ABUSE TRACKER

AUSTRALIA
New South Wales Police Force

Man charged with concealing a serious offence – Strike Force Lantle

Tuesday, 17 March 2015 12:36:39 PM

A man has been charged after allegedly concealing a serious offence regarding child sexual abuse in the Hunter region.

Strike Force Lantle was initiated in 2010 to investigate allegations of concealment of serious offences related to child abuse by clergy formerly and currently attached to the Maitland-Newcastle Diocese of the Catholic Church.

Police will allege a 64-year-old man, of South Australia, concealed a serious offence.

Today (Tuesday 17 March 2015), a future court attendance notice was served for conceal serious offence. The man is due to appear in Newcastle Local Court on Thursday 30 April 2015.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

Adelaide Catholic Archbishop Philip Wilson has been charged with concealing child sexual abuse.

The charges relate to Hunter region paedophile priest Jim Fletcher, who worked with the Archbishop in NSW in the 1970s.

Wilson announced in a statement he would take leave from his position after being notified of the charges filed against him by NSW Police.

NSW Police said its operation, Strike Force Lantle, launched in 2010, investigated allegations of concealment of serious offences related to child abuse by clergy “formerly and currently attached to the Maitland-Newcastle Diocese of the Catholic Church”.

They alleged that Wilson, 64, concealed a serious offence.

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

03/16/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

My ‘google alerts’ surfaced an interesting reference to the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis yesterday, or at least to one of its former employees. The Star Tribune’s ‘Business People’ noted that Rita Beatty, formerly the Communications Manager for the Archdiocese, has taken a position as a senior account representative at Himle, Rapp and Co.

I don’t think that Rita’s new position is a result of budget cuts in the Archdiocese or even the previously announced layoffs. From what I have seen, the budget for the Office of Communications has remained steady or even increased in the face of the severe budget deficit and bankruptcy filing. Moreover, Rita’s departure would impact more than just communications. She was the original staff person charged with bringing some sense to the Office of Child and Young Protection, and she all but ran the Aim Higher Foundation from her cubicle in the ‘garden level’ (meaning basement) of the Chancery.

However, what I find most notable about her job change is that she is the third senior communications staff member to depart since this crisis began in September of 2013. The first to depart was Sarah Mealey, who was the Director of Communications for the Archdiocese from April 2012 until March 2014. Publicly, it was stated that Sarah’s departure was to allow her to spend more time with her family, but privately I was told that she was felt that as the crisis unfolded the ‘lawyers’ were making all of the communications decisions. For my part, I always thought it significant that her resignation was announced less than a month after MPR published a series of emails from July of 2012 demonstrating that key staff, her included, were aware that abusive priests remained in ministry even as they assured the public that ‘no priests credibly accused of misconduct are currently in ministry in this Archdiocese’.

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MISSOURI
CBS St. Louis

Kevin Killeen (@KMOXKilleen)
March 16, 2015

ST. LOUIS (KMOX) – The man charged with setting fire to playground equipment in Shrewsbury was preparing to become a Catholic priest in the undergraduate program at Kenrick Seminary in Shrewsbury.

William C. Holmes, 23, of the 300 block of Hoener Street in Waterloo, is accused of setting fires that ruined playground equipment and a picnic table at Brinkop Park in Shrewsbury on March 8.

He is charged with two counts of knowingly burning, a Class-D felony, and was released after posting a $10,000 bond.

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MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

. . .Rumor has it that William C. Holmes, the Waterloo man who admitted setting fire to playground equipment in Brinktop Park in Shrewsbury park, is studying for the priesthood at Kenrick Seminary. The Belleville Catholic diocesan website lists a William Holmes as being in his fourth year of study. (The P-D reports he’s “a college student at a local university.”. . .

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PHILIPPINES
Philippine Daily Inquirer

Juan L. Mercado
@inquirerdotnet
Philippine Daily Inquirer
5:56 AM | Tuesday, March 17th, 2015

“By now, one thing is clear,” writes John Allen in Boston Globe. Faced with attempts to hobble reforms, through the character assassination of his reformers, Pope Francis did not blink.

The latest case swirls around Australian Cardinal George Pell, whom Francis put in charge of straightening up the Vatican’s finances over a year ago.

Pell is a former Australian Rules Football brawler. Despite criticism against Pell, Francis issued early this month statutes for his operation. “To some extent at least, they amount to a vindication for Pell,” Allen writes.

Francis signed the statutes on Feb. 22, but these actually took effect on March 1.

Predictably, some Italian columnists dubbed it a defeat for Pell’s ambition to create a body virtually with unlimited powers over the administration of all Vatican assets.

Francis approved a legal framework for all three new financial oversight bodies that he launched last year. These are: the 15-member Council for the Economy, which sets policy; Pell’s secretariat, which implements it; and a new independent auditor general, charged with keeping everyone “on the straight and narrow.”

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ROME
Crux

By Inés San Martín
Vatican correspondent March 16, 2015

ROME — After a direct request from Pope Francis reportedly sparked the opening of a sex abuse investigation against an Italian priest, a survivors’ group in the United States has complained that the pontiff’s actions do not constitute “real reform.”

The story of the letter and subsequent investigation was first reported in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, which identified the victim only as a 39-year-old male with the pseudonym “Diego” from the southern Italian city of Naples.

According to the newspaper account, Diego claimed to have been abused by the Rev. Silverio Mura, a religion teacher in his school, from the age of 11 until he was 17.

The reports say that after psychological treatment, in 2010 Diego decided to take the allegations to the police. Because of a statute of limitations, however, no investigation was ever opened. …

On Monday, however, the leading activist group for clerical abuse survivors in the United States played down the significance of the pope’s action.

“Two phone calls do not constitute real reform,” read a statement from the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. “We endanger children and help predators if we let two phone calls diminish pressure for substantive change.”

The reference was to a separate case in Granada, Spain, where Pope Francis called an abuse victim who had written him to encourage the victim to make a report, setting an investigation into motion.

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MAINE
Bangor Daily News

By Judy Harrison, BDN Staff
Posted March 16, 2015
.
BANGOR, Maine — A former altar server at St. George Greek Orthodox Church testified Monday at the Penobscot Judicial Center that then-priest Adam Metropoulos, 52, of Bangor sexually assaulted him repeatedly at the church rectory in 2006 and 2007.

The man, who is now 23 and lives in Vermont, is not being identified by the Bangor Daily News because he might be the victim of a sex crime.

He told Superior Court Justice Ann Murray that he was an altar server from age 10 until he was 19 at the church on Sanford Street in Bangor. Because his family lived in Hancock County, he often spent the night at the rectory located on Fourteenth Street in Bangor. He said the assaults most often took place during Lent because there are additional services in the Orthodox church.

The Vermont man said that he would sleep in a spare bedroom or on a futon in the living room. Metropoulos often slept in bed with him, sometimes, a second boy slept with them as well, he testified.

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GEORGIA
Florida Times-Union

ATLANTA |Adults would get two years to sue people they accuse of sexually abusing them as children even if the statute of limitations had already expired under a law pending in the Georgia Senate.

House Bill 17, the Hidden Predator Act, was one of the flurry of bills approved Friday ahead of a deadline for passing bills out the House or Senate.

The proposal from Rep. Jason Spencer, R-Woodbine, was significantly changed in the House Judiciary Committee, but according to the author, it still provides new access to the courts for those who claim to be victims.

“It’s not like we’re doing something unusual nationally because it’s a movement,” said Spencer, who noted that other states have either recently enacted similar laws or are considering doing so.

If approved by the Senate and signed into law by the governor, the bill would give victims a pair of additional opportunities to sue their alleged attackers after age 23 and the expiration of the statute of limitations.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Big Trial

MONDAY, MARCH 16, 2015

By Ralph Cipriano
for Bigtrial.net

The district attorney has until May 10 to decide, after two mistrials, whether to retry Father Andrew McCormick a third time for the alleged attempted rape of an altar boy.

On his twitter account, Rufus Seth Williams, our crusading district attorney, was remarkably low-key about the case. He briefly noted Father Andy’s latest mistrial before deleting the tweet and moving on to more important things.

Such as the D.A.’s call-in on the WIP morning show where he joked about subpoenaing Eagles Coach Chip Kelly to find out “where all these deals will lead us.” And the D.A.’s comparison of himself to Rambo in the D.A.’s running feud with state Attorney General Kathleen Kane over whether to prosecute local pols caught in a sting operation. [“I find myself like John J. Rambo. They drew first blood not me.”]

Meanwhile, the “friends of Father Andy” have launched a petition drive online to “demand an end to the persecution of Father Andrew McCormick by the District Attorney of Philadelphia.” Maybe Father Andy’s friends are on to something. Like those tired Rocky and Rambo franchises it might be time to end the priest abuse trials in Philadelphia before we waste any more taxpayer money or have to suffer through any further embarrassments.

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MALTA
Malta Independent

Duncan Barry
Monday, 16 March 2015

A woman who had filed a criminal complaint against an archpriest for allegedly injuring her slightly and against a vice-archpriest who allegedly insulted her, today withdrew her criminal complaints against the two on the condition that the priests in question stay away from her. This took place after the priests asked for the case to be withdrawn.

The archpriest had been accused of slightly injuring the woman after he allegedly punched her in church. The archpriest had also been charged with breaching the peace. The incident was reported by The Malta Independent.

The vice-archpriest of the same community, who witnessed the incident, had also been charged with insulting the woman with the utterance: “itilqu lill-Arċipriet, m’hawnx qassis li ma tisfrattaħx u ma tistax tara qassis…” (Leave the archpriest alone, you cannot set eyes on a single priest without leading him astray).

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

With two years as pope under his belt, Pope Francis should be in a position now to answer, as a self proclaimed servant of the People of God, some key questions on the minds of some Catholics in the 99%. “Friendly” and “opportunistic” journalists, some apparently seeking to preserve their special access to Vatican sources, have failed predictably to pose many of these questions directly.

So here goes. Hopefully, Pope Francis will respond to some or all of them openly and fully. If he chooses not to answer them, the questions will linger to undermine trust in the pope and his otherwise promising message. Given the escalating governmental investigations, in the UK (including of Cardinal O’Brien), Australia (including of Cardinal Pell), Minneapolis (USA) (including of Archbishop Niensted and his former vicar, the brother of President Obama’s Chief of Staff), in the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico (of Archbishop Wesolowski), and in many other countries, Pope Francis, in his self declared short remaining papacy, will need all the trust he can generate now by giving the full truth, without spin, to Catholics.

1. Why did you, Pope Francis, call for a two step, carefully staged and secretive Synod, instead of an open and more promising ecumenical council, like Good Pope John did within two months of his papal election? As you know, only a full council after a thorough deliberation can infallibly adopt much needed and permanent structural reforms and overdue and updated definitive teachings on sexual morality that cannot then be changed readily by future popes.

2. Why and how did you select the Synods’ limited agenda that omits pressing issues like (a) holding bishops accountable to the Catholic 99 % for protecting predatory child abusing priests, and (b) adding urgently needed married and women priests?

3. Why are women and married couples excluded as full participants at Synods on family matters? Pope John’s birth control commission, for example, as a half century old precedent, had them as full participants on similar issues.

4. Why (a) have you stacked your new financial commissions with clerical majorities and wealthy male lay members that all serve at the pope’s pleasure, and (b) why have you failed so far to select, to review the Vatican’s assets and operations, an outside independent audit firm whose audit report you would now commit to make public fully and promptly?

5. Why have you appointed a cardinal, George Pell, to oversee Vatican financial administration, given that he left his country, Australia, seemingly in disgrace after spending a fortune to defeat an abuse survivor’s valid and much smaller claim? Good financial administration requires both experience and integrity. Staffing for finance differs from fielding a rugby or football team.

6. Why have you failed to rebuke publicly by name so many clerical subordinates for child abuse cover-up missteps, like Cardinals Law, Mahony, O’Brien, Rigali, Egan, George, Danneels, Brady, et al. and Bishops and other clerics, like Vangelhuwe, Mueller (Norway), Finn, Nienstedt, George Ratzinger ( Regensburg choirmaster), et al. ?

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MINNESOTA
Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant
March 16, 2015

This past week, the Diocese of New Ulm disclosed 4 names of accused priests. The new names are really not new. They are names that they should have known earlier and that they should have disclosed. I found it interesting to look at the names that are not on their list.

– We know that the diocese, headed by Bishop John Nienstedt in 2004, had identified 12 priests accused of sexual misconduct with children in a report to U.S. Catholic Bishops. These are the lists of the credibly accused that the other Diocese in the state have disclosed.

Diocese of Winona Release Their List of 14 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis Release Their List of 34 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

The Diocese of St Cloud Release Their List of 33 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

St. John’s Abbey Release Their List of 18 Monks and Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

The Diocese of Duluth Release Their List of 17 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

The Diocese of Crookston Release Their List of 6 Priests Accused of Sexually Abusing Minors

New Ulm has not released their list.

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CHILE
U.S. News

By EVA VERGARA, Associated Press

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — Juan Carlos Cruz recalls that he and another teen boy would lie down on the priest’s bed, one resting his head at the man’s shoulder, another sitting near his feet. The priest would kiss the boys and grope them, he said, all while the Rev. Juan Barros watched.

