ABUSE TRACKER

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Associated Press | Posted: Monday, March 26, 2012

Defense lawyers plan to attack the credibility of the troubled adult accusers when two Roman Catholic priests go on trial in a landmark child sex-abuse case involving the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

But that strategy took a hit Thursday when co-defendant Edward Avery entered a last-minute guilty plea, confirming one accuser’s account of a brutal 1999 sexual assault inside a church sacristy. The victim was then a 10-year-old altar boy, Avery a 57-year-old priest.

Avery’s plea leaves Monsignor William Lynn and the Rev. James Brennan on trial on Monday. Brennan, 48, is charged with raping a 14-year-old boy in 1996.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
UPI

PHILADELPHIA, March 26 (UPI) — A former high-ranking Catholic official accused of hiding Philadelphia alleged priest sex abuse acted as if his job was to shield the abuser, a prosecutor said.

Msgr. William Lynn “would have done something about the allegations” if he were “thinking about kids first” when he handled allegations of sexual abuse by priests from 1992 to 2004, Assistant District Attorney Patrick Blessington said at a pretrial court hearing Friday ahead of opening arguments set to begin Monday.

Lynn, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of endangering the welfare of children, is the highest-ranking member of the U.S. Catholic hierarchy to have his case reach trial on charges related to coverup allegations.

The opening arguments at the state Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia, were to begin at 9:30 a.m. EDT, but might be postponed, lawyers said.

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BELLEVILLE (IL)
News-Democrat

Sexual abuse of children by priests went unchecked for decades because church leaders ignored the problem or worked to keep it secret. We are nearing the 20-year mark of the bishops finally acting against pedophile priests and the scandal becoming public in the Belleville Diocese.

It seemed that the lessons of secrecy’s insidious nature had dawned on diocesan leaders. Open declarations about accusations and actions were made, bringing forth other victims. Sunshine was used to cleanse the pulpit.

Yet here we are still dealing with the legacy of secrecy, paying victims $7.5 million in damages. That was before this past week, when three more lawsuits were settled for “substantial” sums.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
God Discussion

In lawsuits involving pedophile priests within the Catholic Church, typically it is the priest accused of abuse who stands trial. But in a case that will start this week in Philadelphia, a priest alleged to have covered up the crime will also be tried.

Monsignor William Lynn is charged with child endangerment and conspiracy for allegedly failing to remove predator priests from the ministry. He will be the first Roman Catholic church official in the U.S. to go on trial on allegations of transferring accused priests to new assignments.

Attorney Mitchell Garabedian specializes in sexual abuse cases, although he is not connected with this one. Garabedian told the Associated Press that Lynn’s case is very rare and may set legal precedent if there is a conviction. “Given the fact that a monsignor, Monsignor William Lynn, of the Catholic church is being prosecuted means that the government has taken the next step and going after, criminally, supervisors of pedophile priests within the Catholic Church and not only the pedophile priests themselves. I believe that a conviction will have a chilling effect on the Church, and that it will make the Church more moral. And supervisors of the Church may realize that they are also susceptible to criminal charges and that they will not transfer pedophile priests.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Opening statements are scheduled for today in an unprecedented case: the trial of a priest who allegedly raped a boy, and a Monsignor who is charged with endangering children as part of what authorities say was a Philadelphia Archdiocese-wide criminal conspiracy. The defendants have pleaded not guilty. But, before the trial starts, the judge must determine if jurors have been tainted by a co-defendant’s guilty plea last week.

The prosecution alleges Monsignor William Lynn, Secretary for Clergy reviewed secret archives, containing allegations and admissions of sexual abuse by dozens of priests, but he allowed them to remain in ministry to abuse children.

According to prosecutors, Monsignor Lynn and other church officials were concerned about scandal and lawsuits, but what was missing was concern for children.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Newsworks

March 26, 2012
By Elizabeth Fiedler

The landmark trial of a Roman Catholic Church official is set to begin in Philadelphia Monday. It will turn a new page in the court battle in the cases of Monsignor William Lynn and the Rev. James Brennan.

Lynn, the former secretary for clergy for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, is the first U.S. church official charged criminally for his administrative actions. He’s accused of child endangerment and conspiracy for allegedly transferring priests accused of sexual abuse to unsuspecting parishes.

Eyes across the country are focused on the Philadelphia case, says Patrick Wall, a former Catholic priest. Wall now works as a consultant for a law firm that has filed suits on behalf of those sexually abused as children.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Morning Call

By Peter Hall, Of The Morning Call

5:25 a.m. EDT, March 26, 2012
A judge is expected to decide whether opening arguments will begin today in the sex abuse trial of two Philadelphia-area clergymen where retired Allentown Bishop Edward Cullen is likely to testify.

Following a surprise guilty plea by one of his codefendants, defense attorneys for Monsignor William Lynn asked Judge Teresa Sarmina to delay the trial to pick a new jury. The jurors, Lynn’s attorneys said, were likely exposed to media reports of defrocked priest Edward Avery’s guilty plea.

The judge said she would decide before the scheduled start of the trial this morning whether a new jury is needed.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Catholics4Change

March 25, 2012 by Susan Matthews

Click here to read: “Philadelphia priest abuse trial to draw plenty of attention,” by Ross Levitt and Susan Candiotti, CNN, March 25, 2012

Excerpt: “(Rich) Green, the nephew of deceased Cardinal John O’Connor of New York, says he was abused by a priest at a Philadelphia high school in 1990. The priest died in 1999, and the statute of limitations has run out on Green’s ability to sue the Philadelphia archdiocese.

Green did receive a settlement from the Archdiocese of Wilmington, Delaware, where the priest’s order is based, and says he plans to attend Lynn’s trial as often as he can.

“We are asking for these people who are responsible for destroying our lives to be held accountable for what they did to us,” Green said. “We are the ones telling the truth, and I don’t understand why the Catholic Church can’t tell the truth.”

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MEXICO
El Plural

Mexicanos que denunciaron los abusos sexuales cometidos por Marcial Maciel, fundador de los Legionarios de Cristo, así como algunas de sus víctimas, pidieron al Papa Benedicto XVI, de visita en ese país reconocer la responsabilidad de la Iglesia en el ocultamiento de los hechos.

Los exlegionarios José Barba y Alberto Athié y los investigadores Fernando M. González y Bernardo Barranco han denunciado en una rueda de prensa celebrada en León, la ciudad del Estado de Guanajuato donde pernoctó el Papa este sábado, que el Vaticano ocultó los abusos sexuales cometidos por Maciel desde los años cuarenta del siglo pasado.

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MEXICO
La Nacion (Chile)

Víctimas de abusos sexuales del mexicano Marcial Maciel, un sacerdote fallecido en 2008 que fundó la congregación católica Legionarios de Cristo, difundieron un manifiesto en el que acusan al Papa Benedicto XVI, de visita a este país, de haberles ignorado.

“Por vuestras manos pasó la oportunidad de aceptar esa verdad” (los abusos sexuales de Maciel), dice el manifiesto presentado en León, a 400 km al noroeste de la capital, donde el Papa se aloja en su primera visita a México. “Pero no se nos escuchó ni se nos creyó oportunamente. Durante mucho tiempo fuimos ignorados”, agrega el manifiesto.

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MEXICO
Orlando Sentinel

Por E. EDUARDO CASTILLO y ADRIANA GOMEZ LICON

LEON, México (AP) — El vocero del Vaticano, padre Federico Lombardi, afirmó el sábado que ningún Papa encubrió la doble vida del fundador de los Legionarios de Cristo, señalado de abuso sexual contra seminaristas y de haber procreado al menos tres hijos pese a ser sacerdote.

Horas después de que fuera presentado un libro sobre el presunto encubrimiento del Vaticano a los abusos sexuales cometidos por Marcial Maciel, Lombardi consideró “injusto” calificar de esa manera tanto al Papa Benedicto XVI como a su antecesor Juan Pablo II.

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MEXICO
Critica Politica

Por Sanjuana MartínezPeriodista www.websanjuanamartinez.com www.elboomeran.com
“Me falta un testículo, por eso tengo la tentación de tocar niños”, dijo como excusa el sacerdote José Luis de María y Campos López de la Diócesis de Guanajuato, a María, madre de un niño a quien violó varias veces bajo el argumento de que era “el elegido por Dios” y con la protección continuada del obispo José Guadalupe Martín Rábago.

En Guanajuato, tierra yunquista, las víctimas de pederastia clerical forman parte de manera silenciosa de la visita del Papa Benedicto XVI quien se ha negado a recibirlas durante su estancia del 23 al 26 de marzo.

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MEXICO
Observador Global

Quienes fueron abusados sexualmente por el sacerdote mexicano Marcial Maciel aprovecharon la presencia del Papa en León para presentar un manifiesto donde lo acusan de ignorar las denuncias al respecto.

Víctimas de abusos sexuales del mexicano Marcial Maciel, un sacerdote fallecido en 2008 que fundó la congregación católica Legionarios de Cristo, difundieron ayer un manifiesto en el que acusan al papa Benedicto XVI, de visita a este país, de haberlas ignorado.

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MEXICO
The Telegraph (United Kingdom)

More than 300,000 Catholic pilgrims gathered in the central Mexican city of Silao on Sunday to hear Pope Benedict XVI say Mass in the country on his first official visit to Latin America.

By Josephine McKenna
9:54PM BST 25 Mar 2012

Benedict held the ceremony in the city’s Bicentennial park in the shadows of the Christ the King statue, a 72-foot monument which recalls the Catholic uprisings of 1926 – 1929.

After landing in the park by helicopter he was presented with a large black sombrero as he greeted fans in his Popemobile before preaching a message of peace in a country reeling from the violence of the drug cartels.

“We ask Christ, to reign in our hearts, making them pure, docile, filled with hope and courageous in humility,” Benedict said in his homily.

Despite the enthusiastic reception Benedict received on Sunday, his visit to Mexico has been overshadowed by accusations from victims of sexual abuse who have accused the Vatican of protecting a notorious Mexican priest for years.

Victims of sexual abuse were angry that the pontiff had no plans to meet them after he had met victims of paedophilia on his previous official visits to the US, Germany, Malta, Australia and the UK in 2010.

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CLEVELAND (OH)
The Plain Dealer

By Evelyn Theiss, The Plain Dealer

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Catholics from many of the closed churches in Northeast Ohio gathered this afternoon for a Mass of thanksgiving at St. Colman Church in Cleveland.

