ABUSE TRACKER

The Roman Catholic archbishop of the German city of Cologne said Tuesday that he made mistakes in past cases involving sexual abuse allegations against priests, although a report has cleared him of wrongdoing, but made clear he has no intention of resigning.

Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki was speaking after the release last week of a report he commissioned on church officials’ response to past abuse allegations. The findings have prompted the current archbishop of Hamburg to offer his resignation to Pope Francis, while three Cologne church officials, including two auxiliary bishops, were suspended.

The report found 75 cases in which eight high-ranking officials — including Woelki’s predecessor — neglected their duties to either follow up on, report or sanction cases of alleged abuse by clergy and lay church employees, and failed to take care of the victims.

It absolved Woelki himself of any neglect of his legal duty with respect…

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[Via Angelus of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.]

On Monday, the scandal-plagued Legionaries of Christ religious order published its latest report detailing what they have done and what they still need to do to repair the damage done and guarantee safe spaces for minors, from third-party investigations to mandatory formation seminars and revealing the names of priests found guilty of abuse.

The religious congregation continues to claim it is cleaning house, after a report released last year showed that the late Father Marcial Maciel Degolaldo, founder of the Legionaries, was far from being the only abusive priest in the movement.

Titled “Truth, Justice and Healing 2020 Annual Report,” the document looks into the implementation of two documents produced at last year’s annual chapter for the order: “Protect and heal” and “Conversion and reparation in relation to the sexual abuse of minors and safe environments.”

According to the Legion, in releasing…

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Four days before Michael Tierney died, the Vatican confirmed a decision to defrock the former Kansas City-area priest after finding him guilty of sexually abusing minors.

Bishop James V. Johnston Jr. has been notified that an appeal by Tierney to reverse the penalty of dismissal from the priesthood was resolved on Dec. 11, the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph announced on its website this month. Tierney died on Dec. 15 at age 76.

“A cover letter dated February 4, 2021, from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) arrived in the Office of the Bishop on February 22, 2021, notifying him of the decision,” the diocese said.

Tierney, who had repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, appealed the CDF’s first decision.

“The second CDF tribunal met December 11, 2020, and upon review of Michael Tierney’s appeal, confirmed the decision of the first CDF tribunal court on both the determination of guilt as…

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The church opened its evidence on its handling of complaints at the Inquiry into abuse in care on Monday.

It said its response to redress has at times been ahead of Vatican guidelines.

The number of cases of abuse within the Catholic Church in New Zealand is in excess of 1100, but the Royal Commission said that is just a preliminary figure.

Counsel for the Commission Katherine Anderson said failure in record keeping from the 1950s impacts on the accuracy of the figures.

Cardinal John Dew told the Commission the church was saddened and ashamed by what has happened.

”Our hope is that this Commission will lead us and help us to be a better church and that is a church that this disgrace of abuse will be addressed, will cease and that our church will always be a church that gives life and hope. That is our mission as…

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[Via the Pantagraph.]

The Rev. Michael Pfleger intends to find other ways to work in the Auburn Gresham community as the Chicago Archdiocese continues to investigate allegations that he molested two brothers in the 1970s, Pfleger wrote in a recent letter to the community.

“I know that I cannot emotionally or spiritually continue to remain isolated in an apartment waiting for this board to do its job,” Pfleger, the pastor at St. Sabina Church, wrote. “While I hope and pray that the Review Board will work a little harder and more promptly to conclude their investigation, I will no longer wait in silence.

“Over the next days, I will seek other ways and opportunities to minister in the Auburn Gresham community and continue outreach while this process seemingly drags on.”

Cardinal Blase Cupich is requiring Pfleger, 71, to live away from the parish during an investigation into allegations that he…

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A man accused of setting a Florida church on fire last year is facing a federal hate crime charge, prosecutors announced Thursday.

A federal grand jury in Orlando returned an indictment Wednesday against Steven Shields, 24, of Dunnellon, according to court records. He’s charged with using fire to commit a felony and intentionally damaging religious property, a hate crime charge that falls under the Church Arson Prevention Act.

He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted of the hate crime and a mandatory minimum of 10 years if convicted of the fire charge. He also faces state arson and burglary charges.

According to the indictment, Shields intentionally set fire last July to the Queen of Peace Catholic Church in Ocala, about 80 miles (about 130 kilometers) north of Orlando.

The Marion County Sheriff’s Office said last year that Shields plowed a minivan through the church’s front door, doused…

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The canonization of Pope John Paul II in 2014 was unprecedented for its rapidity and the context in which it occurred.  At his funeral in April 2005, there were banners and shouts proclaiming Santo Subito! (Saint now).  Even before his death, Wall St. Journal columnist Peggy Noonan called him John Paul the Great.

The last years of John Paul’s life were characterized by declining health and fewer public appearances.  He was ailing as the international sexual abuse crisis was continuing to gain momentum and threaten his papacy.

Almost a decade prior to his death, the Marcial Maciel was gaining momentum and notoriety.  Maciel, a priest with prolific fundraising capacity and a personal favorite of the Polish pope had been dogged by rumors of liaisons with women, abuse of boys, and questionable financial dealings.  In 1997, a group of nine men went public with accusations that they had been abused as youths and…

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A court in Timor-Leste has been forced to postpone resuming the sexual abuse trial of an American former priest due to the imposition of a lockdown following a surge in Covid-19 infections in the tiny predominantly Catholic country.

The trial of Richard Daschbach, 84, was originally scheduled to resume on March 22.

“With the lockdown, the court has had to postpone further hearings because there is no means of transportation either by air or sea,” said Julio Nunes, secretary of the District Court in Oecusse, a small coastal enclave of Timor-Leste surrounded on three sides by Indonesia and located 200 kilometers west of the capital Dili.

As a result, not everyone can get to the court in Oecusse as many of those involved in the trial, including the defendant, are in Dili, he told UCA News on March 21.

Timor-Leste government has imposed lockdowns in the cities of Dili, Baucau and Viqueque…

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[Includes a brief video report, “Catholic Church denied appeal in Mount Cashel orphanage abuse case,” dated January 14, 2021, which shows rare footage of the orphanage, including its demolition, and short interviews with two survivors.]

Roman Catholic parishes in the St. John’s area will be undergoing significant restructuring in the months ahead as the archdiocese works to resolve the harm caused to victims of abuse at Mount Cashel orphanage, parishioners learned on the weekend.

“Over the coming weeks you may expect to see some properties listed on the real estate market,” read an email update from St. John’s Archbishop Peter Hundt.

“There may also be discussions at the parish level around potential changes that may come…We are still very much in an information gathering stage and when decisions are made we will communicate those directly.”

The letter was read both in live masses on Saturday and Sunday, as well as…

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The former bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany has been accused of sexually abusing a child decades ago in a lawsuit filed last week, the seventh time the retired bishop has been named as an abuser in a lawsuit filed under New York’s Child Victims Act.

The lawsuit filed anonymously by a man who is now in his 50s alleges that retired bishop Howard Hubbard abused the plaintiff in 1977 when he was 11, the Times Union of Albany reports.

The complaint claims Hubbard approached the 11-year-old at a church carnival, told the boy to accompany him to the rectory and molested him there.

“At that age, you just don’t know. You don’t know how to deal with it. And I’ve done a lot of reflecting over the years trying to understand — was this my fault?” the plaintiff said in an interview with…

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nce again, Maryland lawmakers are ready to turn aside calls to eliminate the statute of limitations for child sex abuse in the state.

The leading advocate for this change has been Del. C.T. Wilson, a survivor himself who introduced the bill for the third time this year. Early in March, though, he withdrew the House proposal, citing the bill’s chances in the Senate and attacks from opponents on survivors’ stories.

“To my fellow survivors, I am not abandoning you,” he said in a statement released by his office. “Know that I see you, I hear you and I continue to stand with you. You will never be alone in this fight.”

So the focus in Annapolis for the session turned to the Senate, where Sen. Sarah Elfreth, D-Annapolis, co-sponsored legislation from Sen. Shelly Hettleman, D-Baltimore County. It’s the first time there’s been a companion bill to Wilson’s measure in the…

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A priest at a Brighton-area church has been placed on leave pending the outcome of an investigation by the Michigan Office of the Attorney General.

In an email to parishioners Friday, it was announced that Bishop Earl Boyea of Lansing had placed the Reverend Shaun Lowery, Pastor of St. Mary Magdalen Church in Brighton Township, on ministerial leave. The Diocese of Lansing says they are fully cooperating with the Attorney General’s investigation. 