“Barros was there, and he saw it all,” Cruz, now a 51-year-old journalist, told The Associated Press.

Barros has been tapped by Pope Francis to become bishop of a southern Chilean diocese this month, provoking an unprecedented outcry by abuse victims and Catholic faithful who contend he covered up sexual abuse committed by his mentor and superior, the Rev. Fernando Karadima, in the 1980s and ’90s. A Vatican investigation found Karadima guilty in 2011 and sentenced the now 84-year-old priest to a cloistered life of “penitence and prayer” for what is Chile’s highest-profile case of abuse by a priest.

Barros has declined to comment publicly on allegations against him. Now bishop for Chile’s armed forces, he has said he learned of Karadima’s abuse through a 2010 news report he saw on television, according to court records.

While not directly accused of abuse, Barros is said by at least three victims to have witnessed the sexual molestation at the Sacred Heart of Jesus church, part of the El Bosque parish that serves an affluent neighborhood of Santiago.

That history has parishioners, clergy and lawmakers in this predominantly Catholic country protesting the pope’s decision to appoint Barros, 58, to become spiritual leader over the diocese in Osorno, about 580 miles (930 kilometers) south of Santiago.

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MINNESOTA
KDUZ

Area churches under the Diocese of New Ulm have received letters telling them about claims of past sexual abuses in the churches.

The diocese released a statement saying the Catholic Diocese of New Ulm has been named in 12 notices of claim alleging sexual misconduct involving a minor by four priests in the diocese. Only one of the four priests, Father Dennis Becker, is living and he is retired.

All of the priests named in the claims have served parishes in Gibbon, Springfield, Lamberton, Hutchinson, Lafayette, Montevideo, Redwood Falls and Glencoe.

A notice of claim is not a lawsuit but rather a notice stating the time, place and circumstances of the alleged abuse.

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KENTUCKY
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

We’re concerned about abuse by nuns because a disproportionately high number of accused child molesting nuns have worked and lived in Louisville. Abuse by women has gotten little attention and victims of women often get little compassion and considerable misunderstanding.

Nuns also change their names more often than priests so could more easily get access to more kids even after being publicly accused.

In very cursory Internet research, we found that the last nun on this list has been sent elsewhere and is teaching immigrants, a very vulnerable group.

This list

1) Sr. Joseph Anthony

Named in 7/04 suit by one woman alleging abuse by Msgr. Herman J. Lammers and 5 nuns at St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage or at local schools. Woman alleges that one of her abusers was Sister Joseph Anthony at the orphanage. Order has confirmed that nun by this name worked at the orphanage in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Sister Joseph Anthony left the order in 1972.

2) Sr. Arthur

One woman filed suit 2004 alleging abuse by Msgr. Herman J. Lammers and 5 nuns at St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage or at local schools. Woman alleges that one of her abusers was Sister Arthur at Holy Spirit School. Order says that it did not have members working at Holy Spirit School.

3) Sr. Charles

Nun. One woman filed suit 7/04 alleging abuse by Msgr. Herman J. Lammers and 5 nuns at St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage or at local schools. Woman alleges that one of her abusers was Sister Charles at the orphanage. Order has confirmed that nun by this name worked at the orphanage in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Sister Charles is deceased.

4) Sr. James Patrick Cronin

Named in 8/04 civil suit by woman said she was abused by Cronin, two other nuns, and Fr. Lammers at St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage. Order confirmed that Cronin was at the orphanage between 1958-1961. Died.

5) Sr. Madeline de Paul Galatine

Sued 2004. Accused of abuse of 2 girls at St. Thomas-St. Vincent Orphanage. Deceased.

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UNITED STATES
BBC News

The police watchdog is investigating alleged corruption in the Metropolitan Police, including claims it covered up child sex offences due to the involvement of police officers and MPs.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission is investigating 14 referrals relating to child sex offences from the 1970s to the 2000s.

It said the claims were of “high-level corruption of the most serious nature”.

The Met said it had voluntarily referred the allegations.

Sarah Green, deputy chairwoman of the IPCC, said: “These allegations are of historic, high-level corruption of the most serious nature.

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SCOTLAND
The Tablet

16 March 2015 by Brian Morton

The Church in Scotland has responded to media reports suggesting that the Church is “sitting on” a report on allegations regarding Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the former Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh who stood down in 2013 after admitting sexual misconduct.

A spokesman for the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh said that Pope Francis had “tried his very best to handle the case of Cardinal O’Brien with great justice and compassion” and was now considering the report. “We hope and trust that he will reach a decision that is fair and just to everybody involved,” the spokesman said.

Following public accusations by a number of priests and one former priest, and following the cardinal’s resignation, the Pope appointed Bishop – now Archbishop – Scicluna, to speak to all those involved and report back to the Vatican.

One of the men who have accused Cardinal O’Brien of inappropriate sexual conduct said that despite Archbishop Scicluna’s report being “hot enough to burn the varnish” off the Pope’s desk, the Church was moving with “glacial” speed when it came to making public its findings.

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UTAH
Aljazeera America

by Joanna Walters March 16, 2015

This is the first of a two-part series on the FLDS. The second part will be published on March 17.

HILDALE, Utah — “I finally heard about this thing called Facebook, like, a year ago. I had no idea what it was,” says 22-year-old Brigham Johnson, rubbing his neat beard nervously.

He’s embarrassed it took him so long to stumble upon the social-media site. But when he finally did, it was life changing.

“I sneaked a look on a computer, even though that was forbidden, and I found some old friends who’d got out. I was, like, ‘Wow, they’ve been living here in town all this time.’ That’s when I knew I could leave,” he says.

So he packed a bag one midnight in May 2013 and told his brother he was leaving. Then he walked out on the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), the outlaw religion he was born into in a remote town on the Utah-Arizona border.

A secretive group who broke with Mormonism in order to practice polygamy, the FLDS became notorious for child abuse under its repressive leader, the pedophile “prophet” Warren Jeffs. Now serving life in state prison in Palestine, Texas, for aggravated sexual assault of minors, Jeffs continues to exert astonishing power over his flock from behind bars.

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IRELAND
U.S. Catholic

When Bishop Diarmuid Martin was asked by Pope John Paul II in 2003 to leave his post at the Vatican and return to Dublin to eventually become its archbishop, the pope also lobbed this question at him: “How is it that secularization came to Ireland so quickly?” Martin has said that his unvarnished answer to that question would have been, “Your Holiness is wrong,” although of course he didn’t say that exactly. But he did tell the pope that secularization had been on the Irish radar for many years, even if few had realized it.

Martin is currently the Vice Chair of the Irish Bishops’ Conference; during his years in Rome he served as Secretary for the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and as the Permanent Observer of the Holy See in Geneva and at the United Nations. He has been a steadfast advocate for victims of clerical sexual abuse.

How would you describe the state of Catholicism in Ireland today?

I believe the roots of Irish secularization have been there a long, long time, and they weren’t recognized in time. There are people who don’t recognize them still.

I think there’s a feeling that everything is all right—Mass attendance may be down, but people are really still Catholic. That may have been the case a few years ago, but I think more and more young people are losing familiarity with what faith is all about. They’re finding a way of life in which faith doesn’t really seem to hit them.

Just look at statistics today: Slightly over 60 percent of people in Ireland get married in church. Those that get married in civil marriages—it doesn’t mean that they necessarily do this as an ideological thing. They don’t walk in with a banner saying, “We’re coming here because we don’t like the church.” There may be other reasons. …

What can be done to rebuild the confidence of the young in the church?

A lot of people didn’t quite understand how much the sex abuse scandal affected young people. People have said to me, “The young people, they’re not really interested in that.” They were, though. They were quite upset about it, actually. Their confidence in the institution was seriously affected.

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UNITED KINGDOM
GlobalPost

Corinne Purtill
March 16, 2015

LONDON, UK — Try to forget it.

That’s what Jon Bird’s mother told him in 1963 when he ran home at age 4 weeping and in pain, after a stranger pulled him into the woods and raped him.

He heard the same thing six years later, he said, when a boarding school head teacher was fired — but not criminally charged — for sexually assaulting Bird and other students.

Denial, forgetting and covering up were for years the British response to allegations that children were being sexually abused in institutions that were supposed to care for them. Now those walls are coming down.

The UK is poised to launch a major national investigation into allegations that government officials knowingly covered up evidence of sexual abuse of children over decades, even when those crimes were perpetrated by people in the highest echelons of public life and in institutions specifically tasked with children’s care.

“This could be — it probably will be — the biggest inquiry this country’s ever seen,” inquiry spokesman David Jervis told GlobalPost Friday.

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ITALY
Washington Post

By Anthony Faiola March 15

NAPLES, Italy — Diego was the shy one in Father Silverio Mura’s class; a 13-year-old, olive-skinned and handsome, who spent his free time indoors watching cartoons. He walked to school alone in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius, stopping first to pray to a statue of the Virgin Mary in the rose garden in front of his apartment building.

“She was my protector,” he said.

But nothing and no one, Diego charged, protected him from Mura — the religion teacher who invited the then-teenage boy to the priest’s small apartment on Brothers Grimm Street after class one day in 1989. There, Diego, now 39, said Mura cajoled him into a kiss. A few days later, he was asked to return, suffering the first of what he described as hundreds of incidences of sexual abuse that turned a quiet boy who wanted to be a pilot into a deeply troubled adult.

After he finally came forward in 2009, Diego’s case languished. The local diocese even transferred Mura in 2012 to a school where the priest had regular access to children as young as 14. That’s when Diego, who is still Catholic, made what would become a decisive move — he wrote directly to Pope Francis.

His case is one of several in which Francis has personally intervened to aid alleged abuse victims in what the Vatican calls yet another push for change by a pope known for leading by example. The pope, according to the Vatican, escalated Diego’s case, prompting an official church investigation that could ultimately lead to Mura’s defrocking. Given the length of such legal processes in the church, it could take a year or more to establish his guilt or innocence. ….

Francis, like Benedict before him, victims’ groups say, has failed to act decisively against bishops charged with hiding abuse in their diocese, and he has embraced solutions they see as little more than window dressing. They cite alarming instances, for example, in which local dioceses have left abusive priests in ministry. The activist group BishopAccountability.org, for instance, recently drafted a letter to senior church officials profiling a number of accused clerics in the Philippines who, they say, still enjoy easy access to children. Symbolism alone, critics insist, will not get the job done.

“Getting involved in one or two cases is a PR strategy, not a solution,” said David Clohessy, president of the U.S. group SNAP (the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests).

Yet for those few affected by the pope’s involvement, it can feel like nothing short of a miracle.

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AUSTRALIA
SBS

AAP

A national approach to the protection of up to 50,000 children in care would not have the full support of all states and territories, a royal commission has heard.

The second week of a hearing into out-of-home care across Australia was told on Monday that some jurisdictions thought the time and money involved in changing laws and information technology systems were not worth it because it might “not improve client outcomes”.

The commission was told that mandatory reporting obligations for suspected child sexual abuse were applied differently across the country – with some jurisdictions excluding kinship carers.

There are also great variations in reporting practices with some carers required to tell the relevant departments while others must go straight to the police.

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

03/15/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

Has anyone else noticed that the website and twitter account (@NienstedtResign) formerly maintained/operated by the anonymous informant ‘Nienstedt: Resign’ has been taken down and/or the account closed?

If anyone has any information about this I would be eager to hear it. Of course, I have a hard time believing that Archbishop Nienstedt would take this type of step to silence one of his critics.

Oh wait…I forgot about this, and this, and, well, this.

AMDG baby, as the Jesuits would say.

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RHODE ISLAND
Providence Journal

By Paul Grimaldi

Journal Staff Writer

Posted Mar. 15, 2015

SOUTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. — One of the pastoral properties held in Rhode Island by a controversial religious order could soon become an alcohol and drug rehabilitation center run by a new health-care company.

Pennsylvania-based Recovery Centers of America has an agreement to pay approximately $5 million for a 35.5-acre property off Route 1 that once housed the Immaculate Conception Academy, according to a company representative.

The company plans to convert the former boarding school into an addiction-treatment center with about 100 beds, said Matthew F. Callahan, the company’s Rhode Island lawyer. The facility would offer both in-patient and outpatient services.

It does not plan to subdivide the property.

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ALASKA
Daily Reporter

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
First Posted: March 14, 2015

FAIRBANKS, Alaska — A former Fairbanks priest will serve at least 10 years in federal prison on a child pornography offense under a plea agreement.

Clint Landry pleaded guilty to one count of attempted coercion and enticement of a minor in a signed agreement filed Wednesday, The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner (http://bit.ly/1ChbWBI) reported.

Landry was a priest at Sacred Heart Cathedral until May. That’s when the plea agreement said a diocese custodian at Landry’s church-provided home saw an open email on Landry’s computer with a sexually explicit photo of a teenage girl.

The FBI searched Landry’s computer after the custodian contacted her supervisor.

Investigators found other child pornography on his computer and a chat transcript from a few days before in which Landry paid $55 in anticipation of seeing a video from a Yahoo account that claimed to be a 16-year-old boy in the Philippines. During the summer of 2013, he contacted seven Yahoo accounts for the purpose of seeing child pornography, according to the plea agreement.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Tagesschau

[What does the Catholic Church to educate the child abuse cases in their own ranks? A year ago the bishops have a group of researchers the task of bringing light into the darkness. Results: earliest 2017.]