Hymn-singing was emphasized in the Mass, led by St. Colman’s pastor, the Rev. Bob Begin, and it seemed exceptionally joyous.

“This is so beautiful,” said Phyllis Cielec, 81, whose home church was St. Barbara in Cleveland’s Old Brooklyn neighborhood. “This is part of a dream we never thought we’d see.”

The celebration was triggered by the stunning news earlier this month that the Vatican’s Congregation for the Clergy had ruled in favor of 13 closed parishes in Cleveland, saying Bishop Richard Lennon did not follow church law and procedures when he closed them. Banners at the front of the church represented each of those churches.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CNN

By From Ross Levitt and Susan Candiotti, CNN

updated 6:40 PM EDT, Sun March 25, 2012

(CNN) — Opening arguments are scheduled for Monday in Philadelphia in the first case in which an official of a Roman Catholic archdiocese has been accused of protecting abusive priests by moving them from parish to parish.

Monsignor William Lynn has pleaded not guilty to conspiracy and endangering the welfare of a child. Lynn served as the vicar of clergy in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia from 1992 to 2004, a position in which he was responsible for investigating reports that priests had sexually abused children.

A grand jury alleged that he knowingly allowed priests accused of abuse to continue in the ministry in roles in which they had access to children, according to the district attorney’s office. Lynn “acted as if his job was to protect the abuser, never the abused,” a January 2011 grand jury report concluded.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Wall Street Journal

By PETER LOFTUS

PHILADELPHIA—A landmark criminal trial is scheduled to begin here on Monday for a former high-ranking Roman Catholic Church official accused of failing to protect children from alleged molestation by priests.

Amid the sex-abuse scandal that has shaken the Catholic Church over the past decade, because Msgr. William Lynn will be the highest-ranking member of the U.S. Catholic hierarchy to have his case reach trial on charges related to cover-up allegations. He served as secretary for clergy in the Philadelphia diocese from 1992 to 2004, a job that included handling allegations of sexual abuse by priests. He is charged with endangering the welfare of children and has pleaded not guilty.

The case illustrates both the progress and the shortcomings of the Catholic Church’s handling of abuse allegations. The Philadelphia district attorney’s office credited the diocese with referring some of the allegations at issue in the trial to prosecutors, under strengthened reporting policies the diocese adopted in the past decade.

But a grand-jury report last year blasted the diocese for allowing 37 priests to remain in active ministry despite having “credible” abuse allegations lodged against them. The diocese later placed a majority of the priests on leave as it investigated the allegations. Msgr. Lynn also was placed on leave from his post as a parish pastor after he was charged last year.

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MEXICO
Catholic News Agency

Leon, Mexico, Mar 25, 2012 / 12:47 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Benedict XVI has followed his predecessor Blessed John Paul II in working for “truth and transparency” on priestly abuse and other topics, the Holy See Press Office director said on March 24.

Pope Benedict XVI “has truly done much to fight against these problems and put fundamental measures in place,” Fr. Federico Lombardi told journalists during a press conference at the Hotsson Hotel in León, where he has been briefing journalists during the Pope’s visit to Mexico.

“It’s unjust to consider Pope Benedict XVI as someone who has worked against truth and transparency,” he said during the evening press conference.

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MEXICO
YouTube

Published on Mar 25, 2012 by Euronews

http://www.euronews.com/ Pope Benedict XVI’s first trip to Mexico is being overshadowed by a book alleging the Catholic Church hid evidence of sex abuse by one of Mexico’s most prominent Roman Catholics.

Called ‘The Will Not to Know’, the book details the investigation and alleged cover-up of sexual abuse by a former high-ranking reverend who founded a religious order.

One of its authors, Fernando Gonzalez, claimed the Pope was aware of abuse in Mexico’s Catholic church before 2000.

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PORTUGAL
Diario de Noticias

Seis anos depois de um grupo de alunos das Oficinas de São José, no Porto, ter chocado o país com o envolvimento na morte da transexual Gisberta, a Justiça levanta o véu sobre o dia-a-dia na instituição.

O jornal “Público” escreve que seis anos depois de um grupo de alunos da Oficina de São José, no Porto, ter chocado o país com o seu envolvimento na morte da transexual Gisberta, a Justiça levanta o véu sobre o dia-a-dia da instituição tutelada pela Diocese do Porto, que acolhia então mais de 60 rapazes. Agressões reiteradas a monitores, abusos sexuais entre alunos e até menores vítimas de prostituição.

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PORTUGAL
DN

O atual bispo do Porto, que exerce a função há precisamente cinco anos, diz que outra solução não restava senão fechar as Oficinas de S. José, a instituição católica para acolhimento de menores que o caso Gisberta mediatizou.

“Havia um desajustamento em relação àquilo que se procurava” inicialmente, o acolhimento de órfãos, e aquilo que ultimamente se lhe pedia, a institucionalização de menores problemáticos, “e achei que não havia condições” para isso, explica Manuel Clemente.

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PORTUGAL
Publico

Oficina de S. José, que acolheu a maioria dos menores envolvidos na morte da transexual Gisberta, no Porto, foi o palco dos casos de maus tratos e abusos sexuais. Julgamento arranca dia 27.

Agressões reiteradas de monitores, abusos sexuais entre alunos e até menores vítimas de prostituição. Seis anos depois de um grupo de alunos da Oficina de S. José, no Porto, ter chocado o país com o seu envolvimento na morte da transexual Gisberta, a Justiça levanta o véu sobre o dia-a-dia que se vivia na instituição tutelada pela Diocese do Porto, que acolhia então mais de 60 rapazes. Em Julho de 2010, a notícia destes casos, ainda em investigação, precipitou o encerramento do lar que, na altura, já só albergava 30 jovens.

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CANADA
CTV

Parishioners at a central Ottawa church are praying for everyone impacted by charges of sexual exploitation against a former youth pastor.

Sunday was the first gathering at Peace Tower Church on Bronson Avenue since 28-year-old Mark Raymer was charged with six counts of sexual exploitation and one of luring a 16-year-old girl.

“We never heard his side, you can’t just rush to judgment on somebody especially when you’re dealing with spiritual people,” said Maurice Golka. “The law would have to prove he did something inappropriate.”

“If it did happen, I hope people that had the offence done to them . . . I hope they get help and get healed,” said Terry Fierback.

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MEXICO
International

Luis Prados León (Guanajuato) 24 MAR 2012

Las víctimas de los abusos sexuales a menores cometidos por el fundador de la Legión de Cristo, el sacerdote mexicano ya fallecido Marcial Maciel, han manifestado este sábado su repulsa por la ocultación a sabiendas del escándalo por parte del Vaticano durante décadas y su indignación por que el papa Benedicto XVI, de visita en México, no tuviera previsto recibirlos.

Los exlegionarios José Barba y Alberto Athié y los investigadores Fernando M. González y Bernardo Barranco han denunciado en conferencia de prensa celebrada en León, la ciudad del Estado de Guanajuato donde pernocta el Papa, que la Santa Sede ocultó los abusos sexuales cometidos por Maciel desde los años cuarenta del siglo pasado. Maciel fundó la congregación en enero de 1941 con el nombre de Misioneros del Sagrado Corazón y posteriormente lo cambió a Legión de Cristo.

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OSTERREICH
Der Standard

Markus Rohrhofer, 25. März 2012 18:01

Man sei schockiert, Konkretes habe man aber nicht gewusst: Die Verteidigungslinie des Stifts Kremsmünster ist klar definiert – Polizeiliche Akten belegen aber gezielte Vertuschung

Linz – “Gerüchte” habe es gegeben, und es sei aus heutiger Sicht “ein großer Fehler” gewesen, diesen nicht nachzugehen. Abt Ambros Ebhart gibt diese Antwort gerne auf die heikle Frage, ob man denn tatsächlich nichts von gewalttätigen Übergriffen und dem sexuellen Missbrauch im Internat des Stiftes Kremsmünster mitbekommen habe. Vergangene Woche war es wieder einmal Zeit für die bekannte Rechtfertigung. Der 1200 Seiten starke Gerichtsakt der Staatsanwaltschaft Steyr gelangte an die Öffentlichkeit und offenbart ein Bild des Schreckens. Bis in die 1990er-Jahre soll es im Internat des Stiftsgymnasiums Kremsmünster sexuellen Missbrauch und Gewalt gegeben haben.

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MEXICO
Daily Nation (Kenya)

By AFP
Posted Sunday, March 25 2012

GUANAJUATO, Mexico, Sunday

Pope Benedict XVI called on Sunday on adults to “protect and to care for children” and sent a message to minors suffering from violence in a speech in the central Mexican city of Guanajuato.

Amid complaints from sexual abuse victims that the pope would not meet them in Mexico, Benedict referred to the mistreatment of children, without specifically mentioning Catholic priest paedophilia scandals of recent decades.

“I wish to lift up my voice, inviting everyone to protect and to care for children, so that nothing may extinguish their smile, but that they may live in peace and look to the future with confidence,” the pope said before hundreds of cheering children from the balcony of the ornate Casa Del Conde Rul, where he earlier met with President Felipe Calderon.

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NEW JERSEY
The Star-Ledger

By Kevin Manahan/The Star-Ledger

BERNARDS — Bill Crane Sr. remembers the sweaty August day in 1964, when he drove his Pontiac onto the sprawling Delbarton School campus, hoping to land a job as a history teacher that paid $4,400 a year. Married, he had a freshly printed diploma from Upsala College in his pocket and a baby on the way.

But he wasn’t desperate. After all, he had just told a “stuffy” administrator at Hanover Park High School in East Hanover that he didn’t want the job the guy was offering.

“Where do you see yourself in five years?” Crane was asked.

“Anyplace but here,” he replied, then walked out.

But Delbarton was different. Even in midsummer, the place had the feel of serious academia.

“As I stepped out of the car, I said to myself, ‘Now, this seems like a great place,’ ” Crane recalled in a phone interview Wednesday from his home in Washington state. “Knowing what I know now, I would have shut the door and driven away — in a hurry.”

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ESPANA
El Pais

Natalia Junquera 24 MAR 2012

No quisieron esperar más, y a la muerte de Franco, un grupo de viudas e hijos de fusilados se lanzaron a la búsqueda y apertura de las fosas donde los asesinos habían arrojado a sus familiares. En Navarra y La Rioja, arrodillados en la tierra, sin más herramientas que una pala y las propias manos, les acompañaban algunos sacerdotes. Sacerdotes como Victorino Aranguren, Eloy Fernández, Dionisio Lesaca, Vicente Ilzarbe… que ayudaron a aquellas viudas a desenterrar a sus maridos y que en los funerales que oficiaban en su memoria pidieron perdón por el comportamiento de la Iglesia durante la Guerra Civil: “Esta sangre nos salpicó también”, “si decimos que no hemos pecado, hacemos a Dios mentiroso”, “desde aquí, yo, sacerdote, aunque pecador, os pido perdón en nombre de la Iglesia…”.

