ABUSE TRACKER

The head of a lay committee looking into historic child sex abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church said Tuesday the problem in the past had been “widespread” and on some occasions reached “truly endemic” proportions.

Pedro Strecht, a psychiatrist who heads Portugal’s Independent Committee for the Study of Child Abuse in the Catholic Church, said his panel has compiled a list of 424 alleged victims. Before the committee started its work in January, senior church officials had claimed that only a handful of cases had occurred.

The panel, which was created by the Portuguese Bishops Conference, is looking into alleged abuse cases from 1950 to the present involving minors aged two to 17. It is due to publish a report on Jan. 31.

Information obtained so far indicates that “a significant number” of Catholic Church priests and members allegedly have committed sex abuses since 1950, Strecht told a news conference…

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Press Release – October 11, 2022

With District Court of Guam Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood approving the confirmation of the Fifth Amended Joint Plan of Reorganization on Tuesday, Oct. 4, the process to make restitution to victim survivors of clergy abuse on Guam can begin.

Attorney  Ford Elsaesser, lead legal counsel for the Archdiocese of Agaña’s Chapter 11 Reorganization said Monday that the amount that the victim survivors trust fund will receive would be in the range of at least $34 million to $45 million. The final amount would be dependent on the actual sum that the sale of respective archdiocese properties would bring in.

The settlement amount encompasses actual cash contributions from the combined Catholic schools and parishes; archdiocese properties that are being transferred to the victim survivors trust fund; plus money from the insurance companies that insured the archdiocese.

Additionally, the archdiocese will provide the following to family…

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In light of sex abuse charges against Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, keeping quiet is no longer an option

When Dutch magazine De Groene Amsterdammer first exposed sex abuse allegations against Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, the long silence about the shameful past finally broke. Several mainstream media outlets around the globe followed suit in covering the allegations.

Two alleged victims, now in their 40s, cited in the story, had the courage to break the silence. Their courage is expected to inspire more alleged victims to come forward. It is indicated that Bishop Belo may have also allegedly abused other minors in the 1980s at the Salesians’ education center, where he taught before becoming a bishop.

The question is: will other alleged victims have the same courage to at least recount their memories and stories? The media circus and criminal trial of the case may or may not be helpful in bringing justice, particularly…

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The Catholic Church of Costa Rica was convicted of sexual abuse against a minor. A Costa Rican Court indicated that the Church had to pay the compensation of 65 million colones ($100,000) and the legal costs, equivalent to 10.6 million colones, close to US$16,000.

The sentence establishes that the Episcopal Conference of Costa Rica, Temporalities of the Archdiocese of San José, and the Archbishop of San José, José Rafael Quirós Quirós, must make a joint payment for the damages caused to the victim by the sexual abuse of former priest Mauricio Víquez Lizano.

In March, the Costa Rican Criminal Court sentenced Víquez Lizano to 20 years in prison. The Court found the ex-priest guilty of sexual abuse and rape of an 11-year-old boy in 2003.

Additionally, the court ruling indicates that the ecclesiastical authorities covered the crimes.

“Quirós Quirós (the archbishop), temporalities of the Archdiocese of San…

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The Diocese of Arlington, Virgina’s former director for the Office of Child Protection, Father Terry Specht, was found not guilty Oct. 5 of aggravated sexual battery.

Specht was indicted in December 2021 on two charges related to child sexual abuse. One of those charges was dropped during court proceedings.

Bishop Michael Burbidge of the Diocese of Arlington issued a statement after the priest’s acquittal. “While Father Specht was found not guilty, I nevertheless convey my heartfelt and sincere sorrow to anyone who has suffered sexual abuse,” Burbidge said.

“The Diocese of Arlington continues to offer whatever counseling or pastoral support we can to help them manage their pain and suffering,” he added.

Specht’s lawyer, Dawn Butorac, told the Washington Post that it was “obvious” that Specht was not guilty of the charges.

“They put a man who has dedicated his life to service of his community, both in the Navy…

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Od 2019 r. Watykan zajmował się skargami na 18 polskich hierarchów. W kilku sprawach nałożonych sankcji nie ujawniono.

Biskup Henryk Tomasik, który zaniedbał wyjaśnienie sprawy księdza oskarżonego o wykorzystywanie małoletnich, został przez Stolicę Apostolską obłożony sankcjami. Nie ogłoszono ich jednak publicznie. Podobnie postąpiono w odniesieniu do biskupa Jana Tyrawy, który w maju 2021 r. zrezygnował z funkcji ordynariusza bydgoskiego. Kary wymierzono, ale po cichu – ustaliła „Rzeczpospolita”.

Z naszych informacji wynika, że obaj hierarchowie zastosowali się m.in. do nakazu wpłaty na Fundację Świętego Józefa. Do dziś nie zrobił tego biskup Tadeusz Rakoczy (b. ordynariusz bielsko-żywiecki), na którego sankcje były nałożone publicznie.

Płacą, ale nie wszyscy

W maju 2019 r. papież Franciszek ogłosił dokument „Vos estis lux mundi”, ustanawiający m.in. procedury postępowania w przypadkach oskarżeń biskupów oraz wyższych przełożonych zakonnych o wykorzystywanie seksualne małoletnich, a także zarzutów o zaniedbania przy wyjaśnianiu tych przestępstw. Dokument wszedł w życie 1…

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The Catholic diocese of Toruń has been ordered by a court to pay 600,000 złoty (€123,000) compensation to a man who was sexually abused by a priest for almost a decade when he served as an altar boy.

“I am glad, though no compensation could be adequate for what happened to me,” the victim, who was nine years old when the abuse began, told news service Onet. In a statement issued by the diocese, it said that “the bishop of Toruń respects the ruling of the court”.

The decision marks the end of a longrunning legal battle by the victim, whom the church initially treated as an “accomplice in the sin of adultery” during an ecclesiastical trial that found the priest not guilty. The priest was, however, eventually sentenced by a state court.

The abuse in question was carried out between the years 2000 and 2009 by Jarosław Pestka, a…

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German Catholics involved in the Synodal Path are convinced the church must address the “systemic causes” of the clerical sexual abuse scandal and that will require change, said Charlotte Kreuter-Kirchhof, a member of the German Synodal Assembly.

And while some of the assembly’s proposed changes sound radical to some people — with the harshest critics even warning that the Synodal Path could lead to schism — Kreuter-Kirchhof said, “We are members of the Roman Catholic Church, and we will stay members of the Roman Catholic Church.”

Kreuter-Kirchhof, a professor of law and member of the Vatican Council for the Economy, spoke about the Synodal Path at a conference Oct. 4 at the German Embassy to the Holy See.

The fourth assembly of the Synodal Path was in September. The fifth and final meeting is scheduled for March.

In the wake of the clerical abuse scandal and with the release of…

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One year after the devastating report on abuse within the Catholic Church in France, it’s surprising that there have been no similar investigations into other sectors of society

It is not surprising that the protest against the report on sexual abuse in the Church (CIASE), published a year ago, focused on the figures, particularly on the 330,000 victims of sexual abuse since 1950 (216,000 of whom were abused by a priest).

Not that these figures are wrong. As has been amply demonstrated since then, they were obtained with all the scientific rigor that presides over this kind of investigation. But it’s because it is “too much”, enormous, inconceivable.

The magnitude of this criminal phenomenon and its systemic dimension is like certain mass murders. They are too overwhelming to be believed.

All the more so because it happened right next door to us, in parishes, scout groups and schools that we…

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Insurer makes out-of-court settlement for alleged attacks by teachers in the 1990s

Two ex-pupils who alleged rape, bullying and severe sexual abuse at the junior school of Gordonstoun in the 1990s have won out-of-court settlements totalling more than £500,000 from its insurers.

The stories of Kate (not her real name) and John Findlay were first told in the Observer Magazine in 2015. Kate, who was a scholarship student, alleged she was raped when 13 years old by a gap-year teacher on a school camping trip, while John was drugged, sexually assaulted and photographed in his dormitory bed at Aberlour House, considered to be a prep school for Gordonstoun, by a different teacher. The quest for justice has been hard for both victims. “I am relieved it’s over, it’s been so long,” Kate told the Observer this weekend.

The school’s insurer has settled without admission of liability in the case…

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The Bishop of Leicester has apologised for the church’s handling of abuse cases

A woman was sexually abused by a clergyman while she was training to become a vicar within the Diocese of Leicester. To compound her pain, she says she was ignored when she reported the assault to church officials several years later.

The woman, who has asked to remain anonymous, says the abuse left her feeling “violated” and that officials within the Church of England dismissed her complaint and offered no support. At one point, she was told speaking out about her experiences would harm her career within the church.

She was one of nine people who took part in a local part of a national review of the Anglican Church’s past handling of abuse claims. Leading figures in the church, including the Bishop of Leicester, the Right Reverend Martyn Snow, have apologised for the church’s…

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The Catholic Diocese of Lafayette is targeting the constitutionality of a law passed in 2021 that expanded the right of sexual abuse victims to sue in a lawsuit over allegations against a deceased Lafayette priest. 

The Lafayette Diocese was sued in September 2020 by a person alleging that Father Stanley Begnaud sexually abused them when they were a teenager in 1961 or 1962. Begnaud, who died in 1985, was named on the list of credibly accused clergy released by the diocese in 2019. 

The alleged victim has not been identified in public court documents, and is referred to only as Sam Doe. Their identity is known by the court and the church. 

Lawsuits like Doe’s generally must be filed within a set number of years, which would normally put abuse from 60 years ago out of contention. 

