ABUSE TRACKER

NEW YORK (NY)
Daily News

July 2, 2019

By Michael Gartland

A priest at an Upper West Side church is stepping down amid accusations that he sexually abused a number of children, a New York Archdiocese spokesman said.

Eight accusers have claimed they are victims of Monsignor John Paddack, who on Tuesday told parishioners at the Church of Notre Dame on W. 114th St. that he will be resigning his post there.

“Msgr. Paddack has written to his parishioners to tell them that, although he denies the allegations against him, for the good of the parish and the people, he has decided to step aside while the investigation into the allegation proceeds,” Archdiocese spokesman Joe Zwilling told the Daily News.

Paddack’s accusers claim he abused them at various postings throughout the city, including Cardinal Hayes High School in the Bronx, St. Joseph by the Sea High School on Staten Island and the Church of the Incarnation in Upper Manhattan.

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GREEN BAY (WI)
Press-Gazette

July 2, 2019

By Haley BeMiller

The names of priests at St. Norbert Abbey accused of molesting children could be made public this summer.

The abbey is in the final stages of reviewing sexual assault allegations against Norbertines over the years, the Green Bay Press-Gazette has learned. Montie Chavez, a spokesperson for St. Norbert, said the abbey aims to release the names of those priests by the end of summer.

Chavez declined to identify the independent agency handling the investigation, but the Right Rev. Dane Radecki, abbot of St. Norbert Abbey, told the Press-Gazette earlier this year that Praesidium was assisting with it. Praesidium is an organization that works with Catholic dioceses on their responses to clergy abuse.

Norbertines, sometimes known as Premonstratensians, differ from diocesan priests in the vows they take, according to St. Norbert’s website. Locally, the order is based at an abbey in De Pere and serves Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church and Holy Cross, among other parishes. Their priests also work at four Catholic schools, including St. Norbert College.

St. Norbert’s findings would follow the release of a list by the Catholic Diocese of Green Bay earlier this year of 48 priests with “substantial allegations” of sexual abuse of a minor against them. The diocese initially released 46 names but added two more as additional survivors came forward.

The abbey’s investigation also comes amid heightened scrutiny of the Catholic church as survivors and their advocates call for greater transparency worldwide. Pressure is coming from the Vatican, too, as Pope Francis recently issued a decree requiring clergy to report abuse to church officials.

Meanwhile, at least 14 state attorneys general in the U.S. have launched their own investigations into clergy abuse.

Allegations against Norbertine priests have surfaced throughout the years. Perhaps the most well-known is former priest James Stein, who was convicted in 2004 of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy in a hot tub at the abbey.

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DALLAS (TX)
Morning News

July, 2, 2019

By David Tarrant

The Dallas Catholic Diocese has added a new name to its list of clergy members credibly accused of sexual abuse of children.

The diocese, embroiled in scrutiny over its handling of past sexual abuse allegations, posted on its website over the weekend that Peter Barusseau was accused of abusing a minor while serving in North Texas. The diocese’s short news item says the alleged abuse occurred in 1960. Diocese leaders did not release any further details about the alleged abuse.

According to church records, from 1960-61, Barusseau substituted for other priests at Immaculate Conception in Denton, St. Anthony in Dallas and St. Mary in Sherman.

Born in 1909, Barusseau is believed to be dead, but the diocese is attempting to confirm his date of death with his home diocese in France.

The diocese first released its list of 31 credibly accused clergy — both living and dead — on Jan. 31. The list was part of a joint transparency effort by all Texas dioceses. Combined, those lists included nearly 300 names of clergy members who have been “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of children since 1950.

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BUFFALO (NY)
Buffalo News

July 2, 2019

By Jay Tokasz

The 2019 Catholic Charities appeal finished more than $1.5 million short of an $11 million goal, as the Buffalo Diocese struggled to overcome dismay over its handling of clergy sexual abuse claims.

The Catholic human service agency did not have a final tally of the amount raised, said spokeswoman Rose Caldwell, adding that a full announcement would happen in mid-July.

But, she said, “To my knowledge, there hasn’t been any major significant change that would put it over goal.”

Sunday was the final day of the annual appeal. A progress tracker at the Catholic Charities website shows the appeal raised $9,251,843. The final tally might end up being more, but Caldwell she was not aware of any large last-minute gifts that would have closed the gap.

It was the first time since 2010 that the appeal fell short of goal.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Associated Press

July 2, 2019

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York has filed a lawsuit against more than two dozen insurance companies seeking to compel the firms to cover claims filed by people who say they were abused by clergy members.

Church officials anticipate that numerous alleged abuse victims will file lawsuits under New York’s Child Victims Act. The new state law gives victims a one-year window to file claims alleging sex abuse that were previously barred by the statute of limitations.

The archdiocese says in its lawsuit filed Friday in Manhattan state Supreme Court that many of its insurers “intend to dispute, limit, or deny coverage” for abuse.

Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the Child Victims Act into law in February. The one-year window to file claims starts in August.

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
WPRI Target 12 News

July 2, 2019

By Eli Sherman, Ted Nesi, Darren Soens, Kim Kalunian

When the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence gave the late Rev. Robert Marcantonio his 16th and final pastoral assignment in 1989, he’d already been accused of sexually abusing minors multiple times over the previous two decades.

Marcantonio, who died in 1999, started out at Sacred Heart Church in West Warwick in 1967. Within three years diocesan leaders were alerted that he had molested multiple boys, according to documents compiled by the group BishopAccountability.org.

Rather than remove Marcantonio from ministry, however, the diocese sent him to Iowa. He returned to Rhode Island in 1975 and resumed active ministry, spending four years at St. John Vianney Church in Cumberland and then a decade at Rhode Island College, along with overlapping assignments at the University of Rhode Island, Bryant College and the U.S. Navy Reserve. More abuse allegations followed.

The Providence Diocese finally removed Marcantonio from ministry in 1989, according to a list of “credibly accused” priests released Monday by Bishop Thomas Tobin. His alleged misconduct was hardly a secret: a year after his removal, Marcantonio was the subject of an explosive investigative report on WPRI 12 that led then-Bishop Louis Gelineau to revoke the station’s right to televise Thanksgiving and Christmas Masses.

Over the 22 years leading up to his removal, Marcantonio served as a pastor at five parishes, six colleges, a high school and a seminary, spanning three states. Survivor advocates say such frequent reassignments were a common trend for abusive priests.

“Moving around predators was typical,” said Tim Lennon, president of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP.

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By CBCP News

July 1, 2019

Manila, Philippines

A Catholic priest has been accused of sexual abuse and was relieved of his duties, a church leader said Sunday.

The alleged victim, a 17-year-old girl, was not identified. She accused Fr. Daniel Baul of abuse that happened at a church-based center for women and children in Pampanga.

A formal complaint was made by the alleged victim to the authorities which resulted in the issuance of a warrant of arrest.

The Archdiocese of San Fernando said it is cooperating with officials investigating the case, but provided no other information.

Archbishop Florencio Lavarias said they would exert all efforts “so that truth and justice may be served for both parties”.

“As a matter or protocol, the accused, though innocent until proven guilty, has been relieved from his assignment,” Lavarias said.

He also said that “pastoral care” is being extended to the alleged victim, while the archdiocese is conducting its own investigation.

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NEW YORK (NY)
The Observer

July 2, 2019

By Sophie Partridge-Hicks

Nine years ago, Esther Harber was sexually assaulted by a Fordham Alumnus. After years of attempting to resolve the issue within the Catholic Church, Harber has decided to make her story public with the goal of protecting others in the future. She hopes that, by sharing her story, necessary change will be made to the Catholic Church and the way it supports victims of sexual assault.

Harber says she was raped by the Reverend Edwin Erhimeyoma in 2010. At the time of the assault, Rev. Erhimeyoma was pursuing a doctoral degree at Fordham’s Graduate School of Religion and Religious Education, which he completed in 2015. According to Bob Howe, assistant vice president for communications at Fordham University, Fordham was never informed of the allegations against Erhimeyoma.

Harber shared in an interview with the Catholic News Agency (CNA) that she had met Erhimeyoma while she was working as a lay missionary serving women and children in New York CIty. Erhimeyoma was a priest at Holy Rosary Parish, a church in Edgewater, New Jersey, which Harber often visited. Over the next two years, the two engaged in what Harber calls an abusive relationship.

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OTTAWA (CANADA)
Canadian Catholic News

July 2, 2019

By Deborah Gyapong

Pope Francis is leading efforts to heal the wounds of the sexual abuse scandals so the Church can fulfill her mission, says Canada’s apostolic nuncio.

“Pope Francis sees the Church as a community of men and women who live for others, who care for those in need, for those who are injured, for those who find themselves on the margins of life,” Archbishop Luigi Bonazzi told a gathering of about 300 people, including diplomats, bishops, church officials, lay leaders and friends at a June 27 reception at his Ottawa residence honouring the sixth anniversary of Pope Francis’ election. “But in order to heal others, we need to be cared for and healed ourselves.”

Bonazzi, the Vatican’s representative in Canada, spoke of Pope Francis’ “unique image” of the Church as a “field hospital,” based on the story of the Good Samaritan.

“Precisely to help and ensure the good health of the Church, which in recent times has found itself sick and wounded by the serious scandals of sexual abuse, Pope Francis is leading a serious and ongoing process of healing and reconciliation, a process which had one of its most significant moments in the convocation last February, of bishops and religious Superiors from around the world on The Protection of Minors in the Church.”

The nuncio called it an open and transparent process, noting Pope Francis is not asking the Church to “hide or ignore” her wounds, but to instead put Christ at the centre since He is the One who can heal them.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
WWL Radio

July 2, 2019

By Tommy Tucker

“The defense of the sacramental seal and the sanctity of confession can never constitute some form of connivance with evil, on the contrary, they represent the only true antidote to evil that threatens man and the whole world,” states the note signed by the head of the penitentiary, Cardinal Mauro Piacenza on July 1.

What all of the above means, simply stated, is that if you’re a priest hearing the confession of a pedophile who says he’s molesting a child, you can’t tell anyone. You can’t tell the police. You can’t tell the Bishop. You can’t tell parents to keep their kids away the pedophile. In other words, you forgive the offender and send him on his way. Most experts will tell you a pedophile cannot be cured; so odds are you’re sending him off, cleansed of his sins, to victimize more children.

I’m a cradle Catholic, but, I gotta tell ya, that’s the most un-like Christian thing I can imagine. Do you REALLY think, in your heart of hearts, that Jesus would approve of that? My heart tells me that CHILDREN ALWAYS COME FIRST! If there’s only food for one, they eat FIRST. If there’s only shelter for one, THEY SLEEP INSIDE. If only one person can be protected it is, WITHOUT DOUBT, THE CHILD.

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FORT WORTH (TX)
Star Telegram

July 1, 2019

By Nichole Manna

The June 2018 resignation of the Rev. Richard Kirkham, of Prosper, is valid, according to the Diocese of Fort Worth, which received a decree on the matter from the Congregations for Clergy at the Vatican.

Under Catholic Canon law, Father Kirkham remains a priest of the Diocese but must vacate the parish rectory, the Diocese of Fort Worth said in a statement.

“The Congregation has lifted the suspension of Father Kirkham, but he is without assignment. Bishop (Michael) Olson will assess how to proceed after meeting with Father Kirkham; however, he will not return as pastor of St. Martin de Porres,” the statement from the Diocese said.

Olson asked Kirkham to resign after a letter Kirkham wrote to another priest in Dallas was deemed intimidating, manipulative and inappropriate by the bishop.

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NASHVILLE (TN)
Baptist News Global

July 1, 2019

By Bob Allen

One of Houston’s leading law firms is handling the appeal of a lawsuit alleging sexual abuse by former Southern Baptist Convention leader Paul Pressler.

A district judge recently signed final orders dismissing the three remaining claims in a lawsuit filed by Gareld Duane Rollins Jr., a 54-year-old man who says sexual abuse that began when he was a teenager sent him on a downward spiral of substance abuse and multiple arrests that continued until he made an outcry statement to a prison psychologist in 2015.

Last year Houston Judge Ravi K. Sandill dismissed counts of abuse alleged prior to 2004, saying the claims are too old to litigate due to the state’s statute of limitations.

Rollins filed a notice of appeal June 18 represented by attorneys with Baker Botts, a firm with history dating back to the Republic of Texas in 1840 that now employs about 725 lawyers in 14 cities around the globe.

Rollins discharged his former lawyer, Daniel Shea, in April. Shea previously represented Rollins in a lawsuit against Pressler settled in a confidential agreement in 2004.

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RICHMOND (VA)
Richmond Times-Dispatch

July 2, 2019

By C. Suarez Rojas

Parishioners, employees, volunteers and clergy in the Catholic Diocese of Richmond have a new way to report suspected misconduct that isn’t sexual abuse.

As of Monday, the diocese has a third-party company, EthicsPoint, managing an anonymous hotline intended for people to report financial mismanagement or administrative issues in local churches, offices and schools in the diocese’s jurisdiction. The diocese covers most of the state.

The implementation of the new ethics hotline comes as the diocese is reckoning with its admission that approximately 50 of its priests have been credibly accused of sexually abusing children in incidents that took place between the 1950s and 2000s.

