ABUSE TRACKER

LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times

Cardinal Roger Mahony intends to help select a new pope in Rome despite calls from some critics that he withdraw from the process in the wake of revelations about his actions in the priest sex-abuse scandal.

The day Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation almost two weeks ago, Mahony wrote on his blog that he looked forward to participating in the conclave of cardinals in Rome to elect Benedict’s successor.

That stance elicited some criticism given that last month the Los Angeles Archdiocese stripped Mahony, its former archbishop, of his public duties after it was revealed that he plotted to conceal child molestation by priests.

But Mahony indicated via Twitter on Friday that he still would be part of the sequestered papal selection process. He tweeted: “Just a few short hours before my departure for Rome. Will be tweeting often from Rome, except during the actual Conclave itself. Prayers!”

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SCOTLAND
Scotsman

By ROSEMARY FREE
Published on Sunday 24 February 2013

THE most senior Roman Catholic cleric in Britain failed to show for Mass in Edinburgh today amid claims of inappropriate behaviour dating back three decades.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland, is facing allegations from three priests and one former priest who are demanding his immediate resignation, it has emerged.

The allegations sent shockwaves through the Catholic community on the day that Pope Benedict XVI gave his final Sunday blessing before tens of thousands of people in St Peter’s Square. The cardinal, who remained in his official residence in Morningside this morning, is contesting the claims, and is taking legal advice. A spokesman for the Vatican said that “the pope is informed about the problem and the question is now in his hands.”

In tears

Bishop Steven Robson, who took the special Mass at St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh in the cardinal’s absence, told the congregation – some of whom were in tears – that they “cannot not be saddened” by events, after which a number of people left the cathedral.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, the former archbishop of Westminster, said he was “very sad” to hear of the allegations made against Cardinal O’Brien and would have to “see how that pans out.”

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VATICAN CITY/UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Vatican confirms priests’ written allegations against Cardinal Keith O’Brien have been received and issue is in pontiff’s hands

Severin Carrell, Catherine Deveney, John Hooper and Sam Jones
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 24 February 2013

The pope has been told about allegations that the UK’s most senior Catholic had been accused of “inappropriate acts” against fellow priests, and is considering how to respond.

Hours after the allegations were published by the Observer, the Vatican confirmed that written allegations against Cardinal Keith O’Brien by three serving priests and one former priest were being studied by Pope Benedict XVI.

As the pope gave his last pontifical blessing to crowds in St Peter’s Square, a spokesman for the Vatican said “the pope is informed about the problem and the issue is now in his hands”.

Cardinal O’Brien, the UK’s most senior Roman Catholic and head of the Scottish Catholic church, missed giving mass at his cathedral on Sunday, citing legal advice. He contests the allegations, which date back 30 years to the 1980s, when O’Brien was a rector of a seminary in Aberdeen and then archbishop.

The cardinal, who is himself to retire in mid-March after taking part in the conclave at the Vatican next month to choose the new pope, had been due to hold mass at St Mary’s cathedral in Edinburgh to celebrate Pope Benedict XVI’s eight years as pontiff.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Harlow Star

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric should be allowed to help choose the next Pope despite facing allegations of inappropriate behaviour, the former archbishop of Westminster says.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor expressed sadness at the claims – which have been denied – made against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the church in Scotland.

Three priests and a former priest have complained to the Vatican about behaviour towards them going back 30 years, according to the Observer. They are reported to be demanding Cardinal O’Brien’s immediate resignation.

Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor said: “I was obviously very sad to hear that. The cardinal has denied the allegations, so I think we will just have to see how that pans out. There have been other cases which have been a great scandal to the church over these past years. I think the church has to face up – has faced up – to some of them very well indeed.”

Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor said it was up to Cardinal O’Brien – who is reported to have sought legal advice – “how he faces the allegations”.

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UNITED KINGDOM
NBC News

By Mohammed Abbas, Reuters

LONDON — Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric, a cardinal expected to take part in the conclave to choose the next pope, rejected allegations on Sunday that he had behaved in an “inappropriate” way with other priests.

The Observer newspaper said Cardinal Keith O’Brien, 74, the archbishop of St. Andrews and Edinburgh, who is known for outspoken views on homosexuality, had been reported to the Vatican over allegations of inappropriate behavior stretching back 30 years.

“Cardinal O’Brien contests these claims and is taking legal advice,” a spokesman for the cardinal said.

Three priests and a former priest, from a Scottish diocese, have complained to the Vatican and demanded O’Brien’s immediate resignation, the newspaper said, adding that they wanted the conclave to choose Pope Benedict’s successor to be “clean”.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

Britain’s most senior Catholic ‘should be allowed to vote on next Pope’ despite allegations of inappropriate acts

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric should be allowed to vote on the next Pope despite facing allegations of ‘inappropriate’ acts involving four men, the former archbishop of Westminster has said.

By Telegraph reporters
3:32PM GMT 24 Feb 2013

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor said he was saddened by the allegations made against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the only figure based in mainland Britain with a vote on the next Pope.

Cardinal O’Brien is said to be “contesting” the claims which involve three priests and a former cleric.

Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor said: “I was obviously very sad to hear that.

“The cardinal has denied the allegations, so I think we will just have to see how that pans out. There have been other cases which have been a great scandal to the church over these past years.

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CANADA
Montreal Gazette

RIMOUSKI — The Assembly of Quebec Catholic Bishops is happy that Cardinal Marc Ouellet is being considered a possible successor to Pope Benedict XVI, who is resigning this week, but doesn’t want to show any preference.

The president of the assembly, Bishop Pierre-André Fournier of Rimouski, believes that Ouellet has the qualifications to assume the highest office in the church. He said he’s not surprised that the former archbishop of Quebec is on the list of potential candidates. But he notes that the cardinals, who will assemble in a conclave in mid-March, must elect the person who best responds to the needs of the Catholic Church.

Bishop Fournier said he admired the courage of Benedict, who said he no longer had the physical strength necessary to exercise his functions as the “great servant” of the church.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Chicago Tribune

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric, a cardinal expected to take part in the conclave to choose the next pope, rejected allegations on Sunday that he had behaved in an “inappropriate” way with other priests.

The Observer newspaper said Cardinal Keith O’Brien, 74, the archbishop of St. Andrews and Edinburgh, who is known for outspoken views on homosexuality, had been reported to the Vatican over allegations of inappropriate behavior stretching back 30 years.

“Cardinal O’Brien contests these claims and is taking legal advice,” a spokesman for the cardinal said.

Three priests and a former priest, from a Scottish diocese, have complained to the Vatican and demanded O’Brien’s immediate resignation, the newspaper said, adding that they wanted the conclave to choose Pope Benedict’s successor to be “clean”.

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SCOTLAND
ITV

by Debi Edward: ITV News Scotland Correspondent

Cardinal Keith O’Brien has not turned up to St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh.

An apology was given to the congregation saying he wouldn’t be coming due to the allegations in a Sunday newspaper.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Irish Times

Britain’s most senior Catholic cleric should be allowed to help choose the next Pope despite facing allegations of inappropriate behaviour, the former archbishop of Westminster said today.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor expressed sadness at the claims, which are denied, which have been made against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the Catholic church in Scotland.

Three priests and a former priest have complained to the Vatican about behaviour towards them going back 30 years, according to the Observer. They are reported to be demanding Cardinal O’Brien’s immediate resignation.

Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor said: “I was obviously very sad to hear that.

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ARIZONA
Arizona Daily Star

[Kevin Barmasse – Los Angeles archdiocese]

Stephanie Innes Arizona Daily Star

When a young Catholic priest in Los Angeles was accused of sexually molesting a 12-year-old boy in 1983, church officials did not remove him from ministry.

Instead, they sent him to Tucson.

Recently released court documents from the Archdiocese of Los Angeles show church officials allowed Kevin Barmasse to minister in Tucson for seven years after that original accusation.

Once in Tucson, Barmasse worked at three churches in Southern Arizona and was later accused of molesting five local teens who had been members of youth groups he led.

Those five teens, now men in their 40s, later filed lawsuits saying Barmasse abused them. They received a total of nearly $2 million apiece in settlement money from the Los Angeles archdiocese and the Tucson diocese. The settlements in Tucson were part of the local diocese’s bankruptcy case.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

By MICHAEL MCGLADE
Published on Sunday 24 February 2013

THE most senior Catholic cleric in Britain – Cardinal Keith O’Brien – who was born in Ballycastle – is facing allegations of inappropriate behaviour.

Three priests and a former priest in Scotland have reported Cardinal O’Brien, to the Vatican over allegations of inappropriate behaviour stretching back 30 years.

A report published in the Observer website claimed the four, from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, have complained to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, and demanded O’Brien’s immediate resignation. A spokesman for the cardinal said that the claims were contested.

One of the complainants, it is understood, alleges that the cardinal developed an inappropriate relationship with him, resulting in a need for long-term psychological counselling.

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SCOTLAND
The Scottish Sun

By CAMERON HAY

SCOTLAND’S top Catholic was last night set to fight allegations made by four priests.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, 74, has been accused of “inappropriate behaviour” dating back more than 33 years.

It is understood that three serving and one former priest have made claims against the churchman in reports to the Vatican.

But last night a spokesman for the Edinburgh-based Cardinal said he will “contest” the claims.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric, has missed Sunday Mass after being accused of inappropriate behaviour.

The Observer said three priests and one former priest have made complaints going back 30 years against the 74-year-old cardinal, who is leader of the Scottish Catholic Church.

They demand his immediate resignation. …

‘Saddened’

He was due to take Mass in St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh to celebrate the eight years of Pope Benedict holding office.

But Bishop Stephen Robson, who is auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, made a statement at the cathedral.

He said: “A number of allegations of inappropriate behaviour have been made against the cardinal. The cardinal has sought legal advice and it would be inappropriate to comment at this time. There will be further statements in due course.

“As always in times of need such as this we cannot not be saddened by the events of the last 24 hours.

“It is to the Lord that we turn to now in times of need.”

A spokesman for the Vatican said that “the Pope is informed about the problem and the question is now in his hands”.

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NEDERLAND
NRC

door Joep Dohmen

Het schandaal rond het grootschalig kindermisbruik kost de Rooms-Katholieke Kerk in Nederland bijna 30 miljoen euro. Daarvan is 19,2 miljoen euro smartengeld voor de slachtoffers, blijkt uit onderzoek van NRC Handelsblad. De kosten van het klachtenmeldpunt en de commissie-Deetman, die de Kerk zelf moet betalen, bedragen 10,5 miljoen.

In het buitenland is de Kerk beduidend meer kwijt. Bisdommen en congregaties in de Verenigde Staten, Ierland, Canada en Australië betaalden bij elkaar 2 miljard euro aan smartengeld en kosten. Alleen al in Ierland zegden religieuze ordes in 2009 een half miljard euro toe.

