ABUSE TRACKER

A digest of links to media coverage of clergy abuse. For recent coverage listed in this blog, read the full article in the newspaper or other media source by clicking “Read original article.” For earlier coverage, click the title to read the original article.

April 12, 2012

Kardinaal Simonis niet vervolgd voor meineed

NEDERLAND
Metro

Justitie heeft een aangifte van meineed tegen kardinaal Ad Simonis die een misbruikslachtoffer van de rooms-katholieke kerk eerder dit jaar heeft gedaan, geseponeerd. Volgens het Openbaar Ministerie in Middelburg is er onvoldoende aanleiding voor een verdenking, laat een woordvoerder woensdag weten.

Volgens de aangever heeft de kardinaal begin vorig jaar gelogen bij een verhoor in een rechtszaak over seksueel misbruik door de inmiddels overleden pater Jan N. De man, die bij de rechtszaak betrokken was omdat hij naar eigen zeggen zelf is misbruikt door N., stapte naar de politie naar aanleiding van het rapport van de commissie-Deetman.

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

‘Catholic Spring’ uprising prediction for Ireland over dissenting priest Father Flannery

IRELAND
Irish Central

By
JAMES O’SHEA,
IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Thursday, April 12, 2012

Several leading priests in Ireland are predicting a “Catholic Spring” as dissent against the Vatican decision to ban Father Tony Flannery grows.

The Daily Beast website has reported that leading priests now believe that the Vatican has gone too far in silencing Father Flannery who has been sent to a monastery to reflect on his actions.The Association of Catholic Priests which has 800 members has already come out strongly against the silencing.

Another leading priest Father Sean MacDonagh a founder of the ACP has now strongly criticised the Vatican move.

“It is a bit like Walmart, where you have the CEO in Rome and his people there decide on policy and then insist that the bishops, as branch managers, implement that policy,” he told the Irish Examiner.

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

Fellow priests support Galway Redemptorist silenced over stance on sex abuse scandal

IRELAND
The Connacht Tribune

April 12, 2012

by Bernie Ní Fhlatharta

Fellow members of the Association of Catholic Priests have voiced their solidarity with the Galway priest who has been silenced by the Vatican over his backing for the Taoiseach’s condemnation of the Church’s response to clerical sex abuse in Ireland.

Fr Tony Flannery, who is based in the Redemptorist Monastery in Esker, was silenced following his public support of Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s attack on rhe Vatican’s handling child sex abuse allegations. An Taoiseach, speaking in the Dáil earlier this year, called on the Catholic Church to apologise.

Fr Flannery who was also one of the founders of the Association of Catholic Priests, visited Rome two months ago to argue his case after he was censured by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, which ordered that he stop writing in the Redemptorist Order’s own magazine, Reality or on the Association’s website.

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

Vatican Silences Outspoken Irish Priest

IRELAND
Newser

By Rob Quinn, Newser Staff

Posted Apr 12, 2012

(Newser) – A popular Irish priest known for his liberal views has been told to shut up by church authorities, reports the Daily Beast. Father Tony Flannery, who has questioned the doctrine of celibacy, and said the priesthood should be opened up to women, has been told to stop writing about controversial subjects, and to spend the next six weeks in prayer and reflection at a monastery. His monthly column in a Catholic magazine has been axed on orders from the Vatican.

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

Priests in plummet as crisis looms

IRELAND
Kilkenny People

Published on Wednesday 11 April 2012

WITHIN ten years, a significant number of existing Catholic parishes in the Diocese of Ossory, will be without a full-time priest. Not so long ago, the diocese boasted 140 clerics and that number is now down to 65 and will shrink further with a number of senior clerics expected to step down in the next two years.

The lack of vocations is already beginning to bite with less Masses, especially in rural areas with only one person in the last seven years opting for life in the clergy

And the failure of the Vatican to appoint a new Bishop in the adjacent Diocese of Kildare and Leighlin has fuelled speculation that the current Bishop of Ossory, Dr Seamus Freeman will be asked to take over the diocese that includes Paulstown, Graignamanagh, all of Co Carlow, Co. Kildare and parts of Co. Offaly.

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

Davenport column: Church change is illusive

UNITED STATES
Jackson Sun

By Gene Davenport

In June of last year a group of approximately 300 Austrian priests published “Appeal to Disobedience,” a document in which they pledged to pray and work for several major reforms in the church. The number of signers now has been expanded by priests from other parts of the world.

The document was primarily the work of Father Helmut Schuller, at the time a chief aid to one of the Austrian bishops and one of the best known priests in Austria. Noting the serious decrease in the number of men entering the priesthood, the document set forth the signers’ pledges 1) to pray, at every ceremony, for church reform; 2) not to deny Holy Communion to “believers of good will” — even to non-Catholic Christians and to Catholics who have remarried outside the church; 3) to avoid offering Mass more than once on Sundays and holy days (primarily to avoid offering it at more than one church), but at churches not having a priest to have a “priestless Eucharistic celebration”; 4) to ignore the rule that only ordained clergy can deliver a homily (or a sermon); 5) to oppose the merger of parishes as a means of solving the shortage of priests, but to insist on parishes having their own leaders, whether male or female; and 6) “to use every opportunity to speak out openly” in favor of the admission of married men and of women to the priesthood.

In an interview with a Catholic magazine Schuller said that he had at one time hoped for changes in the Church in line with the work of Vatican Council II, but that now he fears the Church is in the hands of leaders who want it to “go backwards … and (be) a fortress against the world.”

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

Aangifte tegen Simonis geseponeerd

NEDERLAND
ED

MIDDELBURG – Het Openbaar Ministerie (OM) in Middelburg heeft een aangifte tegen kardinaal Ad Simonis wegens meineed geseponeerd. Een woordvoerster van het OM zei woensdag dat er onvoldoende aanleiding is voor een verdenking.

Een man die zegt dat hij is misbruikt door de vorig jaar overleden salesiaanse pater Jan N., stapte na publicatie van het onderzoek door Wim Deetman naar de politie. De man meent dat de kardinaal tijdens getuigenverhoor bij de rechtbank in Middelburg heeft gelogen toen hij zei dat hij niet wist over misbruik van kinderen door geestelijken.

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

Geen vervolging kardinaal Simonis

NEDERLAND
NOS

Het Openbaar Ministerie heeft een aangifte tegen kardinaal Simonis wegens meineed geseponeerd. “We hebben de aangifte nader bekeken en er is onvoldoende bewijs om Simonis te vervolgen”, zegt een woordvoerder van het OM.

Een slachtoffer van pastoor Jan N. in Rijswijk had aangifte gedaan tegen Simonis wegens meineed. De kardinaal zou volgens het slachtoffer vorig jaar hebben gelogen voor de rechtbank in Middelburg toen hij werd gehoord als getuige.

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

Mother Talks About Her Son’s Alleged Abuse At Priest Trial

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – A mother’s pain and allegedly mis-placed trust is detailed at the clergy abuse trial. The jury has now heard from the mother of a man, who testified last week that he was assaulted in 1996 during an overnight stay at a priest’s residence.

The witness has testified Father James Brennan was like a brother to her, uncle to her children. But things changed after that overnight incident. Her son would only say something weird happened. She and her husband confronted Father Brennan, who, she says, acknowledged something inappropriate happened, but said they had to talk to their son.

Father Brennan has pleaded not guilty.

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

The priest, the boy & that night

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

BY JOHN P. MARTIN & JOSEPH A. SLOBODZIAN
Inquirer Staff Writers

THE BUCKS COUNTY mother was perplexed.

Her 14-year-old son was visibly shaken after spending the night with the Rev. James Brennan in 1996, she said. The boy clung to his mother and refused to sleep alone in his bed. But he wouldn’t tell her what happened at the priest’s apartment, she said.

Brennan, an inspiring priest and friend so close she considered him a brother, was just as evasive when she and her husband pressed him days later for answers, she told a Common Pleas jury Wednesday.

“He said something inappropriate happened and it will never happen again,” she said.

Prosecutors called the woman in a bid to bolster their claim that Brennan tried to rape the teen. They say his co-defendant, Monsignor William J. Lynn, the former secretary for clergy for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, knew or had reason to suspect that Brennan would sexually abuse minors.

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

Cleric objects to Vatican’s ‘diktat culture’

IRELAND
Irish Examiner

By Dan Buckley

Thursday, April 12, 2012

A senior Irish cleric has launched a broadside at Pope Benedict XVI and his senior advisers, accusing them of attempting to row back on Catholic Church reforms initiated in the 1960s by Vatican II.

He said the Pope and his governing body, the Curia, was far too insistent on demanding unswerving obedience to the Holy See while stifling dialogue among the laity and the ministry.

“It is a bit like Walmart, where you have the CEO in Rome and his people there decide on policy and then insist that the bishops, as branch managers, implement that policy,” said Fr Sean McDonagh, a founder of the 800-strong Association of Catholic Priests, which was set up two years ago to give a voice to priests within the Irish Church.

“If Rome says ‘jump’ are we simply expected to say, ‘how high?’ Operating like a multinational where the number one requirement is obedience is at total variance with the Church of Jesus,” said Fr McDonagh.

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

Catholics in favour of women priests

IRELAND
TV3

12.04.12

Irish Catholics are in favour of allowing women become priests according to a new survey.

It also found that Catholics in Ireland are in favour of priests being allowed to marry.

People surveyed said they would also like to see a return to the old liturgy during mass.

The research was carried out by Amárach for the Association of Catholic Priests. It reveals that there is a significant disconnect between the official Catholic Church teachings and what Catholics actually believe.

The findings of the report on Contemporary Catholic Perspectives found:

•A relatively even split on the Catholic Church’s understanding of the challenges faced by Catholics, although uncertainly surrounding Bishop’s listening to Irish priests and laypeople.

•Only 1 in 10 believe that the Catholic Church has some independence from Rome, with almost 3 in 5 (57%) believing them to be subservient.

•The majority of people favour Catholic Bishops serving a fixed term (55%), while relatively even split for as long as they like or until 75.

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

New charges that Belgian Cardinal Danneels knew of abuse complaints years ago

BELGIUM
Catholic Culture

A Belgian newspaper has reported that Cardinal Godfried Danneels, the retired Archbishop of Brussels, was notified at least 40 times about sexual abuse by priests under his jurisdiction. The cardinal’s lawyer has angrily denied the report.

