ABUSE TRACKER

BELGIUM
Vatican Insider

The major sexual abuse scandal that struck part of the national clergy has led the primate to a public confession and commitment to the community

Giacomo Galeazzi
Vatican City

“I ask your forgiveness.” In the space between a “painful” 2011 and the opening of a 2012 of “purification,” the Catholic primate of Belgium and Archbishop of Brussels, André-Joseph Lèonard, extended a “mea culpa” for sexual abuse by members of the clergy. On behalf of a national church badly affected by the pedophile priest scandal, Monsignor Lèonard took responsibility for the sins of priests and religious “infidels,” while the church hierarchy in Belgium goes through a particularly difficult time as well, due to internal challenges by “dissidents.” The “mea culpa” extended by Lèonard – a bishop who is very Ratzingerian in his sensibilities – comes at a time when the Belgian church hierarchy is particularly under pressure.

After the 2010 evisceration of the tomb of the prestigious Cardinal Leon-Joseph Suenens by the Belgian police in search of secret papers (a dramatic breakthrough of secular culture into Catholicism), the sorties went on constantly until the most recent in September, when, at the Court of Ghent, around seventy victims of pedophile priests publicly denounced the Belgian Conference of Bishops and the Vatican for doing nothing to prevent the alleged crimes that took place in the diocese of Bruges.

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MISSOURI
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on January 03, 2012

This is an unprecedented bullying effort to silence and invade the privacy of victims and their allies and protect predator priests and their corrupt supervisors. It’s an expensive, cumbersome fishing expedition that tramples on the constitutionally-guarantees of freedom of speech, association and privacy and cripples our ability to counsel and console deeply wounded men, women and teenagers who turn to us for help.

Thousands of individuals – police, prosecutors, journalists, witnesses, whistleblowers and concerned Catholics – who’ve never met or even heard of Fr. Tierney or his accuser will have their private communications publicly disclosed.

Bishop Finn is Fr. Tierney’s boss. Tierney has sworn obedience to Finn. Finn can order Tierney to stop this. But he won’t.

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IRELAND
Highland Radio

Posted: 4/Jan 12:36

A County Donegal priest has been granted a two week adjournment of a hearing at which he is to face a number of Indecent assault charges.

Fr Eugene Boland, whose address is listed as the Parochial House, Killyclogher county Tyrone faces four charges of indecent assault on a female.

Fr Boland, originally from Moville, has previously worked as administrator in Galliagh parish in Derry and also served in the Creggan and Waterside parishes in the city.

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SAN DIEGO (CA)
10 News

[with video]

SAN DIEGO — A Catholic priest who ministers at a Southcrest church is facing a sexual assault charge and is accused of forcing himself on a 20-year-old woman at his home, authorities reported Tuesday.

Jose Davila – who is also known as Father Alexis – is an associate pastor at St. Jude’s Shrine of the West on Boston Avenue. He turned himself in to San Diego police on Sunday, two days after the alleged crime, SDPD Lt. Anastasia Smith said.

“Mr. Davila voluntarily turned himself in to the sex crimes detectives,” said Smith.
He is accused of assaulting the woman – whom he has known for several months – while she was visiting his residence Friday morning, according to Smith.

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SAN DIEGO (CA)
NBC San Diego

By Sarah Grieco

Tuesday, Jan 3, 2012

A 53-year-old priest was arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting a young woman in his own home.

Jose Davila, a priest at St. Jude’s Church in Southcrest, was visited at home by the 20-year-old victim whom he had known for several months, according to police. While alone with Davila in his home, the victim was allegedly sexually assaulted.

She returned home and reported the assault to her family and police.

Sex Crimes Unit detectives interviewed the victim and Davila, who was compliant with the investigation. He voluntarily turned himself in on Sunday.

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SAN DIEGO (CA)
Los Angeles Times

A Catholic priest has been arrested on suspicion of sexually assaulting a 20-year-old woman, the San Diego Police Department said Tuesday.

The Rev. Jose Davila, 53, associate pastor at St. Jude Shrine of the West church, was booked into county jail Sunday after detectives interviewed him and the woman.

The victim was visiting Davila at his home Friday morning when the alleged assault occurred, police said. She later reported the incident to her family and the family called police.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Majella O’Sullivan

Wednesday January 04 2012

DIOCESES around the country face another crisis as they struggle to pay for nursing home care for retired priests.

Most dioceses have a fund in place to help to meet the cost of elderly care. But as the number of seminarians dwindles and an increasing number of priests reach retirement age, there are fewer ‘working’ priests to contribute to these funds.

An Irish Independent survey of 20 of the 26 dioceses countrywide has revealed that 450 priests have reached the age of retirement of 75, though some of these remain in active ministry.

Of the priests who have reached retirement age, 79 are no longer living independently and require full-time nursing home care.

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SAN DIEGO (CA)
KFMB

Video Report By Richard Allyn, Reporter

SAN DIEGO (CNS/CBS 8) –

SAN DIEGO (CNS) – A Catholic priest who ministers at a Southcrest church is facing a sexual assault charge for allegedly forcing himself on a 20-year- old woman at his home, authorities reported today.

Jose Davila, 53, an associate pastor at St. Jude’s Shrine of the West on Boston Avenue, turned himself in to San Diego police on Sunday, two days after the alleged crime, SDPD Lt. Anastasia Smith said.

He is accused of assaulting the woman, whom he has known for several months, while she was visiting his residence Friday morning, according to Smith.

The alleged victim went home and told her family about the alleged assault, then called the police to file a report.

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MISSOURI
Catholic News Agency

By Michelle Bauman

St. Louis, Mo., Jan 4, 2012 / 06:07 am (CNA).- A group claiming to advocate for clergy sex abuse victims says it will not comply with a court order asking it to turn over documents, amid concerns that it had received information in violation of a judge’s gag order.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, has said that it will refuse to submit to a judge’s request for information involving allegations of sexual abuse against a Missouri priest.

SNAP director David Clohessy told CNA on Jan. 3 that his organization should be held to a “different standard” of transparency than Church leaders and dioceses, which he described as “organizations that enable and conceal thousands of pedophiles to rape tens of thousands of kids.”

The order was issued by Jackson County Circuit Court Judge Ann Mesle in an abuse lawsuit brought against Father Michael Tierney and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph in Sept. 2010.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Philly Catholic Post

January 3, 2012 By Susan Matthews

Philadelphia’s Saint John Neumann is credited with establishing the first diocesan school system in the country back the mid 1800s. His feast day is this Thursday, Jan. 5. One day later, Philadelphia Catholic education will certainly need his intercession.

Archbishop Chaput has the unpleasant task of announcing what is expected to be massive school closings across the Archdiocese. The press conference is scheduled for 4 p.m., Friday, Jan. 6 at Archdiocesan headquarters at 222 North 17th Street. Principals and pastors will be given the news in a private meeting at Neumann University earlier in the day. There are sure to be leaks in between. According to sources, the Archdiocese will debut a Web site dedicated to dealing with the issue.

The decision to close schools will be a devastating blow to the morale of Philadelphia Catholics still reeling from the clergy sex abuse cover up revealed in last February’s grand jury report and the related ongoing trials and investigations.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Catholics4Change

January 4, 2012 by Susan Matthews

The Philly Catholic Post has been created for readers and comment givers who wanted to tackle broader issues. The site will serve as an independent news source and forum for all things Philadelphia and Catholic. Please visit and share your thoughts.

Catholics4Change.com will remain committed to protecting children and offering solidarity to victims of clergy sex abuse.

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UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune

Lindsay Whitehurst

Also today, the Attorney General’s Office got a three packages of Warren Jeffs’ revelations, backlogged from the holidays.

Click here to read the first one they got, dated Oct. 9, 2011 and received Dec. 27.

After that revelation, the AG’s office got two copies of the same 149-page book of revelations, one on Dec. 28 and one today. I haven’t seen that one yet, but spokesman Paul Murphy says about 20 of the approximately 60 revelations are repeats. The most recent is dated Dec. 12. I’m planning to take a look at it tomorrow, and I may be able to post some of the revelations.

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BOSTON (MA)
TheMediaReport

Dave Pierre

Let the gloating begin.

It will soon be ten years to the day that the Boston Globe initiated its widely heralded, full-throttle coverage of the Boston-area clergy scandals, and the paper wants everyone to know about it.

Starting on January 6, 2002, the paper launched its astonishing string of 947 items on the Catholic Church abuse scandal for the 2002 calendar year. (Yes, that’s an average of over two-and-a-half items per day. Don’t believe it? Count for yourself.)

Today (Tue., 1/3/12), the Globe has trumpeted a front-page, 1,200-word feature interview with the Boston archbishop, Cardinal Sean O’Malley.

