ABUSE TRACKER

A former Lexington pastor is facing multiple sexual-related offenses after allegedly having sex with a minor for over one year, according to court documents. Zachary King, 47, is facing charges of first-degree rape, third-degree rape, first-degree sodomy, third-degree sodomy, first-degree sexual abuse and procuring or promoting the use of a minor by electronic means, according to court records. Attorney General Russell Coleman’s office confirmed King was a former executive pastor of LexCity Church.

King’s arrest citation says resigned after being confronted by church staff in reference to allegations of an inappropriate relationship with a minor. King consented to an interview with a detective and admitted to having sex with a 15-year-old minor beginning in January 2023 and lasting until April 2024. The sexual encounters happened at his home, the minor’s home and at the former pastor’s church, according to court documents. King’s arrest citation didn’t say specifically where he was…

Four Gateway Church elders, including Robert Morris’s son, have temporarily stepped down from their positions with the Dallas megachurch.

Gateway Church founder Robert Morris resigned from the church’s top position on June 18, following Cindy Clemishire’s bombshell allegations she was sexually abused by Morris in 1982 when she was 12 years old. 

Kevin Grove, Steve Dulin, Gayland Lawshe, and Pastor James Morris volunteered to take a temporary leave of absence, according to a June 28 statement on Gateway Church’s website.

The move follows the recommendation by Haynes & Boone, the law firm investigating the Morris allegations, that any elder with a potential conflict of interest step down temporarily. The recommendation applies to any elder related to Morris and elders who were on the Board from 2005 to 2007.

This is the time period when Clemishire says she reached out to Robert Morris and at least one Gateway elder about the…

Mistakes and political fights have long delayed an amendment to give sexual abuse survivors a chance to sue the perpetrators. Now, the effort might fail again.

A long-awaited constitutional amendment that would give survivors of childhood sexual abuse a chance to sue their abusers will not be on the November ballot unless lawmakers advance it in the next month.

Members of the divided legislature remain deadlocked. They broadly agree that voters should be given an opportunity to consider such a proposal, but are divided on how to advance it.

Democrats who control the state House want to send to voters a single question about opening the lawsuit window, while Republican leaders say the abuse amendment should be advanced alongside other GOP priorities, including an expanded voter ID requirement.

The issue has been before the body for nearly two decades and came tantalizingly close to reaching voters several years ago only…

Church told to pay $104 million for abuse in N.L.

The Roman Catholic Church has been ordered to pay settlements totalling $104 million to 292 survivors of historical abuse in Newfoundland and Labrador, including those at the now infamous Mount Cashel orphanage in St. John’s.

The decision Friday was met with relief, hurt and even grief by survivors who’ve endured a decades-long fight for justice, said lawyer Geoff Budden. His firm represents more than 200 survivors of abuse at the former Mount Cashel orphanage from the 1940s to the early 1960s.

“Some get validation from this,” he said in an interview. “They are happy that they were believed, that their claims were accepted and they’re going to receive compensation … but it triggers. It brings back memories, and it’s a struggle.”

And the fight is not over, he said: the church doesn’t have enough money to pay the settlements.

The…

Settlement figure is more than double what church has raised so far through property sales

A third-party insolvency monitor has put forward a sum of $104 million to pay the victims of sexual abuse by Newfoundland and Labrador clerics, but it’s not certain how much money will actually flow to hundreds of claimants. 

A four-page document filed with Newfoundland and Labrador Supreme Court by George Kinsman, a senior vice-president of Ernst & Young, puts the net claim award at $104,074,667. 

Among the 367 claims filed, 292 have already been accepted, while 65 were disallowed and 10 are considered pending. 

The document says the average payment to a claimant is $356,417. 

The document, released Friday, is the latest step in a saga that started in 1987 with charges against one priest and would expand to a series of scandals that closed the Mount Cashel orphanage in St. John’s and recently forced…

The diocese of Trier reports on the status of the processing and prevention of sexual abuse. There are some interesting figures.

Sexual abuse – Diocese of Trier pays almost 500,000 euros to victims

The Diocese of Trier paid nearly 500,000 Euro in compensation for victims of sexual abuse last year. According to the “Annual Report 2023 Prevention – Intervention – Reconciliation” presented in Trier, there were 26 requests for recognition of suffering granted. Among them were several so-called hard cases, where victims each received sums of 50,000 Euro or more.

Since the revelation of the sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church in 2010, the Diocese of Trier has paid out a total of 2.7 million Euro in compensation. The report, the second of its kind in the Diocese of Trier, also lists therapy costs for victims: These amounted to a total of approximately 143,000 Euro, of which almost…

Twin cities, Ciudad Juárez and El Paso share the pain brought by clergy sexual abuse, but their bishops’ responses are vastly different.

Although twinned by their location, the Roman Catholic dioceses of El Paso and Ciudad Juárez offer contrasting and contradictory responses to clergy sexual abuse.

In El Paso, bishop Mark Seitz published a list of clergy abusers, publicly apologized, and has compensated victims, while José Guadalupe Torres Campos harasses the victims in Ciudad Juárez.

hat Ciudad Juárez and El Paso are united by something more than the common history of the founding and the separation that came after the war of 1846-8, does not prevent their citizens from being aware of the many differences between the twin sister cities at the border.

The differences do not end or begin with language, currency, the way of measuring distances or temperatures. They can be seen dramatically in the stories of clergy…

A bill that would expand the scope of certain sexual offenses under Massachusetts law perpetrated by a health care provider or a member of the clergy is making its way through Beacon Hill.

The bill also would add rape of a patient or client by a health care provider, indecent assault and battery on vulnerable persons in law enforcement custody, and indecent assault and battery on a patient or client by a health care provider to definitions related to sexual offenders.

The Massachusetts House approved the bill last week.

The proposal comes amid cases of doctors accused of sexual abuse and the ongoing clergy sexual abuse scandal.

The bill would establish that anybody who holds themselves out to be a health care provider or clergy member, and who commits an indecent assault and battery on a patient, client or individual during diagnosis, counseling, or treatment could be punished by imprisonment for…

Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò has been declared excommunicated for schism by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. The Vatican dicastery, however, opted not to remove him from the clerical state, though canon law does not exclude that penalty.

The decision had been widely expected after the former nuncio to the United States refused to participate in the trial against him, saying that he “did not recognize the authority” of the dicastery or its prefect, Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, or Pope Francis.

The archbishop has stated that he does not recognize the legitimacy of Pope Francis and said, “I reject and condemn the scandals, errors and heresies of Jorge Mario Bergoglio,” adding, “with this ‘Bergoglian church,’ no Catholic worthy of the name can be in communion.”

The dicastery had summoned Archbishop Viganò to present himself or submit a defense on June 20 and said he had the right to appoint…

ROME (AP) — The Vatican has excommunicated its former ambassador to the U.S., Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, after finding him guilty of schism, an inevitable end for the firebrand conservative who became one of Pope Francis ‘ most ardent critics and a symbol of the polarized Catholic Church in the U.S. and beyond.

The Vatican’s doctrine office imposed the penalty after a meeting of its members on Thursday and informed Vigano of its decision Friday, a press statement said.

It cited Vigano’s “refusal to recognize and submit to the Supreme Pontiff, his rejection of communion with the members of the church subject to him, and of the legitimacy and magisterial authority of the Second Vatican Council.”

The Vatican excommunication means that Vigano is formally outside the church, and cannot celebrate or receive its sacraments, for having committed one of the gravest crimes in canon law: schism. A schism occurs when someone…

In a rare trial, the Vatican acted against Carlo Maria Viganò, a former ambassador to the U.S. and one of Pope Francis’s most vociferous internal critics.

ROME — The Vatican on Friday excommunicated Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, exacting a severe punishment on the most vociferous internal critic of Pope Francis for refusing to recognize the authority of the pope and liberal reforms made by the Roman Catholic Church since the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.

Such drastic steps are exceedingly rare in the church and illustrated the extent to which Viganò — the Vatican’s former ambassador to the United States — is perceived to have crossed a line. He has called on the pope to resign and excoriated him in harsh terms, including calling him “a servant of Satan.”

Viganò’s punishment suggests that Francis, who has faced conservative criticism since early in his papacy, may be losing patience with…

Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the disgraced former papal nuncio to the United States who questioned the legitimacy of Pope Francis and the authority of the Second Vatican Council, has been found guilty of schism and excommunicated, the Vatican announced on July 5.

“His public statements manifesting his refusal to recognize and submit to the Supreme Pontiff, his rejection of communion with the members of the Church subject to him, and of the legitimacy and magisterial authority of the Second Vatican Council are well known,” stated a Vatican bulletin that announced the ruling.

The decision of Viganò’s excommunication was widely expected following the archbishop’s June 20 announcement that he had been charged with schism by the Dicastery for the Doctrine for the Faith and that he would not be cooperating with the Vatican penal process.

At the time, Viganò said he would not comply with the…

The Vatican doctrine office announced Friday that it had found Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò guilty of the canonical crime of schism and declared his automatic excommunication.

A July 5 statement from the Holy See press office said that the verdict of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) was reached on Thursday and communicated to the former papal nuncio to the United States Friday.

