ABUSE TRACKER

A former Catholic priest removed from the clergy in a sex abuse scandal was charged Wednesday with gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated in Rossmoor by the Contra Costa County district attorney.

Walnut Creek police said 75-year-old Stephen Kiesle, of Rossmoor, was behind the wheel of a vehicle at about 9:15 p.m. Saturday night that struck a couple walking on the sidewalk on Tice Creek Drive near Fairlawn Court in Rossmoor. The collision killed 64-year-old Curtis Gunn and caused minor injuries to his wife, Laurelyn Gunn, both of Rossmoor.

Kiesle, who police said also suffered minor injuries, was extricated from his vehicle by the fire department and later arrested.

According to a news release issued Wednesday from the office of District Attorney Diana Becton, Kiesle was also charged with driving under the influence of alcohol and other special allegations for prior felonies.

Kiesle has a lengthy criminal history and is being…

View Cache

A Hamilton County judge on Thursday rejected a plea deal for a suspended Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing a teenage boy in 2016.

Hamilton Superior Judge Michael Casati rejected the agreement that would have allowed David Marcotte to plead guilty to one count of dissemination of matter harmful to minor, a level 6 felony.

Indianapolis priest in minor sex abuse case

Photo by: ProvidedFr. David Marcotte, 32, pleaded guilty to one count of dissemination of matter harmful to minors, a level 6 felony.By: Vic RyckaertPosted at 3:30 PM, Apr 21, 2022 and last updated 3:41 PM, Apr 21, 2022

HAMILTON COUNTY — A Hamilton County judge on Thursday rejected a plea deal for a suspended Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing a teenage boy in 2016.

Hamilton Superior Judge Michael Casati rejected the agreement that would have allowed David Marcotte to plead guilty to one count of…

View Cache

A judge rejected a proposed plea agreement for a suspended Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing a teenage boy in 2016 and instead set a trial date for the cleric Thursday.

Hamilton County Superior Court Judge Michael Casati threw out the deal that would have allowed David Marcotte to plead guilty to one count of dissemination of matter harmful to minor in exchange for the state dismissing charges of child solicitation and vicarious sexual gratification.

Casati scheduled a jury trial for Oct. 10 on the three felony counts, WRTV-TV reported.

The boy was 14 and 15 when Marcotte allegedly texted him inappropriate photos and engaged in sexual conduct via social media platforms, court documents state.

Marcotte met the boy in 2016 when he worked at St. Malachy Church and School in Brownsburg. The abuse allegedly happened in 2017 and 2018, according to a probable cause affidavit.

At…

View Cache

Christopher Lawton faces sentence of several years in prison

A pastor from Greenfield who provided Christian counseling has pleaded guilty to dozens of counts of sexual assaulting a teenage girl.

Christopher Lawton was indicted by a grand jury on charges of sexually assaulting a child under the age of 18. He is now facing several years in prison.

Lawton entered guilty pleas Wednesday afternoon to more than a dozen counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault. According to court documents, between February 2015 and June 2016, Lawton sexually assaulted a teenage girl he was counseling.

The victim was older than 13 and younger than 18 at the time, prosecutors said. Officials said Lawton was providing pastoral counseling to the victim and used his power of authority to coerce her into sexual acts on at least 16 different occasions.

“They occurred in the home. They occurred in cars,” Assistant Hillsborough County Attorney…

View Cache

The amount, with the average amounting to about $300,000 per person, is one of the largest by a U.S. diocese.

The Diocese of Camden, New Jersey, will pay $87.5 million to approximately 300 alleged sexual-abuse victims, under a settlement reached Tuesday.

The payout, one of the largest by a U.S. diocese, would surpass the Archdiocese of Boston’s historic 2003 settlement of almost $85 million, The Associated Press reported. The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has the largest settlement to date, $660 million.

A U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge in Camden still must approve the settlement. 

Payments of the funds will roll out over a four-year period into a trust. The agreement also requires the diocese to keep “maintaining or enhancing” child-protection protocols.

The New York Times reported that payments will differ for each of the plaintiffs, with the average amounting to about $300,000 per person.

The settlement still allows the alleged victims to…

View Cache

The Anglican Church of Canada says an archbishop has resigned over allegations of sexual misconduct.

Mark MacDonald was the first national Anglican archbishop responsible for representing Indigenous church members when he was appointed in 2007.

In a letter posted on the church’s website, Rev. Linda Nicholls, who is primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, says prayers should be directed to the complainant.

The church says the resignation was tied to an independent investigation.

It did not provide further details on the allegations.

MacDonald was appointed to the position as part of the church’s effort to heal a long-standing rift with Indigenous people.

“The ripple effects will be felt throughout the Church both in Canada and internationally, but most especially within the Sacred Circle and Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples,” Nicholls wrote.

MacDonald is originally from Duluth, Minn., and also served as bishop of the U.S. Episcopal Diocese of Alaska.

Bishop Sidney…

View Cache

Bishop Michael Olson of the Catholic Diocese of Fort Worth requested the resignation of the head of Catholic Charities Fort Worth earlier this month.

Olson, who’s served as bishop since 2014, called for the resignation of the chief executive officer, Christopher Plumlee, in a letter dated April 4. In the letter, Olson says he has a “sincere and deep lack of confidence” in Plumlee, stemming from an April 1 meeting about a women’s summit.