Citing news leaks from a government investigation of the sex-abuse scandal in the Catholic Church, Het Laatste Nieuws said that Cardinal Danneels has testified that he was unaware of abuse complaints, and was astonished when those complaints surfaced years later.

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$2.1 billion since 2004

UNITED STATES
California Catholic Daily

[the report]

Washington, D.C. (CNA/EWTN News) — Law enforcement found only seven credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors against Catholic clergy in the U.S. in 2010 and 2011, though more abuse victims from past decades have come forward, according to the latest report on child protection in the Catholic Church.

In response to the findings, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, urged continued attention to abuse prevention.

“While the report supports the conclusion of both studies done by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice – that the majority of allegations are way in the past – the Church must continue to be vigilant,” he said in the report’s preface.

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

Mother of Alleged Victim Says She’ll Never Know What Happened Between Her Son and Her Priest

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Priest Abuse Trial Blog

Ralph Cipriano

She seemed genuinely conflicted. In two hours on the witness stand, Patricia Bukowski acknowledged that the defendant, Father James J. Brennan, was a gifted priest who had helped her through one of the darkest periods of her life.

“We hit it off,” Bukowski testified at the archdiocese of Philadelphia sex abuse trial. “He [Father Brennan] would come to dinner on Sunday. We became very close friends,” Bukowski told the jury. The Bukowski family called him Father at first, then it was just Jim.

He became “a member of the family,” Bukowski said. “He was like a brother to me.”

But Patricia “Trish” Bukowski of Newtown, Bucks County, is also the mother of Mark Bukowski, Father Brennan’s principal accuser. In two days on the witness stand last week, Mark Bukowski charged that in 1996 when he was 14 years old, Father Brennan allegedly attempted to rape him.

After the attempted rape, Mark Bukowski told the jury, he became trapped in a downward spiral of drug and alcohol abuse, numerous criminal convictions, three suicide attempts and a discharge from the Marines for mental health reasons.

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

Priest’s Jury Is Told How a Complaint Was Scorned

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The New York Times

By JON HURDLE

Published: April 11, 2012

PHILADELPHIA — A Roman Catholic bishop told his superiors that a church worker was trying to “stir up conflict” after she reported her concern that a priest in her parish was receiving pornography in the mail, a court heard on Wednesday.

Bishop Robert P. Maginnis of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia wrote in 1996 to the office of Msgr. William J. Lynn, former secretary for clergy at the archdiocese, in response to a complaint from a Sister of Mercy about pornographic magazines received by another priest, the Rev. Edward M. DePaoli.

Bishop Maginnis, who as vicar of Montgomery County, Pa., was responsible for the parish, told the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas that he could not remember much about the episode but that he had been trying at the time to establish whether the sister’s assertions were true.

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

Family of cleric in RTE abuse claim seeks new probe

IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Edel Kennedy

Thursday April 12 2012

THE family of a dead man accused of child sex abuse on RTE’s ‘Mission To Prey’ programme has called on the Communications Minister to open an investigation into the accusations.

The family of Brother Gerard Dillon told the Irish Independent yesterday that a request made to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) to investigate his case alongside that of Fr Kevin Reynolds had been rejected.

The reason given was that the complaint was made more than 30 days after the ‘Prime Time Investigates’ programme was broadcast.

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

Former Marist Center priest is on sex abuse list

MASSACHUSETTS
MetroWest Daily News

[Archdiocese of Boston’s list of accused priests]

[New Garabedian List – BishopAccountability.org]

By Julia Spitz/Daily News staff
MetroWest Daily News

Posted Apr 12, 2012

A priest who lived at the former Marist House in Framingham for more than 15 years was among a dozen clerics named in recent sexual abuse claims settlements, Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian announced yesterday.

The Rev. Henry Rancourt, who moved to a retirement building owned by the Stigmatine order in Waltham after the Marist retreat center closed last year, was anonymously accused of molesting boys while serving at St. Angela’s Parish in the Mattapan section of Boston in 1992.

Rancourt, who also served in parishes and schools in Michigan, New York and Ohio, was at the Marist House in 1987-88 and again from 1994 until the center closed in 2011, according to records on the bishopaccountability.org watchdog website.

His status as a priest is listed as “active’’ by the Archdiocese of Boston.

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

US priests accused in 700 sex cases in 2011 – Report

UNITED STATES
Spyghana (Ghana)

WASHINGTON: About 700 people launched new claims of sexual abuse against Catholic clergy in the United States last year, including 21 who are still minors, according to a new report released by US bishops. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops said in the report released Tuesday that of the 683 adults who reported allegations for the first time, “most allegations reported today are of incidents from previous decades.”

Sixty-eight per cent of the complaints relate to events that took place between 1960 and 1984 — the majority from 1975 to 1979, the report says. Many of the clergy members accused have since died, or been relieved of their church duties. More than 280 of them had been accused in the past, it said.

Of the 21 accusations made by minors, seven were considered credible by the police and three were determined to be false, the report said. Three other cases were still under investigation. The Church spent $144 million dealing with the scandal in the United States in 2011 — including attorneys’ fees, settlements, and support for offenders — a decrease from $150 million in 2010.

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

Trial begins in role of diocese in sex case

STOCKTON (CA)
The Record

By The Record

April 12, 2012

STOCKTON – Phase Two of a civil trial in which a former altar boy is suing the Diocese of Stockton for damages stemming from a child sex abuse claim was postponed Wednesday and will begin today.

A civil jury has found the pastor of St. Joachim Church in Lockeford, Michael Kelly, liable of various actions related to sexual assault.

On the stand, the plaintiff described being groomed, molested and raped by Kelly when they both served at Cathedral of the Annunciation in Stockton more than 20 years ago, Kelly as priest and plaintiff as an altar boy.

The jury found unanimously in favor of the plaintiff, identified in court papers as John TZ Doe, after two months of testimony. The archdiocese immediately removed him from his position.

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

April 11, 2012

Priest group brands Vatican silencing of Athenry cleric as ‘unfair

IRELAND
Galway Advertiser

By Martina Nee

The Association of Catholic Priests (ACP) has expressed its support of Fr Tony Flannery, branding the intervention of the Vatican to effectively silence the Athenry-based Redemptorist cleric as “ill-advised” and “unfair”.

The group, which represents more than 800 priests, issued its statement of solidarity this week following events which saw Fr Flannery, a founding member of the association established less than two years ago, placed under investigation by the Vatican following his outspoken views on issues such as the ending of celibacy, opening up the Church to lay people, the ordination of women, the Church’s ban on contraception, as well as his frustration with the way the Church hierarchy operates. The Vatican has also ordered the discontinuation of Fr Flannery’s column in the religious magazine Reality, a column which he has written for the past 14 years. It is understood that a second priest, Fr Gerard Maloney, the magazine’s editor has also been banned from writing on various topics.

Pope Benedict, in the Holy Thursday homily at St Peter’s Basilica, denounced disobedience warning that the Church will not tolerate priests speaking out against Catholic teaching and chastised any priests who sought the ordination of women or the abolition of priest celibacy.

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

Disciplining dissent

IRELAND
The Irish Times

HAMLET ORDERED Ophelia to “Get thee to a nunn’ry” to avoid the temptations of a sinful world. The Vatican has suggested that Fr Tony Flannery take himself to a monastery for six weeks to pray and to reflect on his liberal views. Fr Flannery, a Redemptorist priest, has upset the Vatican authorities. They have questioned the “orthodoxy” of some of his theological opinions. They have also censured and – for now – silenced him.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) – which upholds the teaching and doctrine of the Catholic Church and disciplines theological dissenters – has stopped Fr Flannery writing further articles on a number of issues: contraception, celibacy of priests, and the ordination of women priests. And the CDF has asked him to withdraw from the Association of Catholic Priests (ACP), of which he is a founding member. The organisation was set up in 2010 to provide Irish priests with a forum for debate and to give them an independent voice. Today about one in five priests are members.

The harsh disciplinary measures taken against Fr Flannery have come shortly after publication of the summary findings of the Vatican’s apostolic visitation to Ireland. Pope Benedict sent the group to examine the condition of the Irish church in the wake of the clerical child sex abuse scandal. In its report, the delegation of senior bishops was critical of what it described as a “fairly widespread” tendency among priests, religious, and laity to hold theological opinions “at variance” with the teachings of the church. This criticism of some Irish clergy may well have informed the CDF’s decision in Fr Flannery’s case. Last week, Pope Benedict once again warned that he will not tolerate priests who disobey the essential teachings of the church.

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Belgische kardinaal Danneels stopte seksueel misbruik in de doofpot

BELGIE
Welingelichte Kringen

Door: Monique Smits

Hij werd zeker 40 keer op de hoogte gebracht over seksueel misbruik in de rooms-katholieke kerk in België. Maar nooit is de Belgische kardinaal Godfried Danneels met die kennis naar de politie gestapt. Tijdens verhoren heeft hij altijd beweerd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik. Dat meldt de Vlaamse krant Het Laatste Nieuws op grond van het gerechtelijk dossier van ‘Operatie Kelk’. Daarin staat ondere andere dat de gevallen waarover Danneels werd ingelicht, niet alleen betrekking hadden op zijn eigen bisdom, maar op heel Vlaanderen.

‘In de meeste gevallen is er sprake van teruggevonden briefwisseling tussen Danneels en de slachtoffers, hun families of nabestaanden’, schrijft HLN.

 Soms schreef hij een brief terug waarin hij beloofde te zullen bidden voor de slachtoffers. Soms plaatste de voormalige aartsbisschop een geestelijke over naar een andere gemeente.



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Former Baptist camp director pleads guilty to sex crime

LOUISIANA
Associated Baptist Press

By Bob Allen

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

SHREVEPORT, La. (ABP) – A former Louisiana Baptist camp director has pleaded guilty to sending pornographic photos of himself over the Internet to an undercover police officer posing as a 14-year-old girl, according to media reports.

Michael P. Latham, 45, faces sentencing Aug. 8 in U.S. District Court for attempting to transport obscene material to a minor, a federal law that carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and/or a $250,000 fine.