Komende week is het drie jaar geleden dat het misbruikschandaal in Nederland uitbrak. Op 26 februari 2010 onthulden NRC Handelsblad en de Wereldomroep het jarenlange misbruik van leerlingen door de paters en broeders salesianen in internaat Don Rua in ’s-Heerenberg. Daarna volgde een vloed aan mediaberichten over kindermisbruik door kerkelijke dienaren.

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VATICAN CITY
Manila Bulletin

VATICAN CITY (AP/Reuters) — Pope Benedict XVI made his last St. Peter’s Square window appearance of his pontificate on Sunday.

Addressing the crowd, the pontiff said he was following God’s wishes by resigning and turning to a life of prayer.

Although facing a life of seclusion form the public, Pope Benedict said he will continue to serve the church with the “same dedication and love” after resigning.

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IOWA
Radio Iowa

February 23, 2013 By O. Kay Henderson

The state’s four Catholic bishops say interest in the election of a new pope is creating “energy” in their church.

“Maybe this is a bad analogy, but it’s almost like watching Britain and their monarchy,” Davenport Bishop Martin Amos said during a visit to the Iowa statehouse this past week. “Everybody gets excited about it and I think there’s a lot of excitement when it’s been so long that a pope retired.”

Bishop Richard Pates of the Des Moines Catholic Diocese said he’s experienced some of the energy first-hand as he’s talked with students in Catholic schools about the search for a new pope.

“Anytime you have a new beginning, it gives people a great deal of hope and, I think, creates curiosity for the church and where it’s going to go,” Pates said, “and personalities make a difference, obviously.”

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times

A Catholic organization has delivered a petition with thousands of signatures asking Cardinal Roger Mahony to recuse himself from the conclave in Rome that will select the next pope.

The group, Catholics United, collected nearly 10,000 signatures making “a simple request” that the former archbishop of Los Angeles not participate in the process because of the priest abuse scandals that happened under his watch, said Chris Pumpelly, communications director for Catholics United.

The petition was delivered Saturday to St. Charles Borromeo in North Hollywood, where the cardinal resides. It was accepted by a church staff member.

Pumpelly said that the conclave offers “an opportunity for healing in the church” and that having someone like Mahony, with his complicated history, runs counter to that.

“This is one thing that would cast a cloud of scandal and shame over the conclave,” Pumpelly said of the participation of Mahony and others connected to priest abuse scandals.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
NBC Los Angeles

[with video]

By Samantha Tata

Saturday, Feb 23, 2013

Thousands of signatures demanding that retired Cardinal Roger Mahony withdraw from voting in upcoming papal conclave were set to be delivered Saturday afternoon to a North Hollywood church, where Mahony has a residence.

The former archbishop of Los Angeles, Mahony was stripped of his public and administrative duties in January for his role in shielding alleged priest child molesters. But that does not affect his standing with Rome.

“It’s a symbolic statement to say we will be heard,” said Chris Pumpelly, spokesman for Washington, D.C.-based Catholics United.

“There is pain in this church and we will no longer be silenced. We love the church. We just can’t stand this crisis of leadership.”

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
LA Daily News

[Photos: Catholics United Petition Cardinal Mahony]

By Mariecar Mendoza, Staff Writer
dailynews.com
Posted: 02/23/2013

Shortly before he heads to Rome to help elect the next pope, Cardinal Roger Mahony gave a closed-door deposition on Saturday in a lawsuit over a priest suspected of molesting as many as 26 children in Los Angeles in the late 1980s.

Mahony was required to give the deposition regarding Father Nicholas Aguilar Rivera, who fled the country in 1988 as he was being investigated on multiple charges of sexual abuse.

Aguilar Rivera remains a fugitive in Mexico.

Attorney Anthony De Marco is suing the Archdiocese of Los Angeles on behalf of one of Aguilar Rivera’s alleged victims.

De Marco said in a brief email afterward that the deposition “went well,” but declined to comment further about it due to court orders.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
KTLA

by Doug Kolk
KTLA 5 Reporter

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — A Catholic organization has delivered a petition with thousands of signatures asking Cardinal Roger Mahony to recuse himself from the conclave in Rome that will select the next pope.

The group, Catholics United, collected nearly 10,000 signatures making “a simple request” that the former archbishop of Los Angeles not participate in the process because of the priest abuse scandals that happened under his watch, said Chris Pumpelly, communications director for Catholics United.

The petition was delivered Saturday to St. Charles Borromeo in North Hollywood, where the cardinal resides. It was accepted by a church staff member.

Pumpelly said that the conclave offers “an opportunity for healing in the church” and that having someone like Mahony, with his complicated history, runs counter to that.

“This is one thing that would cast a cloud of scandal and shame over the conclave,” Pumpelly said of the participation of Mahony and others connected to priest abuse scandals.

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UNITED STATES
CBS News

By Magalie Laguerre-Wilkinson

(CBS News) NEW YORK – About 116 cardinals will vote for the new pope. Eleven are American — including Cardinal Roger Mahony of California. But there are Catholics in both Los Angeles and Italy demanding Mahony stay away because of his role in shielding sexually abusive priests.

Cardinal Roger Mahony led the Los Angeles archdiocese, the largest in the United States for 25 years. He retired in 2011.

Calls increase for abuse-tainted cardinal to withdraw from vote for new pope
Should abuse-tainted cardinal be allowed to vote for new pope?

On Saturday, Mahony was deposed for a lawsuit filed by a 35-year-old man who claims he was the victim of sexual abuse in the 1980s. The suit alleges that church leaders allowed the accused priest to leave the United States to avoid prosecution. The priest remains a fugitive in Mexico.

Earlier this February, the Los Angeles archdiocese released more than 12,000 pages of files documenting a pattern in which Mahony and other church officials reassigned many accused priests away from California — shielding them from law enforcement authorities in the 1980s.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

There’s a big disconnect between committee’s findings and personal accounts of hardship, writes Eilis O’Hanlon

24 February 2013

It would have been welcome had Martin McAleese stuck around afterwards to answer questions and provide clarification on his final report as chair of the inter-departmental committee to establish the facts of State involvement in the Magdalene Laundries, but none of the authors of the last four reports did either, so it wasn’t as if the former first husband was breaking with tradition. Nor is it the outgoing senator’s fault that the Government initially dropped the baby he handed to them.

But it is his responsibility if the report issued under his name turns out not to be as insightful a document as it seemed on first glance.

Of course, it’s easy to pick holes. Whatever failings the McAleese Report may have, it still deserves credit for nailing the myth that the laundries were wholly private institutions over which the State had no power, and the equally poisonous lie, told by the previous government to the UN, that the “vast majority” of inmates went there voluntarily.

Many of its details have also added hugely to the historical picture, including cases of disabled and psychiatrically-ill girls sent to laundries for no other reason than that it was more cost-effective than providing them with proper treatment.

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IRELAND
Limerick Leader

By Mike Dwane
Published on Saturday 23 February 2013

ENDA Kenny’s “sincere and heartfelt” apology and “modest redress” would suffice for most of the Magdalene women, according to Charleville solicitor Declan Duggan.

But a minority who spent much of their lives “deprived of liberty” should not now be deprived the right to be legally represented in seeking compensation, he said.

The Government has pledged to financially support survivors of the Magdalene laundries but terms of reference announced this week studiously avoid the word compensation. Judge John Quirke has been given three months to come up with a scheme to assist the women.

Mr Duggan represents a number of survivors – including women who spent years toiling behind the walls of the Good Shepherd laundry on Clare Street, Limerick – and has in the past acted for over 100 people at the Residential Institutions Redress Board.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

24 February 2013

Abuse victims in “Protestant Magdalene Laundries” with links to the State were not included in the redress scheme for fear of the financial cost, contrary to the official policy that money would not be a factor, official documents suggest.

Church of Ireland survivors are also convinced that they have to date been excluded from any redress scheme because they were not Catholics, but are demanding justice and are preparing a legal case against the State if not included.

Following the State apology to the Magdalene survivors, the Government is under mounting pressure from within its own ranks and from the opposition to include Protestant victims, such as survivors from Bethany Homes, in a compensation scheme, currently being extended to Catholic survivors in the Magdalene Laundries.

There are less than 20 survivors left who went through Bethany Homes, and they have argued that their inclusion in the Quirke scheme would result in a very small additional cost to the State.

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IRELAND
Journal

THERE HAVE BEEN calls for a dedicated unit to be established within the Department of Justice to help and assist survivors of the Magdalene Laundries while they wait on a redress package.

Judge John Quirke has three months to compile a report about how best to provide compensation to the 1,000 or so women who were forced to work, unpaid, in the system and are still alive today.

Among other factors, he will look at payout caps and the position of those women who received money through the Residential Institute Redress Board. Although, it has been confirmed that they will not be excluded from applying to the fund.

There are other details to figure out too, says James Smith of the Justice for Magdalenes group. “Will Judge Quirke have independent statutory powers? Will the process be transparent (private but not secret)? Will there be a process for appeal if a woman is dissatisfied? Will there be independent monitoring, such as an ombudsman who reports back on the process?”

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric has been reported to the Vatican over claims of inappropriate behaviour going back 30 years, a newspaper says.

The Observer said three priests and one former priest have made the complaint against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, 74, leader of the Scottish Catholic Church.

They have demanded his immediate resignation, it said.

A statement from the Scottish Catholic Church said Cardinal O’Brien contested the claims and was taking legal advice. …

BBC religious affairs correspondent Robert Pigott says the allegations seem to have been publicised now because the four complainants do not want Cardinal O’Brien to go to the Vatican to participate in electing a new pope.

The chances of him not going, however, are “very remote”, as not only has he denied the allegations but it is very difficult to prevent a cardinal from exercising their papal vote, unless he is detained by the state.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, the former archbishop of Westminster, told the BBC’s Andrew Marr programme he was “very sad” to hear of the allegations made against Cardinal O’Brien.

“There have been other cases which have been a great scandal to the Church over these past years.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Channel 4 News

Three priests and a former priest report the most senior Catholic clergyman in Britain, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, to the Vatican over allegations of inappropriate behaviour stretching back 30 years.

The Observer newspaper says they have demanded his immediate resignation.

The allegations come just days after Cardinal O’Brien called for Catholic priests to be able to marry and have children, saying some struggled with celibacy.

A statement from the Scottish Catholic church said Cardinal O’Brien contested the claims and was taking legal advice.

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VATICAN CITY
Irish Independent

Lizzy Davies in Rome– 24 February 2013

When Pope Benedict XVI tendered the first papal resignation in almost 600 years, the more hopeful of his flock said it would help the Roman Catholic Church make a break with its recent past and usher in a new era of missionary vibrancy untainted by intrigue and scandal.

The headlines of the past fortnight, however, have shown quite how unlikely that is. Not only has anger built over the role of several compromised cardinals in the choosing of a papal successor, but increasingly lurid claims have emerged about why Benedict chose to stand down in the first place.