Plumlee told the Star-Telegram on Wednesday that stepping down would indicate that he’s done something wrong, which he hasn’t.

“I have no intention of resigning,” Plumlee said. “If I resigned, it would have intimated that I’ve done something that I should have resigned over. And I haven’t.”

This isn’t the first time the bishop has made headlines on personnel changes under his supervision. Here’s what we know about Bishop Michael Olson:

WHO IS BISHOP…

View Cache

‘SENSELESS’

Stephen Kiesle, a disgraced former Roman Catholic priest in Oakland, now faces charges for allegedly killing a retiree while drunk driving.

Laurelyn Gunn and her husband, Curtis, loved trivia.

“Between the two of us, we had a lot of otherwise useless knowledge,” Gunn, 63, told The Daily Beast.

On Saturday night, the couple, who lived at Rossmoor, a 55-plus retirement community in Northern California, spent a few hours participating in a monthly trivia event held at the nearby clubhouse.

“A friend of ours put together a pretty strong team, and one of the guys on our team was this guy named Steve. I never knew his last name,” Gunn said. “And we were walking home from the trivia game when Steve, who was sitting across the table from us, killed Curt.”

“Steve” turned out to be Stephen Kiesle, a disgraced former Roman Catholic priest in Oakland who in 2004…

View Cache

A multimillion-dollar settlement between the Roman Catholic Diocese of Camden, New Jersey, and victims of child sexual abuse by members of the clergy has been announced by the diocese and a survivors committee.

About 300 victims who experienced child sexual abuse will share an $87.5 million trust established by the diocese and related Catholic entities, Jeff Anderson, who represents some of the survivors, told CNN.

The settlement will be funded over four years, and victims each will get their disbursements from an allocator, he said.

While both the Camden diocese and the survivors’ attorneys announced they have agreed to the terms, the official settlement is still a few weeks out, Anderson said. The parties are seeking court approval by early June, after bankruptcy lawyers draft official language and submit it the survivors for their assent.

The settlement follows numerous allegations made against other Catholic…

View Cache

A defrocked Catholic priest who served time in prison for molestation has been charged by the Contra Costa District Attorney on three counts of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated, driving under the influence of alcohol, and special allegations for prior felonies, according to a release from the Costa Contra County District Attorney’s Office.

Walnut Creek Police say that 75-year-old Stephen M. Kiesle, who has resided in Rossmoor since 2010, was driving in Rossmoor on the night of April 16 when he struck 64-year-old Curtis Gunn and his wife Laurelyn on a sidewalk. The couple was walking near their home on Tice Creek Drive near Fairlawn Court around 9:15 p.m. when Mrs. Gunn said a vehicle veered on to the sidewalk, striking her husband and sideswiping her.

When officers arrived, they found Mr. Gunn with life-threatening injuries and Mrs. Gunn with minor injuries. The vehicle was on its side and…

View Cache

Exclusive interview with Sister Josée Ngalula, internationally recognized theologian who has spent the past 20 years offering pastoral assistance to sex abuse victims in Africa

St. Andrew’s Sister Josée Ngalula says there are at least “eight main reasons” why it is difficult for people in Africa to denounce sexual abuse, mostly due to cultural norms on the vast continent.

The 62-year-old Congolese religious sister last year became the first African woman ever to be named a member of the International Theological Commission (ITC), a body under the aegis of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Sister Josée teaches dogmatic theology at several theological institutes in Africa. And she has also spent the past 20 years providing pastoral assistance to sex abuse victims and the institutions that support them.

She has just compiled a report based on her work in this area. She spoke about it in this exclusive…

View Cache

[See video of a public lecture by Professor Kevin Lewis O’Neill.]

Between 1952 and 1968, a Roman Catholic religious order known as the Servants of the Paraclete sought, bought, and finally sold several small islands in the Caribbean for priests unable to stop “sin[ning] repeatedly with little children.” This talk details the Servants of the Paraclete’s mid-twentieth-century efforts at offshoring sexually abusive priests. It is an historical account that encourages scholars and activists alike to rethink the geography of clerical sexual abuse: though there is a generally agreed upon history that bishops throughout the United States transferred priests between parishes to evade suspicion and at times prosecution, this provides a previously untold account of how the U.S. Church leveraged developments in moral theology, pastoral psychology, and free market capitalism to secure transnational lines of flight for some of its most incorrigible abusers. 

Kevin Lewis O’Neill is the Director of the View Cache

Deal Allows Survivors to Pursue Insurance Coverage and Provides a Pathway to Enhanced Child Protection in the Diocese

Today, a partial settlement is being announced with the Diocese of Camden and survivors of sexual abuse who courageously filed lawsuits under the New Jersey Victims’ Rights Bill. In addition to the $87.5 million provided by the diocese, survivors and their attorneys still have the opportunity to take legal action against insurance companies that represent the diocese. Thus far, the insurance companies have played hardball and refused to meaningfully honor their insurance obligations. Furthermore, the settlement will include several child protection measures that are still being finalized. This will require the diocese to publicly disclose the history of abuse in the diocese.

