral and spiritual perfection are prone to mistakes, errors in judgment, blindnesses and biases. As human beings, we cannot be otherwise, and the organizations we create to govern ourselves—whether for business, political, security, social or religious purposes—reflect these imperfections. The Catholic Church is facing twin crises that prove this point exactly: a sexual abuse crisis and a crisis of confidence in leadership practices that allowed, then covered up, the abuse.

The issue now is how to restore trust in church leadership. My experience in the United States Army—over 37 years, 11 as a general officer—suggests that the path of “I’m sorry, trust me this time” won’t work. Rather, the church must become trustworthy, and that means taking comprehensive corrective action.

Addressing scandal in the ranks

At one point in my career, I witnessed how then-Chief of Staff of the Army, General (now retired) Dennis J. Reimer, and the rest of the senior Army leadership dealt with the 1996 Aberdeen sexual abuse scandal. I was a colonel then, General Reimer’s executive officer. This scandal broke when Major General (now retired) Robert Shadley discovered, reported and began an investigation into allegations of sexual abuse involving the Army drill instructors responsible for training new recruits at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Md.

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CAMDEN (NJ)
Cape May County Herald

February 13, 2019

On Feb. 13, 2019, the Diocese of Camden, in concert with the other dioceses of New Jersey, has published the names of all diocesan priests credibly accused of sexual abuse of minors.

The following is Bishop Dennis Sullivan’s explanatory statement regarding the release of names.

In keeping with a promise made by the Roman Catholic Bishops of New Jersey, I am today releasing the names of 56 priests and one deacon of the Diocese of Camden who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse of minors. The other bishops from New Jersey are simultaneously releasing the names of priests from their dioceses.

In the Diocese of Camden, these 56 priests are a small percentage of the more than 800 priests who have faithfully served the people of South Jersey since the diocese was founded in 1937.

As to the names on the attached list, it includes those who admitted to the abuse, those who were found guilty after a trial in the church courts or the civil courts, and others against whom the evidence was so overwhelming as to be virtually unquestionable. Most of these incidents occurred in the 1970s and the 1980s and involved male teenagers. It should also be noted that the majority of these priests, all of whose names have been provided to local law enforcement authorities, are dead.

In many cases, a single allegation from 30 or 40 years ago was the only such charge that had ever been made against the priest and was received after he had died. Thus, he was unable to respond to the allegation.

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PETERSBURG (VA)
Progress Index

February 13, 2019

By Bill Atkinson

Diocese releases names of 42 men with ‘credible, substantiated’ accusations of assault of minors

The Catholic Diocese of Richmond released a list Wednesday of 42 former diocese priests having “credible and substantiated” accusations of sexual abuse of minors, and that list includes a former priest at a Prince George County parish.

In an open letter to the diocese membership, Bishop Barry C. Knestout said the release coincides with his promise for transparency and accountability in how the church has dealt with the allegations. Knestout said the release is being done to help the survivors and their families heal from their past abuse.

“To those who experienced abuse from clergy, I am truly, deeply sorry,” Knestout wrote. “I regret that you have to bear the burden of the damage you suffered at the hands of those you trusted. I am also sorry that you must carry the memory of that experience with you. Moreover, I apologize to family members and friends of the abused, and to all members of the Catholic Church.”

Knestout stated that the crisis calls for the diocese to “be immersed in three aspects of reconciliation” — acknowledgement of the abuse, regret for the victims and a commitment that it never happens again.

“In doing so, we make known — and support with actions — our commitment to repair the damage that has been done,” the bishop wrote.

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NORWICH (CT)
Norwich Bulletin

February 13, 2019

By Kevin Aherne

The Diocese of Norwich this week released the names of 43 former priests in the diocese with “allegations of substance” made against them regarding the sexual abuse of minors, but a group of protesters say the church has not gone far enough to address the issue.

A small group of protesters from the Connecticut chapter of SNAP — the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests — held a press conference Wednesday afternoon in front of the Cathedral of Saint Patrick in Norwich urging the diocese to “come fully clean now” and to out additional priests the organization said were excluded from the list.

Also Wednesday, the Roman Catholic diocese in Richmond, Va., published a list of 42 priests with a “credible and substantiated” allegation of sexual abuse against a child, while New Jersey’s five Roman Catholic dioceses listed more than 180 priests who have been credibly accused of sexually abusing minors over a span of several decades.

Gail Howard, the leader of the Connecticut chapter of SNAP, said the release of the names by the Norwich diocese was a step forward in addressing decades of abuse that had been previously covered up, but more steps need to be made.

Howard also claimed the list of 43 clergy in the Norwich diocese omitted at least nine names, citing six missing names reported Tuesday by The Day, and three more identified by SNAP.

Howard unveiled details on the three priests that had previously gone unreported by the diocese and the media including: a priest who allegedly repeatedly assaulted a boy in New Hampshire in the 1960s and had served in the Norwich diocese at a church in Willimantic; a priest charged in 1993 with molesting a child in Massachusetts who had previously served in the Norwich diocese at a church in Middletown; and a priest who admitted abuse who had served in the diocese at a church in Middlefield.

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TOPEKA (KS)
Topeka Capital-Journal

February 13, 2019

By Tim Hrenchir

The names of five Roman Catholic priests thought to have molested children in other states — though they weren’t on the list the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas released Jan. 25 identifying 22 priests it concluded had sexually abused children — were made public Wednesday in Topeka by the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

Four of the five priests on the list released by Kansas City SNAP leader Jim McConnell are deceased. They include the Rev. Anthony Palmese, whom an obituary provided by SNAP indicated held assignments that included serving at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Topeka.

The archdiocese confirmed Wednesday that two of the priests had served there but said it had no record of sexual allegations against either during their time there.

The archdiocese indicated it had no record of the other three, including Palmese, having been assigned there and had confirmed that with Husch Blackwell, the law firm hired to independently review all its files.

“It is possible that one or more of these individuals worked, undertook studies or lived in the area at some time in the past,” said Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann. “But if they did, we were not aware of it because the records, going back some 75 years, did not show it.”

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington Post

February 13, 2019

By Michelle Boorstein and Sarah Pulliam Bailey

Virginia’s two Catholic dioceses Wednesday released lists of clergy whom officials say were deemed “credibly accused” of sexually abusing youth, the latest in a slew of U.S. dioceses to make public such names amid a national crisis over clerical abuse and cover-ups.

The diocese of Arlington, which covers the northeastern corner of Virginia, released a list of 16 names. It said the list was the product of two former FBI agents contracted by the diocese and given access to clergy files and information dating to its founding in 1974. It wasn’t immediately clear if any of the names were completely new to Catholics of the diocese.

Bishop Michael F. Burbidge said in a letter that he ordered the list be released to help “victims and survivors of clergy abuse to find further healing and consolation.”

The diocese of Richmond, which covers the rest of the state, released 42 names.

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RICHMOND (VA)
WRIC TV

February 13, 2019

The Catholic Diocese of Richmond has released the names of dozens of priests that are facing ‘credible and substantiated’ allegations of sexual abuse against a minor.

The list, which contains the names of 42 priests, was published by the Diocese of Richmond Wednesday afternoon.

The full list of priests can be found below.

“To the victims and to all affected by the pain of sexual abuse, our response will always be about what we are doing, not simply what we have done,” the Most Rev. Barry C. Knestout, Bishop of Richmond, said in an open letter published with the clergy list.

“We will seek not just to be healed but will always be seeking healing. We will seek not just to be reconciled but will always be seeking reconciliation.”
In an open letter addressed to the Catholic Church community last September, Bishop Barry Knestout says he is committed to addressing accusations of abuse quickly and transparently., Bishop Knestout promised to address all accusations ‘quickly and transparently.’

Snap, or Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, called for the names, “that may have been omitted,” to be added to the list on Wednesday. Snap also asked for additional background information about the priests, including how the diocese handled each allegation, to be made public.

We urge catholic officials in Virginia to not only go back to these lists and add any names that may have been omitted, but also to add work histories, information about current whereabouts and, critically, when the diocese first learned of the allegations and what their immediate response was. Only by including this information can we get a clearer picture of what went wrong in Virginia and what must be done now to protect children and prevent abuse.”-Snap

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OMAHA (NE)
KMTV

February 13, 2019

By Jake Wasikowski

A victim’s support group is calling for more transparency from the Archdiocese of Omaha amid the sexual abuse scandal.

“The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests” is calling on Omaha’s Catholic Church to include four clerics who were accused of sexual abuse on children in other states.

In December, the church released a list of 38 clergy with substantiated claims of sexual abuse or sexual misconduct with a minor.

SNAP says Fathers Thomas Laughlin, Alphonsus Ferguson, James Kelly, and Michael Nash all worked or spent time in Nebraska and were accused of sex crimes in other states. Though Laughlin and Ferguson have died; they say the others could be living here.

“Our view is that any child molesting priest, brother, nun, bishop, seminarian who was in this arch diocese the Catholics and the citizens need and deserve to know about them because we can protect our kids best if we know who and where these predators are,” said David Clohessy, with SNAP.

The Nebraska Attorney General’s Office has asked the Omaha, Lincoln, and Grand Island diocese to share investigation reports dating back 40 years.

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PRAGUE (CZECH REPUBLIC)
Czech Radio

February 13, 2019

Unlike elsewhere in Europe, the Catholic Church in the Czech Republic has faced relatively few scandals involving the sexual abuse of minors or nuns by priests. But as is common worldwide, many cases are never reported or become public knowledge.

Petra Panská, a former nun, is among seventeen people, including victims, who have signed on to a letter to Cardinal Dominik Duka asking him to meet in person with those abused by clergymen. After years of silence, she told Czech Radio, she began speaking out about her own repeated abuse by a Catholic priest, since convicted of multiple counts of rape.

“In my case, I experienced post-traumatic stress disorder, and a multiple personality disorder and depressive disorder also developed. Again and again in my mind I intensively re-live these traumatic events.”

Cardinal Duka has tended to downplay the problem, claiming that only 10 percent of accusations against priests are proven – which does not mean they did not occur. In 2010, when still Archbishop of Prague, he spoke of sexual abuse by the clergy as “abominable” but also said it was over-reported, part of a wider “media campaign” against the Catholic Church and the Pope.

It was for such a stance on the issue that the US-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, includes Cardinal Duka on its “Dirty Dozen” list of papabiles deemed unfit to ever become Pope. This due to his role, according to SNAP, in protecting paedophile priests and making public statements offensive to their victims.

The letter challenging Cardinal Duka to meet face to face with victims was initiated by documentary filmmaker Michal Štingl. He says it stems from the frustration of signatories – all practising Catholics – with the Church’s reluctance to address the issue in open discussion.

“I have repeatedly tried to meet both with the Archbishopric and with the heads of the dioceses where cases have occurred. There was virtually no reaction anywhere. The vast majority are simply not willing to talk about it.”

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Religion News Service

February 13, 2019

By Daniel Burke

Since 1998, about 380 Southern Baptist leaders and volunteers have faced allegations of sexual misconduct, according to a sweeping investigation by two Texas newspapers.

The Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News also found that in the past 20 years, more than 700 victims have been abused, with some urged to have abortions and forgive their abusers.

The newspapers said their investigation included “examining federal and state court databases, prison records and official documents from more than 20 states and by searching sex offender registries nationwide.”

In Texas alone, the newspapers interviewed police and district attorneys in 40 counties.

“Ultimately, we compiled information on 380 credibly accused officials in Southern Baptist churches, including pastors, deacons, Sunday school teachers and volunteers,” the newspapers said. “We verified that about 220 had been convicted of sex crimes or received deferred prosecutions in plea deals.”

Of those 220, 90 remain in prison and 100 are registered sex offenders, according to the report.

The investigation comes as other religious bodies, including the Catholic Church, face accusations of widespread sexual abuse of its members, especially children, over decades.

Churches are autonomous
But unlike the Catholic Church and other Christian denominations, the Southern Baptist Convention is a collection of 47,000 autonomous churches, with little power to force churches to comply with policies.

“The SBC presents no governing policies to churches because the SBC is not a governing organization; it is a service organization. Each church is self-governing,” said Sing Oldham, a spokesman for the Southern Baptist Convention.

“However, the Convention has consistently called on churches to report immediately to law enforcement any known or suspected instance of sexual abuse in a church context and has provided resources to inform churches of ways to help protect their congregants,” Oldham added.

With about 15 million members, the Southern Baptist Convention is the largest Protestant denomination in the United States.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington Post

February 13, 2019

By Sara McDougall

Speaking with reporters last week, Pope Francis acknowledged that the Catholic Church is confronted not just with a crisis of widespread allegations of sexual assault and abuse of minors, but also the rape and even “a kind of sexual slavery” of nuns.

This statement was not technically news. Many already knew of these long-standing allegations of such horrific abuses of power.

What was new, and what some might consider a grave sin on the part of the pope, was not his silence but his public recognition of the problem.

We know all too well how long Catholic authorities have sought to keep priests’ sexual sins quiet. Only recently, because of the brave children and nuns who have come forward, has the depth of sexual abuse in the church been acknowledged as a crisis that must be addressed.

But why has scandal been systematically silenced in the church for so long? One answer lies in the medieval church’s doctrine on scandal.

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WOODLAND PARK (NJ)
North Jersey Record

February 13, 2019

By Mike Kelly

The names are just ordinary. John and Michael and Robert and Peter and William and Thomas and Ken.

All Catholic priests.