In a video announcing the hotline, Richmond Bishop Barry Knestout said the diocese hopes more people will feel encouraged to report misconduct, but that sexual abuse allegations should continue to be reported to law enforcement authorities and child protective service agencies before a caller contacts the diocese’s confidential sexual abuse hotline.

“We must uphold the commitments we have made and the legacy we have been handed in a fair and honorable manner. This includes reviewing existing policies and procedures and revising them in order to ensure that the diocese is providing the tools and environment needed to strengthen our Church, our communities and one another,” Knestout said in a letter to the church community.

A report from the National Catholic Reporter about fraud in churches published earlier this year quotes a Diocese of Richmond officer who said all of the diocese’s parishes are regularly audited and mandated to have procedures for money collection and accounting.

The article also mentions recent major embezzlement cases in the archdioceses of Philadelphia and Miami, and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Missouri.

Knestout has declined to be interviewed by the Richmond Times-Dispatch at least four times since August, but has said in communications with parishioners that the diocese is committed to improving transparency.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

July 1, 2019

By Chaz Muth

When Ethan K. Alano walks into the reconciliation room at Queen of Peace Catholic Church in Salem, he bares his soul before God and goes into detail about his sins during confession. Alano’s trust in the priest is solid.

He is certain that anything he says in the confessional is confidential, allowing him to air his sins in complete specificity so that he may receive a just penance, reaffirming his relationship with the Lord.

That penitential confidence is a centuries-old rite in Catholicism and protecting it from governmental intrusion goes beyond tradition, religious freedom and church law, said Auxiliary Bishop Peter L. Smith of Portland, who also is a canon lawyer.

It disenfranchises the sacrament if the faithful believe there is the slightest possibility that civil authorities could compel a priest to reveal what they have shared in the confessional, Bishop Smith told Catholic News Service in a May interview.

In the confessional, “people encounter the mercy of God,” he said. “They encounter God’s forgiveness of them, but they also encounter the Lord helping them to live their lives more fully as he calls them to. So, that’s what we should experience in the sacrament of reconciliation.”

It’s the humanitarian benefit for the individual and society that has motivated the church in making the priest-penitent privilege absolute.

So much so that the Code of Canon Law states the penalty for a priest who violates the seal of confession is automatic excommunication, which can only be lifted by the pope himself.

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SACRAMENTO (C)
ABC 10 News

July 1, 2019

There is new fallout following ABC10’s exclusive discussion with Bishop of the Sacramento Catholic Diocese Jaime Soto. Now the Sacramento Diocese has identified five new victims, bringing the total of known survivors to 135.

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MANILA (PHILIPPINES)
Manila Bulletin

July 2, 2019

By Leslie Aquino

The Archdiocese of San Fernando in Pampanga said it was cooperating with officials investigating the case of Father Daniel Baul, who has been accused of sexual abuse.

Pampanga Archbishop Florencio Lavarias said they would exert all efforts “so that truth and justice may be served for both parties”.

He also revealed that the concerned priest has already been relieved from his assignment as a matter of “protocol”.

“As a matter of protocol, the accused, though innocent until proven guilty, has been relieved from his assignment,” Lavarias said in a CBCP News post.

He also said that “pastoral care” was being extended to the alleged victim, while the archdiocese is conducting its own investigation.

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CHARLOTTE (NC)
WBTV News

July 2, 2019

A former Catholic priest in Charlotte was listed among credibly-accused clergy in the Diocese of Providence in Rhode Island.

William Tanguay served the Diocese of Charlotte from 1995 to 2002, and worked with the Hmong Ministry.

Tanguay’s name was listed by the Diocese of Providence in Rhode Island where he also served for years.

He’s served in the church since 1969 and was removed from the ministry in 2002. The church did not detail any of the allegations, or if they’re based in Charlotte.

The Diocese of Providence released the list Monday and provided the following statement on its website.

At the direction of the Bishop, the Director of Compliance was tasked with conducting an independent, thorough and objective review of files dating back to 1950, a year used by many other dioceses as a benchmark. Many files were several decades old, and the Director was not the initial investigator. The Director reviewed all diocesan files compiled over seventy years, and employed his training and expertise as a twenty-three year State Police detective to make assessments and judgments regarding the available and developed evidence within the files. In some instances, the Director made additional inquiries to corroborate and bolster certain allegations. In some cases of his own choosing, the Director of Compliance consulted the Director of Outreach and Prevention and/or the Diocesan Review Board for further advice. In all instances, however, the Director of Compliance ultimately exercised his own independent, expert judgment in determining whether to place particular clergy on the list.

The Catholic Diocese of Charlotte has not yet released a full list of names of credibly-accused clergy, but the Diocese says they plan to release that list by the end of the year.

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BOSTON (MA)
WGBH News

July 1, 2019

By Marilyn Schairer

Rhode Island survivors of clergy sex abuse are saying that the list of 50 clergy members credibly accused of sexual abuse released Monday by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence, Rhode Island is far from enough.

Psychologist Dr. Ann Hagan Webb, who is a member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), said she’s certain the list is incomplete.

“It feels like damage control. It’s a little bit too late, certainly,” she said. “This list is names they have known for a very long time. There are priests on there that have been moved around 15 times.”

Hagan Webb, who says she was molested by her parish priest in West Warwick, Rhode Island between the ages of 5 to 12, said she hopes the authorities step in and prosecute.

The Providence diocese posted on its diocese website 50 names of clergy, religious order priests and deacons that are “credibly” accused of sexual abuse. The published list includes 19 men who are still alive, although all have been removed from ministry. The diocese list also posts where each of those “credibly” accused men once worked.

SNAP said in a statement that it hopes the release of this information will lead to safer, more informed communities, and that survivors will be encouraged to come forward and make a report.

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ALLENTOWN (PA)
The Morning Call

July 2, 2019

By Paul Muschick

The Catholic church clergy sex abuse scandal has claimed new victims — employees who were let go or suffered other consequences because the church finally had to compensate victims.

The Allentown Diocese announced Monday that it has cut operating costs and is reducing its office work force by 24 percent. Pay freezes were instituted and departments were restructured.

A news release said the changes were necessary so the diocese could “continue its charitable and pastoral mission throughout its five counties while freeing up funds to compensate victims of clergy sexual abuse.”

Most of the 23-person reduction occurred through attrition, including a voluntary retirement program, the diocese said. A spokesman wouldn’t disclose how many workers were laid off.

I feel for people who lost their jobs or suffered other repercussions. But if they’re looking for someone to blame, don’t blame the abuse victims who filed claims and were compensated. Blame church officials for not heading off this problem decades ago.

Remember, the diocese could sell assets and borrow money. Those were other sources it said it could tap when it opened the compensation fund in April. The diocese doesn’t have to make its staff bear the brunt.

It also could cut back on the charitable services it provides. That’s a tough choice, and could create even more victims — the aid recipients who don’t get the help they need. But it’s an option.

Allentown and other Pennsylvania dioceses created compensation funds in response to a grand jury report released last summer that detailed sexual abuse accusations against 301 priests statewide who had abused hundreds of children over several decades.

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NEW YORK (NY)
America Magazine

July 1, 2019

By Ellen K. Boegel

The Catholic Church is campaigning against California’s proposed changes to its mandatory child abuse reporting law that could compromise the ancient Catholic defense of the “seal of the confessional.” Currently, clergy members are mandated reporters of child abuse and neglect, but need not report abuse if their reasonable suspicions are based on “penitential communications.” Several bills have been proposed that would eliminate or limit this reporting exception.

The version of SB 360 passed by the California Senate and scheduled for a July 9 hearing before the Assembly’s Public Safety committee narrows the definition of penitential communications to those similar to the Sacrament of Reconciliation, in that they must be “made in the manner and context that places the clergy member specifically and strictly under a level of confidentiality that is considered inviolate by church doctrine.” The bill, if enacted, would also require reporting of child abuse revealed through “penitential communications between a clergy member and another person that is employed at the same site or facility as the clergy member” and “between a clergy member and another clergy member.”

This change is significant, but SB 360 does not apply to most confessions and, as currently written, would not change California’s Evidence Code, which retains the priest-penitent privilege and grants everyone the right “to prevent another from disclosing a penitential communication.” The laws of other states are more severe and less religiously accommodating, although practical considerations have limited their impact on religious adherents.

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PEMBERTON (CANADA)
Globe and Mail

July 1, 2019

By Nancy MacDonald

Hubert Jim says he can smell visitors long before he ever sees them. The wind, he says, carries their scent: sunscreen, deodorant, soaps, shampoos – all of it sickly sweet, unmistakably human and foreign to the alpine wilderness he calls home.

This sounds, of course, like total hokum. But a few hours after saying it, Hubie, as Mr. Jim is better known, suddenly went pounding down the winding one-kilometre trail leading to a sturdy, log bridge he built years ago. There, on the far side of the churning, white waters of the Cayoosh Creek stood a pair of bemused retirees from Britain, blinking in the hot, spring sun. They were stretching their legs – a pit stop on a camper trip across the province. Hubie had apparently nosed them out.

He was 37 when he moved to the mountain for good. This fall Hubie turns 57, marking almost 20 years living alone in a shack in B.C. grizzly territory, 40-kilometres northeast of Pemberton. Unless he is forcibly removed, Hubie, a Lil’wat Nation hereditary chief, says he will die here.

The protest camp named Sutikalh was erected in 2000 by a group of First Nations people aiming to stop the last, pristine watershed on Lil’wat lands from being turned into a ski hill. The resort would rival Whistler, the co-host of the 2010 Winter Olympics and playground to the global super rich that also happens to be located on the traditional territories of the Lil’wat Nation.

Within a year, every protester except Hubie had gone home.

Construction on the Cayoosh Resort at Melvin Creek was mothballed owing to Indigenous opposition. The developers – former Olympian Nancy Greene Raine and her husband, Al Raine, the mayor of Sun Peaks, B.C. – however, could still build on the land in the future depending on the outcome of consultations with First Nations in the area. Because of this, Hubie still doesn’t feel it is safe to leave the mountain untended.

“So much of the world has already been destroyed,” he says. “I’m looking after the mountain not just for the Lil’wat, but so the whole world can enjoy it.”

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FALL RIVER (MA)
WPRI TV

July 1, 2019

By Eli Sherman and Ted Nesi

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Fall River is continuing to conduct an internal review into sexual abuse allegations against its priests and clergymen, but is still not setting a date for when a list of credible accusations will be released.

Fall River Bishop Edgar Moreira da Cunha announced in January he had hired William Gavin, a former FBI assistant director, as an independent consultant to review all past claims of sexual abuse against Fall River clergy. Gavin’s hiring followed a reorganization of personnel files last fall.

The bishop said at the time he expected the review would be done “in the spring.” However, diocesan spokesperson John Kearns said Monday the review wasn’t finished yet and he didn’t know when it would be.

“I don’t want to speculate at this point,” Kearns told WPRI 12. “When the review is finished, we will be publishing the list.”

BishopAccountability.org, a website that tracks the Catholic abuse crisis nationwide, lists 31 members of the Fall River diocese who have faced some past accusation of sexual abuse. The diocese includes Bristol County, Cape Cod and the Islands, as well as Marion, Mattapoisett and Wareham.

In a January letter to the region’s Catholics, de Cunha indicated he expected the list would reveal relatively few unknown abuse cases.

“While most of these names have already been reported in the media, the publication of a list is necessary for greater transparency on our part in response to clerical sexual abuse,” he wrote. “I wish that this information could be made available sooner; yet it takes time and diligence to compile a list that is accurate and complete.”

Fall River’s diocesan leaders also established an Office of Safe Environment a year ago, led by retired law enforcement officers, to oversee child protection in the diocese.

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ALLENTOWN (PA)
Morning Call

July 1, 2019

By Emily Opilo

The Allentown Diocese has cut its office staff by nearly a quarter and enacted a pay freeze to help compensate victims of clergy sexual abuse, officials announced Monday.

The cuts, effective last Friday, were centered in the diocesan’s administrative office, where 96 people worked prior to the reductions, according to a news release from diocese spokesman Matt Kerr. Most of the cuts were made through attrition, and a voluntary retirement program was offered, according to the diocese.

Kerr would not disclose how many of the 23 affected positions were eliminated via layoffs.

A victim’s compensation fund was created earlier this year in response to a grand jury report released last summer that detailed sexual abuse accusations against 301 priests statewide who had abused hundreds of children over several decades. The report named 37 priests from the Allentown Diocese, and the diocese itself added another 15 names until the list.

A five-month window to file claims with the fund will close in September.

Allentown has set aside millions for the fund, which will not tap future collections from masses, or school and parish funds, according to the diocese. The fund was expected to be built on available cash, borrowed money and the sale of assets.

While no future collections will be used, the diocese’s existing assets were accumulated via donations — the church’s only source of revenue — and investments of that money made by the diocese, Kerr said Monday.

Diocese officials would not specify in April how much money was available in the fund, but said it would provide a public report on the number of victims and the total amount paid to them at the conclusion of the program.

The number of claims filed so far, which has not been disclosed, was not a factor when making the staffing reductions, Kerr said.