“Participé en muchas exhumaciones. Era muy impactante. Las viudas decían: ‘Ese es mi marido, que era un poco chambo’, ‘ese otro es el mío, que le puse yo esa medallita…”, recuerda hoy Victorino Aranguren, sacerdote, de 80 años. “Besaban los huesos como si fueran reliquias y me pedían que los besara yo también. Todos tenían el cráneo agujereado por el tiro de gracia”.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Associated Press

By MARYCLAIRE DALE, Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A landmark priest-abuse trial opening Monday in Philadelphia may unveil the cryptic operations of the Roman Catholic archdiocese and detail how child sex-abuse complaints were buried for decades in secret archives adjacent to a glorious cathedral as the priests they named went unpunished.

Monsignor William Lynn is the first U.S. church official ever charged with endangering children for allegedly failing to oust accused predators from the priesthood. But he may not be the last.

Philadelphia prosecutors say he helped carry out “an archdiocesan-wide policy … (that) was criminal in nature.” And they’ve hinted they could charge others when the trial ends.

Civil lawyers believe the trial will help them refile priest-abuse lawsuits that were thrown out in Pennsylvania because of legal time limits, or persuade the state legislature to open a window for filing child sex-abuse claims.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
Washington Post

Stakes are high for church as ‘failure to report’ case unfolds against Kansas City bishop

By Associated Press, Updated: Sunday, March 25

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The charge is only a misdemeanor, but if prosecutors are able to win a conviction against Kansas City Roman Catholic Bishop Robert Finn, they could be opening up a whole new front in the national priest abuse crisis.

Finn is accused of violating Missouri’s mandatory reporter law by failing to tell state officials about hundreds of images of suspected child pornography found on the computer of a priest in his diocese.

Experts say a criminal conviction against Finn, the highest-ranking church official charged with shielding an abusive priest, could embolden prosecutors elsewhere to more aggressively pursue members of the church hierarchy who try to protect offending clergy.

“Cases can sit like land mines in files for a long time and suddenly come to light,” said Matthew Bunson, a senior fellow at the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology and co-author of a book, “Pope Benedict XVI and the Sexual Abuse Crisis: Working for Reform and Renewal.” ‘’Those cases may ultimately involve leaders in the church.”

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MEXICO
Hispanically Speaking News

Mexicans who denounced the sexual abuses committed by Marcial Maciel (1920-2008), founder of the Legion of Christ, asked Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday to acknowledge the church’s responsibility in covering up his case and to announce that “never again” will pederasty be tolerated.

“We don’t plan to boycott the visit, absolutely. What we do want is to ask him from Mexico: Where are you going, Benedict XVI? Do you want to find your charisma once more and the mission of Peter, or is strengthening your papacy and your position as head of state what you want?” former priest Alberto Athie said at a press conference.

He spoke those words in presenting a new book of which he is co-author, “The Voluntad de No Saber” (The Will Not To Know), a 2012 publication of Grijalbo, which offers 212 documents from the secret archives of the Vatican that refer to the sexual abuse of minors and other inappropriate conduct connected with Maciel beginning in 1944.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin
Inquirer Staff Writer

The neighborhood that rings St. Jerome’s Church in Northeast Philadelphia is flush with cops and firefighters, reliable Catholics in brick homes with tidy lawns, backyard slides, and a few front-door crucifixes.

That was the backdrop last year for one of the more sordid clergy sex-abuse allegations to emerge in years. A grand jury report described a 10-year-old altar boy being confronted in St. Jerome’s sacristy after Mass, ordered to strip, and engage in sex.

Not once, but three times – by two different priests – over a year in the late 1990s.

On Monday, a Philadelphia jury is scheduled to start hearing about those accusations and one that looms larger: that leaders of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia could have predicted, or prevented, the attacks but instead followed a long-held practice of protecting the church and abusers within it.

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ILLINOIS
WGIL

A self-proclaimed Catholic priest and former owner of a Galesburg church is facing seven felony charges in Knox County.

According to Assistant States Attorney Erik Gibson, Reverend Ryan St. Anne Scott was arrested in St. Louis County last week on a Knox County warrant. The warrant charges the former Holy Rosary Abbey owner with three counts of financial exploitation of an elderly person, three counts of theft, and one count of deceptive practices.

The Catholic Archdiocese of Peoria has previously disassociated themselves from Scott and his teachings.

Gibson says Scott allegedly obtained accounts and other personal finance documentation illegally from an older woman in Galesburg between 2009 and 2011. He says the priest is accused of making it a habit to borrow money across the midwest region and bounce around to other cities. Earlier this month, Gibson says, Scott was targeted by federal bankruptcy authorities in the Cedar Falls area.

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MEXICO
SDP Noticias

Por Andrés Beltramo Álvarez. Enviado

León, Gto., 24 Mar (Notimex).- El vocero del Vaticano, Federico Lombardi, consideró injustos los señalamientos hacia Benedicto XVI por el tema de la pederastia y aclaró que una reunión con víctimas no fue prevista con antelación.

En rueda de prensa sostuvo que el Papa es un hombre de transparencia, incluso en el caso de Marcial Maciel, y que la preocupación del líder católico por el problema de los abusos sexuales contra menores y su interés en las víctimas ha sido explicado muchas veces.

?Un punto fundamental es si los Papas fueron encubridores del problema y en ese sentido debo decir que no, según mi conocimiento de estos Papas no es verdad que fueron encubridores?, dijo.

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MEXICO
El Mundo (Espana)

Jacobo G. García | León (Guanajuato, México)

Ahí estaba Guadalupe Dávila, llegada de Ciudad Juárez después de que asesinaran a su hijo durante una fiesta. También Josefina Torres, de Durango, esposa de un militar. O María Valencia, madre de un policía secuestrado por el crimen organizado en Michoacán.

Apenas un puñado de historias pero suficientes para que el Papa Benedicto XVI, en su segundo viaje a Latinoamérica, viera de cerca el rostro macabro de la violencia que vive México, que ha dejado 50.000 muertos en la guerra entre y contra los cárteles en los últimos años. El Papa Benedicto XVI se reunió este sábado con víctimas de la violencia durante el encuentro que sostuvo con el presidente Felipe Calderón en Guanajuato. Un encuentro fuera de agenda de los que suele improvisar Benedicto XVI en sus viajes. “Hay que luchar contra este mal”, había dicho días antes.

Pero a quien no verá, al menos eso es lo que señaló el portavoz del Vaticano, Federico Lombardi, es a las víctimas de violencia sexual del ex líder de ‘Los Legionarios de Cristo’, el sacerdote mexicano Marcial Maciel, fallecido en 2008. El portavoz de la Santa Sede insistió en que el tema de la pederastia preocupa a Benedicto XVI y está presente “cuando pide que nadie quiete la sonrisa a los niños”. Lombardi reiteró que el Papa se pronuncia en contra de todas formas de violencia y en estos se incluye el de abuso sexual, por lo que ha insistido en ayudar a los niños.

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MEXICO
El Diario de Yucatan

Por E. EDUARDO CASTILLO y ADRIANA GOMEZ LICON

LEON, Guanajuato (AP).- El vocero del Vaticano, padre Federico Lombardi, afirmó el sábado que ningún Papa encubrió la doble vida del fundador de los Legionarios de Cristo, señalado de abuso sexual contra seminaristas y de haber procreado al menos tres hijos pese a ser sacerdote.

Horas después de que fuera presentado un libro sobre el presunto encubrimiento del Vaticano a los abusos sexuales cometidos por Marcial Maciel, Lombardi consideró “injusto” calificar de esa manera tanto al Papa Benedicto XVI como a su antecesor Juan Pablo II.

“Tengo que testimoniar que los dos Papas fueron hombres, que son hombres de verdad y de transparencias en este problema”, aseguró el portavoz de la Santa Sede. “Creo que es verdaderamente injusto de considerar al Papa Benedicto como un hombre que ha trabajado en contra de la verdad y de la transparencia”, dijo. El libro “La voluntad de no saber”, uno de cuyos coautores es una víctima de abuso de Maciel, señala que el Vaticano encubrió esa doble vida del fundador de Los Legionarios de Cristo.

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MEXICO
Que

LEÓN, México (Reuters) – La visita del Papa Benedicto XVI a México se vio ensombrecida el sábado por la revelación de nuevos detalles sobre abusos del padre mexicano Marcial Maciel, mientras las víctimas lamentaban la falta de respuesta ante sus peticiones de reunirse con el pontífice.

Benedicto XVI llega a la segunda nación con más creyentes del mundo después de Brasil cuando la fe católica de los mexicanos se ha visto disminuida entre otras cosas por el escándalo de Maciel, que durante décadas abusó sexualmente de seminaristas y llevó una doble vida.

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MEXICO
Informador

Presentan libro con documentos referentes a abusos sexuales y otras conductas inapropiadas relacionadas con Maciel

GUANAJUATO (25/MAR/2012).- En paralelo con la visita del Papa Benedicto XVI a Guanajuato, ayer fue presentado un libro de denuncia ante los casos de pederastia.

“No pretendemos boicotear la visita, absolutamente. Lo que sí queremos es decirle desde México adonde vas, Benedicto XVI: ¿Quieres reencontrar carisma y tu misión de Pedro o quieres caminar a fortalecer tu Pontificado máximo y tu Jefatura de Estado?”, dijo en rueda de prensa el ex sacerdote Alberto Athié. Esas palabras las pronunció al presentar un nuevo libro del que es coautor, ”La voluntad de no saber” (Grijalbo, 2012), que ofrece 212 documentos procedentes de los archivos secretos del Vaticano que refieren abusos sexuales y otras conductas inapropiadas en torno a Maciel desde 1944.

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MEXICO
A.M.

Por: Luis Meza.

Víctimas de abuso sexual lamentaron que dentro de las actividades del Papa en México no se haya considerado un espacio para su encuentro con ellos, como sí ha sucedido en otras latitudes.

Joaquín Aguilar, dirigente en México de la Red de Sobrevivientes de Abusos Sexuales de Sacerdotes, señaló que es falso que no hayan buscado ese encuentro, como lo dio a entender hace unos días Carlos Aguiar Retes, presidente de la Conferencia del Episcopado Mexicano.