The Diocese of Lansing told church members that they expect all diocesan employees, clergy, and volunteers to, “exemplify the moral teachings of Jesus Christ and His Holy Catholic Church in their personal and professional life” and then referenced the Diocesan Code of Conduct. The communication then provided anyone wishing to report misconduct an opportunity to do so. 

While the nature of the investigation has not been disclosed, the church email did state that if anyone had a reason to suspect physical, sexual or emotional…

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Patrick Wattigny, a former priest at a Slidell church, has been formally charged with molestation of juvenile, District Attorney Warren Montgomery announced on Thursday, March 18.

Wattigny, 63, the former pastor of St. Luke the Evangelist Catholic Church and chaplain at Pope John Paul II High School, both in Slidell, is accused of molesting a teenager, then 15, between June 1, 2013, and August 31, 2014.

Wattigny was arrested in October of 2020.

Investigators say Wattigny started grooming the victim, who was 15 at the time, through general conversation, which led to telephone and text message conversations and eventually in-person visits, at which time the acts of molestation occurred on at least four different occasions. investigators said.

Some of those instances occurred in the church rectory.

The Archdiocese of New Orleans released a statement saying,

“We acknowledge the charges filed against Travis Clark and Patrick Wattigny by the St. Tammany…

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The school’s president, a friend of President Biden, has been placed on leave

Victim advocates Friday called on Santa Clara University to release more details of the allegations of impropriety against Santa Clara University President Rev. Kevin O’Brien, who was placed on leave Thursday pending an investigation.

The Catholic university’s board Thursday said only that it was informed that the Jesuit Provincial Office “recently received accounts that Father O’Brien exhibited behaviors in adult settings, consisting primarily of conversations, which may be inconsistent with established Jesuit protocols and boundaries.”

Tracey Primrose, spokeswoman for the Jesuits West Province, which along with the university is overseeing the investigation, said Thursday that confidentiality practices prevent her from saying more, including whether the allegations involved sex abuse.

But that lack of information, while intended to protect O’Brien during the inquiry, was also fueling speculation. SNAP, the Survivors Network, said Friday the university…

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The morning of March 18, the chair of Santa Clara University’s Board of Trustees, John M. Sobrato ’83, sent the following message to the campus community. 

Dear Santa Clara University Community,

I write to you with an important update. I have been informed by the Provincial of the USA West Province that the Jesuit Provincial Office recently received accounts that Father O’Brien exhibited behaviors in adult settings, consisting primarily of conversations, which may be inconsistent with established Jesuit protocols and boundaries. An independent investigation into these accounts is being conducted on behalf of the USA West Province and the conclusions of the Province’s process will be shared with the Santa Clara University Board of Trustees. Father O’Brien was placed on leave from his position as University President for the duration of the investigation by the USA West Province consistent with its protocols. He has agreed to cooperate fully with the investigation…

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The president of a Jesuit university in the Bay Area is under investigation for “alleged misconduct and comments.” We call on university officials to be more transparent regarding the allegations so as to encourage others who may have experienced similar misconduct to come forward.

Father Kevin O’Brien, the president of Santa Clara University, has been placed on leave while an investigation into his alleged misconduct is underway. While we appreciate that action has been taken by the Santa Clara board of trustees, we think that the vague statement released by the university does no favors to either the university community or the alleged victims. In January, Fr. O’Brien presided over the inauguration of President Joe Biden.

This is not the first time that a high-ranking Jesuit official has been accused of misconduct. Notable examples include Bishop Gordon Bennet, who resigned as…

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TO THE QUESTION PROPOSED: 
Does the Church have the power to give the blessing to unions of persons of the same sex?

RESPONSE:
Negative.

Explanatory Note

In some ecclesial contexts, plans and proposals for blessings of unions of persons of the same sex are being advanced. Such projects are not infrequently motivated by a sincere desire to welcome and accompany homosexual persons, to whom are proposed paths of growth in faith, “so that those who manifest a homosexual orientation can receive the assistance they need to understand and fully carry out God’s will in their lives”[1].

On such paths, listening to the word of God, prayer, participation in ecclesial liturgical actions and the exercise of charity can play an important role in sustaining the commitment to read one’s own history and to adhere with freedom and responsibility to one’s baptismal call, because “God loves every person and the Church does the same”[2],…

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Former president of Ireland, Mary McAleese, has written to the head of the Catholic Church in Ireland appealing to him to “acknowledge the hurt” caused by the recent CDF document on blessing same sex unions.

In her correspondence to Archbishop Eamon Martin, seen by The Tablet, the former head of state describes the language in the two-page Responsum on the blessing of the unions of persons of the same sex as “gratuitously cruel in the extreme”.

Her correspondence to Archbishop Martin is accompanied by a letter she has written to The Tablet criticising the contents of the CDF’s document and Pope Francis.

Admitting that she did not expect the answer to the dubium to be positive, “I am not that naïve”, Professor McAleese adds that she did not, however, anticipate the “unbearably vicious language which can only have brought more heartache to our gay children and to us their families”.

“Heartache and hurt…

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Document on same-sex blessings shows that Pope Francis ‘toes the old hard line’

Former president Mary McAleese has criticised Pope Francis as a populist who raises expectations only to dash them, following a Vatican document published on Monday which sustained a ban on same-sex blessings.

She described the document, approved by the pope, as “withering”.

About Francis himself, Ms McAleese said his “chummy words to the press often quite reasonably raise hopes of church reform which are subsequently almost invariably dashed by firm restatements of unchanged church teaching”.

While raising hopes, “he is the pope who toes the old hard line”, she said.

She has also written to Ireland’s Catholic bishops asking that they challenge language used about gay people in the document, published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF). She asked “if there is even one among you willing to acknowledge publicly that the language used in…

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A former Catholic bishop in Albany has been accused of molesting an 11-year-old boy at a carnival more than 40 years ago, according to new court papers.

It’s the seventh such lawsuit leveling allegations against retired Bishop Howard Hubbard.

Hubbard’s latest accuser — now an adult who filed suit anonymously — was volunteering at a carnival fundraiser for the Clifton Park church St. Edward’s in the summer of 1977 when he was sexually abused, says the Albany Supreme Court lawsuit filed last week.

The accuser — who came from a devout Catholic family — went to get cups from a storage room when Hubbard told him to join him in the rectory, the court papers allege.

Hubbard, who was wearing his priestly garb, then “sexually assaulted and abused” the boy, the documents say.

Hubbard, in a statement issued to The Post through a spokeswoman Friday, denied the allegation.

“I pray for…

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The Cologne abuse report has cleared Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki of failing to do his duty when handling cases of priestly sexual abuse but has found other senior churchmen in the Cologne archdiocese to be guilty 

After months of turmoil in the Cologne archdiocese due to Cardinal Woelki’s refusal to publish a first abuse report he had commissioned with a Munich law firm, the second report he commissioned with a law firm in Cologne was punctually published yesterday.

The 800-page report, which examines 236 archdiocesan abuse case files between 1976 and 2018, clears Woelki himself of neglecting to do his duty in the handling of priestly abuse cases but finds several senior churchmen guilty.

“We found a system that favoured hushing up abuse,” Björn Gerke, the head of the Cologne law firm responsible for the second report, told domradio.de (this morning, 19 March). “The state the files were in was disastrous. They…

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Via Irish Times

Lawyer says he found over 200 abusers and over 300 victims, mostly boys under the age of 14

A team of German lawyers said on Thursday they had found no evidence that a former Archbishop of Cologne had breached his duty in his handling of sexual abuse cases over decades, but they criticised and named several other senior church officials.

In an 800-page report into the handling of abuse cases in the archdiocese of Cologne between 1975 and 2018, criminal lawyer Bjoern Gercke said he had found more than 200 abusers and more than 300 victims, mostly boys under the age of 14.

Among those named in the report as having breached their duty to deal with reports of abuse were the Archbishop of Hamburg Stefan Hesse and Joachim Meisner, who died in 2017 and was Rainer Maria Woelki’s predecessor as archbishop of Cologne. Archbishop Hesse did not immediately…

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Via RTÉ

An independent study commissioned by the Catholic Church uncovered hundreds of cases of sexual violence allegedly committed by clergy and laymen in Germany’s top diocese. 

The 800-page report on the Cologne diocese found 202 alleged perpetrators of sexual assault and 314 victims between 1975 and 2018, Bjoern Gercke, a lawyer mandated by the Church, told reporters.

“More than half of the victims were children under the age of 14,” Mr Gercke said.

However, the investigation cleared Cologne’s Archbishop Rainer Maria Woelki of breach of duty over the abuse.