All accused of abusing little boys and girls.

On Wednesday, after decades of CIA-like secrecy and obfuscation, the Catholic church in New Jersey finally opened its files and told the faithful in the pews what it knew about priests who had molested children.

“I wish to express my genuine sorrow to the victims and their families who were so profoundly betrayed,” Newark’s Cardinal Joseph Tobin wrote in a letter that accompanied the list. “On behalf of our Church, I beg your forgiveness. You have my solemn promise of prayers and support as you continue on your healing journey.”

In itself, the list is shocking – more than 60 names, just in the Newark Archdiocese, which includes roughly 1.3 million Roman Catholics in Bergen, Hudson, Essex and Union counties. By noon, the list had grown to nearly 200 priests across the state as New Jersey’s four smaller dioceses of Paterson, Metuchen, Trenton and Camden released names of abusive priests.

Click here for the full list of names.

At the same time, however, these lists– and, in particular, how many priests were named – should not shock anyone who has followed the sex-abuse crisis that has crippled the Catholic church for the past two decades, draining its finances and its moral credibility.

Church officials, in New Jersey and across the world, have known for years that far too many priests led secret lives in which they regularly abused some of the most vulnerable members of their flock.

The list of Newark Archdiocesan abuser priests dates back to 1940. It includes ordinary parish priests and others who became significant leaders. The archdiocese said all the cases had been “previously reported to law enforcement agencies.”

One prominent name is former Newark Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, who regularly abused seminarians but was nevertheless promoted to cardinal and placed in charge of the politically significant Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. McCarrick, now in retirement near Washington, has since been stripped of his cardinal’s title by the Vatican.

DIG DEEPER
Catholic priest abuse in NJ
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Here’s the list of NJ priests accused of sexually abusing children
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Catholic sexual abuse crisis: Where to get help

Another prominent figure is the Rev. Charles Hudson, a well-known parish priest in Bergen County and former chaplain at Holy Name Medical Center, who became a nationally recognized leader in the hospice movement. Hudson died two decades ago. But the hospice he founded, the Center for Hope in Union County, is still considered a trend setter in the care of those who are dying. One of the center’s facilities in Elizabeth is called “Father Hudson House.”

The release of names such as McCarrick and Hudson underscore just how damaging the sex abuse scandal has been to the church and what it sees as its mission to offer guidance on a wide range of social, political and moral issues.

Just a few weeks ago, in the midst of the partial shutdown of the federal government over President Donald Trump’s demand for a wall along the Mexican border, Cardinal Tobin wrote a passionate op-ed article for the The New York Times in which he called for more lenient treatment of immigrants. The article was part of Tobin’s unabashed effort to become a national voice in America’s immigration debate.

“There are moral issues involved,” Tobin said in an interview about his stance on immigration. “I think the responsibility from a Christian standpoint is to welcome the stranger, to assist those in danger, certainly to offer love we owe to children and the mothers who carry them.”

Story continues below video:

Cardinal Joseph Tobin, the leader of the Newark Archdiocese posted this video message on the Newark Archdiocese web site on Feb. 13, 2019. North Jersey Record

This week, however, Tobin has been pulled back to the church’s dark side – its sex-abuse crisis.

On Monday, he announced a special fund to compensate victims. On Wednesday, he released the names of abuser priests.

“The revelations of clergy sexual abuse of minors throughout this past year have provoked feelings of shock, anger, shame, and deep sorrow throughout our Catholic community,” Tobin said Wednesday. “Victims, their families, and the faithful are rightfully outraged over the abuses perpetrated against minors. Additionally, the failure of Church leadership to immediately remove suspected abusers from ministry is particularly reprehensible.”

Instead of calling police or defrocking abusive priests, bishops and other church leaders regularly often moved them to different parishes – a pattern that sometimes resulted in even more abuse.

Nevertheless, the fact that the files were finally pried open just a bit represents a significant change from the church’s long history of secrecy – and, sometimes, outright lies – when it comes to questions of behavior by priests.

But while Wednesday’s release of names of abuser priests in New Jersey represents a renewed emphasis by the Vatican on transparency, the list is still not complete.

Not included were priests from some religious orders such as the Franciscans, Dominicans, Benedictines and Carmelites who served parishes or schools in New Jersey. Last month, the Jesuit order released names of 50 abusive priests from northeast states, including 10 who worked in New Jersey.

Also not included are the files on the abusive priests that could offer some context on how many children were victimized and why bishops and other church officials did not impose some measure of discipline. And finally, there is no reporting yet by church officials on whether bishops or other Catholic leaders might be disciplined for helping to cover up the reports of abuse.

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NEWARK (NJ)
KTRK TV

February 13, 2019

New Jersey’s five Roman Catholic dioceses listed more than 180 priests Wednesday who have been credibly accused of sexually abusing minors over a span of several decades, joining more than two dozen other states that have named suspected abusers in the wake of a landmark grand jury report in Pennsylvania last year.

The lists released Wednesday (and posted below) identified priests and deacons who served in the dioceses of Camden, Trenton, Metuchen and Paterson and the archdiocese of Newark. Many priests on the lists are deceased, and others have been removed from ministry.

Cardinal Joseph Tobin, the archbishop of Newark, which listed 63 former priests, said in a statement that he hoped the disclosure “will help bring healing to those whose lives have been so deeply violated.”

Camden’s diocese listed 56 priests and one deacon; Trenton’s diocese named 30 priests; the Paterson diocese listed 28; and Metuchen’s diocese named nine plus two others who are currently the subject of civil investigations.

State Attorney General Gurbir Grewal formed a task force in the fall to conduct a criminal investigation into sexual abuse by clergy in the state, shortly after a Pennsylvania grand jury report identified over 300 predator priests and more than 1,000 victims in that state.

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RICHMOND (VA)
News Channel 6

February 13, 2019

By Scott Wise

The Catholic Diocese of Richmond has released a list of 42 priests who have “a credible and substantiated allegation of sexual abuse” against a child.

“To the victims and to all affected by the pain of sexual abuse, our response will always be about what we are doing, not simply what we have done. We will seek not just to be healed but will always be seeking healing. We will seek not just to be reconciled but will always be seeking reconciliation,” the Most Rev. Barry C. Knestout, Bishop of Richmond, wrote in an open letter published with the list of priests.

The first “credible and substantiated” incident of child sex abuse was reported to the Diocese in the 1950s, according to a Catholic Diocese of Richmond spokesperson. The most recent occurred in 1993, the spokesperson continued.

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TRENTON (NJ)
Asbury Park Press

February 13, 2019

By Alex N. Gecan and Andrew Goudsward

The Catholic Diocese of Trenton has named 30 former clergymen who stand credibly accused of sexual abuse against children.

All 30 men are either dead or have been removed from their ministries. The diocese did not specify whether the men were priests or deacons, where they worked when active, what sort of accusations they faced or from how many victims.

“This preliminary list will be updated as more information becomes available,” Bishop David M. O’Connell wrote in a statement Wednesday. “I do this with the greatest sadness and a heavy heart.

The Diocese of Trenton is in charge of churches in Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth and Ocean counties, according to its website.
The accused are:
Romanilo S. Apuro
Ronald R. Becker (deceased)
Richard C. Brietske
Gerard J. Brown (deceased)
Francis D. Bruno
Charles J. Comito (deceased)
Benjamin R. Dino (deceased)
Manuel R. M. Fernandez (deceased)
Thomas J. Frain (deceased)
Gerald J. Griffin (deceased)
Douglas U. Hermansen
Frank J. Iazette (deceased)
Vincent J. Inghilterra
Francis J. C. Janos (deceased)
Leo A. Kelty (deceased)
Patrick F. Magee
Terrance O. McAlinden (deceased)
Francis M. McGrath
Joseph F. McHugh (deceased)
William J. McKeone
Richard R. Milewski
Liam A. Minogue (deceased)
Sebastian L. Muccilli (deceased)
Robert J. Parenti
Joseph J. Prioli
Joseph R. Punderson
Thomas A. Rittenhouse (deceased)
John E. Sullivan (deceased)
Florencio P. Tumang (deceased)
Brendan H. Williams

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WHYY Radio

February 13, 2019

By Joe Hernandez

New Jersey’s five Roman Catholic dioceses on Wednesday released the names of nearly 200 priests and deacons they say were credibly accused of sexual abuse.

The releases from the Archdiocese of Newark and the Dioceses of Camden, Trenton, Metuchen, and Paterson come as the child sexual abuse scandal in the church continues to unfold and just five months after New Jersey authorities announced a statewide investigation of allegations of abuse and cover-ups.

Cardinal Joseph Tobin, the ​Archbishop of Newark, said he wants to restore trust in the scandal-scarred church and provide solace to victims, and he said releasing the names could help get justice for those abused.

“The disclosure of this list of names is not an endpoint in our process. Rather, it is an expression of our commitment to protecting our children, and a new level of transparency in the way we report and respond to allegations of abuse,” Tobin said in a statement. “We must protect our children, first, foremost, and always.”

Yet some critics viewed Wednesday’s news as damage control by a church they said had been uncooperative in investigating child sex abuse.

“My message would be take these lists with a large dose of salt,” said Mitchell Garabedian, a Boston attorney who has represented scores of clergy sex abuse victims and was portrayed in the film “Spotlight,” which profiled the Boston Globe’s seminal investigation of clergy sex abuse.

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NEWARK (NJ)
Associated Press

February 13, 2019

By David Porter and Claudia Lauer

The Archdiocese of Newark released a list Wednesday of 63 Roman Catholic clergy members that it said have been credibly accused of sexually abusing minors dating back to 1940.

Joseph Cardinal Tobin, the archbishop, said in a statement that he hoped the disclosure “will help bring healing to those whose lives have been so deeply violated.”

New Jersey is one of more than two dozen states where dioceses have released the names of abusive clergy members since a Pennsylvania grand jury report in August identified over 300 predator priests.

In the wake of the Pennsylvania report, New Jersey’s attorney general formed a task force last fall to conduct a criminal investigation into sexual abuse by clergy in the state.

Newark’s list includes Theodore McCarrick, a former Newark archbishop who served as Washington, D.C., archbishop from 2000 to 2006. McCarrick was removed from public ministry in June.

All of the clergy members on the list are described as deceased or having been removed from ministry, and about half have been named in previous news reports. About half are believed to be responsible for multiple victims.

New Jersey’s four other dioceses are expected to release names soon of clergy members suspected of abusing minors.

The number of named clerics on the Newark list is likely to grow larger, as the current list doesn’t include those who are currently the focus of lawsuits. The archdiocese said those names would be added if accusations are found to be credible.

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[Friar and founder of Atlético school admits having abused a child]

BARCELONA (SPAIN)
El País

February 13, 2019

By Oriol Güell

Una víctima acusa al marianista Manuel Briñas de haberle agredido sexualmente en un colegio de Madrid durante tres años

El fraile marianista Ángel Manuel Briñas, quien fue uno de los responsables de la cantera del Atlético de Madrid durante más de dos décadas, ha admitido a EL PAÍS haber abusado sexualmente de un menor de edad cuando era fraile marianista en un colegio de Madrid. Los hechos, según la víctima, ocurrieron entre 1973 y 1975, cuando Briñas era el responsable deportivo y de scouts del Colegio Marianista Hermanos Amorós, del barrio de Carabanchel. El centro educativo y el club han mantenido históricamente una estrecha relación por la que muchos futbolistas de las categorías inferiores del Atlético estudiaban allí.

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[The powerful network that overlooked priest Poblete’s double life]

CHILE
El Mostrador

February 13, 2019

By Macarena Segovia

El sacerdote construyó un sistema perfecto con el que no solo sustentó la obra del Padre Hurtado, haciendo crecer el Hogar de Cristo, sino que recobró el poder y la influencia en la élite que los jesuitas habían perdido tras la irrupción de otras órdenes, como el Opus Dei. El poder de sus amistades y benefactores le dieron un “halo” que sumió en la ceguera a sus cercanos, en donde a pesar de que “todos sabían” y se le veía cerca de mujeres jóvenes, “nadie sabía” del abuso y poder que ejercía sobre ellas.

“Polvete”, así era llamado Renato Poblete Barth, el sacerdote que fue pilar fundamental del Hogar de Cristo y del legado del Padre Alberto Hurtado. Un hombre poderoso, “casi santo”, que ostenta el Premio Bicentenario entregado por la Presidenta Michelle Bachelet y que hasta cuenta con un parque con su nombre para honrarlo. Un religioso que protagonizó la reinvención de los jesuitas, luego que la Compañía de Jesús comenzara a perder fuerza entre los católicos de élite a fines de los sesenta, y constituyó la beneficencia como la base de las redes de poder que lo protegieron durante décadas ante los “rumores” que siempre hubo sobre su doble vida.

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[Catholic order promises to cooperate with abuse investigations into Francisco Cox]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 13, 2019

By Alberto González and Nicole Martínez

Los Padres de Schoenstatt reiteraron que entregarán toda la colaboración a la justicia para establecer la verdad en los casos de abuso sexual contra menores que pesan sobre el exsacerdote Francisco José Cox. Recordemos que el exreligioso, quien fue destituido de sus labores sacerdotales por el papa Francisco, retornó a nuestro país procedente de Alemania para enfrentar acusaciones en su contra por abuso de menores.

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[Apostolic administrator of Puerto Montt asks people not to condemn a deceased former priest]

CHILE
SoyChile

February 13, 2019

Ricardo Morales se refirió al suicidio de Francisco Núñez quien era investigado por abusos sexuales.