The statement said: “On 4 July 2024, the congress of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith met to conclude the extrajudicial penal process referred to in canon 1720 CIC against the Most Reverend Carlo Maria Viganò, titular Archbishop of Ulpiana, accused of the reserved delict of schism (canons 751 and 1364 CIC; art. 2 SST).”

“His public statements manifesting his refusal to recognize and submit to the Supreme Pontiff, his rejection of communion with the members of the Church subject to him, and…

The Vatican has officially excommunicated Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith announced Friday.

Viganò was found guilty of the canonical crime, or delict, of schism, or the refusal to submit to the pope or the communion of the Church, at the conclusion of the Vatican’s extrajudicial penal process on July 4.

The Vatican’s doctrine office announced the “latae sententiae” excommunication (automatic excommunication) on July 5, citing Viganò’s “public statements manifesting his refusal to recognize and submit to the Supreme Pontiff, his rejection of communion with the members of the Church subject to him, and of the legitimacy and magisterial authority of the Second Vatican Council.”

The former papal nuncio to the United States is now excommunicated, the most serious penalty a baptized person can incur, which consists of being placed outside the communion of the faithful of the Catholic…

Zachary King, pastor at multiple megachurches including LexCity in Kentucky has been charged with rape and sexual abuse of a minor.

The 47-year-old was arrested on Monday.

According to the office of Attorney General of Kentucky, Russell Coleman, King was booked in the Fayette County Detention Center and charged with several offences including rape, sexual assault and procuring or promoting use of minor by electronic means. 

King has reportedly resigned from Lexington City Church after members confronted him about the allegations.

At his arraignment on Tuesday, despite his lawyer asking for a $50,000 bond for his release the judge ordered it be $250,000 which he will have to pay 10% of.

Local news site Lex18.com reported that King confessed in an interview with Coleman’s office that he “engaged in a sexual relationship with a minor over the course of the last year and a half”, adding that it had begun when she was 15 in January 2023 and…

A recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling in a pharma case could have major effects on a New York diocese’s negotiations for bankruptcy and clergy sex abuse settlements.

The Rochester Beacon reported that the Diocese of Rochester filed for bankruptcy nearly five years ago in response to New York’s Child Victims Act, which removed the statute of limitations on childhood sexual abuse cases for two years. 

The Act resulted in roughly 485 claims in the Diocese’s bankruptcy filed by people who maintain they were sexually abused by clergy or other Church officials when they were children.

Since filing for bankruptcy, the Diocese has been involved in years of negotiations and discussions to settle the child sex abuse claims, but a June 27 U.S. Supreme Court case that blocked OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma’s bankruptcy plan could affect how the Diocese proceeds with its own bankruptcy reorganization plans…

The changes come as the denomination prepares to welcome a new presiding bishop with a history of bringing abuse to light.

As it elected Bishop Sean Rowe its new presiding bishop at last week’s General Convention in Louisville, Kentucky, the Episcopal Church adopted more than 20 resolutions related to Title IV, a section of the church bylaws that governs its response to allegations against clergy of abuse or misconduct.

Over the past year, a spate of public Title IV cases prompted concerns about the complexity and effectiveness of the denomination’s approach to clergy discipline, particularly in cases involving bishops’ decisions or misconduct of their own. Less than two weeks before General Convention, the denomination disclosed that three of the five presiding bishop nominees had faced current or prior Title IV complaints. (Rowe was one of the two nominees not listed in the disclosure.)

“There’s been a lot of activity and action of…

The Archbishop of Canterbury has withdrawn an award given to Soul Survivor founder Mike Pilavachi after an investigation upheld safeguarding concerns.

Pilavachi received the Archbishop’s Lambeth Award in 2020 in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to evangelism and discipleship amongst young people in the United Kingdom”.

The Soul Survivor movement was founded by Pilavachi in 1993 and reached thousands of young people each year with its summer music festivals. 

Giving the award four years ago, Archbishop Justin Welby said Pilavachi had “shaped a spirituality and discipleship for generations of young people in which the primacy of worship, evangelism, provision for the poor, ministry in the power of the Holy Spirit and a love for scripture are non-negotiable”.

“This award for evangelism recognises that, above all, Soul Survivor has been the place where tens of thousands of young people have found faith. What is more, Mike has exercised this ministry with exemplary…

The Vatican’s Dicastery for Communications are digesting a robust rebuke by the Pope’s key point-man on clerical sexual abuse, the steely Irish American Cardinal Seán Patrick O’Malley OFM Cap.

Last week, the head of the Vatican’s communications department Paolo Ruffini strongly defended the continued use by his office of the art work of Jesuit artist Marko Rupnik who has been accused of appalling crimes of abuse against adult females.  His case is being investigated by the Vatican’s DDF.  The use of the art is highly contentious given victims say it’s a continuation of the abuse and a reminder of it.

In what seasoned PR professionals could only describe as a car crash intervention, Mr Ruffini told journalists that discontinuing the use of Fr Rupnik’s art of the Holy See’s website “is not a Christian response”.

“As Christian[s], we are asked not to judge,” he said, asking the journalists: “Do you…

The Catholic leader responsible for a world-famous and much beloved Marian healing shrine in France has ordered measures to lower the visibility of mosaic artwork by an accused serial rapist, but has stopped short — for the time being — of ordering the removal of the art.

Father Marko Rupnik is accused of abusing dozens of victims — most of them women religious — over several decades, much of which he spent in Rome at the Centro Aletti art institute he founded in the early 1990s.

Rupnik’s accusers say the removal of Rupnik’s art from places of worship is necessary because the abuse they suffered was part of Rupnik’s “creative” artistic process, making the art particularly ill-suited to sacred space.

Other victims of sexual abuse say the presence of art bearing the signature of a notorious abuser — especially one who escaped justice for so long as Rupnik did —…

The former Jesuit priest is under Vatican investigation after having been accused by women of spiritual and sexual abuse

As the commission discerning whether Father Marko Rupnik’s mosaics stay or go from the facade of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary in the French sanctuary of Lourdes completed its work, no definitive decision was reached.

For now, the mosaics will stay, the sanctuary announced July 2, but “it will eventually be necessary” to remove them, the bishop of Lourdes told La Croix.

At the same time, artwork by the priest, who is under Vatican investigation after having been accused by between 20 and 40 women of spiritual and sexual abuse, with accusations made public in 2022, is still being installed around the world.

In France, the commission on the Rupnik art was established in 2023 by Bishop Jean-Marc Micas of Tarbes and Lourdes and included a prosecutor, a…

While opinions divide on the future of the works of mosaic priest Marko Rupnik, accused of sexual abuse, columnist Katie Prejean recounts what she did with a work by the artist she purchased by mistake.

I accidentally bought a piece of Marko Rupnik art while in Rome last month.

I saw a lovely Divine Mercy medal in a gift shop right by my hotel, and priced at only eight euro, it seemed like a steal. I’ve long had a devotion to the Divine Mercy, I did not have a medal to wear on the chain around my neck, and I thought it’d be appropriate to add one while on this trip to Rome for the World Meeting of Human Fraternity.

An hour later, as I was adding the medal to my chain, I took it out of the small display box and realized, to my horror, that on the back of…

Bishop Advocates for Removal of Marko Rupnik’s Art in Lourdes Amid Abuse Allegations

In response to allegations of abuse against the artist Marko Rupnik, the Bishop of Lourdes has expressed a personal stance favoring the removal of Rupnik’s mosaics from the revered sanctuary. This perspective aims to respect and support the victims of the alleged abuses by the former Jesuit.

Bishop Jean-Marc Micas of the Diocese of Tarbes and Lourdes released a statement on July 2, 2024, highlighting the sensitive issue of retaining Rupnik’s artwork, which is prominently displayed at the entrance of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary.

The bishop underscored the pain and trauma that these mosaics evoke for the victims, citing that many have voiced their distress over the artworks’ continued presence.

In the statement, Bishop Micas recounted the formation of a commission between May and October of the previous year. This commission, comprising abuse…

Earlier today, Bishop Jean-Marc Micas of the Diocese of Tarbes et Lourdes issued a statement announcing that after months of consultation he has reached the decision to take down the mosaics designed by former Jesuit and alleged abuser Fr. Marko Rupnik that appear at the entrance of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary in Lourdes. Since revelations about allegations against Rupnik for perpetrating sexual abuse — against as many as two dozen women — became public in late 2022, Catholics have debated what to do regarding his artwork, which is displayed in many prominent churches and shrines around the world.

Many observers looked to Lourdes to make the “first move,” and today they did, although Bishop Micas did not set a timetable for the removal of the art, and indicated that his arrival at the decision was the beginning of a process. As a “first step,”…

FAIRFIELD, Connecticut – As the Catholic leader responsible for a world-famous and much beloved Marian healing shrine in France continues to seek consensus over the removal of artwork by an accused serial abuser, two Catholic institutions in the U.S. state of Connecticut are among the scores of Church organizations faced with the question: What to do with the art produced by Father Marko Rupnik and his Centro Aletti art studio in Rome?

Rupnik is accused of psychologically, spiritually, and sexually abusing dozens of victims—most of them women religious—over some thirty years, many of which he spent in Rome at the Centro Aletti art institute he founded with the blessing of Pope St. John Paul II in the early 1990s.