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TOLEDO (OH)
The Blade

July 1, 2019

By Nicki Gorny

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Toledo announced a routine series of clergy appointments and transfers on Monday, including the retirement of the Rev. Nelson Beaver, who remains on administrative leave as the diocese continues an internal investigation into sexual abuse allegations against him that began to emerge last year.

Authorities in Williams County, where an initial allegation of sexual abuse of a minor arose in October, closed their investigation at the request of the accuser in March. The allegation had dated back more than 25 years. In the course of that months-long investigation, two additional and also decades-old allegations arose in Lucas County and in Huron County.

Lucas County authorities did not investigate the allegation, which would have fallen beyond the statute of limitations, in line with the wishes of the accuser.

Huron County authorities, who did not respond to repeated requests for comment from The Blade in March, have since closed their investigation, Kelly Donaghy, diocesan spokesman said. That leaves the matter to the diocese, which will investigate according to its own policy and ultimately determine whether Father Beaver, who is now retired or of “senior status,” is suitable for ministry.

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NEW YORK (NY)
New York Law Journal

July 1, 2019

By Dan M. Clark

The Archdiocese of New York has filed a lawsuit against its various insurers over the years after one company said it’s not planning to cover claims brought through a new law enacted this year that will open a window for older victims of child sex abuse to file civil litigation in New York.

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LONDON (ENGLAND)
The Sun

July 1, 2019

By Amy Nickell

However this wasn’t an innocent childhood romance – perverted Graham was Rachel’s 28-year-old teacher, and he would go on to abuse the teen over three years.

Rachel says: “You think you’re grown up and as a teenager you know everything but you realise you don’t and you are still a child.

“That makes what Graham did worse because it’s taking away somebody’s innocence, and that’s what he did to me.”

Sadly, she’s not alone. In the last five years in the UK over 200 teachers have been struck off as a result of sexual misconduct with students.

Groomed and sexually abused, married mum-of-one Rachel, now 43, kept her personal ordeal secret for 25 years.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

July 1, 2019

By Cindy Wooden

The first time Archbishop Michael J. Byrnes of Agana, Guam, celebrated Mass in his cathedral, he had to cross a picket line to do so.

Australian Archbishop Peter A. Comensoli of Melbourne said Catholics in his archdiocese are angry.

The two were among 30 archbishops from 25 nations who received their palliums — woolen stoles — from Pope Francis June 29.

In interviews with Catholic News Service before the Mass, both archbishops spoke of the impact of clerical sexual abuse on the people of their dioceses and said survivors are the members of their flocks most in need of care.

The first week of August, both Archbishop Byrnes and Archbishop Comensoli will celebrate their first anniversaries as archbishop of their dioceses. For both archdioceses, it has been a year of coming face-to-face with the abuse crisis.

Archbishop Byrnes was an auxiliary bishop of Detroit when Pope Francis sent him to Guam in October 2016 as the coadjutor bishop with special powers in the midst of accusations of sexual abuse and financial mismanagement against Guam’s Archbishop Anthony Apuron.

The appointment “was a little overwhelming,” the archbishop said. Guam was far away and Catholics there were in an uproar.

Meeting Pope Francis before he went to Guam for the first time, he said he told the pope that when a sports team is doing badly, the important thing is to return to the fundamentals and that’s what he planned to do in Guam: “Being friends with Jesus Christ.”

But “my first meeting when I arrived in Guam was with lawyers,” he said. “At that time we had six complaints of sexual abuse of minors and to date over 230 victims have come forward — it’s a lot for a small island.”

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
GoLocalProv News Team

July 1, 2019

The Diocese of Providence on Monday morning released the names of clergy, diocesan and religious order priests as well as deacons, who have been “credibly” accused of sexual abuse of minors. Bishop Tobin stated last year that the names would be released in 2019.

In February, the Diocese of Providence’s Rhode Island Catholic Conference in written testimony to the House Judiciary Committee disclosed that the church has made tens of millions of dollars in payments to sexual abuse victims over the past few decades.

The testimony had been offered in opposition to legislation — recently passed by the General Assembly — to extend the statute of limitation of those who are sexually abused from the existing seven years to up to 35 years.

Payments to Victims

The disclosure of the payments may, in part, be an indicator as to the Diocese’s financial issues and why the church failed to make proper contributions to the pension fund of the now collapsed St. Joseph Health Services retirement fund — the largest pension fund failure in Rhode Island history.

“Reflecting [on] our commitment to justice, the Diocese of Providence has resolved over 130 claims and paid out over $21 million in legal settlements. Additionally, a pastoral outreach program has provided victims with nearly $2.3 million for the cost of counseling in order to facilitate healing and wholeness. There have been many long-standing and effective efforts towards prevention here,” said the Church in written testimony to the House committee.

Last October, the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), a national non-profit, has called on Democratic candidate for Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha to commit to investigating the Diocese of Providence.

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Wrestling World blog

July 1, 2019

By Joan Jalbuena

The community of Henderson in Nevada, located just south of Las Vegas is a small one of only about 300,000 people. It’s a quiet place, which is why, earlier this year they were shocked to rack up their third homicide in a year.

The victim was a 70 year old man, who was supposedly “quiet” and who neighbors believed was merely a retired teacher who occasionally ran tutoring sessions in his home.

According to Fox 5, the Henderson police were conducting a welfare check at the home of John Capparelli, at around 9:30 am on March 9. They found Capparelli’s body in the kitchen. He had been shot in the neck in an apparent robbery.

It was only then that his neighbors realized that their “quiet” neighbor had come to their community to hide allegations of a dark past.

Capparelli was a defrocked priest accused of molesting multiple boys in the guise of “teaching” them to wrestle.

Capparelli had been a Catholic Priest for the period of 1980 to 1992, until multiple allegations of sexual misconduct were brought against him. Several young men alleged that he had groped them and worse. He was suspended from the church in 1992.

Even after he was defrocked, however, Capparelli continued to work with children and young boys as a public school teacher, said a report from NJ.com. He only stopped in 2011 after a report in the Star-Ledger made public, the allegations against him.

“Submission” wrestling
An earlier story that the NJ.com ran about John Capparelli’s life in New Jersey also reveals that Capparelli was linked to a fetish website called nhb-battle.com, which he was supposed to be running out of his home in Belleville.

Two of Capparelli’s victims during the years he was a priest have been vocal about their molestation at his hands. They were to testify against Capparelli during his hearing with the New Jersey State Board of Examiners but didn’t get a chance to as the case reached a settlement.

“I am happy that after all this time, he’s finally being held accountable,” said Rich Fitter, who has stated that Capparelli used to touch him inappropriately during “submission wrestling” matches in the 1980s.

“He should not be around children. To me he should be in jail,” said Fitter.

According to Fitter and another of the alleged victims, Andrew Dundorf have shared their experiences with Capparelli both which involve “wrestling”.

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ROME (ITALY)
CBS News

July 1, 2019

By Anna Matranga

The Vatican’s highest court issued a document on Monday approved by Pope Francis strongly reiterating Catholic teaching that priests may not, under any circumstances, reveal information learned inside the confessional. The document was a response to mounting political and social pressure for priests to report details of sexual abuse of minors acquired during confessions to authorities.

The document states that any legislation aimed at forcing priests to report such information would be an “unacceptable offense” against the church’s freedom from secular power, as well as a violation of the religious freedoms of both the penitent and the confessor.

The Vatican said it felt it was “necessary to intervene,” to explain the importance of the confessional seal to the church, and to promote understanding of it.

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
Providence Journal

July 1, 2019

By Brian Amaral

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence on Monday morning released a list of clergy, priests and deacons who have been “credibly accused” of sexually abusing children.

The list, posted on the diocese’s website just after 8 a.m., represented generations of private torment for victims and public disgrace for abusers and their enablers. It includes 50 names, 19 of them still living but none still active.

The state recently extended the statute of limitations for victims to file lawsuits over child sexual abuse from seven years to 35.

To find the list of credibly accused Diocese of Providence priests and deacons, click here.

Bishop Thomas J. Tobin announced in December that the list would be released sometime in 2019; in a statement, the diocese said it hopes the list will provide “healing and consolation.”

The list was broken down into several categories, including credibly accused living clergy, credibly accused living deacons, credibly accused deceased clergy, credibly accused deceased religious order priests, and two “publicly accused” deceased clergy. All but one of the 19 living clergy and deacons were listed as “removed from ministry.” The one who wasn’t removed had resigned before an allegation was received, the diocese said.

One priest was born in 1904, and was ordained in 1930. He died in 1977, before any allegation was received. The youngest living credibly accused priest is now 60, and was ordained in 1990.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

July 1, 2019

This morning, the Diocese of Providence, RI has finally taken the step of posting the names of clergy who have been accused of abuse. Now we call on church officials in Rhode Island to aggressively reach out to parishioners, informing them of this list and urging anyone with information or allegations of their own to report to local police and prosecutors.

While it is likely that this list was only published in response to growing public pressure, we hope that the release of this information will lead to safer, more informed communities We also hope that survivors who may be suffering in silence will be encouraged to come forward and make a report to police and the attorney general.

Unfortunately, the list released today Rhode Island church officials only includes names, ages, years of ordination, and their current status. While this information is valuable, it is not enough for a complete list. Bishop Thomas Tobin should work immediately to update his list and include, at a minimum, the work histories of each accused priest so that communities where abusers served know to look for survivors in their midst. Similarly, he should include information about when the archdiocese first received the allegations and what they did in response. Only by knowing what went wrong to enable abusers in the past can we best know how to prevent similar situations in the future.

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AUSTRALIA
The Leader

June 28, 2019

By Murray Trembath

A former Church of England Boys’ Society lay leader and scripture teacher at Sutherland has been sentenced to a minimum three years and seven months jail for historical child sexual assault offences.

Many of the offences occurred in church-run camps for boys in Royal National Park.

William Richmond Sandwell, 78, of Loftus, appeared in the District Court, Downing Centre, after a jury found him guilty of 11 child sexual assault offences, committed against six children between 1965 and 1985.

Sandwell, who also used the name Sandell at one time, denied the offences.

Among “survivors” in court for the sentencing was Alexander Hayes, who now lives in Perth.

Mr Hayes said outside the court Sandwell’s assaults on him between the ages of 11 and 15 had had a “catastrophic effect on my life and a horrific impact on many families, including his own.”

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VATICAN CITY
La Croix

June 28, 2019

By Robert Mickens

How Pope Francis is initiating processes of Church reform that will be hard to undo

How many cardinals does it take to help Pope Francis reform the Roman Curia? And how many years do they need to get the job done?Many Catholics – at least those who are hoping the pope can succeed in decentralizing ecclesial power away from the Vatican – have grown frustrated that after some six years there have been no definitive answers to those questions.After meeting roughly five times annually, the Council of Cardinals (a body initially made of eight members or C8, then quickly expanded to C9 and more recently depleted to C6) has still not given the pope a final draft for a new apostolic constitution to reform the Church’s central offices.But they are getting closer.

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
Providence Journal

June 30, 2019

By Donita Naylor

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence will publish a list Monday of clergy, priests and deacons who are “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of minors.

The complete list of names as well as other pertinent information will be published at 8 a.m. Monday on the diocesan website: www.dioceseofprovidence.org

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UNITED STATES
ABC News

June 29, 2019

By Cho Park, Erin Brady, Juju Chang and Eamon McNiff

[PHOTO: These four women and two other families filed a civil lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints alleging they failed to warn or protect them from a sexual predator.]

The following report was put together by reviewing trial testimony and court documents, and interviewing multiple plaintiffs who were involved in a lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints. The plaintiffs in that lawsuit alleged that the Church and several Church officials failed to take steps to protect the plaintiff’s children from a teenager who was ultimately convicted of sexually abusing two young children.

The Church told ABC News in a statement, “These allegations are false, offensive, and unsubstantiated. As soon as Church leaders learned of abuse by this individual, they encouraged the parents of the abused children to report to West Virginia police and confirmed the report.”

The lawsuit was settled for an undisclosed payment in 2018.

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ALBANY (NY)
Albany Times-Union

June 29, 2019

By Paul Grondahl

Claims of “unspeakable atrocities” by ex-area priest come as legal window opens

In his bedroom upstairs at the Home for Wayward Boys in Knox, the priest had a king-sized waterbed with royal blue satin sheets.

The Rev. Gerard R. “Jerry” Miller, a priest of the Missionaries of Our Lady of La Salette order founded in Hartford, Conn., repeatedly sexually assaulted teenage boys in his care on that waterbed for three years beginning in 1984, two of his victims alleged in legal documents their lawyers sent recently to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany and the Albany County district attorney’s office.

In outlining their case in preparation for filing a lawsuit, Martin Smalline and JoAnn Harri, a husband and wife team who run an Albany law firm, laid out allegations of “rape and sexual assault … but also the trafficking of children across state lines, along with obstruction of justice and concealment of criminal behavior.”

The victims’ accounts in the legal documents allege that in addition to assaulting boys in Albany County, Miller drove teenagers under his care to Agawam, Mass., and Atlanta, Ga., where they were sexually assaulted by Miller and another priest identified only as Father Jim.