El padre Ricardo Morales administrador apostólico de la Arquidiócesis de Puerto Montt, emitió un comunicado público tras la muerte del ex sacerdote José Francisco Núñez Calisto, donde solicitó no reprochar y menos condenar al fallecido.

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PARIS (FRANCE)
LaCroix International

February 13, 2019

Asia has so far experienced very few instances of clergy sex abuse involving minors. One primary reason is that Roman Catholics are just a drop in a this ocean of overwhelmingly Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist and Muslim countries of Asia. Catholics are a majority only in the Philippines and Timor Leste.In the Philippines, “no member of the clergy has been convicted or imprisoned for sexual abuse of children or vulnerable adults,” Bishop Buenaventura Famadico of San Pablo, south of Manila, and president of the Episcopal Commission for the Clergy, told La Croix last September.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
National Catholic Reporter

February 13, 2019

By Heidi Schlumpf

After the release of the Pennsylvania grand jury report last summer, Thomas Mengler, president of St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas, sat down and wrote his archbishop a letter, in effect saying, “You need to get ahead of this.”

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Mengler recommended a lay commission to audit the archdiocese’s efforts addressing the issue and to suggest ways to improve. This would be separate and in addition to the archdiocesan review board that evaluates individual allegations — and this new commission’s members would not be appointed by the archbishop.

San Antonio Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller listened. A well-respected retired appeals court chief justice, Catherine Stone (herself a survivor of sexual abuse, though not by a clergy member), was tapped to head the commission, which issued its report on Jan. 31, the same day the Texas bishops released names of priests accused of sexual abuse.

Six of the seven members of that commission were affiliated in some way with St. Mary’s University; five were alumni, including Stone, whose law degree is from the Marianist school. The commission is one example of how Catholic colleges and universities are stepping up to the plate to assist the church with the crisis of sexual abuse and cover-up.

“I think Catholic universities have a responsibility to help the church,” Mengler said. Mengler told the story of the commission as part of a workshop — ominously titled “Multiple Paths of Securing Money in a Hostile Environment” — as part of the annual meeting Feb. 2-4 of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities in Washington, D.C.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

February 13, 2019

By Rhina Guidos

In a video posted Feb. 11 on YouTube, Bishop Frank J. Caggiano of Bridgeport, Connecticut, offered support for the “many sisters and brothers who have been wounded, violated, hurt and abused at the hands of priests and deacons” and whose sexual abuse in their youth “changed their lives forever.”

“The crime and sin of sexual abuse in our midst is a deep evil that has created a deep wound,” said Caggiano, who has been one of the most outspoken U.S. bishops on the topic of sex abuse by clergy.

Getting rid of the “evil” is not enough, he said, calling on others to offer support for those who have been victimized, “those whose lives sometimes have been completely shattered.”

“We stand with them because we love them, because they’re part of our family and even though some members of our family have betrayed them, you and I will not,” he said. “We stand with them because in the name of Jesus, his love invites them and us to heal, for we are all in need of healing.”

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KANSAS CITY (MO0
National Catholic Reporter

February 13, 2019

By Michael Sean Winters

One week from tomorrow, the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences will begin a four-day meeting in Rome to discuss the church’s response to clergy sex abuse. What can we reasonably expect from such a short meeting and on such a complex issue?

Most prognosticators think the meeting will fall short of expectations. I suppose that depends on what those expectations are. Take for example, my colleague Jesuit Fr. Tom Reese, who offered five reasons he thought the meeting would fail, the last of which was this:

Nonetheless, the meeting will also fail because, in order to succeed, Francis will have to lay down the law and simply tell the bishops what to do, rather than consulting with them. He’ll have to present a solution to the crisis and tell them to go home and implement it.

Francis will not do that. He does not see himself as the CEO of the Catholic Church. He has a great respect for collegiality, the belief that the pope should not act like an absolute monarch. At his first synod of bishops, he encouraged the bishops to speak boldly and not be afraid to disagree with him.

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HARRISBURG (PA)
PennLive

February 12, 2019

By Ivey DeJesus

Catholic bishops have long held that victims compensation programs offer a chance for victims to heal.

That theory is about to be put to the test for potentially hundreds of victims of clergy sex abuse across the Diocese of Harrisburg.

On Tuesday, officials from the diocese rolled out a program that will pay out millions of dollars in financial compensation to adults who were sexually abused as children by priests and church officials. The diocese has not announced the size of the fund or estimates of how much will be awarded to settle individual claims.

Some victims welcome the idea of a compensation award, particularly in light of the fact that the legislative reforms that would allow victims to sue predatory priests in court have up to now failed in the General Assembly.

The majority of victims linked to the findings of the grand jury report are timed out of the legal system because the statute of limitations have expired for them.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
Newsradio 1020 KDKA

February 12, 2019

“I was a sophomore in high school when I met David Pullson at Bradford Central Christian in the little town of Bradford and he was my English teacher.” Jim Van Sickle told KDKA Radio’s Marty Griffin and Wendy Bell on Tuesday afternoon.

“He had just come out of seminary that same year. I had just some things happen in my family that had me wondering aimlessly.”

“I was a perfect target.”

Sickle is just one of countless survivors of Catholic priest sex abuse that has come forward to tell their stories in hopes to heal, inspire others, and to get the Catholic Church to stop trying to protect itself, and start healing the survivors of these atrocious crimes.

It is in this pursuit for vindication that has fueled Sickle to travel to the Vatican, where he has meetings set up to speak with people in high-powered positions. He hopes that his meetings will get his messages heard, and, hopefully, be taken to the top of Catholic leadership: the Pope himself.

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INDIANAPOLIS (IN)
WISH-TV

February 13, 2019

The Archdiocese of Indianapolis said Tuesday it has suspended one of its priests from the ministry after a report of sexual abuse involving a minor in 2016.

The Rev. David J. Marcotte is prohibited from all public ministry. The abuse report about the 32-year-old priest was made Wednesday to the archdiocese’s victim assistance coordinator, a statement said.

The statement said “civil authorities” and the chair of the Archdiocesan Review Board were notified of the allegation. Local law enforcement officials have announced no criminal charges against Marcotte.

Marcotte was ordained June 7, 2014. He has worked with these ministries: 2014, associate pastor, SS. Francis and Clare Parish, Greenwood, and Catholic chaplain, University of Indianapolis; 2015, associate pastor, St. Malachy Parish, Brownsburg; 2016, administrator, St. Martin of Tours Parish, Martinsville; 2017, chaplain, Roncalli High School, Indianapolis; Catholic chaplain, University of Indianapolis; and sacramental assistance, SS. Francis and Clare Parish, Greenwood.

In 2018, the Archdiocese of Indianapolis suspended two more priests for sexual abuse allegations. Retired Priest John Maung came to light in August, and Father Patrick Doyle was the subject of credible accusations in September. Doyle later resigned.

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OMAHA (NE)
KMTV

February 12, 2019

By Danielle Meadows

Holding childhood photos and signs, members of a nation-wide support group for clergy sex abuse will stand outside Omaha’s Catholic headquarters tomorrow urging officials to make changes and provide more information.

The support group is called SNAP (the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), and say via e-mail that Omaha Archbishop George Lucas omitted crucial details and four names from his list of 38 alleged predators released in November.

Members plan to disclose those four names of publicly accused priests who spent time in the Omaha area but have been left off of the Catholic church’s recently released accused clerics list.

SNAP will urge Omaha Catholic officials to add those names to the list and do “more aggressive outreach” towards those who may have been impacted by priest abuse in the city.

According to the e-mail, SNAP hopes Archbishop Lucas will release more details about two clerics accused of sexual misconduct who face multiple allegations but have “apparently not been ousted from ministry,” and provide more information on accused “extern” clerics whose whereabouts are not being disclosed.

The group also aims to urge the Archbishop to provide more details about the allegations against Father Francis Nigli and Father Andrew Syring.

Members will gather on the sidewalk outside the Omaha Catholic headquarters at 100 N. 62nd St. Wednesday at 1:45p.m.

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MEMPHIS (TN)
LocalMemphis.com

February 12, 2019

By Rebecca Butcher

The sex abuse investigation surrounding the Southern Baptist Convention faults a prominent local pastor for being complacent in reporting sexual abuse.

The Houston Chronicle reports current pastor of Bellevue Baptist, Steve Gaines, failed to immediately fire an offender.

Now he says his staff is trained detect abuse.

When Local 24 News asked Pastor Gaines about the incident – he released this statement saying:

“Any form of abuse is tragic and the occasion of great sorrow, and there should be absolutely no tolerance for any sort of abuse. Consequently, all of our staff have been and are being trained on an ongoing basis to detect abuse and know what to do if it is suspected or reported. Every church should do the same. Churches must take responsibility to protect and minister to all victims and be safe places for all congregants. The Southern Baptist Convention now has a Sexual Abuse Presidential Study Group to help churches deal with these heinous issues. I fully support this initiative and look forward to the report and the suggestions that they bring.” ~Steve Gaines, Senior Pastor, Bellevue Baptist Church

According to the report, Gaines admits waiting six months to fire a pastor who confessed to molestation.

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DALLAS (TX)
WFAA TV

February 12, 2019

By Jobin Panicker

Attorney David Finn confirmed to WFAA that the family of Fr. Patrick Koch – a former president and principal at Jesuit prep school in Dallas – has filed a cannon law appeal to the Catholic Diocese of Dallas, the Diocese of Corpus Christi, and the Vatican over Koch being included on a list of priests credibly accused of sexual abuse.

The appeal was hand-delivered to the diocese on Monday before close of business, according to Finn.

The Koch family met with Bishop Edward Burns last Friday to discuss Koch being named on the list. Finn said that the meeting was very cordial and the family said Burns “showed remarkable and unprecedented courage” in meeting with them.

In late January, the Catholic Diocese of Dallas released names of priests “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of minors over the last seven decades. Koch, who was principal at Jesuit from 1972-1979 and president from 1979-1980, was one of 31 priests named.

Finn said the appeal was represented by more than 25 members of the Koch family across the country. The attorney also said the family has also enlisted the help of a cannon lawyer based out of Rome.

“We want to make this very clear: this is not an attack on any victims,” Finn said. “We encourage any and all victims of abuse to come forward. This is about transparency to the process and fairness. My concern is whether there was due process. We don’t know who said what, where, or when. The jury is still out on this. He’s [Koch] not here to protect his good name.”

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HARRISBURG (PA)Penn Live

Feb 12, 2019

By Jana Benscoter

A Manheim Township couple who has stopped attending Mass said they don’t believe the leader of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Harrisburg when he speaks.

Central Pennsylvania’s diocese has scheduled listening sessions to atone their role in the Catholic Church’s clergy sexual abuse scandal. The fourth session was held at St. Leo the Great Parish in Lancaster County on Tuesday evening. Another session is scheduled Wednesday in St. Joseph Parish in Mechanicsburg.

Harrisburg’s Diocese earlier Tuesday announced its establishment of a victim’s compensation fund, which is why Claire Rennie, 60, said she attended the Lancaster listening session. She said her husband was abused in the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese.

She thinks it’s insulting, she added, that Bishop Ronald W. Gainer deflects questions and avoids providing sincere answers.

“We hear the church abused you, the bishop covered it up, you don’t get statute of limitation,” she said..

The couple has been married for over 30 years, but Rennie said she only learned of her husband’s childhood nightmare a year ago.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Agence France-Presse

February 12, 2019

By Nova Safo

The United States’ largest Protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, is facing a sexual abuse crisis after a bombshell report revealed hundreds of predators and more than 700 victims since 1998.

The report by 2 Texas newspapers found some 380 church leaders and volunteers have faced public accusations of abuse, mostly of children as young as three years old.

Some of the accused continued to work at Southern Baptist churches, the newspapers said.

In response to the report, church officials acknowledged the number of victims could actually be higher and urged survivors to come forward.

“One of the things I’m encouraged by are the number of pastors that are actively engaged right now,” in the report’s aftermath, convention leader Russell Moore told AFP on Tuesday.

The revelations threatened to engulf the denomination — with some 47,000 churches and 15 million members mostly in the southern US — in the same type of scandal that has roiled the Catholic Church.

A more comprehensive response was likely to come from the Southern Baptist organization next week when president JD Greear “is scheduled to give an update on a sexual abuse study he commissioned last summer,” said spokesman Roger Oldham.

LAX OVERSIGHT

Unlike the Vatican, the Southern Baptist Convention is a loose network of churches allowed to run autonomously, ordain their own ministers — who are not required to be celibate — and hire staff and volunteers based on each church’s own standards.

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DENVER (CO)
Catholic News Agency

Feb 12, 2019

By J. D. Flynn

Archbishop Theodore McCarrick will reportedly be laicized this week, if he is found guilty of having sexually abused minors.

But what does it mean to be “laicized,” “defrocked,” or “dismissed from the clerical state?”

Ordination, the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches, “confers a gift of the Holy Spirit that permits the exercise of a ‘sacred power’ which can come only from Christ himself through his Church.”

The Church says ordination marks a person with an irremovable imprint, a character, which “configures them to Christ.” Ordination, in Catholic theology, makes a permanent change that the Church has no power to reverse.

“You are a priest forever,” the Letter to the Hebrews says.

This change is referred to as an ontological change, or a change in being itself.

