ABUSE TRACKER

WEST VIRGINIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Judy Jones on April 18, 2012

A man has given sworn courtroom testimony in Philadelphia today that West Virginia’s bishop, Michael Bransfield, took boys to a beach cabin, and a Philly priest told him Bransfield was abusing one of them.

And years ago, the friendship between the Philly priest and the West Virginia bishop was noted in a grand jury report. (As best we can tell, Bransfield never tried to refute the report.)

Philadelphia Grand Jury Report and Criminal Charges
Compared with Previous Agreements of Law Enforcement Regarding Other Dioceses

In light of this, we believe that Bransfield – not his lawyer or his PR man – should address these allegations, immediately and directly, and take questions about them. (Remember bishops have repeatedly promised for a decade to be “open and transparent” in clergy child sex abuse and cover up cases.)

This isn’t rocket science. For starters, there are three simple questions Bransfield should answer:

Did or does he own a house with Philly’s Fr. Gana? If so, did he take boys there? And did he molest any of them?

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UNITED STATES
U.S. Catholic

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

By Meghan Murphy-Gill

Were you under the impression that the Vatican investigation of U.S. women religious had just blown over? News on that front had been quiet for nearly three years. Well, the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith and USCCB announced today an initiative to “renew” the Leadership Conference of Women Religious following an “assessment” from the CDF. Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain will be the new Archbishop Delegate for organization, the main organizing body for women religious in the U.S., assisted by Bishops Leonard Blair and Thomas John Paprocki.

The assessment names three things Cardinal William Levada found problematic in the investigation, but remains extremely vague and relies on what seem to have become buzz words for “out of line”: “addresses at the LCWR assemblies” (naming Sister Laurie Brink, OP, a former US Catholic interviewee), “policies of corporate dissent,” and “radical feminism.” (Ironically, the document makes a point earlier of the usage of the word “radical” to mean “the roots,” but fails to do so in this case, thus relying on the whole “feminism is scary” trope.)

Likewise, “The doctrinal assessment criticized positions espoused at LCWR annual assemblies and in its literature as well as the absence of support from LCWR for Church teaching on women’s ordination and homosexuality” and that the LCWR isn’t doing enough to promote “the Church’s Biblical view of family life and human sexuality.”

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UNITED STATES
The Telegraph (Australia)

Vatican busts nuns for focusing on poverty – says they should target gay marriage, abortion

A GROUP of Catholic nuns has been reprimanded by the Vatican for focusing too much on poverty and not enough on fighting gay marriage and abortion.

A male bishop has been appointed to bring to heel the US’ most influential group of Catholic Nuns, The Leadership Conference of Women religious, after the Vatican announced it would be completely overhauling the group, reported The New York Times.

The Vatican has been secretly investigating the group since 2008 because of its support for health care reform and after it questioned the Church’s position on homosexuality.

An assessment report released yesterday found the group had “radical feminist themes” incompatible with the Catholic Church.

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TOLEDO (OH)
Toledo Blade

BY DAVID YONKE
BLADE RELIGION EDITOR

The Vatican has called on Bishop Leonard Blair of Toledo to help lead reform of an organization representing 80 percent of American nuns, saying the “doctrinal and pastoral situation” of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious “is grave and a matter of serious concern.”

The appointment announced Wednesday follows Bishop Blair’s lead role in a two-year “doctrinal assessment” of the nuns’ group, which included reviewing a decade’s worth of the nuns group’s annual conferences, keynote speeches, and documents and publications. The assessment, released Wednesday, found the group’s teachings to be “problematic” in certain areas, citing concerns over the organization’s position on homosexuality and the ordination of women and its “silence” on some foundational Catholic doctrines such as the right to life.

The Vatican said Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle will lead the new reform initiative, assisted by Bishop Blair and Bishop Thomas John Paprocki of Springfield, Ill., and working with nuns in the group’s leadership.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

The Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has called for reform of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) and named Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle as its Archbishop Delegate for the initiative.

The Archbishop Delegate’s role is to provide “review, guidance and approval, where necessary, of the work of the LCWR.”

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UNITED STATES
The New York Times

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN

Published: April 18, 2012

The Vatican has appointed an American bishop to rein in the largest and most influential group of Catholic nuns in the United States, saying that an investigation found that the group had “serious doctrinal problems.”

The Vatican’s assessment, issued on Wednesday, said that members of the group, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, had challenged church teaching on homosexuality and the male-only priesthood, and promoted “radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith.”

The sisters were also reprimanded for making public statements that “disagree with or challenge the bishops, who are the church’s authentic teachers of faith and morals.” During the debate over the health care overhaul in 2010, American bishops came out in opposition to the health plan, but dozens of sisters, many of whom belong to the Leadership Conference, signed a statement supporting it — support that provided crucial cover for the Obama administration in the battle over health care.

The conference is an umbrella organization of women’s religious communities, and claims 1,500 members who represent 80 percent of the Catholic sisters in the United States. It was formed in 1956 at the Vatican’s request, and answers to the Vatican, said Sister Annmarie Sanders, the group’s communications director.

Word of the Vatican’s action took the group completely by surprise, Sister Sanders said. She said that the group’s leaders were in Rome on Wednesday for what they thought was a routine annual visit to the Vatican when they were informed of the outcome of the investigation, which began in 2008.

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SEATTLE (WA)
Seattle PI

[Congregatio Pro Doctrina Fidei]

By JOEL CONNELLY, SEATTLEPI.COM STAFF

The Vatican on Wednesday gave Seattle Archbishop J. Peter Sartain the job of imposing discipline and adherence to dogma on America’s largest organization of Catholic nuns, making it toe the line to “the teachings and discipline of the Church.”

A Vatican document praised the women religjous for promoting social justice, but said they have not spoken out on issues of abortion and human sexuality.

In an eight-page “Assessment” from the Congregration for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican said that it found “serious doctrinal problems,” instances of disagreement with the Church’s bishops, and charged nuns with promoting “radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith.”

The target of the Vatican’s probe was the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), which includes leaders of Catholic women’s religious orders in the United States representing more than 80 percent of America’s 57,000 nuns.

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UNITED STATES
BBC News

The Vatican has ordered a crackdown on a group of American nuns that it considers too radical.

It says the group is undermining Roman Catholic teaching on homosexuality and is promoting “feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith”.

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious is the largest organisation of Catholic nuns in the US.

An archbishop has been appointed to oversee its reform to ensure that it conforms to Catholic prayer and ritual.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
Annenberg TV News

By Jerome Campbell

The student claims school administrators and officials in the Los Angeles Archdiocese could have prevented the 2006 incident.

The plaintiff, identified as John Doe, filed the suit in Los Angeles Superior Court against his former high school teacher, John Malburg, and the Archdiocese, which owned the school. The plaintiff’s suit alleges sexual battery and negligence.

The plaintiff said he was coerced into appearing in a series of pornographic videos produced by his teacher at Daniel Murphy Catholic High while church officials tried to cover up the allegation as early as 2005.

A spokesman of the archdiocese disputed accusations of negligence and said Malburg was removed quickly when information surfaced.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC Central Victoria

By ABC Bendigo

Former Victoria police detective Dennis Ryan spoke to Central, Western and North Western Victoria Mornings presenter Nicole Chvastek about the state government parliamentary inquiry into clergy sexual abuse.

Days after the state government announced an inquiry into clergy sexual abuse, former Mildura police officer Dennis Ryan says a parliamentary inquiry isn’t equipped to investigate the issue.

The inquiry was announced after dozens of suicides were linked to abuse by members of the Catholic clergy.

“A royal commission without a doubt would be best of all but that would never ever be agreed upon because the depth of a royal commission would be such that it would tarnish many people.”

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AUSTRALIA
SBS

A national inquiry into sexual abuse in religious institutions is needed, the Australian Lawyers Alliance (ALA) says.

The ALA says the Victorian government’s parliamentary inquiry into abuse, announced on Tuesday, will be “manifestly inadequate” as it will miss widespread cases of abuse across the rest of Australia.

A spokesman for the alliance’s NSW branch, Andrew Morrison SC, said many cases in the state had not been properly investigated.

Dr Morrison singled out the Catholic Church, saying while many other religious institutions also had problems, the church was infamous for failing to comply with legal obligations to report abuse by priests under the Crimes Act.

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AUSTRALIA
Northern Rivers Echo

The Victorian Government has announced it is going to hold a year-long parliamentary inquiry into the Catholic Church and its handling of criminal abuse cases against children.

Good.

There were many people calling for a Royal Commission, which would have greater powers to compel witnesses to give evidence and to elicit documentary and electronic information, but at least there are moves to call the Church to account for one of the great unspeakable atrocities in our society.

For years we have heard reports of how Catholic priests and brothers have committed horrible acts against children, with Church authorities denying, covering-up or blaming “a few bad apples” when the number of cases seems to suggest a culture that is absolutely rotten to its core.

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BOSTON (MA)
The Heights

By Heights Editorial Board

Published: Thursday, April 19, 2012

A recent Boston Globe article has revealed that Rev. Bradley M. Schaeffer, S.J., current member of Boston College’s Board of Trustees, allegedly failed to investigate or contact the police after receiving complaints regarding then-popular Donald J. McGuire’s behavior with young boys. Instead, Schaeffer, leader of the Jesuits in the Chicago area during the early ’90s, sent McGuire to treatment for a sexual disorder—treatment he later acknowledged did not go well. He reportedly knew about McGuire’s repeated abuse for over 30 years.

According to the article, following the treatment, McGuire allegedly continued to molest boys until at least 2003, six years after Schaeffer left Chicago. McGuire is now serving 25 years in a federal prison for child sex abuse while the Jesuits face a lawsuit for their failure to protect one of McGuire’s alleged victims. The Jesuits did not expel McGuire from the order until 2007, nearly 40 years after the first serious allegation against him.

Though Schaeffer, now 62, is planning to retire from BC later this year, The Heights feels the University should take action immediately, and we urge the Board of Trustees to remove him from their membership. While we acknowledge the fact that the University had no knowledge of Schaeffer’s role in the McGuire case when he was elected to the board, The Heights feels that inaction in this case would endanger the school’s reputation as one of the most prestigious Catholic institutions in the country.