In the spring of 1986, according to statements attorneys provided to authorities, the two alleged victims who are part of the legal action were sexually assaulted at the same time on the waterbed by Miller and Father Jim when the second priest visited Altamont.

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BUFFALO (NY)
WBFO-FM (NPR affiliate)

June 30, 2019

By Mark Scott

Three Catholic priests who were placed on leave after making inappropriate remarks during a party with seminarians in April are being reinstated.

Bishop Richard Malone is returing Fr. Arthur Mattulke, Fr. Patrick O’Keefe and Fr. Robert Orlowski to active ministry, effective this Friday.

Malone said an investigation found no inappropriate physical conduct by the priests. He said corrective measures were taken, including retraining in the Diocesan Code of Conduct.

The Bishop praised the seminarians for coming forward.

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
The Boston Globe

June 26, 2019

By Amanda Milkovits

The Rhode Island General Assembly overwhelmingly passed legislation on Wednesday to give victims of childhood sexual abuse more time to sue perpetrators and hold institutions and public entities accountable.

The legislation heads to the desk of Governor Gina Raimondo, who is expected to sign it into law.

It extends the statute of limitations to 35 years after victims reach adulthood.

Victims will have 35 years to bring lawsuits against individual perpetrators, regardless of whether the case had been “time-barred” under previous laws. The bill also keeps state law allowing victims to file suits within seven years of “discovering” they’d been abused.

They will also have 35 years to bring lawsuits against institutions and organizations, as well as the state, municipalities and quasi-public agencies. Nesslebush said she insisted on adding those agencies, after seeing the widespread abuse by Jerry Sandusky at Penn State and Larry Nassar at Michigan State University.

However, the 35-year extension is prospective only against institutions, except under the seven-year “discovery rule.”

The bill caps a years-long battle brought by survivors of sexual abuse, and in the waning days of this session, appeared that the effort was going to fail when the House and Senate brought forward conflicting bills.

Then Wednesday afternoon, Senator Donna Nesselbush, D-Pawtucket, suddenly announced a compromise with the “best parts” of her bill and the bill sponsored by Narragansett Representative Carol Hagan McEntee.

The legislators didn’t waste time. Within two hours, the compromise legislation flew through the Senate Judiciary Committee, unanimously passed the Senate to applause, and then sailed through the House, 70 to 1. (Representative Brian C. Newberry, R-North Smithfield, was the only nay.)

The governor said Wednesday evening that she intended to sign it into law.

“Abuse of any kind cannot be tolerated anywhere. As a mother, I find reports of child abuse particularly disturbing,” Raimondo said in a statement. “I’ve long supported efforts to hold abusers accountable and ensure that victims are given the time needed to come forward.”

The sudden revival of the bill had surprised McEntee, as well as some of the victims who had testified on the legislation and admitted losing hope as time ran down.

Nesselbush praised their courage and singled out two victims who were invited to the announcement and the votes — McEntee’s sister Dr. Ann Hagan Webb, who’d testified about being molested by the family’s parish priest, and Jim Scanlon, whose accusations against a priest at Boston College High School were part of the movie “Spotlight.”

Scanlon trembled a little after the announcement. “I’m surprised, pleasantly surprised,” he said.

This was for the victims, who could finally get justice, Scanlon said.

In short, victims will be able to sue their alleged abusers, as well as institutions such as the Catholic Church, the Boy Scouts and other “youth-serving” organizations.

Kathryn Robb, executive director of Child USAdvocacy, said the bill was a move in the right direction, but there was still more work needed. “Unfortunately, it still allows institutions to conceal their horrific acts of child abuse and cover-up, and hence many victims are left without any justice,” she said in a statement.

However, the lobbying arm of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence announced it supported the bill. “It is now time for the process of achieving justice and healing for victims to move forward,” the Rhode Island Catholic Conference said in a statement.

McEntee had sponsored the bill in honor of her sister, Dr. Ann Hagan Webb, who had testified in despairing details about being molested starting when she was five.

The two sisters hugged each other after the bill passed the Senate. They beamed at each other across the House floor as the vote came through.

House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello, who’d backed the legislation, congratulated Webb. Noting that Wednesday was her birthday, he added, “I don’t believe in coincidences,” and wished her a happy birthday.

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PITTSBURGH (PA)
Tribune Democrat

June 30, 2019

By Paul Guggenheimer

David Egan is well aware of the stigma attached to priests in the wake of the Catholic Church child sex abuse scandal.

“I assume that other people assume things about me, that they’re very suspicious of me now,” Egan said. “If you walk out in public with a collar on, I think people are questioning ‘Is this one of the good guys? Or is this someone who has committed some terrible sin among his own flock?’ ”

Egan is one of four area men who were ordained to the priesthood Saturday by Bishop David A. Zubik of the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh during a Mass of Ordination at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Oakland.

In addition to Egan, 30, of Glenshaw, the new priests are Timothy Deely, 37, of Greenfield, Brendan Dawson, 30, of West Deer and Mingwei Li, 31, who immigrated with his family from China and grew up in the South Hills.

“Freedom of religion is limited in China. Coming to the U.S. was part of God’s plan,” Mingwei said.

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VATICAN CITY
La Croix International

June 21, 2019

By Robert Mickens

American alt-right leader enlists Catholic allies to turn people against the pope

Among all the world’s political and social leaders, Pope Francis stands increasingly alone as the most powerful force for global peace and stability. Thank God – and the cardinals who elected him in March 2013 – that the Argentine Jesuit is the current Bishop of Rome.

In an age when alt-right populists are masquerading as Christians and using religious symbols to scare believers into embracing racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia and ultra-nationalism – all so starkly at odds with the Gospel, by the way – Francis has played an indispensable role in preventing a dangerous spiral into a full-blown clash of civilizations.

This is because there are people as crazy as the populists in other currents, as well.
Another pope may not have had the courage, fortitude or deep and genuine faith to stand against all this and not allow himself to be co-opted to the Christian sovereigntists’ cause.
And while the 82-year-old Francis has not been able to convince enough voters to reject the populists, he has kept most bishops, cardinals and other Catholic leaders from publicly endorsing them. This is no small matter.

Populists state that their intention is to defend the Judeo-Christian heritage of the Western world. And, unfortunately, this is quite enticing to those for whom Catholicism is, in essence, a Eurocentric philosophical ideology and moral code.

Tribal Catholics of the “no salvation outside the Roman Church” type like the message.

And the man who has enlisted them is Steve Bannon.

The American millionaire populist who rails against the elites

Chief architect of Donald Trump’s election to the U.S. presidency and co-founder of the far-right Breitbart News, the 65-year-old Bannon is now the most famous ringleader of the alt-right’s populist fear-mongering movement.

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VATICAN CITY
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE

June 25, 2019

U.S. Cardinal Raymond Burke has resigned from the Dignitatis Humanae Institute, saying it has become “more and more identified with the political program” of Steve Bannon.

In a letter posted on his Twitter feed, Burke said June 25 he had urged the institute to return to its original purpose of promoting the respect of human dignity but “it has not done so,” so he was terminating his relationship, including being the institute’s honorary president. Eleven other cardinals make up the institute’s advisory board and Bannon, former chief strategist at the White House, is a patron and member of the board of trustees.

“I have been made aware of a June 24 LifeSiteNews online article — now removed — entitled ‘Steve Bannon hints at making film exposing homosexuality in the Vatican,’ in which the insinuation is made that somehow, through my association with Mr. Benjamin Harnwell of the Dignitatis Humanae Institute, I was involved in a meeting between Mr. Bannon and Mr. Frederic Martel, author of the book, ‘In the Closet of the Vatican,’ to promote a film version of Mr. Martel’s book,” Burke said in his letter.

“LifeSiteNews made no contact with me to verify my possible involvement,” he said. “Given the overall content of the article and given several statements made by Mr. Bannon in the article, I must make the following clear:

“I do not, in any way, agree with Mr. Bannon’s assessment of the book in question,” Burke said. “Furthermore, I am not at all of the mind that the book should be made into a film. I disagree completely with a number of Mr. Bannon’s statements regarding the doctrine and discipline of the Roman Catholic Church.

“Above all, I find objectionable his statement calling into question the church’s discipline of perpetual continence for the clergy, in accord with the example and desire of Christ …” he said.

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UNITED STATES
Patheos

June 30, 2019

By guest writer William M. Shea

James Carroll’s recent essay on the priesthood in The Atlantic, the critical responses by Thomas Reese and James Martin, and the tempered comments by Donald Cozzens (NCR) indicate to me that the discussion of reform has taken a significant turn. We seem now to be asking questions about the structure of authority in the Roman Catholic church rather than only about sin and how to counter it. The pope and bishops, for all their admirable attempt to amplify the reporting and handling of changes of abuse and cover-up by bishops, are struggling to keep the reform urges inside the boundaries of the received structures of authority, i.e., there are to be no independent lay bodies to open and review cases. All is to remain under hierarchical control.

In my own reading experience it was Garry Wills’ book, Why Priests? A Failed Tradition (2013) that decisively kicked open the door on the dissolution of the clericalism and hierarchism that, in my view, plague the Catholic church and, one way or another, most of the Christian churches, none of which has found an ideal solution. This intensified discussion in the last decade is fraught with many dangers, I admit. Even I, a retired and increasingly breathless old man, have been accused of apostasy by the renowned archbishop of Philadelphia for my memoir, Judas Was a Bishop (2015).

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ENGLAND
Premier Christianity

June 30, 2019

The leader of Roman Catholics in England and Wales has referred to the abuse inquiry into the Catholic church but swiftly moved on to celebrate priests.

Cardinal Vincent Nichols celebrated a National Mass of thanksgiving and renewal for priests at Westminster Cathedral on Friday lunchtime, welcoming everyone and then saying:

“In recent days, in the IICSA Report and in the media, there has been sharp criticism of our work of Safeguarding in the Catholic Church, and of aspects of my ministry in Birmingham. I acknowledge this, of course.

“Yet this not the time nor place for those matters. Rather today is about you, my brother priests, about your faithfulness, your steadfast generosity, your ministry of healing, your endurance, not least under the burden of the grievous damage done to innocent victims by just a very few of our brother priests. I thank you for your faithfulness, your generosity, your perseverance. I thank you, as do each of us bishops, and the people of your parishes. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you!”

He then moved on and did not refer to the topic again in his homily.

In June, Cardinal Vincent Nicholls was criticised in the report from the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse for putting the reputation of the Church before welfare of children.

He was the Archbishop of Birmingham between 2000 and 2009, the Archdiocese which was looked into thouroughly.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
St. Louis Public Radio

June 30, 2019

By Andrea Y. Henderson

Giving Voice, a peer-led national organization for nuns and religious sisters under the age of 50, convened for a four-day conference to build bridges between religious life and social justice issues.

Eighty of the group’s sisters from around the country and other nations worked together at Fontbonne University to push for change within the church and create a cross-generational culture of community and growth.

In 2016, Pope Francis wrote a letter to men and women religious calling for the church to become experts in spiritual conversation. And at this year’s convention the sisters examined his letter and found ways to “live boldly” in their faith by communicating and witnessing to others who live various lifestyles.

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IRELAND
Irish Central

June 30, 2019

Top Irish newspapers The Irish Times, The Irish Examiner, and The Evening Echo have printed formal apologies for a seminarian sex scandal story regarding the Pontifical Irish College in Rome that proved to be fake.

In May 2018, The Irish Times published a story claiming that two seminarians were dismissed from the Pontifical Irish College in Rome after being found in bed together. The story was subsequently reported by a number of other media outlets.

Claims that the sex scandal occurred after students attended a Mass commemorating Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae on artificial birth control also proved to be false. There was no such Mass.

Connor Gannon, a former clerical student at the college in Rome, launched High Court proceedings against a total of eight newspapers to clear his name.

The Irish Times, The Irish Examiner and the Evening Echo have all issued apologies acknowledging they referred to and identified Gannon. The three newspapers have said there was no truth in and no basis for the allegations made, TheJournal.ie reports.

Each publication acknowledged that the article was “false and should not have been published” and have agreed to pay damages to Gannon for the “upset and distress caused to him by the article.”

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TOLEDO (OH)
The Blade

June 29, 2019

By Jay Skebba

Rossford Schools is considering changes to its sexual harassment policy after being criticized for concluding female students touched against their wishes by a former school administrator weren’t sexually harassed because their academic performance didn’t suffer.

The move would make Rossford an outlier among most of its neighbors, as many school districts throughout the Toledo area — including Rossford — use the exact same policy language to determine if an employee committed sexual harassment.

But what actions specifically fall under those guidelines can be left up to interpretation, and that means different districts likely would have interpreted the sort of situation that transpired in Rossford in different ways.

The debate over what constitutes sexual harassment at Rossford Schools surfaced this spring when Pat Murtha resigned as athletic director and assistant high school principal. Mr. Murtha resigned April 22, and records from a district investigation obtained by The Blade in May concluded he engaged in the following behavior:

Mr. Murtha, who served as an anti-harassment compliance officer, often pinched or pulled a girl’s nose, tugged on her ears, rubbed her head, messed up her hair, and took her food without asking. She asserted Mr. Murtha touched her about 40 times since the middle of the 2017-2018 school year.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

June 28, 2019

By John L. Allen Jr.