But the Louisiana Legislature unanimously passed an View Cache

Yet another evangelical megachurch is repenting for mishandling clergy sex abuse.

Every few days, it seems, we’re hearing about a different instance of a pastor or church leader who has abused women and/or children and a church (or denomination) that has completely mucked up its response. Why is that? Why can’t churches get handling abuse right?

The reasons are myriad, complicated and intersecting, and I’ll try to unpack some of that here and offer suggestions for what churches can do to prevent sexual abuse and address it appropriately.

Devaluing girls and women

Many churches don’t take abuse seriously because in belief and in practice they devalue women and girls, particularly women’s and girls’ bodies, their right to bodily autonomy and their full selfhood. On the whole, our culture does not take sexual violation that seriously because it sees girls/women as primarily of value for their sexual availability to men.

“Many churches don’t…

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Elizabeth Harris, a retired detective who worked with thousands of sex abuse survivors during her NYPD career, has been named to two roles in the Diocese of Brooklyn’s Office of Protection of Children and Young People.

Harris’ journey began when she joined the NYPD in 1998. In her first few years, she served at the 17th Precinct in Manhattan. She then joined the Sex Offender Monitoring Unit, a squad responsible for handling convicted offenders who had served time in jail and were now free. Sex offenders are required by state law to register their home addresses with law enforcement authorities.

“I was tasked with interviewing, monitoring, and assessing, at that point, the over 5,000 registered sex offenders in the five boroughs,” Harris said.

While she felt her work was important, she longed to do more to help victims. 

“I gained some skills there, but I really wanted to go and…

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Eleven more cases of alleged historical abuse by Church of England associates in Lancashire need investigating, including six that have been referred to police, a report has revealed.

A Diocese of Blackburn report said the number of incidents involving clergy, officers and volunteers which had required further action was now 120.

The findings were part of a national review ordered by Church leaders.

A Lancashire bishop has apologised to victims for the Church’s past failings.

The new national Past Cases Review came about following criticism of the previous review, published in 2010, which said the Church had found only 13 new cases requiring further action.

The updated version, published on Wednesday, was highly critical of a culture within the Church that was portrayed as still not adequately dealing with abuse.

The reviewers found 383 cases nationally relating to abuse, that the Church said required further attention.

The Diocese of Blackburn commissioned…

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The Holy See has begun collecting information on the case of Bishop Carlos Belo of Timor-Leste, the Nobel Peace Prize winner accused of raping teenage boys

The Vatican has launched an internal investigation into sex abuse allegations against Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo SDB, according to sources in Rome.

The former apostolic administrator of Timor-Leste (East Timor) from 1988-2002 and co- recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996, is accused of multiple instances of abuse over 20 years.

The allegations were revealed on September 28 in the Dutch news weekly De Groene Amsterdammer. The Holy See Press Office admitted one day later that the Vatican had been informed of the matter in 2019.

“We are beginning the work of collecting information and putting together a file,” said a Vatican official who wished to remain anonymous.

The official told La Croix that the accusations against the 74-year-old retired bishop, a…

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For now, the judge is protecting The Eagle’s confidential sources. But she left the door open for more legal battles as the case moves to trial. 

This week, a court ruling marked a victory for the rights and protections of the free press. Hampden County Superior Court Justice Karen L. Goodwin ruled that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield can’t obtain information from a Berkshire Eagle journalist that could reveal the identities of his anonymous sources.

Still, a question must be asked and answered: Was this defense against an attack on a reporter and a sacred pillar of investigative journalism necessary in the first place?

The anonymous sources in question were essential to Eagle editor Larry Parnass’ bombshell reporting on a Chicopee man’s credible claims that he was repeatedly sexually assaulted by former Bishop Christopher Weldon and two other priests. That years-long series of articles also exposed…

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O presidente da Conferência Episcopal Portuguesa adiantou ainda que foi informado por Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa que o caso de encobrimento de abusos que aconteceram em 2011 fora enviado para a PGR.

As denúncias de abusos sexuais contra o antigo bispo Ximenes Belo foram divulgadas na semana passada e, esta segunda-feira, José Ornelas, bispo da Diocese de Leiria-Fátima e presidente da Conferência Episcopal Portuguesa, sublinhou que não sabia do caso antes de serem noticiados.

Ao recordar que encontrou Ximenes Belo em várias visitas que fez e que foram colegas enquanto estudaram teologia, José Ornelas referiu, em entrevista à TVI, que “pensava que o conhecia”.

É para mim uma tristeza muito grande. Duplamente grande. Penso nele, penso nas vítimas dele e penso que aquilo que estas vitimas significam, e é precisamente a negação daquilo que nós queremos ser.”

Tal como o Observador avançou na semana passada, a igreja católica em Portugal tinha conhecimento…

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Vandaag is het dertig jaar geleden dat ik eindelijk mijn eerste boek kon voorstellen aan de lezer. Twee weken eerder mislukte een eerste poging tot voorstelling van ‘De Laatste Dictatuur’ omwille van de druk die de toenmalige kardinaal Godfried Danneels op mij uitoefende, waardoor de avond voor de voorstelling op 22 september 1992 de voorstelling ervan werd afgelast. Er was die dag wél een boek, maar geen auteur op het avondjournaal.

Ik ben nu dertig jaar – en om en bij de veertienhonderd dossiers van seksueel en ander machtsmisbruik door priesters van diezelfde kerk – verder. Er kwam een Parlementaire Onderzoekscommissie rond sekten in 1997 en een Parlementaire Commissie rond seksueel misbruik in de kerk in 2010-2011. Weer tien jaar later, in oktober 2021 zette het Europees Hof voor de Rechten van de Mens  (EHRM) in Straatsburg de kroon op het werk met de uitspraak dat de…

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Krakowska kuria zawarła przedsądową ugodę z kobietą, która ponad dwa lata temu oskarżyła biskupa Jana Szkodonia o molestowanie seksualnie — dowiedział się Onet. Tym samym abp Marek Jędraszewski zgodził się na wypłatę finansowego odszkodowania pokrzywdzonej. Przypomnijmy, że wcześniej kwestię oskarżeń wobec bp. Szkodonia badał Watykan, który stwierdził “nierozważne zachowanie biskupa wobec nieletniej”, ale uznał, że jego wina “nie została udowodniona”.

• Kobieta oskarżała bp. Szkodonia, że od 1998 r. robił wszystko, by zbliżyć się do jej rodziny, a potem do niej samej. Miał wydzwaniać do 15-letniej Moniki w nocy, zapraszać ją wielokrotnie do swojej prywatnej rezydencji, rozbierać się przed nią, dotykać ją w miejsca intymne i całować
• W połowie 2019 r. sprawa trafiła do prokuratury, która wszczęła śledztwo i powołała biegłych. Ci z kolei potwierdzili autentyczność zeznań złożonych przez poszkodowaną. Śledztwo zostało umorzone ze względu na przedawnienie
• Kobieta wniosła pozew cywilny przeciwko kurii. Abp Marek Jędraszewski, który stoi na czele krakowskiego Kościoła,…

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( en español )

The Diocese of Arlington learned on Friday, October 7, that Kevin D. Rice has been arrested in Prince William County and charged with multiple sexual assault charges that allegedly took place between 2012 and 2019, and involve a family member who was a minor.

Mr. Rice is a former volunteer Catholic Youth Organization coach with All Saints Catholic Church in Manassas, coaching boys basketball at All Saints from 2016-2018. He also volunteered in the church’s nursery from 2003-2014.

As a condition of his volunteering, Mr. Rice underwent a criminal background check and completed VIRTUS safe-environment training on the prevention and reporting of abuse. Mr. Rice completed the VIRTUS training in 2003, 2006 and 2016. No known allegations have been made against Mr. Rice related to his time as a volunteer at All Saints.

Anyone with any relevant information regarding Mr. Rice should immediately call the Prince William…

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On Friday, September 30, the Diocese of Arlington received allegations of sexual abuse of minors related to Fr. Robert Buchmeier, a priest of the Archdiocese of Washington. The allegations allege abuse prior to his ordination in 1991. After reviewing the preliminary information, the Diocese of Arlington provided the allegations to the Archdiocese of Washington, where Fr. Buchmeier is incardinated, and immediately reported it to Alexandria City Police. Upon request, we will participate in any archdiocesan or law enforcement investigation and provide pastoral support and counseling to the alleged victims and their families.  

The Diocese of Arlington has a zero-tolerance policy for abuse. No one with a credible accusation of abuse of minors is serving in the Diocese.

We are committed to training our clergy, staff and volunteers to identify and report suspected instances of abuse. The Diocese of Arlington encourages anyone who knows of any misconduct or abuse on the part of any cleric, employee or volunteer of…

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Father Terry Specht, a retired priest in the Diocese of Arlington, was found not guilty in Fairfax County Circuit Court on October 5 of aggravated sexual battery of a minor. 

“Along with the parishioners of the Diocese of Arlington, I express my sincere gratitude to all involved in the legal process that brought this case to a resolution,” said Bishop Michael F. Burbidge of the Diocese of Arlington. “While Father Specht was found not guilty, I nevertheless convey my heartfelt and sincere sorrow to anyone who has suffered sexual abuse. The Diocese of Arlington continues to offer whatever counseling or pastoral support we can to help them manage their pain and suffering.”