He had faced months of protests for refusing to allow the publication of an earlier study on abuse committed by priests in his diocese.

He had justified his decision by citing a right to privacy of the alleged perpetrators accused in the report, carried out by a Munich law firm, and what he called a lack of independence on the part of some researchers.

His approach…

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A Glouster woman filed a $1 million civil lawsuit against Glouster’s Holy Cross Catholic Church, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Steubenville and its bishop for negligence following her reported sexual abuse by a since-dismissed priest that she experienced as a minor.

Attorneys representing the defendants are calling for the suit’s dismissal, according to Athens County Common Pleas Court documents.

The plaintiff, who is referred to in the suit pseudonymously as “J.W.,” was a parishioner at Holy Cross in Glouster, one of two parishes of ex-priest Henry Christopher Foxhoven. During that time, the suit contends, she was “groomed for sexual abuse … in open view of parishioners of Holy Cross and agents and employees of the Diocese.”

In November of 2018, Foxhoven was sentenced in Athens County Common Pleas Court to a dozen years in prison, with no option for judicial release on three counts of sexual battery. Foxhoven is also…

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[Photo above: A carnival float depicting a sleeping Cardinal, reading ’11 years of relentless processing of cases of abuse’ is set in front of the Cologne Cathedral to protest against the Catholic Church in Cologne, Germany, Thursday, March 18, 2021. Faced with accusations of trying to cover up sexual violence in Germany’s most powerful Roman Catholic diocese, the archbishop of Cologne Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki publishes an independent investigation. (AP Photo / Martin Meissner)]

A report commissioned by Germany’s Cologne archdiocese on church officials’ handling of past cases of sexual abuse found 75 cases in which high-ranking officials neglected their duties. The findings on Thursday prompted the archbishop of Hamburg to offer his resignation to Pope Francis.

The report commissioned by Cologne’s archbishop, Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki, absolved Woelki himself of any neglect of duty with respect to abuse victims.

However, Woelki’s late predecessor, Cardinal Joachim Meisner, was accused of…

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In an interview with CNA Deutsch on March 18, the Archbishop of Cologne talked about the publication of the expert report that he had commissioned.

It is probably the most comprehensive and transparent study ever commissioned by a German institution on the subject of sexualized violence against minors: The publication of the 800-page, independent Gercke Report today, March 18, is intended to clarify roles and responsibilities in the Archdiocese of Cologne. It was commissioned by Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki, archbishop of Cologne since 2014. 

In December 2018, the archdiocese commissioned the Munich law firm Westpfahl Spilker Wastl to examine relevant personnel files from 1975 onwards to determine “which personal, systemic or structural deficits were responsible in the past for incidents of sexual abuse being covered up or not being punished consistently.”

After lawyers advising the archdiocese raised concerns about “methodological deficiencies” in the law firm’s study, Woelki commissioned Cologne-based criminal law…

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Via Macau Business Media

The Catholic Church has been shaken by a string of child sex abuse scandals. The latest is a report released on Thursday which uncovered hundreds of cases allegedly committed by clergy and laymen in Germany’s top diocese.

Here are some high-profile cases around the world:

– United States –

In February 2019 Pope Francis defrocked a former cardinal in a first for the Roman Catholic church over accusations American Theodore McCarrick, 88, sexually assaulted a teenager 50 years ago.

A grand jury investigation into dioceses in Pennsylvania in 2018 threw light on sexual assault, systematically covered up by the Church by “over 300 predator priests”. More than 1,000 child victims were cited.

US Cardinal Donald Wuerl, accused over a cover-up, resigned.

Between 1950 and 2016 the US Catholic Church received 18,500 complaints against 6,700 members of the clergy, according to the site bishop-accountability.org.

Several senior church…

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Via Perth Now

A former Catholic priest who has served time for sexual offences against young girls has now been found not guilty of charges of historical abuse against a schoolboy.

Neville Joseph Creen, 80, denied indecently abusing the teenager in Mount Isa, northwest Queensland, where he served as a priest in the 1970s.

The alleged victim, who cannot be identified, first met Creen after his father was killed in a mining accident, crown prosecutor Katrina Overell told the Brisbane District Court.

Creen was accused of summoning the boy to his office and rubbing his thigh and groin on four separate occasions in 1974 and 1975. However, Judge Ian Dearden said much of the evidence was unreliable and self-contradictory.

“Although I’m prepared to accept that the complainant is seeking to give a narrative of events he believed occurred to him in 1974 and 1975 … that narrative is completely unreliable,…

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A former Catholic priest previously jailed for molesting young girls during his time as a clergyman in rural Queensland has been found not guilty of further child sexual assault allegations.

Neville Joseph Creen, 80, was acquitted of four charges in the Brisbane Supreme Court on Friday after being accused of inappropriately touching a boy, who was aged 13 and 14 at the time of the allegations.

In his judgment after a multi-day trial, Judge Ian Dearden described the complainant’s evidence as “inconsistent” and described him as “completely and utterly unreliable”.

Creen was previously convicted of molesting young girls while serving as a priest in Mount Isa, in north-west Queensland, from 1973 to 1981.

In September 2003, he was sentenced to three years’ jail after pleading guilty to 34 counts of indecent dealing with 20 girls aged between four and 13.

In November 2004, Creen pleaded guilty to a further six…

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The archbishop of Hamburg offered his resignation and the cardinal of Cologne suspended two senior officials over failures to report accusations of clerical sexual abuse.

Berlin – A Roman Catholic archbishop in Germany offered his resignation and two other high-ranking officials were suspended in the wake of a report that found decades of “systematic cover-up” in the church’s handling of accusations of sexual abuse at the hands of clergy members.

The 800-page report, examining the years 1975 to 2018 at the Archdiocese of Cologne, was released on Thursday after five months of intense investigation. It was critical of the actions of Stefan Hesse, who had worked at the Archdiocese of Cologne and is now the archbishop of Hamburg.

Archbishop Hesse said he would offer to step down. “To prevent damage to the office, of the archbishop or the Diocese of Hamburg, I am offering Pope Francis my resignation and ask…

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A much-anticipated report on the handling of abuse cases in the Archdiocese of Cologne exonerates Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki but incriminates Hamburg Archbishop Stefan Hesse and Cologne Auxiliary Bishop Dominik Schwaderlapp.

The report by the law firm Gercke Wollschläger accuses Cardinal Woelki’s predecessors, the deceased Cardinals Joseph Höffner (1906-1987) and Joachim Meisner (1933-2017), of many breaches of duty in the handling of abuse cases — in terms of state and church law as well as in terms of the church’s self-understanding, the German Catholic news agency KNA reported.

The report also incriminates the former vicar general, Father Norbert Feldhoff, and the head of the Cologne church court, Father Günter Assenmacher, who is accused of having given inaccurate legal information in two cases.

In an immediate reaction to the findings, Cardinal Woelki relieved Bishop Schwaderlapp and Father Assenmacher of their duties, KNA reported. Bishop Schwaderlapp subsequently offered his resignation to Pope…

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Via National Catholic Register

A long-awaited report published on Thursday raised serious concerns about Archbishop Heße’s handling of several cases during his time in Cologne.

A German Catholic archbishop announced on Thursday that he was offering his resignation to Pope Francis and requesting “immediate release” from all duties.

Archbishop Stefan Heße of Hamburg made his brief declaration live on YouTube March 18, saying: “I am of the firm conviction that taking responsibility is part of our duty to actively deal with this dark chapter in the best possible way and to move towards a better future for everyone, first and foremost for the victims themselves.”

“I have never participated in any cover-up. Nevertheless, I am willing to bear my share of responsibility for the failure of the system,” Archbishop Heße said.

The archbishop was in charge of pastoral personnel in the Archdiocese of Cologne from 2006 to 2012. He served as vicar…

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State lawmakers are running out of time to reconfirm their commitment to holding child molesters accountable.

They can do it if they pull together, stop bickering and think of the victims instead of themselves.

Lawmakers are scrambling to resurrect a proposed amendment to the state Constitution that would open a two-year window for victims of childhood sexual abuse to retroactively sue their attackers, along with organizations that covered up the abuse, such as the Catholic church.

The effort was driven by a scathing 2018 grand jury report. It disclosed accusations of more than 1,000 Pennsylvania children being sexually abused by hundreds of priests over seven decades.

Lawmakers previously approved a referendum to ask voters whether they wanted to amend the Constitution to allow lawsuits. The referendum was supposed to be on the May primary ballot.