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IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

Brian Lennon, s.j.

Pope Benedict in his Holy Thursday Chrism Mass sermon rightly called on Catholics to obey the teaching of the Church. Processes exist to establish what that teaching is. There is, however, a major problem with some of these processes and that in turn raises questions about the reliability of the answers they reach about some truth questions.

Over 25 years ago, as editor of Studies, the Irish Jesuit review, I phoned Fr Richard McCormick, s.j., then a leading Catholic moral theologian, to ask him to write an article on family issues. He was unable to do so because his views were unacceptable to the Vatican. Instead he referred me to one of his former students who kindly agreed to write the article.

While there is a need for the magisterium, it is also the case that the magisterium has grounds to be cautious, given that its predecessors silenced many, including Karl Rahner and Henri de Lubac, who subsequently became periti or experts at Vatican II, and whose views were adopted by the Council. It seemed extraordinary to me then that such a leading theologian should be silenced. The issue has a particular relevance in Ireland today, given the silencing of Frs Tony Flannery and Gerard Moloney.

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IRELAND
The Southern Star

By Editor
Saturday April 21st, 2012

THE findings of a survey, entitled Contemporary Catholic Perspectives, which was commissioned by the Association of Catholic Priests, could be deemed facile, given that the recent report of the Apostolic Visitation group from the Holy See declared that people who profess to be members of the Roman Catholic Church must be prepared to fully abide by its teachings and rules, which are quite clear and unambiguous

Much has been made in the survey – carried out among 1,000 Catholics throughout the island of Ireland over a two-week period in February – of people’s preferences for various changes in the institution that could make it more relevant in the modern world and also more palatable to them. In restaurant parlance, the majority of those surveyed would ideally like to be à la carte catholics, just picking the bits they like and adding some tempting side orders, but the reality is that this option is off and they can only avail of the set menu.

The dictat from the Vatican could be interpreted on the one hand as the church being out of touch with its members, who – albeit perhaps naïvely – expect the institution to react to the concerns of members and fulfill their wishes. However, as history has shown down through the centuries, the church regards itself as the single-minded guardian of its core beliefs and sticks rigidly to its rules, yielding little or nothing to those who question them.

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NETHERLANDS
Radio Netherlands

The Roman Catholic church actively encouraged the castration of homosexual boys and men in the 1950s and ’60s, according to scholars who testified to the Dutch parliament. Medical historian Mart van Lieburg told parliament that a Dutch bishop ordered surgeons to perform castrations.

Professor Van Lieburg was speaking at a hearing called to clarify reports of castrations in Roman Catholic psychiatric care. He declined to name the bishop or the surgeons who had made the allegations. Another historian, Marnix Koolhaas, told parliament that several pastors sent boys to a doctor with orders to have them castrated.

Further research neeeded
Christian Democrat parliamentarian Madeleine van Toorenburg is now calling for new scholarly research into castrations. She told Dutch broadcaster NOS she wants to know whether they were performed on minors, or on anyone without consent. She stopped short of demanding a parliamentary inquiry.

The Dutch daily NRC Handelsblad reported last month that Henk Heithuis, a minor, had been forcibly castrated as a punishment for blowing the whistle on sexual abuse by a Catholic brother in 1956. The incident was reported in 2010 to the Deetman Commission which was investigating sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic church. The church-installed commission did not investigate the case and made no mention of it in its final report last December.

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AUSTRIA
New Europe

Two years ago a commission in charge of investigating allegations of misconduct sexual and abuse by Catholic clergy was established in Austria and finally they unveiled the results.

The commission dedicated €8 million from a compensation fund set up by the Austrian Catholic Church for compensating victims in cases they found to be merited.

Some 702 cases, sometimes dating back to 1960s, were examined, and out of 1,244 complainants, nearly two thirds alleged sexual abuse and four out of five victims were younger than 13, nearly a third younger than 10 at the time when abuses were conducted. More than three quarters of all claimants were men and on average the abuse lasted for four years.

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COLORADO
Craig Daily Press

By Matt Stensland

Steamboat Springs — A former Steamboat Springs private school teacher and pastor has been arrested on suspicion of sexually assaulting one or more children in Routt County.

John Holland Brothers Jr., 43, was booked into Routt County Jail on Tuesday night after being arrested in Louisiana last week. He was booked on 27 felony charges. Among them: eight counts of sexual assault on a child by one in a position of trust, four counts of sexual assault on a child, seven counts of sexual assault and eight counts of first-degree burglary.

An arrest warrant outlining the details of the allegations has been sealed by a judge. The location of the incidents has been redacted in the list of charges filed in Routt County District Court, but the charges state the crimes Brothers is accused of committing took place from April 1, 2006, to May 31, 2008.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

BY NEELIMA CHOAHAN

19 Apr, 2012

A STATE government inquiry into the child sexual abuse by religious and non-government organisations is a first step in a very important process, a leading social justice expert has said.

Former Ballarat academic Professor S. Caroline Taylor, now at Edith Cowan University in Western Australia, said the inquiry would help acknowledge a very serious and entrenched problem in society.

“Whilst some people are critical because they believe the government hasn’t gone far enough in establishing a royal commission … I think (it is) a first step in a very important process of acknowledging the very serious and entrenched problems in society,” Professor Taylor said.

The year-long inquiry, announced by Premier Ted Baillieu and Attorney-General Robert Clark on Tuesday, is to be conducted by a state parliament committee rather than as a royal commission and will report by April 30, 2013.

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UNITED STATES
Verdict

Marci A. Hamilton

Last week, the California Catholic Conference (the lobbyist for the California bishops) sent a one-page letter opposing AB1628, a bill that contains a short extension of the child-sex-abuse statutes of limitations, and requires more rigorous background checks for employees and volunteers who work closely with children. This is a letter worth a closer look, because the bishops are opposing legislation to protect children from predators in many states.

In child-sex-abuse cases involving their employees, the bishops routinely argue that the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses protect them from liability for child sex abuse. Roughly half of the states, at this point, have flatly rejected this argument, with a very persuasive opinion recently issued by the Tennessee Supreme Court in the Redwing decision. But Wisconsin, Missouri, and Utah have—unconscionably—wrapped religious organizations in a First Amendment mantle in child-sex-abuse cases.

On a parallel track, the bishops are lobbying in many states to block legal reform that would protect children from sex abuse. The most recent example of that lobbying is the letter that was sent by the California Catholic Conference in opposition to AB1628.

There are three major arenas in which legal reform is needed if we are to better protect our children. First, we must eliminate the statutes of limitations for these heinous crimes and for the tort actions needed by victims—a type of reform that I discuss in my book Justice Denied: What America Must Do to Protect Its Children. Second, we must improve the reporting of child sex abuse to the authorities. Third, we must improve background check requirements for employees who will, or may, have contact with children.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Hull Daily Mail

CHILD abuse by members of the clergy should be subjected to a public inquiry, a campaigner has said.

Solicitor David Greenwood, who is representing more than 150 victims of abuse at a Market Weighton care home for boys, is launching the campaign for an inquiry.

Mr Greenwood, of Jordan’s Solicitors, is fighting for compensation for the men who suffered physical and sexual abuse at the hands of staff at the now-demolished St William’s through the 1960s to the 1990s.

Mr Greenwood said: “The Church is responsible for covering up sexual abuse by members of the clergy up and down the country.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By Joseph A. Slobodzian
Inquirer Staff Writer

A Philadelphia man testified Wednesday that the Archdiocese of Philadelphia priest who allegedly sexually abused him for years starting the late 1970s had said a colleague – now a bishop in West Virginia – also had sex with teenage boys.

The 48-year-old witness, identified only as “John” in the 2005 report of the Philadelphia County grand jury, described a meeting one summer while in high school when he spent summers at the Rev. Stanley Gana’s 110-acre farm in northeastern Pennsylvania.

He said he was building a flagstone wall when a car pulled up driven by then-Rev. Michael J. Bransfield and containing several teenage boys.

Bransfield is now bishop of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

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ARLINGTON (VA)
Washington Examiner

An Arlington priest has been placed on leave while authorities investigate allegations that he engaged in sexual misconduct with a teenage boy in the 1990s, church and police officials said Wednesday.

The Diocese of Arlington said the investigation into Rev. Terry Specht is in its initial phase and no determination about the alleged misconduct has been made.

The Fairfax County Police Department is also investigating the case. No charges had been filed against Specht as of Wednesday, police spokeswoman Lucy Caldwell said.

Specht, who was a pastor and administrator at Holy Spirit Church in Annandale until he was placed on administrative leave, denies the allegation, according to a statement from the diocese.

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ARLINGTON (VA)
Imperfect Parent

April 18th, 2012 by Ella Desrosiers

The Rev. Terry W. Specht, a prominent priest in the diocese that oversees Northern Virginia, is being investegated following accusations of sexual misconduct with a minor boy which allegedly occurred during the late 1990s while he was a parochial vicar at St. Mary of Sorrows Church in Fairfax.

According to the Washington Post, Specht was director from 2004 to 2011 of the Office of Child Protection and Safety, which handles outreach to child abuse victims, training on abuse for church employees and volunteers and monitoring of youth activities “to ensure that all contact with young people is appropriate,” its Web site says. Specht also served as chaplain and assistant principal from 2000 to 2004 at Paul VI Catholic High School and has been pastor of Holy Spirit Church in Annandale since 2007.

“Any allegation of abuse deepens the pain felt by all Catholics and particularly survivors of abuse,” Arlington Bishop Paul Loverde said in a report by NBC Washington. “We are committed to full cooperation with law enforcement regarding this allegation, and I have directed an independent investigator to review the actions and decisions made by Father Specht during his tenure as director of child protection.”

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ARLINGTON (VA)
The Washington Times

By Meredith Somers
The Washington Times

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

A Catholic priest formerly in charge of the Diocese of Arlington’s child protection and safety office was placed on administrative leave while police investigate whether he was involved in sexual misconduct with a boy in the late 1990s, officials said Wednesday.

The Rev. Terry W. Specht, a priest at the Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Annandale, denied the accusation, according to a statement released by the diocese.