Father Specht served as a priest in the Diocese of Arlington from 1996 to 2012. He has not been serving in priestly ministry since 2012. While on administrative leave in 2012, Father Specht requested medical retirement due to an illness, and that request was granted. Father Specht will not return to ministry…

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A jury has acquitted a retired Catholic priest from northern Virginia who was accused of sexually assaulting a child more than 20 years ago.

A Fairfax County jury found Terry Specht not guilty Wednesday. He had been accused of sexual abuse of a minor under age 13. Prosecutors had alleged he committed the assault in 2000, when he was chaplain and assistant principal at St. Paul VI Catholic High School.

Public Defender Dawn Butorac said the jury deliberated for less than an hour before returning its verdict.

“The jury got it right,” she said. “Mr. Specht’s innocence was clear from the beginning.”

The Arlington Diocese issued a statement saying Specht has been on medical retirement since 2012, and will not return to ministry.

“While Father Specht was found not guilty, I nevertheless convey my heartfelt and sincere sorrow to anyone who has suffered sexual abuse,” Arlington Bishop Michael Burbidge said…

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Fr. James Jackson, a member of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, has petitioned a federal court to throw out evidence of child pornography taken from a seized hard drive, on the grounds that the hard drive’s seizure violated the 4th Amendment.

In a motion filed Oct. 5 in a U.S. District Court in Rhode Island, Jackson’s attorney argued that the warrant used to seize a laptop and hard drive in his rectory last year failed to meet the 4th Amendment’s requirement of “particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.”

“[S]imply put, the warrant authorized a constitutionally impermissible, general search, for which suppression is now required,” Jackson’s attorney argued in the motion.

The priest’s attorney said police should have done more work to identify a specific suspect before acting on electronic evidence of child pornography trafficking, especially because several people lived and…

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A Kansas police detective said that Father James Jackson was the “primary target” in a child pornography investigation run by a local police department, according to a court document in Jackson’s federal case in which he has pleaded not guilty to child pornography charges.

Information regarding the Overland Park Police Department’s investigation into Jackson came to light in a petition that Jackson’s federal probation officer issued to the U.S. District Court of Rhode Island where the priest faces the federal charges.

The probation officer’s July 12 petition cited the police department’s investigation as evidence that Jackson broke the conditions of his pretrial release that were mandatory while he was allowed to live in Leawood, Kansas, with his sister, pending adjudication of the federal charges.

Jackson was originally arrested at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Providence, Rhode Island, in October 2021 after law enforcement agents allegedly found child pornography on his…

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Tommy Nelson, a well-known author and pastor of Denton Bible Church in North Texas claimed in a sermon last May that until 2005, he knew nothing of the sexual abuse perpetrated by a former youth pastor at his church.

“So, this all happened in the late 90s. It came to our attention in 2005,” Nelson told his congregation, referring to the abuse of multiple teenage girls by former junior high minister, Robert Shiflet. Nelson said church leaders had heard reports of Shiflet’s inappropriate behavior but not physical contact. “We saw smoke . . .” Nelson said, but “did not look for fire.”

Now, one of Shiflet’s victims is speaking out, accusing Nelson—who also serves on the board at Dallas Theological Seminary and is Song of Solomon Conference Speaker Emeritus—of minimizing the church’s neglect and harm of victims. The woman, who first told her story…

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A pastor from Citronelle has turned himself in to Mobile police after being indicted on nine charges, including rape, sodomy and sexual abuse.

Court records show that Gregory Renee Adams was indicted by a grand jury on three counts of first degree rape, two counts of second degree rape with a victim under age 16, two counts of sodomy and two counts of sex abuse.

According to WKRG TV in Mobile, Adams was a pastor who would frequently travel to churches in Citronelle and Waynesboro, Miss., where investigators said he would meet his victims.

Two of those said the abuse started when they were 12 years old and spanned decades.

Court testimony in the case reportedly stated that Adams told his victims he could determine whether they went to heaven or hell and that he used “holy oil” as a lubricant…

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Some 940 and 1,367 child abuse cases were recorded in 2020 and 2021 respectively in HK, according to official data

The authorities in Hong Kong have launched an investigation into a school for intellectually disabled children after media reports claimed several parents complained of child abuse by its staff members.

The school under fire is the Hong Chi Pinehill No. 2 School in Tai Po operated by the Hong Chi Association. Founded in 1979, it provides care and education to disabled children.

Hong Kong Education Bureau has instructed relevant regulatory bodies to probe and follow up on the incident, the Standard reported on Oct. 3.  The school has been asked to submit an investigation report on the child abuse complaints.

An unnamed spokesperson from the Education Bureau said that they have received “several complaints” about the mistreatment of students and mismanagement in the institution.

The official stated the need to…

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Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez on Thursday described as intolerable the behavior of male students at a Madrid university residence hall who in a video on Twitter can be heard cheering after one of them screamed a string of sexist and vulgar obscenities at female students.

“We cannot tolerate these acts that generate hate and attack women,” Sánchez posted on his official Twitter account from Prague.

“It’s especially painful to see that the protagonists are young people,” he said. “Not one step backward. Equality policies are necessary. Enough of sexism.”

The video, which has spread widely on social media, was recorded at night across from the college residence hall on the campus of Madrid’s Complutense University. A man can be heard screaming “You are whores, you are nymphomaniacs” and other vulgarities, including threats of sexual assault.

Then, groups of young men at windows on seven floors of the building are…

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 A south Alabama pastor was arrested Tuesday after being indicted on rape and sex abuse charges, news outlets reported.

A grand jury indicted Gregory Renee Adams, 64, on five counts of rape, two counts of sodomy and two counts of sexual abuse by force, according to court documents. Two of the charges involved victims who were between the ages of 12 and 16, according to the indictment. Jail records show that Adams was arrested Tuesday.

Dennis Knizley, an attorney representing Adams, declined to comment Wednesday, saying he had not yet seen the indictment.

Police said the investigation began after several victims came forward. The case was sent to a grand jury which returned the indictment, the first step in sending the case to trial.

WKRG-TV reports that an investigator testified at a preliminary hearing last year that Adams used his power as a pastor to make his victims…

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Sexual abuse in churches is rampant across the world. While such incidents are highlighted now in Western media, it is not the case in Bharat. Whether it be sex-depraved Catholic clergy or Pentecostal pastors, women and children are preyed upon in churches across Bharat. This article lists some of the most shocking incidents among them.

1) Robin Vadakkumchery, a Catholic priest in Kerala raped a 16 year old girl studying at a school under his control. The victim conceived a child and Robin bribed everyone from her parents, hospital staff, orphanage staff and others to hide it. He infact forced the victim’s poor father to confess that he raped his daughter. He tried to flee when the incident came out and later wanted to marry the victim to escape 20 years of imprisonment.

During the hearing the victim was threatened and forced to say in court that it was consensual sex and…

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Newly released federal probation records reveal that Fr. James Jackson, FSSP, was investigated for possessing child pornography this summer, while he was awaiting trial on earlier federal child porn charges, for which he was arrested last October.

The priest could soon be charged with child porn crimes for a second time – this time in the state of Kansas, the federal records show.

“On July 11, 2022, the U.S. Probation Office in the District of Rhode Island was contacted by Detective Christopher Moore of the Overland Park Kansas Police Department,” explained a July federal memo that was released to the public Oct. 5.

“Detective Moore advised this officer that a search warrant was issued for Mr. Jackson’s residence on [redacted] in Leawood, Kansas in response to a child pornography investigation in which Mr. Jackson was the primary target.”

“The child pornography investigated [conducted by Kansas police] identified internet activity linked…

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Actor Kevin Spacey faces the first of a series of sexual abuse claims dating back decades on Thursday in New York in a civil trial that may come to overshadow a glittering career on stage and screen that included two Oscars and numerous other top awards.

The case against the 63-year-old American focuses on accusations by Anthony Rapp, a star of the Broadway musical Rent, who five years ago publicly accused Spacey of sexual assault when he was a teenager.

In the subsequent lawsuit now coming to trial, Rapp alleges that Spacey – whose real name is Kevin Spacey Fowler – acted to gratify his sexual desire during an encounter at a Manhattan party in 1986, when he was 14 and Spacey 26 or 27.

The trial will focus on Rapp’s claims against Spacey of battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress, according to court documents,…

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The St Dominic’s Children’s Home and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Port-of-Spain have responded to the threat of legal action following claims of abuse against children, saying that it happened too long ago to be considered.

On August 30, attorneys representing six former wards issued a pre-action protocol letter to the St Dominic’s Home, Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Port-of-Spain and the Attorney General’s Office, threatening to sue for as much as $2.5 million in damages as a result of that alleged abuse.

On September 28, attorney Gregory Delzin responded to the pre-action protocol letter on behalf of the St Dominic’s Home and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Port-of-Spain.

“I have carefully considered the content of your letters. I note that the proposed action concerns alleged abuse committed against your clients in the mid-1990s, close to 30 years ago. In the circumstances, I have advised my clients that there are provisions…

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Blacks in the US have suffered from clergy sex abuse, but ‘it’s an invisible trauma’

The image of a white victim does not tell the complete story of clergy sexual abuse in the United States, according to a number of panelists during an Oct. 5 online forum titled “Neglected Voices in the Clergy Sexual Abuse Crisis.”

Blacks have suffered from clergy sex abuse, but “it’s an invisible trauma. It’s an unknown trauma because there are Black victims, survivors, of the sexual abuse crisis,” said Father Bryan Massingale, author of “Racial Justice in the Catholic Church.” “Yet in the Catholic imagination, we usually see a white face — a white male face, overwhelmingly.”