In addition to making an ontological change, ordination also makes a legal change in a person’s status in the Church. By ordination, a person becomes in canon law a “cleric.” The word “cleric” is derived from the Greek word for “casting lots,” a process of selection similar to drawing straws or rolling dice, because in Acts 1:26, Matthias is added to the 11 remaining apostles after lots are drawn to select the right person.

A cleric, or a sacred minister in the Church, is an ordained man who is permitted by the Church to exercise sacred ministry. A cleric is bound to certain obligations, among them is usually celibacy in the Latin Catholic Church, and he possesses certain rights, among them is the right to be appointed to pastoral leadership positions in the Church. Clerics have the right to be financially supported by the Church, and are bound by obedience to the pope and to local Church authorities.

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NORWICH (CT)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

February 12, 2019

Three more publicly accused abusers are “outed”
All were left off Norwich’s list of clergy with “allegations of substance”
Victims want Catholic officials to “come fully clean now”
SNAP to CT officials: “Remove time limits for abuse victims”

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will disclose the names and histories of three publicly accused child molesters who worked in the Norwich Catholic Archdiocese but were left off a just-posted list of those with “allegations of substance.”

They will also call on Connecticut’s Church officials to

include the three new names on the diocese’s list,
give more details about each abuser, especially their photos, current whereabouts and full work histories and
They will also urge Connecticut’s political officials to act, specifically prodding
CT legislators to totally remove the criminal and civil statutes of limitations for child sexual abuse and open a permanent civil window, and
CT law enforcement agencies, especially the attorney general, to work harder to investigate and pursue charges against clergy who commit or conceal heinous crimes against kids.

WHEN
Wednesday, Feb. 13 at 1:00 p.m.

WHERE
On the sidewalk outside St. Patrick’s Cathedral, 213 Broadway, Norwich, CT

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NEW YORK (NY)
Bustle

February 12, 2019

By Seth Millstein

According to an investigation by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News, over 200 employees or volunteers at Southern Baptist Convention churches were convicted of sex crimes or pleaded guilty to them in the last 10 years. More than 700 people have reported being abused by church workers since 1998, and dozens of the accused have been able to find jobs at Southern Baptist churches, the Chronicle and Express-News report.

In total, around 380 Southern Baptist ministers, deacons, youth pastors and others have been accused of sexual misconduct in the last 20 years, the Chronicle and Express-News report. Over 250 were charged, around 220 either pleaded guilty or were convicted, and nearly 100 of them are in prison today. There were more accused of sexual misconduct who worked in Texas than any other state, according to the Chronicle and Express-News’ review of court records and newspaper articles from that time. Bustle has reached out to the Southern Baptist Convention for comment.

As part of its report, the two newspapers compiled a database of convicted sexual predators in the Southern Baptist church — a measure that, according to the newspapers, the church itself refused to to do despite requests from alleged survivors.

Since 1998, at least 10 Southern Baptist churches employed, or provided volunteer opportunities to, members who had been charged with sex crimes, the newspapers report. At least 35 accused sexual predators were able to find work at churches after their accusations.

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DENVER (CO)
Crux

February 12, 2019

By Claire Giangravè

A United Nations commission has published a scathing report of Italy’s handling of clerical sexual abuse, stating its concern with numerous cases of children being sexually abused by Catholic priests in the country and calling for an independent and impartial commission of inquiry.

“The committee is concerned about the numerous cases of children having been sexually abused by religious personnel of the Catholic Church in the State party and the low number of investigations and criminal prosecutions,” said a Feb. 7 report of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.

The committee had summoned the Italian government Jan. 22-23 before the UN’s High Commissioner in Geneva regarding the implementation of the 1990 Convention on the Rights of the Child. Among the main topics was Italy’s alleged complicity in the Catholic Church’s child abuse scandals.

Italy was called to answer about its protection of the rights of minors regarding immigrant and refugee children and awareness campaigns throughout the territory, but the commission left ample space for the issue of clerical abuse.

The committee asked for a national plan to prevent and combat sexual exploitation of children and asked that the country “establish an independent and impartial commission of inquiry to examine all cases of sexual abuse of children by religious personnel of the Catholic Church.”

Other recommendations include “the transparent and effective investigation of all cases of sexual abuse allegedly committed by religious personnel of the Catholic Church, the criminal prosecution of alleged perpetrators, the adequate criminal punishment of those found guilty, and the compensation and rehabilitation of child victims, including those who have become adults.”

The UN panel, composed of experts in the protection of the rights of the child, invited the Italian government to establish safe channels for children to report abuse and to ensure their protection by preventing perpetrators who have been found guilty from having further access to minors.

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NEW YORK (NY)
America Magazine

February 12, 2019

By Michael J. O’Loughlin

Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, the former archbishop of Washington who last summer was removed from public ministry and who then resigned from the College of Cardinals, could also be dismissed from the clerical state, one of the highest forms of punishment issued to priests. Also known as laicization and sometimes referred to colloquially as defrocking, a sentence of laicization would complete a stunning fall from grace for the former cardinal, who at one time wielded immense influence in both Rome and the United States. Last year, then-Cardinal McCarrick was reported to the Archdiocese of New York, accused of abusing a 16-year-old boy in the 1970s. Two more allegations of the abuse of minors also surfaced, as did claims that Archbishop McCarrick sexually harassed and assaulted priests and seminarians.

If the Vatican decides to expel Archbishop McCarrick from the priesthood, it would close one chapter of the abuse crisis, but many questions will remain.

What is laicization?
The term “laicization” refers to scenarios in which a member of the clergy, through the use of the church’s legal apparatus, is no longer permitted to act as a priest. Sometimes a priest may petition Rome for laicization, often in order to marry. (A priest who wishes to marry needs, in addition to laicization, to request being released from his vow of celibacy, which is a separate process.)

In other cases, laicization is a form of punishment, commonly described as being “dismissed from the clerical state,” often because of violations of the commandment barring adultery. (Before the 1983 revision to the code of canon law, priests who were laicized were often referred to as being “reduced” to the lay state.)

A sentence of laicization would complete a stunning fall from grace for the former cardinal, who at one time wielded immense influence in both Rome and the United States.
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This is the portion of canon law used by the church to prosecute priests and bishops accused of sexual abuse of a minor. Between 2004 and 2014, the Vatican laicized 848 priests because of sexual abuse. Only the Vatican can laicize priests so accused, which critics say makes the process too cumbersome.

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NEWARK (NJ)
The Associated Press

February 12, 2019

By David Porter

Victims of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy in New Jersey will soon be able to apply for compensation from a fund representing all five of the state’s dioceses, one of the fund’s administrators announced Monday.

Camille Biros, who also is overseeing similar compensation funds in Pennsylvania and New York, said New Jersey’s will be different because all five of the state’s dioceses will follow the same protocols. Those will be posted on a website by early next week followed by a 30-day public comment period before they are finalized.

The first phase will last at least six months, Biros said, and will focus on alleged victims who have made previous claims. A second phase will focus on new claims.

“We are looking forward to working with the dioceses and are pleased about the fact this is a common protocol for the entire state,” Biros said.

A fund Biros oversees in New York has paid out more than $210 million to more than 1,100 victims in five dioceses, she said.

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HOUSTON (TX)
Hoston Chronicle

February 12, 2019

By John Tedesco, Robert Downen, and Lise Olsen; Multimedia by Jon Shapley

Offend, then repeat

Southern Baptist churches hired dozens of leaders previously accused of sex offenses

Doug Myers was suspected of preying on children at a church in Alabama — but he went on to work at Southern Baptist churches in Florida before police arrested him.

Timothy Reddin was convicted of possessing child pornography, yet he was still able to serve as pastor of a Baptist church in Arkansas.

Charles Adcock faced 29 counts of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl in Alabama. Then he volunteered as a worship pastor at a Baptist church in Texas.

The sordid backgrounds of these Southern Baptist ministers didn’t stop them from finding new jobs at churches and working in positions of trust.

They’re among at least 35 Southern Baptist pastors, youth ministers and volunteers who were convicted of sex crimes or accused of sexual misconduct but still were allowed to work at churches during the past two decades, an investigation by the San Antonio Express-News and the Houston Chronicle reveals.

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NEWARK (NJ)
North Jersey Record

February 12, 2019

By Deena Yellin and Abbott Koloff

Hundreds of priests gathered at the headquarters of the Archdiocese of Newark on Tuesday afternoon amid anticipation that the Catholic Church in New Jersey was preparing to release lists of names of abusive priests this week.

Several priests said as they left the meeting that the lists are expected to come out on Wednesday. Others declined to comment, and one priest said the group had been told not to discuss the meeting, which started at 1:30 and lasted a little over 30 minutes.

Cardinal Joseph Tobin, the Newark archbishop, announced last year that the state’s five dioceses were reviewing clergy sex abuse cases. The church, he said, planned to publish the names of all priests and deacons who have been credibly accused of sexually abusing children sometime this year.

The review followed an announcement by state law enforcement officials that they had launched a statewide investigation into alleged sexual abuse by priests.

The state’s five dioceses — Newark, Paterson, Metuchen, Trenton and Camden — are expected to release their lists at the same time. The Diocese of Paterson plans to post its list on its website sometime Wednesday morning, the diocesan attorney, Ken Mullaney, said Tuesday.

Priests who work in the diocese will be notified shortly before the list is published, he said, adding that he didn’t know what time it would be released to the public.

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[Ex-bishop Francisco Cox returns to Chile to face allegations of child abuse in La Serena]

CHILE
BioBioChile

February 12, 2019

By Alberto González and Nicole Martínez

El exobispo Francisco Cox, quien fue destituido de sus labores sacerdotales por el papa Francisco, retornó a nuestro país procedente de Alemania para enfrentar acusaciones en su contra por abuso de menores, informó este lunes la Iglesia en un comunicado.

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NEW YORK (NY)
U.S. News & World Report

February 12, 2019

By Megan Trimble

MORE THAN TWO DOZEN Southern Baptist church leaders had faced sexual misconduct charges, but churches employed them anyway, according to a new report from the Houston Chronicle.

A San Antonio Express-News and the Houston Chronicle investigation found churches in the Southern Baptist Convention hired at least 35 Southern Baptist pastors, youth ministers and volunteers in the last two decades, despite their being convicted of sex crimes or accused of sexual misconduct. The Southern Baptist Convention is the largest coalition of Baptist churches in the U.S. It has refused proposed reforms, such as creating a registry to track abuse cases, the Houston Chronicle reports.

According to the second of three installments published on Tuesday, churches, in some cases, knew of a pastor’s past but still allowed him to work. In other cases, church inaction might have allowed the employees to move between parishes undetected, the report said.

The first installment of the bombshell report revealed sexual misconduct allegations against roughly 380 church leaders and volunteers dating to 1998 and involving some 700 victims. About 220 offenders have been convicted or taken plea deals, the report found.

One pastor has compared the recent report to removing a cancerous lesion.

“The analogy I would give is this: I recently had a cancerous lesion removed from my skin and it hurt and the hole left behind was deep. Was it good? No, it was needed.,” Pastor Wade Burleson told NBC News of the report, which he called a “punch in the gut.”

Burleson told NBC that he thinks the recently published database will lead to change, but he also said he was sad “we didn’t do it ourselves.”

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[Eugenia Valdés, of the Sacred Heart of Jesus: “There are more clerics and women who are abused”]

CHILE
La Tercera

February 6, 2019

Esta semana el Papa Francisco reconoció casos de abusos sexuales a monjas por parte de obispos y sacerdotes, y señaló que esto sería algo que aún ocurre.

María Eugenia Valdés, religiosa del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús, ve como una buena noticia que el Papa Francisco “diga con su nombre y admita que esta es una realidad a voces” los casos de abusos a religiosas dentro de la Iglesia. “Creo que sucede en todas partes”, asegura, y afirma que “hay más religiosas y mujeres abusadas. Debe haber muchos otros testimonios que están en silencio”.

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[Priest investigated for child abuse found dead in Puerto Montt]

CHILE
La Tercera

February 9, 2019

By A. Vera

Tras la investigación y los exámenes realizados por el Servicio Médico Legal se determinó que se trata de un suicidio.

El viernes en horas de la noche fue encontrado el cuerpo del sacerdote José Francisco Núñez – quien estaba siendo investigado por abuso de menores – en su hogar en la comuna de Puerto Montt (región de Los Lagos).

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[Catalan bishops promise to collaborate with civil investigations into abuses of minors]

BARCELONA (SPAIN)
El País

February 12, 2019

By Oriol Güell

La Conferencia Tarraconense muestra su “firme compromiso” con la legislación civil y llama a las víctimas a denunciar

La Conferencia Episcopal Tarraconense, que reúne a los 10 obispos catalanes de las provincias eclesiásticas de Barcelona y Tarragona, ha prometido esta mañana dar un paso en firme para imponer al clero la obligación de poner en conocimiento de la Fiscalía los casos de abusos sobre los que tenga noticia.

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ALBANY (NY)
NEWS 10

February 6, 2019

By Anya Tucker

The Child Victims Act passed unanimously in the Senate on January 28th, but the bill is still waiting to be signed into law by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.

This has some victims of childhood sexual abuse growing nervous.

The Child Victims Act would raise the age from 23 to 28 for victims in criminal cases to come forward. In civil cases, it raises the age to 55. It also provides a one-year lookback in which to file those civil lawsuits.

“The purpose of getting this law was to get the statute of limitations clock going. And the law won’t change until he signs it,” says Gary Greenberg.