But it was botched by the Department…

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The trial in East Timor of Richard Daschbach, a US former priest accused of child abuse, which had been due to resume next Monday at a court in the exclave of of Oecusse, has been postponed until 24 May, a senior judicial source has told Lusa.

The president of the Court of Appeal, Deolindo dos Santos, confirmed the postponement to Lusa, explaining that it had been requested by defence lawyers, citing constraints due to the health cordon set up in the country’s capital, where Daschbach is under house arrest.

The rules of the health cordon require anyone who wants to travel to present a negative result of a tests for the novel coronavirus that causes Covid-19, and that holding the trial required the travel to Oecusse of one of the judges of the panel, the translator, several lawyers involved, members of the public prosecutor’s office and other parties.

“An application…

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[Google translation is followed by the German text.]

When dealing with allegations of abuse in the Archdiocese of Cologne, Cardinal Meisner and Archbishop Heße in particular are said to have violated duties. A new report comes to this conclusion. Cardinal Woelki, on the other hand, is exonerated.

After months of debate, an expert opinion on the handling of cases of abuse in the Archdiocese of Cologne was presented. It burdens the current Archbishop of Hamburg Stefan Heße, Cologne Auxiliary Bishop Dominikus Schwaderlapp and the former Cologne Vicar General Norbert Feldhoff. You are said to have violated obligations in dealing with the allegations of abuse.

Most of the breaches of duty, however, found the report in the case of Cardinal Joachim Meisner, who died in 2017. A third of all determined breaches of duty, namely 24, said criminal lawyer Björn Gercke when presenting his report. Heße are therefore accused of eleven breaches of duty. Most of these are…

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[Google translation is followed by the German text.]

The Cologne Archbishop Woelki is not accused of any breach of duty in the new abuse report. However, the Archbishop of Hamburg, Stefan Heße, is heavily burdened.

Immediately after the presentation of an expert opinion on the handling of cases of abuse in the Archdiocese of Cologne , Archbishop  Rainer Maria Cardinal Woelki drew personal consequences: on Thursday he released his auxiliary bishop Dominikus Schwaderlapp and the head of the Archbishop’s Court, Official Günter Assenmacher, from their duties with immediate effect due to breaches of duty Offices. Hamburg’s Archbishop Stefan Heße, who was previously the head of personnel in Cologne, is also heavily burdened by the report. The experts accuse him of 11 breaches of duty.

In the case of Archbishop Rainer Maria Cardinal Woelki of Cologne , Gercke and his team do not see any breaches of duty in dealing with cases of abuse. This is in agreement…

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[Google translation is followed by the German text.]

Cardinal Woelki releases the responsible persons named in the report

Independent study on dealing with sexualised violence in the Archdiocese of Cologne presented

At a press conference, Kerstin Stirner presented the “Independent study on dealing with sexual violence in the Archdiocese of Cologne” commissioned by Archbishop Rainer Maria Cardinal Woelki. The report covers the period from 1975 to 2018 and examines 236 file processes in detail with the aim of identifying any existing deficits and legal violations as well as those responsible as specifically as possible.

As a first reaction, Cardinal Woelki temporarily released the named persons from their duties: Auxiliary Bishop Dr. Dominikus Schwaderlapp and Official Dr. Günter Assenmacher.

As Cardinal Woelki had announced several times in advance, his main concern in coming to terms with the work was to create clarity and – as far as possible – justice for those affected by…

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[Google translation is followed by the German text.]

Accreditation to view the reports

From Thursday, March 25, 2021, there will be the opportunity to view both the expert opinion of the Gercke & Wollschläger law firm and the Munich expert opinion of the Westpfahl – Spilker – Wastl law firm in the Maternushaus in Cologne . Anyone interested can register for a viewing.

The registration is only valid for you personally and is not transferable. The registration form can be found at the bottom of this page.

Place and dates

Viewing is possible from Thursday, March 25th up to and including Thursday, April 1st, 2021 . A period of up to  1.5 hours is possible for viewing . The report is not available for download, but can only be viewed in person at

Maternushaus
Kardinal-Frings-Str. 1-3
50668 Cologne

The following time slots are available:

• 09:00 to 10:30
• 11:30 am to 1:00 pm
• 14:00 to 15:30
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In each time window, up to 10 places are available at the same time…

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Christchurch’s Anglican Diocese allowed clergy to continue in their duties despite being aware of allegations of abuse against them, an inquiry has heard.

Bishop Peter Carrell, giving evidence at the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care on Thursday, said he was aware of 13 reports of abuse that had involved the Diocese, ranging from verbal harassment to rape.

This does not include abuse complaints against former Christchurch priest Rob McCullough from the 1970s and 80s, which were settled financially in 2003.

In relation to the 13 reports Carrell was aware of, he said the approach to the claims varied. In many instances he was not able to determine how the allegations were dealt with at the time due to poor record keeping.

“There have been historic instances where a perpetrator’s [church] licence or permission to officiate (PTO) was endorsed despite the Diocese’s knowledge of the allegations of abuse….

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Australian Associated Press

• Former Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing schoolboy pleads innocence
• Neville Joseph Creen denies indecently abusing teenager in Mount Isa in 1970s 
• The former priest told police the teenager had the ‘wrong bloke’

A former Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing a schoolboy at a remote parish almost 50 years ago told police the teenager had the ‘wrong bloke’, a court has heard.

Neville Joseph Creen, 80, denies indecently abusing the teenager in Mount Isa, northwest Queensland, where he served as a priest in the 1970s.  

Asked about the allegations in 2018, Creen told officers he had ‘never, ever touched the boy’, calling it a ‘gross injustice’ that he had been accused.

‘This is repulsive,’ Creen told detectives in the interview played to the Brisbane District Court on Thursday.

‘I think he’s got the wrong bloke.

‘It could be (the victim was referring to someone else) … Whether it…

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A former Vatican altar boy has testified that an older seminarian would come into his bed at night to perform a sexual act on him in the Vatican’s youth seminary, saying his initial shock gave way to resignation because he feared being sent home.

Accuser L.G. testified for the first time Wednesday in the Vatican’s criminal courtroom, in the first-ever case to go to trial alleging sexual abuse within the Vatican walls — among the altar boys who serve at papal Masses in St. Peter’s Basilica.

The Rev. Gabriele Martinelli is accused of abusing his authority as a more senior seminarian to force L.G. into “carnal acts” of sodomy and masturbation, using violence and threats, from 2007-2012. The former rector of the seminary, the Rev. Enrico Radice, is charged with having helped Martinelli avoid investigators by discrediting L.G.’s allegations as baseless.

Martinelli has denied he molested L.G., saying the allegations…

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Polish prosecutors say they have received allegations that four senior churchmen broke the law by failing to report a complaint that a priest allegedly sexually abused a minor.

National Prosecutor’s Office spokeswoman Ewa Bialik confirmed to The Associated Press Wednesday that the formal notification was received this month from a new state commission that reviews whether reports of pedophilia should be reported to prosecutors.

She said the allegations were passed on to prosecutors in Krakow, who have authority over the area where the developments took place.

It was not immediately clear whether an investigation would be opened. If it is, and should charges be pressed, they would carry a potential sentence of up to three years in prison.

The allegations concern abuse by a village priest in the 1980s of a man who was then a minor. In the 1990s, the alleged victim informed the local bishop but said there…

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A criminologist who was commissioned by the German bishops to investigate clergy abuse cases has alleged that the cardinal intervened to undermine his investigation.

German Cardinal Reinhard Marx has rejected as “baseless” accusations he prevented a full disclosure of information regarding clergy sex-abuse cases in his diocese a decade ago — similar to accusations he himself has made against Cardinal Rainer Woelki, the archbishop of Cologne.

The charges were made against Cardinal Marx, the archbishop of Munich and Freising, by German criminologist Christian Pfeiffer, whom the German bishops commissioned in 2011 to investigate a major study of abuse in the Church in Germany. That study was published in 2018.

Last month, Pfeiffer repeated strident criticisms he had made to Bavarian newspaper Merkurin February 2020 regarding his investigation, saying that he and his research colleagues were unable to obtain some key information they were promised, in particular relating to any bishops who…

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Many people first met Gemma Hoskins through her appearance on “The Keepers,” a 2017 Emmy-nominated Netflix docuseries, that focused on the death of Sister Cathy Cesnik and cases of sexual abuse at Archbishop Keough High School.

Hoskins is out with a memoir that offers her theory of what happened to Cesnik. WBAL-TV 11 News spoke with Hoskins about why she wrote it.

Hoskins has made it her life’s work to find out what happened to Cesnik, a popular Archbishop Keough High School teacher. Hoskin’s efforts, along with other students, became the focus of “The Keepers.”