“We as Alaska Native people, American Indian people,” panelist Elsie Boudreau, a Yup’ik Eskimo from Alaska, said, “are statistically number one in all of these different areas of suicide, alcoholism, homelessness, incarceration, childhood sexual abuse, domestic violence, and…

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Five days after Father Robert Buchmeier, the pastor of Holy Cross Parish in Garrett Park, Maryland, was placed on administrative leave and his priestly faculties were suspended following an allegation of abuse of minors from decades earlier before he was a priest, Washington Cardinal Wilton Gregory met at that church to talk with, listen to and pray with parishioners and members of the Holy Cross School community.

“You are here because of your love for this parish, your love for Father Bob, and your love for our Church, and I thank you for that, from the bottom of my heart,” Washington’s archbishop told the approximately 140 people gathered at the church on the evening of Wednesday Oct. 5.

Seated at a table in front of the church’s sanctuary, the cardinal had greeted the people there moments earlier, saying, “It’s a difficult moment for your parish, and a difficult moment for…

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Eight more lawsuits against the state were filed last week alleging sexual and physical assault of youth ordered detained by the state at Pine Haven Boys Center in Allenstown as a place where priests are accused of beating and sexually abusing them.

Also named in the lawsuits, filed in Merrimack County Superior Court, are the state-run Youth Development Center (YDC), now known as the John H. Sununu Youth Services Center, in Manchester, and The Philbrook School, a state facility for youths with mental health challenges.

John Doe #453, now 49, said in his filing that when he was brought before Judge Armand Capistran, who presided in Manchester District Court from 1979-1995, he told him of the abuse he suffered at both Pine Haven and YDC.  The judge, he said, called him a “brat” and did nothing about it.

The lawsuit details how John Doe #453 grew up in an abusive…

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A retired Catholic priest who for a time oversaw the Arlington diocese’s efforts to protect children on Wednesday was found not guilty of sexually abusing a child two decades ago.

Terry Wayne Specht, 69, of Pennsylvania was found not guilty by a juryin Fairfax County ofone felony count of aggravated sexual battery of a child younger than 13, court records show. Investigators claimed the assault took place in 2000, according to an indictment, whenSpecht was chaplain and assistant principal at St. Paul VI Catholic High School.

Dawn Butorac, Specht’s attorney, said she thought the jury had reached the correct decision.

“It was obvious to me that Mr. Specht was not guilty, and the prosecution should not have even brought the case,” Butorac said. “They put a man who has dedicated his life to service of his community, both in the Navy and as a priest, in jeopardy by threatening his…

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• The CofE published a new report which found 383 ‘new’ cases of alleged abuse 
• Of these, 168 relate to children and  242 of alleged perpetrators are clergy  
• Archbishops of Canterbury and York spoke of their ‘profound shame’ at findings
• For confidential support for adults who suffered any type of abuse in childhood call NAPAC on 0808 801 0331, free from landlines and mobiles 

 Church of England officials involved in sexual abuse were enabled by a ‘belief in forgiveness’, according to a review.

The Church’s most extensive ever review into sexual abuse of children and vulnerable adults found 383 ‘new’ cases going back to the 1940s. Two-thirds involved clergy while the rest include volunteers and officials. 

Leading Archbishops have apologised and spoken of their ‘profound shame’ after a review found hundreds of ‘new’ cases of alleged abuse by Church of England (CofE) officials, mostly against children and vulnerable adults.

The report made 26 recommendations…

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If you grew up under the influence of the Catholic Church, you likely know someone who was sexually abused by a priest. In my family, the destruction manifested in the form of a man who, after several years training for the priesthood, returned home and spent the next few decades preying on boys in the Central Valley.

He would eventually die alone, ostracized as a registered sex offender, but his evil lives on in the anguish of the victims he permanently damaged. His name does not appear on any official list of abusive clergy, but I count his horrific crimes as part of what I consider the Catholic Church’s systematic and global campaign of child rape.

Despite revelations that thousands of ordained priests abused a countless number of children over decades and centuries, the Catholic Church has been slow to repent. Church leaders from Pope John Paul…

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(For Immediate Release October 4, 2022)

According to a release by church officials, a Catholic priest from the Archdiocese of Washington has been placed on leave following an accusation of sexual abuse of minors that is reported to have occurred in another diocese decades ago.  

As listed on the parish website, Cardinal Wuerl named Father Robert P. Buchmeier to work at Holy Cross Parish and School, Garrett Park, Maryland in 2015. Buchmeier also worked at St. John the Evangelist Parish, Clinton; St. Bernardine of Siena Parish, Suitland; Christ the King Parish, Silver Spring; St. Mary Parish, Bryantown; and St. John the Evangelist Parish, Clinton. Other work assignments include St. Nicholas Parish, Laurel, from 1998 to 2005; St. Columba Parish, Oxon Hill, from 2005 to 2011; and Sacred Heart Parish in La Plata from 2011. Buchmeier was ordained in 1991 after studying at John XXIII…

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Cardinal retains post

Pope Francis wants Boston’s Cdl. Seán O’Malley to remain president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.

The news comes as the pope added 10 new members to the commission this past week, while retaining 10 others. 

O’Malley’s continued leadership role on the committee seems to contradict Pope Francis’ zero-tolerance policy toward abuse.

“No abuse should ever be covered up, as was often the case in the past, or not taken sufficiently seriously, since the covering up of abuses favors the spread of evil and adds a further level of scandal,” Francis proclaimed at the 2019 Vatican sexual abuse summit, formally known as the “Meeting on the Protection of Minors in the Church.”

The cardinal appeared to be a prudent choice when Francis established the commission in 2014 because of O’Malley’s reputation for being a “fixer” capable of contending…

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A Vatican leader on child protection did not advise a negligent German bishop to remain in office, the bishop’s spokesman said Wednesday, despite the bishop’s recent suggestion to the contrary.

“In conversation with Bishop Franz-Josef Bode, Father Hans Zollner spoke neither for nor against the bishop’s resignation,” Thomas Arzner, a spokesman for the Diocese of Osnabrück, Germany, told The Pillar Oct. 5.

The diocese responded to questions from The Pillar after a Sept. 22 press conference at which Bode, who was found to have mishandled abuse allegations against priests, said he had consulted with Fr. Zollner, a Vatican expert on child abuse, before deciding not to resign from diocesan leadership.

The bishop’s reference to Zollner was widely taken to imply that the priest had endorsed Bode’s decision to remain in office, despite scandal surrounding his episcopal leadership.  

Bode’s decision not to resign came as a surprise in Germany, and was criticized by…

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Taking a Gander: Let’s Just Throw the Children Under the Bus

The name Paul Adams is one that will not soon be forgotten. Years ago, the Bisbee, Arizona man confessed to his Mormon bishop that he had been abusing his 5-year-old daughter. As required by church policy, his bishop called a church helpline that had been established for that very purpose.

A recent Associated Press report showed that the bishop was advised by church lawyer, state Rep. Merrill Nelson, not to report the abuse and to keep it strictly confidential.

Because a penitent’s confessions are considered privileged under a special clergy exemption law, the helpline’s advice to the bishop may have, indeed, been correct, but only from a legal standpoint. There’s no decent person alive that can say the advice was morally right.

Not surprisingly, Adam’s abuse of that daughter continued for seven more years. During that time, he reportedly…

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Inquiry examines records going back to the 1940s and finds culture of deference, victim-blaming and misogyny

The Church of England has suffered from a culture of deference, inertia, misogyny, protectionism and victim-blaming, a three-year internal review of abuse cases has found.

Almost 400 new cases involving actions by clergy, officials and volunteers against children and vulnerable adults were uncovered in the most extensive review of personnel records ever undertaken.

In a foreword to the review team’s 129-page report, published on Wednesday, the archbishops of Canterbury and York wrote of the “great sadness and profound shame that we, again and again, come face-to-face with the brokenness and failings of our church”.

The review led to 26 national recommendations, including the establishment of a victims’ charter to enable children to be “truly ‘heard’ when they are expressing distress or communicating that something is wrong”.

The review team trawled…

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Information gathered on the alleged perpetrators found that 242 cases related to clerics

MORE than 380 cases of church-related abuse, almost half of which involved children, have been newly identified in a long-awaited national review of the files of every living cleric and church officer in the Church of England.

The Archbishops of Canterbury and York have issued a formal apology to victims of abuse and their families, saying: “Our faith compels us to take safeguarding with the utmost seriousness.”

The second Past Cases Review (PCR2) searched through 75,253 personal files (commonly known as blue files) — some dating back to the 1940s — in each of the 42 dioceses to find allegations of abuse or neglect and to understand how those allegations were identified and handled.

Unlike its predecessor — the first and heavily criticised Past Cases Review of 2007-09 — PCR2 also included files from the National Church…

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The Holy Cross Parish in Montgomery County has tweeted in the past that they are so thankful for the leadership and support of their “amazing pastor, Fr. Robert Buchmeier.” Now, this community is still trying to wrap its head around the news that their beloved priest has been suspended and faces serious allegations.

Buchmeier has been removed from his duties after allegations of sexual abuse of a minor that was alleged to have occurred in Northern Virginia three decades ago.

Father Buchmeier has been at Holy Cross since 2015. Before his vocation, Buchmeier served 15 years as an officer in the U.S. Army. Church leaders wrote in a letter Holy Cross Church and The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington take seriously our responsibility to protect children entrusted to our care. The abuse allegedly occurred in Northern Virginia.Holy Cross Church in Garrett Park, Md. on Oct. 5, 2022.