“This day, this settlement with the Bishop of Camden is a powerful advance in accountability. The credit goes to the survivors for standing up for themselves and the truth. It…

View Cache

The settlement with the Camden diocese is among the largest such agreements involving the Catholic Church in the United States.

The Diocese of Camden, N.J., said on Tuesday that it had agreed to pay $87.5 million to settle claims made by hundreds of people who accused clergy members of sexually abusing them, one of the largest such settlements involving the Catholic Church in the United States.

In what may be a first for such litigation, the ultimate payout to the plaintiffs could be substantially higher, lawyers representing them said, because the settlement allows for further litigation against insurance companies for the diocese and related entities like parishes and schools.

“This is a triumph of courage, with all credit to the survivors for staying unified and strong,” Jeff Anderson, a lawyer for about a quarter of the roughly 300 plaintiffs, said.

In a statement announcing the settlement, Bishop Dennis J….

View Cache

Josh and Leona Kimes, the co-pastors of Hillsong Boston, announced on Monday (April 18) that the two have “made the difficult decision to resign.” The announcement of their departure comes a week after the results of an investigation into Hillsong New York City, where the couple worked previously, were leaked to a Christian online news outlet.

The Kimes’ departure is the most recent in a slew of upheavals at the global megachurch and multimedia empire, including the resignation two weeks ago of its global senior pastor Brian Houston after allegations of sexual misconduct. Co-founded by Houston in Australia nearly 40 years ago, the church had grown to some 30 locations before scandals closed three of its U.S. churches.

The couple, who helped launch Hillsong NYC under now-disgraced former pastor Carl Lentz before planting the Boston campus, were “ready for a fresh start,” Kimes said in an Instagram post featuring photos of…

View Cache

In August 1979, Wendy Guay told her best friend that her father, Paul Guay—then a pastor at John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church—was regularly molesting her.

Her friend, Lisa (Tucker) Ward, told The Roys Report (TRR) that when she’d sleep over at Wendy’s house, Wendy would insist that they both go to bed fully clothed. Sometimes, Paul Guay would come in Wendy’s room in the middle of the night and would “hover over us,” Ward said.

But one night, the girls woke up and Guay was rubbing their backs. “Wendy woke up, freaked out, and grabbed me,” Ward said.

Soon afterward, Wendy divulged her secret to Ward. They then told Ward’s dad, John Tucker, a former missionary and then-member of Grace Community Church (GCC), about the abuse.

This began a process that led Paul Guay to confess his abuse directly to John MacArthur weeks later, according to Tucker, an alleged eyewitness to the…

View Cache

Paul Dyal will be back in court on Wednesday to discuss his personal belongings.

A former Jacksonville pastor accused of sex crimes will remain in jail.

Action News Jax first told you in March when police linked Paul Dyal to physical and sexual abuse that happened over decades.

A judge ruled Monday that Dyal will be back in court Wednesday.

It’s for a potential bond setting and hearing, to talk about his personal belongings.

Investigators say Dyal along with two other men, Vernon Williamson and Jerome Teschendorf, abused children at the Jacksonville Assembly of the Body of Christ Church.

JSO said it has identified and spoken with numerous victims and witnesses and said it believes there are additional suspects, victims and witnesses.

Anyone with any information is asked to contact JSO at 904-630-0500 or to remain anonymous, contact Crime Stoppers at 1-866-845-TIPS.

If you or someone you know…

View Cache

The first day of a jury trial in a high-profile sexual abuse case in Lauderdale County is set to begin Monday morning.

The former pastor of Lighthouse Baptist Church in Florence, John Thomas Martin, admitted in a June 2019 pulpit confession that he had inappropriate relationships with young men, according to the Assistant District Attorney in Lauderdale County, Coty Hand.

According to the church’s website at the time, Martin had been the pastor since 2010. He immediately resigned from his role following the confession.

Less than a week after his confession, he was arrested and taken to the Lauderdale County Detention Center and placed on a $60,000 bond. In all, Hand said Martin admitted to four counts of sexual abuse of a child – those charges involve a victim younger than 16.

Following Martin’s confession, members of the church immediately contacted One Place of the…

View Cache

Every year, one of the world’s leading dance competition companies sells the dream of Hollywood fame to hundreds of thousands of ambitious young dancers hoping to launch careers on television, in movies and on stage.

But behind the bright lights and pulsing music, some dancers say they were sexually assaulted, harassed and manipulated by the company’s powerful founder and famous teachers and choreographers, according to a joint investigation by The Associated Press and the Toronto Star.

The problems date back to the founding of Los Angeles-based Break The Floor Productions; as the company has grown into an industry powerhouse, its leaders perpetuated a culture of sex and silence, according to interviews with dozens of former and current staff and students.

Break the Floor’s reach extends across the entertainment industry to some of the biggest names in music, television and social media. Alumni and faculty have danced on stage with Lady…

View Cache

Protest letter signed by hundreds of Reform Jews urges immediate action for greater accountability and transparency, following a report about alleged sexual misconduct in the movement in past decades

Nearly 500 past and present staff members of the Union for Reform Judaism are demanding “a concrete plan and public timeline for institutional review and reform” following a damning investigation released last month uncovering numerous instances of sexual misconduct, sexual assault and tolerance of a “sexualized culture” in the movement’s summer camps, Israel trips and youth movement activities over the past 50 years.