Fairfax County police are investigating the claim, but no charges have been filed.

Bishop Paul S. Loverde said in the statement that he directed the investigation “to review the actions and decisions made by Fr. Specht during his tenure as Director of Child Protection.”

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
KPCC

April 18, 2012 | By Ashley Myers-Turner with Paige Osburn

Members of a group for survivors of clergy sexual abuse accused the L.A. Archdiocese on Wednesday of covering up a sexual abuse scandal at Daniel Murphy High School.

Joelle Casteix and other members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) allege that a former staffer at Daniel Murphy High School abused children and produced child pornography — something they say church officials have been aware of since 2005.

“That’s why the civil process is so important,” said Casteix at Wednesday’s news conference. “Because people will be deposed and documents will be released. And we’ll see just who knew what and when.”

Casteix also claims that parents whose kids were enrolled in Daniel Murphy were not informed when John Malburg, the former dean of students, was arrested and sentenced to eight years in prison. Parents were also reportedly left in the dark about the allegations themselves.

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WEST VIRGINIA
WSAZ

[with video]

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — Roman Catholics in West Virginia are reacting with disbelief and shock after a witness at a clergy-abuse trial in Philadelphia testified the leader of West Virginia’s Catholics committed sexual abuse.

A man testified Wednesday that a priest raped him at a home owned by Bishop Michael Bransfield and that his accused abuser told him the bishop also sexually abused a boy. The testimony came at the trial of the Rev. James Brennan.

Monsignor Edward Sadie, rector of the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Charleston, says he finds the allegations against Bransfield “impossible to believe.”

Margery Webb of Charleston was shocked by the news as she arrived at a Morgantown church for Mass but said she hadn’t heard anything about it.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

A FORMER Catholic priest has been jailed for at least five years for sexually abusing girls as young as eight.

Brian Spillane, 69, was convicted today of eight charges of indecent assault on a female younger than 16 and one count of indecently assaulting a female aged 16 years or more.

The charges relate to abuses during the 1970s and 1980s when Spillane was a priest working in both Sydney and country areas of New South Wales.

In sentencing Spillane, Judge Michael Finnane called each assault “serious, planned and callous”.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Eimear Ni Bhraonain

Thursday April 19 2012

AN Irish priest who fled the US after a civil jury found him guilty of molesting an altar boy last night insisted on his innocence after absconding from the trial.

Fr Michael Kelly, from Ballingarry, Co Tipperary, yesterday said that he was in Ireland on “health grounds”.

The 62-year-old cleric has protested his innocence since he was first accused in 2008 of sexually abusing a student in the mid-1980s.

However, his actions this week have stunned even his own legal team as he flew to Ireland the day before he was due to give evidence in the second phase of his sexual abuse civil trial.

His friends in Ballingarry yesterday expressed shock and disbelief that he didn’t “stay and stand his ground”.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
News and Sentinel

April 19, 2012

By HEATHER ZIEGLER , The Wheeling Intelligencer

PHILADELPHIA – A man testified Wednesday in a clergy abuse trial that a priest raped him in the 1970s at a beach house owned by the Most Rev. Michael J. Bransfield and that he was told that Bransfield, who currently serves as bishop of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, also sexually abused a boy.

The 48-year-old man also testified that he saw Bransfield with a car full of boys at a farm owned by his accused abuser, the Rev. Stanley Gana. The witness said that Gana told him Bransfield was having sex with the boy who was in the front seat.

Another man has testified that Bransfield had a lewd conversation with him. …

Bransfield is not charged with any crimes in the case and has never been charged with sexually abusing children.

“The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston is learning of media reports originating from legal proceedings under way in Philadelphia, and Bishop Michael Bransfield’s name was brought up in court today. Until such time that the facts and issues surrounding this testimony are made fully known to the Diocese, we cannot comment at this time,” diocesan spokesman Bryan Minor said Wednesday. “However, this is certainly an opportunity for us – as a church – to remember all victims of sexual abuse and to pray for them and their families.”

The local diocese called the trial “a circus” and said Philadelphia prosecutors are trying to smear people never charged with a crime.

“They seem to want to bludgeon witnesses, smear individuals not on trial, anything to bolster their persecution of the church,” the diocese said in a separate statement. “The trial appears to be evolving into a circus with no rules and boundaries.”

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ARLINGTON (VA)
WUSA

Rev. Terry W. Specht of Arlington, Va. Diocese, placed on leave pending investigation of sexual misconduct allegation

ARLINGTON, Va. (WUSA) – A priest with the Diocese of Arlington has been placed on administrative leave pending investigation of an allegation of sexual misconduct involving a male minor in the late 1990s, according to a statement by the Diocese.

Rev. Terry W. Specht denies the accusation. The statement indicates that the investigation is in its initial phase. No final determination has yet been made regarding the allegation.

The Diocese has received no other allegations of misconduct against Rev. Specht. According to the statement, Specht, like all priests, diocesan employees and volunteers who work with children, underwent an official background check early in his tenure.

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AUSTRALIA
The Sun Daily

Posted on 19 April 2012

SYDNEY (April 19, 2012): An Australian court jailed a former Catholic priest for at least five years on Thursday for sexually abusing girls as young as eight in what the judge called “a major breach of trust”.

Brian Spillane, 69, was convicted of nine charges of indecent assault relating to abuses during the 1970s and 1980s, when he was a priest in both Sydney and rural areas of New South Wales state.

Jailing Spillane, Judge Michael Finnane said he had used his position to gain the trust of the families of young girls and access to their homes.

He called each assault “serious, planned and callous” and described Spillane as a “violent bully and coward”.

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STOCKTON (CA)
The Record

Diocese cuts off pay, benefits after flight to Ireland

By Jennie Rodriguez-Moore
Record Staff Writer

April 19, 2012

STOCKTON – Jury members must decide for themselves if the sudden departure of Catholic priest Michael Kelly, found liable of sexually assaulting a former altar boy, is an attempt to limit evidence against the Diocese of Stockton, San Joaquin County Superior Court Judge Bob McNatt told a jury Wednesday in a civil case filed against the priest and the church.

Kelly left the United States on Sunday for his native Ireland just two days before he was scheduled to testify in the civil trial. A former altar boy who said he was molested by Kelly more than 20 years ago is seeking damages from Kelly and the diocese.

This jury already found Kelly liable and is now determining whether the diocese is also to blame.

The diocese, which continued paying Kelly a salary and benefits until church officials learned he left for Ireland, stopped his compensation, defense attorney Jim Goodman confirmed Wednesday.

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AUSTRALIA
7 News

A former Catholic priest has been jailed for at least five years for sexually abusing girls as young as six.

Media reports say the judge presiding over the case described the assaults as “serious, planned and callous”.

Brian Spillane, 69, has been convicted of abusing girls in the 1970s and 1980s when he worked in Sydney and country areas of New South Wales.

It is understood that Spillane worked at St Stanislaus’ College, Bathurst, where he became close with the family of two boys at the school, later abusing their 11-year-old sister.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
CBS Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES (CBS) — A group comprised of child sexual abuse victims and their supporters alleged on Wednesday that officials with the Los Angeles Archdiocese tried to cover up allegations that a former staffer had abused and videotaped a Catholic high school student.

KNX 1070′s Vytas Safronikas reports John Malburg was sentenced to eight years in prison in 2009 after pleading guilty to sexually molesting a male student and videotaping another one for commercial purposes.

Malburg, 43, was dean of students at now-closed Daniel Murphy Catholic High, which was closed by the Archdiocese in 2007 in an effort to help pay for its share of a $660 million settlement with families of abuse victims.

But now a complaint filed on behalf of former Daniel Murphy Catholic High School student John Doe TD against the archdiocese and John Malburg alleges sexual battery, negligence and fraudulent conveyance and claims church officials tried to cover up the allegations as early as 2005.

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WEST VIRGINIA
WTRF

By D.K. Wright, Digital Journalist

The Board of Trustees at Wheeling Jesuit University has provided a 2008 independent investigation to the U.S. Attorney.

According to a news release from the University, the board authorized the release of an independent, special counsel investigative report addressing the University’s cost allocation method used by its technology centers to the Office of the United States Attorney for the Northern District.

In the past week, Wheeling Jesuit University has been in the news as the result of the release of an affidavit related to a federal investigation of the University’s cost allocation methods for its technology centers.

“The University has always been and always will be completely transparent with regards to its cost allocation methods of its technology centers,” said WJU President Rick Beyer. “Once the affidavit was reviewed, the Board of Trustees decided to release a report of an independent investigation regarding this issue, which was originally addressed by the University in 2008.”

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WEST VIRGINIA
CBS News

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The president of Wheeling Jesuit University says an independent investigation in 2008 found billing practices now under investigation by federal prosecutors violated no laws.

President Rick Beyer says the Board of Trustees voted Wednesday to give the special counsel’s report to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. He says Wheeling Jesuit has been and will remain transparent about its cost-allocation methods.

Federal prosecutors are investigating whether the school and vice president Davitt McAteer conspired to use millions of grant dollars from NASA and other federal agencies for personal gain and the school’s benefit.

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WEST VIRGINIA
Washington Post

Wheeling Jesuit president: 2008 independent review found no problem in federal grant billings

By Associated Press, Updated: Wednesday, April 18

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — An independent investigation of Wheeling Jesuit University’s billing practices for federal grants and programs in 2008 found no violations of laws or regulations, the school’s president said Wednesday.

President Rick Beyer said the Board of Trustees voted Wednesday to turn that report over to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Wheeling, adding that the Northern Panhandle Catholic school is cooperating in the investigation.

Federal investigators are looking into whether the university and a vice president, former Mine Safety and Health Administration chief J. Davitt McAteer, conspired to use millions of federal grant and program dollars from NASA and other federal agenices for personal gain.

Some of the allegations against the school and one of the world’s foremost experts on mine safety are contained in an affidavit filed by an agent in the NASA Office of Inspector General.

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STOCKTON (CA)
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on April 18, 2012

From today’s Stockton Record:

From left, Bishop Stephen Blaire, consultant Michael Heenan and Monsignor Richard J. Ryan walk down a hallway inside the San Joaquin County Courthouse on Tuesday morning, when jurors in Michael Kelly’s trial were sent home for the day. (emphasis mine)

Consultant?