The childhood sexual abuse survivor says his concern is for victims who may have birthdays coming up in the next couple of days or weeks that would leave them out of the bounds of the new statute. He points to the speed at which Gov. Cuomo signed other bills into law, such as the Reproductive Health Act, on the very same day it was passed.

Gov. Cuomo’s office sent NEWS10 ABC an email saying, in part, “We are working to identify a date for a bill signing with advocates and survivors who have been affected by this issue…[they] need to have an opportunity to attend this historic event.”

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ALLENTOWN (PA)
Morning Call

February 12, 2019

By Steve Esack

The Harrisburg Diocese opened its child sex abuse compensation fund Tuesday, giving victims 90 days to make claims about assaults by clergy.

And victims had better be prepared to bare their souls.

The diocese’s Survivor Compensation Program, administered by a national mediation firm, includes an eight-page online questionnaire asking victims a host of biographical questions about schooling, employment, marital and offspring status, and about criminal history before asking them to detail the alleged abuse.

The form also carries a warning that anyone making an abuse claim that had not been previously disclosed to the diocese as of Monday will have their allegations forwarded to law enforcement and to the Department of Human Services for investigations.

Discover which new cars and trucks contribute more to the U.S. economy, regardless of where the manufacturer’s brand is actually headquartered. Click to read learn more.

Victims will have until May 13 to apply for the first round of payouts. Those who receive a payment can still receive counseling services, but must give up their right to sue the diocese at a later date.

Lawsuit payouts typically are bigger than victims compensation funds.

New victims who come forward after the program starts will be considered for future participation in the program.

“The establishment of the Survivor Compensation Program is another step forward in our Diocese’s efforts to show our support to survivors of clergy child sexual abuse,” said Bishop Ronald W. Gainer, a former Allentown Diocese official. “While we understand that financial compensation will not repair or erase the heartache and damage done by the abuse these survivors have suffered, we hope and pray this support can help to improve their lives.”

The Allentown Diocese will open its victim compensation fund in March or April, spokesman Matt Kerr said.

All eight Catholic dioceses in Pennsylvania announced plans last year to start their own victim compensation funds after Attorney General Josh Shapiro released a scathing statewide grand jury report detailing decades of child abuse and cover-ups in six dioceses. The two dioceses excluded from that report — Philadelphia and Johnstown — were the subject of prior grand jury reports that found similar abuses and cover ups.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Commonweal

Feb 12, 2019

By Austen Ivereigh

Pope Lowers Expectations for Next Month’s Sex Abuse Summit — the Associated Press headline may not have been heart-lifting, but it was fair. During Pope Francis’ flight back from Panama on January 27, he had told reporters that “we have to deflate the expectations” surrounding the bishops’ first global summit on clerical sex abuse, which is to take place at the Vatican between February 20 and February 24.

Francis described the summit as essentially a “catechesis”: to make church leaders across the world aware of the pain of victims, and their obligations to act against abuser priests, as well as to hear survivors’ testimonies and to pray, penitentially, for the church’s failures. But three days is not a long time, and no one is expecting a revolution. “The problem of abuse will continue,” Francis assured reporters. “It’s a human problem.” No one should be expecting the pope to pull a new solution out of a top hat.

As the Vatican’s press-office director, Alessandro Gisotti, points out, the Vatican meeting is only the latest stage in a long-maturing response. If you thought this was just Rome’s attempt to seize the initiative after the Pennsylvania grand-jury report or the Cardinal McCarrick scandal, forget it. The Vatican’s editorial director, Andrea Tornielli, insists that the issue will be looked at from a “global perspective,” not “solely European and American.”

This is just as much about Africa and Asia and Latin America, where they don’t think they have an abuse crisis, but they do.Still, while Francis may have wanted to “deflate” expectations, he was not saying the meeting does not matter. He thinks it matters very much—just not in the way people might think it does. Before talking about new protocols and procedures, the pope said on the plane, there is something else the bishops have to do: “We must become aware.”

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MEXICO CITY (MEXICO)
Mexico Daily Times

February 12, 2019

The Catholic church in Mexico has revealed that 152 priests have been suspended over the past nine years for child sex abuse, triggering demands that the clerics’ names and whereabouts be made public.

Rogelio Cabrera López, president of the Mexican Episcopal Conference (CEM), revealed the information Sunday, explaining that some of the priests are serving prison terms while others received non-custodial forms of punishment.

However, he didn’t disclose the number of victims.

Cabrera, who is also the archbishop of Monterrey, lamented that there is no national information system which compiles information related to cases of sexual abuse within the Catholic church and said that it was necessary to establish one.

He also said it was the responsibility of bishops to formally report to authorities all illegal acts detected within the church.

Responding to the church’s revelation, the Mexico director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), a non-governmental organization founded in the United States, said he was taken by surprise that such a high number of priests have been suspended for committing sexual abuses against children.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Hawk

February 12, 2019

A panel discussion held on Feb. 6 about Pennsylvania’s 40th Grand Jury Report was an opportunity for candid conversation on reconciling Catholic identity with the Church’s sexual abuse crisis and cover-ups.

Despite the event’s importance, it was sparsely attended by St. Joe’s students, predominantly attracting community members including Charles Gallagher, a former prosecutor who worked on a 2005 grand jury investigation of sexual abuse concealment within the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

Contributions from people outside the St. Joe’s community can add new dimension and insight to open forum discussions, especially those regarding issues as widely impactful as sexual abuse within the Catholic Church. Events like last week’s panel can and should be promoted to members of the outside community.

However, as part of a Catholic university, St. Joe’s students have a responsibility to be informed on the topic of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church.

Even if we do not identify as Catholic, and whether or not we have ever known anyone who was a victim of priest abuse, we live and learn in an environment steeped in Jesuit-Catholic identity.

Catholic values are enshrined in our General Education Program in the form of Faith, Justice, and the Catholic Tradition, the theology requirement.

An education on Catholicism is incomplete without an understanding of the institution behind it, and that requires learning about the Catholic Church’s internal structuring and its institutional history of protecting priests who commit sexual abuse. Last week’s panel was an opportunity to learn from experts who have worked with victims of priest abuse and who study the crisis within the Church.

Scheduling conflicts and busy days may also be to blame for the lack of turnout from St. Joe’s students, and that is perfectly understandable. With discussions as important as these, however, the focus should be on making time rather than finding the time.

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HOUSTON (TX)
Houston Chronicle

February 12, 2019

By Leslie Contreras Schwartz

In 1999, during my last semester at the University of St. Thomas, I studied Spanish and Mexican culture in Merida, Yucatan, with a priest as one of my teachers. Father Jack Hanna, a charismatic and charming priest, taught us about Mayan culture and the joy of the Spanish language. Over those three months, I had no reservations in living in a house with him and the other dozen students.

A few weeks ago, the Galveston-Houston diocese released a list of priests “credibly accused” of sexual abuse. Hanna’s name was on the list.

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

February 11, 2019

Yesterday, the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News published the first part of a bombshell series looking into the abuse of children and vulnerable adults in the Southern Baptist Convention.

We are grateful to these intrepid journalists for looking deeply into this issue. As this article shows all too well, abuse by clergy is not just a Catholic issue. In any situation where the powerful have authority and autonomy over the vulnerable there are bound to be tragic situations like this. We have seen this play out from Hollywood to Michigan State University, and in churches across the globe.

What is critical is that the article lead not only to awareness of this issue in the Southern Baptist Convention, but to immediate and decisive action by church and law enforcement officials. We hope that anyone who has seen, suffered, or suspected abuse by Southern Baptists – or any other religious figure – will immediately contact the local police, prosecuting attorneys, state attorneys general, and the Department of Justice. It is critical that law enforcement officials at every level of government look into these cases and determine what actions they are able to take immediately to keep the vulnerable safe and to ensure that those who have abused children or adults are removed from any position of power that would let them hurt others.

More and more people are finding their voice and the ability to speak out about heinous crimes such as those described in yesterday’s article. It is critical that we as a nation continue to listen to and learn from victims as they share their experiences. By believing and advocating for survivors, we can learn from their trauma how to prevent cases like this in the future, to ensure that no child or adult is ever hurt by an authority figure that is meant to care for them.

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WOODLAND PARK (NJ)
North Jersey Record

February 11, 2019

By Deena Yellin

Victims of clergy abuse from any of New Jersey’s five Roman Catholic dioceses will be able to seek compensation from a newly launched Independent Victim Compensation Program, the program’s administrators announced Monday.

The administrators, Kenneth Feinberg and Camille Biros, are noted victims’ compensation experts who have operated similar programs for dioceses in other states, as well as the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund.

“The program provides victims with an attractive alternative to litigation, providing victims a speedy and transparent process to resolve their claims with a significantly lower level of proof and corroboration than required in a court of law,” Feinberg and Biros said in a joint statement.

The announcement of the program drew mixed reactions Monday from advocates for victims of clergy abuse.

“If the compensation fund helps a clergy sexual abuse victim try to heal, then the victim should enter into the fund process. But if a victim wants to try to gain full transparency through a legal action, then the victim should wait to determine if the statute of limitations will be amended,” said attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented more than 50 clergy abuse victims in New Jersey.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
Times Picayune

February 12, 2019

By Tim Morris

So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin. — James 4:17

One common evil in the sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist churches is the number of people in authority who chose to cooperate, compromise or remain silent in allowing the wrongdoing to continue.

Just six months after a grand jury report provided horrific details of sexual exploitation and abuse by members of the Catholic clergy and laity in Pennsylvania, the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News published a joint investigation Sunday (Feb. 10) documenting similar offenses by pastors, ministers and volunteers within the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention.

As with the Catholic offenses, the worst atrocities are magnified by the church’s indifference to the victims or its protection of the perpetrators.

District attorney says we have a crime problem, not an incarceration problem

A case in point is the story of Debbie Vasquez, who was just 14 when she was first molested by her Southern Baptist pastor in Sanger, Texas, a small town an hour north of Dallas. The abuse went on for years until she became pregnant at age 18.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

February 12, 2019

By Fredrick Nzwili

‘I think there could be more cases in Africa, but most go unreported because of fear’

Africa is also grappling with clerical abuse, say Catholic leaders

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

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

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

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LOUISVILLE (KY)
Louisville Courier Journal

February 12, 2019

By Andrew Wolfson

Six Kentucky men are among roughly 380 Southern Baptist church preachers and volunteers accused of sexual abuse and misconduct over the past 20 years, two newspapers have reported.

The Kentuckians named include a pastor, an associate pastor and four youth ministers, according to a database compiled by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News. There are 2,400 Southern Baptist churches in Kentucky.

The newspaper report said the more than 300 named either were convicted or credibly accused, leaving behind more than 700 victims, many of them shunned by their churches or urged to forgive their abusers or to get abortions.

About 220 offenders, including Sunday school teachers, deacons and pastor, were convicted or took plea deals, and dozens of cases are pending, the report says.

Nearly 100 are still held in prisons across the U.S., more than 100 are registered sex offenders, and some still work in Southern Baptist churches today.

Archdiocese of Louisville report:48 Louisville priests, others accused of sex abuse

Curtis Woods, co- interim executive director of the Kentucky Baptist Convention, said in a statement that “as a Christian leader and former child abuse prevention social worker, I grieve with thousands of Kentucky Baptist churches over the devastating effects of immorality in any sphere of human existence, especially when children are victimized by predatory adults.”

Woods, who also is an assistant professor of applied theology and biblical spirituality at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, added that “in any child abuse case, the best interest of the child should be the first line of defense. God-fearing Christians must see themselves as mandated reporters. There is no excuse.”

The Kentucky church leaders identified were:

Joseph Niemeyer
Joseph Niemeyer (Photo: Kentucky Corrections Department)

• Joseph Niemeyer, a youth pastor at the Banklick Baptist Church in Walton, who was convicted last year of sodomy and sexual abuse and sentenced to 20 years in prison. According to press accounts, a prosecutor said Niemeyer raped and sexually abused a 5-year-old in his custody over four years.

• Gordon H. Lunceford, a former youth minister at First Baptist Church in Lawrenceburg, who pleaded guilty in 2010 to an unlawful transaction with a minor and sexual misconduct many years earlier. He was sentenced to five years of probation.

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SANTA FE (NM)
Santa Fe New Mexican

February 11, 2019

Inmates were asked to clear a room at the Santa Fe County jail Monday afternoon for the video arraignment of an 81-year-old former priest charged with raping and kidnapping a 6-year boy in the late 1980s.

Unlike other inmates, Marvin Archuleta’s hands were unbound. He leaned heavily on a walker as he entered the room, his sliver-white hair parted to the side. Slowly, he lowered himself into his seat, adjusted the walker, cleared his throat and straightened the collar of his khaki jumpsuit. He looked into the camera lens, then down.

Santa Fe Magistrate Judge David Segura addressed Archuleta’s televised image through the window of a Sony television set.

“A criminal complaint has been filed against you,” Segura began. The judge read aloud the statutes that govern first-degree criminal sexual penetration of a child under 13, kidnapping or unlawful confinement resulting in great bodily harm.

Archuleta, who served as a priest for the Archdiocese of Santa Fe for more than a decade, was arrested Friday in Albuquerque on charges he raped and confined a first-grader at Holy Cross Catholic School in Santa Cruz. If convicted, he could face up to 60 years in state prison.

Monday marked his first court appearance.