A protest letter carrying the signatures of both employees and volunteers at institutions run by the Union for Reform Judaism, including senior rabbis in the movement over the years, was delivered late last week to the URJ’s leaders. 

The letter urged immediate action for greater accountability and a clearer path to address the flaws in…

View Cache

Details from the leaked report paint a picture of a church leadership rife with abuse, sexual misconduct and secrecy.

The results of an investigation by an independent law firm into the culture of Hillsong NYC, the Manhattan site of the global megachurch, have been leaked to The Christian Post, and its reported contents paint a picture of a church leadership rife with abuse, sexual misconduct and secrecy.

Among the details reported by the Washington, D.C.-based news outlet include several extramarital affairs by the New York church’s former pastor Carl Lentz and spiritual abuse of volunteers and staff, as well as “multiple incidents of consensual or non-consensual sexual interaction between church leaders and congregants, staff, volunteers, or non-churchgoers,” according to the article published Monday (April 11).

The publication’s summary of the report also furthers details of the relationship between Lentz and his former nanny, Leona Kimes, who alleged in May 2021 that…

View Cache

A defrocked Bay Area Catholic priest convicted of child molestation and accused by multiple families of sexual abuse and assault during his decades-long tenure has now been arrested for allegedly killing a man while driving drunk in a gated community.

Stephen Kiesle, the 75-year-old who was at the center of an Associated Press exposé on Pope Benedict, was arrested Sunday morning on suspicion of gross vehicular manslaughter and driving under the influence, Walnut Creek police told Rossmoor.com.

The crash took place at around 9:15 p.m. in the “active adults 55+” gated community of Rossmoor, Rossmoor.com reported, when Curtis and Laurelyn Gunn were walking home from an event at the nearby Gateway Complex. While approaching an intersection, a car going above the 25 mph speed limit hit the Gunns while driving on the curb, striking Curtis head-on and scraping Laurelynn. Curtis Gunn was pronounced dead at the scene, the news site said.

Kiesle…

View Cache

A New Jersey Catholic diocese has agreed to pay $87.5 million to settle claims involving clergy sex abuse with some 300 alleged victims in one of the largest cash settlements involving the Catholic church in the United States.

The agreement between the Diocese of Camden, which encompasses six counties in southern New Jersey on the outskirts of Philadelphia, and plaintiffs was filed with U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Camden on Tuesday.

The settlement must still go before a U.S. bankruptcy judge. If approved, the settlement would exceed the nearly $85 million settlement in 2003 in the clergy abuse scandal in Boston, although it’s less than other settlements in California and Oregon.

“I want to express my sincere apology to all those who have been affected by sexual abuse in our Diocese,” Bishop Dennis Sullivan said in a statement. “My prayers go out to all survivors of abuse and I pledge my…

View Cache

An independent ombudswoman hired by the Catholic Church of Montreal said Tuesday she’s encountering delays and resistance to her efforts to address complaints, warning that the process to tackle abuse and misconduct risks becoming a “smokescreen.”

The third quarterly report published Tuesday by Marie Christine Kirouack said that in recent months she’s faced a number of problems, including non-compliance with deadlines, delays and a failure by church officials to follow up with people who are subject to complaints.

Kirouack, who was hired in May 2021, noted that addressing abuse and other complaints requires a “major culture change” that will only happen if it comes “clearly and unequivocally directly from above.”

“It is only in this way that people reluctant to change will follow in the footsteps of this reform,” she wrote. “Thus and only thus, will they be able to grasp that their future and the future of their church…

View Cache

Over 200 completed reports of over 150 abusers, 51 reporting for the first time

As Wisconsin approaches the one-year anniversary of the launch of Wisconsin’s Clergy and Faith Leader Abuse Initiative, AG Kaul is releasing additional information and highlighting the successes.

“In the year since we launched the Clergy and Faith Leader Abuse Initiative, over 200 people have reported information, and a District Attorney has criminally charged a defendant in a previously unreported case,” said AG Kaul. “We continue to encourage anyone with information about clergy and faith leader abuse to report that information.”

Wisconsin DOJ Takes Every Report Seriously

Shortly after launching the initiative, DOJ organized training for victim advocates in Wisconsin so that they would be prepared to support survivors of sexual abuse by clergy and faith leaders. The training offered live presentations by national experts on working with survivors of clergy sexual abuse. Victim advocates at DOJ…

View Cache

Wisconsin’s attorney general said his investigation into clergy sex abuse across the state has resulted in 1,000 calls to his tipline, 204 reports, and one criminal case. But there are some questions the AG is not answering.

Kaul launched his investigation into the Catholic Church in Wisconsin one year ago. On Tuesday, he provided an update on his progress.

“As of April 18, the Wisconsin Department of Justice Clergy and Faith Leader Initiative has received a total of 204 completed reports to the toll-free tip line and the online reporting tool accusing more than 150 individuals of abuse. Over 1,000 calls have been made to or from the tip line, including repeat calls from survivors who remember additional information or are looking for follow up information,” Kaul said in a statement.