Cesnick was found dead in a Lansdowne dump in 1970, months after she disappeared.

In her book “Keeping On,” Hoskins talks about her own work as a teacher, experiences that shaped her and offers a theory of what happened to Cesnick.

“I believe that is was a police officer and I shared his picture with…

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Victims say it’s also vital to show what was — or wasn’t — done about their actions

Roman Catholic Church officials in Saskatoon are promising to publish a report this spring naming all abusive priests and staff going back to 1933.

Saskatoon would be just the second jurisdiction in Canada to release names of abusive priests. A partial list was published by the Vancouver diocese in 2019. In the U.S., the vast majority of churches chose — or were forced by the courts — to make their lists public more than a decade ago.

The Saskatoon report will list the priests involved in public court cases, but also the ones contained in the church’s internal records, said Brenda Fitzgerald, a member of the historical review committee for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Saskatoon.

Fitzgerald said it will also show who knew about the abuse and how it was handled.

“There is no doubt it is going to evaluate if past historical decisions were appropriate. And actually,…

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Now that Gov. Cuomo has been accused of being a serial predator, he is insisting that his due process rights be respected. Yet when it came to accused priests, Cuomo sang a different tune. 

Cuomo has a different standard for himself. When asked this week about the charges against him, he said, “You can allege something, might be true, might not be true. You may have misperceived, there may be other facts.” 

If this is his best defense, the man is in trouble. Nevertheless, what he said was accurate. Not all allegations are true. Misperceptions are not uncommon. There may be other facts that have yet to surface. That’s why the accused, including him, are entitled to due process.

However, when it came to allegations against priests—for offenses alleged to have happened decades earlier—Cuomo showed no respect for their due process rights. He was happy to sign legislation that gave rapacious lawyers…

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The Roman Catholic Diocese of Saskatoon is among the first nationwide to announce it will release a report listing abusive priests and staff going back decades.

A local committee is expected to release the list in late spring. This means Saskatoon would be the second jurisdiction in the country to release such a list, following Vancouver.

The Saskatoon list is expected to name those priests who were involved in public court cases and those who were mentioned in the internal records of churches.

Brenda FitzGerald is a member of the historical review committee for the diocese.

She and 10 laypeople from all walks of life have been going over cases of abuse for over two years.

She’s from Newfoundland and says she lived a block away from the infamous orphanage at the heart of one of the first major cases of abuse in the Catholic Church at Mount Cashel.

FitzGerald…

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Time is running out for those who want their child sexual abuse claim against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse to be considered during bankruptcy proceedings.

The Northern District of New York has established a deadline of is April 15, 2021 for filing proofs of claim in the diocese’s Chapter 11 reorganization.

Claims will have to be filed on that day by 11:59 p.m..

If claimants do not file a timely proof of claim, they may forfeit their right to vote on any plan of reorganization and to share in any distributions made to creditors in connection with the diocese’s Chapter 11 case.

For information on filing a claim, go here or call 855-329-4244.

The Diocese of Syracuse filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code in June of last year following dozens of lawsuits being filed against the Diocese as a result of the New York Child…

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A Polish Cardinal, who was heavily linked to scandal involving the disgraced ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, now faces jail time for allegedly ignoring claims of sexual abuse. This is welcome news and we firmly believe that the only way to end the culture of sexual abuse within the church is to root out and punish those men responsible for ignoring allegations and propagating a culture of silence and deceit.

Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz could face up to three years in jail for his role in covering up cases of clergy abuse by failing to report allegations to police. This is an important step forward in the fight to protect children and the vulnerable from sexual abuse. In our view, one of the main reasons that clergy sexual abuse remains a rampant problem worldwide is because of the church’s playbook for handling abuse. As described by A.G. Josh Shapiro…

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A recent investigation alleging two then-employees at Gilman School sexually assaulted boys over several decades is the latest example of why Maryland needs to remove age limits for survivors to file lawsuits, some state legislators and advocates say.

A report commissioned by the school and obtained by The Baltimore Sun concluded that two staff members — Dr. Martin Meloy and Thomas Offutt — abused at least 20 students between them, with allegations against Meloy from the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s and Offutt dating to the 1950s.

Neither Offutt nor Meloy was prosecuted, according to the report and Maryland court records. Meloy died in 2015. Offutt did not respond to multiple requests for comment from The Baltimore Sun.

Gilman is the most recent Maryland institution to conclude that some of its staff sexually abused children in its care. In 2019, the Baltimore law firm Kramon & Graham found that  View Cache

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Sex abuse victims still have a shot at justice even after their statute of limitations has run out. Pennsylvania lawmakers are working on an emergency constitutional amendment this week.

The amendment would correct the Wolf Administration’s failure to properly advertise the original amendment.

But is a clerical error an amendment-worthy emergency? Critics say no. Rep. Mark Rozzi (D-Berks), a clergy sex abuse survivor, says otherwise.

“I have known many victims of childhood sex abuse who have committed suicide, who have become alcoholics who have become drug addicts. This is a serious threat to our commonwealth,” Rozzi said.

And a threat to the amendment, according to Rozzi, is language inserted by the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday to remove sovereign immunity. Lisa Baker is the chair of the state Senate judiciary committee.

“We clarified that if you’re a teacher at parochial school or teacher at public school you’ll be treated…

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State agencies question police inaction in probe against orphanage founder accused of molesting boys

Two state agencies in Indonesia have accused police in West Java of dragging their feet in a sexual abuse case involving a “Catholic brother”.

The case was first reported to local police in September 2019 by three boys living at the Kencana Bejana Rohani orphanage in the city of Depok.

They accused orphanage founder Lukas Lucky Ngalngola, also known as Brother Angelo, of abusing them.

Ngalngola claims to be a member of the Blessed Sacrament Missionaries of Charity (BSMC), an obscure order based in the Philippines.

He was arrested by police following the report but was released three months later after investigators failed to complete a report for prosecutors to bring the case to court, claiming that they could not find the whereabouts of the boys to get additional statements requested by prosecutors.

The case was…

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A former Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing a schoolboy at a remote parish almost 50 years ago told police the teenager had the “wrong bloke”, a court has heard.

Neville Joseph Creen, 80, denies indecently abusing the teenager in Mount Isa, northwest Queensland, where he served as a priest in the 1970s.

The alleged victim, who cannot be identified, had just lost his father in a mining accident when he first met Father Creen, crown prosecutor Katrina Overell has told a Brisbane court.

He remembers Creen being at his home when he first learned his father would never be coming home.

Creen allegedly put an arm around the teenager’s shoulders before promising to see him when he started high school.

The alleged victim remembers Creen seeking him out in the schoolyard on his first day, reminding him they had met before.

“He asked (the victim) to accompany him to…

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The Methodist pastor in Fiji alleged to have sexually assaulted 14 boys has been questioned and released by police.

The pastor was accused of sexually assaulting the boys while serving on an outer island between 2018 and this year.

Police said the case file had been sent to the force’s Divisional Crime Officer Eastern for further inquiries.

This was not the first time a member of the clergy in Fiji had been accused of sexually abusing women and children.

In December, a judge found a pastor guilty for raping and sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl from his church.

The pastor was convicted of three counts of rape and one count of sexual assault.

For the offence of sexual assault committed on 21 March, 2019, in Nausori, the court found he had unlawfully and indecently assaulted the complainant by kissing her and fondling her breast.

On the rape charge, the court…

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A civil complaint filed in Albuquerque alleges a former Las Cruces Catholic priest sexually abused a teenage girl in the 1970s.

The Rev. Jesus Goni was a pastor at St. Genevieve’s Catholic Church at the time of the alleged incident.

The plaintiff, who is identified as Jane Doe 43 in the lawsuit, accuses Goni of ordering her into his office in approximately May 1970 and inappropriately touching her. She was about 14 years old at the time. She was brought up to obey priests and did not think she would be believed if she told anyone what had been done to her, the lawsuit stated, and kept the incident secret “for many years.”

This is believed to be the first accusation of sexual abuse against Goni. According to the St. Genevieve’s website, Goni became an assistant pastor in 1965 and head pastor in 1970. It appears that he left the…

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The National Commission for the Protection of Minors and Vulnerable Adults of the Costa Rican Bishops’ Conference released a statement in response to the alleged cover up of the sexual abuse of a former student at the Calasanz Catholic school.

According to the local newspaper La Nación, a 21-year-old woman surnamed Cruz Carrillo made the accusation on social media that two of her male classmates sexually abused her in 2016.