“El mencionó que no conocía a las víctimas. Yo personalmente fui hace unos días a presentarle un caso dramático de Tlalnepantla y nunca me quiso recibir. En México quieren seguir con esta política de silencio que lamentablemente provoca que el mismo Papa se vea involucrado con los delincuentes, al no querer hablar de esto que es violación y abuso sexual hacia menores”, expresó.

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MEXICO
Pulso

El Universal

La presentación del libro “La Voluntad de no Saber: lo que sí se conocía sobre Maciel en los archivos secretos del Vaticano desde 1944”, ha llamado la atención de los representantes de los medios de comunicación que cubren la visita del Papa a México.

El libro escrito por Alberto Athié, José Barba y Fernando M. González, presentado por Bernardo Barranco y Carmen Aristegui, ha generado grandes expectativa y la presencia de unos 100 representantes de los medios de comunicación.

José Barba no ha podido asistir debido a problemas de salud pero se proyectó un video con un mensaje en el que acusa al Vaticano de saber desde el año de 1997, los abusos cometidos por el fundador de la congregación de los Legionarios de Cristo Marcial Maciel.

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MEXICO
La Voz

El papa Benedicto XVI ha sido agasajado por multitudes en México, donde tuvo un emotivo encuentro con niños y adolescentes en Guanajuato, horas después de que víctimas de abusos sexuales del sacerdote mexicano Marcial Maciel le reprochasen haberlos ignorado. Benedicto XVI instó a “proteger y cuidar a los niños”, en especial los que “soportan el peso del sufrimiento, el abandono, la violencia”, en un discurso pronunciado desde un balcón de la plaza de la Paz, interrumpido por aplausos y gritos. A punto de cumplir 85 años, el Papa no dio muestras de fatiga. “Deseo elevar mi voz invitando a todos a proteger y cuidar a los niños, para que nunca se apague su sonrisa, puedan vivir en paz y mirar al futuro con confianza”, señaló en Guanajuato, 380 km al noroeste de la capital, la tercera ciudad mexicana que visita en este segundo viaje por América Latina que incluye también a Cuba.

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MEXICO
Periodista

Federico Lombardi portavoz del Vaticano afirmó que los Papas Juan Pablo II y Benedicto XVI no fueron “encubridores del padre Marcial Maciel y es injusto considerar que el actual Pontífice está en contra de la verdad y la transparencia”.

En conferencia de prensa descartó que el Obispo de Roma se vaya a reunir con las víctimas de abuso sexual, porque es un tema que no está en la agenda de la Conferencia del Episcopado Mexicano (CEM) como sí lo estuvo en países que ha visitado como Francia e Irlanda.

El vocero del Vaticano manifestó estar informado de que se había presentado un libro de víctimas de abuso sexual, “el cual no he tenido tiempo de leerlo” pero su punto fundamental es que “si los papas fueron encubridores” y en “mi conocimiento de estos Papas es que no fueron encubridores”.

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MEXICO
Periodista

Mexicanos que denunciaron los abusos sexuales cometidos por Marcial Maciel (1920-2008), fundador de los Legionarios de Cristo, pidieron hoy al papa Benedicto XVI reconocer la responsabilidad de la Iglesia en el ocultamiento de ese caso y proclamar que “nunca más” se tolerará la pederastia.

“No pretendemos boicotear la visita, absolutamente. Lo que sí queremos es decirle desde México adónde vas, Benedicto XVI: ¿Quieres reencontrar carisma y tu misión de Pedro o quieres caminar a fortalecer tu Pontificado máximo y tu Jefatura de Estado?”, dijo en rueda de prensa el exsacerdote Alberto Athié.

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MEXICO
Boston Herald

By Tracy Wilkinson and Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times
Sunday, March 25, 2012

LEON, Mexico — Singing, strumming guitars and trying to shield themselves from a searing sun, tens of thousands of Mexican Catholics came together Saturday nearly 24 hours ahead of an open-air Mass with Pope Benedict XVI.

They walked miles and took up position in Bicentennial Park, a short distance from a hilltop monument that honors the 1920s Cristero War by Catholic counter-revolutionaries.

But as religious fervor was on display here in Silao, in central Mexico’s Guanajuato state, a sexual-abuse scandal involving a notorious Mexican priest threatened to cast a pall on the pope’s first visit to the Spanish-speaking Americas.

At a news conference in nearby Leon to launch a scathing book, sexual-abuse victims and advocates angrily accused the Vatican of protecting the priest, the late Rev. Marcial Maciel, for decades. And they said they were dismayed that there were no plans for Benedict to meet victims.

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KANSAS
Casper Star-Tribune

Associated Press

A California boy attends only four days at a Kansas military boarding school where he is tormented by staff and students after breaking both his legs in separate incidents. A Tennessee student’s stomach is forcibly branded as a rite of initiation. A Florida cadet breaks his hand fending off a student with a history of sexual abuse who tries to grope him, and school officials refuse to investigate or inform his parents of the attack.

These claims are the latest additions to a growing list of former cadets who allege in a federal lawsuit they were abused at St. John’s Military School in Salina, Kan. An amended complaint filed Friday in federal court in Kansas City, Kan., now includes six sets of named parents who have filed on behalf of cadets, plus one ex-cadet who is now an adult. The plaintiffs come from California, Florida, Tennessee, Colorado, Texas and Illinois.

The Episcopal boarding school, which charges families nearly $30,000 per year for students enrolled in grades 6-12, draws students from across the nation.

Two new defendants are named in the revised lawsuit: The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America and the Episcopal Diocese of Western Kansas, entities which the suit says created the school.

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MEXICO
Reuters

By Mica Rosenberg and Philip Pullella

LEON, Mexico | Sun Mar 25, 2012

(Reuters) – Pope Benedict’s first full day in Mexico was clouded by fresh allegations the Vatican hid evidence of sex abuse by one of the country’s most prominent Roman Catholic leaders for decades.

The authors of a new book say a trove of once-secret Vatican documents prove Church officials ignored complaints of drug use and molestation of seminarians by the late Father Marcial Maciel, founder of the Catholic order the Legionaries of Christ.

Adding to the criticism of the Church, victims of abuse by priests in Mexico came forward to seek an audience with Benedict, but said their calls have not been answered.

Church officials acknowledged in 2009, a year after Maciel’s death at the age of 87, that the charismatic Mexican cleric had led a double life, secretly fathering children and lavishly spending the generous donations of his followers.

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MEXICO
ABS-CBN (Philippines)

Agence France-Presse

Posted at 03/25/2012

LEON, Mexico – Victims of sexual abuse accused the Vatican on Saturday of protecting a notorious Mexican priest for decades, and expressed frustration that Pope Benedict XVI would not meet them in Mexico.

The pope has met with abuse victims in many foreign countries but has no plans to do so during a three-day visit to Mexico which began on Friday.

A group including alleged victims of abuse by Marcial Maciel, the late founder of the influential Legion of Christ religious order, presented a book that they say proves that Vatican officials ignored crimes committed by Maciel.

“The opportunity to accept this truth passed through your hands,” read a statement presented to journalists by Jose Barba, a former Legionary and alleged victim, during a video transmission from Mexico to the central city of Leon, where the pope is staying.

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MEXICO
Latin American Herald Tribune

LEON, Mexico – Mexicans who denounced the sexual abuses committed by Marcial Maciel (1920-2008), founder of the Legion of Christ, asked Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday to acknowledge the church’s responsibility in covering up his case and to announce that “never again” will pederasty be tolerated.

“We don’t plan to boycott the visit, absolutely. What we do want is to ask him from Mexico: Where are you going, Benedict XVI? Do you want to find your charisma once more and the mission of Peter, or is strengthening your papacy and your position as head of state what you want?” former priest Alberto Athie said at a press conference.

He spoke those words in presenting a new book of which he is co-author, “The Voluntad de No Saber” (The Will Not To Know), a 2012 publication of Grijalbo, which offers 212 documents from the secret archives of the Vatican that refer to the sexual abuse of minors and other inappropriate conduct connected with Maciel beginning in 1944.

According to the ex-priest, with Benedict XVI at the head of the church, “he and he alone can chart a new course to resolve this tremendous problem…the holocaust of thousands of boys and girls who were abused in many parts of the world.”

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
The Kansas City Star

By MARK MORRIS
The Kansas City Star

Good moms know that simple instructions and clear expectations often lead to positive, vigorous outcomes.

With that in mind, consider this guidance crafted by the two mothers, Jenifer Valenti and Carrie Cooper, who now lead child protection efforts for the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph:

If you know or suspect that a child is being abused, call the police, the Missouri Child Abuse Hotline and, finally, the diocese’s ombudsman.

Under the old system, muddled reporting policy and blurred responsibilities led to confused inaction and even criminal charges for the diocese and its bishop.

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MINNESOTA
In-Forum

By: Stephen J. Lee, Forum Communications Co., INFORUM

CROOKSTON, Minn. – The Catholic Diocese here, in its first official comment since news of the arrest of the Rev. Joseph Jeyapaul in India last week on Minnesota sexual assault charges, says it hopes he is returned for trial.

“The only way for this to be resolved is for him to be here, so we would like a resolution to it,” Monsignor David Baumgartner, who, as vicar general of the diocese, serves as the right-hand man to Bishop Michael Hoeppner, told the Grand Forks Herald this week.

Jeyapaul, 57, has been a fugitive for six years for criminal charges first filed in 2006 in state district court in Roseau. He is accused of sexually assaulting a parish member in Greenbush, Minn., when she was 14 and 15 in 2004 and 2005. In 2007, the charges were amended to include similar counts involving a second girl who was 16 during the same period.

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MEXICO
TheDenverChannel

LEON, Mexico (CNN) — On the same day Pope Benedict addressed and blessed a group of 1,800 children in Guanajuato, Mexico, three Mexican authors released a book accusing the Vatican of hiding or ignoring cases of child sex abuse by Roman Catholic priests.

The book, “La Voluntad de no Saber” (Willing Not to be Aware), chronicles multiple cases of sexual abuse of minors committed by Marcial Maciel, a Mexican-born Roman Catholic priest who was influential at the Vatican.

Maciel, who died in January 2008 at age 87, was the founder and director of the Legion of Christ and the Regnum Christi movement.

The book was authored by Jose Barba, a former seminarian who says he was the victim of sexual abuse by a priest. Historian Fernando M. Gonzalez, a co-author, says the book is based on 212 documents leaked from the Vatican.