Latham was arrested last October in a joint investigation by the Louisiana State Police and Claiborne Parish Sheriff’s Office targeting online sexual predators. At the time he was director of Harris Baptist Conference and Retreat Center, a Southern Baptist campground owned by the Bienville, Concord Union and Webster Claiborne Baptist associations in northwest Louisiana.

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

Embattled Clergy Sex-Abuse Survivors Submit New Evidence to International Criminal Court

UNITED STATES
Veterans News Now

Today, a survivor-led support group for sex abuse victims, which is under attack by U.S. Catholic officials, submitted to the International Criminal Court (ICC) new and extensive documentation that the organization says shows ongoing child rape by Catholic clergy and continuing cover-ups by bishops and Vatican officials. The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) says the new evidence, submitted by SNAP’s attorneys at the Center for Constitutional Rights, underscores the urgent need to prevent future child sex crimes and cover-ups and hold church officials accountable for widespread human rights abuses.

By the Center for Constitutional Rights

Nearly 500 victims, witnesses, whistleblowers and supporters from 65 different countries have reached out to SNAP since September when the organization filed the complaint with the ICC.

“We’re grateful so many brave but wounded and fearful victims across the world are starting to speak up and get help,” said Barbara Blaine, SNAP’s president “But we’re still shocked by how aggressively church officials still hide, ignore and enable clerics to assault kids, escape justice and flee elsewhere while focusing almost strictly on damage control and public relations maneuvers.”

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Misbruik kostte kerk VS bijna 2 miljard

VERENIGDE STATEN
Parool (Nederland)

De Amerikaanse Rooms-Katholieke Kerk heeft sinds 2004 bijna 2,5 miljard dollar (1,9 miljard euro) uitgetrokken voor slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik door geestelijken. Dat blijkt uit cijfers die de Amerikaanse bisschoppenconferentie deze week heeft gepubliceerd. Vorig jaar kostten de schandalen de kerk 108 miljoen dollar (83 miljoen euro).

De bisdommen trokken sinds 2004 ruim 2,1 miljard uit voor de slachtoffers. Andere religieuze instellingen, vooral ordes en congregaties, besteedden 358 miljoen. Vorig jaar ging 57 procent van het geld van de bisdommen naar schadevergoedingen en therapieën voor de slachtoffers. De rest werd onder meer besteed aan kosten van advocaten en hulp aan plegers van het seksueel misbruik.

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Boston Archdiocese reaches settlements in sex abuse cases

BOSTON (MA)
NECN

[with video]

[New Garabedian List – BishopAccountability.org]

(NECN: Jennifer Eagan, Boston) – The Boston Archdiocese has settled sexual abuse cases involving two Massachusetts priests, including a former Boston Police chaplain.

Both priests, Rev. James H. Lane and Rev. Rickard O’Donovan, are now dead. Lane died in 2007, and O’Donovan died in 2000.

One of the priests served at St. Brendan’s parish in Boston.

A victim’s advocacy group says Father James Lane served at the parish in the early 1980s alongside a key figure in the church’s sex abuse cases.

“He had the intention, he had the ability, he had the opportunity and he did it,” said Robert Perron, who says he was nine years old when Father Rickard O’Donovan, a priest at what was then St. Coleman’s Church, offered him private confirmation classes. “I never received anything about confirmation. What I did receive was sexual abuse, and I was molested over 20 times.”

Perron reached a settlement with the Boston Archdiocese for his claims of sexual abuse. Two years of torment, he says, changed his life forever.

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Mother of alleged abuse victim testifies at trial

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

By JOANN LOVIGLIO
The Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA — A woman whose son gave emotional testimony about his alleged abuse at the hands of a Roman Catholic priest took the stand herself Wednesday at a landmark trial in the priest abuse scandal and said she regrets maintaining contact with the priest for years afterward.

The woman said the Rev. James Brennan was like a brother to her, a confidant and spiritual adviser at a vulnerable time when she was caring for her terminally ill mother and raising three young children, so she remained friendly with him even after her son told her “something weird” happened on an overnight trip with the priest.

“Regrettably, I did not,” she replied Wednesday when asked if she cut ties with Brennan after the alleged 1996 molestation, “and I’ll never forgive myself for it.”

Brennan is on trial with Monsignor William Lynn, the first Roman Catholic official in the U.S. charged with endangering children for allegedly shifting priests suspected of molestation from parish to parish without warning anyone of prior sex-abuse complaints. Both have pleaded not guilty.

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

US priests accused in 700 sex cases in 2011: Report

UNITED STATES
The Times of India

WASHINGTON: About 700 people launched new claims of sexual abuse against Catholic clergy in the United States last year, including 21 who are still minors, according to a new report released by US bishops.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops said in the report released Tuesday that of the 683 adults who reported allegations for the first time, “most allegations reported today are of incidents from previous decades.”

Sixty-eight per cent of the complaints relate to events that took place between 1960 and 1984 — the majority from 1975 to 1979, the report says.

Many of the clergy members accused have since died, or been relieved of their church duties. More than 280 of them had been accused in the past, it said.

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Mass. attorney releases 6 accused clerics’ names

BOSTON (MA)
Coshocton Tribune

[New Garabedian List – BishopAccountability.org]

By Jay Lindsay, Associated Press

BOSTON (WTW) — A Massachusetts attorney for clergy sex abuse victims released six new names of clerics accused of abuse, saying Wednesday that it shows that a crisis that began a decade ago is far from over.

Mitchell Garabedian said he reached five- or six-figure settlements in all the cases over the past 15 months.

One of the men is living and served in New Jersey. Five are dead and served in various Northeast states, including two who were priests in the Boston Archdiocese.

One of the Boston priests, the Rev. James Lane, reported the notorious abuser John Geoghan to church leaders during the 1980s.

At a news conference, Garabedian singled out the Boston Archdiocese for not disclosing its names first.

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Nearly all US dioceses’ abuse policies found to comply with charter

UNITED STATES
Catholic News Service

By Nancy Frazier O’Brien
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Ten years after passing their “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People,” the heads of nearly all U.S. dioceses are in full compliance with the 17-point document, according to recently completed audits.

Two dioceses — Baker, Ore., and Lincoln, Neb. — and six Eastern Catholic eparchies refused to participate in the audits, as they had in past years, and were found to be noncompliant.

In dioceses where the audits took place, however, only one diocese was found in noncompliance with one article of the charter. The Diocese of Shreveport, La., was found to be noncompliant because its diocesan review board had not met in two years.

The diocese had not “experienced any charter-related violations in at least four years,” and the board was immediately convened when the diocese was notified of the gap, according to the report from StoneBridge Business Partners of Rochester, N.Y. StoneBridge conducted the audits for the first time in the year ending June 30, 2011. Earlier audits had been carried out by the Gavin Group of Boston.

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99.98% OF PRIESTS ARE INNOCENT

UNITED STATES
Catholic League

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on the findings of the 2011 Annual Report on priestly sexual abuse that was released by the bishops’ conference; the survey was done by a Georgetown institute:

The headlines should read, “Abuse Problem Near Zero Among Priests,” but that is not what is being reported.

According to the 2011 Official Catholic Directory, there are 40,271 priests in the U.S. The report says there were 23 credible accusations of the sexual abuse of a minor made against priests for incidences last year. Of that number, 9 were deemed credible by law enforcement. Which means that 99.98% of priests nationwide had no such accusation made against them last year. Nowhere is this being reported.

Here are more data from the report that won’t appear elsewhere: almost all the offenses involve homosexuality. Indeed, 16% of the credible allegations made against priests who work in dioceses or eparchies, and 6% of religious order priests, involved pedophilia. In the former category, 82% of the alleged victims were male; in the latter, the figure is 94%. In other words, we are not talking about kids as victims, and we are not talking about females: we are talking about postpubescent males who were allegedly violated by adult males. That’s called homosexuality.

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Next phase of ex-priest’s sex abuse trial delayed

STOCKTON (CA)
Modesto Bee

Bee Staff Reports
local@modbee.com

STOCKTON — Phase Two of a civil trial in which a former altar boy is suing the Diocese of Stockton for damages stemming from a child sex abuse claim was postponed Wednesday and will begin Thursday.

A civil jury has found the pastor of St. Joachim Church in Lockeford, Michael Kelly, liable of various actions related to sexual assault.

On the stand, the plaintiff described being groomed, molested and raped by Kelly when they both served at Cathedral of the Annunciation in Stockton more than 20 years ago, Kelly as priest and plaintiff as an altar boy.

The jury found unanimously in favor of the plaintiff, identified in court papers as John TZ Doe, after two months of testimony. The archdiocese immediately removed him from his position.

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Former baseball coach testifies: Saw priest massage boy’s back

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By Joseph A. Slobodzian
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

The former baseball coach of the alleged victim of a sexual assault by the Rev. James J. Brennan told a Philadelphia jury today that he once saw Brennan massaging the preteen boy’s back during a postgame house party in about 1990.

Robert T. Kane testified that the boy – the son of one of his assistant coaches – had been playing with friends outside and returned inside sweaty and wearing no shirt.

As the boy sat at a table, Kane said, Brennan approached from behind and began massaging the boy’s bare shoulders.

The image stuck in his head, Kane told the Common Pleas Court jury under questioning by Assistant District Attorney Jacqueline Coelho.

“It was kind of like looking at a black-and-white picture and seeing someone wearing a yellow hat,” Kane testified. “I just seemed odd to me.”

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Embattled Clergy Sex-Abuse Survivors Submit New Evidence to International Criminal Court

UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Dorothee Benz, CCR on April 11, 2012

April 11, 2012, New York – Today, a survivor-led support group for sex abuse victims, which is under attack by U.S. Catholic officials, submitted to the International Criminal Court (ICC) new and extensive documentation that the organization says shows ongoing child rape by Catholic clergy and continuing cover-ups by bishops and Vatican officials. The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) says the new evidence, submitted by SNAP’s attorneys at the Center for Constitutional Rights, underscores the urgent need to prevent future child sex crimes and cover-ups and hold church officials accountable for widespread human rights abuses.

Nearly 500 victims, witnesses, whistleblowers and supporters from 65 different countries have reached out to SNAP since September when the organization filed the complaint with the ICC.