As a PR person myself, I don’t fault Heenan for doing his job. But trial watchers say that he has been in court every day. That gets pretty spendy. Especially at an hourly rate.

Between lawyers’ and public relations consultants’ fees to cover the tracks of Fr. Michael Kelly, the priest found liable for abuse—and who then absconded from the country—the Stockton diocese should also be held to account for misleading parishioners about how their hard-earned contributions are spent.

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STOCKTON (CA)
KCRA

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (KCRA) — The civil trial against the San Joaquin County priest who has apparently fled the country continued Wednesday in a Stockton courtroom.

Father Michael Kelly, in a letter to Bishop Stephen Blaire, said he returned to his native Ireland to be with family due to health concerns.

The civil case was put on hold Tuesday due to Kelly’s absence.

Judge Bob McNatt told the jurors they would hear from Kelly’s earlier deposition, and can consider Kelly’s departure when evaluating the case.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WSLS

By: MARYCLAIRE DALE | Associated Press
Published: April 18, 2012

PHILADELPHIA (AP) A man who spoke of “an emptiness where my soul should be” following years of sexual abuse testified Wednesday that a priest raped him at a home owned by the current West Virginia bishop and that he was told the bishop also sexually abused a boy.

The 48-year-old man also testified in a landmark clergy abuse trial that he saw the bishop, Michael Bransfield, with a car full of boys. The man said his abuser told him Bransfield was having sex with the boy in the front seat.

Bransfield’s diocese called the trial “a circus” and said Philadelphia prosecutors are trying to smear people never charged with a crime.

“They seem to want to bludgeon witnesses, smear individuals not on trial, anything to bolster their persecution of the church,” the Wheeling-Charleston diocese said in a statement. “The trial appears to be evolving into a circus with no rules and boundaries.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)/CHARLESTON (WV)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 18, 2012

Shame on West Virginia Bishop Michael Bransfield. In a blatant rebuke to a judge and prosecutors, Bransfield is refusing to send one of his top aides to a criminal child sex abuse and cover up trial in Philadelphia. (Reportedly, Bransfield claims the trial appears to be evolving into a circus.)

The official is Fr. Kevin Quirk, who supposedly was involved in child sex allegations against a Philly priest.

Quirk’s been asked to testify in the high profile case involving Msgr. William Lynn, whose unprecedented trial is happening now. (Lynn’s accused of endangering kids by ignoring and concealing known and suspected clergy child sex crimes. It’s the first time in the US that a high-ranking member of the Catholic hierarchy has faced such charges and could wind up in prison)

So remember this situation when you next hear bishops, in child sex cases, pledging that they’ve “learned” and are “reforming.” A sitting US bishop is arrogantly rebuffing efforts by a judge and prosecutors to resolve a pending criminal trial.

In addition, according to CBS news in Philly, “another witness is expected to testify Wednesday that Bransfield also brought boys to an infamous farm where (a Philly priest) allegedly raped multiple boys. And the prosecutor says they have been notified of another incident of fondling by Bransfield.”

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UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 18, 2012

Today the Vatican has announced a new “reform effort,” coming in the form of the renewal of the Leadership Council of Women Religious (LCWR). The Vatican has tapped Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain to lead this effort. We argue that Archbishop Sartain is a poor choice.

Before coming to Seattle, Sartain was the bishop of the Diocese of Joliet, IL, where he had a terrible record on clergy sex abuse.

In one especially egregious case, Sartain hid allegations against two Joliet priests for five months, and only disclosed the allegations and suspended the priests after SNAP publicly “outed” them. Months after the priests were suspended, Sartain kept silent on their fate and refused to disclose to his parishioners and the public the results of the investigation.

He also ordained Fr. Alejandro Flores despite Flores having been caught with young porn. Yet barely six months after he was ordained, Flores was accused by parents of molesting their son for five years, dating back to when Flores was in seminary. Flores was later found guilty and sentenced to four years in prison.

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ARLINGTON (VA)
CBS DC

ARLINGTON, Va. (CBSDC/AP) — A Catholic priest from Fairfax County who served as director of his diocese’s Office of Child Protection and Safety has been placed on leave after he was accused of sexual misconduct in the 1990s involving an underage boy.

The priest, Rev. Terry Specht, denies the allegation, the Diocese of Arlington said. Specht has been pastor at Holy Spirit Church on Woodland Way in Annandale since 2007.

He also served as chaplain and assistant principal at Paul VI Catholic High School from 2000 to 2004 and was director of the child-protection office from 2004 through 2011. Among other duties, that office conducted background checks on diocese employees who could come into contact with children and provided training to diocese workers.

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CHARLESTON (WV)
NECN

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — Roman Catholics in West Virginia are reacting with disbelief and shock after a witness at a clergy-abuse trial in Philadelphia testified the leader of West Virginia’s Catholics committed sexual abuse.

A man testified Wednesday that a priest raped him at a home owned by Bishop Michael Bransfield and that his accused abuser told him the bishop also sexually abused a boy. The testimony came at the trial of the Rev. James Brennan.

Monsignor Edward Sadie, rector of the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Charleston, says he finds the allegations against Bransfield “impossible to believe.”

Margery Webb of Charleston was shocked by the news as she arrived at a Morgantown church for Mass but said she hadn’t heard anything about it.

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VIRGINIA
NBC Washington

A Catholic priest from Fairfax County who served as director of his diocese’s Office of Child Protection and Safety was placed on leave after he was accused of sexual misconduct involving an underage boy in the late 1990s.

The priest, Rev. Terry Specht, denies the allegation, according to the Diocese of Arlington. Specht has been pastor at Holy Spirit Church in Annandale, Va., since 2007. He also served as chaplain and assistant principal at Paul VI Catholic High School from 2000 to 2004. He was director of the child-protection office from 2004 through 2011.

“Any allegation of abuse deepens the pain felt by all Catholics and particularly survivors of abuse,” Arlington Bishop Paul Loverde said. “We are committed to full cooperation with law enforcement regarding this allegation, and I have directed an independent investigator to review the actions and decisions made by Father Specht during his tenure as director of child protection.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Beaver County Times

Associated Press

A man has testified during a clergy sex-abuse trial that he was raped at a home owned by the current West Virginia bishop and that he was told the bishop also sexually abused a boy.

The 48-year-old witness made the statements Wednesday in Philadelphia about Michael Bransfield, bishop of the Wheeling-Charleston diocese.

He says he saw Bransfield bring several boys to a farm owned by now-defrocked priest Stanley Gana. The witness says Gana told him Bransfield was having sex with one of them.

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WEST VIRGINIA
MetroNews

Staff
Charleston

The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston says it has no comment at this time in connection with testimony Wednesday in a clergy sex-abuse trial taking place in Philadelphia that mentioned Wheeling-Charleston Bishop Michael Bransfield.

A witness in the trial testified that he was raped by another priest in a beach house owned by Bransfield.

The 48-year-old man also told the jury he was told by Stanley Gana, a now defrocked priest, that Bransfield was having sex with another boy he saw at the Philadelphia area farm years ago.

The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston released the following statement Wednesday:

“The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston is learning of media reports originating from legal proceedings underway in Philadelphia, and Bishop Michael Bransfield’s name was brought up in court today. Until such time that the facts and issues surrounding this testimony are made fully known to the Diocese, we cannot comment at this time.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Boston Globe

By Maryclaire Dale
Associated Press / April 18, 2012

PHILADELPHIA—A man who spoke of “an emptiness where my soul should be” following years of sexual abuse testified Wednesday that a priest raped him at a home owned by the current West Virginia bishop and that he was told the bishop also sexually abused a boy.

The 48-year-old man also testified in a clergy-abuse trial that he saw the bishop, Michael Bransfield, with a car full of “fair-haired” boys. He said that his abuser told him Bransfield was having sex with the boy in the front seat.

Another man has testified that Bransfield had a lewd conversation with him.

Bransfield’s diocese called the trial “a circus” and said Philadelphia prosecutors are trying to smear people never charged with a crime.

“They seem to want to bludgeon witnesses, smear individuals not on trial, anything to bolster their persecution of the church,” the Wheeling-Charleston diocese said in a statement. “The trial appears to be evolving into a circus with no rules and boundaries.”

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BROOKLINE (MA)
Wicked Local Brookline

By Teddy Applebaum/tapplebaum@wickedlocal.com
Wicked Local Brookline

Posted Apr 18, 2012

Brookline —

A deceased cleric who ended his career at a friary in Brookline nearly 60 years ago was one of six church leaders accused of sexual abuse last week.

Attorney Mitchell Garabedian said the Rev. Leonard Walsh, who worked at the friary on Rawson Road from 1950-54, abused his client, a 9-year-old Brookline boy, for four months in 1953.

Garabedian said the Franciscans agreed to pay an unspecified six-figure settlement to the man, who still lives in Massachusetts.

Before he came to Brookline, Walsh worked in Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Washington, D.C. He died in 1954.

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ARLINGTON (VA)
Roman Catholic Diocese of Arlington

2012-04-18
(ARLINGTON, VA) – Rev. Terry W. Specht, a priest of the Diocese of Arlington, has been placed on administrative leave pending investigation of an allegation of sexual misconduct involving a male minor in the late 1990s. The investigation is in its initial phase, and no final determination has yet been made regarding the allegation.

Rev. Specht denies the accusation. The Diocese of Arlington has received no other allegations of misconduct against Rev. Specht. Like all priests, diocesan employees and volunteers who work with children, he underwent an official background check early in his tenure.

Pursuant to the Diocese of Arlington’s child protection policy, the Fairfax County Police Department was notified when the diocese received the allegation, and the diocese is cooperating fully with law enforcement.

The majority lay-person Diocesan Review Board, which advises Arlington Bishop Paul S. Loverde and reviews allegations of sexual abuse of minors by clerics, has been advised of the allegation and will continue to review the information that is gathered during the investigation. Under diocesan policy, any priest with an allegation of abuse or misconduct with a minor that reaches a final determination of credibility is permanently removed from ministry.