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MEXICO
El Paso Times

By Alejandro Martínez-Cabrera \ El Paso Timeselpasotimes.com
Posted: 03/25/2012

LEON, GUANAJUATO — Victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests accused Mexican Catholic Church officials on Saturday of denying them an audience with Pope Benedict XVI during his visit to Mexico.

Members of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, said the Mexican Catholic Church has publicly said a meeting wasn’t coordinated because abuse victims never approached them to request one.

However, Jesús Romero, a member of SNAP and a victim of abuse when he was 11 years old, said they requested a meeting with Mexico City Archbishop Norberto Rivera several times, but the request was never granted.

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MEXICO
The New York Times

By RACHEL DONADIO

Published: March 24, 2012

LEÓN, Mexico — The shadow of the disgraced Mexican founder of a powerful religious order darkened the visit of Pope Benedict XVI here this weekend, as former victims and authors staged news conferences to call attention to the church’s failure to combat what they call a systemic culture of sexual abuse.

In the past week, two books released in Mexico drew new attention to longstanding questions about whether Benedict, when he was the head of the Vatican’s doctrinal office, acted decisively enough about the Rev. Marcial Maciel Degollado, a Mexican priest who founded the Legionaries of Christ, once victims began coming forward claiming he had had abused them.

The media attention shows that the Maciel case is far from closed. The Vatican has said that Benedict does not plan to meet with abuse victims while in Mexico, as he has done in other countries.

After complaints of sexual abuse were filed against Father Maciel in 1998, Benedict, who was then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, quashed a Vatican investigation. He re-opened the case in 2004, ultimately finding that Father Maciel had led a double life, raped seminarians, fathered several children and abused drugs while leading a charismatic organization known for producing ranks of priests.

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MEXICO
La Jornada

Los autores del libro ‘La voluntad de no saber’ aseguran que éste demuestra con documentos que el Vaticano ha mentido de manera sistemática sobre ese delito.

Carolina Gómez, Arturo Cano y Carlos García, enviados y corresponsal
Publicado: 24/03/2012

León, Gto. Para que realmente su visita a México pueda ser considerada histórica, el papa Benedicto XVI debería “reconocer públicamente su responsabilidad” en el ocultamiento de los casos de pederastia clerical, particularmente los relacionados con el fundador de la Legión de Cristo, Marcial Maciel, consideraron los autores del libro La voluntad de no saber, que fue presentado hoy.

En conferencia de prensa, Fernando González, experto del Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales de la UNAM; el exsacerdote Alberto Athié; el experto en asuntos religiosos Bernardo Barranco, y la periodista Carmen Aristegui, expusieron que Joseph Ratzinger debe hacer un mea culpa y comprometerse como la máxima autoridad de la Iglesia católica y ex prefecto de la Congregación de la Doctrina de la Fe -instancia que conoció de primera mano las denuncias por los abusos sexuales a menores- a tomar las medidas necesarias para que estas situaciones no vuelvan a suceder.

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MEXICO
proceso

MÉXICO, D.F. (apro).- La jerarquía católica consideró hoy que el Papa Benedicto XVI ha procedido con todo realismo y energía ante los casos de pederastia en la Iglesia católica.

De acuerdo con el sitio web de Reforma, el cardenal de Guadalajara, José Francisco Robles Ortega, dijo que no se puede acusar al pontífice de ser cómplice de esta situación o de no querer actuar.

Enfatizó que el Papa ha querido purificar a la Iglesia de la gravedad de este asunto.

Por su parte, el cardenal emérito de Guadalajara, Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, dijo que ya se esperaba que durante la visita papal se volviera a sacar el tema de la pederastia.

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MEXICO
El Pais (Espana)

Luis Prados León (Guanajuato) 24 MAR 2012

Las víctimas de los abusos sexuales a menores cometidos por el fundador de la Legión de Cristo, el sacerdote mexicano ya fallecido Marcial Maciel, han manifestado este sábado su repulsa por la ocultación a sabiendas del escándalo por parte del Vaticano durante décadas y su indignación por que el papa Benedicto XVI, de visita en México, no tuviera previsto recibirlos.

Los exlegionarios José Barba y Alberto Athié y los investigadores Fernando M. González y Bernardo Barranco han denunciado en conferencia de prensa celebrada en León, la ciudad del Estado de Guanajuato donde pernocta el Papa, que la Santa Sede ocultó los abusos sexuales cometidos por Maciel desde los años cuarenta del siglo pasado. Maciel fundó la congregación en enero de 1941 con el nombre de Misioneros del Sagrado Corazón y posteriormente lo cambió a Legión de Cristo.

“El Vaticano sistemáticamente eludió su responsabilidad. No solo sabía, sino que toleró y protegió a Maciel. El Vaticano mintió”, afirmó Barranco.

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MEXICO
CNN

Por Guillermo Cruz
Sábado, 24 de marzo de 2012 a las 14:41

LEON, Guanajuato (CNNMéxico) — El hecho de que el papa Benedicto XVI no haya hecho referencia durante su visita por México a los casos de abusos y pederastia registrados en el país hasta el mediodía de este sábado, fue cuestionado en la ciudad de León durante la presentación del libro La Voluntad de No Saber.

“Es un error de agenda del Vaticano porque el papa Benedicto XVI ha tenido contactos con víctimas en Estados Unidos, Australia, Irlanda, Malta y Alemania, ¿por qué en México no?, ¿acaso no existen víctimas en México?, ¿por qué el Papa no va a tener contacto con las víctimas de abuso sexual de Marcial Maciel? ¿acaso nació en otro país?”, cuestionó Bernardo Barranco, experto en temas religiosos y autor del prólogo de la publicación de la Editorial Grijalbo.

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MEXICO
Tabasco Hoy

Publicado: Sábado, 24 de Marzo del 2012, a las 14:45 hrs.

León, Guanajuato

“Estoy aquí, alzando la voz en nombre de muchas víctimas, lamentablemente somos muchos, nosotros hemos tenido unos cientos de casos, sabemos que son miles”, afirmó Julián Aguilar, director de SNAP, organización que aglutina a víctimas de abusos sexuales cometidos por sacerdotes.

“Estamos lastimados tras escuchar que no se van a reunir con nosotros, no les interesan las víctimas en México”. Aguilar habló durante una conferencia previa a la presentación del libro “La Voluntad de no Saber”, escrito por Alberto Athié, José Barba y Fernando M.González.

En dicho espacio se recordó que el Obispo de Roma se ha reunido con víctimas de abusos sexuales en Estados Unidos, en Australia, en Irlanda y en la Isla de Malta, entre otros puntos, pero que en dichos lugares los encuentros se dieron por la intermediación de los obispos locales, algo que no quisieron hacer los sacerdotes de la jerarquía católica en México.

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MEXICO
Milenio

León, Tendencias • 24 Marzo 2012 – 2:11pm — Pedro Domínguez

Los autores del libro ‘La voluntad de no saber’, afirman tener documentos en los que se comprueba que Joseph Ratzinger sabía de los abusos a niños por parte de sacerdotes y exigen rinda cuentas y reconozca su complicidad.

León, Gto. • El Papa Benedicto XVI debe pedir disculpas por los abusos sexuales del padre Maciel y reconocer su complicidad al encubrir el caso, afirmó el ex sacerdote Alberto Athié.

En conferencia de prensa al presentar el libro titulado ‘La voluntad de no saber’, respaldó su dicho en la posesión de archivos secretos de El Vaticano desde 1944 hasta el 2002 donde se da cuenta de cómo la Santa Sede, incluido Joseph Ratzinger, conocían y encubrían la doble vida del ex líder de los Legionarios de Cristo.

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LOUISIANA
NECN

LAKE CHARLES, La. (AP) — A former priest in two area Catholic churches has been charged with two counts of aggravated rape and 52 counts of sexual battery, according to the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office.

Kim Myers, a sheriff’s office spokeswoman, tells the American Press ( ) that 56-year-old Mark A. Broussard, who left the priesthood in the mid-1990s, was charged with engaging in sexual conduct with an 8-year-old parishioner from 1986 to 1989.

Victims of sex crimes have 30 years after their 18th birthday to report abuse.

Broussard was arrested Thursday in his home in Duson. Broussard is being held in the Calcasieu Correctional Center on a $1 million bond.

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MEXICO
Los Angeles Times

REPORTING FROM LEON, MEXICO — Sexual abuse victims angrily accused the Vatican on Saturday of protecting a notorious Mexican priest for decades, and said they were dismayed that Pope Benedict XVI will not meet with them on his visit to the country.

Benedict has sat down with abuse victims in almost every country he has visited. But his spokesman said Mexican bishops did not request such an encounter here — an omission that victims’ advocates said was unconscionable.

The pope arrived in Mexico’s central Guanajuato state Friday and continues to Cuba on Monday. He was scheduled to meet with President Felipe Calderon later Saturday and will preside over an open-air Mass on Sunday that organizers say could draw more than 300,000 people.

A group that included abuse victims and experts in the field held a forum here in Leon to release a book that they say establishes “irrefutably” that Vatican officials knew of the egregious crimes committed by the late Rev. Marcial Maciel.

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NEDERLAND
de Gelderlander

GIESBEEK – De pastoor uit Giesbeek die zich volgens de belangenorganisatie Klokk in de jaren zeventig mogelijk schuldig heeft gemaakt aan seksueel misbruik, is overleden. Dit meldt het bisdom Utrecht, dat nazoekingen naar de pastoor heeft gedaan.

Volgens een woordvoerder zijn er, sinds het misbruik in de katholieke kerk aan het licht gekomen is, geen klachten bij het bisdom over de Giesbeekse priester ingediend.

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CALIFORNIA
WFMY

Costa Mesa, CA — Televangelists Paul and Jan Crouch, who built the Trinity Broadcasting Network into the world’s largest Christian broadcaster, are now facing attacks from within their own family.

Their granddaughter, Brittany Koper, has filed court papers that include allegations of $50 million in financial wrongdoing at the ministry headquartered in southern California. Her suit was followed by another from a Koper in-law, who detailed opulent spending at the network on items such as private jets, mansions and a $100,000 mobile home for Jan Crouch’s dogs.

The lawsuits came after Koper’s husband was accused by a debt collection company of embezzling more than $1 million from TBN. The debt collection company that filed the lawsuit later added the Crouches’ granddaughter and two of her in-laws as defendants.