Indeed, the article/interview does not contain any new or revelatory information. The archbishop continues to meet with alleged victims of clergy abuse, and he acknowledges the irreparable harm that the atrocious abuse by Catholic priests wreaked on innocent minors.

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NEW JERSEY
TheMediaReport

Dave Pierre

Six years after the ridiculous accusation that he “touched [a] child in a public setting,” Father James Selvaraj is still fighting to clear his name.

Fr. Selvaraj told Erin Duffy of The Times (Trenton, New Jersey) (Tue.,1/3/12) that he is still publicly stigmatized as an accused molester.

Because searches of him on Google return articles about his accusation, “I’m branded as if I’m a pedophile,” the priest says. “[M]y life has been ruined.”

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MISSOURI
TheMediaReport

Dave Pierre

After nearly six hours of direct questioning at a deposition on Monday (1/2/12), David Clohessy, the national president of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), says that could end up behind bars.

Clohessy is refusing a lawful order from a judge to turn over documents and correspondences related to the case of an accused Missouri cleric.

In addition to the fact that Clohessy may face jail time, Clohessy’s actions appear to have the entire SNAP organization reeling in panic.

A public appearance today (Tue., 1/3/12) by Clohessy prompted a St. Louis radio station to report:

“The usually confident, sometimes strident, David Clohessy appeared shaken and teary-eyed by what he says is the worst legal problem the group has faced in 23 years.”

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

ST. LOUIS > Advocate for victims of clergy abuse says he refused to answer lawyer’s questions — The director of an advocacy group for victims of clergy abuse said he refused to answer questions or turn over documents in a deposition Monday in a Kansas City clergy abuse case. David Clohessy, the St. Louis-based director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said in a statement that attorneys for the Rev. Michael Tierney had requested “hundreds or thousands of pages of SNAP records involving victims and others across the country going back some 23 years.” Clohessy’s lawyer had asked the Missouri Supreme Court to quash the deposition subpoena in order to avoid disclosing confidential information from victims of clergy sexual abuse, members of the organization and journalists. Attorneys who work with abuse victims had said compelling such testimony would betray the trust of abuse victims and introduce a chilling effect for those who have yet to come forward. Tierney’s attorneys could not be reached Tuesday evening.

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MISSOURI
Catholic Sensibility

Our weekend getaway to Kansas City is complete. A rush of nitrogen and oxygen buffeted our mid-size car on I-35 on the way north this afternoon. Otherwise, it was a good beginning to a year which, hopefully, will be an improvement on what was a mostly crummy 2011.

Years, I think, are successful or crummy to the extent we are able to engage their obstacles and emerge unscathed, if not smiling. I count up a good pile of obstacles: financial slippage on the rental house in Kansas City and my wife’s continuing worries about “losing everything,” a brother sent off to eternal life (my young nephew in contrast, lost a dad, a grandpa, a great-grandfather in 2011), a mostly ridiculous MR3 translation. On that last point, I noticed my old KC parish had a significant number of worshipers using the old words. Who knows why: ticked off at the bishop; upset about prioritizing deck chairs above the safety of children? Anybody’s guess.

Speaking of my old parish, my friends reported on an Advent penance service there designed to help people work past anger at Bishop Finn and mismanagement of predators and child safety. I have to say I’m less angry and more worried. My wife reported our daughter sang at Mass for the first time in months and even recited the new Creed.

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CANADA
CFRA

Josh Pringle
Wednesday, January 4, 2012

A disgraced Roman Catholic Bishop will be sentenced today in an Ottawa courtroom for importing child pornography.

Raymond Lahey volunteered to go to jail to begin serving his sentence when he pleaded guilty in May to one count of importing child pornography.

Lahey was arrested at the Ottawa International Airport in September 2009, and Ottawa Police say they found hundreds of pornographic photos of young boys on his laptop and a handheld device.

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CANADA
The Ottawa Citizen

By Chris Cobb And Dan Neutel, Ottawa Citizen
January 4, 2012

Disgraced Catholic Bishop Raymond Lahey will be the first test of new church rules dealing with clerics involved with child pornography.

It is possible that Lahey, who is expected to be sentenced today after pleading guilty to possessing violent child pornography, will be defrocked by the Catholic Church.

“It is extremely rare for a bishop to be removed from the clerical state because typically bishops haven’t committed these types of crimes,” said Chad Glendinning, a canon law professor at Ottawa’s Saint Paul University. “But he has admitted his guilt so it makes it a little easier for the Holy See. They need not hold a full hearing to determine his guilt so could send the matter directly to the Pope and he could make the decision to dismiss him. But this isn’t automatic. It’s a possibility but not an inevitability.”

In May 2010, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith approved new rules to deal with clerics who use child pornography and made it a crime under canon law to possess child pornography. The Lahey case is the first to be dealt with under those new rules, so the Catholic Church will enter new ground in when it decides his fate.

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CANADA
VOCM

71-year-old Roman Catholic Bishop Raymond Lahey will be sentenced today in an Ottawa courtroom on a charge of importing child pornography. Lahey, the former head of the diocese in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, is originally from this province. He apologized for his actions during a sentencing hearing last month, and voluntarily went to jail last spring.

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BOSTON (MA)
National Catholic Register

Rebuilding From the Ruins: Cardinal O’Malley on the 2002 Boston Sex-Abuse Scandal, Part 2 of 2

[part 1]

by JOAN FRAWLEY DESMOND
01/03/2012

A decade ago, the Boston clergy sexual abuse crisis engulfed the archdiocese, ultimately drawing global attention to a once-hidden scourge that has destroyed the innocence of minors, shattered families, severely damaged the credibility of Church leaders everywhere and led to an estimated $1 billion in settlements to American survivors.

Cardinal Seán Patrick O’Malley was named archbishop of Boston in 2003. He replaced Cardinal Bernard Law, who resigned after the 2002 publication of archdiocesan personnel files revealed that clergy with credible allegations of child sexual abuse were reassigned to new parishes, rather than removed from ministry, and that parishioners were not warned about their history.

In the second part of his two-part interview with Register senior editor Joan Frawley Desmond, Cardinal O’Malley discusses why the Vatican has chosen him to address clergy sexual abuse in four separate scandals, his approach to financial settlements for victims, and the admission of candidates with same-sex attraction to the seminary.

You were chosen to address a succession of clergy sexual abuse scandals — Fall River, Mass., West Palm Beach, Fla., Boston, and then Ireland. Aren’t there other bishops available and trustworthy for this kind of mission?

Well, the Church needed to find someone who had credibility and was capable of dealing with [the issue], as I had already dealt with it in Fall River.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By Rebecca Seales

A paedophile monk who forced a schoolboy to take part in sex acts and paid him 50p each time has been jailed for five years.

Richard White, 66, was finally jailed yesterday after evading justice for more than two decades – because monastic authorities and the parents of one of his two victims hushed the matter up.

White, a Benedictine monk, abused pupils while a geography teacher at Downside, one of England’s leading Roman Catholic schools.

Taunton Crown Court heard that he was warned about his behaviour after molesting one 12-year-old boy, but instead of contacting the police the Benedictine abbot of the monastery attached to the school simply stopped him from teaching younger students.

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CANADA
CBC News

A Roman Catholic bishop who admitted he was addicted to looking at child pornography is set to learn his sentence Wednesday in an Ottawa courtroom.

Raymond Lahey, 71, a Newfoundlander who had been the head of the Nova Scotia diocese of Antigonish, was caught in 2009 at Ottawa’s airport after authorities checked his personal computer and found a large cache of child pornography.

Lahey pleaded guilty to possessing child pornography for the purposes of importation to Canada.

The Crown’s case involved 588 photos and 63 videos, with the Crown pointing out that some involved adolescent boys engaged in sex acts while wearing a crucifix and rosary beads.

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CALIFORNIA
Long Beach Press-Telegram

By Greg Mellen, Staff Writer
Posted: 01/03/2012

LONG BEACH – An overflow crowd gathered Tuesday in Naples to celebrate and pay honor to Cardinal William Levada, who in December was recognized at the Vatican on the 50th anniversary of his ordination into the priesthood.

Levada, who heads up the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, an administrative branch in the Vatican, is the highest-ranking American member in the Roman Catholic Church. He occupies the same position held by Pope Benedict XVI before his elevation.

On Tuesday, alumni from St. Anthony High, Levada’s alma mater, and church leaders and other dignitaries gathered at Michael’s on Naples to fete him. …

Levada has led the church’s recent efforts to deal with the continuing fallout from sexual abuse.

San Francisco Archbishop George Niederauer, a classmate of Levada and his successor in San Francisco, said the cardinal’s firsthand experience dealing with sex abuse cases beginning in the 1980s gives him keen insight in this post at the Vatican.

Levada handled several high-profile cases when the depth and scope of sexual abuse cases were coming to light in the United States. Although the cardinal has been both praised and criticized for his handling of the scandals, church leaders, like Niederauer, say Levada is particularly suited to deal with the international crisis.