Was tut die katholische Kirche, um die Kindesmissbrauchsfälle in den eigenen Reihen aufzuklären? Vor einem Jahr haben die Bischöfe eine Gruppe von Forschern damit beauftragt, Licht ins Dunkel zu bringen. Ergebnisse: frühestens 2017.

Von Anja Würzberg, Redaktion Religion und Gesellschaft, NDR

Matthias Katsch sieht nicht aus wie ein Mann, der sich leicht erschüttern lässt. Doch es gibt etwas in seiner Vergangenheit, das ihn zutiefst belastet: Als 14-Jähriger wurde er am renommierten Canisius-Kolleg von einem Pater sexuell missbraucht. Das Canisius-Kolleg gehört zum angesehenen Jesuiten-Orden. Ein Internat mit Schule, das Kindern Geborgenheit und Bildung vermitteln will. Für den damaligen Schüler Katsch und einige seiner Mitschüler wurde es zu einem gefährlichen Ort.

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CHILE
Conferencia Episcopal de Child

La Nunciatura Apostólica en Chile ha entregado este sábado 14 de marzo la siguiente declaración:

“La Nunciatura Apostólica renueva su confianza y apoyo a S.E. Mons. Juan Barros Madrid, Obispo electo de la Diócesis de Osorno.

La Nunciatura Apostólica invita, por tanto, a toda la Iglesia en Chile y, en manera particular, a la Comunidad diocesana de Osorno a prepararse, mediante la oración y las obras de bien, al inicio del gobierno pastoral de S.E. Mons. Barros Madrid, reavivando un espíritu de fe como también de comunión con el Sucesor de Pedro y con el nuevo Pastor.

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CHILE
La Tercera

[The Apostolic Nunciature in Chile yesterday expressed support for Juan Barros Madrid, named by Pope Francis as the new bishop of the diocese in the city of Osorno, last January 10. The apostolic nuncio, Ivo Scapolo said yesterday through a statement posted on the Episcopal Conference of Chile (Cech) that “the Apostolic Nunciature renews its confidence and support for SE Mons. Juan Barros Madrid, elected Bishop of the Diocese of Osorno”.]

por María José Jarpa – 15/03/2015

La Nunciatura Apostólica en Chile manifestó ayer su respaldo a Juan Barros Madrid, nombrado por el Papa Francisco como el nuevo obispo de la diócesis de la ciudad de Osorno, el pasado 10 de enero.

El nuncio apostólico, Ivo Scapolo, señaló ayer a través de un comunicado publicado en la Conferencia Episcopal de Chile (Cech) que “la Nunciatura Apostólica renueva su confianza y apoyo a S.E. Mons. Juan Barros Madrid, Obispo electo de la Diócesis de Osorno”.

Además, en el documento se “invita a toda la Iglesia en Chile y, en manera particular, a la comunidad diocesana de Osorno a prepararse, mediante la oración y las obras de bien, al inicio del gobierno pastoral de monseñor Barros”.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

1. Pope Francis surely, and sadly for Catholics, is not up to the example of “Good Pope John”. Francis practices “clever clericalism” that, under cover of platitudes about caring for the “poor sheep”, seems almost always to put protecting cardinals and clerics (and their plutocratic donors) ahead of the Gospel message and the poor and defenseless. At the same time, the pope “jesuitically” feeds, to a gullible and opportunistic media, popular “pious platitudes” to write about, without much original thought or effort being required on their part.

2. n contrast, Pope John XXIII wisely and courageously called, within barely two months of becoming pope, for an ecumenical council that effected some permanent reforms. He quietly backed squarely, without much spin, the large majority of bishops who wanted consequential reforms that only an ecumenical council could (and still can) permanently adopt. He did this until 81 years old as he battled both cancer and entrenched Vatican bureaucrats.

3. Francis could have followed, and could still follow, Good Pope John’s wise and courageous example. Instead, Francis has so far mostly protected the hierarchy, no matter what they did and do.

4. Of course, so far Francis has also salvaged the Vatican Bank’s profitable operations, as he protected Vatican cardinals from prosecutors investigating financial crimes. And he has also tightened his and future popes’ absolute control over Vatican finances — that seems mostly to be about it in terms of significant actual results after two years under Pope Francis.

5. Predictably, Francis has now, it appears, made a firm decision to stand behind his indefensible decision to assign a bishop in Chile, linked to one of the country’s most notorious clerical sex abusers, as the new leader of a local diocese.

6. Bishop Juan de la Cruz Barros Madrid, previously Chile’s military chaplain and likely in that position well known to Francis’ evidently strong ally and former Chilean Papal Nuncio, Cardinal Angleo Sodano, seemingly a long time supporter of Chilean military dictator Pinochet. Barros had been appointed in mid-January as the new bishop of the small Osorno diocese.

7. Barros is one of at least four bishops mentored by the Rev. Fernando Karadima, a longtime prominent Chilean cleric. In 2011, the Vatican sentenced Karadima to a life of “penitence and prayer” after finding him guilty of pedophilia and abuse of his ecclesiastical position.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Sexueller Missbrauch durch Angehörige der katholischen Kirche im Bistum Trier

[The Catholic Church continues to support Pastor J.]

Claudia Adams

“Weiteres trauriges Schauspiel

Sie schreiben, dass Dechant Hans Peter Kippels die Entfernung wie folgt begründet: ‘Ein Gebetshaus könne nicht dauerhaft für Demonstrationszwecke genutzt werden. Dies gelte für alle Beteiligten. Auch die Blumen, Kerze und Plakate, mit denen Gläubige vor der Kirche den entpflichteten Pfarrer J. unterstützen, seien nicht mehr vorhanden.

Es enstpricht nicht der Wahrheit, dass auch die Solidaritätsbekundungen mit Pfarrer W.J. entfernt wurden. An der Eingangstür befand sich auch Tage später noch ein großes Schild mit der Aufschrift: ‘Solidarität für Pfarrer W.J.’ und dem Konterfei des Pfarrers. Das Schild befand sich bereits bei meinem letzten Besuch in der Kirche am 22. Februar dort. Solidarität mit den Opfern ist in der Kirche also verboten, aber der Täter prangt weiterhin am Eingang.

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SERBIEN
kath.net

[According to Serbian media report, the highest governing body of the Serbian Orthodox Church has dismissed right-wing nationalist Bishop Filaret against his will. There are a number of issues but he has been accused of sexual abuse.]

Laut serbischen Medienberichten beschloss das oberste Leitungsgremium der serbisch-orthodoxen Kirche, , den rechtsnationalistischen Bischof Filaret (Micovic) gegen seinen Willen abzuberufen. Eine offizielle Erklärung der Kirche gab es zunächst nicht

Belgrad (kath.net/KNA) Die serbisch-orthodoxe Kirche hat den durch mehrere Skandale belasteten Bischof von Mileseva im Südwesten des Landes abgesetzt. Laut serbischen Medienberichten vom späten Donnerstagabend beschloss das oberste Leitungsgremium, der von Patriarch Irinej I. geleitete Heilige Synod in Belgrad, den rechtsnationalistischen Bischof Filaret (Micovic) gegen seinen Willen abzuberufen. Eine offizielle Erklärung der Kirche gab es zunächst nicht.

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OSTERREICH
Nachrichten

[The priest sentenced to 12 years in prison for sexually abusing pupils at Kremsmunster in Austria must begin his incarceration within three days.]

KREMSMÜNSTER. Jener rechtskräftig wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs an Zöglingen des Stiftes Kremsmünster zu zwölf Jahren Haft verurteilte Ex-Pater muss binnen drei Tagen seine Haft antreten.

Der Mann war laut Gutachten nur bedingt haftfähig. Dass er ins Gefängnis muss, hat nun die Vollzugsdirektion entschieden, berichtete das Neue Volksblatt (Samstag-Ausgabe).

Der ehemalige Geistliche werde in einer Justizanstalt mit angeschlossener Sonderkrankenanstalt untergebracht, so sein Anwalt Oliver Plöckinger. Bei welcher es sich dabei handle, sei noch ungewiss. Fest steht, dass der 81-Jährige vorerst in Wels einsitzen wird. Laut Verteidiger besteht keine Möglichkeit, die Entscheidung der Vollzugsdirektion zu bekämpfen.

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MINNESOTA
Winona Daily News

Bob Redig

While Pope Francis is on the right track, moving from pomp and arrogance to simplicity and humility, he has two major problems to deal with.

While some concepts can be dismissed as a theological construct, as Pope Benedict did with “limbo,” others require the consent of the whole Catholic Church.

Papal infallibility and irreformability are, as Bishop Robinson of Australia says, a prison that the Vatican has built around itself stone by stone. By definition only one entity can claim that perfection. The institutional church is not God. Truth may be absolute but human interpretation and understanding of it is imperfect and must adapt and grow.

Only when all Catholics are included in the discernment process can we humans begin to approach the truth. If not, egregious mistakes will be (and have been) made, too numerous to list, but among them the claiming of papal infallibility and irreformability.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Sunday Express

THERESA MAY must leave no stone unturned in her probe into allegations of child sex abuse that runs through every level of society “like a stick of rock”.

Sun, March 15, 2015

Appalling cases have already been uncovered in Rochdale, Rotherham, Derby, Bristol and Oxfordshire. The Home Secretary yesterday warned there is worse to come.

Days after she named a new panel to head the inquiry into abuse in England and Wales, she warned the trail would lead “into our schools, hospitals, churches, youth clubs and other institutions that should have been places of safety but instead became places of the most appalling abuse”.

For too long complaints were trivialised, dismissed or swept under the carpet. Ms May’s comments this weekend show her commitment to champion this issue on behalf of the victims and survivors, who have had the courage to speak out to save the next generation of children.

Although it had a difficult beginning, the Home Secretary now has confidence in the inquiry to get to the truth. However it is important that it does not take too long.

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NEW HAMPSHIRE
These Stone Walls

A Federal Court will hear oral arguments in the Habeas Corpus appeal of wrongly imprisoned priest, Fr Gordon MacRae.

His 1994 trial has been called a perversion of justice.

I have the honor of assisting to maintain a page for wrongly imprisoned priest, Father Gordon MacRae, at the professional social network LinkedIn. I hope you will visit it. The page has well over 1,000 followers which is somewhat unusual for LinkedIn. Many are Catholic priests throughout the world. About once a month or so, however, I receive in my inbox a message from a Catholic reader with an inquiry. The question is often the same: “I’m hearing of this story for the first time. Why is this injustice not shouted from the rooftops?”

I’m not sure I have an answer to that question. On March 17, Saint Patrick’s Day, at 10 A.M., Chief Judge Joseph LaPlante is slated to hear oral arguments in the Habeas Corpus appeal filed on behalf of Father MacRae in U.S. District Court in Concord, NH. I do not know what to expect, and it may be some time before a decision is published as a result of this hearing.

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UNITED STATES
Seasons of Grace

March 15, 2015 by Kathy Schiffer

Father Gordon J. MacRae may finally be freed soon, after serving more than twenty years in prison. Father MacRae, whose story is told on the blog These Stone Walls, has long been believed to be innocent of the alleged crimes for which he was convicted in 1994. This week, though, he will be back in court–where his case will be reviewed with fresh eyes.

The clergy abuse scandal was fresh in the news, and there was a lot of anger toward the Church when Father MacRae was accused of sexual assault in 1994. His accuser was 27-year-old Thomas Grover–a man with a long history of volence, theft, and drug charges. Although the charges against Fr. MacRae were uncorroborated, and although Grover himself stood to benefit substantially from filing a complaint against the priest, the court found Father MacRae guilty.

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CHILE
Cooperativa

[The Apostolic Nunciature on Saturday issued a statement in “trust and support” of Bishop Juan Barros Madrid, who is January was appointed bishop of the Osomo diocese. He has been criticized for being a disciple of priest Fernando Karadima, who was convicted of sexual abuse of minors while serving at El Bosque.]

La Nunciatura Apostólica emitió este sábado un comunicado en el que declaró que renovaba la “confianza y apoyo” al obispo de la diócesis de Osorno, Juan Barros Madrid, quien se ha visto cuestionado por haber sido uno de los discípulos de Fernando Karadima, sacerdote condenado por abusos sexuales contra menores cuando ejercía como párroco en El Bosque.

En el comunicado, la Nunciatura invita “a toda la Iglesia en Chile y, en manera particular, a la Comunidad diocesana de Osorno a prepararse, mediante la oración y las obras de bien, al inicio del gobierno pastoral de S.E. Mons. Barros Madrid”.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

SHANNON DEERY HERALD SUN MARCH 15, 2015

THE wife of one of Australia’s most notorious paedophiles has launched a scathing attack on one of his victims, saying the nine-times child molester should never have been jailed.

The remorseless child predator is serving an eight-year prison term for molesting ­students at Yeshivah College over two decades.

But in a shocking defence of the paedophile, the man’s wife, who cannot be named, has publicly singled out a victim, naming him in online posts, and accusing him of making up allegations of abuse.

Victoria Police and the ­Office of Public Prosecutions have been made aware of the taunts.

It comes amid claims that victims of abuse from Yeshivah College are continuing to be bullied and intimidated for speaking out against the ultra-orthodox Jewish community.