Shrines and chapels and other sacred spaces from Lourdes to Springfield Lakes, Australia—and more than two hundred other places in between, including the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican—have over the past thirty years availed themselves…

[Watch video.]

A Newshub investigation into historic allegations of abuse at a Catholic-run orphanage in Upper Hutt has led to revelations the church has already upheld a separate complaint against one of the priests accused. 

The church is currently investigating Steve Carvell’s complaint that alleges he was abused when he was 7-year-old by two priests at St Joseph’s Orphanage in the 1970s. 

Newshub has learned another complaint about Father Noel Donoghue went to the church in 2006 and was investigated. 

And now a third person has come forward alleging he too was abused by Donoghue. 

It was two grainy black-and-white images of Father Noel Donoghue broadcast on Newshub in March which immediately triggered a strong reaction from a man who Newshub has agreed not to identify.  

“Yeah, that horrifies me,” he told Newshub looking at the historical photo of Donoghue.   

“It sent a shiver up my spine, because as…

The pastor of a Kentucky megachurch was arrested Monday for rape and sexual abuse of a minor, according to a press release from the Kentucky Attorney General’s Office.

Zachary King, 47, served as the executive pastor at LexCity Church in Lexington, Kentucky, the Attorney General’s Office said. He resigned from the church, after being confronted by church staff regarding allegations that he had an inappropriate relationship with a minor, according to an arrest citation obtained by Lex 18 News and other news sites.

According to LinkedIn, King previously served as a campus pastor at Metropolitan Baptist Church (The MET) in Houston and as a youth pastor and Central Team Leader at Lifechurch.tv, developing and training youth staff.

The Roys Report (TRR) reached out to LexCity Church for comment and further information but did not hear back prior to…

Father Marko Rupnik’s mosaics will not be immediately removed from the facade of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary in Lourdes (France), but it will eventually be necessary to do it, the Bishop of Lourdes said. Meanwhile, the artwork will no longer be highlighted.

A year and a half ago, Bishop Jean-Marc Micas of Lourdes initiated a reflection group to consider the fate of the mosaics in the Basilica of the Rosary at the heart of the Marian sanctuary.

Should this monumental work by priest-artist Father Marko Rupnik, now accused by several women of multiple sexual abuses, be removed or retained?

In this exclusive interview with La Croix‘s Heloïse de Neuville, Bishop Micas revealed his deep conviction and reflected on the long discernment process that led him to an intermediate solution at this stage.

La Croix: From May to October 2023, as Bishop of Lourdes, you launched a reflection group to…

The decision by the Diocese of Lourdes to stop highlighting the works of Slovenian artist Father Marko Rupnik that adorn the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes was praised by women victims July 3. However, they are calling for additional measures.

Women accusing Slovenian priest and mosaic artist Father Marko Rupnik of sexual assault applauded the July 3 decision by the Diocese of Tarbes-Lourdes to no longer illuminate his works adorning the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes while demanding for more action.

Bishop Jean-Marc Micas of Tarbes-Lourdes announced that the mosaics of the famed Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes in southwest France, created by Father Rupnik, would “no longer be highlighted,” pending a definitive solution. Until now, the mosaics were featured in “light shows during the Marian procession that gathered pilgrims every evening,” the bishop explained.

In a letter, the Italian lawyer for the five accusers, Laura Sgro, welcomed…

The bishop of Lourdes said Tuesday that he personally believes that the Marian shrine’s mosaics by alleged abuser Father Marko Rupnik should be removed but is holding off on making a final decision on the mosaics’ fate in the face of “strong opposition.”

Bishop Jean-Marc Micas of Tarbes and Lourdes issued a statement on July 2 explaining that more time is needed “to discern what should be done,” as his belief that Rupnik’s mosaics should be torn down “would not be sufficiently understood” and “would add even more division and violence” at this moment. 

For now, as a “first step,” the French bishop has decided that Rupnik’s mosaics will no longer be lit up at night during the Lourdes’ nightly candlelight rosary processions with pilgrims.

The Lourdes bishop’s announcement comes less than two weeks after he met with Pope Francis in a private audience at the Vatican on…

A French bishop has put off any decision on whether to remove mosaics by an ex-Jesuit artist accused of abusing women, saying that they’ll stay for now on the Lourdes shrine but that eventually they should be removed.

The mosaics will no longer be lit up each night during the evening prayer, Lourdes Bishop Jean-Marc Micas said in a statement Tuesday. But he told the French Catholic daily La Croix that he had decided not to remove them now because he didn’t want to “tear the church apart.”

“My deep, formed, intimate conviction is that they will one day need to be removed: they prevent Lourdes from reaching all the people for whom the sanctuary’s message is intended,” Micas was quoted as saying. “But I have decided not to remove them immediately, given the passions and violence the subject incites.”

The Rev. Marko Rupnik has been accused by over 20 women of…

Father Bouchard is no longer on administrative leave and his good name will be restored

NEWS RELEASE
July 1, 2024

Contact: Dennis Biviano, PR & Media Specialist, (330) 744-8451, ext. 320; dbiviano@youngstowndiocese.org

The Very Reverend William Lawrence, Provincial Superior of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter, has reported to the Diocese of Youngstown that an Independent Review Board found no sufficient evidence to proceed with criminal action in the matter of accusations against Father Denis Bouchard.

Father Bouchard, the former pastor of Queen of the Holy Rosary Parish, was placed on leave in 2018 after a man accused Bouchard of sexual abuse when he was a child. The jury rendered a verdict in Father Bouchard’s favor on the claims for civil assault, civil battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

The investigation is now closed, Father Bouchard is no longer on administrative leave and his good name is restored. Father Bouchard will return…

YOUNGSTOWN − A Catholic priest under investigation since 2018 has been cleared of accusations of sexual abuse.

The Very Rev. William Lawrence, provincial superior of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter, has reported to the Catholic Diocese of Youngstown that an independent review board found no sufficient evidence to proceed with criminal action in the matter of accusations against the Rev. Denis Bouchard.

A former pastor of Queen of the Holy Rosary parish in Vienna, Ohio, Bouchard was placed on leave in 2018 after a man accused Bouchard of sexual abuse when he was a child.

The board rendered a verdict in Bouchard’s favor on the claims for civil assault, civil battery andintentional infliction of emotional distress.

The investigation is now closed and Bouchard is no longer on administrative leave. He will return to his provincial headquarters and receive a new assignment.

(ANALYSIS) When members of the Society of Jesus gather at Borgo Santo Spirito, their headquarters near the Vatican, they worship surrounded by the relics of Jesuit saints and works of sacred art.

This includes the work of Father Marko Ivan Rupnik, who the Jesuits expelled in June 2023 after long investigations into allegations that he sexually and emotionally abused as many as 30 women in religious orders. The Vatican excommunicated the Slovenian priest in 2020 — but quickly withdrew that judgment.

Some abuse, according to alleged victims, took place while nuns were serving as models for Rupnik’s art.

The question the Vatican should answer, according to the leader of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, is whether it’s time to remove Rupnik’s art from Vatican websites and publications, as well as holy sanctuaries.

“We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological…

VATICAN CITY, July 3 (Reuters) – The sanctuary of Lourdes, one of the world’s most popular Catholic pilgrimage sites, will not for the moment remove mosaics made by a prominent Slovenian Jesuit priest accused of sexual abuse, the local bishop said in an interview.

Father Marko Ivan Rupnik, whose mosaics adorn about 200 churches and chapels around world as well as the Vatican, has been accused of sexual and psychological abuse by about 20 people, mostlyformer nuns.

Rupnik has not commented on the allegations. The Jesuits last year called them “very highly” credible and expelled him. Both the order, to which Pope Francis belongs, and the Vatican have launched internal investigations.

The Rupnik mosaics adorning the facade of Lourdes’ Rosary Basilica “will one day need to be removed”, Lourdes Bishop Jean-Marc Micas said in an interview with French Catholic newspaper La Croix published on Tuesday.

The mosaics “prevent Lourdes from…

Seven Native American tribes in Arizona and New Mexico should soon receive official notice explaining how tribal members who are clergy sex abuse survivors can file claims against the Franciscan Province of St. Barbara in its Chapter 11 case now wending its way through U.S. Bankruptcy Court.

The province, through its civil entity the Franciscan Friars of California, Inc., filed for bankruptcy protection Dec. 31, 2023, exactly one year after California’s most recent “lookback window” for filing sex abuse claims closed. The province, which covers the western U.S., was facing 94 new abuse claims, most filed in California, Franciscan Fr. David Gaa, the provincial minister, stated in a court filing Jan. 8.

“To date, 59 current or former friars associated with the Debtor have been accused of childhood sexual abuse in the states of Arizona, California, Idaho, Missouri, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington,”…

An Indigenous image of Jesus Christ by an acclaimed iconographer has been removed from a New Mexico church for unspecified reasons, days after the U.S. bishops approved a pastoral framework for Indigenous ministry.

Painted by Franciscan Friar Robert Lentz, “Apache Christ” is an 8-foot icon depicting Jesus as a Mescalero holy man, with the inscription in Apache “giver of life.” Since 1989 it had hung behind the altar of the church under a crucifix.

This image and a painting of Apache dancers by the late Apache artist Gervase Peso were taken down from the interior walls of St. Joseph Apache Mission in Mescalero, New Mexico, sometime during the evening of June 26 and the early morning hours of June 27.