A major new controversy, therefore, is the last thing that the Vatican needs. Rather than heralding a bold new dawn, the most unexpected and unpredictable conclave in centuries looks increasingly likely to be overshadowed – just as much of Benedict’s papacy was – by scandal.

The clerical sex abuse scandals that dominated Benedict’s eight years as pope have left several prelates due to take part in conclave facing questions over how they handled the affairs.

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SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland

Sunday 24 February 2013

SCOTLAND’S most senior Catholic is facing allegations of inappropriate acts stretching back 30 years.

It has been reported that Cardinal Keith O’Brien is at the centre of complaints by three priests and one former priest dating back 33 years.

The four, understood to be from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, are believed to have complained to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, and demanded O’Brien’s immediate resignation.

A spokesman for the Cardinal said that the claims were contested. A senior source for the Catholic Church told the Sunday Herald last night that he knew nothing about the allegations.

The accusations come just days after the Cardinal sent shockwaves through the Catholic community by saying he would welcome an end to the Church�s celibacy rule for the priesthood.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sky News

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic clergyman has been reported to the Vatican over claims of inappropriate behaviour, a newspaper has claimed.

The Observer reports that three priests and a former priest have made the allegations against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland.

A spokesman for the Scottish Catholic Church told Sky News that Cardinal O’Brien “contests these claims and is taking legal advice”.

According to the Observer, the four claimants reported to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, that Cardinal O’Brien had committed “inappropriate acts” going back 33 years.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Aljazeera

Three priests and one former cleric have accused Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the senior leader of the Catholic church in Britain, of committing inappropriate behaviour against them.

The UK’s Observer newspaper reported on Sunday that the cardinal, the head of the Scottish Catholic church, made the physical advances as far back as three decades ago.

The allegations against O’Brien come at a time when Roger Mahony, another cardinal, is being accused of covering up sex abuses by priests in the US, further clouding the remaining days of Benedict XVI as pope.

O’Brien and Mahony are among the 116 cardinals eligible to vote for the next leader of the 1.1 billion Catholics around the world, once Benedict resigns on February 28.

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SCOTLAND
Daily Record

SCOTLAND’S top Catholic Cardinal Keith O’Brien has been accused of inappropriate conduct by three priests, it has been revealed.

THE leader of Scotland’s Catholics, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, has been reported to the Vatican over allegations of inappropriate conduct.

Three priests and a former priest are understood to have reported the Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh to nuncio Antonio Mennini – the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain – complaining about incidents stretching back 30 years.

A newspaper last night claimed the four are demanding O’Brien’s immediate resignation.

O’Brien, 74, who is due to retire next month and denies all the claims, is Britain’s most senior Catholic.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Telegraph

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the only figure based in mainland Britain with a vote on the next Pope, is said to be “contesting” the claims which involve three priests and a former cleric.

By John Bingham, Religious Affairs Editor
9:59AM GMT 24 Feb 2013

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric is fighting allegations of “inappropriate” acts involving four men.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the only figure based in mainland Britain with a vote on the next Pope, is said to be “contesting” the claims which involve three priests and a former cleric.

The allegations have been passed to the Vatican through its representative in the UK, the Papal Nuncio, Archbishop Antonio Mennini.

The accusers, who have not been named, are calling for the Cardinal’s resignation and said to be anxious to prevent him attending the Conclave in Rome next month.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Indian Express

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric, who is due to vote on Pope Benedict XVI’s successor, has been reported to the Vatican over claims of inappropriate behaviour, the Observer reported today.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland, contests allegations by three priests and a former priest which were sent to Rome a week before Pope Benedict’s resignation on February 11. The four claimants, from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh in Scotland, reported to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, that O’Brien had committed “inappropriate acts” going back 33 years. One priest claims he received unwanted attention from the cardinal after a late-night drinking session. Another alleges that O’Brien used night prayers as cover for inappropriate contact, according to the paper. O’Brien has a vote in the forthcoming papal conclave. The claimants, who are demanding the cleric’s resignation, are worried that their report will not be properly addressed if he is allowed to travel to Rome.

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VATIKAN
Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten

Machtkampf im Vatikan: Im Finanz-Skandal um die Vatikan-Bank hat Papst Benedikt XVI. am Freitag überraschend eine der Schlüssel-Figuren nach Kolumbien versetzt. Ein Geheim-Bericht spricht angeblich von homosexuellen Ausschweifungen und Erpressungs-Geldern. Es geht um viel Geld, sagt ein Kardinal. Immer klar wird: Die massive Wirtschafts-Kriminalität hat Joseph Ratzinger zu seinem spektakulären Rücktritt veranlasst.

Nachdem die italienische Zeitung „La Repubblica“ am Freitag Details aus einem Geheim-Bericht von drei Kardinälen über Korruption, Unzucht und Kriminalität enthüllt hatte, reagierte Papst Benedikt XVI. mit einer überraschenden Personalie: Er griff noch einmal in den mit aller Härte geführten Machtkampf der Kirchenfürsten ein und versetzte die rechte Hand des mächtigsten Mannes im Vatikan-Stadt, des Kardinal-Staatssekretärs Tarcisio Bertone: Ettore Balestrero muss als Nuntius nach Bogotà gehen.

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VATIKAN
Neue Zurcher Zeitung

Nikos Tzermias, Rom

Am Samstagvormittag hat Papst Benedikt XVI. die diesjährigen Exerzitien für die Fastenzeit in der Kapelle Redemptoris Mater beendet und den anwesenden Kardinälen für die grosse Kompetenz, Zuneigung, Liebe und den Glauben gedankt, mit dem sie die schwere Last des Petrusamtes mitgetragen hätten. Darauf empfing Benedikt, der für den 28. Februar seinen epochalen Amtsverzicht angekündigt hat, den seinerseits scheidenden italienischen Staatspräsidenten Giorgio Napolitano zu einer Privataudienz.

Soweit zu den neusten nüchternen Fakten, die indes am Samstag nicht nur von anhaltenden Spekulationen über die tatsächlichen Umstände des Rücktritts des Papstes, sondern auch durch neue Kontroversen um die Skandale um sexuellen Missbrauch überlagert wurden. Der üblicherweise ruhig wirkende Vatikansprecher Lombardi reagierte in einem Editorial für Radio Vatikan sehr unwirsch auf den «Druck», der auf das bevorstehende Konklave ausgeübt werde. Es fehle nicht an Personen, die sich den Moment der Überraschung und Desorientierung schwacher Geister zunutze machen wollten, um Verwirrung zu säen und die Kirche und ihre Leitung in Misskredit zu bringen.

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VATIKAN
Frankfurter Rundschau

Rom –
Der Vatikan hat vor einer Beeinflussung des Konklaves durch Falschmeldungen und Gerüchte gewarnt. Nach den Spekulationen um gestohlene Dokumente, Sex und Korruption kritisierte der Vatikan die Medien und wehrte sich gegen die Gerüchte. Es sei erbärmlich, dass es kurz vor Beginn der Papstwahl „eine Verbreitung von oft ungeprüften, nicht verifizierbaren oder sogar falschen Nachrichten“ gebe, die großen Schaden für Personen und Institutionen verursache, hieß es am Samstag in einer Erklärung des vatikanischen Staatssekretariats.

Papst-Sprecher Federico Lombardi beklagte in einem Editorial für Radio Vatikan „Verleumdung und Desinformationen“. Einige versuchten, den Moment der Überraschung nach dem angekündigten Rücktritt von Papst Benedikt XVI. für Diffamierungen und Falschinformationen zu nutzen. Es werde „inakzeptabler Druck“ ausgeübt. „In den meisten Fällen haben die Richter, die scharfe moralische Urteile abgeben, nicht die geringste Autorität dazu“, sagte Lombardi.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Katholisches

Deutsche Kirche „stinkreich aber innerlich verrottet“ – Kritik an Pille-danach-Entscheidung und progressiven Aussagen deutscher Bischöfe

(Madrid/Rom) „Die brechreizauslösende deutsche Kirche. Ist sie noch katholisch?“ Das vernichtende Urteil und die Frage stammen vom spanischen Kirchenhistoriker und katholischen Kommentator Francisco José Fernández de la Cigoña. Der Spanier läßt in einem heute veröffentlichten Kommentar seiner Empörung freien Lauf über die Entscheidung der deutschen Bischofskonferenz, die „Pille danach“ zuzulassen, und über jüngste progressive Stellungnahmen deutscher Kardinäle und Bischöfe, die zum Teil „häretischer Natur“ seien, wie die Forderung nach der Frauenordination, so die italienische Internetseite Messa in Latino.

Es verwundert im katholischen Ausland weniger, daß durch die Sedisvakanz die Progressisten im Episkopat hervorpreschen. Mit größerem Unmut wird das Schweigen der anderen deutschsprachigen Kardinäle und Bischöfe registriert. „Im Augenblick muß sie die schlimmste [Landeskirche] der Welt sein“, so de la Cigoña, der es bedauert, daß Deutschland im nächsten Konklave mit sechs Kardinälen vertreten sein wird.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Vaterland (Liechtenstein)

Der in einem Missbrauchsskandal belastete frühere Erzbischof von Los Angeles, Kardinal Roger Mahony, ist am Samstag von Richtern in Los Angeles befragt worden. Der Geistliche soll am Konklave zur Wahl des neuen Papstes im März teilnehmen.

Rom/Vatikanstadt/Washington. – Mahony antwortete vier Stunden lang auf Fragen der Richter, die feststellen wollten, ob er pädophile Priester gezielt vor Strafverfolgung geschützt habe. Dabei ging es um mindestens 20 Missbrauchsfälle, berichteten italienische Medien. Der Kardinal antwortete geduldig auf die Fragen, die ihm auch die Rechtsanwälte der Opfer stellten.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Chicago Tribune

Reuters

By Brandon Lowrey

LOS ANGELES, Feb 23 (Reuters) – Roman Catholic activists on Saturday petitioned a U.S. cardinal to recuse himself from taking part in selecting a new pope so as not to insult survivors of sexual abuse by priests committed while he was archbishop of Los Angeles.

The activists delivered a petition with nearly 10,000 signatures to the North Hollywood church where Cardinal Roger Mahony resides.

“It’s a total slap in the face to victims to think (Mahony) can cover up 25 years of child sex abuse and then go prancing off to Rome like a prince of the Church,” said Joelle Casteix, western regional director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

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UNITED STATES
BBC News

Roman Catholics in the US have delivered a petition asking Cardinal Roger Mahony to stay away from the conclave in Rome to choose a new pope.

The former Archbishop of Los Angeles was stripped of his duties last month over allegations he protected priests accused of child sex abuse.

Continuing scandals over sex abuse in the Church have cast a shadow over the process of choosing a new pope.

Benedict XVI – who is abdicating – is giving his final Sunday blessing.