The young woman’s decision to bring this complaint to light five years later was due to photographs and posters that began to circulate in the women’s bathrooms at the school, exposing similar cases, La Nación reported.

Cruz Carrillo spoke with the local newspaper and stated that “she and her family were pressured and manipulated by the then director of the institution, a priest from the Dominican Republic, as well as by the psychologists, for them to not file a criminal…

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Six weeks after the Wolf administration revealed that a clerical error had derailed a years-long  effort to help survivors of child sex abuse, Pennsylvania state lawmakers are invoking a seldom-used legislative power to salvage it.

If the plan that lawmakers put in motion on Monday succeeds, Pennsylvania voters will be asked during the May 18 primary election to ratify an emergency amendment to the state constitution allowing child sex abuse victims to sue perpetrators in decades-old cases.

If it fails, voters will have to wait at least two years before they can weigh in.

The margin for error is slim. To invoke the emergency powers, the House and Senate will need two-thirds agreement on a measure that has eluded action for years. 

A Senate vote scheduled for Monday was delayed as of press time. But a committee vote in the House indicates that lawmakers can reach the two-thirds threshold.

On…

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A former Catholic priest has denied sexually abusing a teenage schoolboy almost 50 years ago while stationed at a remote northwest Queensland parish.

Neville Joseph Creen, 80, pleaded not guilty to four historical counts of indecent and sexual abuse of the teenager in Mt Isa, where he served as a priest in the 1970s.

The alleged victim, who cannot be identified, had just lost his father in a mining accident when he first met Father Creen, crown prosecutor Katrina Overell said in her opening in Brisbane District Court.

He remembers church members being at his home when he first learned his father would never be coming home.

Creen was allegedly one of those men from the church sent to comfort the family and allegedly put an arm around the teenager’s shoulders before promising to see him when he started high school.

When the teen started high school, he remembers Creen…

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His church is no longer ‘in friendly cooperation’ with the denomination that found it ‘knowingly employs as pastor a man convicted of statutory rape.’

A Tennessee pastor who confessed two decades ago to statutory rape has resigned after his church was recently removed from the Southern Baptist Convention for hiring him.

Pastor Randy Leming Jr., who served at Antioch Baptist Church in Sevierville, announced his resignation on Feb. 28, the Baptist and Reflector reported on Thursday (March 11).

The Baptist and Reflector, a publication of the Tennessee Baptist Convention, said Leming had been with the church since 2014.

The Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee, meeting in February, determined that the church was no longer “in friendly cooperation” with the denomination because “the church knowingly employs as pastor a man convicted of statutory rape.”

The SBC voted in 2019 to amend its constitution to make sexual abuse one…

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A Polish cardinal, former secretary to St. John Paul II, could face jail time after a Polish state commission accused him of ignoring sexual abuse by Catholic clergy.

Poland’s State Commission on Pedophilia said it would initiate procedures against bishops “for not notifying law enforcement authorities, despite their knowledge that minors were being harmed by their subordinates.”

Meanwhile, the TVN-24 channel published a leaked letter naming Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, retired archbishop of Krakow, and three bishops from the suffragan Diocese of Bielsko-Zywiec, and said all could face three years in jail for failure to report “credible information” about crimes.

Dziwisz, who served as the Polish pope’s secretary for 39 years, was accused in a November 2020 TVN-24 documentary of ignoring abuse complaints after becoming archbishop of Krakow in 2005.

The cardinal dismissed the claims in a TV interview, citing his four decades of “service to the church, pope and Poland,” but said…

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Research into childhood sexual abuse is clear that most victims take decades to come forward due to myriad factors including shame, self-blame, and fear of reprisal. That is why the Michigan teenager who has filed a lawsuit regarding the sexual abuse he experienced in 2010 at a Lapeer-area Catholic school is so courageous. Due to his bravery and willingness to come forward, we believe others may be spared the pain of childhood sexual abuse.

According to the lawsuit, the plaintiff was a student at Bishop Kelley Catholic School in Lapeer, MI, where he was raped by Fr. Aloysius “Al” Volskis. Making matters worse is the fact that Fr. Volskis was reported to the police and Catholic officials in “early 2011.” Despite this report, Fr. Volskis was allowed to remain in the rectory until July 2011, when he fled the US and presumably returned to Eastern Europe. We worry…

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Anyone who wants to file a claim seeking damages for clergy sex abuse against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse must do so by midnight on April 15.

The diocese issued a reminder of that deadline, known as the “bar date,” in a news release Sunday. The deadline was initially set in November 2020 by U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Margaret Cangilos- Ruiz.

The diocese filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the Northern District of New York in June 2020. That move immediately shifted all abuse claims from state court to bankruptcy court.

At the time, there were more than 100 claims of abuse against the Syracuse diocese. The bankruptcy filing came just days after 38 people filed Child Victims Act lawsuits against the church.

Under the judge’s order, those with claims must file them by April 15 or risk losing their rights…

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Divine Word congregation scotches rumors that Richard Daschbach could be reinstated after sex abuse trial

The superior of the Society of the Divine Word congregation in Timor-Leste has moved to scotch rumors that ex-priest and self-confessed pedophile Richard Daschbach, who is currently on trial for sexual abuse, will be reinstated.

In a statement, a copy of which was obtained by UCA News on March 13, Father Yohanes Suban Gapun also expressed sympathy for the former American priest’s victims who were abused at the Topu Honis shelter that he founded in Oecussi, a small coastal enclave of Timor-Leste located 200 kilometers west of the capital Dili.

He faces 14 charges of sexual abuse of children under the age of 14, child pornography and domestic violence. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.

“We … want to state emphatically that based on his admission of the heinous crime of abusing minors…

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The gist of a meeting on a late February weeknight at St. Joseph Parish in Babylon, New York, is probably familiar to many Catholic churches across the country, as Fr. Jason Grisafi, the pastor, discussed how St. Joseph could meet its expenses in light of steadily declining contributions, a drop exacerbated during the last year by COVID-19.

The meeting, however, was remarkable, given St. Joseph’s recent history. For one, it was livestreamed and a video of it was posted on the parish’s website, which also contained St. Joseph’s latest financial report.

That transparency stands in stark contrast to the alleged opacity that marked the tenure of the previous pastor, Fr. Charles Mangano, who has moved on to a new assignment but has left behind unanswered questions about his financial stewardship at St. Joseph.

For a variety of reasons, very few parishioners are willing to discuss what…

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Eight years ago today, Pope Francis emerged on the balcony of St. Peter’s Square for the first time, clad not in the red ermine cape and new red loafers prepared for the next pope, but in a simple white cassock and his old black orthopedic shoes.

His simple apparel set the tone for what would become a whirlwind papacy including 52 papal trips, six major documents, three synods and thousands of speeches and homilies aimed at shifting the church toward simplicity, collegiality and care for the poor and outcast.

While much ink has been spilled by Vatican watchers interpreting how the pope’s writings and structural changes will shape the church for years to come, Pope Francis’ gestures may do even more to define his legacy.

Long after “Amoris Laetitia” and “Laudato Si’” have faded into history, people will remember the images of this South American pope warmly embracing a man…

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Analysis – Public hearings provide a valuable window to see the work of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. But what’s happening behind closed doors will almost certainly have the more enduring effect on the ultimate political outcome of the costly exercise.

This week the commission resumes its historical examination of faith-based institutions managed by the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches, and, in particular over the coming few days, the Salvation Army.

William Booth, the Methodist minister who established the Salvation Army in the late 1800s, used to talk about the power of a punchy sermon to dangle listening sinners over the fires of hell. Over the coming days, the boot might be on the other foot.

The latest hearings began with Gerry Walker, the denomination’s chief secretary who has tendered an apology to former wards while also outlining the Salvation Army’s policies for retrospectively dealing with these…

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Father Vincent Duggan ordained in 1940; died in 1984

The Archdiocese of St. Louis has added the name of a deceased priest to its list of clergy who have had substantiated allegations of sexual abuse of a minor.

Father Vincent Duggan was added to the list of clergy with substantiated allegations of sexual abuse of a minor. Because Father Duggan was accused after his death, his name will be added to that section of the list. He was ordained in 1940 and died in 1984.

The updated list of clergy with substantiated claims of abuse is available online at archstl.org/list. Archbishop Mitchell Rozanski sent a letter to parishes in the archdiocese where Father Duggan had served in ministry, and an announcement will be made in those parish bulletins.

The archdiocese’s list is accurate to the best of officials’ knowledge; however, the archdiocese will add names of any additional clergy who…

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Maltese priest Rob Galea delivered an impassioned homily in Australia last Sunday, condemning the sexual abuse that has gripped the Church and apologising on behalf of them.