The investigation…

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The German Catholic Church’s reform process is again under fire from the Holy See, with a Vatican cardinal seemingly comparing its proposals for theological development to the thinking that sustained Germany’s Nazi era.

The furor launched by Swiss Cardinal Kurt Koch, who heads the Holy See’s office for Christian unity, marks the latest criticism of the German attempt to pursue reforms as a response to the clergy sex abuse scandal and the hemorrhaging of Catholic faithful.

Koch suggested in an interview with German Catholic newspaper Die Tagespost last week that the German reform process was seeking to introduce new sources of divine revelation, beyond Scripture and Christian tradition, to justify theological change.

He said it was the same thing some pro-Nazi Protestants did when they “saw God’s new revelation in blood and soil and in the rise of Hitler.”

His comments sparked outrage among German bishops who, along with…

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The chief judge of the US district court of Guam Frances Tydingco-Gatewood has approved the final revision to the compromise agreement that would bring closure to the clergy abuse victims’ civil action against the Catholic Church

The settlement amount for victim-survivors of clergy sexual abuse will be in the range of between US$34 million and US$45 million, but Catholic church officials said the final amount would depend on the actual sum that the sale of respective archdiocese properties would bring in.

“Victim-survivors of clergy sexual abuse in Guam will now finally receive an important measure of compensation and restitution for the agony they’ve endured,” the archdiocese said in a statement following Tydingco-Gatewood’s confirmation of the Fifth Amended Joint Plan of Reorganization.

“We are happy above all for the sake of the numerous victim-survivors of clergy sexual abuse who have waited many years for this day,” the archdiocese said.

The archdiocese…

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A Hampden County judge on Monday ruled that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield can’t obtain information from a Berkshire Eagle journalist that could reveal the identities of anonymous sources.

In a reversal of her earlier order related to a civil lawsuit against the diocese by a victim of clergy sexual abuse, Superior Court Justice Karen Goodwin said the diocese can only look to what non-confidential sources told Larry Parnass, who began reporting on the abuse in 2019.

Goodwin also said that if the diocese wants to continue to press Parnass for communications and testimony involving sources to whom he promised confidentiality, it will first have to demonstrate what efforts it has made to get the information from other sources.

Goodwin, however, said the court is “open” to requiring Parnass to disclose whether any of his anonymous sources are trial witnesses, and “to produce the information those sources provided to…

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Alexandria police are investigating allegations that a Catholic priest now serving in Montgomery County sexually abused minors several decades ago before he was ordained, according to police and church officials.

The pastor of Holy Cross Catholic Church in Garrett Park, Md., who has not been charged with any crime, is accused of committing the abuse before hebecame a priest in 1991, the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington told parishioners in a letter Friday.

The archdiocese “immediately” placed him on administrative leave after learning of the alleged abuse Friday, wrote the Rev. Anthony Lickteig, the archdiocese’s vicar for clergy and secretary for ministerial leadership. He said the accused pastor’s priestly faculties — including his ability to say Mass and administer sacraments — were suspended and that he is no longer at the rectory where he had been living.

Lickteig encouraged anyone with information about the allegation to contact Alexandria police, and he…

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Rev. Robert Buchmeier, pastor of Holy Cross in Garrett Park, has been suspended following accusations of child abuse occurring before he was ordained.

A prominent Montgomery County priest has been suspended following allegations he sexually abused children years ago, before he became a priest. 

Father Robert Buchmeier — pastor of the Holy Cross Parish in Garrett Park — was stripped of his priestly faculties and removed from the rectory, while police and church officials investigate.

Parishioners got word of the allegations against their pastor over the weekend. In a letter to the parish, the Washington Archdiocese Vicar for Clergy, Very Reverend Anthony Lickteig, wrote that pastor Buchmeier had been accused of sexual abuse of minors. The allegations date back decades before he was ordained as a priest, and occurred in the Arlington diocese. 

“It deeply saddens us to have to share some difficult information, however,…

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A Nobel Peace Prize-winning bishop alleged to have abused teenaged boys during the 1990s was sanctioned by the Vatican, which limited his movements and prohibited him from contact with minors or with his home country of East Timor. Meanwhile in Yakima, Washington, after a whistleblower raised concerns about the previous bishop’s handling of sexual abuse allegations, the now-retired bishop received a formal reprimand from the Vatican.

Though the details of these two cases differ, what they share in common is that the consequences to the church leader under investigation — and even the fact of the investigation itself — were kept secret. That is, until news media shared the truth.

In the case of Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, who shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996 with current East Timor President José Ramos-Horta for their nonviolent resistance to Indonesia’s occupation, the Dutch newspaper De Groene Amsterdammer last week (Sept….

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Bishop Belo was sanctioned by the Vatican in 2019 following reports of his ‘serious crimes’

The Vatican representative in Timor-Leste has urged Catholics to respect the sanctions that have been imposed on Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo for “the serious crimes” he has committed and asked them to maintain loyalty to the Church amid heated debates over the issue.

Bishop Belo’s case is no longer just an accusation, but it has been decided, Monsignor Marco Sprizzi, charge d’affaires of Apostolic Nunciature in Dili, said in an interview broadcast on the state television RTTL on Oct. 4

“This is a decision made and accepted by the bishop and that we just have to respect it, respect the bishop and respect the Vatican’s decision,” he said.

“I tell Timorese Catholics, who are so loyal to the Pope, to the Vatican, to follow Vatican guidelines, just as Bishop Belo…

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The Legionaries of Christ announced Monday the conclusion of a judicial process in the Ordinary Court of Milan involving three priests and two other persons in Italy.

In a statement posted on their website Oct. 3, the Legionaries reported that the ruling says, “All the defendants have been fully acquitted of the crime of attempted extortion because such an attempt did not exist,” and that “the judge will announce the reasons for her decision within 90 days.”

The statement explains that the accusations were made in 2013, “in the context of the relationship with a family that had reported abuse by Vladimir Reséndiz Gutiérrez.”

Reséndiz is a Mexican national and former Legionary of Christ priest. In 2011 he was accused of committing sexual abuse between 2006 and 2008 in the congregation’s minor seminary in Gozzano, in Italy’s Novara Province.

In March 2011, while working in Venezuela, he was removed from…

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A priest at a Catholic church in Garrett Park, Maryland, has been placed on administrative leave after he was accused of sexually abusing minors before he became a priest.

The Archdiocese of Washington (ADW) informed parishioners at Holy Cross Catholic Church in a Sept. 30 emailed letter that their pastor, Father Robert P. Buchmeier, had been suspended from his duties and is no longer living at the rectory. Buchmeier has not been charged criminally in connection with any of the allegations.

In the letter, Father Anthony Lickteig, the ADW’s episcopal vicar for clergy, explained that the Archdiocese of Arlington, Virginia, notified the ADW of the accusations against Buchmeier and noted that the abuse was alleged to have taken place decades before in another diocese “prior to his ordination to the priesthood.”

The letter did not specify the number of incidents of abuse cited in the accusation.

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Father James Jackson, a Rhode Island priest who was arrested in October on federal and state child pornography charges, admitted Monday in federal court that the government could prove that he violated certain conditions of his pre-trial release.

The conditions of Jackson’s pretrial release were set in November 2021 before he was allowed to leave Rhode Island to reside with a family member in Kansas. He was arrested in July by the U.S. Marshals in Kansas. He is currently in the custody of the U.S. Marshals at the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls, Rhode Island. 

In his Oct. 3 hearing in U.S. District Court in Providence, Jackson admitted that the government could prove that he violated the condition prohibiting him from “possessing any materials including videos, magazines, photographs, computer generated depictions or any other forms that depict sexually explicit conduct involving children,” according to James…

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A man from Manchester who ran an after-school program at a Hartford elementary school and a home-based ministry has been found guilty of sexually assaulting a child, state officials said.

Robert Nichols, 43, was found guilty by a jury in Hartford Superior Court of two counts of sexual assault in the fourth degree and risk of injury to a child, according to a statement by Hartford State’s Attorney Sharmese L. Walcott.

According to testimony at trial, Nichols was running an after-school program connected to the Michael D. Fox Elementary School in Hartford during the 2009 and 2010 school year when he offered to let an 11-year-old boy stay at his home over the summer to help his mother “with disciplining the child,” Walcott’s office said.

During that time, Nichols sexually and physically assaulted the boy, according to court testimony and Walcott’s statement.

According to police, the boy came forward after…

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Steve Greisen, a Christian filmmaker and veteran of the Jesus movement’s 1970s-era music scene, was arrested last month in Colorado Springs following “a summer long collaborative effort to identify and arrest child sexual predators” involving local and federal investigators.

The Gazette reported the arrests on Oct. 1.

Greisen, 68, has operated two film companies in Monument, a small town north of Colorado Springs:

• Principal Exploration Films Distribution, which says it manages distribution of over 400  films that “celebrate the true, the good and the beautiful,” including “Incredible Creatures that Defy Evolution,” which is popular with Christians who embrace young-Earth creationism.
• Reel Productions, LLC, which released “First Love,” the acclaimed film on the early years of the contemporary Christian music movement, as well as the biblical thrillers “The Mystery of The Ark of The Covenant” and “The Search for The Real Mt. Sinai” (both narrated by John Rhys-Davies…

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A civil lawsuit filed on behalf of three John Does claims that a church in Florence, Alabama, enabled a man who held various leadership positions there to sexually abuse them.