In “The Simpsons,” the annual Halloween episodes are known for their spoofs of the supernatural. Back in 1993, one of my favorites featured a vision of Hell, where the legendarily donut-loving Homer has been assigned to the “Ironic Punishment Division.” He’s tethered to a chair as a machine force-feeds him pastry after pastry.

(Homer appears delighted, mumbling “more please!” after each mouthful, leading a frustrated demon to say: “I don’t understand it … James Coco went mad in 15 minutes!”)

I thought of that episode this week, speaking to a visiting clergyman who was astonished to discover that German Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van-Elst – better known to the world as the “Bling Bishop,” whose exuberant spending in the Diocese of Limburg in 2013 caused such a furor that he was granted a “sabbatical” by the newly-elected Pope Francis – is actually now a Vatican official.

My cleric friend recently attended a meeting in the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization, where Tebartz-van-Elst led the discussion. He said he spent a few minutes trying to figure out where he’d heard the name before, until realization dawned: “My God, he’s the bishop of bling!”

Welcome to the “Ironic Employment Division” in Pope Francis’s Vatican.

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MELBOURNE (AUSTRALIA)
The Age

June 30, 2019

By Farrah Tomazin

The controversial scheme set up by George Pell to handle sex abuse claims against Melbourne’s Catholic Church spent almost as much money paying its independent commissioner as it did compensating hundreds of victims.

The church’s own figures reveal that between 1996 and March 2014, the archdiocese spent $34.27 million to run its so-called Melbourne Response, but only $9.72 million – or 28 per cent of it – was used to compensate 307 child sex abuse victims.

The bulk of the money during that period was spent on other operational costs for the scheme, including $7.8 million to employ barrister Peter O’Callaghan, QC, as its independent commissioner, and a further $4.7 million on general legal fees.

Mr O’Callaghan’s job was to determine the credibility of victims’ claims and make suggestions about what action to take against alleged abusers.

Another $432,000 was used to fund the compensation panel that made recommendations about ex gratia payments, and $11 million was used to fund the church counselling service known as Carelink, most of which was spent on staff and administration.

The figures, contained in a spreadsheet labelled “strictly confidential”, are the most up to date the archdiocese has ever been required to provide publicly. They were subpoenaed by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse as “supplementary information” and until now have been buried in thousands of documents that form part of the commission’s landmark inquiry.

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HARRISBURG (PA)
Pennsylvania Record

June 28, 2019

By Karen Kidd

The state Superior Court recently reinstated a lawsuit against the Catholic Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown filed by a woman who alleged she was repeatedly molested by a pedophile priest in the 1970s and 1980s.

In its 38-page decision, the Superior Court reversed a December 2017 Blair County Common Pleas Court decision dismissing the lawsuit filed by Renee’ A. Rice, saying the diocesan defendants were not entitled to judgment on the pleadings based upon the statute of limitations. “All three of Ms. Rice’s issues on appeal have merit,” the Superior Court said in remanding the case.

Judge Deborah A. Kunselman wrote the Superior Court decision in which judges Eugene B. Strassburger and Jacqueline O. Shogan concurred. Strassburger is a retired senior judge was assigned to the Superior Court in this case.

In her lawsuit, Rice alleged that she was about 9 when a then-priest at St. Leo’s Church in Altoona, Rev. Charles F. Bodziak, began molesting her and continued to do so for years, as often as twice a week. Rice said the abuse occurred in the church’s rectory, a cemetery and in Bodziak’s car and did not end until 1981.

The diocesan defendants argued that the statute of limitations on Rice’s claims ended in October 1987, two years after her 18th birthday.

Blair County Judge Jolene Grubb Kopriva agreed and dismissed Rice’s lawsuit.

“To support that contention, they [the diocese] predominately relied upon two cases from this court that had affirmed judgments on the pleadings in favor of pedophile clergy and various, corporate manifestations of the Catholic Church under the statute of limitations,” the Superior Court’s decision said.

The Superior Court reinstated Rice’s lawsuit based on a Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision in Nicolaou v. Martin, which was handed down about 10 months after Kopriva’s dismissal and which abrogated the Superior Court decisions upon which Kopriva had relied.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

June 29, 2019

By Inés San Martín

As the Catholic Church in Germany prepares to embark on a synodal process motivated in part by a desire to stop a hemorrhage of faithful, Pope Francis has sent them a letter reminding them they don’t walk alone but with the universal Church.

In the missive he also reminds the Germans that a “structural” reform, simply changing to adapt to modern times, is not the solution.

The Church’s raison d’etre, Francis wrote in a letter released by the Vatican Saturday, is that God “so loved the world that he gave his only Son so that all who believe in him may not die, but may have eternal Life.”

This means that the transformation and revitalization sought after by the German Church, with a synod called by the bishops’ conference, cannot simply be a “reaction to external data or demands,” including a drop in births and aging communities. Though these are “valid causes,” Francis wrote, seen outside the ecclesial mystery they could stimulate a reactionary attitude.

The pope’s letter to the Catholics of Germany comes three months after Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich and Freising announced that the local church was embarking on a “binding synodal process” to tackle what he says are the three key issues arising from the clerical abuse crisis: Priestly celibacy, the Church’s teaching on sexual morality, and a reduction of clerical power.

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

June 29, 2019

By Inés San Martín

Australian bishops spent the past week in Rome meeting with Pope Francis and the head of various Vatican offices, and the matter of Cardinal George Pell, convicted of historical sexual abuse but awaiting the result of his appeal, risked becoming the elephant in the room.

Yet, according to Archbishop Peter Comensoli of Melbourne, it didn’t, because it was directly addressed in most of the official conversations the 40 bishops had during their June 24-28 ad limina visit to Rome.

Though he wouldn’t reveal what was said about Pell, the archbishop told Crux on Thursday that there have been “two things” running through most of their meetings: The clerical sexual abuse crisis (Pell included), and the upcoming plenary council for the Church in Australia.

“The reality is that, in Australia, in a very real way, we stand at the feet of the Cross,” Comensoli said.

“The people who’ve been abused and their families, the devastation it’s caused, the suffering associated with that, the further traumatization that comes from the processes they’ve been put through in the past by the Church, all of that is part of the realness of where things are at.”

In addition, he noted the suffering of those who, without being survivors or members of their families, have been “traumatized” by the scandals, who are “disgusted by the way processes were applied.”

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PASADENA (CA)
The Good Men Project

June 29, 2019

By James A. Haught

By now, it’s clear that religion is fading in America, as it has done in most advanced Western democracies. Dozens of surveys find identical evidence: fewer American adults, especially those under 30, attend church—or even belong to a church. They tell interviewers their religion is “none.” They ignore faith.

Since 1990, the “nones” have exploded rapidly as a sociological phenomenon—from 10% of U.S. adults, to 15%, to 20%. Now they’ve climbed to 25%, according to a 2016 survey by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). That makes them the nation’s largest faith category, outstripping Roman Catholics (21%) and white evangelicals (16%). They seem on a trajectory to become an outright majority. America is following the secular path of Europe, Canada, Australia, Japan, New Zealand and other modern places. The “Secular Age” is snowballing.

Various explanations for the social transformation are postulated: the Internet exposes young people to a wide array of ideas and practices that undercut old-time beliefs: That family breakdown severs traditional participation in congregations. That the young have grown cynical about authority of all types. That fundamentalist hostility to LGBTQ+ persons and abortion has soured tolerant-minded Americans. That clergy, child-molesting scandals have scuttled church claims to moral superiority. That faith-based, suicide bombings and other religious murders horrify normal folks.

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NEW YORK (NY)
ABC News

June 29, 2019

By Cho Park, Erin Brady, Juju Chang and Eamon McNiff

The following report was put together by reviewing trial testimony and court documents, and interviewing multiple plaintiffs who were involved in a lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints. The plaintiffs in that lawsuit alleged that the Church and several Church officials failed to take steps to protect the plaintiff’s children from a teenager who was ultimately convicted of sexually abusing two young children.

The Church told ABC News in a statement, “These allegations are false, offensive, and unsubstantiated. As soon as Church leaders learned of abuse by this individual, they encouraged the parents of the abused children to report to West Virginia police and confirmed the report.”

The lawsuit was settled for an undisclosed payment in 2018.

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SACRAMENTO (CA)
ABC 10 News

June 28, 2019

Bishop Jaime Soto is speaking with us in his first sit down interview since revealing the names of 44 priests and two deacons credibly accused of sexually abusing children and young adults over the past 70 years.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

June 28, 2019

Now that five men have bravely disclosed their childhood sexual abuse at the hands of a priest, Arkansas Catholic officials must work to find others who were hurt and may be trapped in silence, shame and self-blame.

We are grateful to the survivors of Fr. John McDaniel who stepped forward, sought justice and exposed this predator. We believe that other victims of sexual violence will feel vindication because of their courage, and we hope this settlement brings them some measure of healing.

But while this case has settled, the work is far from over. Most abuse victims never report what happened to them and instead live silently with their pain. If Bishop Anthony Taylor wants to be a real shepherd, he will use parish bulletins, church websites and pulpit announcements to urge anyone with information or suspicions about Fr. McDaniel – or any other abusive priest, nun, deacon or other church staffer – to come forward to independent sources of help, like police, prosecutors, therapists and support groups like ours.

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PARIS (FRANCE)
LaCrois International

June 28, 2019

By Father Amado L. Picardal

(This is the final part of a three-part series from Redemptorist Father Amado Picardal on the clerical sex abuse crisis.At the root of clergy sex abuse is the “dark side” of leadership. To overcome the dark side, a priest must be aware of it and acknowledge its existence. This requires spending time in solitude, silence and prayerful reflection.

This is a time spent for examining his life and conscience. This should be done regularly and be part of the rhythm of his life. This is a time for introspection — to examine the lights and the shadows of his exercise of leadership.

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MERCED (CA)
Sun Star

June 28, 2019

By Vikaas Shanker

A Catholic priest twice convicted of possessing child pornography in Merced County — and recently released from prison — has continued to receive checks from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno since he was first arrested nearly five years ago.

Father Robert Gamel, 69, was released on post-release community supervision from the California Institution for Men prison in Chino on April 13, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Gamel was incarcerated four years, including 605 days of time served in Merced County jail, following his second arrest on possession of child pornography, according to a CDCR statement.

Gamel, the former head of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Los Banos, where he was affectionately known as “Father Bob,” now resides in Tulare County with his family. He remains on paid administrative leave, pending a canonical investigation, said Diocese of Fresno Chancellor Teresa Dominguez.

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HOUSTON (TX)
ABC 30 News

June 28, 2019

By Guy Davies

A priest at the center of an alleged child sex scandal in Houston has been indicted on charges of exposing himself to a teen during confession.

Father Manuel La Rosa-Lopez of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston faces his fifth sexual-abuse charge in Conroe, Texas, based on alleged incidents in the 1990s and 2000s. La Rosa-Lopez exposed himself to an unnamed 15-year-old during confession in the year 2000, according to the indictment.

The minor alleges that after confessing his homosexuality to the priest, La Rosa-Lopez asked him vulgar questions and “proceeded to open the partition window in the confessional booth and exposed (himself).”

The victim spoke about the incident in a session with a therapist in 2017, according to the lawsuit.

The indictment means there are now five charges against La Rosa-Lopez involving three alleged sexual-abuse victims.

ABC News contacted the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, which referred questions about the case to La Rosa-Lopez’s attorney, Wendell Odom, who did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Montgomery County District Attorney Brett Ligon told ABC News that they are hoping to get to trial by the end of this year or early 2020.

“Obviously, we feel strongly about the evidence against La Rosa-Lopez and our pursuit of justice for victims,” he said. “We look forward to presenting our case to a Montgomery County jury soon.”

Michael Norris, the head of the Houston arm of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, told ABC News that his hope is that La Rosa-Lopez pleads guilty, and that the Catholic Church is in need of reform.

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SPRINGFIELD (MA)
The Republican

June 28, 2019

By Anne-Gerard Flynn

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield is investigating an allegation of sexual misconduct against a deceased priest by a former Berkshire County resident that dates back to the early 1970s when the woman was a high school sophomore.

The allegation against the Rev. James D. McKenna was reported Thursday by the Berkshire Eagle, which quotes the woman, who now lives in Ohio, as alleging McKenna would get her drunk on a weekly basis and press her to engage in sexual activity that stopped short of intercourse in a parish rectory.

It quotes a letter the woman is said to have sent Bishop Mitchell Rozanski in September detailing the alleged abuse saying that the priest “would get me drunk until I could no longer fight back his advances. He is the reason I have been an alcoholic for a good part of my life.”

The woman is said to have received a response from Rozanski in October, thanking her, as reported by the Eagle, for “having the courage to write to me and share this painful experience with me” and urging her to contact the intake person at the time in the diocesan office for reporting claims of clergy sex abuse.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Fox News

June 28, 2019

By Lauren Green

Is the devil behind the Catholic Church sex abuse crisis?