“We’re grateful so many brave but wounded and fearful victims across the world are starting to speak up and get help,” said Barbara Blaine, SNAP’s president “But we’re still shocked by how aggressively church officials still hide, ignore and enable clerics to assault kids, escape justice and flee elsewhere while focusing almost strictly on damage control and public relations maneuvers.”

“The documentation we presented today includes evidence that has come to light in the six months since we filed the original submission,” said CCR senior staff attorney Pam Spees. “These developments demonstrate yet again both how widespread this human rights crisis is and how it tragically continues.”

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Vatican Silences Father Flannery

IRELAND
The Daily Best

Barbie Latza Nadeau

The Vatican has cracked down on a popular and outspoken Irish Catholic priest. Barbie Latza Nadeau reports on the Catholic Spring

The Vatican has been watching Father Tony Flannery for a long time. The popular Irish Catholic priest has candidly voiced his liberal – and critical – views on the Church, becoming a beacon of reason to his many of his loyal readers.

He questioned celibacy and was an advocate of ordaining women into the priesthood, frequently writing about how women priests could help the church bring more Catholics to mass. To many, Flannery channeled the pop vox of today’s Catholics who wanted to keep the faith, but couldn’t easily navigate the Church’s tough stance on issues like contraception and divorce.

But to his critics, his writing bordered on heresy.

The Vatican clearly had enough of Flannery and last week silenced the 65-year-old priest. Just days before Easter, Flannery, a prolific and long-time columnist for the Redemptorist Order’s monthly magazine “Reality”, was told he can no longer write on any of the church doctrine issues.

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Diocese of Charleston to hold special mass for Child Abuse Prevention Month

CHARLESTON (SC)
WCBD

By: Diocese of Charleston News Release | WCBD News 2
Published: April 11, 2012

CHARLESTON, SC – April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month. Bishop Robert E. Guglielmone is observing the month long initiative by celebrating a special Mass on Sunday, April 15 at 5:15 p.m. at the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Charleston.

This Mass will be offered for the healing of child sexual abuse victims and their families, and in recognition of the Diocese’s newly adopted Policy that addresses sexual abuse allegations. “This special Mass will be an opportunity for the Catholic community to pray for all victims of abuse and to remind everyone about the importance of protecting God’s children,” said Most Reverend Robert E. Guglielmone, Bishop of Charleston.

April 15 also marks the day in which the Policy Concerning Allegations of Sexual Misconduct or Abuse of a Minor by Church Personnel (2012) goes into effect. “There are three major revisions to the Policy,” said Bishop Guglielmone. “The first is new restrictions when communicating with youth through social media. The second is closing any ambiguity regarding background screening and safe environment training of employees and volunteers. The third gives more independence to the advisory board that assesses allegations.”

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New victims surface in alleged molestation by former Fort Lauderdale pastor

FLORIDA
Orlando Sentinel

By Erika Pesantes, Sun Sentinel

1:33 p.m. EDT, April 11, 2012
Additional molestation charges were brought against a former Fort Lauderdale pastor Wednesday bringing the total number of victims to six.

Jeffery London, 48, of Lauderdale Lakes, has been accused of molesting two more victims and has been charged with five counts of sexual battery on a child and three counts of sexual battery.

London allegedly performed oral sex on the now 21-year-old victim when he was 11 years-old and had the child do the same, according to a Broward Sheriff’s Office report. It occurred on a daily basis until the child reached adulthood.

London would allegedly give the victim money in exchange for oral sex; the initial abuse occurred at a time when the victim’s mother was incarcerated and the child was staying with London, according to the report.

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Focus at Philadelphia Priests’ Sex Abuse Trial: Who Was In Charge?

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — Evidence in the Philadelphia clergy child-abuse case today has focused on who was in charge — who was responsible for the placement and transfer of alleged and suspected “predator” priests in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

It has become apparent that priests suspected of preying on children were shuffled, for decades, from one parish to another in the Philadelphia archdiocese (see related stories).

But the defense contends that defendant Msgr. William Lynn, who is charged with endangering children by allowing the suspect priests to remain in ministry, wasn’t responsible.

Although he was the archdiocese’s Secretary for Clergy — handling personnel matters including allegations of misconduct — the defense contends the archbishop had final say and signed the papers on all personnel moves.

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Church Settles Dozens Of Clergy Sex Abuse Claims

BOSTON (MA)
TheBostonChannel

BOSTON — Dozens of cases of alleged sexual abuse by clergy have been settled by the Archdiocese of Boston, according to a lawyer representing the alleged victims.

Mitchell Garabedian outlined the settlements at a press conference on Wednesday in a downtown Boston hotel.

The settlements, described in the five- or six-figure range, include no admission of guilt from the archdiocese.

A spokesman for the archdiocese confirmed the settlements, but said its own investigation found the claims “inconclusive.”

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Milwaukee judge keeps depositions sealed, says release won’t advance bankruptcy

MILWAUKEE (WI)
National Catholic Reporter

Apr. 11, 2012

By Maryangela Layman Roman, Catholic News Service

MILWAUKEE — A U.S. bankruptcy judge ruled April 5 that the depositions of Milwaukee’s retired archbishop, a Milwaukee auxiliary bishop and a former priest will remain sealed and may not be made public.

The ruling by Judge Susan V. Kelley was in response to a motion filed by Jeff Anderson and Associates, the law firm representing claimants in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin where Kelley is presiding over the Chapter 11 reorganization of the Milwaukee Archdiocese.

At issue are the depositions of retired Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland, Auxiliary Bishop Richard J. Sklba and a former priest, Daniel Budzynski.

In denying the motion to unseal them, Kelley noted she had previously authorized “rule 2004 examinations,” or depositions, which were taken last October and November, for three reasons:

— The potential loss of evidence because of the age or infirmity of the witnesses; Weakland is 85; Sklba is 76; and Budzynski is 84.

— The testimony would be used to value claims and determine whether they were objectionable.

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Clergy sex victims lose ruling, but case moves forward

RHODE ISLAND
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 11, 2012

Two child sex abuse lawsuits against the Providence Catholic diocese are still moving forward despite a judge’s decision in favor of the defendants. The cases involve alleged child sex crimes by Fr. Brendan Smyth and alleged recklessness by the Providence diocese. In the 1960s, Smyth worked at Our Lady of Mercy parish in East Greenwich RI.

Though they are taking legal action decades after they were allegedly hurt, the victims argued that the statute of limitations should be suspended because they repressed their memories of the abuse and because Catholic officials “fraudulently concealed” their knowledge of Smyth’s crimes.

Last week, Judge Netti Vogel ruled against the fraud claim. The repressed memory argument will be heard later.

“We think it’s reprehensible when Catholic bishops, who purport to be caring shepherds, act in court like cold-hearted CEOs,” said David Clohessy of St. Louis, SNAP’s director. “If Bishop Tobin honestly believes this once-imprisoned priest is innocent, Tobin should defend the case on its merits, not by exploiting legal technicalities.”

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Child sex abuse case settled against priest living in Wisconsin

WISCONSIN
SNAP Wisconsin

Fr. Glenn Davidowich is founder of Junior Pro Wrestling Association

Statement by John Pilmaier, SNAP Wisconsin Director
CONTACT: 414.336.8575

Today an attorney has announced that he has settled a child sex abuse claim involving a Catholic priest now living in Manitowoc Wisconsin. The accused cleric is Fr. Glenn Davidowich. The attorney who reached the settlement is Mitchell Garabedian.

Davidowich worked at Catholic churches in Pennsylvania, Virginia, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Davidowich was also the founder of an organization known as the Junior Pro Wrestling Association (JPWA) which produced and sold videos of teenage boys in sexually suggestive poses. The JPWA website featured pictures of boys in swimming briefs, some wearing dog collars and chains.

We continue to be disappointed that the truth about pedophile priests is still hidden by Catholic officials and that credible allegations against child molesting clerics are still not disclosed by church officials. We hope that anyone who may have seen, suspected, or suffered crimes by Fr. Glenn Davidowich will come forward, get help, and start recovering.

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Judge Keeps Charges against Catholic Bishop Who Didn’t Report Porno-Priest

KANSAS CITY (MO)
Directors and Officers Liability

While charges and stories of priests abusing children have been surfacing and being suppressed across the country for decades, a criminal prosecution of clergy engaged in cover-ups is rare. Bishop Robert Finn, head of the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph is the highest-ranking U.S. Catholic leader facing criminal charges in connection with alleged child sexual abuse.

Bishop Finn is charged for failing to report a priest who kept pornographic pictures of girl children under the diocese on his computer. The defense of Bishop Finn argued that charges against him be dropped as he had no duty to report to the authorities of the alleged abuse by another priest. But, Jackson County Circuit Judge John Terence rejected the arguments and held that Bishop Finn had a duty to report after church officials found pictures of naked girl children on the computer of Father Shawn Ratigan.

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Why the Pope is right to gag Fr Trendy

IRELAND
Daily Mail (United Kingdom)

Mark Dooley

Two years ago, I appeared on a television programme entitled Faith in Crisis. I was joined on the panel by Fr Tony Flannery, a founding member of the self-styled Association of Catholic Priests in Ireland (ACP). Last week, the Vatican banned Fr Flannery from contributing to the Redemptorist Order’s Reality magazine.

Before appearing on Faith in Crisis, I had not met Fr Flannery. In fact, it wasn’t until he accused me of suggesting that he didn’t celebrate the Eucharist correctly, that I realised he was a Catholic priest. This was because he neither spoke nor dressed as someone who wished to be identified as a member of the clergy.

Like most of the other participants on that programme, Fr Flannery chanted from a radical hymn book. His message was one of dissent from Rome on issues ranging from clerical celibacy to women priests. As he spoke, I remember being surprised that the Vatican permitted such flagrant opposition to Church doctrine by one of its priests.

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Ex-RTE chief blasts team in Prime Time priest debacle

IRELAND
Herald

By Alan O’Keeffe

Wednesday April 11 2012

SEVERE criticisms of RTE’s handling of the Fr Kevin Reynolds story have been made by its own former director of television Helen O’Rahilly.

There were “shocking” aspects, she said, to the way the national broadcaster dealt with the claims of rape against the priest which were proved to be false after the programme was broadcast

Hitting out at RTE, Ms Rahilly said what has emerged about the programme makers methods were “extremely damning.”