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CALIFORNIA
The Press Democrat

By GUY KOVNER
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Published: Saturday, February 23, 2013

Sebastopol police are beginning to delve into a 42-year-old case of alleged sexual assault linked to a Catholic priest, including the reason why it was reported long after the victim’s death, Police Chief Jeff Weaver said.

Although the police chief would not identify the suspect in the case, it clearly is related to the Rev. John Crews, the long-time director of the Hanna Boys Center near Sonoma who resigned unexpectedly Feb. 6. The Catholic Diocese of Santa Rosa has acknowledged that Crews resigned in the wake of an allegation of sexual misconduct about 40 years ago.

Prior to taking the top spot at Hanna Boys Center, a highly regarded facility for at-risk boys, in 1984 Crews, 67, served at St. Sebastian’s Catholic Church in Sebastopol.

Weaver said he believes the male victim died “years ago” and that he had told the person who reported the crime earlier this month not to disclose it nor to notify police.

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CALIFORNIA
KABC

[with video]

Amy Powell

NORTH HOLLYWOOD, LOS ANGELES (KABC) — Cardinal Roger Mahony, the retired Los Angeles archbishop, was headed to Rome on Saturday to help select the new pope, the same day Mahony was deposed over the sexual abuse scandal that took place during his watch.

Mahony was described as calm and unflappable by the attorney who questioned him for more than three hours.

Recently released files show the former head of Los Angeles’ Catholic Archdiocese maneuvered behind the scenes to protect pedophile priests in order to protect the church from scandal.

Mahony has apologized for those actions and contends he turned the archdiocese into a leader for safeguarding children.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

Cardinals seem to be biting the immoral dust faster than the Dublin bookmakers’ computers can adjust their papal handicapping system. A few days ago Honduran Cardinal Maradiaga was accused credibly in the National Post of making anti-Semitic charges about priest child abuse by Harvard Law School Professor Alan Dershowitz. Now the UK’s senior Cardinal, Keith O’Brien, has been credibly reported based on allegations of four priests to have “dirty hands”. His futile attempt to pivot by recently backing married priests seems to have failed. He hails for the same area and era in Ireland as disgraced Irish Cardinal Brady (and sadly, near my parents’ birthplace). If “clean hands” were to be made a prerequisite for Cardinals’ voting, will any Cardinal still be standing to vote by March 15, or at least worthy to be Pope if “clean hands” were to be introduced for the first time as a papal requirement?

Popes for centuries have told us how they had the exclusive “truth”, the “deposit of faith”, the “Tradition”. the “Magisterium”. etc. It was drilled into the consciousness of Catholic schoolchildren, including me and mine. The mystical smokescreens are quickly dissipating as fast as the the Internet can clear them.

Will other Christians now weigh in and give their advice here? Clearly the Popes do not have all the answers and solutions. Given the historical treatment of Orthodox and Protestant traditions by Rome, these traditions will understandably be hesitant to speak up. Nevertheless, Christian Catholics need their help at this critical point. Who knows? Maybe before the Papal Olympics are over, Catholics may have to ask their “separated brethren” to lend us a Papal Quarterback?

In the past week, Catholic ecumenical scholar, Hans Kung, former Dominican and now Episcopal priest, Matthew Fox, and Anglican deacon and Oxford historian, Sir Diarmaid MacCulloch, have weighed in on the current crisis. Hopefully, other Christian leaders and scholars, will weigh in soon. Catholics need some help here. So many Catholic leaders and scholars have been muzzled for so long by the Vatican’s ruthless inquisitors under the present Pope and his Polish predecessor, that in-house Catholic “players” may arrive at the papal match too late.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Express

DETECTIVES investigating Jimmy Savile’s sordid past will this week probe claims that he was involved in a Satanic ritual where a secret film of his debauched activities is said to exist.

By: James Murray
Published: Sun, February 24, 2013

The former BBC presenter went to weird events at a place known locally as The Chamber, which had a ceremonial whipping post in the centre of the room.

The room was decorated with an occult style pentagram and goats heads.

The building housing The Chamber still exists in Whitby, North Yorkshire, but has since been redecorated and the whipping post removed.

Officers working on Scotland Yard’s Operation Yewtree investigation will travel to the coastal town in the coming days to interview a local resident who has been amassing a file of evidence about the strange goings on there decades ago.

The man, who declined to be named, said: “There is a substantial amount of information to show Savile was invited to Satanic rituals in Whitby on a number of occasions. Once someone made a recording of what unfolded and that film is still said to be in existence in DVD form.

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UNITED KINGDOM
AFP

LONDON — Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic cleric, who is due to vote on Pope Benedict XVI’s successor, has been reported to the Vatican over claims of inappropriate behaviour, the Observer reported on Sunday.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland, contests allegations by three priests and a former priest which were sent to Rome a week before Pope Benedict’s resignation on February 11.

The four claimants, from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh in Scotland, reported to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, that O’Brien had committed “inappropriate acts” going back 33 years.

One priest claims he received unwanted attention from the cardinal after a late-night drinking session. Another alleges that O’Brien used night prayers as cover for inappropriate contact, according to the paper.

O’Brien has a vote in the forthcoming papal conclave.

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CANADA
Vancouver Sun

The odds are strong – seven to two – that Canada will next month become much more famous.

Two big British bookmakers are putting serious money on a Canadian horse: Ladbrokes and PaddyPower are betting that Marc Ouellet, a cardinal from Quebec, could be elected pope at the March conclave.

If that happens, Canada’s Catholic roots and its supposedly polite, multi-faith culture will be thrust into the international spotlight.

The interest has already arrived. Popular American satirist Stephen Colbert devoted much of a show last week to mock-complaining that Ouellet would be “too Canadian” (i.e., too nice) to be pope.

When a man is catapulted to the top of a church of 1.2 billion people, unpredictable things happen to him and his country of origin. For good or ill.

A media blitz struck Poland after native son Karol Cardinal Wojtyla became John Paul II in 1978. It happened to Germany when Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI in 2005.

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CANADA
Vancouver Sun

If Quebec Cardinal Marc Ouellet is elected pope, what would the world discover about Canadian Catholicism?

Here are some of the answers: …

A LEGACY OF ABUSE STILL UNRAVELLING

While he was Pope, Benedict never made it to Canada. However, he did travel in 2008 to the U.S., where he apologized for his priests’ role in the sex abuse scandal.

High-level Catholic leaders, including New York’s Dolan, have admitted to covering up chronic abuse.

Catholic officials have admitted there have been, since the 1950s, more than 6,100 accused U.S. priests.

What’s different in Canada? The debacle over sex abuse by priests exploded in the U.S. in the past 15 years.

But Canadian bishops had brought in measures to curtail it during the early 1990s, as hundreds of priests, brothers and Catholic school staff were being convicted of molestation.

They had to respond to Catholic abuse cases that came out of Mount Cashel orphanage in Newfoundland and from survivors of now-defunct Catholic-run residential schools, which housed and educated more than 100,000 aboriginals during the 20th century.

The Canadian Catholic Church, as a whole, has received widespread criticism for refusing to formally apologize for abuse at the schools.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Pink News

by Scott Roberts
23 February 2013

Britain’s most senior Catholic leader, notorious for his anti-gay views, has been reported to the Vatican over historical allegations of inappropriate behaviour involving several male priests.

The Observer reports three priests and one former priest made the complaint against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the Scottish Catholic Church.

The four, from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, have complained to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, and demanded O’Brien’s immediate resignation.

A statement from the Scottish Catholic Church said Cardinal O’Brien contested the claims and was taking legal advice.

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CALIFORNIA
NBC Southern California

By Samantha Tata

Saturday, Feb 23, 2013

Thousands of signatures demanding that retired Cardinal Roger Mahony withdraw from voting in upcoming papal conclave are set to be delivered Saturday afternoon to a North Hollywood church, where Mahony has a residence.

The former archbishop of Los Angeles, Mahony was stripped of his public and administrative duties in January for his role in shielding alleged priest child molesters. But that does not affect his standing with Rome.

“It’s a symbolic statement to say we will be heard,” said Chris Pumpelly, spokesman for Washington, D.C.-based Catholics United.

“There is pain in this church and we will no longer be silenced. We love the church. We just can’t stand this crisis of leadership.”

Janet Kwak is in North Hollywood. She’ll have a live report from the demonstration during the NBC4 News at 5 p.m.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times

A “relatively unflappable” Cardinal Roger Mahony answered questions under oath for more than 3 1/2 hours Saturday about his handling of clergy sex abuse cases, according to the lawyer who questioned the former archbishop.

“He remained calm and seemingly collected at all times,” said attorney Anthony De Marco, who represents a man suing the Los Angeles Archdiocese over abuse he claims he suffered at the hands of a priest who visited his parish in 1987.

Mahony has been deposed many times in the past, but Saturday’s session was the first time he had been asked about recently released internal church records that show he shielded abusers from law enforcement.

De Marco declined to detail the questions he asked or the answers the cardinal provided, citing a judge’s protective order.

The deposition occurred just before Mahony was to board a plane for Italy to vote in the conclave that will elect the next pope. In a Twitter post Friday, Mahony wrote that it was “just a few short hours before my departure for Rome.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
Press TV (Iran)

Britain’s most senior Catholic clergyman, Cardinal Keith O’Brien has been implicated in possible sexual abuse scandals dating back 30 years ago by three priests and a former priest in Scotland, local media reported.

Cardinal O’Brien, who is an outspoken opponent of gay rights, condemning homosexuality as immoral, has been reported to the Vatican by the four, from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, the daily The Guardian reported.

They complained to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, that they had fallen victim to O’Brien’s inappropriate behaviour at the time, and called for his immediate resignation.

Their claims had been submitted to the nuncio’s office the week before Pope Benedict’s resignation on 11 February, nurturing speculations that Benedict’s shock move may be connected to further scandals to come. Allegations of sexual abuse by members of the church have dogged the papacy of Benedict XVI, who is to step down as pope at the end of this month.

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VATICAN CITY
CNN

[with video]

By John L. Allen Jr., CNN Senior Vatican Analyst

updated 5:50 PM EST, Sat February 23, 2013

Editor’s note: John L. Allen Jr. is CNN’s senior Vatican analyst and senior correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter.

(CNN) — Suffice it to say that of all possible storylines to emerge, heading into the election of a new pope, sensational charges of a shadowy “gay lobby” (possibly linked to blackmail), whose occult influence may have been behind the resignation of Benedict XVI, would be right at the bottom of the Vatican’s wish list.

Proof of the Vatican’s irritation came with a blistering statement Saturday complaining of “unverified, unverifiable or completely false news stories,” even suggesting the media is trying to influence the papal election.

Two basic questions have to be asked about all this. First, is there really a secret dossier about a network of people inside the Vatican who are linked by their sexual orientation, as Italian newspaper reports have alleged? Second, is this really why Benedict XVI quit?