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UNITED STATES
Daily Mail (United Kingdom)

Private jets, 13 mansions and a $100,000 mobile home just for the dogs: Televangelists ‘defrauded tens of million of dollars from Christian network’

By Nina Golgowski

Two former employees of the world’s largest Christian television channel Trinity Broadcasting Network are accusing the non-profit of spending $50 million of its funding on extravagant personal expenses.

Among purchases, the network founded by Televangelists Paul and Jan Crouch, is accused of misappropriating its ‘charitable assets’ toward a $50 million jet, 13 mansions and a $100,000-mobile home for Mrs Crouch’s dogs.

Their granddaughter, Brittany Koper, 26, recently filed her allegations in court after a brief appointment as the network’s chief finance director in July.

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MEXICO
Voice of America

Pope Benedict meets with Mexican President Felipe Calderon Saturday, as the Roman Catholic leader embarks on a five-day Latin America trip that will also take him to Cuba.

The pontiff began his day with celebration of a private Mass at Miraflores College in the central Mexican city of Leon. He planned an early evening meeting with the Mexican leader at the state government house in Guanajuato, followed by a gathering with children on the city’s Peace Square. …

The Roman Catholic Church is under pressure in Mexico from the growing rise of Protestant churches, as well as a scandal involving a prominent priest, Marcial Maciel, who was facing allegations of drug addiction and molesting young boys when he died.

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NEDERLAND
Kerknieuws

Vic Marijnen, de latere minister-president, heeft in 1958 als bestuursvoorzitter van het jongensinternaat Harreveld geprobeerd het ministerie van Justitie te beïnvloeden over vermeende misbruikpraktijken op het instituut. Marijnen was toen bestuursvoorzitter van het instituut. Dat stelt Bert Kreemers, voormalig secretaris van de commissie-Deetman, vrijdag in NRC Handelsblad.

Die informatie staat niet in het eindrapport van de commissie-Deetman, die onderzoek deed naar seksueel misbruik in de Rooms-Katholieke kerk.

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MEXICO
El Financiero

AP

La primera visita del Papa Benedicto XVI a México coincidirá con la publicación de un nuevo libro que revelará documentos que presuntamente demuestran que el Vaticano tuvo conocimiento de los abusos sexuales cometidos contra varios seminaristas por parte del fundador de Los Legionarios de Cristo, el mexicano Marcial Maciel, y sobre su aparente adicción a la morfina.

El libro, “La voluntad de no saber”, tiene previsto salir a la luz pública el 24 de marzo, un día después de la llegada a México de Benedicto XVI, un Papa que en viajes fuera del Vaticano y anteriores a éste, se ha reunido con víctimas de abusos sexuales cometidos por sacerdotes pero quien no tiene planeado hacer lo mismo en territorio mexicano.

Editado por Random House Mondadori, el libro tiene un tiraje de más de 6,000 copias y sólo circulará en México.

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MEXICO
El Diario

Bernardo Barranco

Distrito Federal— “Este Papa me tiene desilusionado, ya no creo en él”, dice José Barba, catedrático del Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México y una de las víctimas de Marcial Maciel. Cuando se le pregunta si accedería a tener un encuentro con Benedicto XVI en su próxima visita a México, responde categórico: “No estoy dispuesto a juegos mediáticos estériles ni a supuestos perdones cargados de retórica”.

Barba, Alberto Athié y el investigador Fernando M. González son autores de un libro que contiene evidencias documentales de algo que era ampliamente sabido: el Vaticano tenía conocimiento y registro del comportamiento enfermizo de Marcial Maciel desde los años cuarenta.

La próxima semana Random House-Mondadori pondrá en circulación el libro, La voluntad de no saber, cuyo subtítulo es elocuente: Lo que sí se conocía sobre Maciel en los archivos secretos del Vaticano desde 1944. Los documentos incluidos en la obra muestran que la curia romana siempre tuvo información sobre la trayectoria llena de aberraciones del fundador de los Legionarios de Cristo… Pero el Vaticano lo toleró y protegió.

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MEXICO
La Cronica de Hoy

José Barba Martín, ex miembro de Los Legionarios de Cristo, aseguró que el papa Benedicto XVI y los obispos mexicanos sí conocen la identidad de las víctimas del sacerdote pederasta Marcial Maciel y rechazó tener interés en ser recibido por el pontífice durante su estancia en esta ciudad.

En entrevista con Notimex se mostró indignado por las declaraciones vertidas en las últimas horas por algunos exponentes del Episcopado, quienes negaron conocer a quienes sufrieron los abusos sexuales del fundador de los Legionarios de Cristo.

“El tema se ha exacerbado en los últimos días con motivo de la visita del papa Benedicto XVI a México porque el Episcopado, a través de varios voceros, ha declarado que no nos conoce y eso no es verdad”, indicó.

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MEXICO
La Voluntad de No Sabor

[con los documentos]

Para que se tenga clara la secuencia de las oportunidades que tuvieron las autoridades de intervenir a la Legión de Cristo describiré lo siguiente: la primera fue en diciembre de 1944 cuando el V obispo de Cuernavaca recibió la denuncia del joven Luís de la Isla y de sus padres, pero no actuó en consecuencia y hasta donde se puede colegir, tampoco envió un informe al Vaticano; la segunda posibilidad se dio en el periodo 1948-50 cuando dos jesuitas de Comillas enviaron informes a la Sagrada Congregación de religiosos; la tercera se dio en 1954 cuando el Arzobispado de México pidió informes al legionario Federico Domínguez, el cual habló por primera vez de la adicción a la Dolantina (Morfina) por parte de MM y el documento si llegó a la SCR; la cuarta se dio en 1956 cuando el Arzobispo de México y el VII obispo Cuernavaca enviaron sendas cartas denunciando a Maciel por adicción a la droga y pederastia dichas denuncias terminaron con la suspensión temporal de Marcial Maciel …

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VATICAN CITY/MEXICO
National Catholic Reporter

Mar. 24, 2012
By Jason Berry

On Saturday, as Pope Benedict XVI makes the first appearance on his March 23-28 trip to Mexico and Cuba, three authors will hold a news conference in the same city, Leon, Mexico, discussing a book that quotes Vatican files on the pedophilia and drug abuse accusations that trailed Fr. Marcial Maciel, the founder of the Legion of Christ, for decades until his death in 2008.

Maciel, a native of Mexico who died at 88, was a subject of long-running concern at the Vatican congregation that governs religious orders, according to La Voluntad de No Saber – “The Will Not To Know,” published by a Mexico City imprint of Random House international.

The authors are Alberto Athié, a former priest who directed a Mexican bishops’ charity; José Barba, a retired college professor and former Legion seminarian who filed a 1998 canon law request in Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith tribunal, seeking Maciel’s excommunication; and Fernando M. González, a scholar in Mexico City and the author of a biography of Maciel.

In late 2004, with Pope John Paul II in failing health, Ratzinger finally ordered an investigation of Maciel. In 2006, Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, banished him from active ministry to a life of prayer and repentance. That stopped short of excommunication as Barba and seven other victims wanted. The Legion continued defending Maciel until 2009 when its leaders abruptly reversed course, revealing that he had sired several out of wedlock children, now grown.

NCR received a PDF of the book. Grijalbo, the publisher, is posting selected excerpts on a website www.lavoluntaddenosaber.com, the AP reported.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Sueddeutsche

Es geht um mehr als 200.000 Euro: Eine Erzieherin soll das Taschengeld der ihr anvertrauten Kinder unterschlagen haben, nun steht sie in Passau vor Gericht – und hat eine überraschende Begründung für ihr Verhalten.

Sie soll die Kirche und ein Jugendheim um etwa 200.000 Euro betrogen haben. Am zweiten Prozesstag vor dem Passauer Landgericht brach die 46 Jahre alte Angeklagte am Freitag ihr Schweigen und nannte eine überraschende Begründung für die massiven Untreuevorwürfe gegen sie: “Ich hatte sieben Jahre die Beziehung mit einem katholischen Pfarrer gehabt und gelebt, davon fünf Jahre im Pfarrhaus”, sagte die frühere Jugendbetreuerin aus. Deswegen habe die Kirche sie auf dem Kieker, sie sei dort eine “Persona non grata”.

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FLORIDA
Gainesville Sun

By Lillian Guevara-Castro
Staff writer

Published: Saturday, March 24, 2012

Sister Christine Schenk, SSJ, executive director of FutureChurch, an organization of Catholic lay people, priests and nuns working within the Roman Catholic Church to effect change, is the guest speaker at “A Lenten Evening of Prayerful Dialogue & Listening” at United Church of Gainesville, 7-9 p.m. Monday.

Organizers addressed the event invitation to “Vatican II reform-minded Catholics” adding that the evening is an effort to gather input from the laity about the state of the Church in the Diocese of St. Augustine and present it to Bishop Felipe Estevez prior to his meeting with Pope Benedict XVI in Rome in May.

“(It) is meant to give a sounding board to the laity to express their issues with the church,” said John Frank, professor of educational leadership at the University of North Florida and the event’s facilitator. “There are 30 million former Catholics in the U.S. alone. Any company dealing with that kind of loss of market share would be dealing with what it’s doing or not doing right.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — One day after a defendant in the Philadelphia clergy abuse case pleaded guilty, the attorneys for two co-defendants have asked for a new jury panel because, they argue, this one was tainted by the latest developments.

Edward Avery, 69, who sat alongside co-defendants Msgr. William Lynn and Father James Brennan during jury selection, is now out of the case. He has pleaded guilty and has been sentenced (see related story), and the prosecution says he has not agreed to testify against his fellow defendants.

But attorneys for Lynn and Brennan have cited the local and national coverage of the Avery development, saying there is no way jurors could have avoided it and not been prejudiced by it.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Chicago Tribune

Dave Warner
Reuters

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – Defense lawyers for the highest ranking church official to go on trial in the Catholic church’s pedophilia scandal, charged with child endangerment, asked a judge on Friday to pick a new jury because a co-defendant pled guilty.

Opening arguments in the trial of Monsignor William Lynn, 61, former secretary of the clergy under the late Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, were slated to begin on Monday. A jury has already been selected.

Lynn was to go to trial with defrocked priest Edward Avery and Rev. James Brennan, who are among four others charged in the child sex abuse case that rocked the Philadelphia Archdiocese.

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TEXAS
San Angelo Standard-Times

By Matthew Waller

MIDLAND — The Texas Ranger had to squeeze through a hole in the wall to get into the vault, grasping a gun and flashlight.