The Herald Sun can reveal one victim has even been forced to take out an intervention order against a prominent community member over concerns of harassment.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Bognor Regis Observer

A FORMER teacher who worked at two schools in Chichester as well as the cathedral has been jailed for 18 months for indecently assaulting a teenage boy in Harrow in the 1980s.

David Gutteridge was sentenced on Wednesday at Harrow Crown Court after earlier being found guilty by a jury of two counts of indecent assault on a boy under the age of 16.

The court heard the offences took place during the 1980s after Gutteridge plied the victim with alcohol and cigarettes.

Gutteridge was a former employee at Prebendal School and Bishop Luffa School, both in Chichester, and was a former secretary of the Chichester Cathedral Choristers’ Association.

However, there is no indication that any offences took place in Chichester.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Daily Beast

Nico Hines

In Britain’s sickening scandal to end all scandals, the child victim who may have the most to tell is now a man who has rebuilt his life in Connecticut.

LONDON — The key to bringing Britain’s alleged VIP pedophile ring to justice could be the testimony of a successful businessman now living and working in Connecticut.

The man, who allegedly was the victim of sickening sexual abuse as a schoolboy, fled Britain for a new life in the United States where he now has a thriving career and a family.

Scotland Yard detectives have told The Daily Beast that they understand his reluctance to come forward after officers failed to properly investigate his claims in the past, but they believe his account could prove crucial to securing the convictions of surviving members of a child sex abuse ring that operated at the heart of the British establishment throughout the 1980s. …

As the tangle of interconnected police inquiries at Scotland Yard continues to investigate historic child abuse allegations, some of the men involved are finally being brought to justice.

Tony McSweeney, a Catholic priest, was found guilty last month of sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy in a care home in Richmond called Grafton Close. He had been due to stand trial alongside his friend John Stingemore, who ran Grafton Close, and was said to be the ringleader.

Stingemore died before the trial started but one of the rapes he is accused of was said to have taken place at the Elm Guest House. Stingemore and McSweeney were arrested by Operation Fernbridge officers who were probing allegations that vulnerable boys were regularly sent from the Grafton children’s home to be abused at Elm Guest House.

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TEXAS
KFOX 14

EL PASO, Texas – Saint Patrick’s Cathedral opened up its doors to residents who are dealing with abuse.

Today the cathedral hosted its very first Mass of Atonement and Hope.

They invited survivors of physical, emotional and sexual abuse, as well as their families.

Bishop Mark Seitz and parishioners prayed for victims of abuse whether it happened within the Church, in the family or society.

The church says people who have been hurt by abuse aren’t recognized enough and this is the first step to raise more awareness.

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UNITED STATES
CNN

By John Blake, CNN
Video by Matt Gannon and Nick Scott

The boy was watching people sing at a sweaty Pentecostal tent service one Sunday morning when a prophet onstage scanned the congregation and fixed her eyes on him.

“You need to come up here,” the prophet told the wide-eyed 9-year-old, D.E. Paulk. “The Lord has a word for you that you need to speak to the church today.”

As he was led to the stage, D.E.’s heart raced and his legs went numb. He grabbed the microphone with clammy hands and stammered the only words he could find: “Uh.. God… uh… loves you.”

From that moment on, D.E. hid behind furniture in his family’s church in Atlanta whenever pastors prophesied. But someone would steer him to the pulpit, and D.E.’s family would join the prophet in laying hands on him while predicting mighty signs and wonders for the boy they called “The Promised Seed.”

No prophet, though, came close to predicting what really happened to D.E. in the years ahead.

No one predicted that his family would build one of the most racially groundbreaking megachurches in America only to see it collapse from a series of bizarre sex scandals covered by “A Current Affair” and other tabloid magazines and TV shows.

No one predicted that D.E. would discover that the man he believed to be his uncle, Archbishop Earl Paulk Jr., was really his biological father. The bishop had slept with his brother’s wife while sharing the pulpit with both.

And no one predicted that after years spent extricating his family from assorted scandals, D.E. would do something in church that was, for many of his parishioners, far more outrageous than anything his notorious uncle did.

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NEW YORK
New York Post

By Philip Messing and Amanda Lozada
March 14, 2015

That’s not holy water!

An Episcopalian minister was nabbed with an open bottle of vodka and prescription meds inside her car after she was allegedly spotted driving drunkenly through the Holland Tunnel Friday night, Port Authority police said.

Diane Reiners, 53, was swerving in her 2004 orange Toyota and hitting the curb inside the tunnel, at times coming to a full stop, as she traveled from Manhattan to New Jersey around 6 p.m., authorities said.

Panicked drivers called 911, and PA Officer Christopher Paskovitch was eventually able to stop the Brooklyn woman’s car on the New Jersey side of the crossing.

Officers allegedly found the open container of Absolut on the center console, as well as vodka inside a water bottle, 31 Lorazepam pills prescribed in someone else’s name, and 22 packets of Tramadol, a high-potency pain killer.

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NEW YORK
Daily Freeman

By Paula Ann Mitchell, Daily Freeman
POSTED: 03/14/15

RHINEBECK >> The announcement on Jan. 25 sent shockwaves through a church and its mission parish in the heart of Northern Dutchess.

That was when parishioners at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Rhinebeck and St. Joseph’s in Rhinecliff learned for the first time that their pastor, the Rev. Peter Kihm, had been suspended due to an allegation of sexual abuse 30 years ago.

They were told by Bishop Dominick Lagonegro at four Masses that weekend that the accusation was “credible,” but that their pastor had denied it.

Even weeks after the news made headlines, staff and congregants at Good Shepherd remained tight-lipped about their loss.

Phone calls were abruptly terminated and a personal visit to the church ended with a woman refusing to comment and closing the door in a reporter’s face.

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VATICAN CITY
NPR

[with audio]

MARCH 14, 2015

SYLVIA POGGIOLI

When the College of Cardinals elected the new head of the Roman Catholic Church two years ago, Pope Francis was given the mandate to put the Vatican’s dysfunctional administration in order.

As the papacy’s enters its third year, some of the biggest reforms have been achieved in the Vatican’s finances, long tainted by scandal.

Three days after his election, Pope Francis made clear his vision of what the Catholic Church should be when he exclaimed, “Oh, how I would love a poor church … for the poor.”

But the pope did not mean he wanted a church with empty coffers. The Vatican’s finances had long been plagued by suspicion of corruption. In order to clean house, Pope Francis created a new department, the Secretariat for the Economy, and chose as its prefect an outsider to the opaque and secretive world of the Vatican bureaucracy.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

1. Pope Francis has taken his unprecedented public relations efforts to new heights on Mexican TV. In front of a large painting prop of Our Lady of Guadalupe, he predicted in an interview that he may retire very soon, or within three years.

2. Retire with so much undone? Pope John XXIII at least called, within barely two months of becoming pope, for an ecumenical council that effected some permanent reforms. He did this as he battled both cancer and entrenched Vatican bureaucrats until 81 years old. Francis has so far mostly just salvaged the Vatican Bank’s profitable operations and protected Vatican cardinals from prosecutors, while also tightening popes’ absolute control over Vatican finances — that seems mostly to be about it. Now he is discussing his exit plans and lowering expectations about permanent reforms. Really?

3. Yet, the heat on the pope may have only barely begun, especially on public outrage over the child abuse scandals in the UK, the Philippines, the USA (Minneapolis), Poland, Australia, Germany and elsewhere. Indeed, an abuse survivor appointed to, and well publicized by the clerics associated with, the pope’s new “go slow” sex abuse commission, has recently indicated his dissatisfaction with the Vatican’s overall approach, which he now has seen up close. Please see, “Leading anti-abuse campaigner offers to take charge of Holy See child protection office” here,

[The Tablet]

4. The Mexican TV interview was triggered by Francis’ unwarranted and ill advised slur about a purported “Mexicanization” process related to drug violence. Pope Francis is now, it appears, trying to pass the buck on Mexican drug wars to the “devil”. The pope reportedly said, ” … I think the devil is punishing Mexico with great fury, …”.

Please see, reminiscent of the “Exorcist” movie, the almost surreal video clip of Pope Francis in the recent interview blaming “El Diablo”, Mexico is being punished“, here,

5. [Washington Post]

Please see also my recent relevant remarks, “A Mess: Mexico & Electing Bishops & Jeb Bush Too“, here,

6. [Christian Catholicism]

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UNITED STATES
Ms. Magazine

March 13, 2015 by Anita Little

This March, for Women’s History Month, the Ms. Blog is profiling Wonder Women who have made history—and those who are making history right now. Join us each day as we bring you the stories of iconic and soon-to-be-famous feminist change-makers.

In September of 2011, Barbara Blaine, the founder of the Survivor Network of those Abused by Priests, traveled to The Hague to file allegations of “crimes against humanity” against the Vatican at the International Criminal Court. Her goal: to hold the Pope and the Catholic hierarchy accountable for the rampant sexual abuse by priests that had been systematically concealed for decades.

The move was unprecedented and The New York Times called it “the most substantial effort yet” to hold pedophile priests responsible for their actions.

Though the ICC decided not to prosecute or even investigate former Pope Benedict XVI and other Catholic leaders, SNAP’s filing of the complaint brought much-needed worldwide attention to the scourge of priest abuse and gave a voice to survivors who testified in the ICC filing.

Her journey to the steps of The Hague began in 1988, long before the priest abuse epidemic was well-known. That was the year Blaine, a lawyer and social worker, founded SNAP. Its mission was simple: expose predators, protect the vulnerable and empower survivors. Blaine was pushed to create the organization after years of suffering privately from the shame and trauma of her own experience with priest molestation as an 8th grader in Toledo, Ohio.

SNAP started out as a small support group with its nascent meetings taking place in the Chicago homeless shelter that Blaine ran at the time; SNAP now has more than 12,000 members and 65 chapters. It even created branches for other religious groups after abuse survivors from non-Catholic backgrounds began to approach SNAP for support.

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CANADA
The Telegram

Pope Francis has certainly found the right words for the problem of sex-offending priests among the ranks of the Catholic Church.

He’s said there is “absolutely no place in ministry for those who abuse minors,” adding “families need to know that the church is making every effort to protect their children. They should also know that they have every right to turn to the church with full confidence, for it is a safe and secure home.”

But while those words from the head of the church are heartening, actions a little lower down may be speaking a little louder.

You cannot help but be discouraged by stories like the ones this week about a bankruptcy proceeding by the Archdiocese of Milwaukee.

The archdiocese went into bankruptcy arguing that it couldn’t pay the potential costs of settlements and court verdicts for abuse by Catholic priests in the jurisdiction.

The archdiocese had argued in the proceedings that, while it had moved US$55 million into a trust fund and away from funds available to pay victims, that money couldn’t be recovered because it was protected from federal action as a matter of religious freedom. (Money from the trust fund, the archdiocese argued, was needed to pay for upkeep at cemeteries, because that was what the money had been donated for. It could, apparently, also be used to pay for lawyers to defend the sex abuse actions.)

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PHILIPPINES
Daily Mail

Australian businessman accused of masterminding paedophile ring opens up to 60 Minutes who claim he’s remorseful for his ‘horrific crimes’

By HEATHER MCNAB FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA

The Australian businessman accused of masterminding an international paedophile ring has spoken from behind bars to 60 Minutes’ Tara Brown, claiming that he has remorse for crimes that have been labelled by authorities as the most horrific they’ve ever seen.

Peter Gerard Scully, 51, was arrested in the Philippines in February on charges of sexually abusing 11 children, the youngest of whom was only 18 months old, and killing another young girl, leading to calls for the reintroduction of the death penalty.

‘He is in every sense of the word a predator. His crimes are like none that the Philippine authorities had ever seen before, acts so depraved and ever escalating,’ Tara Brown told Daily Mail Australia.

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PHILIPPINES
Manila Times

Fr. Shay Cullen

IT must be one of the most heinous crimes of the century, with little exaggeration, and one which went undetected by Filipino police until Dutch Internet investigators found abhorrent and revolting child pornography of Filipino children being sexually assaulted, tortured and murdered on videos on the computer of a Dutch national.

Police investigator Attorney Janet Francisco officer in charge of the National Bureau of Investigation, said the videos were so “hateful, disgusting, and painful to watch the babies being tortured, and sexually assaulted and listening to their cries could haunt you forever” she told a national newspaper.

This terrible litany of crimes against children with the help of Filipino women who recruit, traffic and abduct children as young as one year old is surely just one crime of many. There are hundreds if not thousands of such crimes un-detected, under-reported and unknown.

They are being committed against the Filipinos by Filipinos and foreign nationals like the Australian Peter Gerard Scully, accused of these crimes mentioned above and soon to be reported by 60 Minutes Australia, Ch.9.

These terrible videos are being financed by an international syndicate and distributed around the world. Many pedophiles buy them for large sums of money.

The abusers and criminals choose the Philippines to make child pornography and “snuff” videos because the rule of law is practically non-existent here when it comes to child protection and conviction of abusers. Take for example the 2009 anti-child pornography law. …

The Church is to be held accountable also as the authorities have never turned over a clerical child sex abuser to the civil authorities. Never has a priest sex abuser been convicted. The bishops, who represent the management of the Church, should be held to account for they simply ship off child-abuser priests to dioceses abroad in some cases.