The parish is located on the lands of the Mescalero Apache Tribe.

The discovery was made by parish staff and volunteers as they opened the church for use in catechetical…

As accusations of sexual abuse have mounted against Slovenian Father Marko Rupnik, his art has come under a microscope, and recently attentive observers noted a curiosity – the face of the artist himself, along with two of his closest friends and allies, appears in an obscure section of perhaps his most famous work.

Rupnik’s giant mosaic in the Vatican’s Redemptoris Mater Chapel, sometimes dubbed the “Sistine Chapel” of the late Pope John Paul II, according to an inscription above the door, was installed by the Rupnik-founded, Rome-based Centro Aletti in 1999, and blends eastern and western motifs in depicting the history of salvation.

Rupnik, 69, whose famed murals adorn chapels and cathedrals around the world, including inside the Vatican and at the Marian shrine of Lourdes, is accused of sexually abusing at least 30 adult women, many of them nuns belonging to the Loyola Community he helped found in his native Slovenia…

Robert Morris, former senior pastor of the prominent nondenominational Gateway Church headquartered in Southlake, Texas, resigned two weeks ago after Cindy Clemishire accused him of molesting her for four years, beginning when she was 12. The case has prompted calls for reforms not only in the church but at the state Capitol.

“These actions demand public exposure, should never be tolerated, and any person who harms a child should and must be held accountable,” said Texas state Rep. Nate Schatzline, a Fort Worth Republican whose district neighbors Southlake, on Monday. “I will continue to speak the truth regardless of who it affects, and I will continue to advocate for legislation that protects children from abuse.”

State Rep. Jeff Leach, a conservative Christian who chairs the powerful Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence Committee, told the political newsletter Quorum Report that he plans to hold hearings and…

A Catholic school teacher who abused a student ate dinner at her victim’s home to gain the trust of the teenager’s family.

Victorian woman Michelle Grant, 62, was sentenced to six months in prison for the shocking abuse of the St Columba’s College Essendon pupil in the early 1990s.

On one occasion, during a ‘sleep over’, Grant and the student watched what the County Court heard was a ‘lesbian movie’ and kissed on the couch.

The art and textiles teacher then copied the scenes of the film and sexually abused the teenager, the Herald Sun reported. 

Grant taught at the school from the 1980s until she was fired in 2022, groomed the girl from the age of 14 and wrote letters telling her she loved her.

As their ‘intimacy grew’, the teacher, who was married at the time, drew the victim who was nude and told a ‘web of…

Former Montreal priest and convicted sex offender Brian Boucher remains unrepentant as he prepares to leave prison this month, says the bishop instrumental is bringing him to justice.

While he was denied parole at his June 25 parole board hearing — according to the board report, parole was denied because Boucher refuses to admit to the crimes for which he was sentenced — Boucher is eligible for statutory release in July as he has served two-thirds of his eight-year sentence.

Boucher, 62, was convicted in March 2019 of sexually abusing two teenage boys while a priest in Montreal.

Sault Ste. Marie Bishop Thomas Dowd told The Catholic Register that Boucher “categorically denied that his original crimes ever happened.” Dowd, who while serving as auxiliary bishop in Montreal, attended the former priest’s parole board hearing.

Dowd recounted that when Boucher was asked why he had pled guilty, he replied, “I was advised to do…

Archbishop Etienne argues in court brief that the state has no right to investigate sexual abuse or financial mismanagement  

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: JULY 1, 2024

Earlier this afternoon, Archbishop Paul D. Etienne of Seattle submitted his opposition to Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s petition to compel the archdiocese to cooperate with the AGO’s subpoenas demanding abuse-related documents from Washington State’s three Catholic dioceses.

The AGO filed subpoenas on the basis of the Charitable Trust Act (CTA), which gives the Washington State Attorney General the authority to “facilitate public supervision” of public charitable trusts…and to clarify and implement the powers and duties of the attorney general.” Ferguson argues that criminal activity is not a protected activity under the CTA.

Archbishop Etienne argues that Attorney General Ferguson has no authority to investigate any part of the functioning of the Catholic Church – even when their patterns and practices include concealing and enabling sexual…

When I first learned that Father Marko Rupnik had been credibly accused of serial sexual abuse, in particular of religious sisters, it took me several days to process the news. Years before, I had been in formation for religious life myself and had read his book on discernment. It had a significant impact on my own understanding of hearing God’s voice.

The thought that this priest, with his easily recognizable mosaics that cover churches and chapels in the United States, Lourdes, Rome and throughout the world, had been using his position of spiritual power to abuse women was crushing.

The Vatican has been slow to take action in the case of Father Marko Rupnik. Initially, they said that they could not do anything because of the statute of limitations, although Pope Francis eventually removed that obstacle. Then, the Jesuits expelled Rupnik from their order, citing “disobedience,” but he was welcomed…

Father Denis Bouchard, the former pastor off Queen of the Holy Parish, was placed on leave in 2018 after a man accused Bouchard of sexual abuse when he was a child. 

A priest from Vienna that was accused of sexually abusing a man while he was a child has been reinstated.

This comes after an independent review board found no sufficient evidence to proceed with criminal action against Father Denis Bouchard, according to a news release from the Catholic Diocese of Youngstown.

Bouchard, the former pastor off Queen of the Holy Parish, was placed on leave in 2018 after a man accused Bouchard of sexual abuse when he was a child. 

In a civil suit that was filed in 2019, a jury sided with Bouchard on claims of civil assault, civil battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress against the accuser.

However they did not find that Bouchard was defamed by…

As the Archdiocese of New York and its insurance company, Chubb, battle over who is responsible for millions in potential payouts to survivors of clergy sexual abuse, a new group has entered the picture.

Announcing its presence in November with a full page ad in The New York Times, the Coalition for Just and Compassionate Compensation, which describes itself as an “alliance of survivors of child abuse and their advocates committed to ensuring that survivors receive the restitution that they deserve,” called on Chubb to stop fighting its responsibility in court and said its behavior was “callous.”

But in letters obtained by the New York Daily News, Chubb says it is, in fact, the archdiocese that’s being callous — all but accusing the coalition of being in cahoots with the archdiocese amid efforts to pressure the insurer to pay up.

Both the Archdiocese of New York and the coalition deny…

The latest Catholic commotion is over the Vatican’s promotion of an accused abuser priest’s art.

Not long ago, the Vatican’s chief spokesman told 350 media professionals that Vatican media would still use art by Fr. Marko Ivan Rupnik, 69, currently under investigation for accusations of abusing women religious.

Paolo Ruffini, 67, prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for Communication, defended the official use of art by the accused serial rapist at the annual meeting of the Catholic Media Association in Atlanta. In Rupnik’s  defense and by comparison, Ruffini asked the roomful of media professionals, “What about Caravaggio?”

What about him?

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was a philandering reprobate who produced stunning art. By an extraordinary use of light and dark, his paintings present a realistic view of what it means to be human, drawing the viewer into the deep human emotions he so realistically portrayed.

After killing a rich gangster, Ranuccio…

Just one day after the news that hundreds of thousands of Catholics left the Church in Germany in 2023, the Vatican met with representatives of the German Synodal Way to discuss the controversial plans for a permanent synodal council.

The meeting on Friday resulted in Rome demanding the Germans change the name of the body and agree it cannot have authority over — or be equal to — the bishops’ conference, reported CNA Deutsch, CNA’s German-language news partner.

The gathering came at a critical time: According to the official statistics released by the German Bishops’ Conference on Thursday, more than 400,000 people officially left the Church in 2023.

While this represents a decrease from the 522,000 departures in 2022, the trend remains alarming for Church leaders and Catholics alike.

Currently, there are 20,345,872 Catholics registered in Germany. If trends persist, the number…

Having nothing in particular against the Latin Mass, and no real opinion on the Norvus Ordo (beyond believing it could be vastly improved with the inclusion of a melodic and singable “Gloria” over the truly awful vernacular versions served up in these parts), I leave the debate on Extraordinary or Ordinary liturgical forms for others. For me, all Masses are good; may their numbers increase and may others fight about it and leave me to my prayers, devotions and faith-based interests and outreaches, Amen.

That said, the words “diabolical disorientation” have lately been a distraction.

I’d heard the phrase uttered years ago, by someone using the prophecies of Fatima to argue with me about the validity of the Second Vatican Council and the “new Mass.” His arguments, though passionate, did not persuade, but the alliterative phrase struck me as something worth remembering, especially as the world began a full-on embrace…

A former youth pastor has been charged with assaulting a minor as part of a state investigation into clergy and faith leader abuse in Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Department of Justice said in a release that James Lane, 52, was charged with one count of repeated sexual assault of a child for incidents dating back to 2002 and 2003. An arrest warrant for Lane has been issued.

Lane, of Colorado, was a youth pastor at the Faith Reformed Church in Wisconsin Rapids at the time, a part of the Alliance of Reformed Churches.

The assaults occurred when the victim was 14 and 15 years old, according to the complaint. He once assaulted her in a car while driving her home and other times in his office.