Inside the locked precinct sacred to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Texas Ranger Lt. Jesse Valdez found rows of cabinets laden with boxes of records. It was April 2008 when he first entered the vault within the Temple Annex on the YFZ Ranch in Schleicher County, and now those records are being used as evidence against former FLDS President Wendell Loy Nielsen.

Nielsen, 71, a former president of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, is charged with three counts of third-degree bigamy, each count punishable by two to 10 years in prison and up to a $10,000 fine. Friday was the third day of the trial, and the day began with testimony from Valdez.

Prosecutor Eric Nichols asked Valdez about gaining entrance to the building, the gleaming white Temple Annex, which housed the vault.

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STOCKTON (CA)
Lodi News-Sentinel

By Ross Farrow/News-Sentinel Staff Writer

Two experts testified on the concept of repressed memory Friday in the clergy sexual abuse civil case against Father Michael Kelly.

Dr. J. Alexander Bodkin, who began his testimony on Thursday, finished up on Friday. Bodkin is an associate professor at Harvard University’s medical school. He said that there is no scientific proof that repressed memory is a valid concept.

The plaintiff claims that, due to repressed memory, he recalled in 2006 that Kelly sexually assaulted him more than 20 years earlier.

Later in the day, Dr. Anlee Kuo, a San Francisco psychiatrist who once examined the plaintiff, testified on the plaintiff’s behalf that he suffers from depression and alcohol abuse due to Kelly’s alleged sexual abuse.

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WASHINGTON
Q13 Fox

Dana Rebik
Q13 FOX News reporter

ENUMCLAW—
An Enumclaw man was formally charged Friday with raping a young girl while he served as the assistant pastor of a local church.

The alleged assaults occurred in 2005 when the suspect, Malcolm John Fraser, was 32 and the victim was 10.

According to charging documents, the victim, who is now 17, came forward Monday and reported to Enumclaw police that Fraser had repeatedly raped her while he and his wife were staying with her family from 2005 to 2006. Fraser is the assistant pastor at the non-denominational South Sound Doctrine Church.

Enumclaw police detective Grant McCall said the victim told him Fraser came into her room late at night more than 20 times while staying with her family. Fraser would allegedly hold the victim’s mouth shut while forcing her to perform various sexual acts.

“I’m in shock. I’m scared for other children particularly my own,” resident Ailen Dean said Friday.

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MIDLAND (TX)
Midland Reporter-Telegram

Sara Higgins

Joe Barron, Don Simpson and Ryan Wonderly all were church leaders trusted by their communities, and all have faced allegations related to child sexual abuse.

Fort Worth-based trial lawyer Greg Love held sessions for both church leaders and the public Tuesday at the Midland Center to discuss sexual abuse prevention and awareness. Love, who has represented victims of sexual abuse since 1994, worked to debunk myths in attendees’ minds about who can be a predator, and what warning signs to look for in their own congregations.

“There’s a real good chance that poor information and misunderstanding is going to lead to a poor result in what we do to protect our children,” he said.

Love, who is a youth leader at his home church, co-founded safety system and training organization MinistrySafe with his wife, Kimberlee Norris. The two help congregations around the nation in the design and implementation of safety systems to reduce the risk of child sexual abuse.

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LOUISIANA
KLFY

A former Catholic Priest has been arrested for alleged sexual misconduct with a child. Fifty six year old Mark Broussard has been charged with two counts of aggravated battery and 52 counts of sexual battery.

The alleged victim was an eight year old boy who is now 34. Calcasieu Parish Sheriff Ton Mancuso says his office learned of the case from the Diocese of Lake Charles.

According to the allegations the abuse took place while Broussard was serving as a priest at Saint Henry Catholic Church during a three year period, between 1986 and 1989.

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LOUISIANA
The Advertiser

Written by
Brandon Kane

Even though the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests said it was grateful for the arrest of former priest and Duson resident Mark Broussard on molestation charges, the victim’s advocacy group issued a statement Friday condemning the actions of his church and diocese in what it called an “unconscionable” failure to act.

“We are grateful that Mark Broussard has been apprehended and will be prevented from harming more children. We are extremely upset and disturbed, however, at the revelation that documents were found in this predator priest’s file that detailed sexual contact with at least four other children,” the SNAP said in a release. “It is unconscionable that someone could have knowledge of these depraved crimes and yet do nothing to stop them.”

Broussard was arrested at his home Thursday on more than 50 counts of sexual battery in connection to his tenure as a priest in Lake Charles.

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CALIFORNIA
Los Angeles Times

A retired Roman Catholic priest from Orange County pleaded guilty Friday to sexually assaulting a boy in the 1990s, authorities said.

Denis Lyons, 78, of Seal Beach pleaded guilty to four felony counts of lewd acts upon a child under 14; the crimes took place between Jan. 1, 1992, and Dec. 1, 1995. Prosecutors said they expected Lyons to be sentenced May 25 to one year in jail and five years’ formal probation and be required to register as a sex offender for life.

Lyons was a priest at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Costa Mesa when the crimes occurred. Prosecutors said he assaulted the boy four times on church property when the boy was between the ages of 7 and 9.

Lyons was charged after the victim came forward in 2008. The retired cleric was arrested at Leisure World in Seal Beach as he played cards. That is same community where former priest and convicted child molester Michael Wempe also lived.

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STOCKTON (CA)
The Record

By Jennie Rodriguez-Moore
Record Staff Writer

March 24, 2012

STOCKTON – Testimony from an alleged second sex abuse victim of the Rev. Michael Kelly will not be allowed in the civil jury trial where a former Catholic altar boy has accused the priest of molesting him.

San Joaquin County Superior Court Judge Bob McNatt decided late Thursday that the second person’s story will not be admitted to avoid prejudice.

Kelly, currently pastor at St. Joachim’s Church in Lockeford, is under criminal investigation over the second person’s claims.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Windsor Star

Agence France-Presse
March 24, 2012

The landmark trial of a Catholic Church official accused of covering up pedophile abuses in the United States is set to start Monday.

Monsignor William Lynn, who oversaw the assignment of priests to schools and parishes across the Philadelphia region, faces accusations that he failed to keep priests accused of sexual abuse away from minors.

The role of such a senior official, whose co-defendant Reverend James Brennan is accused of sexually abusing boys in the 1990s, makes the trial the first of its kind in the U.S.

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SALEM (MA)
The Salem News

By Tom Dalton Staff writer

SALEM — Ten years ago tomorrow, James Michael Hogan filed a lawsuit in Suffolk Superior Court that shook the foundations of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston.

The 47-year-old former Salem resident, who drove up from Delaware to face the TV cameras and media crowds, detailed sex crimes that were almost unspeakable, committed against him as a young boy.

The former altar boy at St. James Church said he had been sexually abused “hundreds” of times by the Rev. Joseph Birmingham — “Father B” — who served at the Salem parish from 1965 to 1970.

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ITALIA
romatg24

ROMA, 23 Marzo – L’emozione rotta dalle lacrime copiose e amare. Il senso di vergogna e l’ansia di chi sa di aver subito violenza e che, pur dopo anni, decide di sbattere il mostro in prima pagina col desiderio che l’esperienza vissuta non succeda a qualcun altro. Teodoro Pulvireti,38 anni di Catania ,attualmente ricercatore negli Usa, rompe il silenzio e in una conferenza stampa trova la forza e il coraggio di raccontare la sua storia e di denunciare pubblicamente le molestie e gli abusi che dai 14 ai 15 anni ha subito da don Carlo Chiarenza, ex parroco di S.Paolo ad Acireale e successivamente decano della basilica di San Sebastiano.

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ITALY
The Independent (United Kingdom)

Michael Day
Milan

Saturday 24 March 2012

An Italian man who suffered what he claims was clerical sex abuse as a 14-year-old has secretly recorded his attacker, now a senior Sicilian church figure, appearing to admit the crimes in a chilling case that throws the spotlight on the wider issue of clerical paedophilia in Italy, which many observers say is still being swept under the carpet.

The victim, Teodoro Pulvirenti, 37, now a medical researcher in the US, decided to return to his home town of Acireale in Sicily and confront the alleged abuser, Don Carlo Chiarenza, who is now a Monsignor. Last September, armed with a hidden microphone, he taped the conversation in which the priest is heard admitting to having had a sexual relationship with the-then adolescent, who subsequently made several suicide attempts and had years of psychotherapy.

With Mr Pulvirenti breaking down in tears half-way through the conversation, Mr Chiarenza is said to have claimed that the “intimate sexual relationship” – in Mr Pulvirenti’s words – that took place between them was a way of Mr Chiarenza “telling [Mr Pulvirenti] that I cared for you very much”. He then appears to suggest that the adolescent was to blame for initiating some of the encounters.

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MEXICO
National Catholic Reporter

by John L Allen Jr on Mar. 22, 2012 All Things Catholic

Pope Benedict XVI arrives today in León, Mexico, to kick off the 23rd foreign trip of his papacy but his first to Spanish-speaking Latin America. (He visited Brazil in 2007.) Benedict will spend the weekend in Mexico, then move Monday to Cuba before returning to Rome late Wednesday.

At one level, this is a tale of two different trips.

The pope’s swing in Mexico will likely amount to a celebration of popular Catholicism, with about 3 million exuberant faithful expected to turn out. It also comes just ahead of national elections in July, raising fears of manipulation of the trip for political ends, especially given perceptions that the Mexican church is aligned in favor of the conservative National Action Party. However, Mexican Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragán, a retired Vatican official who will accompany the pope, recently insisted that trying to see the trip through the prism of electoral politics “would be like forcing the ocean into an oyster.” …

In Mexico, Benedict also faces the shadow of the scandals associated with the late Fr. Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, who has become a global symbol of the clerical sexual abuse crisis. Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi said this week Benedict will not meet with victims of Maciel in Mexico, because such an encounter had not been requested by the local bishops. On Saturday in León, one of Maciel’s victims is scheduled present a new book critical of the church’s response to the Maciel case, titled “The Will Not to Know.”

Given that context, even a modest show of popular enthusiasm for Benedict XVI, as well as anything he says or does that’s at all relevant or engaging, may be enough to label the trip a success.

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UNITED STATES
SNAP Wisconsin

The new Cardinal of New York Timothy Dolan has chosen to attack the victims of clergy childhood sexual assault using his close ally Bill Donohue, the president of the Catholic League.

Dolan is very media savvy. He knows he shouldn’t directly attack victims of clergy sexual abuse, so he lets and encourages Donohue to do it for him.