When they abuse abroad and are investigated they rush back to a hideout the Philippines. International law enforcers have asked me to help locate some of these.

They destroy the lives of the children and bring disgrace on the good honest clergy and the entire population of Catholics and the Church itself. Why are a few allowed to get away with such crimes condemned by Jesus in no uncertain terms in the Gospel of Matthew Chapter 18.

The answer may be that some misguided Church leaders have not had the courage and faith to stand by the victims and get them healing, therapy and justice and bring the perpetrators to civil justice.

Its time that the people of God and the morally upright clergy and religious start to speak out and point out the abusers in their ranks. Pope Francis has himself shown the way.

He heard about clergy who abused altar boys in Spain. He himself called up the victims first to pledge help and support. Then he called up the bishop and demanded the accused be turned over to the police for investigation and trial.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

Theresa May warns the public still do not grasp the scale of child sex abuse in Britain, saying it is ‘woven into the fabric of our society’

By LAURIE HANNA FOR MAILONLINE

Child sex abuse is ‘woven, covertly, into the fabric’ of British society, Home Secretary Theresa May has warned.

The Conservative politician announced this week that a new judge-led inquiry into historic child abuse will investigate allegations from before the 1970s.

But she said the public are yet to grasp the full scale of the scandal, with the allegations so far amounting to the ‘tip of the iceberg’.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Mrs May said: ‘We already know the trail will lead into our schools and hospitals, our churches, our youth clubs and many other institutions that should have been places of safety but instead became the setting for the most appalling abuse.

‘However, what the country doesn’t yet appreciate is the true scale of that abuse.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

Child sex abuse is “woven, covertly, into the fabric” of British society, Theresa May has warned.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, the home secretary said the public were yet to grasp the full scale of the problem.

Her comments come after a new panel was announced for the Parliamentary inquiry into historical child abuse.

Mrs May said the inquiry marked a “new beginning”, but warned allegations made so far were only the “tip of the iceberg”.

The inquiry was set up in July 2014 to find out whether public bodies had covered up or neglected allegations of abuse, following claims that a paedophile ring had operated in Westminster in the 1980s.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

Theresa May: Sex abuse runs through every level of society like a ‘stick of rock’

By Theresa May, Home Secretary
14 Mar 2015

This week marked a new beginning for the independent panel inquiry into child sexual abuse. The announcement on Thursday of a four-person panel, the confirmation of the power to compel witnesses and the removal of any cut-off date from the Terms of Reference, means the chairman, Justice Lowell Goddard, can now take the inquiry forward, following the evidence wherever it takes her.

We already know the trail will lead into our schools and hospitals, our churches, our youth clubs and many other institutions that should have been places of safety but instead became the setting for the most appalling abuse. However, what the country doesn’t yet appreciate is the true scale of that abuse.

And that is quite understandable. I have only learnt about the extent and breadth of the problem since I first announced an overarching inquiry into whether public bodies and other non-state institutions had failed in their duty of care towards children.

It is a matter of public record that the inquiry had a difficult beginning. We did not realise the degree to which survivors mistrusted the political establishment. And we set up the inquiry in the way Whitehall always sets up inquiries. But it wasn’t enough for survivors to have the inquiry, its chairman and its terms of reference presented to them as a fait accompli. We needed to work with survivors if we were going to get those things right. It was through this collaboration that my understanding of this complex issue grew.

I learnt the way in which words and phrases can unintentionally cause distress. I was asked not to use the word “historical” in relation to child sexual abuse as to every person who has suffered there is nothing “historical” about what happened to them. They live with the knowledge and the consequences of their abuse each and every day of their lives.

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

03/13/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

If the shoe fits, wear it, or so they say, and so I have concluded that the designation of W.D.O.E. (Worst Diocese on Earth) should be formally conferred upon the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis. The tipping point? This week’s announcement to priests of the dismissal of Curtis Wehmeyer from the clerical state.

During the same week in which I began a series of posts describing how there is a witch hunt underway in Saint Paul (more to come on that), with many priests being targeted supposedly as a result of the Kinsale file review and almost all living in fear that they are just one unfounded accusation away from public humiliation and an end to their ministry, the Archdiocese took a novel approach to informing the presbyterate at large of Wehmeyer’s dismissal: it sent them the news release, which included the statement ‘all priests and parishes of the Archdiocese have been notified’.

There was a brief email along with the attachment which read:

Subject: Update – Curtis Wehmeyer

Dear Reverend Fathers and Deacons,

Attached is a statement to be publicly released shortly regarding the dismissal of Curtis Wehmeyer from the clerical state.

Please let me know if you have any questions, and please keep all affected in your prayers.

Thanks!

Anne

Nothing further.

So, what is so bad about this? Well, first, it did not come from the Archbishop, who really should be the one to inform his priests of something as serious as the dismissal of one of their brothers.

More importantly, however, this means of communicating the decision fails to acknowledge how troubling priests find the idea of ex officio dismissal which, as an exception in the legal system of the Church, confers the most serious penalty possible upon a priest or deacon without any formal process. When there is a witch hunt taking place, notice of an ex officio dismissal can be perceived as a validation of the ‘shoot first’ mentality that already has many priests on edge.

For that reason, in announcing such a decision many bishops will take pains to reassure their clergy that such decisions are made rarely, under very limited circumstances, and only when the cleric’s guilt is well established. I think many priests would have found it very helpful to hear, for instance, that it is only in a few instances that canon law permits a priest to be returned to the lay state without a formal trial or administrative process. Given the current climate of fear and intimidation, I think they would have taken comfort in learning that canon law puts great emphasis on the judicial protections that we have come to associate with the right of defense, and that, therefore, the requirement for a judicial or administrative process can only be set aside when the offense of which the cleric is accused falls under the category of a grave delict, as outlined in Sacramentorum Sanctitatis Tutela, and when the cleric’s guilt is well established. Most bishops, I believe, would also have reminded their priests that in Curtis’s case, his guilt was established through his own admission and guilty plea.

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ILLINOIS
The Daily Journal

Saturday, March 14, 2015

Jeff Bonty
jbonty@daily-journal.com
815-937-3366

The former head deacon at Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church, Angelo T. Ervin, was found guilty of impregnating an 18-year-old woman with mental disabilities and faces at least six years in prison, but up to 30.

“It’s been a very long road,” said Brenda Claudio, one of two assistant state’s attorneys who prosecuted the case. Ervin, 51, who was 47 in 2010 when he raped the victim, also was a family friend and their landlord.

He was taken into custody following the verdict of the jury, made up of 10 men and two women.

“Obviously, we are disappointed with the decision,” said Ervin’s attorney, Richard Dvorak.

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SOUTH AFRICA
Sowetan

By Mogomotsi Selebi | Mar 14, 2015

THE SA Council of Churches has admitted that recent reports of pastors criminally charged with sexual offences were of great concern to them.

Bishop Malusi Mpumlwana from the council warned that lack of accountability on the part of church leadership often led to such incidents.

Mpumlwana’s comments came as a 45-year-old pastor was due to appear in the Bultfontein Magistrate’s Court in Free State today on a charge of rape.

“We are absolutely concerned, but what I would like to say is that, a criminal is a criminal.

“There is no ‘special criminal’ regardless of whether the person is a pastor or not,” Mpumlwana said.

“There is a growing tendency for people to use the trust of the people and to also abuse that trust. One is reminded of the false prophets.”

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MINNESOTA
CBS Minnesota

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO/AP) – The Diocese of New Ulm has released the names of four priests accused of sexual abuse.

St. Paul lawyer Jeff Anderson says that, of the four named, one has to his knowledge not been publicly named before — Father Dennis Becker.

The other three named by the Diocese of New Ulm have all died. They were Father David Roney, Father John Murphy, and Father Michael Skoblik.

Becker is retired, according to the diocese. He was at the Church of the Holy Trinity in 1964 and 1965.

“Any time there is a release of information about offenders, it is a step forward,” Anderson said.

“However, when done quietly and without substantive disclosure there’s still a lack of transparency.”

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Declan Brennan

A detective has been acquitted of forging a letter from the Director of Public Prosecutions in relation to the investigation of a priest accused of sexual abuse.

Detective Garda Catherine McGowan, aged 48, who is based at Bray Garda Station, had pleaded not guilty to one count of forgery on January 15, 2009, at Bray Garda Station and two counts of using a false instrument at Bray Garda Station and at Harcourt Street Garda Station between June 21 and 22, 2011.

The instrument was alleged to have been a letter from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), dated January 14, 2009.

After a 14-day trial, a jury took just three hours to return unanimous verdicts of not guilty on all counts.

The State had alleged Garda McGowan had forged the letter to “hoodwink” gardaí who were reviewing whether she had acted properly in investigating allegations of sexual abuse by a priest. This investigation was prompted by the publication of the Murphy Report which investigated clerical sexual abuse. The priest in Gda McGowan’s case was mentioned in the report.

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INDIANA
South Bend Tribune

Posted on Mar 14, 2015

by Margaret Fosmoe

Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart will host an event March 22 to acknowledge institutional responsibility for sexual exploitation against women by the late John Howard Yoder, who was a prominent Mennonite theologian, and to help bring peace and closure to his victims.

Yoder, who died in 1997 at age 70, was a longtime faculty member and president at a Mennonite seminary in Elkhart and also taught for 30 years at the University of Notre Dame.

Allegations that Yoder had sexually abused, harassed and assaulted women circulated for decades, and were publicly reported in 1992, although he never was charged with any crime. Many of the women were students or others Yoder met through his academic and religious work.

The allegations about his behavior toward women ranged from groping to pressure to disrobe to sexual contact.

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POLAND
Press TV (Iran)

A Polish court has sentenced a Roman Catholic priest to seven years in prison after finding him guilty of sexually abusing underage boys.

The court in the western Polish city of Wroclaw also ordered the 44-year-old priest, identified only as Pawel K., to undergo psychological treatment and prohibited him from working with young people for the rest of his life.

The judge, Maciej Skorniak, described the priest as a “seductive, provocative and dangerous type” during court proceedings.

Pawel K. was arrested in a hotel in Wroclaw in December 2012 when he was checking in with a teenage boy, arousing suspicion among the hotel workers.

The priest, however, did not admit to any wrongdoing.

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NEVADA
The Daily Courier

CARSON CITY, Nev. – A woman who says she was victimized by Bill Cosby is asking Nevada lawmakers to remove the statute of limitations on reporting sexual assault.

Lise-Lotte Lublin said Friday that a Nevada law requiring reports be filed within four years of the incident prevents her from pursuing a case against the comedian.

Lublin says she lost consciousness after Cosby gave her two alcoholic drinks at the Las Vegas Hilton in 1989. She said she went public about the incident after hearing numerous similar allegations.

Cosby’s publicist did not immediately respond to an email message seeking comment. Cosby has denied allegations other women have made against him.

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NEVADA
News 3

Reported by: Sandra Gonzalez
Email: sgonzalez@mynews3.com

LAS VEGAS (KSNV MyNews3.com) — Reporting sexual assault in a timely manner could be getting the boot.

Nevada lawmakers are looking into possibly doing away with the statute of limitations on sexual assault cases in our state. A high profile celebrity’s case has become part of the fight.

“I’m here in front of this committee to tell you this is what sexual assault looks like,” said Benjamin Lublin.

Lublin is now publicly coming forward about being sexually assaulted when he was 13. He’s testifying as a bill is being discussed to remove the statute of limitations in Nevada, which is currently four years.

Then his wife Lise-Lotte Lublin testified next, but needed a moment to collect herself. she says her assailant drugged her drinks in 1989.

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UNITED KINGDOM
ITV

Child sex abuse allegations made against public figures are just “the tip of the iceberg”, according to Home Secretary Theresa May, who also claimed that such abuse is “woven, covertly, into the fabric” of British society.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph Mrs May said the public are yet to grasp the full scale of the scandal which, she said, “will lead into our schools and hospitals, our churches, our youth clubs and many other institutions that should have been places of safety.”

In my discussions with older victims and survivors and their representatives, I began to realise how abuse is woven, covertly, into the fabric of British society.

During one of my first meeting with survivors, one lady said to me: ‘Get this inquiry right and it will be like a stick of Blackpool rock. You will see abuse going through every level of society.’

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MARYLAND
CBS Baltimore

Rick Ritter

BALTIMORE (WJZ) — A Baltimore Catholic school teacher charged with sexual abuse. Now the school employee who reported it says she was fired for being a whistleblower–and she’s suing.

The archdiocese says not so fast.

Rick Ritter has details of the lawsuit obtained by WJZ.

The librarian claims the school retaliated against her for reporting the suspected abuse, but the archdiocese says she broke the law by not coming forward soon enough.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

Article by: JEAN HOPFENSPERGER , Star Tribune Updated: March 13, 2015

The diocese has yet to release the identities of all 12 priest sex offenders it has identified.

The Diocese of New Ulm has quietly released the names of four priests accused of child sex abuse, marking its first public disclosure of any such names.

It remains the only Minnesota diocese that has not made public its full list of priest sex abusers. A list was compiled a decade ago, when now-Archbishop John Nienstedt oversaw the New Ulm diocese as bishop.