Ms O’Rahilly is a former Director of Television at RTE who had previously worked as a BBC executive. She indicated she returned to the BBC after only 10 months at RTE because she had difficulties about how the station operated. She was later promoted to Deputy Controller of BBC One.

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Former N.D. priest sentenced for ripping off paralyzed man

NORTH DAKOTA
Grand Forks Herald

By: Associated Press

BISMARCK — A former Roman Catholic priest won’t have to spend more time in jail for stealing from a paralyzed man while he was caring for him.

A judge sentenced 68-year-old Cyprian Meier to 18 months in prison for exploiting a vulnerable adult. The sentence was suspended for five years. Meier will get credit for 148 days he’s already spent in jail.

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Secret files detailed in Philadelphia priest trial

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Beaver County Times

Associated Press

Philadelphia prosecutors are showing jurors how a priest with a history of child-molestation complaints was reassigned each time a new allegation arose.

The Rev. Francis Trauger was transferred eight times during his clerical career, each time without a warning to the parish.

Hundreds of documents are being presented to a jury in the trial of Monsignor William Lynn, the archdiocese’s secretary of clergy from 1992 to 2004.

Lynn is the first Roman Catholic official in the U.S. charged with endangering children for allegedly transferring priests suspected of molestation. His attorneys insist that Lynn tried to drum out predator priests but his efforts were hindered by his superiors.

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New Garabedian List

MASSACHUSETTS
BishopAccountability.org

On April 11, 2012, Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian announced that in the past year he had settled lawsuits alleging sexual abuse by twelve priests and brothers not on his original list of accused clerics. Below we are providing the assignment histories of these new priests and brothers. This page supplements our previous collection of assignment records for the new priests named by Garabedian on January 19, 2011. A complete list of all the clerics named by Garabedian clients is proviided on the law firm’s website.

Names of clerics not yet in our Database of Accused Priests are noted in the list below. See also Settlements Are Reached in Clergy Sex Abuse Cases: Police Chaplain One of 12 Clerics, by Lisa Wangsness, Boston Globe, April 11, 2012.

Two of the priests in Garabedian’s second list – Revs. James H. Lane and Rickard/Richard J. O’Donovan – are priests of the Boston archdiocese, who should now be added by Cardinal O’Malley to his Boston list, which when it was released in August 2011 included names from Garabedian’s first list. The new Garabedian list also includes religious order priests who worked in the Boston archdiocese.

Rev. James H. Lane of Boston worked for many years as a police chaplain. Sadly, it is not unusual for offending priests to use a chaplaincy with police or firefighters as a cover. Examples are Rev. Joseph T. Herp of Louisville KY, Rev. Gerard P. Walsh of Worcester MA, Rev. Stephen C. Foley of Hartford CT, and Rev. John Cornelius of Seattle WA.

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April 16 arraignment set for former Kanakuk staffer on felony sex charges

MISSOURI
The Turner Report

A 9 a.m. Monday, April 16, arraignment has been scheduled in Taney County Circuit Court for Lee Bradberry, 22, Auburn, Ala.

Bradberry is charged with two counts of statutory sodomy, two counts of sexual molestation and single counts of sexual misconduct and attempted statutory sodomy, all involving underage boys who were under his charge as a counselor at Kanakuk Kamps in Branson.

Bradberry is being held in the Taney County Jail in lieu of $100,000 bond.

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Obedience to law or to Scripture?

AUSTRIA
National Catholic Reporter

by Phyllis Zagano on Apr. 11, 2012 Just Catholic

Now it’s Vienna’s Cardinal Christoph Schönborn who’s wading in hot water. Seems he and a group of Austrian priests and deacons got a full blast of papal steam on Holy Thursday.

The shrill Roman whistle sounded: No women or married men will be ordained.

Goodness, what’s a 67-year-old prince of the church (and son of a count) to do? After all, Schönborn was a student of Joseph Ratzinger in Regensburg, Germany. He taught dogmatic theology at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland. He was a member of the International Theological Commission. He oversaw the creation of the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church.

Now Schönborn’s former professor, the pope, chastised the Austrians (not directly, of course) in the middle of Holy Thursday. Benedict also sent a letter to Schönborn. Do you think it might be about women?

Schönborn has tangled with Benedict before. In 2009, as the Austrian bishops were ending emergency meetings called by the pope, the cardinal handed Benedict XVI a petition. Called an “initiative of the faithful,” it asked for married priests (both men to be ordained and those who left to marry) and for ordination of women as deacons. Since then, the Austrian Priest’s Initiative, representing 15 percent of Austrian clergy, broadened the demands. And, by the way, 87,000 Austrian Catholics have formally resigned from the church.

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Child sex case v. Catholic cleric who worked in NJ settles

NEW JERSEY
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 11, 2012

A child sex abuse case against a former NJ Catholic cleric, Fr. Leonard Thomas Walsh (who worked in Rutherford), has been settled.

We are sad that the truth about pedophile priests is still hidden by Catholic officials and those credible allegations against child molesting clerics are still not disclosed by Catholic officials.

We hope that anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered crimes by Walsh – in NJ or elsewhere – will come forward, get help and start recovering.

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More Boston predators’ names exposed; SNAP responds

BOSTON (MA)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 11, 2012

Boston’s the one archdiocese where transparency about predator priests should be routine. But it’s still not. We still learn about credibly accused clerics from sources outside the church hierarchy.

The obvious question is “How many other credible allegations and secret settlements has O’Malley gotten and made over the past eight years?”

If the head of the Boston archdiocese is still keeping silent about accusations and pay-outs, it’s almost certain that most other US bishops are doing likewise.

We applaud Mitchell Garabedian, BishopAccountability.org, and others who continue to put protecting innocent kids over protecting adults’ reputations.

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Vatican upbraided Irish priest for reformist views: Report

VATICAN CITY
Straits Times (Singapore)

VATICAN CITY (AFP) – An Irish priest was summoned to Rome and asked to retire to a monastery in March after he voiced views in favour of liberal reforms for the Catholic Church, a website reported on Wednesday.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the main guardian of the Church’s dogma, did not reportedly take kindly to Father Tony Flannery’s pronouncements on contraception, the marriage of priests and women’s ordination.

The Vatican Insider website, citing informed sources, said the 65-year-old priest, one of the founders of the Association of Irish Priests, was called back to Rome by the superior general of his Redemptorist order, Father Michael Brehl.

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Looking back – and forth – in anger: Catholic outrage, defections, over abuse scandal

UNITED STATES
Association of Religion Data Archives

By David Briggs

Thousands of victims of sexual abuse will never receive a personal apology from their church leaders.

Many continue suffering into adulthood from the crimes of wayward clergy and the conspiracy of silence by religious hierarchs. Now, some will be offended even more by statements made by Cardinal Edward Egan.

The archbishop emeritus of New York recently expressed regret for issuing an apology at the height of the U.S. scandal, saying, “I don’t think we did anything wrong.”

Yet no matter how much individuals such as the cardinal would like to put the sexual abuse scandal behind them, they can no longer appeal to an obedient laity to ignore or downplay the crimes, according to new research.

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Fr Kevin Reynolds: ‘I just want to move on’

IRELAND
Longford Leader

Published on Wednesday 11 April 2012

Defamed Co Longford priest Fr Kevin Reynolds has blamed the media for keeping the ongoing controversy surrounding his much publicised RTE libelling in the public spotlight.

In a short and candid interview with the Leader on Monday, the Lanesboro born cleric intimated his desire to draw a line under the entire episode and concentrate on his parochial duties as a parish priest.

He also declined to make any further comment about his exclusion from a Broadcasting Authority of Ireland’s investigation into the controversial Prime Time Investigates programme, ‘A Mission to Prey’.

Speaking from his adopted home of Ahascragh, Co Galway, Fr Reynolds said many of his parishioners had also spoken of their frustration at unrelenting media coverage concerning the furore.

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Rabbitte has not seen BAI report

IRELAND
The Irish Times

LUKE CASSIDY

Minister for Communications Pat Rabbitte has neither seen nor received a report commissioned by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) into the Prime Time Investigates programme that libelled Fr Kevin Reynolds.

The unpublished report into the broadcast, which was carried out by former BBC Northern Ireland controller Anna Carragher, and proposed a fine of about €200,000, was sent to RTÉ and interested parties last week.

An article in yesterday’s Irish Times detailed the main findings which were highly critical of the standards of journalism involved in the broadcast, citing briefing notes based on the document.

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Reynolds case ‘shouldn’t have happened’ – Rabbitte

IRELAND
Breaking News

Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte has described RTÉ’s handling of the Fr Kevin Reynolds case as a “debacle”.

Minister Rabbitte said the ‘Mission to Prey’ programe, part of the now-axed ‘Prime Time Investigates’ strand, was a departure from the broadcaster’s “usual high standards”.

Yesterday leaked documents from the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) were highly critical of the standards of journalism involved in the broadcast.

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Sex abuse claim against former Brockton priest settled

MASSACHUSETTS
The Patriot Ledger

BOSTON —

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston has reached settlements in sexual abuse cases involving two priests, including a priest at St. Colman Church in Brockton during the 1950s and 1960s who later served at Sacred Heart in Weymouth.

The Rev. Richard J. O’Donovan died in August 2000, before the allegation was raised against him.

The other case involved the Rev. James Lane, a former Boston police chaplain whose only previous connection with the scandal was as a whistleblower.

The Rev. Lane died in 2007.

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Den Kopf immer tiefer im Sand

DEUTSCHLAND
taz

Was hat die Gesellschaft begriffen nach zwei Jahren Aufdeckung von Missbrauchsfällen? Nichts. Eher im Gegenteil, zumindest wenn man die Reformpädagogik betrachtet.von Christian Füller

Bildungsministerin Annette Schavan (CDU) nennt es gerne eine „neue Kultur des Hinschauens“. Das bedeutet, kurz gesagt: Lehrer, Eltern, Pfarrer, die Polizei, die Öffentlichkeit, alle müssen viel sensibler auf Missbrauchsverdachte achten und schnell reagieren – zum Schutz der Opfer. Das muss die Lehre sein aus der Aufdeckung schwerster und umfangreicher Missbrauchsfälle in Kollegs, Klöstern und der Odenwaldschule. Denkt man.