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ARLINGTON (VA)
WJLA

A priest of the Diocese of Arlington has been placed on leave while allegations of a sexual relationship between him and a boy are investigated, the church said Wednesday.

The investigation into the relationship between Rev. Terry W. Specht and a male minor is in its initial phase, the diocese says.

Specht denies all accusations. It is the only one levied against the priest.

Church officials say that Specht undertook and passed a background check early in his tenure. The abuse is alleged to have taken place in the late 1990s.

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VIRGINIA
Washington Post

By Michelle Boorstein, Wednesday, April 18, 3:13 PM

The priest who until last year headed the Arlington Catholic diocese’s office responsible for protecting children from sexual abuse was placed on administrative leave Wednesday while he is investigated for alleged sexual misconduct with a youth.

The Rev. Terry W. Specht, a prominent priest in the diocese that oversees Northern Virginia, denies the allegation of misconduct involving a male minor in the late 1990s. Specht was a parochial vicar at St. Mary of Sorrows Church in Fairfax at the time.

Specht was director from 2004 to 2011 of the Office of Child Protection and Safety, which handles outreach to child abuse victims, training on abuse for church employees and volunteers and monitoring of youth activities “to ensure that all contact with young people is appropriate,” its Web site says.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Service

By Francis X. Rocca
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Citing “serious doctrinal problems which affect many in consecrated life,” the Vatican announced a major reform of an association of women’s religious congregations in the U.S. to ensure their fidelity to Catholic teaching in areas including abortion, euthanasia, women’s ordination and homosexuality.

Archbishop J. Peter Sartain of Seattle will provide “review, guidance and approval, where necessary, of the work” of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, the Vatican announced April 18. The archbishop will be assisted by Bishop Leonard P. Blair of Toledo, Ohio, and Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Ill., and draw on the advice of fellow bishops, women religious and other experts.

The LCWR, a Maryland-based umbrella group that claims about 1,500 leaders of U.S. women’s communities as members, represents about 80 percent of the country’s 57,000 women religious.

The announcement from the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith came in an eight-page “doctrinal assessment,” based on an investigation that Bishop Blair began on behalf of the Vatican in April 2008. That investigation led the doctrinal congregation to conclude, in January 2011, that “the current doctrinal and pastoral situation of LCWR is grave and a matter of serious concern, also given the influence the LCWR exercises on religious congregation in other parts of the world.”

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VATICAN CITY
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith

Statement of Cardinal William Levada, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on the doctrinal Assessment of the LCWR

The findings of the doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) released today by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith are aimed at fostering a patient and collaborative renewal of this conference of major superiors in order to provide a stronger doctrinal foundation for its many laudable initiatives and activities.

The first step in the implementation of the findings of the doctrinal Assessment consists, therefore, in a personal meeting between the Superiors of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and the Officers of the LCWR. Such a personal encounter allows for the opportunity to review the document together in a spirit of mutual respect and collaboration, hopefully thereby avoiding possible misunderstandings of the document’s intent and scope. In this sense, I also express my gratitude to the Officers of the LCWR for their openness and participation in the doctrinal Assessment since 2008 when I first communicated to them the
Congregation’s intention to undertake this project.

In his Apostolic Letter Porta Fidei announcing the Year of Faith which will begin in October, 2012, Pope Benedict XVI reminds us that it is the Church’s faith that sustains and animates Christian life and witness: “The renewal of the Church is also achieved through the witness offered by the lives of believers: by their very existence in the world, Christians are called to radiate the word of truth that the Lord Jesus has left us.”1 This is all the more true for those who offer the Church and the world the most eloquent witness of religious consecration.

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VATICAN CITY
Congregation for the Doctine of the Faith

Doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious

I. Introduction
The context in which the current doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious in the United States of America is best situated is articulated by Pope
John Paul II in the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Vita consecrata of 1996.

Commenting on the genius of the charism of religious life in the Church, Pope John Paul says: “In founders and foundresses we see a constant and lively sense of the Church, which
they manifest by their full participation in all aspects of the Church’s life, and in their ready obedience to the Bishops and especially to the Roman Pontiff. Against this background of
love towards Holy Church ‘the pillar and bulwark of truth’ (1 Tim 3:15), we readily understand…the full ecclesial communion which the Saints, founders and foundresses, have
shared in diverse and often difficult times and circumstances. They are examples which consecrated persons need constantly to recall if they are to resist the particularly strong centrifugal and disruptive forces at work today. A distinctive aspect of ecclesial communion
is allegiance of mind and heart to the Magisterium of the Bishops, an allegiance which must
be lived honestly and clearly testified to before the People of God by all consecrated persons,
especially those involved in theological research, teaching, publishing, catechesis and the use
of the means of social communication. Because consecrated persons have a special place in
the Church, their attitude in this regard is of immense importance for the whole People of
God” (n. 46).

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UNITED STATES
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops

April 18, 2012

WASHINGTON—The Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has called for reform of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) and named Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle as its Archbishop Delegate for the initiative.Bishop Leonard Blair and Bishop Thomas John Paprocki also were also named to assist in this effort.

The CDF outlined the call in a “Doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious” (http://www.usccb.org/loader.cfm?csModule=security/getfile&pageid=55544), released April 18. The document outlines findings of the 2008 CDF-initiated doctrinal assessment of LCWR, conducted by Bishop Leonard Blair of Toledo, Ohio, which included his findings and an LCWR response submitted at the end of 2009, as well as a subsequent report from Bishop Blair in 2010.

A statement by Cardinal William Levada, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, is also available at

http://www.usccb.org/loader.cfm?csModule=security/getfile&pageid=55673

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Jamie L Manson on Apr. 18, 2012 NCR Today

The Vatican investigation into U.S. women religious, which began in 2009, is finally bearing its first toxic fruit.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops announced Wednesday it has named Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain to lead a five-year reform of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR). The reforms include a revision of the LCWR’s statutes, a review of its programs (including, in all likelihood, Vatican approval of topics and speakers at their annual general assembly) and reviews of their liturgical norms and relationship with NETWORK, a Catholic social justice lobby.

Sartain has made headlines in recent months for his recommendation that parishes in his diocese collect signatures for petitions supporting Washington state’s referendum against same-sex marriage.

This “doctrinal assessment” has been initiated by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Their greatest concern about LCWR’s programming? You guessed it: They’re not explicitly anti-gay and anti-women’s ordination. The USCCB’s press release states:

“CDF said that the documentation ‘reveals that, while there has been a great deal of work on the part of LCWR promoting issues of social justice in harmony with the Church’s social doctrine, it is silent on the right to life from conception to natural death, a question that is part of the lively public debate about abortion and euthanasia in the United States. Further, issues of crucial importance in the life of the Church and society, such as the Church’s Biblical view of family life and human sexuality, are not part of the LCWR agenda in a way that promotes Church teaching. Moreover, occasional public statements by the LCWR that disagree with or challenge positions taken by the Bishops, who are the Church’s authentic teachers of faith and morals, are not compatible with its purpose.'”

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UNITED STATES
The Sacramento Bee

By RACHEL ZOLL
AP Religion Writer

Published: Wednesday, Apr. 18, 2012

The Vatican’s orthodoxy watchdog announced Wednesday a full-scale overhaul of a group representing most U.S. nuns and named an American archbishop to oversee the reform.

The Vatican agency cited the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, the largest umbrella group for Roman Catholic religious sisters in the United States, for using materials that “do not promote church teaching” on family life and sexuality, for sometimes taking positions in opposition to the nation’s bishops and for being “silent on the right to life from conception to natural death, a question that is part of the lively public debate about abortion and euthanasia in the United States.”

Representatives for the women’s group, based in Silver Spring, Md., did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Seattle Archbishop Peter Sartain will manage the five-year reform, which will include rewriting the group’s statutes, reviewing all its plans and programs – including approving speakers – and ensuring the group properly follows Catholic prayer and ritual.

The report specifically cites a social justice group associated with the conference called NETWORK, which played a key role in supporting the Obama administration’s health care overhaul despite the bishops’ objections. The announcement Wednesday made no direct mention of President Barack Obama’s health care law, but said Sartain will review the Leadership Conference’s ties with NETWORK.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WTRF

By Amy Wadas

According to KYW-TV in Philadelphia, the Bishop of the Wheeling-Charleston Diocese, Michael J. Bransfield, is being accused of being linked to an alleged predator priest and child abuse in the early 1980’s.

A witness brought this all out in the open in a Philadelphia courtroom. He told a jury he was raped by Father Stanley Gana.

KYW reports that the witness testified that Gana put him on the phone with then Father Michael J. Bransfield, who allegedly said he was going to have the boy sent to him.

The Philadelphia Inquirer also reports that another witness told the jury on Wednesday, that Bransfield actually had sex with teenage boys. That witness told the judge that Bransfield brought multiple boys to a farm where Gana allegedly raped them.

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PHILADLEPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By Joseph A. Slobodzian
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

A Philadelphia man told a jury today that the Archdiocese of Philadelphia priest who allegedly sexually abused him for years starting the late 1970s had said a colleague who is now a bishop in West Virginia also had sex with teenage boys.

The 48-year-old witness, identified only as “John” in the 2005 report of the Philadelphia County grand jury, described a meeting one summer in high school where he spent summers at the Rev. Stanley Gana’s 110-acre farm in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

He said he was building a flagstone wall when a car pulled up driven by then-Rev. Michael J. Bransfield and containing several teenage boys.

Bransfield is now bishop of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

“They’re his fair-haired boys,” the witness said Gana told him after the brief visit ended. “The one in the front seat he is having sex with.”

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UNITED STATES
The Garden of Roses: Stories of Abuse and Healing

Virginia Jones

I have been holding back, but I decided to give into the temptation to write about my favorite celebrity, as well as my daughter, who inspires me in so many ways.

My daughter discovered the world of K-Pop (Korean popular music) last summer and ever since then has been obsessed with the Korean boy band, Big Bang. The band recently won the award Best Worldwide Act at MTV’s European Music Awards.

During the televised interviews before the awards ceremony, they briefly hung out with American singer, Katy Perry, who towered over them in her high heels. G-Dragon, the Big Bang lead singer, is about 5’7” or 5’8” without heels.