Parishioners received notices in their church bulletins about the priests: Dennis Becker, David Roney, John Murphy and Michael Skoblik.

Becker was a new face; he had not been previously identified by alleged victims of abuse. The other three had. All are deceased except Becker, who served from 1964 until 2000, when he retired from active ministry, the diocese reported.

The priests served at more than 20 churches in cities including Willmar, Redwood Falls and Montevideo. The four priests are named in 12 pending lawsuits against the diocese, said a diocese news release. The abuses occurred “decades ago,” it said.

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ALASKAS
Fairbanks News-Miner

Staff Report, newsroom@newsminer.com

FAIRBANKS—A former Fairbanks parish priest will serve at least 10 years in federal prison for a child pornography-related offense under a signed plea agreement filed Wednesday.

Under the agreement, Clint Landry, 58, pleaded guilty to one count of attempted coercion and enticement of a minor.

Landry was a priest at Sacred Heart Cathedral, Fairbanks’ largest Catholic congregation, until May. In May, a diocese custodian at Landry’s church-provided home saw an open email on Landry’s computer with a sexually explicit photo of a teenage girl, according to a description of the case against him in the plea agreement.

The FBI searched Landry’s computer after the custodian contacted her supervisor. Investigators found other child pornography on his computer and a chat transcript from a few days before in which Landry paid $55 in anticipation of seeing a video from a Yahoo account that claimed to be a 16-year-old boy in the Philippines. During the summer of 2013 he contacted seven Yahoo accounts for the purpose of seeing child pornography, according to the plea agreement.

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FLORIDA
Naples Daily News

Ryan Mills
Mar 13, 2015

NAPLES, Fla. – A priest at an East Naples church is under investigation after an accuser came forward late last year claiming to have been sexually abused by him 30 years ago in an Iowa parish.

But the Rev. Leo Riley, who has been serving at St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church on Rattlesnake Hammock Road since 2013, “strenuously denies that the allegation is true and maintains he is innocent,” according to a statement released by the Diocese of Venice. Both the Florida and Iowa dioceses say there have been no other such allegations against Riley.

Riley, 58, was placed on paid administrative leave on Dec. 14, pending a preliminary investigation by the Archdiocese of Dubuque in Iowa. The alleged abuse was said to have taken place in 1985 when Riley was an associate pastor at a Dubuque parish.

“The Diocese of Venice in Florida and its entities take very seriously the safety of all young people, and works to prevent any instance of abuse from happening,” according to the prepared statement.

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MINNESOTA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, March 13

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, 314 566 9790, SNAPclohessy@aol.com

Four New Ulm Catholic priests have been identified as “credibly accused” child molesters but again, church officials ask victims to call them instead of calling law enforcement FIRST. That’s irresponsible and self-serving.

The four are Fr. Dennis Becker, Fr. David A. Roney, Fr. John M. Murphy, and Fr. Michael G. Skoblik.

New Ulm’s bishop should apologize for repeating a centuries-old hurtful pattern of trying to handle child sex crimes internally rather than criminally. While he mentions both church and secular authorities in his notice to parishioners, the bishop lists church staff first, and includes contact information for them (while only later, and briefly, mentioning “law enforcement” with no contact information provided).

All adults have a moral duty to protect kids and a civic duty to report known or suspected crimes to police. Shame on Bishop John LeVoir and his staff for again selfishly putting their own comfort, careers, prestige and power ahead of the safety of kids by discouraging reports to secular authorities.

Shame on him too for saying these alleged crimes happened “decades ago.” That’s part of a carefully-orchestrated public relations and damage control strategy to mollify parishioners and the public and to imply that clergy sex crimes are all in the past. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Instead of trying to pacify parishioners, Catholic officials should be trying to help police. Instead of encouraging complacency, Catholic officials should be encouraging vigilance.

We urge anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered clergy sex crimes or cover ups in the New Ulm area – by one of these four or by other clerics – to call the experienced and unbiased professionals in law enforcement, not the self-serving and biased amateurs in church offices. We especially encourage current and former church employees who may have information or suspicions about child molesting clerics to find the courage to speak up, expose wrongdoers, protect kids and deter cover ups.

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FLORIDA
News-Press

MELISSA MONTOYA, MMONTOYA@NEWS-PRESS.COM March 13, 2015

A Naples priest has been placed on administrative leave pending an investigation into child molestation accusation stemming from 30 years ago.

The accusation against Father Leo Riley, a priest at St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church on Rattlesnake Hammock Road, began in December of last year at the Archdiocese of Dubuque in Iowa.

According to John Robbins, director of communications for the Archdiocese of Dubuque, the alleged child molestation took place in 1985 when Riley was an associate pastor at a parish there.

In February, the Archdiocese of Dubuque Review Board advised the Archbishop Michael Jackels that accusations were “not manifestly false or frivolous.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
Telegraph

By Peter Dominiczak, Political Editor

A major inquiry into child abuse will reveal that sexual exploitation runs through every level of British society like a “stick of Blackpool rock”, Theresa May warns today.

Writing in The Daily Telegraph, the Home Secretary, says that people across Britain do not yet “appreciate the true scale” of the abuse and that once the inquiry is done, “we will never look at society in the same way again”.

In a highly personal intervention, Mrs May says that the panel, being led by Justice Lowell Goddard, will encourage more victims of abuse to come forward and lead to perpetrators being brought to justice.
“I hope and believe it will give all victims and survivors a voice,” Mrs May says. “For too long nobody listened, nobody wanted to admit the darkness in our midst.”

She warns that “the trail” will lead into schools, hospitals, churches and youth clubs as well as “and many other institutions that should have been places of safety but instead became the setting for the most appalling abuse”.

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OHIO
WTOV

BELMONT COUNTY, Ohio – A victim’s advocate group took its protest to the campus of Belmont College on Friday where defrocked priest Gary Zalenski recently worked as a member of the faculty.

While Zalenski hasn’t been teaching for a while, he has said would like to get back to it. Judy Jones and Steven Spaner are with the group “SNAP” — Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “He’s on the faculty there, and we believe he should never be on a faculty at a college,” Jones said.

The recently defrocked catholic priest was once accused of sexually assaulting a young girl from his former church. A grand jury investigated the case and didn’t find enough evidence to file charges.

Jones and Spaner presented the school with a letter in hopes of getting answers. “If he’s too dangerous to be a priest at a parish, he is too dangerous to be on the faculty at Belmont College, and he needs to be fired,” Jones said.

Belmont College released this statement: “Mr. Zalenski is not currently teaching, nor is he on the payroll, at Belmont College. Prior to August of 2014, he contracted with us part-time on an as needed basis. There are no current plans to contract Mr. Zalenski in the future.” The statement is still not enough for SNAP.

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FLORIDA
WINK News

BY EILEEN COFRE • MARCH 13, 2015

COLLIER COUNTY, Fla.- A Catholic priest in East Naples is on paid administrative leave.

Father Leo Riley is accused of molesting a child in 1985. The allegations just surfaced in December 2014 from Iowa where Riley used to live.

Parishioners say they are shocked to hear the news about the allegations.

In a statement to WINK News, the Diocese of Venice says Riley denies the claims. He is on paid administrative leave, pending the outcome of an investigation at the Archdiocese in Dubuque, Iowa.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

By Phil Lawler | Mar 13, 2015

A Catholic priest who is falsely accused of sexual abuse can’t count on his bishop to defend him. That’s the unhappy conclusion one reaches after reading informative article in the Homiletic and Pastoral Review by David Shaneyfelt and Joseph Maher.

Twenty years ago, diocesan officials and their legal representatives would defend aggressively against sex-abuse claims: disclosing little, admitting nothing, and demanding silence if the victim accepted a financial settlement. The system was tilted against the accusers. But now the pendulum has swung to the opposite extreme; the system tilts against the accused.

Shaneyfelt and Maher explain that even if bishops wanted to defend priests, in cases when they were convinced the accusations were fraudulent, they might not be free to do so. Often the legal strategy of the diocese is dictated by the insurance companies that would be obligated to pay off a claim.

For the insurer, the best possible outcome in a sex-abuse lawsuit is an inexpensive resolution. If the claim can be settled out of court, without the expense of a trial, that will often be the insurer’s preference.

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MINNESOTA
Roman Catholic Diocese of New Ulm

Contact: Office of Communications Release #487
Diocese of New Ulm March 6, 2015
(507) 359-2966; FAX (507) 354-0268
dnu@dnu.org

Statement on 12 Notices of Claim

NEW ULM, Minn. – The Catholic Diocese of New Ulm, Minn., has been named in 12 Notices of Claim
alleging sexual misconduct involving a minor by four priests of the diocese:

• Fr. Dennis Becker (retired)
• Fr. David Roney (deceased)
• Fr. John Murphy (deceased)
• Fr. Michael Skoblik (deceased)

The parishes at which the alleged abuses took place have also been named in the claims. Below is a list of the parishes named in the claims, the priest named, and the time period of the alleged abuse.

• Church of the Holy Trinity, Winsted (Fr. Becker, 1964-1965)
• Church of St. Francis, Benson (Fr. Roney, 1965-1967)
• Church of St. Mary, Willmar (Fr. Roney, 1967-1968 and 1968-1970)
• Church of St. Paul, Walnut Grove (Fr. Roney, 1959-1963 and 1960-1961)
• Church of St. Joseph, Montevideo (Fr. Murphy, 1968)
• Church of St. Catherine, Redwood Falls (Fr. Murphy, 1973-1974, 1974-1975, and 1978-1982)
• Church of St. George (now the Church of St. Pius X), Glencoe (Fr. Skoblik, 1962-1965)
• Church of St. Joseph (now the Church of the Holy Family), Silver Lake (Fr. Skoblik, 1964-1968)

A Notice of Claim is not a lawsuit; it is a notice stating the time, place, and circumstances of the alleged abuse. Under Minnesota law, the eight parishes are independent religious corporations, as is the Diocese of New Ulm.

Anyone who has suffered sexual abuse by a cleric of the Diocese of New Ulm should immediately report such misconduct to local law enforcement. They are encouraged to contact the Victim Assistance Coordinator or the Bishop’s Delegate in Matters Pertaining to Sexual Misconduct, 1421 6th Street North, New Ulm, MN 56073, phone: 507-233-5313, for counseling or assistance, if that is desired.

The diocese has been diligent in its efforts to establish a safe environment program that educates clergy, diocesan and parish staff, teachers, parents, students, and volunteers who work with minors, and helps them identify and prevent sexual misconduct. We are committed to offering help and healing to anyone who has been a victim of sexual misconduct and to preventing this terrible crime from occurring in the diocese.

“The effects of sexual misconduct on the part of clergy are devastating and last a lifetime for those abused,” the Most Reverend John M. LeVoir, bishop of the Diocese of New Ulm, stated in his October 2014 column of The Prairie Catholic. “Please join me in working and praying for healing, reconciliation, and hope in Jesus Christ,” he said.

Fr. Becker was ordained in February 1962. His assignments included the following:

• Church of St. James in Nassau, 1962
• Church of the Holy Rosary in North Mankato, 1962-1963
• Church of the Holy Trinity in Winsted, 1963-1966
• Church of St. Mary in Cottonwood, 1966-1977 (offered one weekend Mass at the Campus
Religious Center at Southwest State University starting in 1976)
• Church of St. Isidore in Clarkfield, 1969-1977
• Church of St. Bridget in DeGraff, 1977
• Churches of St. Francis in Benson, St. Bridget in DeGraff, and Our Lady of the Visitation in
Danvers, 1978-1987
• Church of St. Anastasia in Hutchinson, 1987-1998
• Church of St. Patrick in Kandiyohi and the Church of St. Thomas More in Lake Lillian, 1998-
2000.

Fr. Becker retired from active ministry on July 1, 2000.

Fr. Roney was ordained in August 1945. His assignments included the following:

• Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, 1945-1952
• Church of St. Francis in St. Croix Beach, 1952-1955
• Church of St. John-Assumption in Faxon Township, 1955-1958
• Church of St. Paul in Walnut Grove, 1958-1963
• Church of St. Francis in Benson, 1963-1967
• Church of St. Mary in Willmar, 1967-1980
• Church of St. Gregory the Great in Lafayette, 1980-1993.

He also served as director of the diocesan San Lucas Mission Office and as director of the Office of the Propagation of the Faith. Fr. Roney retired from active ministry in 1993. He died on Jan. 27, 2003, at the age of 82.

Fr. Murphy was ordained in June 1951. His assignments included the following:

• Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, 1951-1957
• Church of St. Theresa in St. Paul, 1957
• Church of St. Willibrord in Gibbon, 1957-1963
• Church of St. John in Ortonville, 1963-1967
• Church of St. Joseph in Montevideo, 1967-1971
• Church of St. Catherine in Redwood Falls, 1971-1981
• Church of the Holy Rosary in North Mankato, 1981-1986
• Church of St. Raphael in Springfield, 1986-1989
• Church of St. Joseph in Lamberton, 1989
• Church of St. John in Appleton and the Church of St. Joseph in Holloway, 1989-1991.

Fr. Murphy retired from active ministry in 1991. Between 1996 and 2000, he volunteered in ministry at
the Church of St. John in Little Canada. Fr. Murphy died on April 30, 2001, at the age of 74.