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Healing sexual wounds

UNITED STATES
Renew America

By Matt C. Abbott

Catholic author, speaker and journalist Dawn Eden has a new book out titled My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints, published by Ave Maria Press. Below is the book’s foreword, written by Mother Agnes Mary Donovan, S.V., superior general of the Sisters of Life.

From the Ave Maria Press website:

‘One in four American women and one in six American men report having been sexually abused during childhood…. Eden uses her own story as a backdrop to introduce numerous holy people — like Laura Vicuña, Thomas Aquinas and Bernard of Clairvaux — who suffered sexual abuse or sexual inappropriateness, as well as saints such as Ignatius of Loyola who suffered other forms of mistreatment and abandonment. Readers seeking wholeness will discover saints with wounds like their own, whose stories bear witness to the transforming power of grace. Eden explores different dimensions of divine love — sheltering, compassionate, purifying, etc. — to help those sexually wounded in childhood understand their identity in the abiding love of Christ.’

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‘Keep it quiet’: The family that covered up sex abuse

UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

By Elaine Thelen BBC News

‘Sarah’ is still traumatised by the sexual abuse she suffered as a young girl. In a church-going, happy and loving family was a seven-year-old girl.

But then, through a weekly ordeal of sexual abuse at the hands of someone she thought would protect her, her life changed forever.

Now 23 years old, the torment of the years of her uncle’s abuse remains strong, along with the anger over how her family covered it up to protect their reputation and that of the Church.

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Main findings

IRELAND
Irish Independent

Wednesday April 11 2012

– Interviews with sources were not documented, while note-taking was non-existent.

– RTE guidelines allow secret filming under certain circumstances, including when it is believed that a subject will not consent. It was assumed Fr Reynolds would not consent.

– There was a mentality that the offer of a paternity test from Fr Reynolds was an attempt to derail the programme.

– Reporter Aoife Kavanagh, although experienced, was working on her first ‘Prime Time Investigates’ programme and had not been provided with training on the guidelines surrounding investigative journalism.

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How the scandal and investigation unfolded

IRELAND
Irish Independent

Wednesday April 11 2012

May 7, 2011: Fr Kevin Reynolds is confronted by an RTE ‘Prime Time Investigates’ team at his church in Ahascragh, Co Galway. He refutes the allegation that he fathered a child.

May 23, 2011: RTE broadcasts the ‘Prime Time Investigates: Mission to Prey’ programme despite an offer from Fr Reynolds of a paternity test.

September 21, 2011: The High Court hears two paternity tests show Fr Reynolds did not father a child to a Kenyan woman.

October 7, 2011: RTE issues an apology to Fr Reynolds. The broadcaster accepted that the allegations against the Galway priest were baseless and without foundation.

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Prime Time report tars all ourcurrent affairs: RTE insiders

IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Colm Kelpie

Wednesday April 11 2012

RTE is likely to accept the findings of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland’s investigation into the libelling of Fr Kevin Reynolds by ‘Prime Time Investigates’.

But the Irish Independent understands there are concerns within the state broadcaster that some of the BAI’s conclusions appear to apply to its entire current affairs output, even though the probe focused only on allegations made against Fr Reynolds in one programme.

The unpublished report was sent to RTE last Thursday and the broadcaster has until April 20 to issue a reply, or request an oral hearing or go to the High Court.

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RTE claim priest accuser understood questioning

IRELAND
Irish Independent

[click here for the story]

By Edel Kennedy

Wednesday April 11 2012

RTE has rejected a claim that the woman at the centre of the Fr Kevin Reynolds controversy did not understand the questions she was being asked during the making of the programme.

A family member of Veneranda Mudi — the woman who claimed she had been raped and had a child by the priest in Kenya — said she did not understand what she was being asked.

However, RTE sources have rejected this outright, saying that expert translators were used at all stages, and each translation was verified a number of times.

They also said that there was “no doubt” among the investigative team that she fully understood what she was being asked.

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Galway priest ‘silenced’

IRELAND
Galway Independent

Posted on 11/04/2012

by Marie Madden
@galwayindo

A group representing over 800 Irish priests has spoken out in support of Galway native Fr Tony Flannery, after he was ‘silenced’ by the Vatican as a result of his liberal views.

Fr Flannery, who is based in the Redemptorist Church Esker, had his regular column in religious magazine ‘Reality’ withdrawn recently after intervention from the Vatican.

It is understood that the move was taken as a result of Fr Flannery’s previous discussions on the ending of celibacy, opening up the Church to lay people and women and other frustrations he had experienced within the Catholic Church. Further action was also taken against a second priest, Fr Gerard Moloney, banning him from writing on various topics.

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Danneels verzweeg seksueel misbruik stelselmatig

BELGIE
Trouw

De Belgische kardinaal Godfried Danneels is de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik in de rooms-katholieke kerk in België. Danneels is met die kennis nooit naar de politie gestapt en heeft altijd gezegd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

Dat meldt de krant Het Laatste Nieuws vandaag op basis van het gerechtelijk dossier van de zogeheten Operatie Kelk. Daarin staat onder meer dat de gevallen waarover Danneels werd ingelicht, niet alleen betrekking hadden op zijn eigen bisdom, maar op heel Vlaanderen. ‘In de meeste gevallen is er sprake van teruggevonden briefwisseling tussen Danneels en de slachtoffers, hun families of nabestaanden’, schrijft de krant.

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Slachtoffer misbruik maakt kunstwerk voor kerk

NEDERLAND
eo

Financiële genoegdoening is geen oplossing voor seksueel misbruik. ‘Het gaat om dialoog en vergeving van de dader’, zegt Frans Houben in het Radio 1-programma ‘Dit Is De Dag’.

Houben, zelf slachtoffer van seksueel misbruik, maakte een kunstwerk over het misbruik in de Rooms-Katholieke kerk. Hij stuit daarbij op veel onbegrip onder andere slachtoffers, die het gevoel hebben dat hij heult met de vijand. De kunstenaar krijgt haatmails en verkapte dreigementen ‘vanuit de slachtoffer-hoek’. ‘Veel slachtoffers zijn nog boos – vaak terecht – en niet aan vergeving toe,’ constateert Houben die zelf nog regelmatig naar de kerk gaat. ‘Boosheid mag maar dan genuanceerd.’

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Beschrijving

NEDERLAND
bol.com

Boek ‘NR. 21’ van Frans Houben werpt nieuw licht op misbruik in RK internaten.
‘NR. 21’ is de titel van de indringende, somtijds rauwe, memoires van Frans Houben over zijn leven in een Rooms Katholiek jongensinternaat. Met broeders die hun handen niet thuis kunnen houden en elke vorm van verzet er meedogenloos uitranselen. Met paters die hun ogen sluiten voor wat er allemaal gebeurt en misstanden onder het tapijt vegen. Met echte vrienden en met jongens die je nooit kunt vertrouwen. Met een moed…

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Spain’s Baby-Snatching Scandal Focuses on Nun’s Alleged Role

SPAIN
The Daily Beast (United States)

Apr 11, 2012

Did doctors and the Catholic Church traffic in stolen newborns? Mike Elkin reports from Madrid on the shocking trial of one nun.

On his deathbed, five years ago in Barcelona, Juan Moreno told his son Juan Luis the family secret: We bought you from a priest in 1969. Moreno Sr. paid 150,000 pesetas, more than what he paid for their apartment seven years earlier. DNA tests have revealed that Juan Luis’s birth certificate, which names his adoptive parents as his birth parents, is false. And Antonio Barroso, Juan Luis’s best friend, was also bought from the same priest, according to Juan Luis. The two families would take summer vacations together to Zaragoza, around 300 kilometers west of Barcelona, but the men now believe the trips’ true purpose was to pay the installments on the two boys to the clergyman, Juan Luis says.

“My adoptive family gave me plenty of love, but it’s also true that my life has been a lie,” Juan Luis says over the telephone from Barcelona.

Moreno is one of thousands of Spaniards who suspect that doctors, nurses, priests and nuns stole and sold babies between the 1960s and the early 1980s. While the 1,500 open cases vary, a common story has a woman being told her newborn has died shortly after birth. The baby is sold to another couple, and official papers are doctored so this couple appeared as the biological parents. At one infamous Madrid clinic, now closed, called San Ramón, it was reported in the Spanish media that staff kept a dead newborn in the freezer to prove to mothers that their babies had died.

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New witnesses come forward in Moti Elon trial

ISRAEL
The Jerusalem Post

By YAAKOV LAPPIN

Prosecutors say 4 young men who studied under rabbi accused of sexual offenses have agreed to come forward.

Jerusalem District prosecutors are seeking to introduce new witnesses in the trial of Rabbi Moti Elon, who has been charged with two counts of sexual offenses against two underage students.

The trial is set to enter the testimony stage next week, and prosecutors have said that four young men who studied under Elon have agreed to come forward with new, allegedly incriminating information.

The offenses are said to have occurred between 2003 and 2005.

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Aangifte tegen Simonis geseponeerd

NEDERLAND
Nu

MIDDELBURG – Het Openbaar Ministerie (OM) in Middelburg heeft een aangifte tegen kardinaal Ad Simonis wegens meineed geseponeerd.

Een woordvoerster van het OM zei woensdag dat er onvoldoende aanleiding is voor een verdenking.

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Priester zeigte sich selbst an

DEUTSCHLAND
Rhein-Zeitung

Kirn – Das Bistum Trier hat Priester Manfred V. von seinen Funktionen als Seelsorger des Diakonie-Krankenhauses Kirn und eines Altenheims in der Stadt entbunden. Das bestätigte am Dienstag Dr. Stephan Kronenburg, der Leiter der bischöflichen Pressestelle, auf Nachfrage.

Das Nachrichtenmagazin „Der Spiegel“ hatte am 19. März unter anderem über Pfarrer V. berichtet. Laut dem Artikel soll der Priester gegenüber dem „Spiegel“ eingeräumt haben, in der zweiten Hälfte der 1990er-Jahre Minderjährige in der Ukraine missbraucht zu haben. Dieser Darstellung sei das Bistum Trier unmittelbar nachgegangen, erklärte Dr. Kronenburg.