In his new book ‘Infiltration, The Plot to Destroy The Church From Within,’ Dr. Taylor Marshall attempts to get at the spiritual roots of the clergy sex abuse crisis as well as other problems in the church, claiming the devil is to blame. Dr. Marshall joins Lauren Green to discuss his book, the sex abuse scandal and share his thoughts on what has contributed to the spiritual decay within the church.

New York’s Archbishop Timothy Cardinal Dolan described last year’s months of revelations about decades of clerical sexual abuse as “the summer of hell.” It’s a figure of speech that one author believes may have more bite than bark. In other words, demonic forces may have played a large part in the Catholic Church’s crisis.

A warning here: If you don’t believe that Satan and his spiritual band of evil malcontents are on the prowl in this world, don’t bother reading his book – per his request.

Author Taylor Marshall said, “We have to remember from the Christian point of view going back from well before the beginning of time, there is the fall of the angels. Lucifer and a third of the angels fell. And then all the way up to the time of Christ, there was all of these betrayals that were spiritual in nature.”

In his new book, “Infiltration, The Plot to Destroy the Church From Within,” Marshall attempts to get at the spiritual roots of the clergy abuse crisis in the Catholic Church.

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RICHMOND (VA)
Richmond Times-Dispatch

June 27, 2019

By Andrew Adkins

The Catholic Diocese of Richmond added six priests to a list of clergy who served in the diocese and were accused of sexual abuse against a minor, bringing the total to 49.

Five of the six men whose names were announced Thursday are dead, while the status of one priest is unknown, the diocese said.

One of the men, Stanley F. Banaszek, served as a priest at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Blacksburg and as a chaplain at Virginia Tech in 1974-75, according to an advocacy group for victims of clergy sexual abuse.

That brings to seven the number of former clergy on the Richmond diocese list with past ties to the region spanning from Bedford to Blacksburg.

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NEW ULM (MN)
Catholic News Service

June 28, 2019

The Diocese of New Ulm has reached a $34 million settlement with 93 survivors of clergy sexual abuse.

In a letter to Catholics of the diocese, Bishop John M. LeVoir said he believes the settlement “we have reached is a fair one” for abuse survivors and also allows the diocese to continue its ministry to those it serves throughout south and west-central Minnesota.

“(It) represents years of respectful negotiations with those representing victims and survivors in order to come to a fair resolution of claims while continuing essential church ministry,” he said June 26. “I believe the settlement agreement we have reached is a fair one.”

News reports quoted Jeff Anderson, an attorney for many of the New Ulm claimants, as saying that reaching the settlement was “a big day for survivors.”

“Throughout this process, all of the survivors have demonstrated tremendous courage and patience,” he said. “They have advanced the child protection movement and made their communities safer for kids.”

A June 26 diocesan news release on the agreement said the funds for the settlement “are made up of insurance coverage settlements and cash and property contributions from the diocese and parishes, including parishes that do not have claims against them.”

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INDIANAPOLIS (IN)
CNN

June 25, 2019

By Jason Hanna, Carma Hassan and Daniel Burke

Two Catholic high schools in Indianapolis were facing the same instruction from an archbishop: Fire a teacher who is in a same-sex marriage, or lose the archdiocese’s recognition as a Catholic institution.

One refused last week, and is keeping its gay, married teacher. But officials at the other have announced they are firing theirs.

Adding to the tense situation: the two teachers have been married to each other since 2017, multiple sources have told CNN. Their marriage, which the couple shared on social media, led a local Catholic to complain to the archdiocese, the sources said.

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RICHMOND (VA)
Richmond Diocese

For Immediate Release: June 27, 2019

Catholic Diocese of Richmond Adds Names to Clergy List

(RICHMOND, Va.) – Today, the Diocese of Richmond announces six names have been added to its list of clergy that have a credible and substantiated claim of sexual abuse against a minor. The names were added after additional information was brought forward and a review was completed in consultation with the Diocesan Office of Safe Environment and the Diocesan Review Board. The names of the individuals with credible and substantiated allegations of child sexual abuse, as well as additional information, can be located on the Richmond Diocese website: www.richmonddiocese.org.

The six priests added are below:

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JOHNSTOWN (PA)
WJACTV

June 27, 2019

By Travis Gary

A Northern Cambria priest has been placed on leave from public ministry after being accused of sexual misconduct involving a minor in the 1980s, according to a release from the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown.

According to the release, Father Donald Dusza was pastor of Prince of Peace Parish.

The 63-year-old Twin Rocks native was ordained as a priest in 1983 and has served various parishes throughout the diocese.

Dusza became pastor of Prince of Peace in 2017.

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PROVIDENCE (RI)
Providence Journal

June 26, 2019

By Katherine Gregg

The Rhode Island General Assembly has passed legislation to give the victims of sexual abuse more time to sue the priests, teachers, coaches and others who molested them when they were children.

After a weeks-long standoff over conflicting versions of the bill, the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday approved a version of the bill introduced by Rep. Carol Hagan McEntee on behalf of her sister, Annie, with only one significant change. Shortly afterward, the full Senate unanimously voted to approve the legislation. The House then voted, 70-to-1, to send the bill to the governor.

Rep. Brian Newberry, R-North Smithfield, was the only lawmaker to vote no.

“This is Annie’s bill,″ said an emotional McEntee, who introduced the legislation in the name of her now 66-year-old sister, Ann Hagan Webb, who was sexually molested repeatedly by their family’s parish priest in West Warwick for a period of seven years that began, she has testified, when she was 5 years old.

“This is a scourge on our society,″ McEntee said. “You’ve seen it all over the country, all over the globe, and we’re not different here in Rhode Island,” but now “we are giving the victims their day in court, the day they so much deserve after so much wrong has been committed on them.”

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LANSING (MI)
WILX News 10

June 28, 2019

The Michigan Attorney General’s office has released an update on the defendants charged in the Clergy Abuse Investigation.

Patrick Casey had a probable cause conference on May 30. The defendant waived his preliminary exam before the Wayne County 18th District Court Judge Mark A. McConnell. An arraignment on information is scheduled for July 18 in the Wayne County 3rd Circuit Court. The defendant is out on bond.

Timothy Crowley is being extradited from Tempe, Arizona and will be delivered to Washtenaw County Jail in early July.

Vincet DeLorenzo has been extradited from Marion County, Florida and delivered to Genesee County Jail on June 17 and was arraigned on June 18. His probable cause conference was adjourned to Aug, 1 for discovery. The defendant is out on bond.

Neil Kalina was extradited from Los Angeles County, California and delivered to Macomb County Jail. He was arraigned on June 20 in the Macomb County District Court. A probable cause conference is scheduled for July 2 and a preliminary exam has been set for July 9.

Jacob Vellian has been charged and we are working with federal authorities to extradite him.

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FLAGSTAFF (AZ)
KNAU Radio

June 28, 2019

By Zac Ziegler

Of the 22 identified, 18 are dead, one is in prison for sexual abuse, and the whereabouts of three are not definitively known.

Jeff Anderson is with Anderson and Associates, the firm that released the report.

“There has not been a full accounting by the Catholic Diocese in Phoenix of all the names that should have been disclosed by the Catholic Bishops past and present.”

The Diocese of Phoenix issued a statement, saying it’s reviewing the report, and that none of the accused are in active ministry in Arizona.

It encourages victims to come forward and contact law enforcement.

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ITTLE ROCK (AR)
Bilgrimage blog

June 26, 2019

By William Lindsey

It might seem obvious that a church facing a crisis of legitimacy caused by clergy raping children would show more humility when claiming to hold ultimate truths about human sexuality.

Instead, in the past month alone, a Rhode Island bishop tweeted that Catholics shouldn’t attend gay pride events because they are “especially harmful for children”; a Vatican office issued a document that described transgender people as “provocative” in trying to “annihilate the concept of nature”; and a Catholic high school in Indianapolis that refused to fire a teacher married to a same-sex partner was told by the Archdiocese of Indianapolis that it can no longer call itself Catholic.

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PARIS (FRANCE)
LaCroix International

June 28, 2019

By Father Amado Picardal

At the root of clergy sex abuse is the “dark side” of leadership. To overcome the dark side, a priest must be aware of it and acknowledge its existence. This requires spending time in solitude, silence and prayerful reflection.

This is a time spent for examining his life and conscience. This should be done regularly and be part of the rhythm of his life. This is a time for introspection — to examine the lights and the shadows of his exercise of leadership.

This is the time to see the ulterior motives behind deeds and behavior. The question that one must constantly ask is: “Which temptation am I most vulnerable to? How far have I succumbed to the temptation of the dark side?”

Acknowledging that he is a sinner and have submitted to domination from the dark side is the first step. There is a need to recognize and struggle against his personal demons.

This requires going through a process of conversion (metanoia) — a conversion to Christ, a moral conversion — to change how he behaves and how he lives.

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Patheos blog

June 27, 2019

By Mary Pezzulo

I have just finished reading a thought-provoking book by my friend Adam A. J. DeVille.

The book is entitled Everything Hidden Shall Be Revealed: Ridding the Church of Abuses of Sex and Power. It provides some intriguing ideas on how to reform and heal the Church from the horrendous culture of abuse that we’ve seen revealed in the news again and again for a year now. Deville is an Eastern Catholic pointing out ways in which the Latin church could benefit from changing her canons to be run and disciplined more like the East, or more like the Latin Church was at some point in her past. The changes he suggests are in the bureaucracy of our church, not in her teaching. And while they are relatively drastic changes, DeVille gives very solid theological reasoning for all of them.

One of DeVille’s major premises is that the laity are not just a lesser breed of Catholic, destined only to blindly follow clerics here and there. He refers to the laity as “laics” and stresses that they themselves are ordained to a sort of priesthood– not the same as the priesthood of the clergy, but not a lesser Catholic either, only a different member of the Body of Christ. And this is something I agree with one hundred per cent. If we are ever to reform the Church and recover from the sex abuse crisis, we must end the idolatry of clericalism and the arrogant contempt that priests in general have shown for the laics.

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ROANOKE (VA)
Roanoke Times

June 28, 2019

By Andrew Adkins

The Catholic Diocese of Richmond added six priests to a list of clergy who served in the diocese and were credibly accused of sexual abuse against a minor, bringing the total to 49.

Five of the six men whose names were announced Thursday are dead, while the status of one priest is unknown, the diocese said.

The priests were accused of sexually abusing a minor either while working in the Catholic Diocese of Richmond or elsewhere. The diocese did not release specific details of the abuses “out of respect for the privacy of survivors,” the statement said.

One of the men, Patrick J. Cassidy, was a priest of the Diocese of Richmond and had nine assignments in Virginia, including Holy Comforter Catholic Church in Charlottesville, according to a list published on the diocese’s website. He was ordained in 1947 and died in 2003.

The diocese initially published the list of clergy in February. The new names were added after “additional information was brought forward and a review was completed in consultation with the Diocesan Office of Safe Environment,” it said in a statement.

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ALTOONA (PA)
Atoona Mirror

June 28, 2019

By Dave Sutor

The pastor of Prince of Peace Parish in Northern Cambria has been placed on leave from public ministry by Roman Catholic Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown Bishop Mark Bartchak.

The Rev. Donald W. Dusza, a 63-year-old Twin Rocks native, is not permitted to function as a priest while on leave. An administrator will be named for the parish.

“The action follows an accusation of sexual misconduct involving a young person,” the diocese stated in a press release. “The alleged incident dates back to the 1980s.”

A call was placed to the church for comment. A man, who did not give his name, declined to talk and suggested contacting a diocese spokesperson.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
University of Southern California
June 27, 2019

By Susan Bell

The first advice the Reverend Najuma Smith-Pollard gives male pastors is not to use terms of endearment when addressing women clergy.

“What I tell them is, number one, she’s not your baby, she’s not your boo, she’s not your sweetie-pie. She needs to be Reverend or Elder or Minister or Miss,” she said. “Recently, I’ve had pastors self-correct, so where before they would have said ‘baby,’ now they say, ‘Oh, Reverend Najuma.’”

Two years ago, Smith-Pollard, a pastor and program manager with the USC Cecil Murray Center for Community Engagement at USC Dornsife’s Center for Religion and Civic Culture (CRCC), says those conversations were not happening with anywhere near the same level of concern. The catalyst, says Smith-Pollard, whose work and expertise focuses on the African-American Church, has been the #MeToo movement, which has gathered momentum since late 2017 following the scandal surrounding widespread allegations of sexual abuse by Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein and other well-known, powerful men.

Like #MeToo, the nascent #ChurchToo movement is starting to mobilize and empower women to address long histories of abuse. Smith-Pollard says concerns are growing in the African-American church that #ChurchToo will reveal widespread sexual and physical abuse of women within the black church — revelations that, as they ripple out across congregations, could be devastating for many church communities and their leaders.

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PITTSFIELD (MA)
Berkshire Eagle

June 27, 2019

By Larry Parnass

Katherine Finn Diaz waited decades to tell her story of Catholic clergy abuse. Then she could delay no longer.

Diaz says that when she was a high school sophomore in Berkshire County in the early 1970s, the Rev. James D. McKenna lured her into a sexual relationship by plying her with alcohol. His assaults began after she volunteered to play the organ and help direct a youth choir associated with the former St. Francis Church parish in South Lee.