The best answers, respectively, are “maybe” and “probably not.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

Britain’s most senior Roman Catholic has been reported to the Vatican over historical allegations of inappropriate behaviour, a Sunday newspaper says.

The Observer said three priests and one former priest made the complaint against Cardinal Keith O’Brien, 74, leader of the Scottish Catholic Church.

They have also demanded his immediate resignation, the paper said.

A statement from the Scottish Catholic Church said Cardinal O’Brien contested the claims and was taking legal advice.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By Olivia Williams

PUBLISHED:18:06 EST, 23 February 2013

Britain’s most senior Catholic clergyman, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, has been reported to the Vatican for inappropriate sexual behaviour.

Four priests complained through statements sent to the papal nuncio, Antonio Mennini.

The first allegation dates back to 1980.

As the head of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland, next week O’Brien will be part of the conclave choosing the next Pope, but now he is facing demands for his immediate resignation.

As reported by The Observer, one of the priests alleges that he has needed counselling since an inappropriate relationship with O’Brien.

A second complainant was 18-years-old when O’Brien made an inappropriate approach after night prayers.

A third priest said he was invited to ‘get to know’ O’Brien at the archbishop’s residence only to face ‘unwanted behaviour’ from O’Brien after late-night drinking.

A spokesman for the cardinal said that he contests the allegations.

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CHILE
Publimetro

James Hamilton, uno de los denunciantes del ex párroco de El Bosque Fernando Karadima, ocupó su cuenta de Twitter para expresar su sentir respecto a la situación del sacerdote Cristián Precht, quien esta semana decidió no apelar a la sanción que le impuso El Vaticano por un presunto caso de abuso de menores.

El médico de profesión hizo una dura crítica al sistema respecto a la, según él, prácticamente nula participación de la PDI en la investigación de los hechos que inculparían al ex Vicario de la Solidaridad. Además aprovechó de repasar al actual arzobispo de Santiago, Ricardo Ezzati.

“Un pedófilo lo persigue la PDI un sacerdote pedófilo lo mandan de vacaciones pagadas : precht gracias a Ezzati” partió señalando.

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VATICAN CITY
Washington Post

By Jason Horowitz

Saturday, February 23

Vatican City — The cardinals who file into the Sistine Chapel for next month’s conclave will check their newspapers, cellphones and iPads at the door. The frescoed chamber will already have been swept for bugs. If the last conclave is any guide, the prelates will cast secret ballots on a floor raised to make room for electronic jamming equipment.

As paramount as privacy is to the deliberations for selecting the next pope, sharing information will be critical to that pontiff’s success. When Benedict XVI’s successor is introduced on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica with the cry of “Habemus Papum,” his name and message will be liked on Facebook pages, blasted out on a Twitter account that already has nearly 2 million followers, downloaded onto a Vatican YouTube channel, linked in Catholic blogs and introduced across multiple platforms tended to by a small Vatican office off the Via della Conciliazione.

“The important thing for us is that people are sharing,” said Claudio Maria Celli, the president of the church’s Pontifical Council for Social Communications, who oversees news.va, a hub for church news. On Saturday its home page, designed in the Vatican’s white and yellow colors, featured the pope’s Twitter feed, MP3 audio files of the speeches of popular Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi during the pope’s Lenten retreat and video of the massive crowd that showed up for one of the pope’s last public appearances. (Still, no gifs.) The site attracts about 15,000 visitors a day, nearly half of whom are new visitors. The average time on site, Celli said, is two minutes and twenty seconds. “They are not there by chance. They came to read.”

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VATICAN CITY
The Daily Star (Lebanon)

February 23, 2013 By Jean-Louis de la Vaissiere

VATICAN CITY: Pope Benedict XVI’s impending resignation is dividing many Catholics between those who see it as a gesture of hope and renewal for the Church and those for whom it is an admission of weakness.

“It is a break that encourages the Church to examine its conscience to start afresh,” said Paolo Colonnetti from the Focolare lay movement.

“It is not at all a gesture that desacralises or has any dangers for the Church,” he said.

Father Sergio, superior general of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a religious congregation, said he too was optimistic.

“I am awaiting with a confident spirit the goodness the Church will receive from this move,” he said.

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UNITED STATES
The New York Times

Here is a composite portrait of the 116 men — age 72, on average — who will elect Pope Benedict XVI’s successor. It was assembled by layering photographs of each cardinal on top of one another. Cardinals from various regions form the first composites, followed by a composite of all 116 men.

By AMANDA COX

Because more than two-thirds of the cardinals must agree, many who were elected as pope have been compromise candidates — not everyone’s first choice, but someone a large majority could support.

Pope John Paul II relaxed that rule a bit, but Benedict restored the traditional requirement for a supermajority in 2007. A spokesman said the two-thirds majority “would guarantee the widest possible consensus.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
Herald Scotland

Gerry Braiden
Local Government Correspondent

CARDINAL Keith O’Brien, Britain’s most senior Catholic cleric, has surprised the faith across the globe by controversially claiming he would be happy for priests to marry and have children.

On the eve of his departure to Rome where he will help select the next Pope, Cardinal O’Brien, who leads the Catholic Church in Scotland, said many priests struggle to cope with celibacy and should be given the choice to marry.

The cardinal is understood to have expressed a long-held personal view and will have supporters among fellow members of the conclave that will elect the successor to Pope Benedict XVI.

He said: “I’d be very happy if others had the opportunity of considering whether or not they could or should be married. It’s a free world and I realise that many priests have found it very difficult to cope with celibacy as they lived out their priesthood, and felt the need of a companion, of a woman, to whom they could get married and raise a family of their own.”

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NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

Published on Saturday 23 February 2013

BRITAIN’S most senior Roman Catholic has said he would be “happy” for priests to be able to marry.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien – who was born in Ballycastle – said many priests struggle to cope with celibacy and should be able to marry and have a family.

The cardinal was speaking ahead of a trip to Rome where he will help elect the next pope, after the resignation of Benedict XVI.

He told the BBC: “I’d be very happy if others had the opportunity of considering whether or not they could or should be married.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Radio New Zealand

The most senior Roman Catholic in Britain says priests should be allowed to marry and have children.

In an interview, Cardinal Keith O’Brien said the next Pope would be free to change the current policy because the principle of celibacy wasn’t of divine origin, as it hadn’t come directly from Jesus Christ.

“I realise that many priests have found it very difficult to cope with celibacy as they lived out their priesthood, and felt the need of a companion, of a woman to whom they could get married and raise a family of their own.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Observer

Catherine Deveney
The Observer, Saturday 23 February 2013

Three priests and a former priest in Scotland have reported the most senior Catholic clergyman in Britain, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, to the Vatican over allegations of inappropriate behaviour stretching back 30 years.

The four, from the diocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, have complained to nuncio Antonio Mennini, the Vatican’s ambassador to Britain, and demanded O’Brien’s immediate resignation. A spokesman for the cardinal said that the claims were contested.

O’Brien, who is due to retire next month, has been an outspoken opponent of gay rights, condemning homosexuality as immoral, opposing gay adoption, and most recently arguing that same-sex marriages would be “harmful to the physical, mental and spiritual well-being of those involved”. Last year he was named “bigot of the year” by the gay rights charity Stonewall.

One of the complainants, it is understood, alleges that the cardinal developed an inappropriate relationship with him, resulting in a need for long-term psychological counselling.

The four submitted statements containing their claims to the nuncio’s office the week before Pope Benedict’s resignation on 11 February. They fear that, if O’Brien travels to the forthcoming papal conclave to elect a new pope, the church will not fully address their complaints.

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VATICAN CITY
The Observer (United Kingdom)

Lizzy Davies
The Observer, Saturday 23 February 2013

When Pope Benedict XVI tendered the first papal resignation in almost 600 years, the more hopeful of his flock said it would help the Roman Catholic church make a break with its recent past and usher in a new era of missionary vibrancy untainted by intrigue and scandal.

The headlines of the past fortnight, however, have shown quite how unlikely that is. Not only has anger built over the role of several compromised cardinals in the choosing of a papal successor, but increasingly lurid claims have emerged about why Benedict chose to stand down in the first place.

A major new controversy, therefore, is the last thing that the Vatican needs. Rather than heralding a bold new dawn, the most unexpected and unpredictable conclave in centuries looks increasingly likely to be overshadowed – just as much of Benedict’s papacy was – by scandal.

The clerical sex abuse scandals that dominated Benedict’s eight years as pope have left several prelates due to take part in conclave facing questions over how they handled the affairs.

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MINNESOTA
Northland’s News Center

February 16, 2013

Duluth, MN (NNCNOW.COM) – A group of Minnesota lawmakers wants to make sure people who sexually abuse children are prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

It’s called the “Minnesota Child Victims Act” and it would give young victims more time to come to terms with what happened to them and gain the strength to take their offenders to court.

“Gradually, through therapy, I began to realize that this wasn’t my fault. I was a kid,” said David Samarzia.

When Samarzia was ten years old he was sexually abused by the pastor in his Duluth church. Like many children, he didn’t tell anyone until many years later.

Jeff Anderson, a nationally known clergy sex abuse attorney in Minnesota, says that situation is all too common.

“The witnesses to the crimes often are children,” Anderson said, “They suffer in silence. They suffer in secrecy and shame and they aren’t able to report it.”

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NEW YORK
CBS New York

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — Many New Yorkers at St. Patrick’s Cathedral Saturday – but not all – dismissed the reports that a scandal had a role in the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI.

The Vatican lashed out at the Italian news media Saturday for what it called defamatory and false reports about the contents of a secret dossier prepared for the pope by a group of cardinals, claiming the existence of a gay priests’ lobby and alleging financial mismanagement. There are claims that it was this scandal that prompted the pope to resign.

As 1010 WINS’ Gene Michaels reported, most of the people at the cathedral Saturday did not believe the reports about the scandal. But Lisa and Greg were not a part of that majority.

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Lisa said.

“Pope Benedict knows that he’s got a terrible situation on his hands. He hasn’t dealt with it as well as he might have, and when it comes as close to the Vatican as that, if that’s true, then I think it was appropriate for him to resign,” Greg added.

But Patrick dismissed the scandal as unfounded.

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VATICAN CITY
The New York Times

By RACHEL DONADIO

Published: February 23, 2013

VATICAN CITY — As cardinals from around the world begin arriving in Rome for a conclave to elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI, new shadows have fallen over the delicate transition, which the Vatican fears might influence the vote and with it the direction of the Roman Catholic Church.

In recent days, often speculative reports — some even alleging gay sex scandals in the Vatican, others focusing on particular cardinals stung by the child sex abuse crisis — have dominated headlines in the Italian news media, suggesting fierce internal struggles as prelates scramble to consolidate power and attack enemies in the dying days of a troubled papacy.