Bill Donohue is clearly comfortable in this role. In 2011 he took out an ad in the New York Times in which, when referring to the thousands of children who were sexually assaulted by Catholic priests, he stated “Let’s get it straight- they weren’t children and they weren’t raped”. This year Donohue referred to victim/survivors who commemorated the 10th anniversary of the Boston Globe investigative report which exposed the clerical sex crimes of the Boston Archdiocese as “pitiful malcontents”.

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LOUISIANA
KATC

[with video]

A former priest, living in Duson, is now accused of sexually abusing children while working for the church. 56-year-old Mark Broussard is charged with two counts of aggravated rape and 52 counts of sexual battery, after the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office said a 34-year-old man came forward and accused the former priest of sexual abuse. The man said he was sexually abused for three years, between 1986 and 1989, while Broussard was a priest at St. Henry Catholic Church in Lake Charles.

When Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Deputies started investigating the man’s accusations, deputies said documents were also located in Broussard’s personnel file with the diocese in which Broussard indicated sexual contact with at least four other boys.

The Diocese of Lake Charles would not answer KATC’s questions about if it was aware of the documents, and if so, why the accusations were not reported to law enforcement.

Morris LeBleu with the Diocese would only state that they received the allegations in December 2011 and “immediately reported the allegations to the District Attorney and Sheriff. The Diocese of Lake Charles has and will continue to cooperate fully with all civil authorities. In light of the ongoing proceedings, the Diocese will have no further comment on this matter.”

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LOUISIANA
KATC

In a press release, The Diocese of Lake Charles released a statement regarding allegations of abuse by former priest Mark A. Broussard. According to the diocese, in December 2011, the diocese received credible allegations regarding the activities Broussard and immediately reported the allegations to the District Attorney and Sheriff. The diocese will not comment further.

The statement said, “Bishop Provost offers his prayers and concern to all victims of sexual abuse, most especially this victim and his family.”

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CALIFORNIA
Patch

Diocese: “There’s nothing we can say” as Denis Lyons pleads guilty to molesting a child at his former Costa Mesa parish in a deal that will likely land him less than a year in jail.

A 78-year-old former Catholic priest from Leisure World pleaded guilty today to molesting an altar boy in the early to mid 1990s at St. John the Baptist Church in Costa Mesa, beginning when the victim was 9 years old.

Denis Lyons, who left the priesthood in April 2004, is expected to be sentenced on May 25 to a year in jail and five years probation. Orange County Superior Court Judge Francisco Briseno, who accepted the plea agreement the defendant reached with prosecutors, is also expected to order Lyons to complete 400 hours of community service or pay a fine. Lyons could have faced up to 14 years in prison had he gone to trial.

“The victim has asked to resolve this case without going through a highly publicized trial,” Deputy District Attorney Heather Brown told the judge. Another alleged victim, who Lyons was not charged with molesting, was willing to testify to corroborate the named victim’s testimony, but he also wanted to avoid a jury trial, Brown said.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Sensibility

Much is being made of the pope not meeting with Mexican abuse victims. Patricio Cerda, who works with victims, strikes a pessimistic tone:

In my opinion it is sad, on the one hand, because Benedict XVI is expected to be more than ‘politically correct’ – he is expected to be a true pastor. On the other hand, the cardinals have their own interests at stake, including the Primate of Mexico (Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera), who defended Maciel to the end. Those directly victimized by the founder do not want to become pawns in what amounts to nothing more than a media game.

Political correctness–the worst sense of that term–can run both ways. There’s a certain pc-strain in churchmen who want nothing more for this scandal of abuse and cover-up to go away. Why does it have to drag on past the obligatory fifteen minutes? This nipping at the heels might well devour good efforts in the new evangelization.

But rather than view the situation in defensive terms, the Church could look upon this as an opportunity. Rather than an annoyance, it presents an opening to develop an apostolate or reconciliation, prayer, and giving a good example of asking forgiveness. Maybe the time is no longer ripe for evangelization–at least as the cover-story initiative of Rome. Maybe it’s time for penitence, sacrifice, and contrition.

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UNITED STATES
firedoglake

New Maciel Revelations on the Heels of Papal Visit to Mexico Underscore Need for Accountability at the Very Top of the Roman Catholic Church

By: Center for Constitutional Rights Friday March 23, 2012

By Pam Spees, Senior Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights

While nothing is being done to protect the children of Mexico still being assaulted by Catholic clergy, plenty of preparations have taken place for this weekend’s papal visit. According to Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Pope will not be meeting with survivors of sexual abuse by priests while in Mexico as he has done in previous visits to other countries. The reason given is that these meetings would have to take place in “a context in which the bishops asked the pope to do it because it was a problem felt in society and the church, and that it was something desired.” It seems that in the case of the many abuse survivors in Mexico, their suffering and the fact that the systematic sexual abuse of children continues does not feel problematic enough for church officials to ask the Pope to address it.

The Pope’s visit to Mexico comes on the heels of recent revelations about the Vatican’s decades-long knowledge and cover-up of rape and sexual violence by the Mexican priest Father Marcial Maciel Degollado, one of its most favored, and notorious. Maciel’s case illustrates once again the Vatican’s role in creating a culture of sexual violence within the Church—and the resulting need for accountability at the very top.

In an effort to ensure accountability for these widespread crimes and end the on-going crisis, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a complaint last year with the International Criminal Court on behalf of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests charging Pope Benedict XVI and three other high-level Vatican officials with crimes against humanity for the widespread and systemic rape and sexual violence against children and vulnerable adults by priests and others associated with the church. The complaint was supported by more than 20,000 pages of documents consisting of findings and reports of commissions of inquiry and grand juries, testimonies, and other evidence of sex crimes by Catholic clergy and of the policies and practices involved in enabling the crimes and in the cover-ups in different countries.

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CALIFORNIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Joelle Casteix on March 23, 2012

First, we want to thank the Orange County District Attorney’s Office for working diligently over the past decade to ensure that Denis Lyons faced justice in the criminal courts. Despite numerous setbacks, prosecutors have never lost sight of the threat that Lyons has continually posed to children across the county.

Despite today’s victory for children, we are still dismayed that church officials knew about Denis Lyons and his crimes for more than two decades.

Instead of calling law enforcement, they sent him to a church-run facility for child-molesting clerics, promoted him to pastor, and then sent him to a parish where he worked side-by-side with another known predator. This behavior is inexcusable and every church official who knew, whether they are still in Orange or in Boise, ID, MUST be called to account. The excuse of “it was a long time ago,” is a slap in the face to victims everywhere.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Mar. 23, 2012
By Jerry Filteau

WASHINGTON — In an unusual study whose main results were released at a Catholic University of America conference in Washington Thursday, Villanova University in Philadelphia asked former Catholics in the Trenton, N.J., diocese why they left the church.

While the results themselves were not surprising, the researchers said, the study suggests new ways the church can approach Catholics who are dissatisfied with what the church teaches or how it acts — including those so dissatisfied that they have decided to leave.

One of their key recommendations was for pastors, bishops and other church officials to respond consistently to questioning or angry Catholics with constructive dialogue rather than a simple reiteration of church rules or policies.

Jesuit Fr. William J. Byron, a professor of business at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia — who collaborated in the study with Charles Zech, founder and director of the Center for the Study of Church Management of Villanova’s School of Business — several times cited a response of one disaffiliated Catholic who complained, “Ask a question of any priest and you get a rule; you don’t get a ‘Let’s sit down and talk about it’ response.”

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UNITED STATES
Pope Crimes & Vatican Evils…

Paris Arrow

This post contains a compilation of all the articles of Goliath-bully Bill Donohue against David & SNAP & victims of the JP2 Army-John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army, so check on its update regularly. It also contains a continuous update of the articles of the defenders and allies of David & SNAP and victims of the JP2 Army. Unlike in the Bible, it will take more than one pebble to beat Goliath-bully Bill Donohue — it will take the MSM main stream media journalists just like Normandy needed major allies to free it from the Nazis. Goliath-bully Bill Donohue is the modern version of a Hitler and Catholic League is his Nazi powerhouse owned and operated by the Vatican Opus Dei Mammon today.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Patch

By James Myers

With recent reports of priests who once served in the Norristown area being relieved of duty – Father Louis Bier, former pastor of St. Patrick’s Church, who was removed from his new post in Springfield and Father Richard Powers, a retired priest who served at St. Patrick’s over four decades ago, who was suspended in retirement – area Catholics are searching for answers from the Archdiocese. According to a Catholic blog, area faithful may have more unpleasant news in store for them.

Catholics4Change.com, a blog forum for Catholics to share their concerns and questions regarding Church accountability, recently made a post titled, “The List Cardinal Bevilacqua Didn’t Want You to See.”

In it, they share what they claim is the “list of priests who have been guilty or accused of sexual misconduct with a minor according to the file material” that was reportedly attached to a memo from Msgr. William J. Lynn to Msgr. James Molloy back in February of ’94 – a list the blog claims Cardinal Bevilacqua ordered to be shredded. Several of the priests listed were stationed in Norristown and the surrounding areas at some point.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Washington Post

Philly monsignor seeks new jury after co-defendant priest’s guilty plea; trial starts Monday

By Associated Press, Updated: Friday, March 23

PHILADELPHIA — A Roman Catholic church official facing a landmark child sex abuse trial wants a new jury seated because of publicity over a co-defendant’s last-minute guilty plea, his lawyers said Friday.

Monsignor William Lynn’s attorneys said Thursday’s plea from defrocked priest Edward Avery could influence jurors in the trial that’s scheduled to begin Monday.

Lynn, the former secretary for clergy for the Philadelphia Archdiocese, is the first U.S. church official ever charged with endangering children by failing to oust accused predators from the priesthood or report them to police.

The jury was seated early this month and advised not to read about the case. Jury selection took weeks given the sensitive sexual and religious issues involved.

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POLAND
U.S. Catholic

By Catholic News Service

WARSAW, Poland (CNS) — A prominent victim of clerical sex abuse has rejected the Polish church’s stance that it is following a zero-tolerance policy toward priests and offers moral support for victims.

Ewa Orlowska, whose book about her ordeal, “I Accused a Priest,” was published in 2008, charged that the church is holding “victims up to ridicule” while “behaving as if nothing has happened.”

“No one in the church has made the slightest gesture. No one has expressed regret, visited or written to me. But now the bishops’ conference head talks about surrounding victims of pedophilia with help and moral compensation,” Orlowska said after the Polish bishops adopted guidelines — in line with May 2011 Vatican instructions — for handling accusations.

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