Over the course of 18 months in 1973 and 1974, Diaz says, McKenna regularly served her alcohol from a bar in the rectory’s living room, then pressed her to engage in sexual contact that she felt unable to fight off and now terms sexual abuse.

“He led me up the stairs and started kissing and fondling me,” Diaz said, speaking of how the assaults began.

Diaz blames her routine consumption of alcohol with McKenna for the start of a drinking problem that followed her into adulthood.

“I became an alcoholic. His purpose was to get me drunk. Very drunk. He did that every time I went to church by myself, which was every week,” Diaz said during the course of several telephone interviews from the Columbus, Ohio, area, where she lives.

The sexual contact initiated by McKenna never resulted in intercourse and was carried out while both remained dressed, said Diaz, who at the time was known as Kerry Finn.

After decades concealing what she experienced, Diaz detailed the priest’s actions in a letter last fall to the Springfield Diocese, for which McKenna served. She said she also reported McKenna’s behavior to the Berkshire District Attorney’s Office and to state police.

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HOUSTON (TX)
Houston Public Media

June 27, 2019

By Alvaro ‘Al’ Ortiz

A Montgomery County grand jury has indicted Catholic priest Manuel Antonio La Rosa-Lopez with three additional counts of child indecency, arising from child sexual abuse allegations, according to court records. La Rosa-Lopez was a priest at Conroe’s Sacred Heart Church and had already been indicted with two counts of indecency with a child.

Tyler Dunman, special crimes bureau chief at the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office, told News 88.7 Tuesday there are three victims so far.

On May 13, La Rosa-Lopez was arraigned on the two initial counts at the Montgomery County 435 District Court in Conroe and entered a not guilty plea.

The new counts against the priest are related to two acts that allegedly occurred in February 1999 and one act that allegedly occurred in June 2000.

La Rosa-Lopez was originally charged in Montgomery County on September 10, 2018. He is one of the 42 clergy included in a list of priests who have been credibly accused of sexually abusing a minor released by the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston in January.

On November 28, 2018, the Conroe Police Department, Texas Rangers, Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office and other agencies executed a search warrant at the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston.

It was the fourth search warrant executed in the joint law enforcement investigation of La Rosa-Lopez.

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LITTLE ROCK (AR)
THV11

June 27, 2019

The Catholic Diocese of Little Rock responded to a settlement between the church and five men who say they were sexually abused by a priest in the 1970s.

The victims, represented by a North Little Rock attorney, said Father John McDaniel sexually abused them when they were students at Holy Souls Catholic School located in Little Rock.

Each of the boys were between 12 and 15 years old at the time.

In a list released last year, Bishop Anthony Taylor named priests credibly accused of sexual abuse, one of the names was Father John McDaniel.

The list also urged any other victims to come forward.

The Dioceses’ statement outlines the payments it made to settle this case out of court. Diocesan Spokesperson Dennis Lee said the settlement was mediated by a mutually agreed upon third party in May.

Since there was no confidentiality agreement, the victims, the attorneys, and the church are all allowed to release details at any point.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

June 28, 2019

By John Winer

After what seemed like a brief lull, various Dioceses throughout the United States are facing a steady stream of accusations from adults who, as children, were sexually abused by clergy in the Catholic Church. And, there seems to be a great deal of willingness on the part of elected officials to help streamline the process, something that did not exist in previous generations.

Throughout the country there seems to be a reawakening of these allegations as District Attorneys in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York and elsewhere have either brought new charges or released the names of priests and others accused of child sex abuse. Archdiocese of New York named 120 clergy who were “credibly accused” of child sex abuse and a law firm released another 300 names accused of abuse in New Jersey.

There is reason to believe the California government will change the civil statute of limitations standard currently in place. The change will allow adult survivors of sexual abuse while a minor to bring claims up to their 40th birthday. At the same time, the statute of limitations for sexual abuse of adults will be changed from two years to 10 years. This will allow California sexual abuse victims to have a far larger window to bring a civil case for monetary damages.

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LITTLE ROCK (AR)
Arkansas Democrat

June 28, 2019

By Youssef Rddad

The Catholic Diocese of Little Rock confirmed Thursday night that it paid nearly $800,000 to five men who say an Arkansas priest sexually abused them when the men were boys in the early 1970s.

North Little Rock attorney Josh Gillispie filed a legal claim on behalf of the men that said the Rev. John J. McDaniel sexually abused them while the men were students at Our Lady of the Holy Souls Catholic Church in Little Rock.

Dennis Lee, a spokesman for the Diocese of Little Rock, confirmed the diocese agreed to pay $790,000 to settle the case after reaching an agreement with the men through a third-party mediator last month.

The settlement is the first publicly acknowledged payment by the Diocese of Little Rock since the diocese released a list of clergy who worked in Arkansas at some point and had credible or substantiated claims of sexual abuse against them.

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BRIDGEWATER (NJ)
Courier News

June 28, 2019

Nick Muscavage

Bishop James F. Checchio of the Diocese of Metuchen participated in a series of three separate votes to hold bishops accountable for instances of sexual abuse of children or vulnerable persons, sexual misconduct, or the intentional mishandling of such cases.

The votes, which took place June 13 at the Spring General Assembly of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in Baltimore, were based on and consistent with the new universal laws for the reporting and handling of complaints against bishops, as set forth in the Motu Proprio “Vos estis lux mundi” – or “You are the light of the world” – issued by Pope Francis in May.

The Motu Proprio is a legislative text that modifies or adds to church law, known as canon law, which applies universally to the Catholic Church throughout the world. The Holy Father’s Motu Proprio calls for a mandatory process – not voluntary – for church investigations of complaints against bishops, not just priests and deacons, for allegations of sexual abuse of a minor.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Fortune

June 27, 2019

By Mary Pilon

Jan. 24, 2018, Rachael Denhollander walked into a Michigan courtroom to speak about the sexual abuse she suffered as a child from Larry Nassar. She was the last in an extraordinary procession of nearly 150 women to offer an impact statement at the sentencing hearing of the longtime USA Gymnastics and Michigan State University doctor.

Standing at a podium facing Nassar as her words were beamed out worldwide, Denhollander, a former gymnast—and now herself an attorney, an advocate for child safety, and a 34-year-old mother of four—concluded her statement with a question:

“How much is a little girl worth?”

For decades, Nassar’s work as a doctor treating athletes at Michigan State University (MSU) and for USA Gymnastics helped give him unfettered access to girls and young women that he serially sexually abused. Since Denhollander became the first survivor to publicly accuse the doctor of abuse, in September 2016, an estimated 500 women have come forward saying that they, too, were abused by Nassar. Some experts on the case think that number could eventually pass 1,000. In July 2017, Nassar pleaded guilty to child pornography charges, and months later, he pleaded guilty to multiple counts of sexual assault of minors. He will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars. In May 2018, MSU agreed to pay a $500 million settlement to victims who had sued the university, among the largest sums ever paid in relation to sex-abuse claims.

As a consequence of that financial victory, Denhollander’s question has taken on a painfully literal meaning.

While the settlement represented the end of one long, difficult story, it signaled the beginning of another. Survivors like Denhollander have been deep in negotiations with lawyers and mediators over the disbursement of the settlement funds. In a process that involves an awkward combination of apologetic recognition, dispassionate mathematics, and, often, a torturous recounting of abuse, hundreds of women are learning what their suffering was “worth” in dollar terms.

Roughly a year into the mediation process, many of the survivors have now received their answers—in decisions about their payouts, known as allocations. For one woman, it was a low five-figure sum that will help her retire credit card debt and relocate; for another, it was an amount in the high six figures, enough to cover bills related to her mental health treatment and to enable her to work with other survivors. For a third, it’s a donation to a nonprofit she cares about. For each, the check will be worth considerably less than its face value, after taxes and attorneys’ fees. And for many, the money itself is a hurtful reminder of the abuse that took place.

The idea of a process that attaches financial value to acts of abuse is appealing to no one, presenting a challenging tangle of money, law, and trauma. Advocates and survivors are the first to say that settlements are more about a sense of justice than about money; no sum could ever compensate for the damage done. At its worst, the process can feel like an invasive haggle that reduces the experience of profound harm to a flat dollar figure. “It’s the trauma you went through, basically, being ranked against [that of] other girls,” says Grace French, a ­Nassar survivor who works in marketing and is a cofounder of the Army of Survivors, a nonprofit that helps those who have experienced abuse. “I do think a lot of girls are still struggling with that after getting that number.”

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Catholic

June 27, 2019

By Michelle Martin

A review of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s policies and procedures on the prevention of sexual abuse of minors, the way the archdiocese reports and investigates allegations and how it supports victims showed many strengths, as well some areas that could be improved.

Monica Applewhite, an internationally recognized expert on sexual abuse and the development of policies and procedures to deal with it, was hired last year to evaluate what the archdiocese has done and could do better.

The review was not sparked by any particular incident in the archdiocese, Applewhite said. Rather, she was asked to look at the systems that were in place to prevent and respond to clerical sexual abuse and suggest any further steps the archdiocese can take.

William Kunkel, the archdiocese’s general counsel, said the archdiocese has asked outside experts for help evaluating and strengthening its sexual abuse prevention and response policies since they were first instituted in 1992.

However, this was the first time a U.S. Catholic diocese has asked Applewhite for this kind of review, she said. She has worked with other dioceses on developing and implementing policies, and from 2003 to 2007 she oversaw the response to the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People by religious communities in the United States, helping them develop their own accreditation policies and directing the accreditation process.

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Patheos blog

June 27, 2019

By Deacon Greg Kandra

From press release from the Diocese of Richmond:

On the same day six names were added to the Catholic Diocese of Richmond’s list of clergy with credible and substantiated allegations of child sexual abuse, Bishop Barry C. Knestout initiated a policy directing all diocesan institutions, schools and parish buildings to only identify themselves with the following: the names of saints, the mysteries of the faith, the titles of our Lady or of our Lord, or the place where the ministry has been established. They will no longer be named after an individual bishop, pastor, founder or individual.

The policy goes into effect today, June 27, 2019.

“Overcoming the tragedy of abuse is not just about holding accountable those who have committed abuses, it is also about seriously examining the role and complex legacies of individuals who should have done more to address the crisis in real time,” said Bishop Knestout. “The continued honorific recognition of those individuals provides a barrier to healing for our survivors, and we want survivors to know that we welcome and support them in our diocese.”

Currently, the only school building, parish or diocesan location that requires a change because of this new policy is Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School located in Virginia Beach. The school returns to its former name of Catholic High School which it was named in 1993 when it moved to its Princess Anne Road location. For more on the history, founding and naming of the school, visit: https://www.chsvb.org/about/history.

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SPRINGFIELD (MA)
The Republican

June 27, 2019

By Anne-Gerard Flynn

Bishop Mitchell T. Rozanski’s recent meeting with a man who says he was sexually abused by the late Bishop Christopher Weldon may test new church guidelines on how to handle claims against a bishop, as well as deliver justice for an alleged victim.

A statement released by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield following the June 20 meeting said that the alleged victim’s remarks had been documented and an initial report filed with the Hampden County District Attorney’s Office. Further, it referenced “the courage it takes any person, including this individual, to share such a traumatic story of abuse.”

The Springfield Diocese noted that Rozanski was “seeking guidance on how this complaint should now be handled in light of the new policies and procedures agreed upon last week by the U.S. bishops but not yet implemented.”

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TORONTO (CANADA)
Catholic Register

June 27, 2019

By Michael Swan

The Vatican put a discussion about married priests on the agenda for the Oct. 6-27 Synod of Bishops for the Pan-Amazon Region. The working document for the Rome meeting calls for “ministry with an Amazonian face” and greater access to the Eucharist in remote communities that rarely see a priest.

Like the Amazon, Canada’s north faces a severe shortage of priests and a complete absence of Indigenous priests.

“The people really do appreciate the sacraments. At this point, they just can’t do that without a priest,” said Bishop Jon Hansen of the Diocese of Mackenzie-Fort Smith.

Hansen’s diocese covers 1.5 million square kilometres and 30,000 Catholics with six parishes, 27 churches and no incardinated priests. Priests currently serving in Canada’s north are on loan for periods of anywhere from six months to two years.

“So I’m constantly on the lookout,” Hansen said.

A conversation in Rome this fall about ordaining married, Indigenous priests for service in their own communities — priests who could offer the Mass fluently in Indigenous languages — has certainly perked up Hansen’s ears.

“I think it would continue to be of interest to me, so I will follow it closely,” he said.

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NEW YORK (NY)
Wall Street Journal

June 27, 2019

By Francis X. Rocca

This October, bishops meeting at the Vatican will consider the possibility of ordaining married men to serve as priests in remote parts of the Amazon region. If the Synod of Bishops recommends such a move to ease celibacy rules and Pope Francis approves, it will be the first time in a thousand years that the Roman Catholic Church has routinely ordained married men as priests.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

June 27, 2019

We applaud lawmakers in Rhode Island, especially Rep. Carol McEntee, for advancing needed reform to the civil statutes of limitations for child sexual abuse. The bill that these legislators have now forwarded to Gov. Gina Raimondo for her signature will help create safer, more informed communities in Rhode Island.