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UNITED STATES
NPR

[with audio]

by Joel Rose

January 3, 2012

Stories of child sexual abuse dominated the headlines in 2011, but because the alleged crimes happened so long ago, few of the victims in those cases were able to sue their abusers.

Now, lawmakers around the country are pushing to extend or waive their states’ statute of limitations for childhood sexual abuse charges, but the initiative has its opponents — including the Catholic Church — who argue it could unleash a torrent of lawsuits.

Giving A Voice To The Abused

It took almost 30 years, but in December 2011, Richard Fitter finally went public with the allegation that former New Jersey priest John Capparelli had repeatedly groped him in the early 1980s.

Fitter says he first reported Capparelli to another priest in 1992. Capparelli, who denies the allegations, was removed from the ministry. Fitter thought Capparelli was no longer working with children, but he continued to teach in Newark, N.J., public schools until reports detailing a long list of allegations against him appeared last year in the Newark Star-Ledger. When Fitter read those stories, he decided it was time to come forward — again.

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SAN DIEGO (CA)
The Sacramento Bee

The Associated Press

SAN DIEGO — San Diego police say they have arrested a priest and charged him with sexually assaulting a 20-year-old woman.

Police said Tuesday that 53-year-old Jose Davila turned himself into authorities on Sunday.Davila is accused of assaulting the woman at his home.

Police say the woman’s family and the priest have been acquaintances for months at St. Jude’s church.

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BOSTON (MA)
National Catholic Register

by JOAN FRAWLEY DESMOND
01/04/2012

BOSTON — Ten years ago, Bishop John D’Arcy of the Fort Wayne-South Bend (Ind.) Diocese got an urgent call from lawyers representing the Boston Archdiocese, where he had previously served as an auxiliary bishop from 1975-1985. He learned that The Boston Globe would soon publish the personnel files of the alleged serial predator, Father John Geoghan, and that a plaintiff’s attorney had obtained a 1984 letter he wrote opposing the priest’s assignment to a local parish.

“I didn’t remember that I wrote the letter at first,” recalled Bishop D’Arcy, during a telephone interview last week while visiting his family in Boston. Ordained in Boston more than half a century ago, he retired as the shepherd of the Fort Wayne-South Bend Diocese in 2009 at the age of 77.

Yet despite that initial lack of recall, Bishop D’Arcy would emerge as an uncommon hero as the clergy abuse scandal unfolded in the media. While the published personnel files of the Boston Archdiocese exposed a legacy of episcopal negligence, Bishop D’Arcy’s repeated efforts to raise the alarm would lead the National Review Board for the Protection of Children and Young People to describe him as a “voice in the wilderness.”

Asked to discuss the reason why he spoke up when others remained silent, Bishop D’Arcy insisted that he should not be singled out for special credit. Rather, he viewed the 10th anniversary of the Boston crisis as an opportunity to reflect on both the vital role of the Catholic bishop, and the ongoing importance of screening candidates for seminary.

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CANADA
CJOB

CJOB’s Kim Lawson reporting
1/3/2012

A former student of St. Jean Baptiste School is suing the Archdiocese and Archbishop of St. Boniface, Red River Valley School Division and two former priests – over sexual abuse allegations. The now 32-year-old man claims he was sexually assaulted by a priest when he was 11-years-old.

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

Written by
Sergio Bichao
Staff Writer

SOMERVILLE — Kevin Waldrip was 13 years old in 1964, the year he says he was raped by a priest in Newark.

But he didn’t tell anyone.

Not even when the priest, Richard Galdon, was finally brought to justice in the 1980s for molesting more than a dozen other Catholic school boys as a Boy Scout troop chaplain. Galdon was sentenced in 1987 to 25 years in prison.

But while Waldrip followed the scandal and trial in the newspaper, rejoicing in Galdon’s “comeuppance,” it took him until just six years ago to talk about what happened to him as a boy.

“You keep it secret,” he said. “People are so embarrassed, so ashamed, you can’t bring yourself to speak to anyone — not to spouses, not to friends.”

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NEDERLAND
Brabants Dagblad

EINDHOVEN – De Eindhovense priester Jan Peijnenburg (81) vecht toch eerst bij de zogenoemde Congregatie voor de Clerus in Rome zijn schorsing door het bisdom Den Bosch aan.

Na overleg met zijn advocaat ziet hij af van een directe gang naar de burgerrechter, vertelde huisvriend en woordvoerder Harrie van Tuijl dinsdag. Van Tuijl: “De kans is namelijk groot dat de burgerrechter ons terug stuurt als we niet eerst het hele proces binnen de kerk hebben doorlopen.”

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NEDERLAND
Omroep Brabant

Auteur: Hilde de Bresser

EINDHOVEN – De Eindhovense priester Jan Peijnenburg gaat toch in beroep tegen zijn schorsing. De 81-jarige priester werd door het bisdom Den Bosch geschorst omdat hij samenwoont met zijn vriendin Threes van Dijk.

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MISSOURI
KPLR11.com

4:06 p.m. CST, January 3, 2012

ST. LOUIS, MO (KPLR)— The leader of a St. Louis-based group fighting sexual abuse by priests is standing his ground, and could face jail time for refusing to turn over documents to lawyers for the Catholic church.

The Missouri Supreme Court has ruled that the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, has to turn over 23 years worth of e-mails, telephone logs, and letters to lawyers for a Kansas City priest.

SNAP director David Chlossey refused to answer questions about those documents yesterday.

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UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune

By Lindsay Whitehurst
The Salt Lake Tribune

Observers say an unprecedented number — up to 1,500 members — of the polygamous sect led by Warren Jeffs were barred from the group’s church after being told over the weekend they were “unworthy” to attend.

Most don’t appear to have been instructed to leave their families and their homes, as is common when people are excommunicated from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, but instead forbidden to enter the LSJ Meetinghouse in Colorado City, Ariz., said former FLDS spokesman Willie Jessop, now opposed to Jeffs.

“They were offered the opportunity to continue their repentance at another location, not at the main church with everyone else,” he said. The people were reportedly estranged for expressing doubt of Jeffs, breaking one of his new, extreme rules or failing to pay increasingly high tithing totaling thousands of dollars.

“They may have kissed their wives, or forgot to sell their ATVs,” Jessop said.

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TEXAS
CNN

By Dave Alsup, CNN

(CNN) — Two people registered to talk to Warren Jeffs on the phone have had their privileges suspended as investigators look into whether the jailed polygamist sect leader preached from prison, authorities said Tuesday.

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice announced last week that it had initiated an investigation into claims that Jeffs used the phone to preach to his congregation on Christmas Day.

“It would be a violation of the rules if the person called were to place the call on speaker phone or record the conversation. The Office of Inspector General has asked us to suspend the accounts of certain individuals on his calling list while they continue to investigate,” said Jason Clark, a Criminal Justice Department spokesman.

“His call list just got shorter,” Clark said.

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

Bernardsville, Somerville communities react to charges against educator as protests hit schools

Written by
Mark Spivey
Staff Writer

BERNARDSVILLE — Some glared angrily in the direction of the small handful of protesters handing out pamphlets urging them to support legislation to lift the statute of limitation in civil cases of child sex abuse and to expand the definition of who’s liable in those cases. Some smiled broadly and even gave the protesters a thumbs-up. Some leaned out of their vehicles to shout a condemnation, critique or words of support.

To be sure, the range of emotions exhibited by parents filing out of the Bernardsville Middle School parking lot Tuesday afternoon was nothing short of staggering.

But vastly outnumbering any of those categories were those who simply rolled down their car windows and accepted a pamphlet. Hunger for reliable information, after all, remains a prevalent sentiment after the school’s assistant principal, Patrick J. Lott, was arrested nearly two weeks ago and charged with videotaping students showering in the locker rooms of Immaculata High School in Somerville, where Lott has served as a dedicated volunteer for years.

“I didn’t even know he volunteered at Immaculata,” said Tony Sisto, a 53-year-old resident of the Peapack section of Peapack-Gladstone and the father of girls in the fifth and eighth grades at the middle school. “It’s so devastating to these children to trust a guy like that when something like this happens.”

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MISSOURI
KTVI

(KTVI-FOX2now.com)—
The leader of a St. Louis-based group fighting sexual abuse by priests is standing his ground and could face jail time for refusing to turn over documents to lawyers for the Catholic Church.

The Missouri Supreme Court has ruled that the survivor’s network of those abused by priests, known as SNAP, has to turn over 23 years worth of e-mails, telephone logs, and letters to lawyers for a Kansas City priest.

St. Louis SNAP Director David Chlossey refused to answer questions about those documents Monday. He says the request is an attempt by the Catholic Church to destroy SNAP by forcing it to reveal confidential information about sexual abuse victims.