Archuleta bobbed his head to his chest and said “yes” to confirm he understood the charges. He told the judge he would like time to arrange his affairs and finances for his studio apartment in Albuquerque.

But Segura told the former priest Magistrate Court has no legal authority over his release and the conditions will be set during a detention hearing in District Court. The state Attorney General’s Office filed a motion Monday asking Archuleta be kept in custody without bond until trial; he will face a District Court judge within the next five days on the state’s custody request.

“We believe this individual is a danger to the community,” said David Carl, a spokesman with the Attorney General’s Office. “And no conditions of release would have protected the community from him.”

The motion to keep Archuleta confined argues the former priest already has proven himself a threat to the community and an international flight risk.

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LAS CRUCES (NM)
Albuquerque Journal

February 11, 2019

By Angela Kocherga

Acknowledging that it must “atone for past mistakes,” the Catholic Diocese of Las Cruces on Monday said it has given the state Attorney General’s Office personnel files and other documents connected to 28 priests and other clergy “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of children and minors.

“We have sent these files to the attorney general for his review, and in those files are the allegations against these individuals and how the situation was managed by the diocese,” Bishop Gerald Kicanas told a news conference in Las Cruces. The diocese said roughly 12,000 pages were turned over, although some of the documents were redacted.

Release of the documents comes three days after the AG’s Office arrested and charged former Archdiocese of Santa Fe priest Marvin Archuleta, 81, on first-degree felony counts of criminal sexual penetration of a child under 13 and kidnapping in the rape of a 6-year-old boy in the 1980s at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Santa Cruz, near Española.

And in September, federal agents extradited former Kirtland Air Force Base chaplain Arthur Perrault from Morocco and charged him with six counts of aggravated sexual abuse and one count of sexual contact in the molestation of an 11-year-old boy in the early ’90s. Perrault has pleaded not guilty to all counts.

The Diocese of Las Cruces, meanwhile, has also added the names of 13 priests “credibly accused of sexual misconduct with minors” to the list of 28 individuals released in November. The new names were of priests who had allegations against them but not during their time in the Las Cruces Diocese.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 12, 2019

Archbishop Jose Antonio Eguren Anselmi of Piura, Peru, has responded to a Feb. 5 Crux report by senior correspondent Elise Harris regarding lawsuits for charges of aggravated defamation he filed against two Peruvian journalists.

In his letter to Crux, Eguren Anselmi said he said he wanted to correct “false or inaccurate” statements on the “prestigious” Crux news site. In general, he believes Crux misrepresented the motives for his lawsuit and also omitted the point that he’s not seeking a jail sentence.

The journalists, Pedro Salinas and Paola Ugaz, co-authored a 2015 bombshell book “Half Monks, Half Soldiers,” which details years of sexual, psychological and physical abuse inside the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae (SCV). A controversial Catholic organization, the SCV originated in Peru and its founder, layman Luis Fernando Figari, has been accused of physical, psychological and sexual abuses.

Figari was prohibited by the Vatican in 2017 of having further contact with members of the group.

Eguren Anselmi, who is part of the SCV, filed the complaints separately but at the same time in July 2018. If the journalists are found guilty, theoretically they could be subject to a fine of $60,000 dollars and a 3-year jail sentence.

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HARTFORD (CT)
WNPR Radio

February 11, 2019

By Frankie Graziano

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Norwich has released names of clergy found to be credibly accused of sexually assaulting minors.

This follows continued reporting by The Day that found at least 28 clergy affiliated with the Norwich diocese had been accused of sexual assaulting both minors and adults. The diocese said last year that the list would come out sometime in January of 2019.

The report lists 43 names, arranged by the person’s position in the diocese. The report also includes some information about what happened to the accused. But, advocates want to know more about what’s not included in the report.

The diocese, according to the report, has paid out around $7.7 million to survivors in a total of nine lawsuits against it. Attorney Kelly Reardon, a managing partner with The Reardon Law Firm in New London, said that number is confusing, because her firm has won more than that just for victims that she’s represented.

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[The Jesuits’ toughest face-to-face: how abuse accusations will affect their intimate conclave]

CHILE
La Tercera

February 10, 2019

By Carla Pía Ruiz and Fredi Velásquez

Las acusaciones de abuso sexual en contra del sacerdote Renato Poblete detonaron una crisis sin precedentes al interior de la Compañía de Jesús y encendieron un debate -hasta ahora soterrado- que amenaza con estallar en el Encuentro de Provincia que se desarrollará en los próximos días.

Fue un ataque silencioso. Estaba en la primera fila, sentado, escuchando a un expositor, como todos sus compañeros jesuitas, en una de las salas de reuniones de la casa construida por el Padre Hurtado. Era la víspera del anual Encuentro de Provincia de la Compañía de Jesús. De pronto, la cabeza del sacerdote cayó hacia un costado, en el hombro de otro jesuita. Primero, pensaron que se había quedado dormido. Lo empezaron a mover. No despertó. Sin sacarlo de su silla, lo llevaron a una pieza.

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[The complex judicial scenario awaiting ex-bishop Francisco José Cox in Chile]

CHILE
La Tercera

February 11, 2019

By J. M. Ojeda and M. J. Navarrete

Exsacerdote enfrenta dos investigaciones por supuesto abuso sexual contra menores: una en La Serena y otra en Rancagua. El exreligioso arribó a Chile el domingo y vivirá con un matrimonio en las afueras de Santiago.

El martes 19 de febrero, el Juzgado de Garantía de La Serena decidirá quién llevará adelante la investigación por presunto abuso sexual de menores que habría cometido el exobispo de La Serena Francisco José Cox. Una posibilidad es que la causa quede en manos de la justicia antigua y la otra es que recaiga en el Ministerio Público.

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[Abuse cases in the Salesians of Deusto taints former director]

MADRID (SPAIN)
El País

February 8, 2019

By Julio Núñez

La Ertzaintza ha recibido 17 denuncias en dos semanas, en las que figuran ya como acusados de pederastia tres clérigos

Las denuncias por abusos en el colegio salesiano de Deusto (Bilbao) no cesan. A las presentadas hace una semana se han sumado después otras cinco y otras cinco más, en total, 17. tras revelar un antiguo alumno su caso, ocho más decidieron hacer pública la cara oculta de José Miguel San Martín, conocido, don Chemi, un salesiano que en los ochenta impartía clases en el centro, de cuyo profesorado formó parte desde 1975 a 1990. Hasta este viernes, la Ertzaintza ha recogido al menos 17 denuncias por pederastia y maltrato en las que, además de figurar como acusado San Martín, están el sacerdote y antiguo director del colegio Luis Rojo (fallecido) y otro religioso que fue docente allí.

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[Salesians of Deusto admit they knew of abuses since 1989]

MADRID (SPAIN)
El País

February 8, 2019

By Julio Núñez

El colegio pide perdón “por no haber actuado con la diligencia que la gravedad de los casos requería”

La dirección del colegio salesiano de Deusto tuvo conocimiento a finales de 1989 de dos casos de abusos que se produjeron en el seno de la institución en la década de los ochenta. Así lo ha reconocido en un comunicado en el que la Congregación Salesiana brinda “su apoyo a las víctimas”. La institución asume que la actuación del centro “fue a todas luces insuficiente” y su reitera su petición de perdón “por no haber actuado entonces con la diligencia que la gravedad de estos casos requería”. También ha anunciado que muestran su apoyo a la concentración que este viernes por la tarde han convocado en la plaza de San Pedro de Deusto las víctimas de abusos.

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MEXICO CITY (MEXICO)
Reuters

February 11, 2019

By Lizbeth Diaz

At least 152 Catholic priests in Mexico have been suspended in the past nine years for sexual abuse against minors, Mexico’s Archbishop for Monterrey said, prompting a lawyer for alleged victims of abuse to question on Monday the Church’s sincerity.

“Some delinquent priests are in prison, others have been suspended from their ministries. In the last nine years, 152 priests have retired,” Rogelio Cabrera, Archbishop of Monterrey, told reporters on Sunday.

The Mexican Church’s announcement comes amid extensive sexual abuse scandals across the Catholic Church in countries including the United States, Chile, Australia, and Germany. Mexico is home to the world’s second-largest Catholic community after Brazil.

Pope Francis will receive bishops at the Vatican later in February to discuss worldwide revelations of sexual abuse in the Church, which have badly eroded the institution’s credibility.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

February 12, 2019

By Claire Giangravè

A United Nations commission has published a scathing report of Italy’s handling of clerical sexual abuse, stating its concern with numerous cases of children being sexually abused by Catholic priests in the country and calling for an independent and impartial commission of inquiry.

“The committee is concerned about the numerous cases of children having been sexually abused by religious personnel of the Catholic Church in the State party and the low number of investigations and criminal prosecutions,” said a Feb. 7 report of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.

The committee had summoned the Italian government Jan. 22-23 before the UN’s High Commissioner in Geneva regarding the implementation of the 1990 Convention on the Rights of the Child. Among the main topics was Italy’s alleged complicity in the Catholic Church’s child abuse scandals.

Italy was called to answer about its protection of the rights of minors regarding immigrant and refugee children and awareness campaigns throughout the territory, but the commission left ample space for the issue of clerical abuse.

The committee asked for a national plan to prevent and combat sexual exploitation of children and asked that the country “establish an independent and impartial commission of inquiry to examine all cases of sexual abuse of children by religious personnel of the Catholic Church.”

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WOODLAND PARK (NJ)
North Jersey Record

February 11, 2019

By Deena Yellin

Victims of clergy abuse from any of New Jersey’s five Roman Catholic dioceses will be able to seek compensation from a newly launched Independent Victim Compensation Program, the program’s administrators announced Monday.

The administrators, Kenneth Feinberg and Camille Biros, are noted victims’ compensation experts who have operated similar programs for dioceses in other states, as well as the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund.

“The program provides victims with an attractive alternative to litigation, providing victims a speedy and transparent process to resolve their claims with a significantly lower level of proof and corroboration than required in a court of law,” Feinberg and Biros said in a joint statement.

The announcement of the program drew mixed reactions Monday from advocates for victims of clergy abuse.

“If the compensation fund helps a clergy sexual abuse victim try to heal, then the victim should enter into the fund process. But if a victim wants to try to gain full transparency through a legal action, then the victim should wait to determine if the statute of limitations will be amended,” said attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented more than 50 clergy abuse victims in New Jersey.

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HARRISBURG (PA)
Pittsburgh Post Gazette

February 11, 2019

By Liz Navratil and Angela Couloumbis

The Roman Catholic dioceses in New Jersey, some reeling from their own clergy abuse scandals, announced plans on Monday to establish a unified victims-compensation fund aimed at providing money to some people who were abused by clergy members as children.

“This is the first time we’re doing a statewide program using the same protocol and the same eligibility criteria,” said Camille Biros, who will administer the program and currently oversees similar ones in New York and Pennsylvania. “This is important news, and we’re looking forward to working with all the dioceses in the state.”

Details of the plan are still being finalized, and it likely won’t include all victims. As has been the case elsewhere, people determined to have been abused by religious order priests, rather than those who report directly to the diocese, are likely to be excluded.

People who accept money from the compensation fund will be required to sign a release saying that they will not sue the diocese. The agreements would not include a confidentiality clause for victims, Biros said.

“Administrators of this program are bound by confidentiality,” she said, later adding: “But the claimant can speak to whomever they want. … They can talk about the money; they can talk about the process.”

Such compensation funds have typically proven controversial. Some clergy abuse victims welcome the news of such funds, viewing them as a path toward justice since they are barred from filing lawsuits by civil statutes of limitations.

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YORK (PA)
York Daily Record

February 11, 2019

By the Fortney family

“I feel like I have a scarlet letter on my chest!”

A common feeling amongst all of us as we walked into the first listening session hosted by Bishop Gainer of the Diocese of Harrisburg.

However, that feeling dissipated as the parishioners’ voices filled with hope, support and love for us and all victims echoed throughout the church. Originally meant as a symbol of shame, our “scarlet letter” quickly became a powerful symbol of Assurance!

Initially intended as a forum for the bishop to hear feedback and answer questions, the listening sessions, for us and many victims as well as parishioners, has become a refuge for healing and empowerment. While some still refuse to acknowledge the darkness behind the pulpit and choose to use their voice as an opportunity to win the bishop’s favor, we also witnessed victims standing up and speaking out for the first time, as well as parishioners enraged and full of disgust pleading for transparency and truth. Some spoke out with questions and concerns while others offered ideas and solutions!

It was clear to us that the majority of Catholic parishioners in attendance were there because they love their church! This is their community, their family, and they are broken! But they aren’t giving up! They have been beaten down many, many times and continue to pick themselves back up,

It has been almost 6 months since the statewide Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report that outlined the widespread sexual abuse of children and the systematic coverup by senior church officials in Pennsylvania and at the Vatican was released, sending shockwaves around world! But why? Have the numerous grand jury reports over the years as well as several movies depicting the magnitude and scope of these criminal and grotesque violations against children by their faithful leaders not been enough for people to stand up and demand change? Maybe it’s just too much to comprehend, or maybe by acknowledging its existence, we then have to acknowledge that it’s true. But that shock is wearing off and the world can no longer deny the truth; on the contrary, the world is demanding it!

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VERONA (NJ)
Inside New Jersey

February 11, 2019

By Tom Barrett

New Jersey State Senator Joe Vitale (D-19) has a bill that’s now grown moldy in the Judiciary Committee (S-477). It calls for the elimination of the two-year statue of limitations for those victimized by sexual abuse.