We are especially grateful to Ann Hagan Webb, a powerful speaker, advocate, and survivor whose efforts were central to the passage of this bill. Rep. McEntee, the sister of this dynamic advocate, said to the press that “this is Annie’s bill.” Ann’s willingness to share her story of abuse publicly and work with survivors and legislators was critical to building momentum for this reform and we applaud her effort.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

June 27, 2019

The Diocese of Richmond has added an additional 6 names to their list of clergy accused of abuse. We call on Bishop Barry Knestout to personally visit each parish where these men worked or spent time and urge witnesses, whistleblowers, and survivors to come forward and make a report to law enforcement.

The more information that is added to these lists, the more information that gets into the hands of parents and parishioners, leading to safer communities for children and vulnerable adults. These updates can also help bring comfort to survivors who previously may have believed they were alone. For those reasons, we are glad Richmond catholic officials have added these names. But there is still more information that is needed for these lists to be as helpful as possible.

First, the diocese should ensure that as much information related to allegations as possible is released. This includes not only names of the accused and their current status, but also a full listing of the locations they worked, a picture, and information related to when the allegations were first received and what was done in response. Similarly, these lists should be expanded and updated to include not only priests, but also deacons, nuns, bishops, or any other church staff that has been publicly accused.

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BOSTON (MA)
The Pilot

June 26, 2019

By Greg Erlandson

For those who say the Church doesn’t get it, or the Vatican doesn’t get it, I offer up Msgr. John Kennedy. Msgr. Kennedy has perhaps the most unenviable job in the Church today. He is head of the Vatican office that investigates allegations of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy.

“I can honestly tell you that when reading cases involving sexual abuse by clerics, you never get used to it, and you can feel your heart and soul hurting,” he said recently. “There are times when I am poring over cases that I want to get up and scream, that I want to pack up my things and leave the office and not come back.”

Msgr. Kennedy made this remarkable admission in a speech to a room full of Catholic communicators and journalists during the 2019 Catholic Media Conference. His speech lasted more than an hour, during which you could have heard the proverbial pin drop. At its end, he received a standing ovation.

The ovation was not for his rhetorical skills, but for his honesty. He spoke frankly about the excruciating purgatory of his work.

“One of the worst things is seeing photographs and exchanges of chats or messages that are often presented in the acts of the case,” he said. “In all honesty, this work has changed me and all who work with me. It has taken away another part of my innocence and has overshadowed me with sadness.”

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ROME (ITALY)
Crux

June 27, 2019

By Elise Harris

Italian Bishop Francesco Cavina has resigned from his post in the Diocese of Carpi following a flood of media allegations accusing him of mingling ecclesial and political affairs during the election of the city’s mayor earlier this year.

In April an article appeared in the Italian magazine L’Espresso accusing Cavina of “electoral corruption,” saying he participated in a campaign to defame his city’s mayor and accepted favors from the deputy mayor, Simone Morelli, in exchange for helping Morelli get votes from the Church.

Cavina was reportedly being investigated by police for being part of an alleged system of favors and patronage with city officials. According to the magazine, police wiretapped some 10 phone calls in which he was allegedly mingling in political affairs, ensuring a electoral victory to Morelli, who reportedly offered gifts to the Church in exchange.

The report also alleged that Cavina accepted too many gifts from faithful in his diocese, at times receiving quasi-romantic notes from a woman he reportedly referred to as ‘an angel’, and that he intervened using contacts in the Holy See to stop proceedings against a young priest accused of pedophilia.

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FLINT (MI)
Flint Journal

June 27, 2019

By Roberto Acosta

A court hearing has been postponed weeks for a former Flint-area priest accused of sexually assaulting a young boy at a Burton Catholic church.

Vincent DeLorenzo, 80, was scheduled for a probable cause conference on Thursday, June 27 in Genesee District Court after being formally arraigned last week on three counts each of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and second-degree criminal sexual conduct.

Mike Manley, DeLorenzo’s attorney, made a brief appearance in court Thursday afternoon when it was decided the hearing would be moved to early August. DeLorenzo was not in court.

The charges against DeLorenzo and four other priests were announced May 24 by Attorney General Dana Nessel.

A five or six-year old boy who attended primary school at a Catholic Church in Burton from 1995 – 2000 is the alleged victim of sexual assault by a former Flint-area priest, according to an affidavit released by the Attorney General’s Office.

The victim, listed as “John Doe” in charging documents, is not being identified.

The boy attended the primary school Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in Burton starting when he was five or six years old in 1995, when the misconduct is said to have begun. The abuse lasted for five years, according to officials.

During this time, DeLorenzo allegedly penetrated, fondled and caressed the boy during blessings and while praying, according to the affidavit. Some of the incidents are said to have taken place in the less visible areas of the Holy Redeemer Church.

In taking on the case, Manley said he’s defending DeLorenzo “to ensure he receives a fair trial.”

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PHOENIX (AZ)
Associated Press

June 27, 2019

By Bob Christie

Victims of sexual abuse and attorneys representing them on Wednesday called for the Phoenix Diocese of the Catholic church to disclose the names of all priests who have been accused of child sex crimes.

The demand came at a news conference where Minnesota-based attorney and longtime clergy abuse victim advocate Jeff Anderson released a report with the names of 109 clerics he says have been accused of crimes against children.

The Phoenix Diocese has publicly released a list of 43 names of clergy who have been “credibly accused” of abuse since the diocese was formed in 1969 and removes them from their clerical duties. Priests accused before that year are disclosed by the Tucson and Gallup, New Mexico, dioceses, which oversaw parts of the region before the new diocese was created.

The diocese said it appeared the list contained names of priests identified on its website and those maintained by other dioceses and religious orders, and that none of those identified by Anderson are in an active Phoenix-area ministry. The Associated Press located one of the names left off the Phoenix list as one maintained on a list by the Gallup diocese.

But Anderson and other advocates say the Phoenix diocese owes victims complete transparency and should disclose every name, including those that have worked for other religious orders allowed to work in the diocese.

He said he believes the diocese has underreported the number of priests who have worked and been accused of child sexual molestation.

“It is time for transparency, and it’s time for disclosure,” Anderson said. “And this is our best effort to begin the process of full disclosure here,” he said of the list he released .

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RICHMOND (VA)
WTVR TV

June 27, 2019

By Nick Boykin

Six names have been added by the Catholic Diocese of Richmond to a list of clergy who have credible and substantiated accusations of sexual abuse of a minor against them.

The six names added by the Diocese are Stanley F. Banaszek, Anthony M. Canu, Patrick J. Cassidy, Leonardo G. Mantei, Thomas D. Sykes and Vincent The Quang Nguyen. The only one not known to be dead already is Vincent The Quang Nguyen.

The list, which was first released by the Diocese in February, contains names of priests and their status in the Church. Some have passed away and others are listed as removed, laicized, convicted or suspended if their status is known.

“Back in February, when we published a list of clergy against whom there are credible and substantiated claims of child sexual abuse, we acknowledged the list would be updated,” said the Barry C. Knestout, bishop of Richmond. “As we continue to engage with survivors of abuse and learn more about the history of our diocese, we continue our commitment to transparency. It is my sincere hope that the additions of these individuals will help provide healing for anyone who suffered at their hands.”

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PHOENIX (AZ)
Phoenix Business Journal

June 27, 2019

By Tanner Puckett

Attorneys with Jeff Anderson & Associates released a report June 25 containing the names, photos and information of 109 clergy accused of sexual abuse in the Diocese of Phoenix.

“It is time for transparency, and it is time for disclosure,” said Jeff Anderson, whose Minnesota-based law firm advocates for victims of clergy sexual abuse.

“The reason why we are here today and disseminating this information is because there has not been a full accounting by the Catholic diocese in Phoenix of all the names that should have been disclosed by the Catholic bishops, past and present.”

The report includes assignment histories and details of accusations. Also included are those who were assigned to or living within the Dioceses of Gallup and Tucson before the formation of the Diocese of Phoenix in 1969.

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NEW ORLEANS (LA)
The Advocate

June 27, 2019

By Ramon Antonio Vargas

The list of Catholic clergymen who served in the Archdiocese of New Orleans and are faced with credible claims of sexually abusing minors grew by four names this week.

Robert Poandl, Christopher Springer, Lawrence Dark and Archibald McDowell were all added Monday to a list that had initially been released Nov. 2 and consisted of 55 priests as well as two deacons.

Poandl and the three others had been religious-order priests who were assigned to work in the archdiocese decades ago. While the archdiocese said it was later notified of sexual misconduct claims against them, their orders were in charge of investigating the cases and determining whether they were credible.

Archdiocesan spokeswoman Sarah McDonald said her organization was “recently” notified that the accusations against all of them had indeed been deemed credible, leading to the decision to add all four to a list which now includes 61 clergymen who are suspected of child sexual abuse.

The archdiocese didn’t further address the timing of the updates to its list. It came shortly after the nation’s Catholic bishops met in Baltimore to pursue stronger accountability and transparency on complaints pertaining to the decades-long clergy sexual abuse crisis.

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VIRGINIA BEACH (VA)
News Channel 3

June 27, 2019

By Nick Boykin

Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School in Virginia Beach will no longer have Bishop Sullivan in its name.

The move was announced by Bishop of Richmond Barry C. Knestout, who stated that the school will return to its former name of Catholic High School.

Buildings in the Diocese will now only be named after saints or titles with other Catholic meanings, not after individuals.

Catholic High School is the only building in the Diocese that currently requires a name change. “Overcoming the tragedy of abuse is not just about holding accountable those who have committed abuses, it is also about seriously examining the role and complex legacies of individuals who should have done more to address the crisis in real time,” Knestout said.

“It is my hope and prayer that the policy change is another way to assist survivors of abuse in their healing, especially those who have, in any way, experienced the failure of Church leadership to adequately address their needs and concerns,” he said.

The change comes after a push by a survivor named Thomas Lee. He’s been calling for the school’s renaming for about 10 years. He says he was abused at St. John Vianney Seminary in Goochland County by Fr. John Leonard and says Bishop Sullivan covered up facts to allow Leonard to continue to serve as a priest.

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SANTA ROSA (CA)
Press Democrat

June 26, 2019

By Mary Callahan

He left his abuser behind when he departed Hanna Boys Center, a graduate at 18, onto another life.

But the anguish of what happened — six years of sexual abuse at the hands of his case worker at the Sonoma Valley residential facility for troubled boys — nearly took him down anyway.

“It was a very, very dark feeling,” said Robert Kennedy, 25, identified until Wednesday in civil and criminal court proceedings only as a John Doe.

His abuser, Kevin Scott Thorpe, who was promoted to clinical director at Hanna months before his June 2017 arrest, is now serving 21 years in state prison in the San Joaquin Valley. Kennedy, one of his victims, kept his story to himself until coming forward two years ago, detailing his claims to law enforcement and later filing a civil suit against Thorpe.

“I felt like I was suffering in silence, and if I did speak that it wouldn’t even matter,” Kennedy said. “That’s what I kept telling myself.”

On Wednesday the Santa Rosa man spoke for the first time outside of court about his experience, standing at a press conference outside the Hanna Boys Center and later in an exclusive interview. The account he shared followed news on Tuesday that he and his brother, another of Thorpe’s victims, had reached a $6.8 million settlement in their pair of lawsuits against Hanna Boys Center and the affiliated Santa Rosa Diocese of the Catholic Church.

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

BALTIMORE (MD)
Baltimore Sun

June 27, 2019

By Betsy Schindler

I opened the Baltimore Sun recently and saw a page of articles on childhood sexual abuse. Southern Baptist Church delegates were meeting in Birmingham, Ala., to begin addressing years of sexual abuse by pastors and youth ministers. And Catholic bishops were meeting in Baltimore to discuss the next steps in addressing the ongoing problem of decades of sexual abuse. I felt exhausted by the overwhelming evidence of abuse everywhere you look, but also hopeful that finally something can be done to prevent future abuse.

I attended the Moore Center for the Prevention of Child Sexual Abuse symposium in April, and there was much discussion of prevention, but also of the lifelong damage inflicted on survivors. It was estimated that survivors spend at least $300,000 in therapy over their lifetimes, but I was thinking of the personal cost to myself.

I thought about how things could have been different if my step grandfather had never entered our family. If my family had never attended two particular churches. I imagine I wouldn’t have temporarily dropped out of college because of an eating disorder. I would have still had student loans to pay off, but maybe I would have paid them off before the age of 50, because I wasn’t spending so much money on therapy and surviving.

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

PHOENIX (AZ)
Arizona Mirror

June 26, 2019

By Jerod MacDonald-Evoy

Lawyers and victims gathered in a hotel conference room Wednesday afternoon to release a report they hope will help survivors of childhood sexual abuse by Catholic priests to come forward.

The report consists of 109 priests and other clergymen who have been accused of sexual predation in Arizona, specifically those in the Phoenix Diocese.

“It is time for transparency and it is time for disclosure,” Jeff Anderson, an attorney who has been representing victims for more than 30 years, said while introducing what he and his firm are calling the Anderson Report.

In a written statement on the press conference held by Anderson’s firm, the Phoenix Diocese encouraged victims to call local law enforcement.

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