I saw that interview they did with Katy Perry a dozen times or so because my daughter is a fan of both Katy Perry and Big Bang, and she watches every interview with Big Bang available on the internet several times over.

Katy Perry said to Big Bang, “You boys are so cute.”

Apparently there is a subculture of Big Bang “Fan Girls” in the US.

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ROM
Nachrichten (Osterreich)

ROM. Eine Aussprache mit dem Papst wird Helmut Schüller, Sprecher der reformorientierten Pfarrer-Initiative, wohl so bald nicht haben. Denn seine Hoffnung, nach der Erwähnung des „Aufrufs zum Ungehorsam“ am Gründonnerstag durch den Papst einen direkten Kontakt zu Benedikt XVI. zu bekommen, wird von Insidern in Rom als unbegründet gesehen.

Auch die jüngste Kritik an der Pfarrer-Initiative von Kurienkardinal Kurt Koch ändert daran nichts.

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OSTERREICH
der Standard

Kolumne | Hans Rauscher, 17. April 2012

Über “Realitätsverlust” in der Kirchenführung

Unter der großen Halle des Petersdoms in Rom befindet sich das Grab des Apostels Petrus, umgeben von den Grabstätten etlicher Päpste und einer Reihe von Kapellen. Eine solche unterirdische Kapelle wählte der steirische Diözesanbischof Egon Kapellari, zugleich Medienbischof, um in einer Frühmesse in der Predigt vor Teilnehmern einer Informationsreise in den Vatikan, auch die Situation der österreichischen Kirche klar anzusprechen: “Wir sind gefährdet. Wir werden weniger und es besteht die Gefahr einer Implosion. Wir dürfen aber weder depressiv werden, noch aggressiv – im Sinne eines Rückzugs auf eine stolze, kleine Elite”.

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OSTERREICH
tagblatt

Wien/Rom Der Schweizer Herbert-Haag-Stiftung ist die rebellische österreichische Pfarrer-Initiative eine Auszeichnung wert. Papst Benedikt XVI. bedenkt die 400 Pfarrer, die sich seit dem vergangenen Juni dem “Aufruf zum Ungehorsam” angeschlossen haben, in der Karwoche dagegen mit Tadel: Die aufmüpfigen Geistlichen, die weder im Zwangszölibat noch im Predigtverbot für Laien einen tiefen Sinn erkennen mögen, versuchten die Kirche nach ihren Ideen auszurichten, so die Kritik aus Rom. Vorwurfsvolle Fragen gibt der Pontifex den reformwilligen Geistlichen auf den Weg. Doch ob er auch die Antworten hören will?

Anfragen für einen Austausch prallen seit Jahren an der Kirchenleitung ab. Nicht Sprechen sei das Gebot der Stunde, sondern Gehorsamkeit gegenüber Rom, betonen österreichische Bischöfe, zuletzt Egon Kapellari aus Graz.

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NEDERLAND
NRC Handelsblad

door Joep Dohmen

De Rooms-Katholieke Kerk heeft in de jaren vijftig en zestig bij chirurgen aangedrongen op castratie van om homoseksuele jongens en mannen. Dat blijkt uit verklaringen van wetenschappers die vanmorgen gehoord zijn door de Tweede Kamer.

Hoogleraar medische geschiedenis Mart van Lieburg meldde dat hij met twee chirurgen had gesproken. Zij bevestigden dat ze van een bisschop rechtstreeks opdrachten tot castratie kregen. Om welke bisschop het gaat zei Van Lieburg niet. Na afloop van de hoorzitting nuanceerde Van Lieburg zijn verklaring: “Ik sprak met twee chirurgen. Van een van hen hoorde ik dat de bisschop, die overigens nog leeft, had aangedrongen op castratie van een homoseksuele man.”

Historicus Marnix Koolhaas meldde dat ook pastoors die als biechtvader optraden, homoseksuele jongens rechtstreeks doorverwezen naar chirurgen. Om welke aantallen het gaat, weet Koolhaas niet. “Maar het kan een praktijk zijn geweest die niet ongebruikelijk was”, aldus Koolhaas.

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CALIFORNIA
OpEd News

By
Joey Piscitelli

The credibility of a “repressed memory” case of child sex abuse has been an ongoing dispute in legal and psychological arenas for decades. But currently the issue is being tackled in a Superior Court in Lodi , California. The victim, a 37 year old man who has regained his memory of his child sex abuse at Cathedral of the Annunciation in the 1980’s, is prevailing in a major court trial that will have far reaching impact. The victim claims he was repeatedly abused by Fr. Michael Kelly; who has been kept in ministry clear up to the day of the recent court jury verdict against him.

The case, John TZ Doe vs. Fr. Kelly and the Diocese of Stockton, has gone through the first of two phases of the judicial system. The first phase of the case was a jury trial which heard evidence from the plaintiff, defendant, witnesses and experts; and that jury was to decide if the plaintiffs recall of past repressed memories was accurate, and credible.

The ten woman, two man jury found the defendant Fr. Kelly liable on multiple counts of assault and sexual abuse, based on the victim’s testimony of his recovered memories.

Although Fr. Kelly can not be convicted criminally for the sexual assault, because of the criminal statute of limitations, he was held civilly liable, which is governed by a different statute of limitations.

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ITALIA
la Repubblica

di BRUNO PERSANO

Un corso per prevenire la pedofilia, organizzato da sacerdoti e destinato a sacerdoti. A Savona, terra di Francesco Zanardi, leader del movimento contro la violenza dei religiosi sui bambini, il vescovo monsignor Vittorio Lupi ha inviato una lettera ai religiosi della sua diocesi perché partecipino al corso.

Dopo lo scandalo di don Seppia, che a Genova è accusato di abusi sessuali su minorenni, la Chiesa corre ai ripari.

Gli incontri offerti anche a chi, nella diocesi, fa attività di animatori o catechisti, serviranno per studiare il fenomeno dell’abuso sui minori, per comprenderne i contorni e le implicazioni. Tra i relatori, anche don Fortunato Di Noto sacerdote da tempo impegnato contro la pedofilia e nella tutela dell’infanzia in Italia e nel mondo, che parlerà della ‘Traccia educativa per una nuova pastorale di prossimità contro gli abusi’.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Barney Zwartz
April 19, 2012

SUICIDE among survivors of clergy abuse could rise sharply if the parliamentary inquiry announced on Tuesday is inadequate, victims spokeswoman Nicky Davis warned yesterday.

Many victims who rejoiced at Premier Ted Baillieu’s announcement that a parliamentary committee would examine the Catholic Church’s handling of abuse allegations have since resolved to keep fighting for a judicial inquiry.

Justice Bernard Teague, who chaired the last royal commission in Victoria, said a parliamentary inquiry could be fine if party politics were kept out, but Liberal MP David Southwick demanded that Labor member Frank McGuire step down from the committee.

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UNITED STATES
Jewish Journal

Posted by Naomi Pfefferman

In March, The Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival made headlines because its executive director, Hilary Helstein, had sent a negative e-mail to other festival directors about the documentary “Standing Silent,” which shines a light on sexual abuse by rabbis within the Orthodox community. Controversy erupted when Helstein’s Sept. 6 e-mail was made public, revealing that she had described the film, as seen by her team, as a “witch hunt” and put a “warning sticker” on it for other festivals.

The film’s producer and director, Scott Rosenfelt (“Home Alone,” “Mystic Pizza”), told The Journal he was livid when he learned about Helstein’s missive just before a “Standing Silent” screening at the Hartford Jewish Film Festival on March 20. A moderator read Helstein’s letter aloud to the audience during the Q-and-A session, following which, Rosenfelt said, “The audience basically gasped.” “Standing Silent” has screened at more than 20 other Jewish films festivals and was profiled in a feature in the Washington Post.

In her e-mail, Helstein told her colleagues that her team had “flat out” rejected the film: “We have a fairly conservative community in L.A. and … our committee felt with a community that reveres it’s [sic] rabbis this was not something they wanted to show.” Helstein went on to say: “I just wanted to put a warning sticker on this one so that you are aware.”

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CHILE
La Segunda

Víctimas de Karadima le responden a arzobispo Ezzati: “Los casos de abuso sexual no se superan con una declaración”

A través de una carta abierta, Murillo, Hamilton y Cruz le piden a la Iglesia chilena que colabore con “justicia y actos de reparación”. “Estamos en contacto con otras víctimas de abuso sexual por parte del clero, pues se han sentido abandonadas por la Iglesia, agudizando su herida y trauma”.

miércoles, 18 de abril de 2012 / Miguel Ortiz, La Segunda.

Al inaugurar, este lunes, la versión número 103 de la Asamblea Plenaria del Episcopado, en Punta de Tralca, el obispo sostuvo que el caso Karadima “es un tema cerrado”. Esto, tras su decisión de disolver la Pía Unión Sacerdotal del Sagrado Corazón, que fuera encabezada por el ex párroco de El Bosque, Fernando Karadima, condenado por el Vaticano por abusos sexuales contra menores.

Lo dicho por la autoridad eclesiástica generó inmediata reacción en el filósofo José Andrés Murillo , el médico James Hamilton y el periodista Juan Carlos Cruz , tres de los cuatro denunciantes de Karadima -Fernando Batlle no firma el documento-, quienes, a través de una carta abierta que hicieron llegar a “La Segunda”, respondieron a Ezzati.

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STOCKTON (CA)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 17, 2012

Cardinal Roger Mahony and his former second-in-command are refusing to show up for a clergy sex abuse and cover up trial happening now in Stockton.

Mahony and his former vicar general, now-retired Msgr. James Cain, have been subpoenaed to appear as witnesses in a civil trial. Mahony now claims he’s traveling to Rome. Cain was to appear last week, but for eight weeks, he has refused (and is still refusing) to produce a doctor’s note excusing him.

Mahony was Bishop of Stockton from 1980-1985. Cain was likely Mahony’s right hand man there for at least five years.