When investigators interviewed Lane, he said he had a “relationship” with a girl in the youth group that got “inappropriate,” the complaint says. He recalled…

• Unlike the debate regarding clergy sexual abuse in California, on the other side of the fence, in the Mexican Californias, there is a deceitful tranquility.
• It is not that Mexico is free from clergy sexual abuse; it is that neither the Church, nor the government are willing to go deep into the issue.
• Despite the alleged existence of a “lay State” in Mexico, churches are under no pressure to report clergy sexual abuse much less to compensate the victims of it.

Last week Los Ángeles Press published a story on the wave of bankruptcies after the clergy sexual abuse crisis in California. On the surface, having half of the Roman Catholic dioceses in that state seeking the protection of Chapter 11, tells a story of turmoil.

But looks can be deceiving. As that story, linked immediately after the next paragraph stresses, the bankruptcies are from cases going back to the 20th…

ROME – Almost three decades after her death, Saint Teresa of Kolkata, commonly and affectionately referred to as “Mother Teresa,” remains an international icon of charity and among the most beloved figures in the world, probably the Catholic Church’s most celebrated 20th century personality who wasn’t a pope.

Named Time’s “Person of the Year” in 1975, Mother Teresa also founded a religious order, the Missionaries of Charity, which has become one of the Catholic Church’s most celebrated institutions, almost universally hailed for its service to the “poorest of the poor.”

Yet despite the society’s international fame, some former members have recounted a shadow side. They describe an internal culture at times marked by abuse and neglect, characterized by what they call a personalistic and pre-Vatican II style of leadership.

These former members, some of whom left decades ago and others who exited more recently, assert the order occasionally exhibits dynamics sadly…

Calls to remove the artwork of alleged abuser Father Marko Rupnik are growing — and clerical abuse survivors told OSV News the issue speaks volumes about how the church views them and their pain.

On June 28, letters were sent to bishops throughout the world by five women alleging abuse by Father Rupnik, describing the retention of the ex-Jesuit’s works in churches and shrines as “inappropriate” and wounding to victims. The priest was expelled from the Jesuits for disobedience in 2023 after the order compiled a 150-page dossier of credible accusations against him, believed to involve between 20 to 40 women.

In a separate June 26 communication, Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley of Boston, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, told the dicasteries of the Vatican Curia that Father Rupnik is currently under Vatican investigation and entitled to the presumption of innocence. However, he made clear that…

Balash will serve as pro tem administrator effective immediately until Sept. 9.

The Catholic Diocese has announced the Very Reverend Micael D. Balash will temporarily replace Father Michael Swierz at Saint Patrick’s in Hubbard amid investigations into Swierz’s past.

Effective immediately, Balash will serve as pro tem administrator until Sept. 9. This is in addition to his responsibilities as Vicar for the Clergy and Religious Services, director for the Office of Worship and sacramental minister at Trumbull North Parishes.

A native of Hubbard, Balash went to St. Patrick School and Hubbard High School. He later earned his master’s in Divinity and master of arts in Biblical Studies at St. Mary’s of the West in Cincinnati.

He was ordained in 1987.

After Sept. 9, Reverend John Rovnak will become the parish’s administrator. Rovnak currently serves as the parochial vicar at Holy Family Parish in Poland and Saint Paul Parish in New Middletown.

Rovnak…

“We believed in our case. I want to recognize the victim’s courage to come into court to testify, and we respect the jurors’ verdict.”

A Cap Cod priest who was accused of two counts of rape between 2005 and 2008 has been found not guilty by a Barnstable Superior Court jury.

The priest, Mark Hession, served as the parish priest for Our Lady of Victory in Centerville from 2000 to 2014, according to The Cap Cod Times.

He pleaded not guilty to all charges on the 2021 indictment, including one count of assault and battery on a child under 14, alleged to have happened in 2002, according to the paper.

On the assault and battery charge, the jury couldn’t reach a verdict last week, according to reports. Judge Mark C. Gildea declared a mistrial, according to the news publication.

The jury deliberated for five days…

I was surprised to see Chesterfield, Missouri, mentioned as I scrolled through my social media.

I was even more surprised to see that they were in the news because a Catholic parish there was supposedly organizing an armed militia. And the whole story, or at least what we know of it right now, is even more complicated than that.

Yesterday on X/Twitter, Laura Burkhardt, a Missouri resident and a volunteer for Moms Demand Action, tweeted out a thread about a very odd advertisement that appeared in the bulletin for Ascension Catholic Parish in Chesterfield, Missouri. The thread starts off with two screenshots. The first is the cover of the bulletin, an ordinary church bulletin like every one I’ve ever seen. The bulletin boasts that the parish is 100 years old and they have an adoration chapel where the Divine Mercy Chaplet is prayed every afternoon. Seems like a nice…

A Florida pastor was arrested and charged with four counts of possession of child pornography on Friday (June 21). Jonathan Elwing, now-formerly of Palm View First Baptist Church in Palmetto, Florida, resigned from the church before being taken into custody. 

Elwing was arrested after an investigation revealed that he allegedly used cryptocurrency to purchase child sex abuse material. Law enforcement executed a search warrant on Friday at the church and Elwing’s home and found child sex abuse material on Elwing’s phone.

In response to the shocking news, Larry Bianchi, the chair of Palm View’s deacon board, told WWSB that “the people of the church are the church.”

“The pastor may be the front man, he may be the leader of the church—and we need a new one,” Bianchi said. “But Palm View Baptist Church will go on because of the strength of the congregation.”

The congregation is affiliated…

The scandal over a famous ex-Jesuit artist who is accused of psychologically, spiritually and sexually abusing adult women came to a head Friday after some of his alleged victims and the Pope’s own anti-abuse adviser asked for his artworks not to be promoted or displayed.

The separate initiatives underscored how the case of Rev Marko Rupnik, whose mosaics grace some of the Catholic Church’s most-visited shrines and sanctuaries, continues to cause a headache for the Vatican and Pope Francis, who as a Jesuit himself has been drawn into the scandal.

Early Friday, five women who say they were abused by Rupnik sent letters to Catholic bishops around the world asking them to remove his mosaics from their churches, saying their continued display in places of worship was “inappropriate” and retraumatising to victims.

Separately, Cardinal Sean O’Malley, head of the Pope’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, sent his own letter…

The Capuchin Franciscan made his mark effectively responding to a sexual abuse scandal in Boston that had worldwide repercussions.

Cardinal Seán Patrick O’Malley, the Archbishop of Boston, turns 80 on June 29 and is therefore no longer able to vote in a papal conclave.

Yet the cardinal continues in key roles five years past the mandatory retirement age of bishops, a sign of Pope Francis’ esteem for the Capuchin Franciscan.

In addition to heading one of the United States’ most significant archdioceses, Cardinal O’Malley is president of the Vatican’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, which has been meeting since May 2014, and is an original member of the Council of Cardinals, an influential body formed in 2013 to advise Pope Francis on the reform of the Roman Curia and other matters.

A public letter

O’Malley, who appears in public wearing the brown robe of his Capuchin…

The Victorian regional city has endorsed a design for a memorial to survivors of sexual violence, and to recognise historic abuse by Catholic clergy

Ballarat is a city of grand churches. Even without the ribbons of survivors tied on the fences, it’s difficult to drive past them without thinking of the past atrocities that, to many, they have come to represent.

Although it is not fair to survivors to describe it as a thing of the past. They’re part of a lingering wound, open and bare, susceptible to becoming infected if left untreated.

We have not all been directly affected. But even those of us lucky to be free of the personal experience of it feel this trauma reverberating through the town.

So how do we treat such a deep laceration?

This week, the City of Ballarat unanimously endorsed the designs for a memorial park in Ballarat for victims of sexual violence….

On the annual celebration of the International Day of the African Child (DAC), which was belatedly marked in South Sudan on June 26, the Director of the Pontifical Mission Societies (PMS) in the country has emphasized the need to pay keen attention to the safeguarding of minors. 

In his message for the event marked annually on June 16, Fr. Santo Gaba urged citizens to report all cases of suspected child abuse as a way of promoting the rights of children. 

“The Church must see that children are safe because the children are the future of the Church,” Fr. Gaba said in his Wednesday, June 26 message.

He added, “The Catholic Church and the leaders in South Sudan should ensure that children’s dignity and their rights to a dignified life and bodily integrity (are) respected, nurtured and safeguarded.”

The member of the Clergy of South Sudan’s Catholic Diocese of Tombura-Yambio (CDTY) recognized children as…

American Catholicism marked a quiet milestone yesterday, as Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston turned 80 years old on the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul. It’s apt that his birthday coincides with the annual celebration of the great apostles of Rome, because it’s arguable that no other U.S. prelate has ever come quite as close to becoming the Bishop of Rome himself as the now-octogenarian Capuchin.

Having turned 80, O’Malley now is no longer eligible to participate in the conclave that will elect the next pope, and almost certainly off the board as a contender. Eleven years ago, however, there was a serious possibility that had the candidacy of the then-Cardinal of Buenos Aires, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, stalled, many electors might have turned to O’Malley.

According to some reconstructions, O’Malley had as many as ten votes on the first ballot in the 2013 conclave. While his name disappeared as it…

The Diocese of Fall River announced that it has launched an investigation into alleged sexual misconduct by the Rev. Jay Mello, pastor of St. Michael’s Church on Essex Street and St. Joseph’s Church on North Main Street. 