Kaul said his office also received what he calls a “significant number of reports from…

View Cache

Attorney General Josh Kaul’s investigation into clergy abuse has generated about 200 reports and one criminal case in the year since it was launched, state Department of Justice officials said Tuesday.

Kaul began the investigation in April 2021, saying he wanted to develop a full picture of clergy sexual abuse over decades. He has encouraged victims to contact the Justice Department and tell their stories.

As of Monday, the agency had received 204 reports accusing more than 150 people of abuse. The investigation has resulted in one criminal case so far against a church camp counselor accused of touching a 10-year-old’s genitals in Waushara County in 2009. That case is still pending.

View Cache

A year after Attorney General Josh Kaul announced a formal investigation into abuse by members of the clergy in Wisconsin, more than 200 reports have been made to the Department of Justice. 

Those include more than 150 individuals accused of abuse, and 51 people were reporting an instance of abuse to law enforcement for the first time, according to a Tuesday morning press release.  

Kaul said in an interview that the number of survivors who reported to the department for the first time signals their trust. 

“One of our goals when we launched this was to provide a safe and trusted place for survivors to support,” he said. “Having 51 people come forward and report information who had never previously reported to law enforcement or religious authorities, to me, indicates that we have succeeded in providing a place where survivors trust the process and know they will be treated with dignity…

View Cache

Two priests who are accused of sexual abuse are suing the Buffalo Diocese.

Fathers Arthur Smith and Pat Ipolito claim the Diocese cut their pensions.

Both men receive about $2,000 a month. The lawsuit says the priests did not take part in a monitoring program, which lead to them losing all or part of their pensions.

The Diocese responded to the lawsuit tonight, saying in part, “Failure to comply entails the potential forfeiture of Diocesan financial support and/or pension benefits, as outlined by Bishop Fisher in October 2021.”

View Cache

Those who have become familiar with the fate of persons sexually abused by priests know that victims experience the indifference (or worse) of Church authorities to their abuse as a tremendous betrayal—something that does more harm than the abuse itself. They experience the Church more as Judas than the Bride of Christ. Indifference, dismissal, cover-up, and protection of the predator are common. Many books, such as Leon Podles’ Sacrilege, document that such has been the response to victims of priestly sexual abuse for nearly a century and perhaps longer.

Sadly, these deplorable responses are still with us, and even the involvement of lay people in the process has not led to the changes that are absolutely necessary for a Church that claims to be Christ’s Church.

For over a year, I have been working closely with a woman (I will call her Kate) who back in the early seventies, when she was 9 and…

View Cache

The Carmel priest who was “suspended from public ministry” in March, is suing a man who came forward with allegations about the priest’s behavior. 

James De Oreo, who was an associate pastor at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church, was suspended March 11 after allegations of “inappropriate conduct with a minor.”

The priest filed a lawsuit April 4 against the man who wrote two letters in 2021 to the Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana about De Oreo’s behavior toward him when he was a teen attending St. Alphonsus Liguori Catholic Church in Zionsville. IndyStar is not naming the man because he was a minor at the time of the alleged abuse.

The man said he was considering becoming a priest, and De Oreo used his position of power to emotionally abuse, sexually harass and groom him for sexual abuse. This led to an eating disorder and PTSD as well…

View Cache

Last year, we pointed out that a Catholic religious order, the Christian Brothers, posted the worst list of child molesting clerics we have ever seen. They listed predators only because they had to. They provided ZERO information about the accused: not where they are or were, not when they were ordained, not whether they pled guilty or admitted guilt or if they were sued dozens of times. . .NOTHING. They also restricted their list to just those clerics who faced two or more abuse reports. We are happy to report that a little more light has been shone upon this secretive outfit. But the new information has surfaced not because of, but in spite of, the order’s top officials.

It comes via the same source which has done so much to protect kids and expose criminals: the secular, mainstream media. Specifically, in a series of articles over…

View Cache

Thank you, Gov. Tom Wolf, for pressing the Pennsylvania Legislature to immediately enact civil child sexual abuse statute of limitations reform so that thousands of middle-aged and older survivors can bring predators and their institutional enablers to justice.

For far too long, perpetrators and the religious institutions, schools, summer camps, athletic organizations, and medical and child care providers that enabled their abuse found refuge in an inadequate statute of limitations that rewarded them for running out the clock on victims who often need decades to come to terms with their abuse and the forces that have silenced them.

Credible statute of limitations reform must include providing a “window” to all sexual abuse survivors, no matter their age, to file civil claims against their abusers and the organizations that enable the abuse. Victims, no matter their age, must have access to justice and the right to demand accountability for…

View Cache

In May of last year, Leona Kimes accused former lead pastor of Hillsong NYC, Carl Lentz, of sexually abusing her while she was working as a nanny for Lentz’s children.

Josh and Leona Kimes, the co-pastors of Hillsong Boston, announced on Monday (April 18) that the two have “made the difficult decision to resign.” The announcement of their departure comes a week after the results of an investigation into Hillsong New York City, where the couple worked previously, were leaked to a Christian online news outlet.

The Kimes’ departure is the most recent in a slew of upheavals at the global megachurch and multimedia empire, including the resignation two weeks ago of its global senior pastor Brian Houston after allegations of sexual misconduct. Co-founded by Houston in Australia nearly 40 years ago, the church had grown to some 30 locations before scandals closed three of its U.S. churches.