Fr. Skoblik was ordained in June 1939. His assignments included the following:

• Church of the Most Holy Redeemer in Montgomery, 1939-1946
• Church of St. Wenceslaus in New Prague, 1946
• Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Veseli, 1946-1947
• Church of the Immaculate Conception in Lonsdale, 1947-1948
• Church of St. Mary in Bechyn, 1948-1952
• Church of St. George in Glencoe, 1952-1965
• Church of St. Joseph in Silver Lake, 1965-1988.
Between March 1964 and August 1965 he served as superintendent of St. Pius X School in Glencoe. Fr.

Skoblik retired from active ministry in 1988. He died on Nov. 22, 1989, at the age of 79.

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MINNESOTA
Jeff Anderson & Associates

Father Dennis Becker Publicly Named for the First Time

The Diocese of New Ulm quietly released the names of four accused clerical offenders. One offender, Father Dennis Becker, was publicly named for the first time. To our knowledge the media and general public were not alerted to this important announcement. The names released include:

• Father Dennis Becker
• Father David Roney
• Father John Murphy
• Father Michael Skoblik

Any time there is a release of information about offenders, it is a step forward. However, when done quietly and without substantive disclosure there’s still a lack of transparency.

The Diocese’s release raises several questions: Why has the Diocese of New Ulm fought sexual abuse survivors and their advocates and concealed the release of the full list of credibly accused clerics? What additional secrets are hidden regarding offenders known only to top officials at this point in time?

Until there is a full, complete and rigorous disclosure by the New Ulm Diocese there is a peril to the community. The survivors who were harmed are still suffering alone in silence. We urge the Diocese of New Ulm and the Bishop to come completely clean, stop the legal maneuvering and resistance to the disclosure, and be transparent.

We remain committed to making sure that children in the communities are safe and to helping the survivors that have been harmed by the many clerics whose identities have remained secret to everyone but the top officials. Every effort will be made to make sure that this information becomes public, both for healing and prevention.

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ROME
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, March 13, 2015

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests ( 314-503-0003, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org )

We hope Vatican officials hire Pete Saunders to head an abuse office, but only if they’re prepared to fully fund it and give him wide latitude. While we are unconvinced that the papal abuse panel on which he sits has much chance to make a difference, we support any move that decreases the role of clerics in dealing with clergy sex crimes and cover ups.

[TheTablet]

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MARYLAND
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, March 13

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, 314 566 9790, SNAPclohessy@aol.com

We are glad that an ex-employee is suing the Baltimore archdiocese and we hope the case goes to trial so that parents and the public learn more about child sex abuse allegations at a Catholic school.

[WBAL]

Frankly, we suspect that Annette Goodman is telling the truth and that Catholic officials are trying to cover their behinds here. We urge top staff at Archbishop Curley High School and the Baltimore archdiocese to honor their pledges of “openness” in child sex cases and be more forthcoming about the child sex abuse accusations at the school and how they were handled.

Based on initial media reports, we called on church officials to fire Ms. Goodman.

[SNAP]

But it’s looking more and more like she was actually scapegoated. We’re anxious for the full truth to emerge in this case.

Catholic officials often tout their written abuse policies which they adopted belatedly and grudgingly in response to widespread scandal, criminal prosecution, civil lawsuits and public outrage. But those same Catholic officials often ignore and violate these policies.

And when Catholic school and parish staff see top church officials violating those policies often, it’s tempting for them to move slowly with child sex suspicions. Employees naturally watch and respond to how their bosses act more than what their bosses say. And when actions contradict words, actions are what matters.

It’s becoming clear that church abuse policies are largely for public relations purposes and bishops’ decades-old patterns of ignoring, hiding and minimizing child sex abuse remain intact.

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UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism

Jerry Slevin

1. It took the experienced Vatican bureaucrat and Church historian , Good Pope John (Saint John XXIII), only two months as pope to realize that the Catholic Church could only be fixed permanently by convening a full and open ecumenical council. Why otherwise would John have convened a massive Church council if he thought he could fix the Church alone or with only minor groups of selected cardinals and bishops? This is all Pope Francis has tried for two years so far, unsuccessfully. Francis was elected by the cardinals who helped create the multiple Church crises. He has mainly relied on some of these same cardinals, unsuccessfully and secretively so far, to try to resolve the crises. That cannot succeed. In the little time he may have left, he must now convene a full worldwide council as John XXIII did.

2. Councils have been considered infallible by Catholics and other Christians from the Church’s beginning. They alone have resolved major Church crises over almost 2000 years from the first “Council of Jerusalem” attended by Jesus’ earliest followers in the year 50. So called “infallible” popes’ had, in effect, only been invented by Pope Pius IX in 1870 at an unfinished council he convened and controlled.

3. John XXIII, with much more experience than Francis with the entrenched Vatican bureaucracy and with international politics, had been born under the first pope that had been elected after popes “became infallible”. He had worked directly under the imperious Pope Pius XI, who made his harmful deals with Mussolini in 1929 and Hitler in 1933 and also recklessly banned birth control in 1930.

4. John knew with certainty that only an infallible council could possibly succeed in reforming the corrupt Church. He knew that it was ultimately futile to rely, as a cure for Church crises, on merely an “infallible” pope who could always be overruled by a successor “infallible” pope, as has happened often since John’s papacy untimely ended in 1963. Francis will be overruled by opportunistic future popes as well, if Francis unwisely fails to convene an open and representative worldwide council soon, a council that alone can infallibly and permanently fix the Church now.

5. Francis may win a temporary public relations “battle” in the polls if he refuses to convene a full ecumenical council like Pope John did, but he surely then will also lose the longer term permanent reform war after the polls settle down. Unlike John, Francis faces multiple major scandals in a 24/7 media Internet Age, especially unprecedented scandals involving priest and even bishop child sexual abuse. These scandals alone could well bring down an unreformed Catholic Church, sooner rather than later.

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MARYLAND
The Baltimore Sun

By Alison Knezevich
The Baltimore Sun

As a former librarian at the all-boys Archbishop Curley High School, Annette Goodman says she initially dismissed it as a rumor when she heard last year that a student and a science teacher had sex in a car.

But after a few conversations with the boy, Goodman came to suspect the science teacher had sexually abused him, according to a federal lawsuit filed in Baltimore last week. The science teacher, Lynette Trotta, later pleaded guilty to sexual abuse.

Now Goodman – whom the school fired last year — is suing the school and the Archdiocese of Baltimore, alleging that officials retaliated against her and that they knew about inappropriate conduct by Trotta before they disclosed it to the public. Goodman’s case, filed last week in U.S. District Court, underscores the need for better training on how to report suspected abuse, child abuse experts say.

Goodman eventually reported her suspicions to the school administration, but Baltimore archdiocese officials say she didn’t tell them soon enough.

In the lawsuit, Goodman alleges that school officials knew of Trotta’s “inappropriate physical conduct” with students in February 2014, but did not fire or suspend Trotta. Goodman says she heard what she thought was a rumor on March 6 of that year, but did not confirm it with the boy on March 18.

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MILWAUKEE (WI)
Religion News Service – Spiritual Politics

Mark Silk | Mar 13, 2015

Back in 2007, when he was still Archbishop of Milwaukee, Cardinal Timothy Dolan asked the Vatican for permission to transfer a $55-million fund for the maintenance of its cemeteries into a special trust. Dolan’s request came just a few weeks before the Wisconsin Supreme Court issued a ruling that allowed victims of sex abuse to sue the archdiocese. Seventeen days after the ruling, the Vatican approved the request.

When this move came to light two years ago, Dolan, now ensconced as Archbishop of New York, was roundly criticized for seeking to deny the victims their due. Denouncing what he termed “old and discredited attacks,” he dismissed the idea “that establishing a perpetual care fund from money belonging to cemeteries and designated for that purpose – as required by state law and mandated by the archdiocesan finance council – was an attempt to shield it from the bankruptcy proceedings.”

Given that the Archdiocese of Milwaukee declared bankruptcy four years after the trust was created, this was not, strictly speaking, a fib. Strictly speaking, the point of creating the trust was, as Dolan put it in his letter to the Vatican, to provide “an improved protection of these funds from any legal claim and liability.”

After the archdiocese declared bankruptcy, the bankruptcy judge disallowed Dolan’s move, making the funds subject to the claims of creditors. The archdiocese then went to federal court, where U.S. District Judge Rudolph T. Randa quickly ruled that the archdiocese had a religious right to shield the funds in a way that a secular entity in bankruptcy would not, inasmuch as care of the dead was a central part of the church’s religious practice.

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MINNESOTA
Winona Daily News

Leslie Hittner

A few weeks ago, three Daily News readers asked that I stop my Catholic bashing. In his letter, Jerome Kulas went on to reinforce everything I had written about recent statements of Cardinal Raymond Burke. The only issue of disagreement between Kulas and me appears to be that I think those statements are preposterous, while Kulas thinks they are spot-on.

That single point of disagreement is hardly “Catholic bashing.”

Next, Bill and Rita Clark asserted that the Catholic Church has been doing all it could with respect to the abusive behavior of some of its priests. They offered no evidence of this and apparently believe that their faith in the church is sufficient to make this true.

In their letter, they conclude: “The church has done everything possible to make amends to the victims of sexual abuse, and as for expecting its employees to follow church doctrine, they can’t expect to stay employed if they flaunt church policies. Just what is Hittner’s problem?”

What I fail to understand is why every Catholic in this country — indeed in the world — is not upset about the continuing cover up of priestly sexual abuse by bishops and other members of the hierarchy.

Why do you accept it as OK? Do you accept it because it happens elsewhere? Do you accept it because the bishops dish out feel-good “we’re doing what we can” statements and take them at their word?

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MARYLAND
WBAL

[with video]

BALTIMORE —A Baltimore City school is being sued over a sex abuse case involving a teacher and a student by the librarian who reported the abuse.

Annette Goodman has a new job, but she’s not over how she was fired from her last one as librarian at Archbishop Curley High School.

“They did it in a way that really wasn’t necessary. They published her name in the newspaper and treated her as if she was a wrongdoer,” said Goodman’s attorney, Linda Correia.

Correia is helping Goodman sue the school and the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

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WISCONSIN
Gundersen National Child Protection Center

June 8-10, 2015
Viterbo University
La Crosse, Wis.

The course prepares students to recognize and respond to cases of sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse and neglect. The course discusses in detail the impact of child abuse on a victim’s sense of spirituality and offers concrete suggestions for working with medical and mental health professionals to assist a child in coping with maltreatment. The course also discusses ideal child protection policies for a faith based institution, including handling a situation in which a convicted sex offender seeks to join a congregation. The course includes a review of various child abuse case scenarios and a discussion on appropriate and inappropriate responses.

Intended Audience
Clergy, chaplains, youth ministers, faith leaders, counselors and other members of a faith community who may work with children or families impacted by child abuse

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Tablet

13 March 2015

A leading anti-abuse campaigner has offered to lead the Vatican’s child protection commission in Rome.

Peter Saunders, the outgoing Chief Executive of the National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac), is already a member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors and Vulnerable Adults.

But in an interview with The Tablet this week, Mr Saunders said he would like to see a beefed up commission office with an extended remit to deal directly with allegations of abuse.

Currently, the commission, which includes safeguarding experts from across the world, is staffed by just one priest, Fr Bob Oliver, and its next meeting is not due to take place until October.

Mr Saunders has said he would be willing to lead the commission office and work closely alongside fellow members including Baroness (Sheila) Hollins, professor of the psychiatry of learning disability at St George’s Hospital, London and Marie Collins, an Irish abuse survivor and campaigner.

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VATICAN CITY
Crux

By Inés San Martín
Vatican correspondent March 13, 2015

ROME — Pope Francis has delivered one of his strongest statements to date on the Catholic Church’s child sexual abuse scandals, calling them a “grave problem” and declaring that “one priest abusing a minor is reason enough to move the Church’s whole structure.”

The pontiff also warned against “disproportionate” expectations for change as a result of a looming Synod of Bishops on the family, which is expected to address hot-button issues such as communion for divorced and remarried believers and a more welcoming stance for gays and lesbians.

Francis conceded he’s long had a “vague sensation” that his papacy might be short, perhaps four or five years, but said “I always leave the possibility open” that it might go on longer.

The comments came in a wide-ranging interview on the second anniversary of his election with the Mexican network Televisa, which also covered themes such as his trip to the United States, immigration, reform of the Church’s government, and the Argentine ego.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Radio

In a wide-ranging interview, Pope Francis marks the second year of his pontificate by addressing the hot topics that have dominated public discourse since his election as the 265th Successor of St. Peter.

(Vatican Radio) Migration and drug trafficking, the reform of the Curia, the challenges of the Synod for the Family and the need to make the Church a safe home for all children and vulnerable adults. In a wide-ranging interview with Valentina Alazraki, from the Mexican broadcaster Televisa, Pope Francis has marked the second year of his pontificate by addressing the hot topics that have dominated public discourse since his election to the papacy, revealing details of the Conclave that made him the 265th Successor of St. Peter.

It was the Holy Father’s choice that the interview with the Mexican broadcaster take place in Casa Santa Marta, in the room where the his Council of Nine cardinals hold their meetings and which is dominated by a large image of the Virgin of Guadalupe.