The civil suit follows a July criminal lawsuit in which Kelly Dale Crotts, 47, was charged with three counts of indecent exposure, two counts of child abuse with sexual motivation, and two counts of second-degree sex abuse, WHNT-TV of Huntsville reported. 

Crotts turned himself in following a grand jury indictment in the criminal case. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges, and his trial is set to begin Oct. 17. 

The civil case, filed last week, alleges assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress/outrage, invasion of privacy, false imprisonment, breach of fiduciary duty, negligence and wantonness, deceit and misrepresentation. Cornerstone Church of Christ, where Crotts worked, also is named as a defendant in the civil action.

…

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The hearings at the Vatican’s corruption trial resumed last week and shed light on new aspects of the “trial of the century” and the broader context of Vatican finances.

Behind every decision and litigation, in the end, one can glimpse a power struggle, whether it is big or small, systemic or personal.

Primarily, the trial revolves around the Secretariat of State’s investment in luxury real estate in London. However, it also explores further criminal allegations.

Cardinal Angelo Becciu, for instance, also faces charges for allocating money from the Secretariat of State to Caritas in his native region. The Sardinian is furthermore called to answer for the engagement of Cecilia Marogna as a consultant to the Secretariat of State.

However, the big deal at the center of the trial is the luxury property investment.

The Secretariat of State bought shares of the property on London’s Sloane Avenue and repeatedly changed brokers — apparently…

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Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Monday that he will humbly listen to people’s “harsh voices” criticizing his governing party’s cozy ties to the ultra-conservative Unification Church and help victims of its allegedly fraudulent businesses and huge donation collection.

Kishida has come under fire in a widening scandal that has exposed decades of close ties between former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who was assassinated in July, his ruling Liberal Democratic Party and the Unification Church, which has been accused of raking in huge donations by brainwashing adherents.

Kishida has split public opinion by honoring Abe with a state funeral, which opponents assailed as a prewar tradition designed to stir nationalism, without an acceptable legal basis or parliamentary discussion. Abe, on top of his divisive legacy, is now seen as a key figure behind the governing party’s church ties.

Kishida desperately needs to regain public trust for his government’s key policies, including a national…

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Canada’s bishops wound up their first in-person meetings in three years with discussion of concrete steps toward reconciliation with Indigenous Canadians.

At the end of four days of plenary meetings of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops in Cornwall, Ontario, Edmonton Archbishop Richard Smith told a news conference that the bishops are following the example of Pope Francis and the priority he placed on meeting with Indigenous people.

“I don’t think it overstates it to say it was a pivotal moment in the history of this country,” Smith said Sept. 29, referring to the pope’s July pilgrimage across Canada. “This was an historic moment, hopefully a moment of healing and moving things forward on this journey.”

Smith pointed to the sacrifice Francis made to be in Canada despite his health issues, to fulfill the promise he made in March to visit Indigenous people on their land for…

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Women religious in Ireland told officials for the upcoming Synod of Bishops on synodality that they feel resigned to and hurt from the “constant battering” from the media, which has used them “as scapegoats for Irish church and society.”

In their submission to the synod as part of the Irish national synthesis of the synodal process published Aug. 16, women religious in Ireland lamented their invisibility and highlighted their sense of marginalization. They said religious life in Ireland has been given a lot of bad press, with a particular focus on the past.

“There is a sense of being silenced, but silence is seen as condoning the accusations and giving an impression that ‘we’re all guilty’. We are partly to blame for our own invisibility as we appear to have gone underground,” they wrote.

They likened the negative coverage to “a niggling sore” and say it…

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Earlier this year, the retired bishop of the Diocese of Yakima, Washington, received a formal reprimand from the Vatican for how he handled clergy abuse allegations — and possibly for how he treated a whistleblower.

Victim advocates have praised the Vatican’s actions on that case as a rare rebuke of a bishop. Yet the dearth of information about both the investigation and subsequent reprimand appears to reinforce advocates’ concerns about one of Pope Francis’ landmark achievements on clergy abuse. Last week’s report that retired East Timor Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo was secretly sanctioned for alleged abuse has raised similar critiques.

Vos Estis Lux Mundi (“You Are the Light of the World”), issued by Francis in 2019, is a sweeping set of laws that includes a system to evaluate reports of abuse or cover-up by bishops. Bishop Carlos Sevilla, who led the central Washington diocese from 1996…

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A judge in Milan on Monday acquitted five members of the Legion of Christ religious order and their lawyers of attempted extortion in a case in which they were accused of offering to pay the family of a sexual abuse victim to lie to prosecutors.

Four of the five were also absolved of obstruction of justice charges because the statute of limitations expired, while a fifth was acquitted outright, said Daniela Cultrera, the lawyer for the victim’s family.

The investigation was an offshoot of a case in which Italy’s highest court last year upheld the conviction and 6 1/2-year prison sentence for a defrocked Legion priest, Vladimir Resendiz, for sexually abusing boys at the Legion’s youth seminary in northern Italy.

That case was sparked in 2013 when one of Resendiz’s victims confided in his therapist about the abuse he suffered while he was in middle school at the seminary. The…

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The Catholic Church has confirmed it is undertaking an investigation into sexual misconduct allegations against resigned Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders.

Key points:

• Bishop Saunders has strongly denied the allegations against him
• A police investigation was closed last year without charges being laid
• Bishop Saunders has been ordered to leave the diocese while the investigation is underway 

It has also ordered that the 72-year-old leave the outback diocese where he has been a priest and bishop for more than 50 years.

In a rare statement released on Saturday night, the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference said a Vos Estis Lux Mundi investigation was underway.

“The Holy See has initiated a canonical investigation into former Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders, with Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane appointed to oversee the investigation,” the statement said.

“Bishop Saunders stood aside … after media reports that Western Australia Police had begun an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.

…

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MEDIA RELEASE: September 24, 2022

[Click here to see our PDF cache of the media release as it appeared on the letterhead of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference.]

The Holy See has initiated a canonical investigation into former Broome Bishop Christopher Saunders, with Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane appointed to oversee the investigation.

Bishop Saunders stood aside as Bishop of Broome in March 2020 after media reports that Western Australia Police had begun an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct. He strongly denies the allegations.

At the conclusion of its investigation, Western Australia Police confirmed that no charges would be brought against Bishop Saunders.

Bishop Saunders later tendered his resignation to Pope Francis, which was accepted in August 2021.

A letter being read at Masses in the Diocese of Broome this weekend, signed by Apostolic Administrator Bishop Michael Morrisey and Archbishop Coleridge, says the Church investigation “could not happen”…

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The Vatican has appointed Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane, president of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference, to oversee an investigation into the former bishop of Broome, Christopher Saunders.

The case is understood to be the first application of “Vos Estis Lux Mundi” in Australia, the norms promulgated by Pope Francis in 2019. 

Saunders stepped aside as bishop of Broome in March 2020 after media reports that Western Australia Police Force had begun an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.

At the conclusion of its investigation, Western Australia Police confirmed that no charges would be brought against Saunders, prompting critics to call on police to “put up or shut up.”

Saunders later tendered his resignation to Pope Francis, which was accepted in August 2021. 

Saunders has steadfastly denied the allegations, which were made by Aboriginal men from remote communities in the West Kimberley region, according to a report by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

The diocese…

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Tylko pełna przejrzystość może pomóc Kościołowi w odbudowie autorytetu.

Watykan – poprzez usta Franciszka oraz wielu, także polskich, hierarchów – od dłuższego czasu mówi o zmianie polityki w podejściu do wyjaśniania spraw wykorzystywania seksualnego małoletnich. Zmiana ta miała dotyczyć zarówno księży sprawców, jak i ich przełożonych, którzy w wielu przypadkach wiedzieli o przestępczej działalności podwładnych, lecz nie reagowali w sposób odpowiedni i tym samym umożliwiali im dalsze krzywdzenie małoletnich.

Jednym z podstawowych elementów tej zmiany miała być transparentność, zerwanie z „kulturą sekretu”. Postulat ten bardzo mocno wybrzmiewał podczas spotkania Franciszka z przewodniczącymi episkopatów z całego świata, które odbyło się w Watykanie w lutym 2019 roku. W ciągu kilku miesięcy Stolica Apostolska przygotowała dokumenty, które wskazywały na to, że idzie nowe. Najpierw – w maju 2019 r. (z mocą obowiązującą od czerwca) – pojawił się dokument „Vos estis lux mundi” (VELM), w którym szczegółowo opisano procedury postępowania wobec biskupów…

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Pope Francis’s 2019 Motu proprio on addressing and handling abuse allegations apparently has some invisible appendix explaining that the law does not apply to bishops or cardinals who are powerful or notable.

Vos estis lux mundi, the Church’s process for handling allegations of abuse or negligent handling of abuse by bishops, has completed its three-year trial period. It is now ostensibly under review by the Vatican. Shall we review its operation?

Recently a Dutch magazine reported accusations of child rape against Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, a Nobel Prize winner from East Timor. The Vatican then revealed that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith had been aware of the case since 2019 and that Bishop Belo had been under certain restrictions since 2020, including being forbidden from ministry in East Timor. Notably, Bishop Belo had resigned in 2002 at…

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A Holy Cross Catholic Church priest has been suspended over sexual assault allegations, according to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.

In a letter sent to the Holy Cross Church Community last Friday, Very Reverend Anthony Lickteig revealed that Reverend Robert P. Buchmeier has been accused of sexually abusing minors.

The incidents are believed to have occurred in another diocese decades ago, prior to Buchmeier’s ordination to the priesthood. 