The couple,…

View Cache

In a bid to keep parishes and officials, including Bishop Salvatore Matano, from answering scores of sexual-abuse allegations against church officials in state court, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester has asked for a Bankruptcy Court trial.

Known as adversarial proceedings or APs for short, such trials look to have a bankruptcy judge resolve differences between parties in a case. Parties not satisfied with a bankruptcy judge’s ruling can appeal the ruling to a federal district court.

As the Rochester Beacon previously reported, the expiration of a Bankruptcy Court stipulation putting the state court sexual-abuse claims against the church on hold came after one of the two parties who struck an agreement some two years ago to halt the state court cases declined to renew the pact. 

Previously, parties to that pact—the bankruptcy’s official creditors committee and the diocese—had renewed the March 2020 agreement 11 times. Late last month, one…

View Cache

Two retired Buffalo priests accused of sexually abusing minors are suing the Buffalo Diocese to restore their pensions, which were reduced or eliminated after the priests refused to submit to a monitoring program pushed by the State Attorney General’s Office.

The Rev. Arthur J. Smith and the Rev. Pascal D. Ipolito maintain that they are not child molesters and haven’t had a fair hearing to defend themselves against the accusations. They also said they earned the pensions that were promised to them when they became priests decades ago and when they retired a few years ago.

“Our position is that the (pension) contract clearly lays out that they have a vested right. It cannot be amended, modified, whatever it may be,” said attorney Mark J. Byrne, who filed a lawsuit Sunday in Erie County State Supreme Court.

The lawsuit might be the first of its kind in the country of…

View Cache

In an open letter, 74 bishops from North America, Africa, Italy and Australia have expressed their “growing concern” about the German Synodal Path process and content, warning about its “potential for schism.”

Joining recent letters of concern by the Nordic and Polish bishops, the “fraternal open letter to our brother bishops in Germany” said “the Synodal Path’s actions undermine the credibility of church authority, including that of Pope Francis.”

“By its destructive example, it may lead some bishops, and will lead many otherwise faithful laypeople, to distrust the very idea of ‘synodality,’ thus further impeding the church’s necessary conversation about fulfilling the mission of converting and sanctifying the world,” the letter concluded.

Signatories included Nigerian Cardinal Francis Arinze, South African Cardinal Wilfred Napier, Australian Cardinal George Pell, and U.S. Cardinal Raymond L. Burke.

All told, 49 bishops from the U.S., four from Canada, 19 Africans, one Italian and one Australian…

View Cache

In my wife’s home city of Wroclaw, there’s a luxury hotel named after John Paul II. It has always seemed strange that the Catholic church sanctioned this. Giant chandeliers and glitzy bathrooms weren’t really what St John Paul stood for, and since the hotel opened in 2002 it had seemed as much a monument to the church’s decline as a tribute to a saint. But everything changed with the war in Ukraine. Some 2.5 million Ukrainians have fled to Poland since Russia’s invasion and the hotel is currently home to more than 100 refugees. It’s as if the building has finally discovered its real purpose.

What’s true of the John Paul II hotel is true more widely of the Polish Catholic church. The response of Polish Catholics to the war was immediate, all-out and magnificently unbureaucratic. A vast chain of care was formed that ran from nuns offering cups of…

View Cache

Warning: This story deals with disturbing subject matter that may upset and trigger some readers. Discretion is advised.

Pope Francis could be making stops in Alberta and Quebec during his visit to Canada, Global News has learned.

“But, trip details have not been finalized yet,” a source with knowledge of the visit confirmed to Global News on Friday.

Plans for a papal visit were initially announced two weeks ago, when Indigenous delegates from Canada were in Rome.

During their visit to the Vatican, the Pope also delivered an apology for the harm caused by some clergy members who operated the church and state sponsored residential school system.

The apology came over 25 years after the last residential school closed in Canada. It has been met with mixed opinion over whether it was sufficient.

‘As a child when I was in residential school…I never thought I’d see the day that I would see the Pope…

View Cache

The independent commission created in January to investigate sexual abuse in the Portuguese Catholic church has already received 290 valid testimonies from victims and 16 cases have already been referred to the prosecutor.

In an assessment of the first three months of work, made on Tuesday at a press conference at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon, the former minister of justice Alvaro Laborinho Lúcio, who is part of the commission, said that among the 290 validated testimonies, 16 have not yet been invalidated and, therefore, have been referred to the prosecutor.

Created in January to investigate sexual abuse in the Portuguese catholic church, the independent commission had already received 214 statements from victims, aged between 15 and 88, in its first month of activity.

Complaints and statements can be sent to the commission by completing an online survey at darvozaosilencio.org, by mobile phone +351917110000 (daily between 10am and 8pm),…

View Cache

Six months after the publication of the Sauvé report, which revealed the scale of sexual abuse over decades in the French Catholic Church, what effect has the crisis had on aspiring priests? Despite the atmosphere of mistrust currently enveloping the Church, some forty students at the diocese in Orléans are training to join the priesthood while attempting to learn from the errors of those before them. Our France 2 colleagues report, with FRANCE 24’s Emerald Maxwell.

Programme prepared by Emerald Maxwell.