Amending the current statue would essentially allow victims more time to seek justice against their abusers and enjoin those who may have enabled them to do so. Right now, victims have two years past the age of 18 to file claims in civil court.

Vitale, to his credit, recognizes that it’s way past time that the New Jersey Legislature takes a stand on behalf of sexual abuse victims, in particular, by priests in the Roman Catholic Church.

A strong voice for reform, Senator Vitale is on record saying: “It takes years for victims to come to terms with abuse…my legislation allows victims to file a claim regardless of when they were abused.”

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Get Religion blog

February 11, 2019

By Terry Mattingly

If you have followed GetReligion over the years, you may have noticed several themes running though our discussions of news coverage of scandals linked to sexual abuse by clergy and other leaders of religious institutions.

Let’s run through this again.

* This is not a liberal Catholic problem. This is not a conservative Catholic problem. And there is way more to this issue than reports about high numbers of gay priests — celibate and noncelibate — in the priesthood. Once again let me repeat, again, what I’ve said is the No. 1 issue among Catholics:

The key to the scandal is secrecy, violated celibacy vows and potential blackmail. Lots of Catholic leaders — left and right, gay and straight — have sexual skeletons in their closets, often involving sex with consenting adults. These weaknesses, past and/or present, create a climate of secrecy in which it is hard to crack down on crimes linked to child abuse.

* This is not a “fundamentalist” problem in various church traditions. There are abusers in all kinds of religious flocks, both on the doctrinal left and the right.

* This is not a “Christian” thing, as anyone knows who has followed news about abuse in various types of Jewish institutions. Also, look of some of the scandals affecting the secular gurus in yoga.

* This is not a “religion” thing, as seen in any quick scan of scandals in the Boy Scouts, public schools, team sports and other nonprofits. This is a national scandal people — journalists, too — tend to overlook.

However, religion-beat pros do need to study the patterns of abuse in different types of institutions. It would be impossible, for example, to ignore the high percentages of abuse among Catholic priests with teen-aged males. It would be impossible to ignore the Protestant patterns of abuse in some forms of youth ministry or improper relationships linked to male pastors counseling female members of their flocks.

This brings me to the post earlier today by our own Bobby Ross Jr., about the massive investigation of abuse inside the Southern Baptist Convention, published by the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News. If you haven’t read Bobby’s post, click over and do that right now. I want to focus on one quote — mentioned by Bobby — from a Q&A with August “Augie” Boto, SBC general counsel, featured in that investigation. Here it is again.

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NEWARK (NJ)
Associated Press

February 11, 2019

By David Porter

Victims of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic clergy in New Jersey will soon be able to apply for compensation from a fund representing all five of the state’s dioceses, one of the fund’s administrators announced Monday.

Camille Biros, who also is overseeing similar compensation funds in Pennsylvania and New York, said New Jersey’s will be different because all five of the state’s dioceses will follow the same protocols. Those will be posted on a website by early next week followed by a 30-day public comment period before they are finalized.

The first phase will last at least six months, Biros said, and will focus on accusers who have made previous claims. A second phase will focus on new claims.

“We are looking forward to working with the dioceses and are pleased about the fact this is a common protocol for the entire state,” Biros said.

A fund Biros oversees in New York has paid out more than $210 million to more than 1,100 victims in five dioceses, she said.

Five months ago, New Jersey’s attorney general announced a criminal investigation into clergy sexual abuse on the heels of a grand jury investigation in Pennsylvania that found more than 1,000 children had been abused by about 300 priests over a span of decades.

Victims who accept compensation in New Jersey will give up their right to sue, which could be of particular importance because state lawmakers have proposed a bill that could eliminate the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse victims to file civil actions. Currently, adults have two years to sue from the time they first realize the abuse damaged them.

The fund also won’t cover abuses by religious order priests, such as Jesuits, who may serve in parishes or schools but are not ordained by the diocese.

Gregory Gianforcaro, an attorney who has won civil settlements for numerous victims of clergy sexual abuse in New Jersey, said that while compensation can be a welcome development for victims, it could preclude other redress they might seek.

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NEW HAVEN (CT)
New Haven Register

February 11, 2019

By Bill Cummings

About 133 victims of sexual abuse at a Haitian boys school affiliated with Fairfield University and other religious groups are a step closer to receiving $250,000 each — or $61 million in total — for their suffering.

U.S. District Judge Robert Chatigny on Monday accepted a negotiated settlement with the university and other groups for payment to the victims. A final settlement is expected to be approved this spring.

The agreement consolidates dozens of lawsuits into one class action suit that creates a $60 million fund to help 133 victims and a $1.2 million fund to administer payments.

“I have no doubt that I should grant preliminary approval,” Judge Chatigny said. “I have studied the papers and, apart from some minor suggestions, I have nothing to say but you have done an admirable job.”

Both sides — a team of lawyers representing the victims and a team representing Fairfield University and other organizations — presented the agreement to the judge, saying it represented months of work and negotiation.

The lawyers said a system to vet additional claims by victims is included in the settlement and initial payouts of up to $10,000 will quickly go out to already vetted victims.

The final settlement amount will depend on whether additional victims are certified and court and legal costs, they said.

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MEXICO CITY (MEXICO)
Associated Press

February 11, 2019

The head of the Mexican bishops’ conference says that 152 Roman Catholic priests have been removed from the ministry over the last nine years for sex abuse offenses against “youths or vulnerable adults.”

Archbishop Rogelio Cabrera says some of the priests have been prosecuted and sent to prison, but did not specify how many.

Cabrera said Sunday that Mexico still doesn’t have a central clearinghouse for information on abuse by the clergy since each bishop handles cases that occur in his diocese.

Pope Francis has convened presidents of all the bishops’ conferences around the world for a three-day summit this month to address the abuse of minors.

The church often uses the term “vulnerable adults” to refer to those with mental or physical handicaps.

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RYE (NY)
Rye Daily Voice

February 11, 2019

By Zak Failla

A former teacher and priest at a private prep schools in Westchester and Fairfield County has resigned after being one of 50 charged with sexually abusing minors last month.

Robert Cornigans, an educator who lived and worked at the Masters School in Dobbs Ferry, who taught English since 2004, resigned immediately on Jan. 15 when his name was on a list of Jesuits

A dozen priests – including Cornigans – from New York and Connecticut who once worked at Fairfield University or Fairfield College Preparatory School were among the list released by the USA Northeast Province Jesuits. Priests on the list have been accused as early as 1950.

“Many accusations were made decades after the abuse allegedly took place, and often after the accused Jesuit had died,” the USANPJ said. “Jesuits with allegations currently under investigation are not included on this list.”

In a letter to parents, Masters said that officials spoke with Cornigans immediately when his name was listed, and he was removed from the campus within days. Upper school students were notified, though younger students were not told of the allegations, and the school left that to parents to determine the best course of action.

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DALLAS (TX)
Dallas Morning News

February 11, 2019

It seems that nearly every day there is a fresh story of children being sexually abused. This time it’s evidence of such abuse going on inside the Southern Baptist Convention.

The temptation is to hope there is an easy fix that involves setting up training or some other measure that ensures against all future abuse. The truth is that this is a complex problem that crops up in so many places because it stems from an evil embedded in human nature. To guard against it, we need our institutions to act proactively, to create a culture of speaking up and acting on evidence rather than ignoring it.

The Catholic Church is grappling with evidence of priests who abused children for decades. This has prompted calls to allow priests to marry and to give laypeople broader authority in the church.

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NEW LONDON (CT)
The Day

February 11. 2019

By Joe Wojtas

The Diocese of Norwich on Sunday afternoon released the names of 43 priests who have served in the diocese since its founding in 1953 and have had “allegations of substance” made against them regarding the sexual abuse of minors.

The list does not include what parishes the priests served at, what they were accused of doing and whether the diocese reported them to police or the state Department of Children and Families, which clergy have been required to do under the state’s mandatory reporter law since 1971.

Sunday’s list also does not say which priests were involved in the almost $7.7 million worth of settlements paid out to victims. It also does not include priests accused of sexually assaulting adults.

The list includes the priest’s name, date of ordination, if they were removed from ministry, if they are deceased and if they are a member of the diocese, members of other dioceses or religious orders, or priests who served in the diocese but had allegations in other locations.

The list includes a large number of priests who have not been publicly identified in the past as having been accused of sexually abusing children.

Prior to the release of the list, The Day had identified 28 priests and brothers affiliated with the Diocese of Norwich who have been accused of sexually assaulting children and adults, according to lawsuits, depositions, sworn statements and statements from alleged victims. Six of these priests were not on the list released by the diocese Sunday.

Diocese spokesman Wayne Gignac said Sunday the diocese would not be commenting on individual allegations or settlements and did not say which allegations were reported to DCF or police. In addition, he said interviews with Bishop of Norwich Michael Cote are not being granted at this time.

“The scope of the task was to provide a list of names of clergy with allegations of substance of sexual abuse of minors. It is our hope that the release of the names will bring some measure of healing, and acknowledgement to those who have been directly harmed,” he wrote in an email.

In a letter distributed at churches in the diocese this weekend, Cote defined an “allegation of substance” as one in which the priest has pleaded guilty or no contest in criminal court to any incident of sexual misconduct, the allegation has been investigated and “been determined to be reasonable, plausible, probable and bearing the semblance of the truth,” is corroborated with other evidence or another source and/or has been acknowledged or admitted to by the accused priest.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Religion News Service

February 11, 2019

By Adelle M. Banks

Leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention have called the reports by two Texas newspapers of hundreds of sex abuse cases in affiliated churches evidence of “pure evil” and “satanic” behavior within their ranks.

Several vowed to improve the ways churches address such behavior.

The Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News launched an “Abuse of Faith” investigative series over the weekend that reports about 220 Southern Baptist church leaders and volunteers have been convicted of or pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct in the last two decades. Overall, they found about 380 Southern Baptists who faced allegations from more than 700 victims in that time period.

“Nearly 100 are still held in prisons stretching from Sacramento County, Calif., to Hillsborough County, Fla., state and federal records show,” they reported. “Scores of others cut deals and served no time. More than 100 are registered sex offenders. Some still work in Southern Baptist churches today.”

SBC President J.D. Greear said the news coverage of the abuse shows that churches connected to the nation’s largest Protestant denomination have failed the survivors of sex abuse.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
National Catholic Reporter

February 8, 2019

By Tom Roberts

If there were a compass mark for a true-north Catholic, John Carr could well be the setting.

He defies the divisions within the Catholic community because he’s not divided on anything when it comes to the church. You can’t bait him into the culture wars because there is no war within him. For him, the seamless garment is more than metaphor. He wears it well and, in it, walks right down the middle of whatever tensions he may find himself mediating these days as moderator of endless discussions in his role as director of the Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life at Georgetown University.

But the conduct of the leaders of the institution he has served his entire life, many of them friends and a few, former bosses, has pushed his forbearance to the limit. “The patience of the people of God is exhausted with the episcopal and clerical culture that puts itself first,” he said.

That was the final line he spoke at the end of a Feb. 2 news conference following two days of discussions of the clergy sex abuse crisis organized here by the Leadership Roundtable, a group of lay, religious and clergy founded to promote best management practices within the church. At the meeting were more than 200 people at more than 20 tables of participants, including Cardinals Sean O’Malley of Boston, Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, and Blase Cupich of Chicago. Joining them were 12 bishops, along with theologians, canon lawyers, abuse survivors, assorted experts from across the country, the papal nuncio and Jesuit Fr. Hans Zollner, the head of the office of child protection at the Vatican. Such a collection of people was perhaps a sign that the patience had run out and that something significant needs to be done.

During the news conference Carr offered up a self-assessment that gives expression to the feelings of many other Catholics rocked by the revelations of the past year. “I’m different,” he said. “You know the talk I gave today I would not have given 18 months ago.”

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LAS CRUCES (NM)
KVIA Channel 7

February 11, 2019

By Kate Bieri

On Monday, the Diocese of Las Cruces released the names of thirteen more credibly accused former priests, including one who pled guilty to sexually assaulting a child prior to his assignment in Las Cruces.

“These priests did not abuse here while they were serving in the Diocese of Las Cruces,” said Bishop Gerald Kicanas. “However, they have been listed on the credible lists of other dioceses.”

Father Lucas Galvan was previously convicted of a sexual crime in Colorado, as listed below. According to the Denver Post, Galvan admitted to sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl in 1990 and got two years of probation.

A spokesman for the Diocese told ABC-7 that Galvan – a convicted pedophile – served at St. Genevieve in 1993.

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MINNEAPOLIS (MN)
Star Tribune

February 11, 2019

By Jean Hopfensperger

Pope Francis will convene a historic clergy sex abuse summit this month, and many Minnesota Catholics are watching to see if it tackles an issue close to home — what to do about reported misconduct by bishops.

It’s an issue felt keenly in the Twin Cities, where the halted 2014 investigation into former Archbishop John Nienstedt is considered by many Catholics as a case study of all that can go wrong when the church has no clear, independent policies for investigating its top leaders.

St. Paul and Minneapolis Archbishop Bernard Hebda is among U.S. bishops now urging the creation of a national commission, with lay members, to tackle reports of bishop wrongdoing. It could build far more public trust than what transpired in St. Paul, which hasn’t been fully resolved even after four years, many Catholics say.