Mello is also pastor of St. Michael’s School, a pre-kindergarten to Grade 8 Catholic school on Essex Street, and serves on the School Committee for the Greater Fall River Vocational School District. He serves as chaplain for the Fall River Police Department. 

In a letter written by Bishop Edgar M. da Cunha, he noted that Mello has denied the allegations.

Learn more about the investigation, here.

Diocese investigation:Fall River priest placed on leave over allegations of ‘sexual misconduct’: What we know

Attorney says Father Jay Mello has other sexual abuse victims

Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented multiple victims of clergy sexual abuse, claimed that in 2013 the Rev….

Former pastor assigned as priest-in-residence in Dinwiddie

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — A pastor at a Catholic Church in Virginia Beach has been reassigned, according to a diocese announcement.

The reassignment announcement comes after St. John the Apostle School notified parents about accusations of abuse made against a parent at the school.

That parent is now deceased.

Following the accusations, the Diocese of Richmond—which oversees parishes in Hampton Roads—said it would remove the pastor, Fr. Rob Cole.

But parishioners fought to have Fr. Cole reinstated.

In a June 27 post, the Diocese of Richmond, on its website, said Fr. Rob Cole had been reassigned as priest-in-residence at a cluster of parishes: St. John Nepomucene, Dinwiddie; St. James, Hopewell; and Church of the Sacred Heart, Prince George, effective July 1, 2024.

In the announcement, the diocese also said the pastor at St. Gabriel parish in Chesterfield, and Good Samaritan…

As parents drove through the “drop-off lane” at St. John the Apostle Catholic School one morning last month, they were approached by a woman carrying a stack of flyers.

The woman was the mother of a student at the private school, and the paper she passed through their car windows contained a warning that there had been a “pedophile” among them who’d assaulted “at least” two female students — including her daughter.

The flyer named the alleged child molester — a Navy pilot and father of three St. John’s students — and informed parents of a previous child sex assault case involving him. It also urged parents of girls who may have spent time at the family’s house to question them.

“I’m providing this information, because if I had been made aware of the first charges and court case, my daughter may have been saved three years of anguish,” the…

As the Archdiocese of New York and its insurance company, Chubb, battle over who is responsible for millions in potential payouts to survivors of clergy sexual abuse, a new group has entered the picture.

Announcing its presence in November with a full page ad in The New York Times, the Coalition for Just and Compassionate Compensation, which describes itself as an “alliance of survivors of child abuse and their advocates committed to ensuring that survivors receive the restitution that they deserve”, called on Chubb to stop fighting its responsibility in court and said their behavior was “callous”.

But in letters obtained by the Daily News, Chubb says it is, in fact, the archdiocese that’s being callous— all but accusing the coalition of being in cahoots with the archdiocese amid efforts to pressure the insurer to pay up.

Both the Archdiocese of New York and the coalition deny having any connection…

A now-former parish staff member in Cincinnati is facing charges in Wisconsin connected to alleged grooming and sexual assault of a member of the Milwaukee Children’s Choir he directed, according to court records filed Tuesday.

Marco Melendez is charged with two counts of child enticement and one count of third-degree sexual assault for alleged actions that took place between 2016 and 2019 in Milwaukee.

A warrant was filed for his arrest on Tuesday, June 25, but records do not show whether he has been arrested yet. He is not listed as an inmate in the Milwaukee County jail.

Fr. Alex McCullough, pastor of the Queen of Apostles Parish Family said in a letter to parishioners that Melendez was hired as the music director for Queen of Apostles Parish Family in February. McCullough said as of June 25, when the warrant for his arrest in Milwaukee was filed, he is no…

Less than one week after the head of the Vatican’s communications department strongly defended his office’s continued use of the artwork of alleged serial abuser Fr. Marko Rupnik, the president of Pope Francis’ own abuse prevention commission has written to every Vatican department urging them not to use artwork of alleged perpetrators of abuse.

“We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological distress that so many are suffering,” read the letter sent by Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston to the heads of Vatican dicasteries on June 26. 

“Pastoral prudence would prevent displaying artwork in a way that could imply either exoneration or a subtle defense” of alleged abuse perpetrators “or indicate indifference to the pain and suffering of so many victims of abuse,” the letter stated.

Excerpts from the cardinal’s letter were included in a June 28 press release from the…

On Friday, American Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston issued a statement saying he has asked the heads of all offices in the Roman Curia to take down the artwork of a famed priest and artist accused of abusing dozens of adult women.

The statement came from the Pontifical Commission for Protecting Minors (PCPM), for which O’Malley serves as President, and said in that capacity, the cardinal has written to the heads of all Vatican departments asking that “pastoral prudence would prevent displaying artwork in a way that could imply either exoneration or a subtle defense” of alleged abusers “or indicate indifference to the pain and suffering of so many victims of abuse.”

In his letter to Vatican prefects, dated June 26, O’Malley said, “We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological distress that so many are suffering.”

The statement comes after the head…

The pope’s top adviser on sexual abuse by clergy is asking Vatican officials not to use art by a former Jesuit priest accused of sexually abusing women — even as some Church officials continue to do so. 

Cardinal Seán O’Malley, the archbishop of Boston and head of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, sent a letter to the dicasteries that govern day-to-day affairs of the Roman Curia expressing hope that “pastoral prudence would prevent displaying artwork in a way that could imply either exoneration or a subtle defense” of those of accused of abuse. 

“We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological distress that so many are suffering,” O’Malley wrote in a letter to leaders of the Curia on Wednesday, June 26, according to the commission he heads. 

The letter — which was made public Friday, June 28,…

The Vatican’s media arm appears to be defying an appeal from Cardinal Seán O’Malley, who has urged the Vatican to stop using artwork created by alleged abuser Fr. Marko Rupnik. 

On the same day the cardinal’s call to all Vatican departments was made public, several of Rupnik’s alleged victims also appealed for Church institutions to remove displays of his work.

O’Malley, the head of the Pontifical Council for the Protection of Minors (PCPM), wrote a June 26 letter to the dicasteries of the Roman Curia calling for a moratorium on the display of artwork by alleged abusers.

“Pope Francis has urged us to be sensitive to and walk in solidarity with those harmed by all forms of abuse,” the Archbishop of Boston wrote in the letter, quoted in a June 28 post on the PCPM’s website. 

“I ask you to bear this in mind when choosing images to accompany the publication…

Boyd Householder faced 78 felony charges — including rape — stemming from his years directing the Circle of Hope Girls Ranch near Humansville. Householder’s wife, Stephanie, is scheduled for her own trial in late October on 21 similar charges.

Boyd Householder died Tuesday, according to reporting by the Kansas City Star citing multiple sources.

Missouri court records show the 75-year-old Householder was set to go on trial this fall on 78 felony charges related to statutory rape, sodomy and physical abuse — along with child abuse and neglect allegations. The charges were related to Householder’s years directing a Christian boarding school near Humansville known as Circle of Hope Girls Ranch.

When he filed the charges back in early 2021, Eric Schmitt, Missouri attorney general at the time, called the allegations against Householder “extensive and horrific.”

Householder’s wife, Stephanie Householder, is also scheduled for a trial…

The Southern Baptist Convention just took yet another step toward a dystopian handmaid’s society for Southern Baptist women.

In its June annual meeting, the Southern Baptist Convention rejected a proposed amendment to its constitution that would have designated any church that had “any kind” of a woman pastor as no longer in “friendly cooperation” with the SBC. Those churches could have then been expelled from the SBC.

Some might express surprise at this vote and wonder if Southern Baptists are changing direction on women’s issues—if they’re becoming more accepting of women in leadership.

They’re not. This vote wasn’t at all about supporting women. 

Instead, delegates to the annual meeting (“messengers” in Southern Baptist terminology) argued that, in a 2000 doctrinal statement and a 1984 resolution, the convention had already affirmed that only men could be pastors, thereby making the proposed constitutional amendment a redundancy. And these mechanisms were…

New child sexual abuse and child pornography charges have been brought up against a Florida pastor who was arrested last week for possession of child porn and now faces 18 felony charges.

Jonathan Elwing, 43, of Palmetto, has been charged with two counts of capital sexual battery, six counts of production of child sexual abuse material and six counts of child porn possession, according to the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.

Those are in addition to the four counts of possession of child sexual abuse images he was charged with earlier this month after law enforcement received information that the pastor used cryptocurrency to purchase the images online.

A forensic search of Elwing’s cell phone found images of him sexually battering a child and the production and possession of 12 images of child pornography, reports the Sarasota-based WWSB ABC 7.

Authorities expect more charges in the…

(Opinion)—Gateway Church Pastor Robert Morris has been exposed as an alleged child molester and defenders of John MacArthur are outraged.

“If parents come to a church & say a pastor has sexually molested their 12 year old daughter, you call the police. Full Stop,” posted Daily Wire Culture Reporter Megan Basham on X.

Similarly, prominent Southern Baptist Pastor Tom Buck posted about Morris, “Not only should he not be in ministry, he should be in jail. There should be no statute of limitations for molesting a child!”

(Please see original article for additional information.)