The drumbeat of scandal has reached such a fever pitch that on Saturday, the Vatican Secretariat of State issued a rare pointed rebuke, calling it “deplorable” that ahead of the conclave, “when the Cardinal electors will be held in conscience and before God, to freely indicate their choice, that there be a widespread distribution of often unverified, unverifiable or completely false news stories, that cause serious damage to persons and institutions.”

The Vatican compared the news reports to attempts in the past by foreign states to exert pressure on the papal election. “Today there is an attempt to do this through public opinion that is often based on judgments that do not typically capture the spiritual aspect of the moment that the Church is living,” the statement said.

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CALIFORNIA
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on February 23, 2013

Dare to publicly shame him? Be prepared for a “you didn’t think it was wrong last month” answer.

Criticize him? He’s gonna pray for God to forgive your righteous—yet apparently sinful—anger.

Dare say that he shouldn’t go to the Conclave? He’s gonna tell you that he’s full of the Holy Spirit and can’t wait to get to Rome.

You see, it’s not his fault. He’s been scapegoated. Outcast. He now knows what it’s like to “be among the excluded ones.”

If there was ever an example of why sex abuse and cover-up has thrived in the Catholic Church, it’s Mahony. But the more he struggles, the deeper he sinks into the quicksand of his own arrogance and sinfulness.

The scary part? Look at every bishop and cardinal in the US. They all follow the same script. We were just lucky enough to get some of Mahony’s documents. But what are we missing in other diocese across the Unites States and abroad? What other bishops and cardinals are carefully hovering over the quicksand pit, thankful that victims never got access to their secret sex abuse archives?

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Oxford Times

A PROMINENT Oxford theologian has said Pope Benedict XVI’s reign will not be remembered as successful or inspiring but only for his resignation.

Professor Diarmaid MacCulloch is a theologian at Oxford University who has written numerous books as well as presented a number of TV series on the history of Christianity.

He has said the pontiff spent most of his time in office “crushing” other visions of Catholicism and suggested he would be chiefly remembered for giving up the role.

Prof MacCulloch, who was knighted last year, said: “You have to admire a man who not just knows he’s no longer up to the job, but is brave enough to tell other people.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Oxford Times

With one announcement, a documentary that might otherwise have slipped under the radar has become the most important film of the week. Alex Gibney’s Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God follows his previous exposés Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005) and the Oscar-winning Taxi to the Darkside (2007) in showing how a single shocking incident fits into a bigger and far more egregious picture. But, while Monday’s announcement from Rome stands to deflect attention away from the crimes of Father Lawrence Murphy, it will redouble the focus on the part played by the future Benedict XVI, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, in the Vatican conspiracy to cover-up the extent of child abuse within the Roman Catholic Church and to prevent those who betrayed the trust of the vulnerable individuals in their care from facing civil justice.

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IRELAND
RTE News

The Department of Justice and Equality has received hundreds of telephone calls from people signalling their interest in getting help from a Government fund for former residents of the State’s Magdalene Laundries.

The Department of Justice has also said the women and girls who worked in the Magdalene Laundries without pay arrangements “simply cannot be applied to the completely different circumstances” that applied in maternity and infant homes, including the Bethany Home.

A spokesperson for the Department said that the issues relating to the Bethany Home relate primarily to health care and children.

The spokesperson said that the Government is conscious of these issues, and that Minister for Justice Alan Shatter, and Minister of State at the Department of Health, Kathleen Lynch, are looking at the matter.

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UNITED STATES
Vatican Insider

According to a survey, 60% of Americans would like to see a cardinal from a third world country elected to the papacy

Paolo MAstrolilli
New York

Most American Catholics have a positive opinion of Benedict XVI but they also think it is time for the Church to change, by electing a cardinal from a developing country as Pope in the upcoming Conclave. This is according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center straight after Joseph Ratzinger’s resignation.

In the U.S., 74% of Americans express a favourable view of the Pope’s work although this figure has dropped since April 2008 (83%) and is lower than the highest approval rating earned by John Paul II (93%). The most controversial issue is still the sex-abuse scandal in the Church: Only 33% of Americans judge the Pope’s efforts to combat this as good or excellent, while 63% said it was unsatisfactory. Peoples’ opinion of the Church’s relations with other religions, however, is more positive, with 55% saying “that Benedict has done a good or excellent job in promoting relations with other religions.”

U.S. Catholics are split over which path the Church should take in the near future in terms of doctrine in general. Indeed, 51% thinks it should maintain the traditional positions of the Church, while 46% would like to see it moving in new directions.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Michael Brennan Deputy Political Editor– 23 February 2013

THE number of Magdalene Laundry survivors who have come forward for a new compensation scheme has now reached 550.

The numbers getting in touch with the Department of Justice’s special helpline have steadily climbed from an initial 200 earlier in the week.

A compensation fund is being set up as a result of Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s historic state apology to the women for the ordeal they had suffered.

The Magdalene Survivors Together group wants a payment of €20,000 for each year that a woman worked without wages in a Magdalene Laundry – and a lump sum payment of €50,000 each for psychological damage.

The maximum amount paid to any woman would be capped at €200,000 regardless of how many years she had worked in the laundry.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

HARRY MCGEE

BACKGROUND: Within hours of the Magdalene Report being published a fortnight ago, the Taoiseach and Government knew they had paid a political price for an insipid apology and lack of a process.

“As we all know now, the report was published immediately after a Government meeting, before anybody had time to absorb it,” said a source familiar with the process.

“We anticipated that people would not be happy with an incomplete response.”

‘Lessons to be learned’

“There are obviously lessons to be learned about how Government handles reports of that magnitude. Time needs to be given to study the findings and discuss them,” said the source, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Thus it became a political imperative to produce a thought-through, sensitive and comprehensive response over the following 14 days; one that would repair the Government’s hand after what was seen as the debacle of the initial response.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

MARY MINIHAN and COLIN GLEESON

Doubts have emerged on whether Magdalene women who have previously received compensation because they resided in industrial schools or other institutions will qualify for further payment under the new scheme.

The president of the Law Reform Commission, Mr Justice John Quirke is to recommend criteria to be applied when assessing provision in terms of “payments” and supports such as medical cards and counselling services to the Magdalene women.

A Department of Justice spokeswoman said the issue of further compensation for women who were sent to the laundries from industrial schools – and were thus compensated by the State Redress Board – “will be considered by Judge Quirke”.

However, Minister of State for Trade Joe Costello said: “I think they should be dealt with in the context of the Magdalenes. They shouldn’t be excluded.”

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IRELAND
BBC News

[with video]

The Irish government’s decision to apologise to the women who worked in the Magdalene Laundries – workhouses run by nuns – has prompted members of the Bethany Home Survivors Group group to say they also want justice.

Magdalene laundries were places for what were described as “fallen women”.

They were workhouses to where the Irish authorities sent Catholic girls and women considered “troubled” to do unpaid manual work.

The last one closed in 1996.

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POLEN
Kleine Zeitung

Der polnische Bischof Tadeusz Pieronek hat mit Aussagen über Kindesmissbrauch von katholischen Geistlichen Empörung ausgelöst. Auf das Pontifikat von Benedikt XVI. angesprochen sagte er, der Papst habe “mit viel wichtigeren Themen gerungen als der Pädophilie”. Pädophilie habe es immer gegeben und werde es immer geben: “Keine Macht hält den Menschen von dem ab, wozu ihn die Leidenschaften treiben”.

Die stellvertretende Präsidentin des polnischen Unterhauses (Sejm), Wanda Nowicka, bis vor kurzem mit der linksliberalen Bewegung Palikots (RP) verbunden, warf Pieronek die Verharmlosung von Kindesmissbrauch vor. Sie forderte den Kinderbeauftragten der Regierung in einem Brief zu einer Stellungnahme auf. “Die Kirche behandelt Pädophilie offenbar als ein Phänomen des Brauchtums”, sagte Nowicka gegenüber TVN24. Pieronek stelle damit die Notwendigkeit einer strafrechtlichen Verfolgung infrage.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Kreis-Anzeiger

Manfred Dickert schreibt an Kardinal – „Offenheit und Übernahme der Verantwortung“

(cke). Die Einstellung der Missbrauchsstudie durch die katholische Kirche und die noch immer ausstehende Entschuldigung von Kirchenverantwortlichen aus dem Bistum Mainz gegenüber den Opfern, die vom ehemaligen Grebenhainer Pfarrer Wolfgang Grabosch sexuell missbraucht wurden, veranlassten Grebenhains Bürgermeister Manfred Dickert, einen Brief an den Mainzer Bischof, Kardinal Karl Lehmann, zu schreiben. Der Rathauschef, in dessen Gemeinde sich ein Teil der widerwärtigen Taten ereigneten, fordert eine klare Entschuldigung der Kirche und einen ehrlichen Umgang mit den Missbrauchsfällen.

„Die Berichterstattungen in der Presse vom Januar zu dem mit einem großen Eklat gescheiterten Forschungsprojekt der Aufarbeitung von sexuellem Missbrauch an Minderjährigen durch das kriminologische Forschungsinstitut Niedersachsen machen zutiefst betroffen“, schreibt Dickert an den Kardinal. Zum Brief veranlasst sehe er sich durch die Haltung der katholischen Kirche, des Bistums, gegenüber den Missbrauchsopfern aus der Gemeinde Grebenhain und der umliegenden Dörfer im Einzugsbereich des von Pfarrer Grabosch geführten Dekanats. „Meine bisherigen Kenntnisse reichen nur bis zu einem Mitgefühl der Kirche mit den Opfern.

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DEUTSCHLAND
domradio

Theologin Ranke-Heinemann misstraut Vorschlägen katholischer Bischöfe

Uta Ranke-Heinemann im Gespräch mit Matthias Hanselmann

Die Deutsche Bischofskonferenz möchte ein Diakonat für Frauen einrichten, um ihnen den Zugang zu Leitungspositionen zu erleichtern. Die Theologin Uta Ranke-Heinemann glaubt aber nicht an einen echten Fortschritt: Der Vatikan sei “der reine Junggesellenverein, wo nur die Jungfrau Maria Zutritt hat”.

Matthias Hanselmann: Auf der diesjährigen Frühjahrsvollversammlung der Deutschen Bischofskonferenz in Trier, die heute zu Ende geht, sagte der Osnabrücker Bischof Franz-Josef Bode, dass in Zukunft mehr Frauen in Leitungspositionen der katholischen Kirche kommen sollten. Des Weiteren schlug Kardinal Walter Kasper ein neues Diakonat für Frauen vor, die dann im Namen der Kirche pastorale, liturgische und Segenshandlungen vornehmen könnten. Aber wohlgemerkt, ohne dass sie vorher ordiniert werden müssten. Von der Priesterweihe sollen Frauen also auch weiterhin ausgeschlossen sein, daran wird nicht gerüttelt.