“I hope that what we went through in the Twin Cities shows the compelling need for reform,” said Hank Shea, law professor at the University of St. Thomas and a former assistant U.S. attorney. “Those lessons should be heeded by every American archbishop and bishop to avoid their repetition elsewhere.”

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NEWARK (NJ)
Associated Press

February 11, 2019

Victims of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic clergy in New Jersey will soon be able to apply for compensation from a fund representing all five of the state’s dioceses.

Details were announced Monday. The administrators of the fund say guidelines will be posted by next week followed by a 30-day public comment period. All the dioceses will be asked to turn over lists of known or alleged victims.

Those compensated will give up their right to sue. Administrators said Monday a similar program in New York has paid out more than $210 million to more than 1,100 victims.

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TYLER (TX)
CBS 19 TV

February 11, 2019

By Reagan Roy

On the heels of the Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops instructing all Catholic dioceses in the state release a public list of clergy “credibly accused” of child sex crimes, the Houston Chronicle has published a nationwide report detailing Southern Baptist Convention church officials and volunteers nationwide who have been convicted of sex crimes.

In the Texas section, four ex-East Texas pastors were identified.

BILLIE LEWIS MINSON – PASTOR (SMITH COUNTY)
Minson was arrested in August 2008 one count of indecency with a child. Police say he molested a 12-year-old female family member at a motel.

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WINSTON-SALEM (NC)
Baptist News Global

February 11, 2019

By Bob Allen

Christa Brown contacted 18 influential Baptist leaders in four states between July 2004 and May 2005, warning there might be a sexual predator among their ranks. Not one offered to help.

Today she has their attention. The Colorado woman and sexual abuse survivor is among sources quoted in a 6,000-word investigative story by two Texas newspapers reporting decades of sexual abuse by hundreds of church leaders and volunteers in the Southern Baptist Convention.

Sunday’s story, the first of a three-part expose by the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News, says about 380 Southern Baptist pastors, Sunday school teachers, deacons and church volunteers have faced allegations of sexual misconduct since 1998.

More than 200 have been convicted or confessed as part of a plea bargain, and nearly 100 are currently in prisons across the United States. The papers found more than 700 victims in the past 20 years.

Some, like Brown, have been asking the nation’s largest Protestant body to consider prevention policies similar to those adopted by other faith groups, such as the Roman Catholic Church, for more than a decade.

“My heart grieves for the 700 documented victims in this report even as it splits wide open with the certain knowledge that these 700 are just the tip of the iceberg,” Brown said Feb. 11. “There are so many more whose stories remain hidden, who were bullied into silence in the past and who may never come out from that shroud of shame again.”

“My heart grieves for the 700 documented victims in this report even as it splits wide open with the certain knowledge that these 700 are just the tip of the iceberg.”

In her 2009 book, This Little Light: Beyond a Baptist Preacher Predator and His Gang, Brown tells how she broke down in tears during a piano lesson due to guilt from having had “an affair” with her youth minister. She was forced to apologize to the man’s wife and told never to speak of it again. He soon moved to another church, complete with the type of send-off celebration befitting a man of God.

When Brown’s daughter turned 16 – the age she had been when her own abuse began – she saw herself at that age. Imagining how she would feel if her child were victimized by an authority figure in a position of trust, she assumed Southern Baptist leaders would want to know if her abuser still had access to children.

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SAN JOSE (CA)
San Jose Insider

February 11, 2019

By Joey Piscitelli

On Oct. 18, 2018, Bishop Patrick McGrath of the San Jose Diocese released a public list of “priests with credible allegations of sex abuse” in the Diocese. That list contained only 15 names. In comparison, other dioceses in the U.S. this past year released lists of clergy abusers with much higher numbers.

The disparity left parishioners, public, and media in San Jose scratching their heads. Was the San Jose Diocese uncommonly less prone to child sex abuse reports than the rest of the country? Or did Bishop McGrath and his consultants arbitrarily pick and choose what priests they wanted on the list?

According to newly released documents and testimony from clergy abuse victims, the list appears to be 440 percent short.

Ever since the Pennsylvania Attorney General and grand jury released their scathing report of clergy abusers in August 2018, dioceses across the U.S. have been releasing their own voluntary lists of abusers. Abuse victims and their advocates say this voluntary action is an attempt at damage control, and an effort to beat other state attorneys general to the punch. Some say it’s also an attempt at minimizing the numbers beforehand.

Why the purportedly low numbers in San Jose?

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Religion News Service

February 11, 2019

David Clohessy and Christa Brown

As the media spotlight focuses its glare on the clergy sex abuse scandal in the Southern Baptist Convention, we who have been dealing with abuse issues for years already see familiar patterns of institutional protection and image management in the Southern Baptist leadership’s response.

To Baptist clergy sex abuse survivors, therefore, we’re offering these tips in your efforts to confront the dysfunction and intransigence you may be encountering in the days ahead.

Know that you aren’t alone. The cruelest lie that clergy abuse survivors can believe is that their experience is unique. It isn’t. Experts say that more kids are likely being abused among Protestants than among Catholics, and the recent Houston Chronicle exposé makes plain that the extent of the Baptist problem is horrific.

Find a trauma therapist. When horrific memories begin to intrude, many survivors make the mistake of thinking, “I can handle it.” But almost without exception, every abuse survivor will be able to “handle it” better with the support of a skilled therapist. Get one sooner rather than later, and make sure she or he is licensed by the state. Faith-based counselors who are typically ill-equipped for dealing with such serious trauma have further wounded countless numbers of survivors.

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

NEW JERSEY
NJ.com

February 8, 2019

By Rebecca Everett

The Benedictine religious order in charge of the Delbarton School and the former St. Elizabeth’s School has settled two lawsuits from men who said they were sexually abused by monks when they were students over 45 years ago.

The settlements are the sixth and seventh in the last year in the sex abuse scandal involving the schools. In a letter to the community last summer, Delbarton leaders said 30 former students had reported being abused by 13 monks going back decades. Former students who said they were abused argue that the number of victims is much higher.

One of the men who settled, identified in court by the pseudonym John Doe, said that reliving everything and fighting in court was a hellish experience, and he didn’t settle for the money.

“I couldn’t take it anymore,” said the man, who agreed to speak to NJ Advance Media on the condition his real name not be used.

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

VATICAN CITY
NBC News

February 5, 2019

By Claudio Lavanga and Corky Siemaszko

But scope of problem worldwide remains unclear as victims are reluctant to come forward and church leaders are slow to admit behavior of predator clergy.

Pope Francis for the first time publicly acknowledged that nuns have also been the victims of sexual abuse at the hands of predator priests and bishops.

Vowing to do more to protect vulnerable nuns, the pontiff also credited his predecessor, Pope Benedict, with taking action against a French-based order after some of its nuns were subjected to “sexual slavery.”

“Should we do something more? Yes,” Francis told reporters during a press conference on the papal flight back to Rome from his historic two-day visit to the United Arab Emirates. “Is there the will? Yes. But it’s a path that we have already begun.”

“It’s not something that everyone does, but there have been priests and even bishops who have done what you say,” Francis added. “And I think that it’s continuing because it’s not like once you realize it that it stops. It continues. And for some time we’ve been working on it.”

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

THE PHILIPPINES
NBC News

February 7, 2019

By Kate Snow, Aliza Nadi and Rich Schapiro

The accused sexual predators are living freely in communities around the U.S., their sordid pasts known only to a few.

When the clock struck 8 p.m. inside the Aritao boarding school in the Philippines, the children would gather in a common area for their evening routine.

A nightly devotional. A Bible reading. Prayers.

The children were the sons and daughters of American evangelical missionaries. The sessions were led by mission caretakers known as the “dorm dad” and “dorm mom.”

When the prayers were over, the boys and girls as young as 6 would march off to bed. Sometimes, the dorm dad would trail behind the girls, slip into their rooms and do ungodly things to them in the dead of night.

He would put “his hands under the covers and would touch me,” recalled Joy Drake, who says the sexual abuse started when she was 9.

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

FORT WORTH (TX)
Star-Telegram

February 8, 2019

By Cynthia M. Allen

Last week, the Roman Catholic Bishops of Texas did something rather unprecedented. They made public a list of clergy credibly accused of sexual misconduct.

The list spans eight decades, covers 15 dioceses and contains nearly 300 names. Some of the clerics identified have been defrocked; others have served jail time (although many have not, as the term “credibly accused” suggests a lower standard than that employed by law enforcement); far more are deceased. The details offered about the accused are often scant — just their names, those of the parishes they served and their dates of service are included.

For some Catholics and abuse survivors, the release was a tremendous letdown. Paul Petersen, a spokesman in Dallas for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, called the total number of names released “crazy low.”

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

BERLIN (GERMANY)
AFP

February 8, 2019

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

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

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

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

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

NEW YORK (NY)
New York Post

February 7, 2019

By Laura Italiano

A tony Westchester private school found out two weeks ago that it had an accused, former pedophile on its faculty — and in short order, parents were alerted, the teacher was ousted and a respected New York private investigative firm was hired for an in-house probe.

“We are aware of how unsettling this allegation is,” parents and alumni of The Masters School in Dobbs Ferry were told in a letter this week.

The letter was a follow-up to a Jan. 16 email revealing that English teacher Robert Cornigans had been accused of an abuse that took place in a Boston private school in 1976.

He has since resigned and moved off campus, according to this week’s letter, signed by Head of School Laura Danforth and Edith Chapin, who chairs the board of trustees.

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

DALLAS (TX)
WFAA 8 ABC

February 7, 2019

By Jobin Panicker

Father Patrick Koch was a former principal and president at Jesuit College Preparatory School in Dallas.

If you walk into John Patrick Korman’s home, you will see an abundance of school pride.

“It’s walking into Jesuit,” said Korman, a graduate of Jesuit Preparatory School in Dallas.

He was class of 1970 and once a teacher at Jesuit for five years, teaching film-making.

But any pride he has is masked now by the news that came out last week.

“It’s the five stages of grief,” Korman said. “I’m not sure which one I’m in now.”

The Catholic Diocese of Dallas released names of 31 priests “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of minors over the last seven decades. On that list was Father Patrick Koch, who was a former principal and president at Jesuit College Preparatory School in Dallas.

Korman has been in contact with alumni through a series of emails, which he released to WFAA.

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

HARTFORD (CT)
Hartford Courant

February 7, 2019

By Dave Altimari

A former Hartford Archdiocese priest, whose career started at a Catholic school in Naugatuck, will go on trial in Albuquerque, N.M., this month on charges of sexually assaulting one of his altar boys at a New Mexico Air Force Base and a national cemetery 27 years ago.

It has been a circuitous route for Arthur Perrault, who was ordained as a Hartford priest in 1964, sent to New Mexico for psychological evaluation at a now infamous treatment center and transferred to the Santa Fe Archdiocese, before fleeing to Morocco in 1992 only to be expelled last year and returned to New Mexico to face federal charges of aggravated sexual abuse and aggravated sexual contact.

The now 82-year-old Perrault — who, records show, once wrote a letter to a victim’s family claiming he had molested their son because he had cancer when he didn’t — fled the United States in 1992 when he learned that a series of lawsuits alleging he had sexually assaulted as many as 38 boys in New Mexico were about to be filed, court records show. He lived in an apartment in Tangier teaching at an all-boys school, until FBI agents — after getting the King of Morocco to agree to expel him from the kingdom — swooped in and arrested him in September of 2017. He has been held in a federal prison ever since, after a judge ruled him a flight risk and a danger to society.

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

WASHINGTON (DC)
National Organization for Women

February 8, 2019

By National NOW President Toni Van Pelt

For years, the Catholic Church hierarchy has proven it has no moral authority on issues concerning women. This week, Pope Francis publicly acknowledged for the first time a chronic history of sexual abuse by priests and bishops of nuns, who had been forced to have abortions or give birth to children of these men. In his response, he claimed that the Church has a will to “do something more.”

So do more. Actions speak louder than words. Stop objectifying children and women, treating them as second class parishioners, concubines, or indentured acolytes who are available to service predatory men in your church.

Abuse in the Church has been a well known issue for decades. Some believe sexual abuse of nuns dates back centuries, and in the 1990s, members of religious orders prepared private reports about this abuse for top Vatican officials that went nowhere.

Stop protecting abusive priests, open the gates of secrecy and adopt real reforms – starting with independent oversight that includes lay persons and leaders of the various orders of Catholic Sisters as part of the process.

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

JOLIET (IL)
ChurchMilitant.com

February 6, 2019

By Bradley Eli, M.Div., Ma.Th.

Fr. Jankowski: ‘I have to answer to God about how I have lived as a priest’

A priest wanting to shield minors from potential sex abuse in the diocese of Joliet, Illinois is now on a forced sabbatical.

Father Peter Jankowski was removed as pastor from St. Patrick’s Catholic Church in Joliet and put on a forced sabbatical by his ordinary, Bishop R. Daniel Conlon, last July. Jankowski, who was pastor at St. Patrick’s from 2006 until his removal, was voicing his concern over fallacious background checks conducted at his parish by its former pastor, Fr. James Lennon.

Jankowski was even more concerned by Fr. Lennon’s frequenting of his parish accompanied by clerics who had been removed from active ministry owing to credible allegations of sex abuse.

Jankowski told Church Militant, “My predecessor at St. Patrick’s (Rev. James Lennon) continuously brought these priests on church property during his tenure and mine (from 1995 through 2007 when I stopped the practice), on school days when [there were] children present, often unbeknownst to those on the property.”

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