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NEDERLAND
De Telegraaf

EINDHOVEN – De Eindhovense priester Jan Peijnenburg (81) gaat toch eerst bij de zogenoemde Congregatie voor de Clerus in Rome zijn schorsing door het bisdom Den Bosch aanvechten. Na overleg met zijn advocaat ziet hij af van een directe gang naar de burgerrechter, vertelde huisvriend en woordvoerder Harrie van Tuijl dinsdag.

Het bisdom heeft Peijnenburg geschorst, omdat hij samenwoont met zijn vriendin Threes van Dijck (85). Peijnenburg en Van Dijck, die al 46 jaar samenwonen, peinzen er niet over uit elkaar te gaan.

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MISSOURI
KMOX

ST. LOUIS–(KMOX)–The director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests says he may faces fines or jail time for refusing to obey a judge’s order to release information on clergy abuse victims.

The usually confident, sometimes strident, David Clohessy appeared shaken and teary-eyed by what he says is the worst legal problem the group has faced in 23 years.

“Church defense lawyers will likely ask that we be found in contempt of court and possibly fined or possibly jailed,” Clohessy said.

Earlier, Clohessy refused to cooperate during a deposition in a Kansas City area abuse case. SNAP has sought help from the Missouri Supreme Court, but it refused to intervene.

“I refused to answer many, many many questions that were all designed to find out the identities and experiences of victims and those who help victims,” Clohessy said.

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MISSOURI
National Catholic Reporter

Jan. 03, 2012
By Joshua J. McElwee

David Clohessy, the head of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), says his court-ordered testimony Monday in the case of a priest accused of sexual misconduct amounted to an “extraordinary fishing expedition” to try and get at the contents of “private communications” between him and sex abuse victims and whistle-blowers.

The testimony, which Clohessy said lasted about six hours and took place in a St. Louis, Mo., hotel, came after the Missouri Supreme Court refused to consider an appeal to stop the deposition.

The deposition, requested by lawyers defending Kansas City, Mo., diocesan priest Fr. Michael Tierney, was first reported late last week. Lawyers requested that Clohessy testify and turn over 23 years’ worth of internal documents, correspondence and emails.

Victims’ advocates said the deposition, the first of its kind for SNAP, would have wide-ranging impact on the ability of victims of clergy sex abuse to identify their accusers and tell their stories without revealing their names in public. …

Referencing that he was questioned by five separate lawyers — one representing the Kansas City diocese, another Tierney, and three others representing other local priests accused of sexual misconduct — Clohessy said there was “almost no mention or questions” about the specific lawsuit against Tierney among the “200-plus questions about SNAP members and supporters and donors and operations.”

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

Demonstrators at Immaculata High School, Bernardsville Middle School address child sex abuse

Written by
Sergio Bichao
Staff Writer

A group of child sex abuse survivors stood outside Immaculata High School Tuesday morning to demonstrate in support of legislation that would lift New Jersey’s statute of limitations on child sex abuse lawsuits.

Last month a longtime volunteer basketball coach at Immaculata was charged with videotaping boys showering in the school’s locker room over a period of three years.

The four men from Road to Recovery, a Livingston-based non-profit support group for victims of child, also planned to stand outside Bernardsville Middle School, where the accused, Patrick Lott, works as assistant principal.

Road to Recover founder and president Robert M. Hoatson said he and the other demonstrators are also victims of sexual abuse.

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MISSOURI
The Republic

JIM SALTER Associated Press
First Posted: January 03, 2012

ST. LOUIS — An advocacy group for clergy abuse victims will fight a court order requiring it to disclose what could be years’ worth of emails and other records to attorneys for a Roman Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing a young parishioner in the 1970s, a group official said Tuesday.

David Clohessy, the director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said last week’s order requiring it to turn over records to attorneys for the Rev. Michael Tierney is too broad, and that the group is weighing its options for fighting the order.

The state Supreme Court on Monday refused to intervene on SNAP’s behalf, rendering its decision after Clohessy was deposed in St. Louis.

Last week, Jackson County Circuit Judge Ann Mesle ordered SNAP to disclose records that could include years of emails with victims, journalists and others. The order is related to an abuse lawsuit against the Rev. Michael Tierney and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph. The plaintiff, identified only as John Doe, B.P., said he was 13 when Tierney attacked and molested him in the 1970s.

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ITALY
Daily Mail (United Kingdom)

By Nick Pisa

A cash-strapped priest has closed his church until Easter because offerings have plunged during the economic crisis and he cannot afford to keep the building open.

Father Stefano Taffarel will close the picturesque 15th Century church of St Peter at Fontanelle, near Treviso, northern Italy, from the middle of this month until April.

Father Taffarel told parishoners in his weekly newsletter at Christmas that rising fuel costs meant weekly Mass offerings were no longer enough to cover the church’s heating bill.

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MISSOURI
Catholic League

January 3, 2012

Yesterday, the director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), David Clohessy, was deposed in St. Louis regarding allegations that he issued news releases based on information contained in legal documents from attorney Rebecca Randles; those documents were subjected to a gag order last August by Jackson County, Missouri Circuit Court Judge Ann Mesle.

Lawyers for Rev. Michael Tierney and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph are seeking internal documents and correspondence from SNAP; Clohessy may have to turn over 23 years worth of such information. Judge Mesle ordered Clohessy to comply with her ruling because he “almost certainly has knowledge concerning issues relevant to this litigation.” An appeal by SNAP to the Missouri Supreme Court failed, thus forcing Clohessy to testify.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments as follows:

This is just the beginning. The Catholic League has long charged that there is an incestuous relationship between SNAP and attorneys like Rebecca Randles; she is a protégé of Jeffrey Anderson, and both have been feeding and greasing SNAP for decades. It’s now time to blow the lid on this scam and get to the bottom of it.

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UNITED STATES
The Californian

Written by
DeWayne Wickham
USA TODAY

The terrorist who worries me most in this New Year is not an avowed enemy being stalked by American forces abroad. It is Warren Jeffs, the homegrown cult leader and imprisoned pedophile.

From his Texas prison cell, Jeffs — who is serving a life sentence for sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl and a consecutive 20-year sentence for raping a 15-year-old girl — is demanding even sheep-like behavior from members of his 10,000-member fundamentalist church.

And he is, apparently, getting it.

Jeffs has banned his followers from having sex until he is released, Joni Holm, who has relatives in the cult, told the Salt Lake City Deseret News. That’s not likely to happen anytime soon since Jeffs, 56, must serve at least 45 years before he can be paroled. Still, Jeffs has ordered his followers to reaffirm their faith (and loyalty to him) by handing over control of most of their worldly possessions to his lieutenants.

Children must give up their toys, girls under 18 aren’t allowed to work or have a cellphone, and access to media outlets and the Internet is banned, the Deseret News also reported.

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TEXAS/UTAH
God Discussion

Even though he is not supposed to be doing so, polygamist Warren Jeffs appears to be issuing edicts to members of the FLDS (Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints) church members. An investigation is underway after FLDS church members came forward saying Jeffs sent orders to his followers from behind bars. Jeffs is in prison in Texas, after being convicted of having sex with under-aged girls who he married. He was sentenced in August to life in prison plus 20 years for assault.

According to his followers in Utah, he recently banned bicycles, ATVs, trampolines and even children’s toys.

In his latest move, Jeffs has voided all marriages in the sect. In his edict, he said that couples can live together but cannot have sex until he is released from prison.

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NETHERLANDS
National Catholic Reporter

Jan. 03, 2012
By John L Allen Jr

[the report]

Two leading politicians in the Netherlands, both from conservative parties, have called for the resignations of Catholic bishops in the wake of a damning report on sexual abuse in the Dutch church.

The country’s prime minister, Mark Rutte, also announced that his cabinet is considering lifting a statute of limitations to allow criminal prosecutions. A complaint has already been filed with the public prosecutor’s office against a former bishop of the Rotterdam diocese, Philippe Bär. An attorney representing alleged victims has charged Bär with covering up abuse during his tenure from 1983 to 1993.

Meanwhile, an influential Catholic commentator in Italy has rejected suggestions that the revelations amount to an indictment of the liberal spirit of Dutch Catholicism following the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).

Released on Dec. 16, the report found that somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 Dutch children suffered abuse by Catholic personnel, ranging from unwanted sexual advances to rape, during the period of 1945 to 2010. A commission sponsored by the Catholic bishops and religious orders of Holland produced the report.

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CHILE
La Tercera

por Andrés López y Angélica Baeza – 03/01/2012

La fiscal judicial de la Corte de Apelaciones de Santiago, María Loreto Gutiérrez, emitió un informe sobre el caso de Fernando Karadima, en el que señala que se aprueba el sobreseimiento del sacerdote, ya dictado por la jueza Jéssica González.