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Bischof Ackermann “entpflichtet” zwei pädophile Priester

DEUTSCHLAND
Rhein-Zeitung

Trier – Triers Bischof Stephan Ackermann hat zwei pädophile Priester in Bistum Trier “entpflichtet”. Ihnen sei damit die Ausübung priesterlicher Dienste untersagt, erklärte ein Sprecher des Bistums Trier am Dienstag.

Ackermann war in den vergangenen Wochen in die Kritik geraten, weil das Bistum mehrere als pädophil bekanntgewordene Priester beschäftigt. Der Bischof ist auch Missbrauchsbeauftragter der katholischen Kirche in Deutschland.

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Danneels heeft niets toe te voegen aan ‘oude’ aantijgingen”

BELGIE
HLN

Bewerkt door: Hanne Adriaen
11/04/12

Het artikel dat vandaag in Het Laatste Nieuws is verschenen over Operatie Kelk, bevat niets meer dan opgewarmde kost. Dat zegt meester Fernand Keuleneer, de advocaat van kardinaal Danneels. In het artikel staat dat Danneels zeker veertig maal op de hoogte werd gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de Kerk maar daar niets tegen ondernam.

“De kardinaal heeft op deze aantijgingen reeds geantwoord in het parlement en heeft aan zijn antwoorden van toen niets toe te voegen”, liet de advocaat weten. “Hij formuleerde zijn antwoorden toen hij door de parlementaire commissie gehoord werd over de behandeling van seksueel misbruik. Dat verslag kan door iedereen geraadpleegd worden op de website van de Kamer”, aldus meester Keuleneer voort.

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“Danneels stopte zeker 40 meldingen van seksueel misbruik in doofpot”

BELGIE
HLN

Kardinaal Godfried Danneels werd de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de Kerk. Dat schrijft de krant Het Laatste Nieuws op basis van de briefwisseling in het dossier Operatie Kelk. Danneels stapte nooit naar het gerecht, en heeft altijd beweerd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

De gevallen waarover Danneels werd ingelicht, hadden niet alleen betrekking op zijn eigen bisdom, maar op heel Vlaanderen. “In de meeste gevallen is er sprake van teruggevonden briefwisseling tussen Danneels en de slachtoffers, hun families of nabestaanden. Die kan de kardinaal nu de das omdoen”, schrijft de krant.

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“Danneels stopte zeker 40 meldingen van seksueel misbruik in doofpot”

BELGIE
De Morgen

Kardinaal Godfried Danneels werd de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de Kerk. Dat schrijft de krant Het Laatste Nieuws op basis van de briefwisseling in het dossier Operatie Kelk. Danneels stapte nooit naar het gerecht, en heeft altijd beweerd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

De gevallen waarover Danneels werd ingelicht, hadden niet alleen betrekking op zijn eigen bisdom, maar op heel Vlaanderen. “In de meeste gevallen is er sprake van teruggevonden briefwisseling tussen Danneels en de slachtoffers, hun families of nabestaanden. Die kan de kardinaal nu de das omdoen”, schrijft de krant.

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Veertig brieven die seksueel misbruik melden gevonden bij Danneels

BELGIE
Het Nieuwsblad

Kardinaal Godfried Danneels werd de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de kerk. Dat werd bevestigd aan de VRT. Danneels heeft altijd beweerd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

In het gerechtelijk dossier van operatie Kelk zitten veertig brieven van mensen die aan kardinaal Danneels melden dat ze seksueel zijn misbruikt door een geestelijke. De brieven werden bij de kardinaal gevonden. Die zou daar echter niets mee hebben gedaan.

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Danneels verzweeg seksueel misbruik stelselmatig

BELGIE
de Volkskrant

De Belgische kardinaal Godfried Danneels is de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik in de rooms-katholieke kerk in België. Danneels is met die kennis nooit naar de politie gestapt en heeft altijd gezegd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

Dat meldt de krant Het Laatste Nieuws vandaag op basis van het gerechtelijk dossier van de zogeheten Operatie Kelk. Daarin staat onder meer dat de gevallen waarover Danneels werd ingelicht, niet alleen betrekking hadden op zijn eigen bisdom, maar op heel Vlaanderen. ‘In de meeste gevallen is er sprake van teruggevonden briefwisseling tussen Danneels en de slachtoffers, hun families of nabestaanden’, schrijft de krant.

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“Danneels wist meer over omvang misbruik in kerk”

BELGIE
Gazet van Antwerpen

Kardinaal Godfried Danneels werd de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de Kerk. Dat schrijft een krant van De Persgroep op basis van de briefwisseling in het dossier Operatie Kelk. Danneels heeft altijd beweerd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

De gevallen waarover Danneels werd ingelicht, hadden niet alleen betrekking op zijn eigen bisdom, maar op heel Vlaanderen. “In de meeste gevallen is er sprake van teruggevonden briefwisseling tussen Danneels en de slachtoffers, hun families of nabestaanden. Die kan de kardinaal nu de das omdoen”, schrijft de krant.

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Veertig brieven die seksueel misbruik melden gevonden bij Danneels

BELGIE
De Standaard

Kardinaal Godfried Danneels werd de voorbije tientallen jaren zeker veertig keer op de hoogte gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de kerk. Dat werd bevestigd aan de VRT. Danneels heeft altijd beweerd verrast te zijn door de omvang van het misbruik.

In het gerechtelijk dossier van operatie Kelk zitten veertig brieven van mensen die aan kardinaal Danneels melden dat ze seksueel zijn misbruikt door een geestelijke. De brieven werden bij de kardinaal gevonden. Die zou daar echter niets mee hebben gedaan.

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Operatie Kelk: “Het Laatste Nieuws serveert opgewarmde kost”

BELGIE
Knack

(Belga) Het artikel dat vandaag in de krant Het Laatste Nieuws staat over Operatie Kelk, bevat niets meer dan opgewarmde kost. Dat zegt meester Fernand Keuleneer, de advocaat van kardinaal Danneels. In het artikel staat dat Danneels zeker 40 maal op de hoogte werd gebracht van seksueel misbruik binnen de Kerk maar daar niets tegen ondernam. “De kardinaal heeft reeds op deze aantijgingen geantwoord in het parlement en heeft aan zijn antwoorden van toen niets toe te voegen”, zegt de advocaat.

“De kardinaal formuleerde zijn antwoorden toen hij gehoord werd door de parlementaire commissie betreffende de behandeling van seksueel misbruik en dat verslag kan door iedereen worden geraadpleegd op de website van de Kamer”, gaat meester Keuleneer voort. Volgens de advocaat is het niet toevallig dat het artikel in Het Laatste Nieuws net nu verschijnt, een week nadat het Hof van Cassatie de huiszoekingen en inbeslagnames bij de kardinaal en in het aartsbisschoppelijk paleis definitief onwettelijk verklaarde.

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Cases of child sexual abuse in US rise in 2011: Church audit

UNITED STATES
Press TV (Iran)

A church-sponsored audit says the allegations of sexual abuse of minors committed by Roman Catholic Church clerics in the United States increased 15 percent in number in 2011.

According to a report by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops released on Tuesday, a total of 489 people reported credible cases of allegations of sexual abuse by priests or deacons in 2011.

The largest portion of the allegations was made by adults who were victimized when they were children by now-deceased clerics.

Twenty-one cases of the abuse allegations involved victims younger than 19 who made the allegations more recently, according to the report.

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Report finds few abuse allegations against Catholic clergy in 2011

UNITED STATES
Catholic News Agency

[the report]

Washington D.C., Apr 10, 2012 / 08:05 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Law enforcement found only seven credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors against Catholic clergy in the U.S. in 2010 and 2011, though more abuse victims from past decades have come forward, according to the latest report on child protection in the Catholic Church.

In response to the findings, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, urged continued attention to abuse prevention.

“While the report supports the conclusion of both studies done by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice – that the majority of allegations are way in the past – the Church must continue to be vigilant,” he said in the report’s preface.

“The Church must do all she can never to let abuse happen again. And we must all continue to work with full resolve toward the healing and reconciliation of the victims/survivors.”

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Lawsuits against Diocese of Monterey affected by California Supreme Court ruling

CALIFORNIA
Monterey County Herald

By VIRGINIA HENNESSEY
Herald Staff Writermontereyherald.com
Posted: 04/10/2012

Three of four clergy-abuse lawsuits pending against the Diocese of Monterey will likely be dismissed or settled for small sums after a recent state Supreme Court ruling.

In a case that was being watched throughout the state, the high court ruled the statute of limitations had expired for six brothers seeking damages from the Oakland Diocese for abuse they allegedly suffered in the 1970s at the hands of a parish priest.

The ruling evaluated the evolving statute of limitations in lawsuits against third-party defendants, such as employers. Issued March 29, the 5-2 opinion created a select category of victims who turned 26 before 1998 but did not file lawsuits during a one-year window of opportunity created by the legislature in 2003.

Among them are two Sacramento men who sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Monterey in 2011 alleging the Rev. William Allison abused them when they were children at San Carlos School in Monterey in the 1960s.

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What’s next for former valley priest Kelly after verdict?

STOCKTON (CA)
The Modesto Bee

By Ross Farrow
Lodi News-Sentinel

STOCKTON — As Father Michael Kelly leaves St. Joachim’s Catholic Church in Lockeford after a jury determined that he sexually assaulted a former altar boy in the 1980s, the Stockton Diocese is picking up the pieces.

Bishop Stephen Blaire said Monday that he placed Kelly on paid administrative leave pending a recommendation by a special committee at the Vatican.

Kelly has moved out of the rectory on the parish grounds in Lockeford. He must find his own living arrangements, and he can no longer wear priest’s clothing, Blaire said.

Kelly, 62, was found liable of sexually assaulting an altar boy at Stockton’s Cathedral of the Annunciation in the mid-1980s. The plaintiff, now a 37-year-old man from Marin County, is on medical leave from his position as a pilot for Southwest Airlines. Kelly doesn’t face criminal charges because the statute of limitations has expired.

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Philadelphia Catholic Priest Trial: The Cardinal, the Clergy and Kiddie Porn

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Priest Abuse Trial Blog

Ralph Cipriano

In the secret files of the archdiocese, a psychologist warned church officials that Father Edward M. DePaoli was a likely repeat offender.