View Cache

More victims are coming forward after the arrest of a Texas youth pastor on multiple charges related to child molestation, police say.

Police in Mesquite, just east of Dallas, announced Monday they had arrested Conner “Jesse” Penny on accusations he had sexual contact multiple times from 2015-2018 with a girl under 17 years old.

Penny, 32, was youth pastor at Inspiration Church, a Southern Baptist church in Mesquite, at the time of his arrest last Thursday, police stated in a press release. He had also worked for the local schools and in the city of Mesquite’s after-school program, according to police.

He’s being held on felony charges of continuous sexual abuse of a child under age 14, indecency with a child, and aggravated sexual assault of a child, according to Dallas County Jail records. Total bond has been set at $2.5…

View Cache

Bishop Georg Bätzing of Limburg, president of the German bishops’ conference, responded Thursday to a letter warning the country’s synodal path could lead to schism by defending the process as a response to abuses in the Church.

“The Synodal Path is our attempt in Germany to confront the systemic causes of the abuse and its cover-up that has caused untold suffering to so many people in and through the Church,” Bishop Bätzing wrote April 14 to Archbishop Samuel Aquila of Denver. The German bishop’s letter was published April 16 at the German bishops’ conference website.

More than 80 bishops from around the world, including Archbishop Alexander Sample of Portland, signed an April 11 open letter sent by Archbishop Aquila that warned sweeping changes to church teaching advocated by the synodal path may lead to schism.

The Synodal Path is a process that brings together German lay people and Catholic bishops…

View Cache

A welcome and heartfelt apology for Catholics’ role in the country’s abusive residential school system.

Pope Francis has asked for forgiveness for the Roman Catholic involvement with Canada’s residential school system. His heartfelt contrition may bring some reconciliation for the indigenous people affected by this disturbing part of my country’s history and the many Canadians frustrated, saddened and embarrassed by it.

The gesture was long awaited by indigenous leaders and came after an intense week of discussions between Pope Francis and First Nations, Inuit and Métis delegations. Before an audience that included 200 bishops as well as indigenous delegates and their supporters in the Clementine Hall of the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace, on April 1 the pontiff expressed “sorrow and shame for the role that a number of Catholics, particularly those with educational responsibilities, have had in all these things that wounded you, and the abuses you suffered and the lack…

View Cache

“When I live a Eucharist-centered life,” says the Bishop of Crookston, Minnesota, “I can offer my struggles and difficulties in union with Jesus to the Father, and my daily life can be part of the redemption of the world.”

Bishop Andrew H. Cozzens, 53, is the Bishop of Crookston, Minnesota. He grew up in Denver, Colorado, the youngest of three children in a devout Catholic family. His father was an aerospace engineer and his mother a school teacher.

He is a graduate of Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas. He was active in the pro-life organization Operation Rescue, and was arrested seven times and jailed for two weeks for physically blocking access to abortion clinics. He was also a missionary with NET ministries and is currently chairman of its board of directors. During his time as a missionary, the future…

View Cache

[From the Greenwood Commonwealth]

A former Franciscan friar convicted of sexually abusing a Greenwood grade-school student in the 1990s will have no chance at parole, according to the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office.

Paul West, 62, was found guilty by a Leflore County jury Wednesday of one count of sexual battery and one count of gratification of lust for preying on  La Jarvis Love when Love was a student at St. Francis of Assisi Elementary School. West was a teacher and later principal at the school.

“Sexual abuse of a child is a heinous crime that deserves serious punishment,” said Attorney General Lynn Fitch in a statement. “Children looked up to this man as a teacher and a priest. They trusted him and he failed them in every way. My Office will always work tirelessly to protect and defend the vulnerable from predators like this.”

West was a Franciscan brother, not a…

View Cache

[From the Greenwood Commonwealth]

This is not an uplifting Easter story. It’s more of the Good Friday variety, when mankind’s worst instincts are on display, prompting feelings of anger, betrayal and profound sadness.

Following former Franciscan friar Paul West’s conviction this past week by a Leflore County jury, I received a call from Arthur Baselice Jr., a retired Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, police detective who now lives in New Jersey.

He had been following the case of West, who was convicted and given what amounts to a life sentence for sexually abusing La Jarvis Love in the 1990s, when Love was a student at St. Francis of Assisi Elementary School and West was a teacher and later principal.

Around the same time that West was preying on Love and allegedly two of Love’s cousins, another friar from the same Wisconsin-based Franciscan province was allegedly abusing Baselice’s son and namesake, Arthur Baselice III.

…

View Cache

This could be the very last Easter Sunday service in some Roman Catholic churches in Newfoundland, but a local priest is putting this Easter in perspective.

Father Paul Lundrigan of Holy Trinity in Torbay says some parishes, including his, are grappling with the legal obligations to the victims of abuse at Mount Cashel orphanage, while trying to find a way forward in the practice of their faith.

He says it is a time of great reflection, but as COVID and other world events have taught them, there are strengths within the Church family, and the faith can survive without buildings as history has already proven.

The early Christians were ostracized and practiced their faith in homes and other places.

Lundrigan says the faith survived like that for a long time, which sends the message that it’s the gathering that matters, not where it happens.