Gutiérrez señala en su resolución – dictada la semana pasada- que con los elementos que hay en este proceso “ha quedado fehacientemente acreditado, tanto la existencia de los delitos de abusos deshonestos reiterados cometidos contra Juan Carlos Cruz, James Hamilton, y Fernando Battle, como asimismo la participación que en ellos le ha correspondido en calidad de autor al sacerdote Fernando Karadima Fariña”.

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MONTANA
KULR

[with video]

[the lawsuit]

By Brad Carl

Story Published: Jan 3, 2012

ASHLAND – A Northern Cheyenne tribal member files a lawsuit against the Great Falls / Billings Catholic Diocese claiming she was abused as a child by a Catholic priest.

The woman says the abuse took place in the late 1950s and early 60s at the St. Labre Mission School in Ashland. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages from the Diocese, the Order of Friars Minor, the Capuchin Order and the school. Reverend Emmett Hoffmann is not named as a defendant, but is identified as the reason for the suit. The attorney for the woman, who is now in her 60s, says she wants to stand up to the man who abused her.

“One of the principle things we want to see is the acknowledgement by the diocese and also from the Capuchin Order of Assistant Friars, of the abuse that my client suffered,” said her attorney Vito de la Cruz.

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NEW JERSEY
The Times of Trenton

By Erin Duffy/The Times

HAMILTON — In 2005, as the Catholic clergy sex abuse crisis continued to grab headlines all over America, even the St. Raphael-Holy Angels parish was not immune to scandal.

One of their own priests was accused of improperly touching a young girl.

Among parishioners, there was anger, confusion, despair. A tragedy playing out in communities across the country had now spread to a close-knit parish in Hamilton.

But a curious thing happened: Instead of turning their backs on the accused, the Rev. James Selvaraj, parishioners rallied to his defense.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

By Erin Durkin / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Tuesday, January 3 2012

A Marine Park Catholic church dedicated its Christmas display to a priest accused of sex abuse, drawing outrage from one of his his alleged victim’s family.

Msgr. Thomas Brady, 78, a retired pastor at Good Shepherd Church, was placed on administrative leave after he was charged in October with attempting a “criminal sex act” on two teenage boys – but officials at the church still dedicated their annual tree lighting to him and posted a sign in his honor in front of the church.

The sign, still posted Monday, says the tree lighting “is dedicated to Monsignor Thomas F. Brady for his Service to and Love for the People of Good Shepherd.”

The dad of a then 13-year-old boy who accused Brady of molesting him in the church rectory said he was furious to see the display at the church, where his family are longtime parishioners and his son attends the parish school.

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NORTHERN IRELAND/FRANCE
Derry Journal

Published on Tuesday 3 January 2012

A former Derry-based priest who paid out on a sex abuse claim is living and teaching in France, where he has been banned from active ministry, it has emerged.

Fr Andrew McCloskey paid out £19,000 in 2005 to a man who claimed he had been sexually assaulted by him as an 18 year-old in the parochial house of St Mary’s Church in Creggan in 1992.

It was revealed that Fr McCloskey was appointed to a Church counselling service for victims of sexual abuse by then Bishop of Derry, Seamus Hegarty, after the allegations surfaced.

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UTAH
Fox 13

Ben Winslow
fox13now.com

HILDALE, Utah— As many as a thousand people may have been exiled by the Fundamentalist LDS Church under an edict by imprisoned polygamist leader Warren Jeffs.

From his prison cell in Texas, Jeffs reportedly set a New Year’s deadline for his faithful followers to be re-baptized into the faith or face excommunication. Over the weekend, hundreds of vehicles were seen parked at a meeting hall as well as schools in the community. Ex-members of the church and observers said it appeared it was where they learned if they remained in the church or were exiled.

“What’s happened is Warren Jeffs has divided the community into at least two different groups, probably three,” said private investigator Sam Brower, who works for attorneys suing the FLDS Church. He photographed hundreds of people going into the meetings.

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IRELAND
Highland Radio

Posted: 3/Jan

A County Donegal priest is to appear before Derry Magistrates Court tomorrow on a number of indecent assault charges.

Fr Eugene Boland, whose address is listed as the Parochial House, Killyclogher County Tyrone faces for charges of indecent assault on a female.

On WednesdayFr Boland, originally Moville, appears in Court on what is called a preliminary enquiry, it is expected that he will then be sent forward for trial.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Just before Christmas, there came yet another condemnation of the actions of the Catholic Church in dealing with child abuse. This time, the condemnation came from an investigation into the sexual abuse of children in Dutch Catholic institutions.

And the breadth of the abuse, to put it bluntly, was staggering.

The Dutch commission, led by Wim Deetman, found that over 40 years, 800 Catholic clergy and church employees were involved in the abuse of tens of thousands of children: in all, children in institutional care had a one-in-five chance of being molested.

“The policy was no washing of dirty linen in public,” Deetman said in the report of the church’s response. “To prevent scandals, nothing was done, abuse not acknowledged, there was no help, compensation or support for the victims.”

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

Somerville man charged with videotaping boys at Immaculata HS had ‘mandatory showers’ policy as coach, former players say

Written by
Mark Spivey | Staff Writer

SOMERVILLE — Harry Osterhoudt never was bothered by his former Montgomery High School basketball coach’s insistence that his players shower immediately after every game and practice.

Those feelings changed somewhat when that coach, Patrick Lott, 54, was arrested late last week, charged with more than 50 criminal offenses for allegedly videotaping 15- and 16-year-old boys showering together at Immaculata High School — where the current borough resident and Bernardsville Middle School assistant principal has volunteered with academic and athletic programs for years.

“I remember the mandatory showers,” Osterhoudt said Friday. “Before, you looked back and it was like, “Ok, you smelled, it was after a game.’ Now you’re looking back like, ‘Ahhh.’”

Osterhoudt, who today plays for the Hudson Valley Kingz of the Atlantic Coast Professional Basketball League, was a senior guard during Lott’s final year of coaching at Montgomery. It was after the 2001-2002 season that Lott abruptly resigned as head coach of the Cougars wrestling and boys basketball teams despite achieving impressive success in both capacities during the previous decade, winning multiple Skyland Conference Raritan Division titles in the former sport and advancing to three NJSIAA sectional finals in the latter.

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

Written by
Sergio Bichao
Staff Writer

SOMERVILLE — About 100 parishioners gathered at 9 a.m. at the Church of the Immaculate Conception to celebrate the first Mass on the first Sunday of the new year.

Halfway into the ceremony murmurs spread through the pews when the pastor, Monsignor Seamus F. Brennan, brought up the school sex scandal that rocked the community less than a week earlier.

It was Brennan’s first public comments on Patrick Lott, the Bernardsville Middle School assistant principal who serves as a volunteer basketball coach at the parish’s Immaculata High School.

Lott was arrested Dec. 23 and is facing more than 50 charges of videotaping 15 boys, all 15 or 16 years old, showering together at the high school. He remains in the Somerset County Jail in Somerville in lieu of $500,000 bail.

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

The following is a transcript of the full remarks delivered Sunday by Msgr. Seamus F. Brennan, pastor of the Church of the Immaculate Conception, following his homily during the 9 a.m. Mass.

Brennan discusses the Patrick Lott scandal at Immaculata High School, where the volunteer coach is accused of video-recording boys showering together in the locker room.

“I do want to address a few words to you regarding the recent incident that took place at Immaculata High School and all of the reports in the paper this week. I want to address the allegations that have been made against one of our volunteers, a longtime volunteer and a part-time assistant coach at Immaculata. And I want to do this in no way to be defensive. We own this and we will deal with it. I just want that understood.

“But I do also want to try to clarify what [are] known facts, just to give you a little information to correct some of the rather misleading and inaccurate information that is often report in the press, [which has] been rather sensational sometimes.

“The first thing I want you to understand is the nature of the allegations that have been made. They are still allegations; nothing has been proven, and so we need to be aware of that. But the wrongful act that is alleged is that of taking pictures of boys showering in the locker room area. That, of course, is serious. That is a breach of the law, that is a serious invasion of privacy, and we do not deny that.

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UNITED STATES
OpEd News

By
Roger Shuler

What was the top news story of 2011? My choice would be the growing list of child sex-abuse scandals, which started at Penn State and quickly grew into a story that is national and international in scope.

Why is this my No. 1 story? The death of Osama bin Laden, the earthquake/tsunami in Japan, and Arab-world unrest led the Associated Press’ list of top stories. The Penn State story did not even make the AP’s top 10, coming in at No. 11.

So why am I going with the child sex-abuse scandals? They are driven by what one columnist has called a “culture of domination.” And that culture, I submit, drives many other stories about unrest in societies around the globe. The protests that marked the Arab spring and the Occupy Wall Street movement in the United States, for example, are efforts to strike back at the few who try to dominate the many.