Father DePaoli was the priest who got busted by U.S. Postal inspectors in 1985 for hoarding $15,000 worth of foreign kiddie porn under his bed in the rectory at the Holy Martyrs Church in Oreland, Pa. The feds raided the rectory and confiscated more than 100 magazines and 14 reels. In the archdiocese’s secret files, Dr. Eric Griffin-Shelley, Father DePaoli’s therapist, told church officials in 1986 that the priest was “likely to repeat his past behavior and become progressively worse.”

The psychologist suggested six months to one year of “intensive in-patient psychotherapy.” The major problem with letting Father DePaoli continue in ministry, the psychologist warned, was the danger that the priest might “go beyond fantasy in terms of his sexual urges toward children.” There was no indication that the priest was on the road to being rehabilitated, the psychologist reported. Despite being busted by the feds, Father DePaoli was still getting porn in the mail, Dr. Griffin-Shelley told church officials.

Besides his addiction to porn, Father DePaoli had other problems, the psychologist revealed in confidential documents displayed Monday at the ongoing archdiocese sex abuse trial, now in its third week. Father DePaoli had a “narcissistic personality,” the psychologist reported, plus a “compulsive personality disorder,” and a habit of forming “poor relationships with other people.”

Everything you’d want in a priest, right?

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Priest molested me, woman says

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

BY JOSEPH A. SLOBODZIAN
Inquirer Staff Writer

THROUGH ALMOST 20 years of disputes with church superiors over his addiction to pornography, the Rev. Edward M. DePaoli inevitably returned to a last defense: It was fantasy; he had never sexually touched another person.

That defense crumbled in 2002, after a Bucks County woman came forward to tell church officials that DePaoli fondled her breast when she was a 12-year-old catechism student at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in Doylestown.

“I jabbed him and looked at him like, ‘What are you doing?’ ” the woman, now 56, told a Common Pleas Court jury. “I was 12 years old and no one had ever touched me like that before.”

The woman, whose name is being withheld, was the final witness Tuesday to testify about DePaoli’s clerical career before he was defrocked in 2005 at age 60.

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Sex abuse cases settled by Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston

MASSACHUSETTS
WWLP

BOSTON (AP) – The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston has reached settlements in sexual abuse cases involving two priests, including a former Boston police chaplain whose only previous connection with the scandal was as a whistleblower.

The chaplain, the Rev. James Lane, and the Rev. Rickard O’Donovan are among a dozen clerics named in separate sexual abuse claims against dioceses and religious orders that Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian says he settled in the last 14 months. Both priests are dead.

Garabedian plans to reveal the 12 names today.

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Settlements reached in clergy sex abuse cases

MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe

By Lisa Wangsness
| Globe Staff
April 11, 2012

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston has reached settlements in sexual abuse cases involving two priests, including the Rev. James H. Lane, a beloved Dorchester pastor and veteran Boston police chaplain whose only previous connection with the abuse scandal was as a whistleblower.

The Boston priests – Lane, who died in 2007, and the Rev. Rickard O’Donovan, who died in 2000 – are among a dozen clerics named in separate sexual abuse claims against dioceses and religious orders that Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian says he settled in the last 14 months. The settlements were five- to six-figure amounts, said Garabedian.

As is standard, none of the settlements involved an admission of guilt.

Terrence C. Donilon, an archdiocesan spokesman, confirmed the two settlements but said in a statement that archdiocesan investigations were inconclusive because both involved a single victim who professed to have been abused more than 40 years ago by a priest who died before he could answer the allegations.

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April 10, 2012

U.S. Catholic Church says child abuse cases rose in 2011

UNITED STATES
Chicago Tribune

By Andrew Stern

CHICAGO, April 10 (Reuters) – The number of credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors committed by Roman Catholic priests or deacons in the United States rose 15 percent last year, and the church spent $144 million to deal with the ongoing scandal, according to a church-sponsored audit released on Tuesday.

A total of 489 people reported credible allegations of abuse by priests or deacons in 2011, the bulk of them involving adults victimized when they were children decades ago by now-deceased clerics, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said in a report on its ninth annual audit of the issue.

Twenty-one of the victims were younger than 19 and victimized more recently. Attorneys for victims say there are likely tens of thousands more victims who have never come forward since the scandal erupted in Boston in 2002.

“We renew our promise to strive to the fullest to end the societal scourge of child sexual abuse,” Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the conference, said in an introductory letter to
the report.

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Victims group blasts NYC Cardinal Dolan over new report

UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by David Clohessy on April 10, 2012

In the church’s ongoing child sex abuse and cover up scandal, Cardinal Dolan continues to dish out pabulum instead of push for reform.

Rather than making even vaguer and largely soon forgotten promises (“to strive to the fullest to end the societal scourge of child sexual abuse,” he pledges today), he should:

— remove his blog post insensitively questioning (and implicitly blaming) a New York City teenager who reported, just last year, being repeatedly molested by her pastor http://blog.archny.org/?p=1556

And

— post on his archdiocesan website the names of proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting clerics (like two dozen of his brother bishops have done).

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Cardinal Bevilacqua Helps Out Priest Who Loves Kiddie Porn

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Priest Abuse Trial Blog

Ralph Cipriano

In the secret files of the archdiocese, a psychologist warned church officials that Father Edward M. DePaoli was a likely repeat offender.

Father DePaoli was the priest who got busted by U.S. Postal inspectors in 1986 for hoarding $15,000 worth of foreign kiddie porn under his bed in the rectory at the Holy Martyrs Church in Oreland, Pa. The feds raided the rectory and confiscated more than 100 magazines and 14 reels. In the archdiocese’s secret files, Dr. Eric Griffin-Shelley, Father DePaoli’s therapist, told church officials in 1986 that the priest was “likely to repeat his past behavior and become progressively worse.”

The psychologist suggested six months to one year of “intensive in-patient psychotherapy.” The major problem with letting Father DePaoli continue in ministry, the psychologist warned, was the danger that the priest might “go beyond fantasy in terms of his sexual urges toward children.” There was no indication that the priest was on the road to being rehabilitated, the psychologist reported. Despite being busted by the feds, Father DePaoli was still getting porn in the mail, Dr. Griffin-Shelley told church officials.

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US bishops report on child abuse allegations, costs for 2011

UNITED STATES
U.S. Catholic

By Nancy Frazier O’Brien Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Although allegations of child sex abuse by U.S. priests and deacons continue to surface, the vast majority involve actions taken decades ago by clergy who have since died or been removed from ministry, according to a new report.

The 2011 survey of abuse-related allegations and costs conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University in Washington was released April 10 by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

It showed that there were 594 new credible allegations of sexual abuse of a minor by diocesan or religious-order priests or deacons during 2011, but only 23 of the new allegations (4 percent) involved children who were under the age of 18 in 2010 or 2011. The allegations were made by 588 people against 461 clergy members.

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Philly abuse trial hears testimony about priest caught with porn

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
National Catholic Reporter

by Brian Roewe on Apr. 10, 2012 NCR Today

In the Philadelphia sex abuse trial, the testimony this morning picked up where it ended Monday, exploring the career of former priest Fr. Edward M. DePaoli.

Msgr. William J. Lynn and the Rev. James J. Brennan both stand trial for their roles in an alleged conspiracy of covering up cases of priest sex abuse within the Philadelphia archdiocese. Lynn, the former secretary of clergy in the archdiocese from 1992-2004, is the first church official charged for his role in a cover-up of priest sex abuse.

According to a report from the Philadelphia Inquirer, the prosecution continued Tuesday to document the career of DePaoli. Defrocked in 2005, he pleaded guilty in 1985 to a child pornography charge and served a year’s probation while participating in mandatory mental health treatment.

DePaoli had been serving as a morals and ethics teacher at Bishop McDevitt High School in a Philadelphia suburb before his indictment.

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Broadcast body to investigate leak source

IRELAND
The Irish Times

MARIE O’HALLORAN

THE BROADCASTING Authority of Ireland and RTÉ have expressed their “disappointment” at the leaking of information to The Irish Times about the Prime Time Investigates programme that defamed Fr Kevin Reynolds.

The authority said it “will review the matter to seek to ascertain how such information was made available”.

The paper received briefing notes of the report by former BBC Northern Ireland controller Anna Carragher, which heavily criticised both the standards of journalism involved in the broadcast and the role of management.

The Mission to Prey documentary falsely accused Fr Reynolds of raping a minor and fathering her child while he was a missionary in Africa. He sued the broadcaster, accepting an apology and a substantial out-of-court settlement.

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Silenced priest told to reflect on situation

IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY and PADDY AGNEW

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

Then, it was hoped, he would return “to think with the church” (sentire com ecclesia), according to the Rome-based website Vatican Insider.

Senior Vaticanologist Gerry O’Connell reported that Fr Flannery was summoned to Rome in mid-March for a meeting with Fr Michael Brehl, the Canadian Superior General of the Redemptorists.

Fr Brehl himself had been summoned to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) by the prefect, US Cardinal William Levada, who expressed his concern about the “orthodoxy” of views expressed by Fr Flannery in articles in the Redemptorist magazine Reality.

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Total number of newly accused clerics in 2011 greater than number of newly ordained priests

UNITED STATES
SNAP Wisconsin

For virtually every new priest ordained in the US, a current one is removed from ministry for child sex abuse

Number of Catholic clergy who sexually assaulted children now tops 6,000 mark

Statement by Peter Isely, SNAP Midwest Director
CONTACT: 414.429.7259

New internal data released by the US Catholic Bishops today reveals that the total number of Catholic clergy who have raped or sexually assaulted children or minors over the past several decades is now 6,115 (a careful breakdown of the numbers in the report can be found at BishopAccountabilty.org). The number of accused clerics is, of course, larger.

Last year, 270 never before identified priests were reported to have committed child sex crimes. 184 of these priests were officially but quietly removed from ministry because these reports of criminal behavior against children were found to be credible and actionable. Quietly, that is, unless parishioners and the public found out about it.

In fact, the total number of newly accused clerics in the US for child sex abuse last year was virtually identical to the total number of newly ordained diocesan priests. The 275 newly ordained diocesan priests in the US outnumbered the number of newly accused child sex offender priests by only five. And, for every one or two priests ordained last year in the US, another priest was taken out of ministry for having sexually assaulted a child.

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