Late yesterday, Manly filed an order to show cause as to why Mahony shouldn’t be found in contempt.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

It’s to the credit of the U.S. Catholic bishops that they have issued several mild statements about the moral shortcomings of the Paul Ryan budget. This is in keeping with a rather predictable game the USCCB has played for some years now. Here’s the game: as a first step, when an election approaches, the members of the USCCB give every outward appearance and every strong sign possible of anointing the GOP as God’s own party.

Then having done their utmost to assure that “real” Catholics will cast their votes for God’s party and that the deck of public Catholic conversation will be strongly stacked in favor of the GOP as God’s party, they make a few ineffectual whispers in the direction of support for Catholic social teaching–whispers that mean absolutely nothing in light of their overweening endorsement of a political party that has no vital connection at all to this social teaching, but which, indeed, stands for its opposite.

I have long since grown disenchanted with this game, and with the dishonesty of Catholic centrists who continue to act as cheerleaders for the bishops, as they issue statements to which the bishops know perfectly well no one will listen, since what they whisper has already been effectively drowned out by their loud, coarse, and persistent pro-Republican proclamations. …

As for the claim that the U.S. Catholic bishops stand pre-eminently with the weak and vulnerable, I’ll keep thinking about that claim as I continue reading the stories coming out of the trials of Bishop Finn in Kansas City and of Monsignor Lynn in Philadelphia. For my money, you can’t get more weak and vulnerable than a child coerced by an adult into unwanted sexual activity.

And if the bishops’ response to those children has been a demonstration of their concern for the weak and vulnerable, then my understanding of terms like “concern,” “compassion,” and “weak and vulnerable” must be upside down.

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UNITED STATES
Steve Julian

I attended an all boys’ Catholic high school in the mid 1970s, but never was sexually abused by a priest. Not even approached. Nor did anything bad happen to me at the Lutheran parochial schools I attended from K-8 although, looking back, I find it peculiar we boys, and our two pastors, swam naked at the Y for two years.

In early 2011 I learned that my high school principal, a Catholic priest, had admitted in the mid 1990s to a sexual relationship with an underage female student of his a decade before I knew him. This news appeared online, created a hubbub among the Facebook group of ’76 grads, and triggered my play Altarcations.

I began writing it over a year ago. It has been through several iterations and even more working titles. Thanks to information I obtained through SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, and the smart people in the Ensemble Studio Theatre’s Playwrights Unit in Atwater Village, it is now presentable. And I believe it’s an important story to tell – stories, actually.

When I was a police officer in the 1980s, a new spousal abuse law took effect and, because of my keen interest in it, I was tasked with writing the department’s policy on handling domestic violence matters. It changed how cops dealt with victims and the people who beat them.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

[with video]

Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has embraced the Victorian Government’s parliamentary inquiry into clergy abuse, but has warned against singling out the Catholic Church.

Victorian Premier Ted Baillieu yesterday announced an inquiry would be held after a police report uncovered dozens of suicides linked to child abuse by Catholic clergy.

Mr Abbott says child abuse is “a terrible blot on society” that has to be eliminated but the blame should not be solely directed at the church.

“There has been a lot of pretty gruesome behaviour in many institutions over the years and we should be careful not to single out particular institutions, given that a lot of this has been or it was pandemic a generation ago,” he said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

April 19, 2012
Opinion

Josh Gordon

ALL those expecting Parliament’s six-member family and community development committee to exhaustively investigate the sexual abuse of children in Victoria by members of the Catholic clergy are going to be disappointed.

It may be the first time such an inquiry has been announced in Australia. It may go some distance towards exposing the horrors of abuse. And it may provide victims with a level of comfort.

But the investigation – by a relatively inexperienced committee already working on two other inquiries and which has been given just 12 months to report back – is unlikely to result in fresh prosecutions or pave the way for financial restitution as the nine-year Ryan inquiry did in Ireland.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

Esther Han
April 19, 2012

THE NSW Greens and advocacy groups for victims of sexual abuse are demanding a state parliamentary inquiry into sex assaults in religious organisations, comparable to the one announced by the Victorian government this week.

THE NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge implored the O’Farrell government to recognise that sexual abuse was rampant outside Victoria and needed the same scrutiny.

“It’s the only way to address an appalling history of sexual abuse,” he said. “Openness and honesty is the only way both the church and survivors can recover.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

From:The Australian
April 19, 2012

THE goal of Victoria’s parliamentary inquiry into the handling of child sex abuse by religious and other non-government organisations is not to dwell on the past but to protect children in future.

Its powers are extensive, including the ability to compel witnesses to give evidence and to summon documents.

Hopefully, as Premier Ted Baillieu said, the fact that it will be less formal than a royal commission will enable those giving evidence to do so without lawyers. Its terms of reference are well-drawn, focusing on practices and protocols for handling abuse allegations and whether more encouragement is needed to report allegations.

The inquiry will determine, for example, whether the arms-length process set up in Melbourne by the Catholic Church in 1996 and run by an independent QC, which is regarded by some victims’ groups as “the best of a bad lot”, is effective. The Towards Healing process that applies in Victorian dioceses outside Melbourne will also come under scrutiny, as will those operated by other denominations and organisations. Melbourne’s Catholic Archbishop, Denis Hart, has pledged to co-operate fully with the inquiry, as should the leaders of other churches and organisations.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

John Ferguson, Victorian political editor
From:The Australian
April 19, 201212:00AM

TONY Abbott has thrown his weight behind the controversial inquiry into child abuse by religious and community organisations in Victoria but warned against singling out institutions such as the Catholic Church.

The Opposition Leader also backed mandatory reporting of child sex offenders, saying yesterday that instances of criminality should be reported to police.

Without naming the Catholic Church, Mr Abbott counselled against attacking “particular institutions” on the grounds that abuse was not isolated to one faith or entity.

He said Victorian Premier Ted Baillieu deserved support for instituting a parliamentary inquiry, which would report within a year into the way church and other community organisations had handled child sex abuse allegations.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Martin McKenzie-Murray
April 19, 2012
Opinion

IN EARLY February this year, leaders of the Catholic Church met in Rome for a symposium on sexual abuse. Called “Towards Healing and Renewal”, the event was intended to help the church prevent further abuses, find ”the best ways to help victims and protect children” and ultimately eliminate abuse from the priesthood.

There lies the problem. The church and the state – in any country you care to name – have different ideas about the “best way” to prevent and report abuse. While February’s symposium repeated the Vatican’s guidelines from last year on co-operation with civil law, the 2011 suggestions were not binding in church law.

The year before, in 2010, the Vatican artificially tweaked its internal laws on punishing abusive priests. But in a document codifying this, the gesture was hopelessly marred by listing the ordination of women as comparably offensive as child abuse. Sceptics are right to doubt the efficacy of internal processes in an organisation that rates the extension of equal opportunity alongside the rape of children.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — As the trial of a Philadelphia monsignor and a priest accused of child sex abuse and cover-ups moves forward, a second man testified Wednesday he was part of a rotation of boys repeatedly abused by a local priest in the late ’70s and early ’80s.

This man, now 48, told the jury he was referred to Father Stanley Gana — later accused of abuse but never charged — after being sexually abused by a family friend.

The alleged victim says the hugging, kissing, and touching began almost immediately, and he was eventually assigned a certain night for sex, in a rotation with other boys (see related story).

And when, in 1995, he finally went to Msgr. William Lynn (who is now on trial) and reported the alleged abuse by Father Gana, he says he sensed a cover-up.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Mercury

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A witness in a Philadelphia clergy-abuse trial says he has “an emptiness where my soul should be” after being raped for years by a now-defrocked priest.

The 48-year-old man says Stanley Gana rotated teen victims each night at his Scranton-area farmhouse, and abused him on trips to Disney World, Niagara Falls and the University of Notre Dame.

He went to the Philadelphia archdiocese in his 30s to seek counseling, money and a meeting with Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua. He thought the cardinal should know what was going on.

The witness says he didn’t get his meeting for five years, and he came to believe the cardinal “was the ringleader” of the sex-abuse scandal.

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NEDERLAND
West

REGIO – Bij het bisdom Rotterdam, waaronder ook Den Haag valt, zijn bijna duizend klachten binnengekomen over trage reacties op het seksueel misbruik in de kerk. Een woordvoerder van het bisdom zei dat tijdens een hoorzitting in de Tweede Kamer.

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OOSTENRIJK
RKnieuws (Nederland)

WENEN (RKnieuws.net) – Een commissie bijeengeroepen door de Oostenrijkse katholieke Kerk gaat acht miljoen euro aan financiële hulp toekennen aan slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik en mishandeling binnen de katholieke instellingen van het land.

De commissie onderzocht sinds eind maart 2010 zo’n 702 gevallen. Ze werd opgericht na een reeks beschuldigingen tegen priesters over feiten die zich meestal afspeelden tussen 1960 en 1980. In 613 gevallen werd een positieve beslissing genomen.

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OOSTENRIJK
De Redactie (Belgie)

In Oostenrijk gaat de katholieke kerk acht miljoen euro schadevergoeding betalen aan slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik en mishandeling binnen katholieke instellingen in het land.

De kerk had in 2010 een commissie opgericht na een reeks beschuldigingen tegen priesters over feiten die zich meestal afspeelden tussen 1960 en 1980.

De commissie heeft 702 gevallen onderzocht. In 613 gevallen werd een positieve beslissing genomen. De slachtoffers zullen financiële hulp krijgen en therapiesessies. De vergoedingen zullen komen uit een schadevergoedingsfonds dat werd opgestart door de kerk.

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GARFIELD (PA)
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

By Michael Hasch, PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The pastor of St. Lawrence O’Toole parish in Garfield has been placed on administrative leave while the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh investigates allegations that he molested a child about 40 years ago.

Officials last week “received a very serious allegation” against the Rev. James Graham, 72, according to a letter from Bishop David A. Zubik that was read to parishioners at weekend Masses.

“The allegations against Father Graham involved a minor a number of years ago,” Zubik wrote.

“The allegation has been judged to have what we describe as a ‘semblance of truth’ — that the timing and circumstances surrounding the allegation fit the facts that are known,” the letter states. “It does not mean, however, that a definite judgment has been reached.”