“This allegation was reported to the Catholic Diocese of Arlington, which notified the appropriate civil authorities and also notified us, The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. Upon receiving this allegation, I, as Episcopal Vicar for Clergy and Secretary for Ministerial Leadership, immediately placed Father Buchmeier on administrative leave in compliance with our Child Protection and Safe Environment Policy. Father Buchmeier’s priestly faculties have been suspended, and he is no longer at the rectory, pending a review of the allegations,” Lickteig stated…

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[See cached PDF of this letter as it appeared on archdiocesan letterhead.]

Dear Holy Cross Church Community,

It deeply saddens us to have to share some difficult information, however, we believe it is important to make the community aware of a matter involving child protection concerns.

Recently, we received information that Reverend Robert P. Buchmeier has been accused of sexual abuse of minors that is reported to have occurred in another diocese decades ago, prior to his ordination to the priesthood.

This allegation was reported to the Catholic Diocese of Arlington, which notified the appropriate civil authorities and also notified us, The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. Upon receiving this allegation, I, as Episcopal Vicar for Clergy and Secretary for Ministerial Leadership, immediately placed Father Buchmeier on administrative leave in compliance with our Child Protection and Safe Environment Policy. Father Buchmeier’s priestly faculties have been suspended, and he…

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A priest of a Catholic Church and school in Garrett Park, Maryland, has been suspended of his duties over allegations of sexual abuse of minors.

The priest serves at Holy Cross Catholic Church. WTOP is not identifying him because no charges have been filed.

A letter from the Archdiocese of Washington posted on the church’s website says the accusations of sexual abuse of minors date back decades, “prior to his ordination to the priesthood” and in another diocese. The pastor was ordained in 1991.

In a statement to WTOP the archdiocese said, “As we shared in our communication to the parishioners, staff and parents of Holy Cross parish and school on Friday evening, we have just learned of this allegation and we have turned the matter over to law enforcement to investigate.

“Our focus is on meeting the needs of our community, and we will be communicating further…

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The former choirmaster of an Altrincham church has been jailed for 12 years for three decades of abuse against underage boys.

Richard Owen, also known as Franklyn Stanowski, abused 14 boys at churches across Cheshire.

Chester Crown Court heard how Owen, from Hale, would abuse the boys for his own sexual gratification in private rooms.

The offences occurred between 1968 and 1998 when the boys were under 16.

Owen became choirmaster at St John’s in Altrincham – now converted into apartments – in the late 1980s and remained in the role until 1998.

During this time he also volunteered at a local primary school, teaching the children to sing as well as attending school trips to recruit choirboys.

The court heard he abused numerous boys during his time in Altrincham, with “hundreds” of occurrences leaving boys terrified.

The 70-year-old, from Winsford, admitted to 27 offences involving indecent assault of underage…

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Survivors of Guam clergy sexual assault are a step closer to obtaining compensation as a judge on Monday began hearing arguments that would get the Archdiocese of Agana out of bankruptcy and pay claimants $34 million to $101 million.

“We’re almost at the finish line,” U.S. District Court of Guam Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood, who’s been serving as bankruptcy judge in the archdiocese case, said on the first day of the hearing.

The remaining concerns about the plan related to the Boy Scouts of America, among other things, are expected to be addressed, and the judge assured of a “reasonable, fair, expeditious” decision.

If the judge confirms or approves the fifth amended joint reorganization plan this week, payments could start reaching survivors in “90 to 120 days,” according to attorney Robert Kugler of Minneapolis-based Stinson LLP, counsel for the creditors committee.

Attorney Edwin Caldie, also representing the creditors committee, told…

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Two years after the Roman Catholic Church on Long Island became the largest diocese in the nation to declare bankruptcy, none of the hundreds of clergy sex abuse cases filed against the church has been settled.

That has some survivors and their attorneys saying it is adding to the pain and injury the victims suffered as children years or even decades ago.

“They declared bankruptcy and said they wanted to see the victims adequately compensated,” said Paul Mones, an attorney who is representing some of the survivors. “People who suffered continue to suffer through these legal machinations that they are forced to go through.”

The Diocese of Rockville Centre has hired a major international law firm, Jones Day, to defend itself in the complex proceedings, which sometimes involve nearly 100 attorneys meeting at the same time.

The diocese declined to comment on the proceedings, other than pointing to court documents…

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Clergy sexual abuse cases are casting a pall over the Catholic Church in Portugal, ensnaring senior officials even as authorities scramble to explain why shelter was given to a Nobel Peace Prize-winning bishop at the center of sexual misconduct allegations.

Senior Catholic leaders apologized over the weekend for the hurt caused by decades of alleged abuse and cover-up — current estimates number around 400 cases — with the archbishop of Lisbon begging the faithful to not lose faith in the church.

“Be confident that for our part we will do our best, with respect to the law and the Gospel,” Archbishop Manuel Clemente said after Sunday Mass.

A spotlight fell on Portuguese church authorities, as well as the Vatican, last week when the Holy See’s sex abuse office confirmed a Dutch media report that in 2020 it had secretly sanctioned Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, the revered independence hero of East…

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In October 1992 in New York’s Times Square, an industrial steamroller crunched over a pathway littered with Sinéad O’Connor CDs as onlookers cheered and journalists filmed the protest. Today, a building overlooking the square bears an enormous photo of the singer’s famous shaven head. Her Bambi eyes gaze out across the city – and a wider country which vilified, mocked and banned her.

When Kathryn Ferguson, director of a new documentary about the singer, came across the picture while walking through Manhattan, she stopped in her tracks. “There she is, this monolith!” she says. “I cried. Like a phoenix from the flames, she’s back.”

In an era when so many public figures are widely applauded activists, it is hard to overstate how alone, courageous, and yet how demonised O’Connor once was. Nor how huge the institutions she took on were: the Catholic church, the Irish constitution,…

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On the first Saturday of fall, a sweating Bart Barber trekked across a weedy pasture in search of Bully Graham, the would-be patriarch of the rural Baptist pastor’s fledgling cattle herd.

With the afternoon temperature in the mid-90s, the 52-year-old Texan found the bull — whose nickname reflects his owner’s deep affection for the late Rev. Billy Graham — and 11 heifers cooling under a canopy of trees.

“Hey, baby girl,” Barber said as he patted one of the cows, a favorite he dubbed Lottie Moon after the namesake of his denomination’s international missions offering.

For nearly a quarter-century, Barber enjoyed relative obscurity as a minister in this town of 3,600, about 50 miles northeast of Dallas. That changed in June as delegates to the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Anaheim, California, chose Barber to lead the nation’s largest Protestant denomination at a time of major crisis.

The previous…

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They were in the Bible study room when Deryk Terril, a shy 11-year-old with shaggy hair in 1976, found the courage to finally say something: An elder at a Jehovah’s Witnesses congregation in Spokane, Wash., had been molesting him for years, Terril, now 57, recounts in a lawsuit filed in August.

He says he told a church leader he trusted to protect him.

Instead, the church leader got angry and told Terril they could do nothing about it without a second witness, Terril says. Police weren’t notified, he says, nor were his parents. The church allowed the alleged abuser, John Earl Jones, to continue spending time with Terril, and he molested the boy for years after, court documents say.

Around the same time, the mother of another boy in the congregation, Daniel Enholm, reported to the church that Jones had touched her son, too. Again, the other church leaders failed to…

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With the approach of the 105th anniversary of The Miracle of the Sun at Fatima in central Portugal, Catholics have been shocked by yet another revelation about the sexual abuse of children within the church.

The Vatican has at long last acknowledged that in 2020 a Nobel Peace Prize-winning Catholic bishop received “disciplinary restrictions” and was banned from “contact with minors” because of allegations that he raped and abused teenage boys.

Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo is accused of carrying out these crimes decades ago in the former Portuguese colony of East Timor. The Vatican first became involved in the case in 2019 if not before, but information about its disciplinary action only came last week, a day after a Dutch magazine, De Groene Amsterdammer, published the accusations in explicit accounts by two of the priest’s alleged victims.

Bishop Belo, 74, shared the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize with his friend José Ramos-Horta for…

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Parishioners of Our Lady of Hope Catholic Church in Rosemont have been notified that an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor has been filed against retired priest Fr. John Clemens.

The accusation is from an alleged incident nearly 50 years ago, according to a statement from the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago.

Clemens served as pastor at Our Lady of Hope from 2008 to 2018 when he retired. He is currently the church’s pastor emeritus. The church serves Catholics in Rosemont, Des Plaines, travelers through O’Hare Airport, and other neighboring communities.

“I have asked Father Clemens to step aside from ministry until our independent Review Board can investigate the allegation and present its recommendation to me,” said Cardinal Blase Cupich in a recent statement. “We have reported the allegation to civil authorities and have offered assistance to the accuser. Father Clemens has agreed to cooperate fully with this process, and…

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The trial over the Secretariat of State’s financial scandal resumed Thursday, offering a preview of the prosecution’s witness list.

The trial over the Secretariat of State’s financial scandal resumed Sept. 28 in Vatican City, kicking off the second year of hearings in the case, and offering a preview of the prosecution’s witness list.

The beginning of a three-day slate of hearings saw the final appearance of a former senior lay official at the Secretary of State’s investment office, and the release of the first slate of witnesses to be called by the prosecution.

The court has been in recess since July. In the intervening months, the judges have been considering a list, submitted by prosecutors and lawyers, of proposed witnesses still to be called in the trial, now in its second year.