Of all the words written about the child sex-abuse scandals of 2011, perhaps the most profound come from Chicago-based journalist Robert Koehler. In a piece titled “Saluting Rapists,” Koehler gets to the mindset at the heart of sex-abuse scandals. And I would argue that he describes a mindset that is present in many other forms of dysfunction.

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NEW JERSEY
MyCentralJersey

Written by
Cheryl Makin
Staff Writer

SOMERVILLE — In response to the recent arrest of Patrick Lott, assistant principal of Bernardsville Middle School and a volunteer coach at Immaculata High School, an organization for victims of sexual abuse plans to demonstrate in front of both schools today as they reopen after the winter break.

Lott was arrested and charged with videotaping naked teenage boys showering at the Immaculata High School in Somerville.

Prior to his current role as assistant principal at the middle school in Bernardsville, Lott was assistant principal at Bernardsville High School and a teacher at Montgomery High School, where he coached the wrestling and basketball teams for about a decade. The borough resident had volunteered with academic and athletic programs at Immaculata for years.

The group planning the protests, Road to Recovery Inc., is a nonprofit organization that assists sexual abuse victims and their families and friends. According to co-founder and president Hoatson, the intention of the demonstrations is to keep the issue fresh in the minds of those involved.

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BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe

By Mark Arsenault
| Globe Staff
January 03, 2012

A decade after revelations of clergy sex abuse rocked the Archdiocese of Boston, survivors still come to Cardinal Sean O’Malley in search of healing.

Not a month passes, O’Malley said, without a victim asking for an appointment. Nearly nine years into his tenure as archbishop of Boston, the cardinal still ministers to victims, still encourages them to return to the church that so profoundly let them down.

He sees his pastoral duty to sex abuse survivors as this: “First of all, to let them know how sad we are that this ever happened,’’ he said. “And a recognition that, you know, apologies won’t make the hurt go away.’’

In a lengthy interview marking the 10-year anniversary of revelations about the archdiocese’s role in protecting abusive priests, which sparked a worldwide Catholic upheaval, O’Malley could not say when the church would achieve redemption and forgiveness.

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SOUTH AFRICA
IOL

January 2 2012

Johannesburg – A 50-year-old Limpopo pastor was arrested over the weekend in connection with the alleged rape of a 14-year-old girl, SABC radio news reported on Monday.

He will appear in the Seshego Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday.

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MISSOURI
Catholic Culture

In an odd reversal of roles, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) is fighting against court-ordered disclosure of the group’s internal documents.

David Clohessy, the director of SNAP, has been ordered by a Missouri court to turn over documents and correspondence relating to the case of Father Michael Tierney, a priest who faces sex-abuse charges. Lawyers for the accused priest argue that a plaintiff’s lawyer violated a gag order by providing information about the case to SNAP.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Richard McBrien on Jan. 02, 2012 Essays in Theology

Bishop Howard Hubbard of Albany, N.Y., is the only U.S. bishop I know of who has explicitly taken into account the report of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life that appeared more than two years ago and found that one in 10 Americans has left the Catholic church.

Thus, if ex-Catholics were a denomination unto themselves, they would constitute the second largest, behind only the Catholic church itself.

Bishop Hubbard is also one of the few bishops who was known and respected by the Catholics of the Albany diocese when he was named in 1977. Today, the frequently heard comments after a bishop has been appointed are: “Who is he? Where is he from?” or “Oh my God, not him!”

Bishop Hubbard has been writing a series of monthly articles in his diocesan paper, The Evangelist, regarding the departure of so many Catholics from the church. His initial column attributed the fall-off to the usual suspects: the loss of a sense of sin, individualism, rampant consumerism, secularism and so forth.

But he received some feedback to these articles. Readers noted that he had “neglected to acknowledge ways in which the church itself has contributed to the alienation of many of its members and to its lack of appeal, especially to younger people.”

Other bishops would do well to read his column, “Failings of the Church,” in Origins, November 17, 2011, vol. 41, no. 24.

At the top of his list of failings is the sexual abuse scandal in the priesthood. The problem was “not only that a number of priests betrayed the sacred bond of trust by sexually abusing minors, but more significantly there is a disillusionment and a loss of faith created by the way we bishops engaged in negligent retention and placed the image of the church before the protection and well-being of children and vulnerable youth.”

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DEUTSCHLAND
Domradio

Ab sofort können ehemalige Heimkinder in Deutschland Anträge auf finanzielle Hilfen stellen. Bund, Länder und Kirchen starteten mit Jahresbeginn 2012 den „Fonds Heimerziehung in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in den Jahren 1949 bis 1975“. Betroffene, die in kirchlichen und staatlichen Heimen unter Misshandlungen und Missbrauch leiden mussten, können sich an Anlauf- und Beratungsstellen in den westdeutschen Bundesländern wenden.

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BELGIEN
Radio Vatikan

Der ehemalige Pfarrer von Dinant ist wegen des Vorwurfs der Pädophilie verhaftet worden. Zehn Missbrauchsopfer hatten den Pensionierten beschuldigt, sie zwischen 1968 und 2001 sexuell missbraucht zu haben. Über den Fall berichtet die italienische Agentur Ansa an diesem Freitag unter Berufung auf belgische Medienberichte. An mindestens zehn Jugendlichen zwischen 13 und 16 Jahren soll Pfarrer Marcel Colignon sich demnach vergangen haben.

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The future of the believer

NEDERLAND
Reformatorisch Dagblad

Is er nog wel toekomst voor de wereld? Dat is de vraag die allerwegen klinkt in deze laatste dagen van 2011. En overal waar die vraag gesteld wordt, klinken sombere woorden en zien we zorgelijke gezichten.

Wat Deetman heeft gezegd rond de aanbieding van het rapport over het seksueel misbruik van minderjarigen in de Rooms-Katholieke Kerk, is in allerlei situaties wereldwijd van toepassing: „Wij zijn er niet in geslaagd een toekomstperspectief te bieden.” Dat geldt voor de EU en voor de euro. Dat geldt voor de christenen te midden van de Arabische lente in het Midden-Oosten. Dat geldt voor tal van Afrikaanse volkeren en voor Noord-Korea na de dood van de ”Grote Leider”. Dat geldt –om maar niet meer te noemen– voor de massa’s jongeren die wereldwijd aan hun lot worden overgelaten.

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NETHERLANDS
The Irish Times

PETER CLUSKEY

TWO DUTCH priests have been suspended on suspicion of child sex abuse in the 1970s and 1980s, following the publication of a report earlier this month which collated evidence of as many as 20,000 cases of abuse by Catholic clergy in the Netherlands between 1945 and 1985.

The priests – both of whom worked in the parish of St Lucas, in the Archdiocese of Utrecht, in the east of the country – were suspended after KLOKK, the umbrella organisation representing victims of child abuse, passed complaints against them on to the police and the church authorities.

One of the priests has been named by the church itself as Fr Bert Sturkenboom, who chaired the parish committee at St Lucas and was “team leader” of the five priests who worked in the parish before the suspensions. The second priest is understood to have worked regularly and said Mass in the market town of Putten, in the heart of the deeply traditional “Bible belt”, most of whose inhabitants are conservative Protestants. The Archdiocese of Utrecht refused to comment on the suspensions at the weekend, but it’s understood both cases are being investigated by the church authorities.

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HOLYOKE (MA)
WGGB

HOLYOKE, Mass. (WGGB)–A hearing is scheduled for supporters of Mater Dolorosa holding vigil at the church.

Attorney Victor M. Anop, the spokesperson for the individuals holding vigil, announced that they would be at the Hampshire County Superior Court on Wednesday at 2 pm. The group will contest a Bishop’s motion to stop their praying at the church.

Anop also says they have a cross motion in to keep the Mater Dolorosa vigil going and to dismiss the case.

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HOLYOKE (MA)
The Republican

By Jeanette DeForge, The Republican

HOLYOKE – The New Year brought a celebration of a different kind at the Mater Dolorosa Church where more than 100 people gathered to recognize the six-month anniversary of a round-the-clock vigil held to save the church.

Friends of Mater Dolorosa – formed shortly after the last Mass was said at the Maple Street church in June – gathered inside the church to say prayers and sing in Polish and English. They shared food and hugged.

Throughout the six months of arranging a schedule to make sure at least two people are in the church at all times, huddling in blankets to stay warm in the heatless building and battling with Springfield Roman Catholic Bishop Timothy A. McDonnell, the group has grown stronger and remains determined, said Shirley Anop, of Chicopee, a long-time member.

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NEVADA
Las Vegas Review-Journal

By Doug McMurdo
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL

Posted: Jan. 2, 2012

When Kevin McAuliffe appears in federal court Jan. 13, the Catholic priest’s addiction to gambling will be used as an argument for leniency in his sentencing for stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from his Summer­lin parish.