Uta Ranke-Heinemann ist Theologin und kirchenkritische Buchautorin, war 1970 die erste Professorin im Fach katholische Theologie, im Jahr 1987 allerdings wurde ihr die Lehrbefugnis dafür wieder entzogen, weil sie offen bekannte, dass sie nicht an die Jungfrauengeburt glauben kann. Ihr Buch “Eunuchen für das Himmelreich” ist gerade in einer erweiterten und aktualisierten Auflage erschienen mit dem Untertitel “Katholische Kirche und Sexualität – von Jesus bis Benedikt XVI.”. Und jetzt ist Frau Ranke-Heinemann für uns am Telefon. Willkommen in unserer Sendung!

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

DIARMAID MACCULLOCH

The Catholic Church, aka the western church of the Latin rite, trades on tradition. That is what so fascinates many people: the lure of its continuity, the certainty, the serene provision of answers.

As anyone mildly acquainted with its history will know, this is a series of illusions. Christian history, like all history, is a delicious Smorgasbord of unintended consequences, paradoxes, misunderstandings, sudden veerings in new directions.

If you like to call that the work of the Holy Spirit, then fine, but do note that the Holy Spirit delights in confounding human expectations and going its own way.

The church of Rome, having been around from near the start of the story, illustrates this general truth particularly well. Its prestige derives from possessing the tomb of the Apostle Peter, who probably never visited the city.

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VATICAN CITY
The Guardian (United Kingdom)

Conal Urquhart, John Hooper and agencies
guardian.co.uk, Saturday 23 February 2013

The Vatican has attacked reports in the Italian media linking Pope Benedict XVI’s resignation to the alleged discovery of a network of gay prelates as attempts to influence the cardinals in their choice of a new pontiff.

The Vatican secretariat of state said in a statement: “It is deplorable that as we draw closer to the time of the beginning of the conclave … that there be a widespread distribution of often unverified, unverifiable or completely false news stories that cause serious damage to persons and institutions.”

The statement was made as Pope Benedict XVI had his final meeting with senior clerics, lamenting the “evil, suffering and corruption” that have defaced God’s creation in a final address to Vatican officials.

Benedict spoke on Saturday at the end of a week-long spiritual retreat coinciding with Lent, the period of 40 days (excluding Sundays) leading up to Easter. For the past week, Italian cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi has led the Vatican on meditations that have covered everything from the family to denouncing the “divisions, dissent, careerism, jealousies” that afflict the Vatican bureaucracy.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

February 24, 2013

Nick McKenzie, Richard Baker

THE Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne has removed a leading Australian priest who sexually preyed on a disabled and vulnerable woman.

In an embarrassing backflip, the Melbourne Archdiocese has removed Father Tom Knowles from one of the nation’s busiest churches just weeks after reinstating him.

The move comes after revelations in Fairfax Media last month that a confidential church inquiry had found he had an improper sexual relationship with disabled woman Jennifer Herrick over a 14-year period in New South Wales.

As a result of this inquiry, Father Knowles was put on administrative leave for 16 months but was returned to active ministry in January this year.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 23 February 2013 (VIS) – The freedom of the College of Cardinals, which, by law, is responsible for providing for the election of the Roman Pontiff, has always been strongly defended by the Holy See as the guarantee of a choice based solely on deliberations directed toward the good of the Church.

Over the course of the centuries, Cardinals have had to face many forms of pressures, exerted upon individual electors or upon the College of Cardinals itself, that sought to influence their decisions, following a political or worldly logic.

If in the past the so-called powers, i.e., States, sought to influence the election of the Pope, today there is an attempt to do this through public opinion, which is often based on judgements that do not capture the typically spiritual aspect of this moment that the Church is living.

It is deplorable that, as we draw closer to the moment that the Conclave will begin and the Cardinal electors will be held—in conscience and before God—to freely express their choice, there is a widespread distribution of often unverified, unverifiable, or even completely false news stories that cause serious damage to persons and institutions.

Never before as at this moment are Catholics focusing on what is essential: praying for Pope Benedict, praying that the Holy Spirit might enlighten the College of Cardinals, and praying for the future Pope, confident that the future of the barque of Peter is in God’s hands.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

by John L. Allen Jr. | Feb. 23, 2013

On Thursday, a major Italian newspaper carried a sensation report alleging that a secret Vatican document commissioned in the wake of last year’s leaks scandal had identified a shadowy “gay lobby” within the institution, suggesting that its influence might have been in the background of Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to resign.

In the immediate wake of the report, Vatican spokespersons basically said “no comment,” stressing that they couldn’t confirm or deny the contents of a report that was supposed to be eyes-only for Benedict XVI.

Today, however, the Vatican’s Secretariat of State lashed out in general terms against media coverage in the run-up to the conclave that it described as “unverified, unverifiable or completely false news stories, that cause serious damage to persons and institutions.”

The complete text of today’s statement, issued in both Italian and English, is below.

* * *
Communiqué of the Secretariat of State

The freedom of the College of Cardinals, which is responsible for providing, under the law for the election of the Roman Pontiff, has always been strongly defended by the Holy See, as a guarantee of a choice that was based on evaluations addressed solely for the good of the Church.

Through the course of the centuries, Cardinals have had to face many forms of pressures exerted upon individual electors or on the College of Cardinals. Such pressures had as their goal to condition the decisions, following a political or worldly logic.

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CITTA DEL VATICANO
La Repubblica

Il portavoce della Santa Sede Lombardi critica i mezzi di comunicazione. Parla di “maldicenza” e di “calunnia” e di “pressioni inaccettabili per condizionare l’esercizio del dovere di voto da parte dell’uno o dell’altro membro del Collegio dei cardinali”

“Pregherò per l’Italia”. Con queste parole il Papa si è rivolto al presidente della Repubblica Giorgio Napolitano nell’incontro, di circa venti minuti, che si è tenuto oggi in Vaticano. Un incontro segnato da forte commozione quello con il capo dello Stato, accompagnato dalla moglie Clio, che coincide in una giornata intensa in Vaticano. La Segreteria di Stato della Santa Sede ha pubblicato un comunicato in cui si deplora il tentativo di condizionare i cardinali, in vista del Conclave, con la diffusione di “notizie spesso non verificate, o non verificabili, o addirittura false, anche con grave danno di persone e istituzioni”. Un chiaro riferimento a quanto scritto sugli intrighi nelle alte sfere del Vaticano.

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VATICAN CITY
WHBF

VATICAN CITY (AP) – The Vatican has lashed out at the media for what it says are a series of defamatory and false media reports before the conclave to elect Pope Benedict XVI’s successor, saying they’re an attempt to influence the election.

The Vatican secretariat of state said in a statement Saturday the Catholic Church has for centuries insisted on the independence of cardinals to elect their pope. Now, it said, “the weight of public opinion is in play.”

It deplored that cardinals have been exposed to “a diffusion of news that is often unverified, unverifiable and actually false, with serious damage to people and institutions.”

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VATICAN CITY
ABC News

[with video]

By SPIEGEL Staff

Feb. 23, 2013

With Pope Benedict XVI’s resignation drawing closer, the struggle for power in the Vatican has gotten underway in earnest. The church badly needs to reform itself, but with Ratzinger lurking in the shadows, will it be able to?

Naked and goaded viciously by hornets and wasps, his blood sucked by loathsome worms. Such was the fate of a pope in Dante’s “Divine Comedy” who “by his cowardice made the great refusal.”

Benedict XVI, in short, knew what could happen to one who rebelled against a centuries-old tradition in a church in which suffering is far from foreign. But he also knew that it wasn’t just a matter of his own suffering — it was a matter of the exhaustion, weakness and sickness of the church at large.

The pope from Bavaria has given up. Nevertheless, when he announced his resignation last Monday, hastily and almost casually mumbling the words as if he were saying a rosary, as if he were returning the keys to a rental car rather than the keys to St. Peter, there was still a sense of how deeply his move has shaken the Catholic empire.

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VATICAN CITY
France 24

The Vatican on Saturday criticised Italian media of ‘misinformation’ concerning reports of blackmail and corruption within the upper echelons of the Vatican, just days before Pope Benoit XVI gets ready to step down.

The Vatican on Saturday condemned Italian media reports of intrigue, corruption and blackmail among senior prelates, saying these were meant to pressure cardinals ahead of their vote to elect Pope Benedict XVI’s successor.

Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi dismissed as “gossip, disinformation and sometimes calumny” the reports, which are linked to an investigation by a committee of cardinals last year over a series of damaging leaks of confidential papal documents.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

With the papal election just around the corner, international media underline the “loneliness of the short distance Pope”

Vatican Insider staff
Rome

The international press is chokablok with speculations on a secret Vatileaks dossier that is so “explosive” it led to Benedict XVI’s resignation and on the shadow of the various scandals which is hanging over the upcoming Conclave. Just a few days after the Pope began his Lenten retreat the media is talking about “the loneliness of the short distance Pope”.

British newspaper The Guardian published an article titled “Papal resignation linked to inquiry into ‘Vatican gay officials’, says paper”, saying that although the Vatican’s spokesman has not confirmed the document, “a potentially explosive report has linked the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI to the discovery of a network of gay prelates in the Vatican.” The dossier’s role in the Vatileaks scandal is also mentioned by the Irish Times, while The Daily Telegraph published an article with the title: “Vatican conclave tainted by scandal before it even begins”. The article underlines how the Vatileaks scandal has now affected Cardinal Timothy Dolan who was called for questioning over his handling of the sex abuse in Milwaukee. The newspaper then points out that Dolan joins the list of cardinals whose reputations have been clouded but will still be voting in the Conclave. The others are Mahony, Rigali, Danneels and Brady. “If they banned all the cardinals who have mismanaged sex abuse or have been involved in other unsavoury business, they’d end up holding the conclave in a broom cupboard,” a Vatican analyst told The Daily Telegraph. Meanwhile, Reuters published a special report on “The loneliness of the short distance pope”, quoting anonymous Vatican sources who paint a picture “is of a serious intellectual who let himself become isolated in the Vatican, ill at ease with the day-to-day running of the Church.”

In France, Le Monde focused on the rumours going round about an internal dossier on the Vatileaks case, in an article titled “Fresh rumours on the reasons for the Pope’s resignation”. Le Point published an article titled “The Vatican prepares for an unusual cohabitation”, discussing the fact that Benedict XVI “will remain inside the walls of the small State, not far from his successor and his previous duties” after he resigns. “Benedict XVI will let his successor deal with the Lefebvrian issue”, Liberation declares in the title of one of its articles. Germany’s Die Welt newspaper wrote about the tweeting ban during the Conclave, in an article titled “Which little bird will tell during the papal election?”, which claims “speculations are increasing regarding the possibility of someone violating the code of pontifical secrecy, revealing who the next Pope will be.” “Ratzinger has secularised the papacy” is the title Zeit gave to one of its articles which claims the Pope “restored the sacred structure of the Church in reason terms.”