Before the court adjourned for the summer in July, chief judge Giuseppe Pignatone told the court that around…

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Thrissur: District Sessions Court rejected the bail plea of a priest who sexually abused a woman on the pretext of “special puja”. The accused Alappuzha native Vadassery Nikarthil Kailas (45) had allegedly raped a woman by intoxicating her with psychotropic drugs while conducting puja.

The incident pertaining to the case happened in April 2021. The priest misled the woman by offering her milk and tamarind solution as “Prasadam”, which was already laced with drugs. Later, the priest sexually abused the woman and recorded the act when she went unconscious.

The complainant informed the court that she was raped again threatening that the videos would be leaked. By considering the arguments of the prosecutor KB Sunil Kumar, the court observed that the case exists prima facie against the accused and dismissed the bail petition.

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Germany’s bishops are meeting in Fulda, a town in the center of the country, this week ahead of a crucial trip to the Vatican.

Their fall plenary meeting, which began on Monday, is dedicated to two major themes: the controversial “synodal way” and the bishops’ November ad limina visit to Rome.

The stakes are high: The Vatican has repeatedly expressed misgivings about the synodal way – the multi-year German initiative bringing together bishops and lay people to discuss four main topics: power, the priesthood, women in the Church, and sexual morality.

In July, the Vatican’s Secretariat of State underlined that the synodal way has no power “to compel the bishops and the faithful to adopt new ways of governance and new approaches to doctrine and morals.”

Earlier this month, the bishops attended an acrimonious session of the synodal way at which they endorsed documents proposing new ways of governance and new approaches to doctrine and…

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The United Nations and advocacy groups for survivors of clergy sexual abuse are urging Pope Francis to authorize a full investigation of Catholic Church archives on three continents to ascertain who knew what and when about sexual abuse by Nobel Peace Prize-winning Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo, the revered independence hero of East Timor.

The Vatican’s sex abuse office said last week that it had secretly sanctioned Belo in 2020, forbidding him from having contact with minors or with East Timor, based on misconduct allegations that arrived in Rome in 2019. That was the year Francis approved a new church law that required all cases of predator prelates to be reported in-house and established a mechanism to investigate bishops, who had long escaped accountability for abuse or cover-up during the church’s decades-long scandal.

But a brief statement by the Vatican, issued after Dutch magazine De Groen Amsterdammer exposed the Belo scandal by…

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The building at 60 Sloane Avenue in London is at the center of the Vatican’s historic corruption trial, which began at the end of July 2021.

After a break of over two months, the Vatican trial on financial corruption in the Secretariat of State continued this week with the interrogation of witnesses for the prosecution.

The court reconvened Sept. 28, 29, and 30, to begin the questioning of the first of what the prosecution expects to be a total of 41 witnesses it will call.

The witness list includes Vatican gendarme Stefano De Santis, who assisted the Vatican’s now chief Prosecutor Alessandro Diddi during the trial’s preliminary investigation; he is expected to testify at the next scheduled hearing on October 12. 

A British-Italian architect, Luciano Capaldo, has been called to testify by the prosecution the same week. Capaldo was the registered director of the holding company London 60 SA Ltd,…

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Over a year into the proceedings, the Vatican mega-trial of 10 individuals accused of defrauding the Catholic institution’s finances through a controversial real estate deal began again this week after a summer recess with an interrogation of the prosecution’s witnesses.

The trial, which resumed Wednesday (Sept. 28) after being on break since July, revolves around a 2018 London real estate purchase by the Vatican’s Secretariat of State that ultimately cost the institution well over $200 million, mainly taken from papal funds destined for charity.

After more than a year of hearing from defendants, including Cardinal Angelo Becciu, judges will now be presented with testimony from the Vatican prosecutor’s submitted list of 27 witnesses.

On Friday, Revisor General Alessandro Cassinis Righini described to judges a culture of mismanagement within the Vatican’s Secretariat of State. Righini was appointed to oversee Vatican budgets and transactions by Pope Francis in March 2021 but had…

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The Vatican auditor general said he was surprised by the lack of ethical standards demonstrated by officials considering investment opportunities, including a failed London property development deal.

During the Vatican trial of 10 defendants accused of various charges related to financial malfeasance, Alessandro Cassinis Righini, auditor general of the Holy See and Vatican City State, criticized the mismanagement of funds as well as the Vatican’s association with people “with clear conflicts of interest,” which resulted in the loss of millions of euros.

“That was not the way to manage funds from Peter’s Pence,” Cassinis told the court Sept. 30, referring to the papal fund used for charity and to support the running of the Roman Curia and Vatican embassies around the world.

When asked by Vatican prosecutors if he was sure that funds from the annual collection were used in the London property deal, Cassinis replied, “Yes.”

The trial, which…

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Pope Francis reconfirmed the leadership of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and expanded its membership from 17 to 20 people, naming 10 new members and reappointing 10 returning members.

U.S. Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley of Boston, president of the commission, said, “Coming from all over the world with varied backgrounds and a common passion for the well-being of children and vulnerable people, the members announced today include advocates and practitioners of prevention and protection to the many areas in which the church ministers to children.”

The members include “representatives from canon law, social work, the medical and psychological professions, law enforcement and the judiciary as well as pastoral experts who currently work in dioceses and religious congregations,” he said in a statement Sept. 30, the day the appointments were announced.

“They have all spent significant amounts of their professional lives listening to and supporting victim/survivors of sexual…

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A pastor and his son have been booked for raping a college girl in Tamil Nadu. The pastor’s son refused to marry her after sexually exploiting her on the promise of marriage. The girl had leveled rape charges against the father and another pastor as well.

Pastor David Jacob runs a Pentecostal church named Zion Prayer House near Panagudi in Tirunelveli. His son Anis Paul(25) made acquaintance with a 22 year old MCA student who attended the church. Anis Paul proposed to her and took her out on many occasions. As per Tamil media reports he also promised to marry her.

On this promise he sexually exploited the girl. But when she started asking him to marry her Paul stopped talking with her. He asked her to stay away from him for 2 years as their relationship would bring bad repute to his family…

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A 62-year-old man who served as pastor of a Baptist church in Missouri City will spend a decade in prison after pleading guilty to the charge of aggravated sexual assault of a child.

William Benjamin Woodward pleaded guilty June 14, but he elected to have his punishment assessed by U.S. District Judge J. Christian Becerra. The first-degree felony is punishable by five to 99 years, or life, in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. 

Woodward was executive pastor at Heritage Baptist Church from 2009 until his arrest in April 2021. The church was rebranded and the name was changed to Horizon Baptist Church a few weeks after Woodward’s arrest.

By pleading guilty to the crime and waiving his right to a jury trial, Woodward became eligible to ask the court for deferred adjudication, a form of probation. During the hearing June 20, his attorney argued that his client was…

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A former Missouri City pastor has been sentenced to prison after he pled guilty to aggravated sexual assault of a child on June 14, according to the Fort Bend County District Attorney’s Office.

William Benjamin Woodward, 62, previously served as pastor for a Baptist church in Missouri City from 2009 until his arrest in April 2021, according to the DA. Woodward elected to have his punishment assessed by Judge J. Christian Becerra of the 434th District Court.

Aggravated sexual assault of a child is a first-degree felony, punishable by 5 to 99 years, or life in prison and a fine up to $10,000.

Woodward’s hearing was held on June 20 where his attorney argued that he was an excellent candidate for deferred adjudication because he had no criminal history, had served his community as a church leader, and had immediately started sex offender therapy after the child in this case…

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U.S. District Judge Ronnie L. White on Thursday sentenced a former youth pastor from New York to 13 years and four months in prison for the sexual abuse of a Missouri 15-year-old in 2013.

Judge White also ordered Jesse E. Vargas, 38, to pay $146,594 in restitution to his victim.

Vargas originally met the then 11-year-old girl at a religious camp in Michigan where he worked.

“Over the course of the next four years Jesse played with my family and I like frogs in a pot,” the victim said in court during Thursday’s hearing. “Slowly increasing the temperature of his manipulation until we each were unaware of the water we had been submerged in, let alone its suddenly scalding temperature. By age thirteen I abandoned most of my spiritual leaders and friendships at his suggestion. By fourteen he even guided me to push away my two closest friends,” she said.

…

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A former youth pastor from New York was sentenced to 13 years and four months in prison.

Jesse Vargas, 38, originally met the girl when she was 11 years old at a religious camp in Michigan. Vargas kept in touch with the family for the next four years and came to her St. Louis home in January 2013, preached at her church and then sexually assaulted her. He returned in March of that year and assaulted her again. He arranged for her to go to New York in June and abused her again.

Vargas pleaded guilty to two felony counts of travel with the intent to engage in illicit sexual contact and coercion and enticement of a minor.

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A Hartford Superior Court jury on Tuesday convicted minister Robert Lee Nichols of touching a 10- or 11-year-old boy in sexual ways during a 10-day visit to Nichols’ family’s Manchester home in the summer of 2009 or 2010.

The year of the visit was disputed, but the real issue was whether the sexual touching happened. The boy testified Monday morning that it did, and Nichols, 43, flatly denied that in testimony later that day. Nichols’ wife, Tamara, subsequently took the witness stand and corroborated important parts of his testimony.

The six-member jury convicted Nichols of two felonies, risk of injury to a child and fourth-degree sexual assault. He faces a mandatory minimum of five years in prison and a maximum of 25 years when Judge Michael Gustafson sentences him Nov. 29.

The judge raised Nichols’ bond to $500,000 after the verdict. Online court records showed Wednesday that he had posted…

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