His attorney, Margaret Stanish, has hired an expert who will offer testimony about gambling and his assessment of McAuliffe as a pathological gambler. The expert, Dr. Timothy Fong, is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles and on the staff of UCLA’s Semel Institute of Neuroscience and Human Behavior. He treats problem gamblers with a combination of pharmacology and psychotherapy, trying to rewire brains that can’t shake the feeling the next bet is going to yield a big payday.

According to court papers, Fong will tell Mahan that the former monsignor, in addition to being a pathological gambler, suffers from major depression and social anxiety.

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MONTANA
Great Falls Tribune

[the lawsuit via BishopAccountability.org]

BILLINGS — A Northern Cheyenne woman has filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings, contending she was sexually abused as a young girl by a popular priest at the St. Labre Mission School in Ashland between 1955 and 1962.

The lawsuit seeking unspecified damages was filed Friday in Cascade County District Court in Great Falls. It also names as defendants the Order of Friars Minor, the Capuchin Order and the school.

Rev. Emmett Hoffmann is not named as a defendant but is identified as the reason for the lawsuit. The 85-year-old Hoffmann retired in 1993 and lives in Ashland.

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IRELAND
Kerryman

Sunday January 01 2012

A priest wrongly accused of sexual abuse has returned to full ministry.

Father Sean Cahill voluntarily stood down from duties at St Malachy’s Church in Castlewellan after the claim was made against him in early 2010.

In August last year it emerged that no charges would be brought against the priest.

Bishop of Down and Connor Noel Treanor welcomed Fr Cahill back to ministry at St Malachy’s at Sunday morning’s Mass.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Pat Loeb

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput is seeking to sell the large estate in Overbrook where he lives. Word of the sale comes as a blue ribbon commission prepares to recommend the closing of dozens of parish schools.

A source in the archdiocese says the proposal to sell the archbishops’ residence has been presented to the priests’ counsel and the finance counsel and now has only to be approved by the Vatican.

The eight-plus acre estate has been home to the archdiocese chief since 1935 but the source says the bishop does not want to continue to live in such splendor when he is about to ask area Catholics to accept sacrifices in the educational system.

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NEW YORK
The Post-Standard

By The Post-Standard Editorial Board

The sexual abuse charges against former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky and the allegations of abuse by former assistant Syracuse University basketball coach Bernie Fine have drawn attention to a reality children’s advocates have long known: Victims of child sexual abuse often wait years before talking about the incidents.

In New York, that means many victims wait too long to be able to seek justice in the courts. Under current state law, the statute of limitations for most sexual felonies involving child victims is five years after the victim turns 18. Bobby Davis, the first person to accuse Fine of sexually abusing him as a child, was 30 when he first reported the alleged abuse in 2002. Mike Lang, who accused Fine in November, is also too old to seek criminal or civil charges in New York.

It’s not unusual for people to go decades without telling anybody about troubling sexual abuse, experts say. Complicated feelings of shame, guilt and fear make it difficult for some to talk about it at all. That means some perpetrators may go free, possibly to abuse others.

New attention to the issue should propel the state Legislature next session to extend the statute of limitations on childhood sexual abuse and allow more victims to seek justice in the courts.

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BOSTON (MA)
National Catholic Register

by JOAN FRAWLEY DESMOND
01/02/2012

A decade ago, the Boston clergy sexual abuse crisis engulfed the archdiocese, ultimately drawing global attention to a once-hidden scourge that has destroyed the innocence of minors, shattered families, severely damaged the credibility of Church leaders everywhere and led to an estimated $1 billion in settlements to American survivors.

Cardinal Seán Patrick O’Malley was named archbishop of Boston in 2003. He replaced Cardinal Bernard Law, who resigned after the 2002 publication of archdiocesan personnel files revealed that clergy with credible allegations of child sexual abuse were reassigned to new parishes, rather than removed from ministry, and that parishioners were not warned about their history.

In a two-part interview with Register senior editor Joan Frawley Desmond, Cardinal O’Malley discusses a range of topics, from the path to healing and spiritual reconciliation for survivors, to rebuilding the moral credibility of the Church, and penalties for bishops that neglect to protect the innocent.

When he arrived in Boston nine years ago, then-Archbishop O’Malley had already addressed clergy sexual abuse scandals in two other dioceses. In 1992, he was appointed to the nearby Diocese of Fall River, Mass., where then-Father James Porter would subsequently receive an 18- to 20-year prison sentence for sexually abusing 28 children.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Amanda Poole
Monday, 2 January 2012

A Catholic priest who had been at the centre of abuse allegations dating back to the 1970s has been restored to his full ministry.

Father Sean Cahill from the dioceses of Down and Connor had always denied wrongdoing and voluntarily stepped aside in February 2010 while the PSNI investigated allegations against him.

In August 2011, the PSNI confirmed no prosecution has been directed against Fr Cahill, who had been working in Castlewellan, Co Down when he stood down.

At Mass yesterday Bishop Noel Treanor told the congregation at St Malachy’s Church in Castlewellan he was “delighted” to welcome Fr Cahill back to his priestly ministry, “with an unblemished character”.

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MONTANA
KFBB

[the lawsuit via BishopAccountability.org]

By KFBB News Team

Story Created: Jan 2, 2012

The Roman Catholic Church is coming under fire again in another sexual abuse case.

The latest lawsuit accusing the church of sexual abuse was filed Friday in Cascade County District Court.

A Northern Cheyenne woman from Ashland is suing the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings. She claims a priest abused her at the St. Labre Mission School between 1955 and 1962.

The woman is seeking unspecified damages. Other defendants named in the suit include the Order of Friars Minor, the Capuchin Order and the St. Labre School.

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WISCONSIN
The Sheboygan Press

The bold move by a group of Catholic priests — including two from Sheboygan — to work with and help victims of clergy sexual abuse gives all victims hope that they can receive justice.

The Rev. James Connell, pastor of Sheboygan’s Holy Name and St. Clement parishes, and the Rev. Richard Cerpich, who serves St. Peter Claver parish, recognized that the Catholic Church needed to do more to reach out to abuse victims.

Last week, they and abuse victims, including Vicky Schneider of Sheboygan, took out full-page ads to remind victims that the deadline for filing claims against the church is less than a month away.

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MISSOURI
TheMediaReport

The strident National Catholic Reporter has exclusively reported that a Missouri judge is forcing David Clohessy, the national president of SNAP, to appear at a deposition, and Clohessy is vehemently fighting the order.

A judge has told Clohessy and SNAP to turn over all of their documents related to the case of an accused priest. According to the Reporter, these demanded documents may include:

press releases or press release drafts;
correspondence with members of the press;
any correspondence with the victim named in the lawsuit;
any correspondence from members of the public “that discuss or relates to repressed memory”;
and more.

Clohessy and his legal help are frantically fighting this court order, weakly claiming that the deposition could have “a huge chilling effect on helping child sex abuse victims at every stage.”

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CALIFORNIA
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on January 1, 2012

I am not (usually) an angry person, but today, my head is about to explode.

I opened the paper this morning to find out that my son and every other child in the state of California must be in a car booster seat until age eight or until they are 4-foot-9. My son is five. He will turn eight at the end of the second grade.

I’m not going to go into the sheer hassle, expense and waste this will cause parents who carpool sports teams, have multiple young children, allow their children to attend field trips, encourage play date companions, etc. Nor will I mention that this legislation flies DIRECTLY in the face of California’s push for higher MPG cars (because many families will be FORCED to buy bigger cars for the four or five carseats that they must now cart with them everywhere. And you can’t fit more than two car seats in the Prius).

But I will say this: I am my son’s parent. Not the State of California.

It is MY decision how to educate my child, how to feed him, clothe him, discipline him (and he is a very good boy), help him create his moral foundation, and/or take (or in my case NOT take) him to church. It is not the government’s job. Period.

But wait, there’s more! My outrage gets a little more personal.

I have to wonder, what happens between age eight, when my kid is still stuffed in a car seat, and ages 9, 10, 13, or 15 when officials at JSerra and Mater Dei High Schools, Penn State and Syracuse Universities, and the Archdioceses of Philadelphia and Los Angeles deem that if my kid is sexually assaulted, it must be my kid’s fault (or not really a crime at all)? My son goes from car seat occupant to sexual provocateur overnight? To add insult to injury, many of these officials and their paid spokespeople blame the victims’ parents for the fact that their children were raped.

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GREAT FALLS (MT)
Montana Eighth Judicial Court – Cascade County

Posted on December 30, 2011
in the Billings Gazette

1.1 Plaintiff suffered physical, sexual, and emotional abuse by Father Emmett Hoffmann, who was employed by the Order of Friars Minor, Capuchin, the St. Labre Mission School, and the Roman Catholic Bishop of the Diocese of Great FallslBillings (hereinafter referred to as “the Bishop”). Plaintiff was then a minor in the care, custody, and control of the St. Labre Mission School, and/or Father Hoffmann, and the Bishop.
. . .