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MINNESOTA
Mankato Free Press

By Robb Murray Free Press Staff Writer

— John Thavis, a Mankato-born journalist who spent 20 years covering the Vatican for the Catholic News Service, was visiting Rome recently when the biggest papal news in recent years broke.

Thavis was in Rome to touch base with the sources he used for his new behind-the scenes book, “The Vatican Diaries,” when Pope Benedict stunned the religious world by announcing he’d was resigning — and the first pope to do so in 400 years.

No one outside the pope’s inner circle knew this news was coming.

But Thavis said he suspected this was coming.

“I had thought for more than a year that the pope might resign,” he said. “He had said, in certain circumstances, it’s your duty to resign.”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

In this week’s editorial, Fr. Federico Lombardi, sj, speaks of the external challenges and pressures put on the Church since the resignation of Pope Benedict and leading up to the upcoming conclave. Fr. Lombardi is the director of the Press Office of the Holy See. Read Vatican Radio’s English translation below.

The journey of the Church in these last weeks of Pope Benedict XVI’s pontificate and up until the election of the new Pope — passing through the sede vacante and the conclave — is very demanding, given the newness of the situation. We do not — and we rejoice — have to carry the pain of the death of a much-loved Pope, but we have not been spared another test: that of the multiplication of the pressures and considerations that are foreign to the spirit with which the Church would like to live this period of waiting and preparation.

There is no lack, in fact, of those who seek to profit from the moment of surprise and disorientation of the spiritually naive to sow confusion and to discredit the Church and its governance, making recourse to old tools, such as gossip, misinformation and sometimes slander, or exercising unacceptable pressures to condition the exercise of the voting duty on the part of one or another member of the College of Cardinals, who they consider to be objectionable for one reason or another.

In the majority of cases, those who present themselves as judges, making heavy moral judgments, do not, in truth, have any authority to do so. Those who consider money, sex and power before all else and are used to reading diverse realities from these perspectives, are unable to see anything else, even in the Church, because they are unable to gaze toward the heights or descend to the depths in order to grasp the spiritual dimensions and reasons of existence. This results in a description of the Church and of many of its members that is profoundly unjust.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
CNN

By Wayne Drash, CNN

(CNN) – Told by two families that a visiting priest was suspected of molesting their children in 1988, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles did not immediately notify police. Instead, Cardinal Roger Mahony’s right-hand man alerted the priest – a heads-up that allowed him to flee the country for Mexico.

He remained in the priesthood there for another 21 years, allegedly continuing to molest. He has denied the accusations and remains a fugitive.

Newly released church documents show the behind-the-scenes machinations of top officials within the Los Angeles archdiocese making decisions on how to deal with pedophile priests, hindering police investigations and saying, in private, something completely different than what they said in public.

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IRELAND
The Irish Sun

By ANN MOONEY

A PRIEST and former headmaster who abused a boy for eight years has been caged.

Fr Vincent Mercer, 66, was previously convicted of indecently assaulting boys between 1970 and 1977.

He received a three-year suspended sentence at Naas Circuit Criminal Court in 2005.

Yesterday, having pleaded guilty at Cork Circuit Criminal Court to 15 sample counts of sexually assaulting the boy on dates between 1986 and 1994, he was sentenced to three years in jail.

But he will only serve half — with 18 months suspended.

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UNITED STATES
Irish Examiner

Saturday, February 23, 2013

The American cardinal who was accused of turning a blind eye to the crimes of Irish paedophile priest Oliver O’Grady will today be questioned about a Mexican priest believed to have molested 26 children.

By Stephen Rogers and Nicole Winfield

Cardinal Roger Mahony, the former Archbishop of Los Angeles, hit the headlines here when it was claimed he transferred O’Grady from diocese to diocese to mask his abuse of children.

O’Grady would eventually serve seven years in a US prison before returning to Ireland. He was sentenced to three years in prison last year when he was caught with a large haul of child pornography.

Now Cardinal Mahony is in the headlines once more. Last month, a Los Angeles court ordered hundreds of files detailing the activities of priests accused of sex abuse. The files show the cardinal and other top archdiocese officials manoeuvred behind the scenes to shield accused priests and protect the Church from a growing scandal while keeping parishioners in the dark.

Today, as part of a clerical abuse case, he will be questioned under oath about a Mexican priest, Rev Nicolas Aguilar Rivera, who visited his diocese in the late 1980s. He will be asked how he managed the Mexican priest during a nine-month stay during which the alleged abuse of 26 children took place. The Mexican priest, now defrocked, is still on the run.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Niall O’Connor– 23 February 2013

A MAN has told how an abusive priest, who was also a family friend, robbed him of his childhood.

Fr Vincent Mercer (66), of Black Abbott, Kilkenny, had caused him “mental pain and torture” and a “living nightmare” which had lasted over 20 years, the victim told Cork Circuit Criminal Court.

“As a young child I was very happy but sadly in 1986 at the tender age of 11 my life changed,” he said.

“I was robbed of my childhood – I was abused by a very close family friend, by a Dominican priest Fr Vincent Mercer.

“For over 20 years I have suffered mental pain and torture that Fr Mercer imposed upon me.”

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
NBC News

[with video]

By Tracy Connor, Staff Writer, NBC News

Los Angeles’ retired Cardinal Roger Mahony, who was rebuked last month for his handling of the sex-abuse crisis, suggests he was “scapegoated” in a blog post ahead of two important dates: his Saturday deposition in a lawsuit alleging that the church hierarchy protected a priest accused of molesting children and his trip to Rome to help pick the next pope.

The high-profile “prince of the church” is at the center of an outcry over several scandal-tainted cardinals being allowed to help choose who will succeed Pope Benedict XVI at next month’s conclave at the Vatican.

Ireland’s Sean Brady, Belgium’s Godfried Danneels and Philadelphia’s Justin Rigali have all been pilloried in the Italian press over allegations they failed to protect children from pedophiles — but it’s Mahony who has drawn the most ire.

A group called Catholics United started a petition against his attendance at the conclave. And an Italian consumer group requested Rome prosecutors open a criminal investigation into Mahony if he travels to the Vatican, the news agency ANSA reported Friday.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
ABC News

Feb 23, 2013

By David Wright

Cardinal Roger Mahony is clearly excited about his trip to Rome.

On the eve of the cardinal’s sworn deposition in a lawsuit over a priest accused of molesting 26 boys in his archdiocese in 1987, Mahony sent this, his 13th tweet, to his 979 followers:

@CardinalMahony Just a few short hours before my departure for Rome. Will be tweeting often from Rome, except during the actual Conclave itself. Prayers!

The cardinal doesn’t mention that before he boards the plane he’ll have to give a 4 hour deposition in the case of Father Nicolas Aguilar-Rivera, who fled to Mexico shortly after a top Mahony aid warned the cardinal the pedophile priest was likely to be arrested.

Mahony’s successor Archbishop Jose Gomez publicly rebuked the cardinal for his mishandling of this and dozens of other cases.

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GERMANY
Spiegel

By Peter Wensierski

Progressive Catholic theologian Hans Küng, whose authority to teach Catholic theology was rescinded by the Vatican in 1979, spoke to SPIEGEL about the challenges facing the next pope and the need for reform of the Catholic Church.

SPIEGEL: What will change now that Pope Benedict XVI has resigned?

Hans Küng: There is now a realization that a pope should step down when the time has come. Joseph Ratzinger made it very clear that he could no longer fulfill his duties. His predecessor felt he had to turn his death into a show. Fortunately, Benedict chose another way, in order to demonstrate that when a pope is no longer capable of doing his job, he should give it up. This is exactly how the office should be approached. In John Paul II’s final years, we weren’t led by a pope so much as by a curia, which governed the Church in his place.

SPIEGEL: Who would you like to see lead your Church as pope?

Hans Küng: A pope who is not intellectually stuck in the Middle Ages, one who does not represent mediaeval theology, liturgy and religious order. I would like to see a pope who is open first to suggestions for reform and secondly, to the modern age. We need a pope who not only preaches freedom of the Church around the world but also supports, with his words and deeds, freedom and human rights within the Church — of theologians, women and all Catholics who want to speak the truth about the state of the Church and are calling for change.

SPIEGEL: Who is your ideal candidate for the office of pope?

Hans Küng: If I were to name anyone, he would most certainly not get elected. But background should not play a role. The best man for the job should be elected. There are no more candidates who belonged to the Second Vatican Council. In the running are candidates who are middle of the road and toe the Vatican line. Is there anyone who won’t simply continue on the same path? Is there anyone who understands the depth of the Church’s crisis and can see a way out? If we elect a leader who continues on the same path, the Church’s crisis will become almost intractable.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

LISTEN UP, PLEASE, ALL VOTING CARDINALS!

Truth always seems so absent at the Vatican. Joseph Ratzinger leaves the papacy for his extensively refurbished convent as he arrived in Rome over thirty years before–up to his eyeballs in lies. The latest is the leaked claim he, and his constant companion, Georgeous Georg, whom the Pope just boosted suddenly into an Archbishopric, were just “shockingly informed” that a gay clique live on their tiny campus. Is it any surprise the bold butler seemed to distrust Georg? Next the Pope will be “shocked” when he learns some in the clique speak German as well as Italian. Really, your Holiness, you can find a better way to duck the dark truths rapidly being unveiled. The Gospels tell us the Apostles were often weak men. But few of them seem as bad as some of their purported successors. Who knows, though, Jesus was talking to someone when he demanded children be protected?

This last ditch effort by Benedict to blame his Vatican’s endless sins on gay persons is, at least, consistent for with his opportunistic career pattern and his early Third Reich formation. He arrived at the Vatican after helping feed his old “friend”, Hans Kung, to John Paul II’s inquisitorial lions in 1980. Fr. Hans Kung was too smart and intrepid, though, for both of these shameful and ambitious hierarchs whose constant concern for clerical child abusers is being sickenly disclosed on an almost daily basis. Typically gracious and candid, Fr. Kung spoke of his former university colleague, Joseph Ratzinger, this week as reported here at:

[Spiegel]

The seemingly unending and substantially unaddressed Vatican scandals of child abuse cover-ups, sexual blackmail, financial corruption and managerial incompetence have reached a tipping point making resignation the only option apparently. Shortly, on March 1, Cardinals reportedly will be told secretly what is in the confidential report of the three octogenerian Cardinal survivors of Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin and Franco. They have seen it all before, no doubt.

The next Pope will surely be bogged down for years in ongoing worldwide governmental investigations, civil litigation and criminal prosecutions of the Church’s hierarchy that are now beginning to mushroom. These challenges are already burdened by the overall dark legacy left by ex-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and his Polish predecessor, so concisely summarized by Dominican priest, Matthew Fox, a student of key theologian, M.-D. Chenu, who theologically guided Joseph Ratzinger and Karol Wotyla at Vatican II, accessible here:

[Huffington Post]

Here’s what well-advised Cardinals who want to survive can and should do, in my view as an experienced international lawyer and lifelong Catholic.

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