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CANADA
The Chronicle-Herald

The former executive director of Talbot House says that while he is “pleased and relieved” that allegations against him have been resolved, he is taking personal time for recovery.

In a statement released Tuesday, Father Paul Abbass said he is thankful for the support he received during what he called “an intensely difficult and challenging period.”

Allegations of inappropriate behaviour with residents of Talbot House surfaced several months ago. A police investigation concluded there was no basis to pursue the matter.

Talbot House was later the subject of an organizational review by the province, and since then, the facility has closed. Abbass expressed disappointment with the way the review was conducted and sadness about the closure.

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MALTA
Times of Malta

An appeals court this morning dismissed an appeal which was filed by the Attorney General after a defrocked priest was cleared of rape because of an error in the charge sheet about where the act took place.

The mistake had emerged during the proceedings against three priests. A victim testified he had been raped at the St Joseph Home in Ħamrun when the charge gave the location of the crime as having been a home in Marfa.

The former priest, Godwin Scerri, was convicted of abusing boys about 20 years ago and jailed for five years. He was, however, acquitted of the rape charge.

A second former priest, Carmel Pulis, received a six-year jail sentence for also abusing boys. A third member of the same Order, Brother Joseph Bonnett, who had been facing the same charges, passed away during the proceedings. The priests have filed an appeal.

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MALTA
Malta Today

Jurgen Balzan

The court of criminal appeal has this morning thrown out a request by the Attorney General to have Godwin Scerri – jailed for five years for abusing boys – be also found guilty of rape, after it a technical error was discovered in the original charge sheet which showed a crime happening in a place when in actual fact it had happened in another.

The court upheld the objections raised by defence counsel Giannella de Marco who argued through case law, that the prosecution had “ample time” to correct its own mistake on the charge sheet, but did not.

Explaining his decision not to uphold the prosecution’s request, Judge David Scicluna, said the mistake was evident early in the court proceedings and argued that the prosecution had enough time to correct it, but had failed to do so.

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IRELAND
Irish Central

By
PATRICK COUNIHAN,
IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Wednesday, April 18, 2012, 7:22 AM

An Irish priest found guilty of child abuse in California has fled home to his family in Ireland – and continued to plead his innocence.

Fr Michael Kelly has absconded after a civil jury in Stockton, Southern California, ruled that he had molested a young boy.

Bishop of Stockton Stephen Blaire has now appealed to the Tipperary native to return to America and ‘see his trial through’.

The Stockton jury ruled unanimously that an unnamed man was molested by Fr Kelly when he was a boy.

The 62-year-old priest was immediately removed from his ministry but denied the allegations while admitting that the jury verdict had to be ‘respected’.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WTRF

By Ashley Mullins

PHILADELPHIA, PA (AP) –
An aide to Bishop Michael Bransfield of the Wheeling-Charleston Diocese is being asked to testify in a clergy-abuse case.

According to the Associated Press, Philadelphia prosecutors say they’re having trouble getting Monsignor Kevin Quirk to testify in the criminal court case of Rev. James Brennan who faces sexual-assault charges. Quirk was a judge at the church’s in-house trial of that case.

Quirk had agreed to testify, but said he had to notify Bransfield. The report states that since then, the process has stalled.

Common Pleas Judge M. Teresa Sarmina has agreed to take it up with court officials in Wheeling.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Testimony and argument in the clergy abuse case allegedly link bishop Michael Bransfield, of the Wheeling-Charleston West Virginia diocese, to an alleged predator priest and child abuse in the early 1980’s.

A witness, who says he was raped by a Father Stanley Gana, has testified that Gana put him on the phone with then Father Michael Bransfield, who allegedly said he was going to have the boy sent to him.

And the prosecutor has told the judge another witness is expected to testify Wednesday that Bransfield also brought boys to an infamous farm where Gana allegedly raped multiple boys. And the prosecutor says they have been notified of another incident of fondling by Bransfield.

Neither Gana nor Bishop Bransfield has been charged. And the Wheeling-Charleston diocese has issued a statement saying they don’t react to rumor and stories and it goes on to say, in part, the trial appears to be evolving into a circus, and they, the prosecutors want to smear individuals not on trial, anything to bolster their persecution of the church.

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UNITED STATES/IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests

An open letter to:

The Association of Catholic Priests of Ireland

On April 14th,some of our Association of Pittsburgh Priests members distributed leafletsquoting Vatican II documentation to an assembly of “Catholic Men”concerned about the so-called threats to Religious Liberty in the USA. We were reminded that the eminent theologian, American John Courtney Murray,S.J. author of the Council’s document on Religious Freedom, was himself censored prior to that history-altering Ecumenical Council.

With this historic reminder before us, we congratulate the Association of Catholic Priests of Ireland and Fr.Tony Flannery and his Religious Congregation, publishers of REALITY magazine, for their serene response to censorship and silencing.

If REALITY magazine must paythe price by its being censored, it’s the seed that might die so that a new reality for the IrishChurch and the World, English-speaking Catholic Church can take on new life.

We are indeed indebted to Father Flannery and your Association for your website, www.associationofcatholicpriests.ieby through which we are kept informed, and for being a remarkable and lively media contribution to Church Renewal.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY

OPINION: TOMORROW is the seventh anniversary of the election of Pope Benedict XVI on April 19th, 2005. The scenes on St Peter’s Square that afternoon illustrated what this divisive figure has meant for his church.

Middle-aged and older people were crestfallen. A man sat at one of the great fountains in the square and wept openly. Around him danced seminarians from the North American College.

Well-scrubbed and in cassocks, they could not contain their glee. “Benedicto, Benedicto, Benedicto,” they shouted. “It’s a regular party,” a seminarian from Pittsburg told this reporter.

For them, the election of John Paul II’s enforcer as pope represented the final defeat of that liberal Catholicism ushered in following Vatican II which they and their mentors see as at the root of all that is wrong in the church today. The rigid certainties enforced by the new pope had so much more appeal for them than the porous, inclusive Catholicism of the previous generation.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY, Religious Affairs Correspondent

THE VATICAN is an “ever-present elephant in the room” for those within the Catholic Church who wish to discuss reform, a priest silenced by the Vatican has said.

He said: “It would appear that we are returning to an authoritarian era where the church will meet its problems, not by discussion and open investigation but by decree. Fr Tony Flannery is the latest to learn this lesson.”

The Redemptorist priest Fr Flannery was silenced by the Vatican because of his views on contraception, celibacy and women’s ordination, and has been advised by Rome to go to a monastery for a period where he would “pray and reflect”.

It also instructed Fr Flannery and the editor of Reality magazine, Fr Gerard Moloney, to desist from publishing articles on these issues, and called on Fr Flannery to withdraw from the Association of Catholic Priests.

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CLEVELAND (OH)
Fox 8

[with video]

It’s a big day for area Catholics. A day years in the making.

Tuesday, Bishop Richard Lennon announced 12 Roman Catholic Churches will reopen.

They are the same churches whose closings were reversed by the Vatican last month.

“It is time for peace and unity in the Diocese of Cleveland. I will not appeal the decrees to the Apostolic Signatura. It would create more uncertainty and continue to divide our Catholic community,” said Bishop Lennon.

Bishop Lennon had the option to appeal the Vatican’s ruling but chose not to after much thoughtful prayer during the Easter Holiday.

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CLEVELAND (OH)
National Catholic Reporter

by Brian Roewe on Apr. 17, 2012 NCR Today

Bishop Richard G. Lennon of the Cleveland diocese has announced he will not appeal the Congregation for the Clergy’s ruling in favor of 12 parishioner groups who appealed to the Vatican to keep their churches open and parishes intact.

“During these Easter days, I often think of Jesus’ first words as he appeared to the apostles after rising from the dead: Peace be with you. I now say, it’s time for peace and unity in the diocese of Cleveland,” said Lennon at a press conference this morning.

“I will not appeal the decrees to the Apostolic Signatura. Doing so would prolong the process for a number of years and would create more uncertainty and continue to divide our Catholic community. Therefore, I will move forward and carry out the Congregation for the Clergy’s directives regarding the parishes in an orderly manner,” he said.

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CLEVELAND (OH)
newsnet5

[with video]

• By: Deb Lee, newsnet5.com

CLEVELAND – A candlelight prayer service was held Tuesday night on the steps of St. Wendelin Church, one of 12 closed Catholic churches that will soon reopen.

Bishop Richard Lennon said Tuesday that he will not appeal the decrees that reversed his closing of the churches.

“It’s time for peace and unity in the Diocese of Cleveland,” he said.

Parishioners from St. Wendelin were joined by members of other closed parishes who also fought to keep their church doors open.

“We’re all Catholics and we have to stick up for each other,” St. Casimir parishioner Joe Feckanin said. “We’re all part of the same body and when one of us is hurt, all of us are hurt.”

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CLEVELAND (OH)
The Plain Dealer

By The Plain Dealer Editorial Board

Cleveland Bishop Richard Lennon’s decision to reopen 12 churches from inner- city Cleveland to Akron and Lorain is a welcome move to help bring peace and reconciliation to a fractured diocese.

For the parishes that successfully appealed to Rome to reverse the loss of their churches, it brings closure and a chance to work with the bishop to heal their relationship and rebuild new faith communities.

Lennon deserves strong praise for choosing conciliation in response to last month’s extraordinary rebuke from the Vatican’s Congregation for the Clergy in Rome, declaring that Lennon failed to follow proper church law and procedures when he closed the 12 churches.

Those dozen parishes were among 50 churches the diocese closed in 2009 and 2010 in a reconfiguration of financial and human resources triggered by long outmigration from the city.

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CLEVELAND (OH)
WKSU

by WKSU’s KEVIN NIEDERMIER
and M.L. SCHULTZE

A dozen churches in the Cleveland Catholic diocese will be reopening. Bishop Richard Lennon announced at a press conference this morning that he will not appeal a rare Vatican decision overruling his decision to close those churches along with some three-dozen others.

The bishop of the Cleveland Catholic diocese is reopening a dozen churches he shut down over the past three years. But he says it could be months before some of those churches will hold services again.

Bishop Richard Lennon announced at a press conference this morning that he will not appeal a rare Vatican decision overruling his church closures.

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