4.1 From approximately 1955 until 1962, Plaintiff was a minor and student at the St. Labre Mission School in Ashland, Montana.

4.2. From approximately 1955 until 1962, Plaintiff was victimized physically, sexually, and emotionally by Father Emmett Hoffmann at the St. Labre Parish and School.

4.3 While inflicting corporal punishment upon Plaintiff, Father Emmett Hoffmann removed Plaintiff’s panties and rubbed her buttocks before and after he spanked her. Father Emmett Hoffmann would tell Plaintiff that God told him to punish her in that manner.

4.4 From approximately 1955 until 1962 and sometime after the incidents described in paragraph 4.3 began, Father Emmett Hoffmann exposed himself to Plaintiff and made her touch and rub his penis.

4.5 Sometime between approximately 1955 through 1962, Father Emmett Hoffman digitally penetrated Plaintiff’s vagina and on at least one occasion digitally penetrated Plaintiff’s anus.

4.6 Sometime between approximately 1955 through 1962, the incidents of sexual abuse perpetrated by Father Emmett Hoffmann upon Plaintiff progressed in scope and severity and included acts of sexual intercourse that were unwanted and unconsented to by Plaintiff, a minor under the age of eighteen.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Irish Independent

By David Young

Sunday January 01 2012

A priest wrongly accused of sexual abuse has returned to full ministry.

Father Sean Cahill voluntarily stood down from duties at St Malachy’s church in Castlewellan after the claim was made against him in early 2010.

In August last year it emerged that no charges would be brought against the priest.

Bishop of Down and Connor Noel Treanor welcomed Fr Cahill back to ministry at St Malachy’s at this morning’s mass.

Bishop Treanor said the unfounded allegation had had a devastating impact but stressed the priest returned with his character unblemished.

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NEDERLAND
Trouw

English translation of title:
Bishops flew with ‘regret’ right off the road

Kerkleiders zijn er niet klaar voor om misbruikonheil het hoofd te bieden. Hun woorden zijn als een schild waar niets door komt.

Eigenlijk ging het in de eerste alinea al mis. De bisschopen openden hun brief over seksueel misbruik met de zinsnede ‘kwetsbaar en klein is God bij ons gekomen, zo klinkt het in de eerste prefatie van de Advent’. Ze spraken ook over Maria en Jozef, ‘bij wie Jezus veilig en geborgen is, ook tijdens de angstige en onzekere dagen in de kindertijd’. Zo vlogen de bisschoppen meteen helemaal uit de bocht.

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NEDERLAND
de Gelderlander

English translation of title:
The manager of the Cornerstone parish center in Elst will resign

ELST – Yvonne Vos, manager van parochiecentrum De Hoeksteen in Elst en voorzitter van de pastoraatsgroep, legt per 1 januari haar taken neer.

Vos nam afscheid tijdens de viering in de RK kerk te Elst waar een bisschoppelijke brief over het seksueel misbruik binnen de katholieke kerk werd voorgelezen. Haar besluit om functies neer te leggen, heeft daar niets mee te maken, benadrukt Vos in een interview, zaterdag in dagblad De Gelderlander.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
The Press Association

A priest wrongly accused of sexual abuse has returned to full ministry.

Father Sean Cahill voluntarily stood down from duties at St Malachy’s Church in Castlewellan after the claim was made against him in early 2010.

In August last year it emerged that no charges would be brought against the priest.

Bishop of Down and Connor Noel Treanor welcomed Fr Cahill back to ministry at St Malachy’s at Sunday morning’s Mass.

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UTAH/TEXAS
UPI

SALT LAKE CITY, Dec. 31 (UPI) — A follower of Warren Jeffs said the polygamous church leader ordered his followers not to have sex while he is in a Texas prison.

The member said he was excommunicated by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints for having sex with his wife, CNN reported. The man has asked that his name not be used.

Jeffs was sentenced to life plus 20 years in Texas for the aggravated sexual assault of two “spiritual wives,” one 12 and the other 15.

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UTAH
Fox 13

Ben Winslow, Reporter
Fox 13

HILDALE, Utah—
A deadline set by Fundamentalist LDS Church leader Warren Jeffs for his members to reaffirm their commitment to the faith is prompting some people to walk away from the polygamous church on the Utah-Arizona border.

Other FLDS members are simply vanishing once they are re-committed to the faith, ex-members and observers told FOX 13.

Jeffs, who is imprisoned in Texas for child sex assault related to underage marriages, has ordered his followers to be questioned by FLDS leaders. They’ve had to fill out questionnaires, confess their sins and be re-baptized into the faith, only after church elders deem them worthy, ex-members said.

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MAINE
Maine Sunday Telegram

If ever there was a window into the state of the modern-day Roman Catholic Church, it’s my inbox.

Over the past few days, I’ve received three emails having to do with the faith in which I grew up back when daily Mass attracted a crowd, all five Sunday Masses were packed and a nun in full habit presided over every classroom.

“Just Hours to Go: Give Now to Hold Bishops Accountable in 2012,” implored bishopaccountability.org in its end-of-the-year appeal for a tax deductible donation. Fifty dollars, it promised, will help “obtain and post 250 pages of once-secret church abuse files and other crucial documents” for all the world to see.

“One More Day,” echoed Voice of the Faithful in its request for money to help work toward optional celibacy for priests, deaconships for women and eternal protection for children from sexual abuse by priests, to name but a few of their causes.

And then there was this from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Maine: “Media Campaign Welcomes Catholics Home.”

The first two messages, truth be told, have appeared regularly in the decade since revelations of child sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests scorched parishes from Maine to California and, more recently, around the world.

But the “Media Campaign Welcomes Catholics Home”? In these parts, as diocese communication director Sue Bernard noted in her news release, that’s a “first-time ever television event.”

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SOUTH CAROLINA
Greenville Online

By Ron Barnett
| Staff Writer

Bob Jones University will review its policies and procedures for dealing with allegations of sex abuse in order to make sure they “fully comply with the law and ensure a loving, scripturally based response,” according to a statement posted on the school’s website.

The review, which was called for by BJU President Stephen Jones, comes “as a result of recent national media reports of the mishandling of sexual abuse,” the statement says.

“When I — or any member of the BJU family — hears of sexual abuse, we grieve for the victim,” Jones said in the statement. “The scars of abuse are deep, long-lasting and life-altering, and our hearts ache for every individual who’s been abused by a predator.”

The school was drawn into controversy earlier this year when ABC’s 20/20 reported on a 1997 rape case that involved a 15-year-old girl and a male member of a Concord, N.H., church whose pastor was a member of BJU’s Cooperating Board of Trustees.

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MONTANA
The Republic

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First Posted: December 31, 2011

BILLINGS, Mont. — A Northern Cheyenne woman has filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings contending she was sexually abused as a young girl by a popular priest at the St. Labre Mission School in Ashland between 1955 and 1962.

The lawsuit seeking unspecified damages was filed Friday in Cascade County District Court in Great Falls. It also names as defendants the Order of Friars Minor, the Capuchin Order and the school.

Rev. Emmett Hoffmann is not named as a defendant but is identified as the reason for the lawsuit. The 85-year-old Hoffmann retired in 1993 and lives in Ashland.

Hoffman did not return a call Saturday from The Associated Press, and a message left at the retirement home where he lives was not returned. A message left at the Roman Catholic Diocese of Great Falls-Billings was also not returned.

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MONTANA
KTVQ

BILLINGS- A legal complaint was filed Friday in the Cascade County District Court in Great Falls by a Northern Cheyenne tribal member claiming she was abused as a young girl by a popular Catholic priest in the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation.

The woman, who is choosing to remain anonymous, says Fr. Emmett Hoffmann sexually abused her from the mid-1950’s to the early 1960’s.

That information was sent out in a press release this weekend by the defendant’s attorney, Vito de la Cruz (of a Yakima, Washington law firm), and claims the abuse began as a form of discipline and evolved into penetration and eventually rape.

In the release from Vito de la Cruz, Hoffmann is described as a hero in the eyes of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe:

“…hailed by some as a priest who did good things for the Northern Cheyenne Indian Tribe. The subject of the book, The Renegade Priest, depicts Hoffmann’s success in converting tribal members to Catholicism. In 1961, Hoffmann (called “Father Emmett” by his faithful), was made an honorary Chief of the Northern Cheyenne Council of 44.”

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MONTANA
KXLH

Updated: Jan 1, 2012

A Northern Cheyenne tribal member alleges she was sexually abused more than 50 years ago by a well known priest while attending school in Southeastern Montana.

The victim, listed as Jane Doe to protect her identity, accuses Father Emmett Hoffmann of molesting and raping her over a period of time.

The complaint was filed Friday against St. Labre Mission School and the Roman Catholic Bishop Diocese of Great Falls – Billings, among other groups.

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