Lundrigan also draws inspiration from the strength…

View Cache

The revelation that a priest’s debts were repaid from a fund to compensate sex abuse victims has prompted outrage in Cologne’s Catholic community.

Catholics in the archdiocese of Cologne on Saturday expressed shock that the church had paid more than €1 million to clear the private debts of a priest.

The news provoked particular outrage as it emerged that the money came from a compensation fund for the victims of sexual abuse, who have so far received only a small fraction of the amount used for the priest’s debt.

What are the revelations?

As far as has become known so far, the diocese initially paid almost €500,000 ($540,000) for the priest to clear his gambling debts.

Since the money was apparently not taxed correctly, a total of €650,000 in income tax, including interest, had to be paid in arrears. The money was said to have been paid from a social fund…

View Cache

With the strike of a gavel, Indonesia’s controversial sexual violence bill has been passed into law by parliament.

As legislators took to their feet on Tuesday to applaud the passage of the long-awaited bill, House Speaker Puan Maharani appeared visibly moved.

The legislation was “a gift for all Indonesian women,” she said.

The bill, known as RUU TPKS, has been a long time coming.

First proposed in 2012, it faced stiff opposition from conservative groups who argued over everything from its name to the contents of the law itself, requiring repeated revisions in an effort to ease its passage.

Elizabeth Ghozali, a lecturer in criminal law at Santo Thomas Catholic University in the city of Medan, told Al Jazeera that the bill was a landmark piece of legislation that finally puts the rights of victims first.

“Previously, Indonesian law was only focused on punishment in sexual violence cases. That was seen as…

View Cache

Arizona victims of long-ago child sex abuse can proceed with lawsuits against groups like the Boy Scouts of America after the state Supreme Court rejected claims that a state law extending victims’ right to sue was unconstitutional.

Arizona is among many states that have reacted to child sex abuse in recent years by allowing victims of even decades-old abuse to sue groups that didn’t protect them from predators. That has led to lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Church, Scouts and others.

The high court last week rejected appeals by Big Brothers Big Sisters of America and its affiliates in central and southern Arizona of lower court rulings that found a 2019 law extending the statute of limitations was constitutional.

The rulings appear to be the first to directly address whether the Arizona law is legal, according to Phoenix attorney Robert Pastor, who represents victims in the two cases the high…

View Cache

A former Catholic friar was sentenced to decades in prison after he sexually assaulted multiple students during the 1990s, officials say.

Following a two-day trial, Paul West, 62, from Wisconsin, was convicted of one count of sexual battery and one count of gratification of lust, according to a news release from Mississippi’s Attorney General’s Office.

West was a teacher and principal at the St. Francis of Assisi School in Greenwood, a city about 100 miles north of Jackson, from July 1993 until October 1998, according to a statement from the Catholic Diocese of Jackson.

Investigators said that West molested multiple children during his years at the school. Decades after the assaults, former students came forward and shared testimonies of “the repeated sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of West,” according to the release.

“Children looked up to this man as a teacher and a priest. They…

View Cache

Richard Eldridge stood outside of the Diocese of Fall River’s Chancery office Wednesday demanding a “substantial settlement” for abuse he allegedly suffered at the hands of Father Edward J. Byington.

Byington was one of two priests suspended by the diocese in January 2020 due to separate allegations of sexual abuse of a minor going back several decades, The Standard-Times reported.

In a statement posted to its website in December 2021, the diocese announced the allegations against Byington “have been determined to be credible” and he would not return to ministry.

At the time of his suspension, Byington was already retired and not assigned to a parish.

Eldridge, 67, told MassLive that when he was 15 or 16 years old, even though he was protestant, he attended the Roman Catholic ECHO (Encountering Christ in Others) retreat because his friends were going. He…

View Cache

A Franciscan brother, Paul West, 62, who was the subject of a major AP News investigation for his abuse of three young boys in Mississippi has been convicted of the 1990s abuse of La Jarvis Love. On Wednesday, April 13, 2022, a jury found him guilty of sexually abusing a student at St. Francis of Assisi School in the 1990s.

The Leflore County jury spent less than an hour deciding West’s fate. The verdict was loud and clear, guilty of one count of sexual battery and one count of gratification of lust, the Greenwood Commonwealth reported. West was accused of sexually abusing La Jarvis Love, now 39. Circuit Judge Ashley Hines sentenced West to 30 years on the first count and 15 years on the second count, to be served consecutively. Love began crying when the verdict was read.

Our hearts go out to La Jarvis Love and his family…

View Cache

Paul West was a teacher and principal at St. Francis School in Greenwood, Mississippi from July 1993 until October 1998. The Diocese of Jackson cooperated fully in the State of Mississippi’s recent criminal conviction of Paul West, including providing background testimony at his trial on the diocese’s list of clergy who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse of minors. The list was first provided to the Attorney General in 2002 and then updated and released publicly in March of 2019.

The Diocese reported the initial allegation against Paul West to the Department of Human Services and the Greenwood Police Department in 1998 and reported the subsequent allegations to the Leflore County District Attorney in 2018. West was removed from ministry after the original 1998 complaint.

The Diocese of Jackson is committed to protecting children. Sexual misconduct by Church personnel violates human dignity and the mission of the Church. The…

View Cache