Podcaster Allie Beth Stuckey likewise chimed in: “Let’s (g)et something straight: repentance and restoration does not include restoring an accused abuser to a leadership position . . . He can be forgiven. He can be restored to the body of Christ. But he failed to fulfill the requirements for overseer God…

Gateway founder Robert Morris allegedly told survivor Cindy Clemishire in 2005 to ‘put a price on it’

Texas megachurch founder and pastor Robert Morris, who recently resigned after confessing to sexually assaulted a child in the 1980s, attempted to pay his abuse survivor for her silence, according to a leaked phone transcript.

The transcript from 22 September 2005, provided to NBC by a former employee of Gateway church, shows Morris telling his victim, who recently revealed herself to be Cindy Clemishire, to “put a price on it”, when she asked to be compensated for the trauma inflicted on her.

“It is not a small number,” Clemishire said. “Money doesn’t make you happy and I can understand that. So that is not what this is about.”

The transcript allegedly shows Clemishire requesting “$2m”, at which point Morris hung up the phone.

The transcript was found when the employee was transferring files from Morris’s…

Boris Bastidas, a Catholic high school teacher in Hollywood, Florida, who was arrested in March 2024 for sexual misconduct with a student, entered into a plea agreement on June 11, 2024. Bastidas changed his plea to guilty to charges that he used coercion and enticement of a minor to engage in criminal sexual activity and traveling in interstate or foreign commerce to engage in any illicit sexual conduct with another person. This guilty plea was accepted, and Bastidas will be sentenced on September 17, 2024, at 11:00 AM in Miami Division at the James Lawrence King Building, 99 NE 4th Street, 11th Floor, before Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks.

Bastidas’s Arrest

According to media reports, on March 14, 2024, Boris Fernando Bastidas, a 35-year-old teacher at Chaminade-Madonna College Preparatory, was apprehended by the FBI Miami Child Exploitation Task Force. Bastidas was accused…

A former Fresno priest accused of sex crimes will spend time in the Fresno County Jail.

Jesus Serna was sentenced to 365 days behind bars and five years probation.

Serna, known to his followers as “Father Antonio,” served from 2007 to 2017 at Our Lady Guadalupe Church in Fresno.

He was arrested in early 2019 following a more than year-long investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct with at least three adult parishioners.

In February, the 56-year-old pleaded no contest to nine counts of sexual assault, and one count of attempting to prevent a witness from testifying.

Twelve other counts were dropped.

Under the conditions of his sentence, Serna will not be allowed to lead any religious ceremonies.

The victims are under a 10-year protective order, and Serna was ordered to pay them restitution.

At least one new lawsuit has been filed against the Diocese of Lafayette seeking damages from alleged sexual abuse by a priest as the state Supreme Court ruled June 12 to give abuse survivors three additional years to file lawsuits no matter how long ago the abuse occurred.

A St. Martin Parish resident, referred to by the initials C.V. in court records, filed a lawsuit June 11, the eve of the Supreme Court decision, suing the Diocese of Lafayette.

The 5-2 opinion says the “lookback window” unanimously approved by the Louisiana Legislature giving abuse survivors a three-year window to sue for damages is constitutional.

The legislature in 2021 gave abuse victims three years to sue their abusers no matter when the abuse occurred. Before that, survivors had until age 28 to sue.

The first publicized case of priest sex abuse occurred in Lafayette in the 1980s, when former…

But Brian Boucher will soon qualify for a statutory release even though he is currently charged with sexually assaulting a fellow inmate last year.

Brian Boucher, who sexually abused two teenage boys while he was a Catholic priest in Montreal, has been denied parole as he continues to serve an eight-year prison term.

In a decision made this week, the Parole Board of Canada denied Boucher, 62, both day and full parole. It also ordered that a series of conditions be imposed on Boucher when he will soon qualify for a statutory release.Article content

Almost all offenders serving time in federal penitentiaries automatically qualify for a release after they reach the two-thirds mark of their sentence if they were not previously granted parole.

In Boucher’s case, the parole board ordered that he reside at a halfway house when he is released. He is not allowed to contact the victims of…

Every Vatican office must be sensitive toward those harmed by abuse and should exercise “pastoral prudence” before deciding to display artwork created by an alleged perpetrator of abuse, the president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors told the Roman Curia.

“We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological distress that so many are suffering,” U.S. Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley of Boston said in a letter to all Vatican dicasteries on behalf of the commission.

While the presumption of innocence toward the accused during ongoing investigations into allegations of abuse must be respected, he wrote, the Holy See and its offices must “exercise wise pastoral prudence and compassion toward those harmed by clerical sexual abuse.”

The commission published only excerpts of the cardinal’s letter in a press release published June 28. The complete letter had been sent privately to the heads…

Berlin – Another 400,000 people formally left the Catholic Church in Germany last year, though the number was down from a record set in 2022 as church leaders struggle to put a long-running scandal over abuse by clergy behind them and tackle calls for reform, official figures showed Thursday.

The German Bishops’ Conference said that 402,694 people left the church in 2023. That was down from 522,821 the previous year, but still the second-highest figure so far. At the same time, 1,559 people joined the church and another 4,127 rejoined.

In Germany, people who are formally members of a church pay a so-called church tax that helps finance it in addition to the regular taxes the rest of the population pays. If they register their departure with local authorities, they no longer have to pay that. There are some exemptions for low earners, jobless, retirees, students and others.

The country’s Catholic…

[Includes 50-minute podcast interview]

Father Hans Zollner SJ is a Jesuit priest, theologian, psychologist, and professor at the Gregorian University. He is also one of the leading experts on safeguarding and the prevention of sexual abuse.

In March 2023, Father Zollner resigned from the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, criticising the leadership of the body in a public letter.

In this 81st episode of Merely Catholic, Father Zollner discusses the issue of sexual abuse in the Church and how Catholics should respond.

Less than one week after the head of the Vatican’s communications department strongly defended his office’s continued use of the artwork of alleged serial abuser Fr. Marko Rupnik, the president of Pope Francis’ own abuse prevention commission has written to every Vatican department urging them not to use artwork of alleged perpetrators of abuse.

“We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological distress that so many are suffering,” read the letter sent by Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston to the heads of Vatican dicasteries on June 26. 

“Pastoral prudence would prevent displaying artwork in a way that could imply either exoneration or a subtle defense” of alleged abuse perpetrators “or indicate indifference to the pain and suffering of so many victims of abuse,” the letter stated.

Excerpts from the cardinal’s letter were included in a June 28 press release from the…

Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson (D) announced an investigation into the dioceses of Spokane, Yakima and Seattle on May 9 claiming that they may have used charitable funds to hide child sex abuse allegations. Clergy abuse survivors say it’s a historic moment. 

Mary Dispenza, a survivor and co-founding member of the Catholic Accountability Project (CAP), says that accountability for the alleged use of charitable funds for abuse cover-ups could bring healing for victims. 

“For victims, being a survivor of clergy abuse and nun abuse, it’s an exciting moment,” Dispenza said. 

Dispenza says that the attorney general’s case is the first time that a sitting archbishop has been subpoenaed for covering up abuse records. 

“The attorney general is saying ‘you’re not above the law.’ So it’s a historic moment for sure,” Dispenza said. 

A state petition to enforce a subpoena against the three dioceses will be considered in King County Superior Court…

The scandal over a famous ex-Jesuit artist who is accused of psychologically, spiritually and sexually abusing adult women came to a head Friday after some of his alleged victims and the pope’s own anti-abuse adviser asked for his artworks not to be promoted or displayed.

The separate initiatives underscored how the case of the Rev. Marko Rupnik, whose mosaics grace some of the Catholic Church’s most-visited shrines and sanctuaries, continues to cause a headache for the Vatican and Pope Francis, who as a Jesuit himself has been drawn into the scandal.

Early Friday, five women who say they were abused by Rupnik sent letters to Catholic bishops around the world asking them to remove his mosaics from their churches, saying their continued display in places of worship was “inappropriate” and retraumatizing to victims.

Separately, Cardinal Sean O’Malley, head of the pope’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, sent his own letter…

Cardinal Sean O’Malley, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, issued a statement calling for “pastoral prudence” regarding the dissemination by Vatican offices of artwork by Father Marko Rupnik, who is the subject of numerous complaints from women accusing sexual abuse, abuse of power, and spiritual manipulation.

“We must avoid sending a message that the Holy See is oblivious to the psychological distress that so many are suffering.” These are the words of Cardinal Sean O’Malley, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, regarding the frequent use of Father Marko Rupnik’s artwork by the Vatican, particularly its Dicastery for Communications, to illustrate online Catholic content.

Artworks regularly promoted by the Vatican

Lately, Vatican News, the official Vatican website, under the supervision of the Dicastery for Communications, has regularly used the priest’s mosaics in articles related to major Catholic feasts and saints. The works of the…

In the hours after Boyd Householder died Tuesday, former students who attended his Circle of Hope boarding school in southwest Missouri had one lingering question.

Would a judge and jury ever hear what they say went on inside the unlicensed school he and his wife, Stephanie, operated for 14 years in rural Cedar County? The brutal restraints, excessive workouts in extreme temperatures, psychological and sexual abuse and food and water used as punishment.

His death at age 75 comes four months before the Householders were scheduled for trial on 99 felony counts of child abuse and neglect, including statutory rape, sodomy and physical abuse. The Missouri Attorney General’s Office charged the couple in March 2021 and then-AG Eric Schmitt described the abuse that students suffered as “extensive and horrific.”