Galea was giving an online sermon about the Cleansing of the Temple, the time Jesus angrily drove merchants out of the Temple, and interpreting it as the wrath of Christ upon discovering that a place of refuge had become a place of exploitation.

Here, he proceeded to draw parallels with the Church, and the several sexual abuse cases that have plagued it over the years.

“It breaks my heart; I became a priest to give hope and dignity to people and the Church exploited the vulnerable,” he said. 

“I know it will do everything to protect the vulnerable now, but we didn’t, and as a result many souls were lost and that’s an eternal ramification, and I dont know what to say.”

…

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A class action by dozens of Nova Scotians who say they were sexually abused by Roman Catholic priests dating back to 1960 “is proceeding,” says the lawyer representing the plaintiffs.

“The court is going to advise us about potential trial dates,” said John McKiggan of McKiggan-Hebert law firm in Halifax, which filed the class action with the Nova Scotia Supreme Court in August 2018.

The class action was filed on behalf of Douglas Champagne and other sexual abuse survivors.

Champagne, according to the court filing, suffered lasting and permanent effects from sexual abuse at the hands of Father George Epoch while Epoch worked as a priest at the Canadian Martyrs Church in Halifax.

The class action says priests employed by the Halifax-Yarmouth archdiocese, which amalgamated the former dioceses of Halifax and Yarmouth in 2011, had for decades “sexually assaulted and battered Catholic worshippers who attended their parishes.”

Responsible for the…

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On March 13, 2013, Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected to the Chair of St. Peter. He is the first Jesuit, the first Latin-American Pope, and the first with the name Francis. These eight years of his Pontificate have been marked by initiatives and reforms to engage all Christians in a new missionary impetus with the goal of bringing the love of Jesus to all humanity.

Closeness, synodality and missionary impetus: these are the cornerstones of the Pontificate of Pope Francis, who was elected eight years ago to the Chair of St. Peter. The perspective of his Pontificate starts from below, from the attention paid to those existential and geographical “peripheries” that act as a counterpoint to his being and acting. Inviting all to recover “the original freshness of the Gospel,” he urges the faithful to take up a new fervor and dynamism so that the love of Jesus can truly…

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The Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans has been in the news for a variety of reasons lately. First was their stance against taking the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine saying that it was “morally compromised” for using stem cells coming from aborted fetal tissue.

Currently, the Church appears to be skirting its responsibilities regarding its abominable record of child molestations, having filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy; this, despite having assets worth over half a billion dollars.

Referring to that bankruptcy filing, Richard Windmann, the president of Survivors of Childhood Sex Abuse, says, “I thought it was a cowardly act. Greg Aymond has been dodging depositions in state civil cases for a long time.” Gregory Michael Aymond is the 14th Archbishop of the Diocese of New Orleans. “A judge finally ordered him to attend the deposition, and they filed bankruptcy two days later. It is nothing…

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The Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh shared a letter regarding a child sex abuse complaint against a former priest that died.

Posted online, the letter encouraged “those with information” to “come forward for confidential conversation.”

Here is the letter in full:

March 12, 2021

Dear Friends in Christ,

I am writing to share some difficult news with you.

My office has received a complaint of child sexual abuse against Charles Appel, who was once a priest in the Diocese of Pittsburgh. The man who has made the complaint reports that the alleged abuse occurred when he was a minor in the late 1970s and early 1980s and while he was at Sheldon Calvary Camp, the camp in Conneaut, Ohio, that is affiliated with our diocese.

Mr. Appel renounced his priesthood in the Episcopal Church in 2001, after charges were brought against him under the Church’s clergy disciplinary system….

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The Senate judiciary committee is scheduled to vote Monday on whether to ask voters to approve an emergency change to the state constitution to open a window for lawsuits by adult survivors of childhood sex abuse.

“At this late point in a debate that has been ongoing for over two decades, the emergency constitutional amendment is the most timely and viable option for affording thousands of abuse victims their long-sought access to justice,” state Sen. Lisa Baker, R-Luzerne County said. “By getting the question on the ballot, we give voters the chance to end the delay and say ‘yes’ to the type of justice that all Pennsylvanians deserve.”

Senate Democrats earlier on Friday called for the passage of a bill that would immediately open a window for adult survivors of child abuse to sue their abusers and organizations, such as the Catholic Church, which covered up for predators.

State Sen….

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The Episcopal Diocese is encouraging anyone with information to come forward for a confidential conversation.

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – The Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh is disclosing a report of sex abuse against a priest who died in 2019.

The late Charles Appel was a priest in Pittsburgh until the church disciplined him in 2001.

Bishop McConnell says the alleged abuse occurred against a child while Appel was at Sheldon Calvary Camp in Conneaut, Ohio in the late 70s and early 80.

Appel spent five years in prison for child porn before his death. Anyone with reports about appel is being asked to contact the Episcopal Diocese.

Bishop McConnell’s letter about the abuse can be found here.

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WINDSOR TERRACE — Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio is denying claims in a lawsuit that he sexually abused an altar boy in a New Jersey church in the 1970s.  

The accuser, Mark Matzek, 57, who is represented by attorney Mitchell Garabedian, filed in Superior Court of New Jersey, Essex County, on March 9. Matzek first went public with his accusations against Bishop DiMarzio in November of 2019. 

In a statement, Bishop DiMarzio said, “These false accusations are an attempt to smear my 50-year ministry as a priest. This lawsuit contains the same false allegations made 16 months ago with a demand for $20 million. There is no merit to any of these claims. The priesthood has been my life. I have faith in the Lord that truth will prevail.”

Joseph A. Hayden, Jr., the lawyer representing Bishop DiMarzio, said his client would never settle the case “because he is innocent and looks…

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• Former priest, now 70, has been charged with historic sexual assault of two boys
• Police will allege the man abused the boys – then aged between 11 and 17  
• Alleged abuse took place over five years while they were in his care, police say 

A former priest has been charged with the historic sexual assault of two young boys in Sydney’s west and on the NSW South Coast.

Detectives in August began investigating the allegations said to have taken place between 1986 and 1991.

The ex-priest will face Penrith Courthouse on Thursday facing 13 counts of sexual assault 

A 70-year-old man was issued with a court attendance notice in January at a facility at Malabar, for multiple charges.

These included indecently assaulting a person under 16, sexual intercourse with a person aged 10-16, homosexual intercourse with a male aged 10-18 and inciting a person under 16 to an act of indecency.

The…

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A Staten Island priest has been accused of grooming a recently divorced and depressed parishioner who sought counseling from him for years to eventually sexually abuse her, new court papers say.

Father Basil Akut in 2015 offered weekly counseling to the woman “in order to isolate, manipulate, and groom her for sexual abuse,” her Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit from Friday alleges.

The victim — who is not named in the court papers — also went to weekly confession with Akut and attended all of his masses at Our Lady Star of the Sea on Staten Island, the court papers say.

From 2016 to 2018, Akut would shower the woman with compliments about her personality and appearance, would text and call her and spend “an inordinate amount of time” with her, the court documents claim.

Things escalated in January 2018 when Akut confessed he was in love with the woman and by…

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A former altar boy is suing St. Mary’s College Preparatory Catholic high school in Manhasset over allegations that he was raped in the early 1980s by a religious brother employed as a guidance counselor.

Steven Gormley, now 53, alleges that in September 1981 Brother Robert Ryan began pulling the then-13-year-old out of class at least twice a week, “taking him to his office, and sexually assaulting him,” molestation that continued during “recess periods, study hall periods, or after school was completed for the day,” and went on for years, according to the 38-page lawsuit, filed March 10.

Years ago, Gormley said, he had raised the allegations with school leadership and was given settlements that included $55,000 in exchange for waiving his legal rights, but he is now seeking to void those agreements on the basis of what he claims is fraud.

The suit, filed by lawyers Kevin T. Mulhearn and…

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A Michigan teen is suing the Archdiocese of Detroit and a Catholic school in Lapeer County amid allegations he was sexually assaulted by a priest more than a decade ago.

The youth was an 8-year-old second grader at Bishop Kelley Catholic School in Lapeer 2010 when he attended a “spiritual formation” session with the priest, Aloysius “Father Al” Volskis, during school, according to the lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District in Detroit.

While in a teacher’s lounge, the priest noticed the boy had a cold and offered two blue pills believed to be medicine; he swallowed them then “fell into a semi-sedated state of consciousness,” the filing said. 