The charges against Boyd Householder allege that he slammed girls’ heads or bodies against walls, slapped or struck…

Boyd Householder, set to stand trial on dozens of child abuse felonies allegedly committed at his now-closed Circle of Hope boarding school, died Tuesday, his attorney told The Star.

Adam Woody, who represents Householder and his wife Stephanie, said Tuesday evening that Boyd “went into cardiac arrest this morning” and died.

“He had been ill for quite some time related to his service for our country in the Vietnam War,” Woody said in a text message to The Star. “He had lung and heart damage from agent orange exposure and had been suffering for several years.”

Recently, Householder, 75, had been using two tanks of oxygen per day, Woody said.

Rebecca Randles, a Kansas City attorney who has filed more than 15 lawsuits against Circle of Hope and the Householders, said her office learned about the death from women they’ve represented. Another source confirmed the death to The Star and…

A man who attended the now shutdown Agape Boarding School alleges he was physically abused, deprived of food, among other allegations in a lawsuit.

The man, identified as M.B.2, filed the lawsuit against the school and several former staff members in United States District Court of Western Missouri, Southern Division.

Named in the lawsuit are Julio Sandoval, a former dean of the school; Seth Duncan, a former staff member; Tyler Hartman, a former staff member; Elijah Reeves, a former staff member; and Brian Clemenson, another former staff member.

Allegations against former staff

M.B.2 said the school had a system where students worked their way up in rankings.

The students were differentiated by the color of shirts they wore, according to the lawsuit.

The lowest rank of students were those who wore brown shirts, and they were referred to as “brown town” students.

M.B.2 said students were sent to “brown town”…

The First Nation, the church signed the covenant back in March

Vancouver’s Catholic archbishop says a sacred covenant signed by the diocese and Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc is not a finished document, but a “living dynamic statement of moving to the future.”

Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver shared newly published details of the Sacred Covenant on Wednesday (June 26). It is meant to be a shared path to reconciliation.

It includes seven “confirmation of truths,” as well as history of residential schools and the post-Truth and Reconciliation Commission events, specifically the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc reporting in May 2021 the preliminary findings of approximately 200 anomalies from ground-penetrating radar. Some of those anomalies may be the unmarked graves of former students.

The covenant was signed on March 30, 2024 on Easter Sunday by Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver and the diocese of Kamloops. The Kamloops Indian Residential School was…

The Catholic Church in BC is promising to provide both financial and scientific support to Tk’emlups as part of a recently-revealed “Sacred Covenant” the two sides have signed.

“The Church was wrong, wrong, in how it complied in implementing a government, colonial policy which resulted in the separation of children from their parents and their families,” said Archbishop Michael Miller as part of a joint, online news conference he participated in on Wednesday, alongside Tk’emlups Kukpi7 Roseanne Casimir.

Signed at the end of March, details of the 31 point agreement — released this week — include a pledge to work together to identify and help repatriate any remains discovered on the site of the former Kamloops Residential School, should that ever take place.

“There is a $30 million pledge, including $2.5 million from the Archdiocese of Vancouver, to help provide grants that further healing and reconciliation,” said Miller.

For her part, Casimir…

‘Residential school system did do great damage,’ archbishop says

WARNING: This story contains details of experiences at residential schools.

Tk̓emlúps te Secwépemc and the Vancouver and Kamloops arms of the Catholic Church have released the details of a signed document agreeing to a historical record acknowledging the harms caused by residential schools and the role the church played. 

On Easter Sunday, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver, Diocese of Kamloops and the First Nation gathered to sign a Sacred Covenant outlining how it will work with the First Nation toward reconciliation. 

“The signing of this sacred covenant is a step in the right direction,” Tk̓emlúps te Secwépemc Kúkpi7 Rosanne Casimir said during a news conference on Wednesday. 

“We all need to rebuild our relationships at every level and walk this journey together.”

Archbishop J. Michael Miller said the church intends to work with Tk̓emlúps te Secwépemc on a path to healing.

…

An attorney spoke Wednesday regarding a sexual abuse case involving a priest in Fall River.

Mitchell Garibedian is representing a man who claims he was sexually abused by a priest in the Fall River Catholic Diocese and said he is glad the case is finally being investigated after 11 years.

Fall River Reverend Jay Mello was placed on administrative leave last week after the diocese received what the church is calling “concerning information” alleging sexual misconduct by the priest.

“This is another example of the Diocese of Fall River and the Catholic Church practicing cover-up and sexual abuse,” Garabedian said. “And not caring about whether or not victims of sexual abuse heal and whether the public is protected from predators.”

Mello was the pastor of St. Michael’s and St. Joseph’s churches and was also the head of St. Michael’s school, serving on the school committee for the Greater Fall River Vocational…

A prominent city priest currently on leave pending a Diocese of Fall River investigation into “sexual misconduct” has also been accused of sexual assault by at least one other person, and there may be others, an attorney for the alleged victim said. 

Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented multiple victims of clergy sexual abuse, claimed that in 2013 the Rev. Jay Mello sexually abused a 28-year-old man. 

“He trusted Father Mello, and Father Mello took advantage of him sexually,” said Garabedian via teleconference at a press conference held outside the headquarters of the Diocese of Fall River on Highland Avenue. “There was no consent in this sexual relationship. It was a violent incident … and my client fled.” 

Mello, the pastor of St. Michael and St. Joseph parishes in Fall River and the pastor of the pre-K to Grade 8 St. Michael’s School, was placed on…

Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and Tennessee Pastor Jeff LaBorg will be headlining a conference this fall with disgraced pastor and former Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) President Johnny Hunt.

Hunt was accused of sexually assaulting the wife of a former SBC pastor in a 2022 blockbuster report, detailing sexual abuse and cover-up within the SBC. The report by Guidepost Solutions found the allegations by the pastor’s wife “credible.”

Hunt maintains that the “encounter,” though inappropriate, was consensual, The Roys Report (TRR) previously reported.

Hunt will be one of the three main speakers at the 28th Annual Fall Jubilee Conference in Gatlinburg, Tennessee this September, according to the conference’s website.

Huckabee, the 44th Governor of Arkansas and a former minister, will also be speaking at the event alongside Hunt. Huckabee is now known for his TV show “Huckabee” and as a guest speaker on Fox News and Newsmax.

…

Televangelist James Robison is under fire for his alleged involvement decades ago in the “restoration” of now-disgraced Pastor Robert Morris and recent statements Robison has made that appear to be false.

Morris resigned last week from Gateway Church, a megachurch in the Dallas area, following the release of shocking allegations he molested Oklahoma resident Cindy Clemishire from 1982—1986, when she was 12 to 16 years old.

In a video posted online two days ago, Robison said he was aware that Morris had “moral failure in his past” but Robison claimed he had “no idea it was a crime against a child.”

Robison also denied allegations he was involved in Morris’ restoration to ministry. And he published a letter from Clemishire’s attorney, Boz Tchividjian, stating that Robison was not at a meeting with Clemishire’s father in the 1980s in which the abuse had been revealed.

Robison’s claims come in response…

Yet another civil lawsuit filed Wednesday against a Missouri Christian boarding school by a former student accuses staffers of forced child labor, physical abuse and tactics aimed at hiding mistreatment from authorities.

The lawsuit, filed in Missouri’s Western U.S. District Court, alleges fraud and negligence by five former employees of the now-closed Agape Boarding School.

More than a dozen other former students have settled lawsuits alleging they were abused at the southwest Missouri school.

When it shut down in 2023, it was the fourth and last unlicensed Christian boarding school to close in Cedar County since September 2020. The school’s former director, Bryan Clemensen, said the school, whose enrollment had tumbled, closed because it did not have the funding to continue.

Several people affiliated with those schools are facing criminal charges.

Advocates for victims of abuse at Missouri boarding schools in May and again on Wednesday urged the state’s attorney general to launch…

Victims want to meet with statewide school group

And they ask Pettis Co. sheriff to investigate facility

Self-help group warns parents about local boarding school

WHAT

Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims will harshly criticize a local man who runs both a

–a boarding school for ‘troubled’ kids in Pettis County and

–a statewide industry group for owners and operators of similar facilities, at least five of which have generated headlines in recent years because of repeated prosecutions, lawsuits and news reports about the sexual, physical and emotional abuse of children at five or more of the schools.

A few months ago, the local man also spearheaded an effort to eviscerate “the few and new bare bones protections” Missouri legislators set up for these facilities, many of which are for-profit, privately-owned and ‘under the radar’ in rural counties across the state.

…

A man who was the alleged victim of sexual abuse by a Fall River priest will be holding a press conference with his lawyer outside the headquarters of the diocese.

Rev. Jay Mello was placed on administrative leave after the diocese received “concerning information alleging sexual misconduct by the priest,” and that an initial inquiry showed “sufficient evidence” for further investigation.

Mello was the pastor of St. Michael’s Church on Essex Street and St. Joseph’s Church on North Main Street.

He was also the pastor of St. Michael’s School, a pre-kindergarten to Grade 8 Catholic School, and served on the School Committee for the Greater Fall River Vocational School District. He was also serving as the chaplain for the Fall River Police Department.

Mello is no longer residing at the parish rectory and has been “directed to refrain from exercising public priestly ministry.”

The man who is alleging the abuse, says…