The youth was unable to move but aware of his surroundings, asserting in the lawsuit that the priest “raped and molested plaintiff in the teachers’ lounge.” The boy claims he heard Volskis  “moaning and uttering prayers or chants…

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A civil complaint filed Thursday in Albuquerque alleges a former Las Cruces Catholic priest sexually abused a teenage girl in the 1970s. 

Fr. Jesus Goni was a pastor at St. Genevieve’s Catholic Church at the time of the alleged incident.

The plaintiff, who is identified as Jane Doe 43 in the lawsuit, accuses Goni of ordering her into his office in approximately May 1970 and inappropriately touching her. She was about 14 years old at the time. She was brought up to obey priests and did not think she would be believed if she told anyone what had been done to her, the lawsuit stated, and kept the incident secret “for many years.”

This is believed to be the first accusation of sexual abuse against Goni. According to St. Genevieve’s website, Goni became an assistant pastor in 1965 and head pastor in 1970. It appears that he left the church by 1974. 

The plaintiff is…

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A third of all German Catholics are considering leaving the Church, according to a new survey published on Thursday.

The representative study, unveiled March 11, was conducted by the Erfurt-based opinion research institute INSA Consulere on behalf of the Catholic weekly newspaper Die Tagespost and the Protestant news agency Idea. It confirms a previous survey’s findings that indicated similar numbers.

Of those surveyed who belong to the Catholic Church, 33% are considering leaving the church because of the ongoing scandals over the handling of clerical sex abuse cases, while 44% said that they were not going to turn their back on the Church. A further 14% of respondents indicated that they “didn’t know.” Nine percent of those involved in the survey did not specify an answer.

CNA Deutsch, CNA’s German-language news partner, reported that the new survey also found that one in four members of the Protestant regional churches in Germany…

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Poland’s Catholic bishops strengthened their child protection system on Thursday with an agreement with the country’s male religious orders.

During the bishops’ plenary meeting in Warsaw on March 11, Archbishop Stanisław Gądecki and Fr. Janusz Sok, C.Ss.R., signed a declaration committing men’s religious orders to cooperation with the St. Joseph Foundation, which the bishops established in 2019 to support abuse survivors.

Gądecki is the president of the Polish bishops’ conference and Sok is chairman of the Conference of Major Superiors of Men’s Orders in Poland

During the plenary assembly, the bishops were updated on the Church’s safeguarding efforts by Archbishop Wojciech Polak, their delegate for the protection of children and youth.

A March 11 statement on the bishops’ conference website said: “The development and strengthening of this system are to be served by the declaration adopted by the plenary assembly on cooperation between the Polish bishops’ conference and the Conference of Major Superiors…

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Plaintiffs’ attorney Jeff Anderson said he believes 400 claims is relatively low for the church in New Orleans.

Roughly 400 people who allege that they were sexually preyed upon by local priests and deacons went to bankruptcy court and sought compensation from the Archdiocese of New Orleans before last week’s deadline for victims of clerical abuse to file such claims, church officials said Thursday. 

The announcement provides some clarity about the number and potential value of remaining clerical abuse cases that the archdiocese will have to settle or litigate before it can reorganize its finances, a process that started when the church filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last May.

March 1 was the final day a sexual abuse claim could be filed in the case, which is the only avenue for compensation for anyone who alleged sexual abuse by clergy or other church officials that took place prior to the…

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Sara Larson is executive director of a Milwaukee-based Catholic nonprofit called Awake Milwaukee, whose mission “is to awaken our community to the full reality of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church and work for transformation and healing.”

How is Awake different from any number of similar movements?

“Many people believe that there are only two options: get angry and leave the Church, or bury your head in the sand and pretend the abuse isn’t happening. Awake tries to fill that gap. We recognize the brokenness of the Church and we also still love our Church.”

They try to support all survivors, including the person who loves the Church in spite of everything and stays, but is hemorrhaging silently and in exile, suffering his or her terrible wound alone.

“We don’t need to duplicate the work done by the many other wonderful organizations, support groups, and diocesan-sponsored initiatives across the…

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A Catholic couple in Peoria, Illinois, is asking for the intercession of hometown hero Ven. Fulton Sheen to save the life of their unborn son.

Royce and Elise Hood, parents of six children including one in utero, recently discovered that their unborn son Fulton Joseph had Potter syndrome. It is a rare condition where, due to a lack of amniotic fluid, the baby’s kidneys and lungs might not develop fully or at all.

At the Hood’s 20-week ultrasound appointment, their doctor informed them of the news and said there was a 95% chance their baby would not survive after birth.

Three days later, the family went and prayed at Sheen’s tomb in Peoria, asking for a miracle.

Sheen was ordained a priest of the Diocese of Peoria at age 24 before being appointed auxiliary bishop of New York in 1951 and Bishop of Rochester, New York, in 1966. He was…

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Prosecutors have been given the green light to press ahead with an appeal in the case of a priest who was acquitted of child sex abuse charges.

Father Stephen Motroni, a former priest at St Mary’s RC church in Saltcoats, Ayrshire, was accused of sexually abusing two young brothers after plying them with drink and playing strip poker.

He faced two historic charges of lewd and libidinous conduct against the children, aged between five and 13, in Scotland and on holiday in Italy.

However, after hearing several days of evidence at Kilmarnock Sheriff Court last year, Sheriff Michael Hanlon decided he did not have jurisdiction to hear the Italian charges and acquitted Mr Motroni of all other offences.about:blank

Sheriff Hanlon claimed that the Crown had not proven its case beyond reasonable doubt.

The procurator fiscal in the summary trial sought an appeal by way of a process known as a…

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Months after a bureaucratic SNAFU upended SOL reforms aimed at preventing future cases of child sexual abuse and providing justice and healing to survivors in Pennsylvania, an emergency constitutional amendment is set to be proposed again in Pennsylvania.

HB 14 would provide the same remedy to the archaic statute of limitations laws as the previous reform, and currently House Republicans and Democrats are working to get a Constitutional amendment back on the May ballot. In order to do so, there will need to be a 2/3 majority in both houses for the bill to be declared an emergency.  Mike McDonnell, SNAP Philadelphia, and Mary McHale, SNAP Reading, joined other advocates in a conference call today, March 10th, along with CHILD USA advocates and legal scholars Marci Hamilton, Esq. and Kathryn Robb, Esq. The call highlighted the continued need to contact state legislators and urge them to support HB14.

The fact is…

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 Bishop Stephan Ackermann of Trier has ordered a reexamination of abuse allegations against Fr. Joseph Kentenich, the founder of the international Schonstatt movement, from his time in exile in the U.S.

The German Catholic news agency KNA reported Ackermann referred to allegations made by an American man who accused Kentenich of sexually abusing him between 1958 and 1962. The bishop told the diocesan newspaper Paulinus that the accusations had been examined at the time, but that such suspected cases were treated differently today.

The allegations against Kentenich were known to the Archdiocese of Milwaukee since 1994, and they had been investigated there, Ackermann said. KNA reported that the church court of the archdiocese had “taken the view that there was no reason to pursue the matter further at that time,” said Ackermann.

The Milwaukee documents were made available to the Diocese of Trier. The bishop now wants an examination of…

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Religious bodies especially Churches must develop “Child Protection Policy,” which will ensure that they take-up the responsibility to protect children against all forms of abuses in their institutions.

The Reverend Ebenezer Tetteh Kpalam, Clinical Psychologist and Pastor at the Church of Pentecost, Tema told the Ghana News Agency in an interview that Religious Child Protection Policy would ensure that children are protected.

He said such a policy would also feed into the general national ambition to reduce incidents of child abuse in Ghana.

Rev Kpalam who is also the author of the “Our Children, the place of child protection in the church’s ministry” said it is a biblical and civic responsibility for religious bodies to protect children against abuses such as physical, emotional, sexual and neglect.

He noted that such child protection policies in the church must define what constitute abuse, how to identify one, how to handle issues of…

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The Methodist Church in Fiji has asked the Superintendent of Dilkusha Home to provide an explanation on the allegations that children living in the orphanage in Nausori have been subjected to verbal and physical abuse and neglect.

Assistant Secretary for Christian Citizenship and Social Services, Noa Tokavou says they will now wait for the outcome of the investigations carried out by Police and the Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Commission before they decide their next step.

He says none of the staff have been removed from the Home as they do not want to interfere in police investigations.

Tokavou says all children at Dilkusha Home are healthy and attending school.

He also confirms the staff of Dilkusha Home had earlier raised concerns in regards to how the institution was managed and while the church was carrying out its review, these allegations reached police.

The Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Commission Director, Ashwin…

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