Indicating the image the Pope explained that the Mexican Virgin is a “source of cultural unity, which leads to holiness in the midst of so much shame, so much injustice, exploitation, and so much death”.
The interview begins with the question as to why a stop in Mexico was not scheduled as part of the papal journey to the USA for the World Day of Families in September.

– The Pope replies that he thought of entering the United States through the border with Mexico. But going to Ciudad Juarez or Morelia without visit to Our Lady of Guadalupe would be perplexing for Mexicans. The Pope also says he cannot pay a fleeting visit to Mexico, any visit to the nation and its people would need at least a week and he promises to pay a visit as soon as possible.

The journalist asks the Pope, as the son of immigrants, for a reflection on what it would have meant to have entered the US via such a significant border for the phenomenon of migration.

Pope Francis responds by pointing out that not only Mexicans cross that border, but people from throughout Central America, for example Guatemala, cross Mexico in search of a better future. “Today – says Francis – migration is the result of a malaise in the etymological sense of the word, the result of a hunger. The same happens in Africa, with the Mediterranean crossings, people who come from countries that are going through difficult times because of hunger, wars. “Today – clarifies the Pope – migration is linked to hunger and lack of work. People are being discarded and forced to seek employment elsewhere”.

– “Right now the problem of global migration is very painful. Because there are various borders of migration. I rejoice that Europe is reviewing its migration policy. Italy has been very generous and I want to say that. The mayor of Lampedusa, who is a woman, has put herself on the line at the cost of transforming the island from a tourist destination to a place of asylum and welcome. Which means earning less money. This is heroic. But now, thank God, I see that Europe is reviewing the situation. Returning to the migration across the Mexican border, the area also has ​​problems due to drug trafficking. Morelia and that whole area is an area of ​​great suffering, where organizations of drug traffickers are not subtle in the least. They carry out their work of death, they are messengers of death both for drugs, and their ‘making a clean sweep’ of those who oppose drugs, the 43 students (of Iguala) somehow are asking, I would not say for revenge, but for justice and to be remembered. And in this regard I wish to satisfy a curiosity: I wanted to make the Archbishop of Morelia a Cardinal, because he is in the firing line, he is a man who really is in a hot spot and is a witness of Christian life, a great priest. But we will talk later about the Cardinals. …

On the issue of child abuse and zero tolerance of the phenomenon.

– The Pope replies that the Commission [for the Protection of Minors, which he set up in 2013 – ed] is not about abuse but for the protection of minors. That is, prevention. The problem of abuse is a grave one, with most cases of abuse occurring in the family sphere or involving other people who are known to them. Even one priest committing abuse is sufficient reason to mobilize all structures of the Church to confront the problem. Indeed, it is a priest’s duty to nurture a little boy or girl in holiness and in their encounter with Jesus and what they [abusers, -ed] do is destroy this encounter with Jesus. Francis talks about the importance of listening to victims and speaks of his experience of meeting with 6 survivors of abuse in the Vatican. The Pope says the interior destruction that they experience is devastating and even one priest who is guilty is enough to make us all ashamed and commit to doing all that is possible. Pope Francis also acknowledges Benedict XVI’s courage in publically stating it is a crime to destroy an innocent creature with such actions and Pope Saint John Paul II’s in having started the work of reporting such crimes.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Mar. 13, 2015 NCR Today

ROME Pope Francis has marked the second anniversary of his election as the leader of the Roman Catholic church by saying he has a feeling that his pontificate will be a short one, lasting perhaps about four or five years.

Speaking in a lengthy television interview with the Mexican program Noticieros Televisa, the pontiff has also reviewed some of the highlights of his papacy so far — including the continuing Synod of Bishops that is touching tough questions like allowing divorced and remarried persons to take communion.

But responding to a question from journalist Valentina Alazraki about remarks he has made several times that he expects to have a short time as pope, Francis gave a very personal and direct answer.

“I have the feeling that my pontificate will be brief,” said the pope. “Four or five years. I do not know, or two, three. Well, two have already passed.”

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DEUTSCHLAND
Clean Kids

[The Catholic Church in Germany has more priests accused of pedophilia than previously thought.]

Die katholische Kirche in Deutschland hat offenbar mehr pädophil geneigte Männer in ihren Reihen als bislang angenommen

Zu dieser Einschätzung kommen namhafte Sexualforscher wie der Berliner Sexualpsychologe Dr. Christoph J. Ahlers und Prof. Klaus M. Beier von der Berliner Charité. Ahlers äußert sich am Montag, 16. März, um 23.30 Uhr im Ersten in der NDR Dokumentation “Das Schweigen der Männer – Die katholische Kirche und der Kindesmissbrauch”.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Tagesschau

Video presentation.

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CANADA
Challies

March 09, 2015

It is terrible but true—sexual predators target churches. In the mind of a predator, a church offers a compelling target and, too often, an easy target. I recently worked my way through On Guard by Deepak Reju and learned that there are at least 6 reasons why sexual predators specifically target churches.

CHRISTIANS ARE NAÏVE

Some sexual offenders state it outright—they go after churches because Christians tend to be naïve. Anna Salter says, “If children can be silenced and the average person is easy to fool, many offenders report that religious people are even easier to fool than most people.” Reju says, “Christian are, generally speaking, trusting folks. Child abusers recognize this fact and want to take full advantage of it.” He quotes a former prosecutor who lays it out: “For a variety of reasons, we naively tend to automatically lower our guard when we are amongst professing Christians. This same naïveté is why offenders flock to the faith community; no other environment provides them such quick and easy access to children without fear of raising concerns.”

CHRISTIANS ARE IGNORANT OF THE PROBLEM

Christians are not only naïve, but also ignorant—ignorant of the problem of abuse and the extent of the problem within faith communities. Many Christians consider it unlikely or impossible that abuse could happen within their church, so they fail to take adequate measures, they ignore warnings, and they disregard reports. Reju says, “Many Christians don’t know how to distinguish likability and trustworthiness. They confuse the two categories, assuming that if someone is courteous and nice, they must also be trustworthy. Moreover, some Christians behave as though the problem doesn’t exist, and some look with suspicion on reports of abuse. They believe children are lying and are more prone to take an adult’s word. Sexual predators know that these dynamics operate in churches, and they know they can get away with a lot on account of it.”

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

13 March, 2015

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse will hold private sessions in Townsville for the first time from 17 to 20 March 2015.

Royal Commission CEO Philip Reed explained that private sessions are critical to the Commission’s work, as they allow Commissioners to hear firsthand of the impact of abuse on people and how the response of an institution affects survivors over their lifetime.

“Through private sessions, we are learning about the impact of child sexual abuse not only on individuals, but their families and communities.

Mr Reed said private sessions also provide information on systemic issues and institutions that may be considered in public hearings.

Private sessions are held in a confidential, safe and supported environment. Commission staff provide counselling and can arrange interpreters or other communication assistance if required.

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ALASKA
Alaska Dispatch News

Jerzy Shedlock
March 12, 2015

Clint Landry, formerly a priest with the Catholic Diocese of Fairbanks, pleaded guilty to a single count of attempted coercion and enticement of a minor for messaging contacts in the Philippines and wiring cash for child pornography, according to a federal plea agreement.

According to Ronnie Rosenberg, the diocese’s human resources and legal coordinator, Landry entered his plea Thursday morning at the federal courthouse in Fairbanks.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Kyle Reardon did not immediately return a call for comment Thursday.

Landry, 58, was placed on administrative leave and suspended from his ministerial duties on May 23, 2014, after “revelations of Internet computer misconduct,” the diocese said in a release. Landry served as the parish priest for Fairbanks’ largest Catholic congregation, Sacred Heart Cathedral.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

BY TIM SCULTHORPE – 13 MARCH 2015

The Home Secretary has been accused of perpetuating the cover-up of child sex abuse at Kincora Boys’ Home in east Belfast.

Theresa May yesterday announced a new four-person panel, including Professor Alexis Jay, to serve in the reformed statutory inquiry into child sex abuse in England.

Mrs May said Drusilla Sharpling, Ivor Frank and Malcolm Evans will also serve alongside Justice Lowell Goddard, a New Zealand judge.

But despite pressure from MPs and victims of the paedophile ring that operated there, she refused to add Kincora to the inquiry’s remit.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian

Melissa Davey
@MelissaLDavey
Friday 13 March 2015

Two days after child sex abuse victims called for the resignations of senior staff from within the Orthodox Jewish Yeshivah community, four of its leaders have stood down.

For two weeks in February, the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse examined the way abuse cases were handled by the Yeshivah centres in Sydney and Melbourne, which run schools, social events and religious activities.

On Wednesday, 11 abuse victims wrote an open letter to the Melbourne centre expressing dismay at what they described as a lack of accountability among senior figures since the commission hearings.

The commission heard how victims were groomed for sexual abuse by staff, then bullied and ostracised by religious leaders when they sought help.

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WASHINGTON
The Spokesman-Review

John Stucke The Spokesman-Review

The auxiliary bishop in San Jose, California, has been named by Pope Francis as the seventh bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Spokane.

Thomas Daly, 54, succeeds Chicago Archbishop Blase Cupich, who left Spokane last fall to lead the nation’s third largest diocese.

Daly comes to Spokane from San Jose, where he serves as auxiliary bishop in the nation’s 10th largest diocese. He was born in San Francisco and was ordained as a priest in 1987. He will spend the next two months completing his obligations in San Jose. His installation in Spokane is set for May 20 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes.

During a Thursday news conference Daly acknowledged the challenges of leading a church during an age of an increasingly secular society. …

“We’re worried about Spokane’s new bishop and how he’ll deal with clergy sex abuse cases,” David Clohessy, the director of St. Louis-based SNAP, said in a news release.

Daly noted that San Jose and neighboring San Francisco also faced challenging abuse cases.

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CIUDAD DEL VATICANO
Noticieros Televisa

El Papa Francisco asegura que 90% de los mexicanos no se ofendió por su expresión sobre la mexicanización de Argentina, emitida en un correo privado; afirma que México no le cerró las puertas y hará una visita

CIUDAD DEL VATICANO, mar. 12, 2015.- El Papa Francisco fue entrevistado en exclusiva por Valentina Alazraki, corresponsal de Noticieros Televisa en El Vaticano, a unos días de cumplir dos años como máximo jerarca de la iglesia Católica.

El pontífice habló sobre las reacciones que desató el correo privado que envió a un amigo, donde le decía que se debería tratar de evitar la mexicanización de Argentina.

Evidentemente que es un término, permítaseme la palabra, técnico. No tiene nada que ver ya con la dignidad de México. Como cuando hablamos de la balcanización, ni los serbios, ni los macedonios, ni los croatas se nos enojan. Ya se habla de balcanizar algo y se usa técnicamente y los medios de comunicación lo han usado muchas veces, expresó el papa Francisco.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic Culture

In a wide-ranging interview with the Vatican correspondent of a major Mexican media company, Pope Francis discussed drug trafficking, the success of evangelical Protestantism in Latin America, the conclave that elected him, the synod of bishops, curial reform, and clerical sexual abuse.

Hesitant to use the word “sects” to describe all evangelical Protestant groups, the Pontiff, according to Vatican Radio, said evangelicals have found success because they are close to the people; the Church in Latin America, in contrast, has a certain clericalism that creates distance from the people. Evangelicals have also found success where priests preach “disastrous” and overly abstract homilies.

Recalling the 2013 conclave, he said:

During the vote I was praying the rosary, I usually pray three rosaries daily, and I felt great peace, almost to the point of insentience. The very same when everything was resolved, and for me this was a sign that God wanted it, great peace. From that day to this I have not lost it. It is ‘something inside’ it is like a gift. I do not know what happened next. They made [me] stand up. They asked me if I agreed. I said yes. I do not know if they made me swear on something, I forget. I was at peace.

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ILLINOIS
Chicago Tribune

By Liam Ford

A 21-year-old Austin man sexually abused a 14-year-old girl he knows from acting as a youth volunteer at a church, prosecutors said today.

Vadonis Landfair, of the 100 block of North Parkside Avenue, abused the girl when she and her 17-year-old boyfriend visited his house in January, according to the Cook County state’s attorney’s office. He was ordered held in lieu of $100,000 bail in a hearing midday Thursday after being charged with aggravated criminal sexual abuse, according to court and jail records.

The girl and her boyfriend visited Landfair at home one day sometime between Jan. 6 and Jan 16, prosecutors said.

The three watched movies and ate, and at some point, Landfair said something to the boyfriend that the girl couldn’t hear, prosecutors said.

The boyfriend became upset, and told the girl Landfair had said he wanted to perform a sex act on the girl. Landfair then asked the girl if he could have sex with her, and she looked at him and said “I don’t know.”

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

MARCH 13, 2015

Dan Box
Crime Reporter
Sydney

THE first wave of criminal prosecutions brought as a result of the child-abuse royal commission have begun to hit the courts, with police pursuing more than 140 separate criminal investigations into information provided by the commissioners.

An 88-year-old man appeared in Coffs Harbour Local Court this week charged with sexually abusing his foster daughter during the 1960s, when she was about 12 years old.

His alleged victim said she ­approached the police only after the establishment of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, to which she has given evidence in a private hearing.

“If it wasn’t for the … royal commission being formed, there would be no way I’d have the courage to come forward,” said the woman, who cannot be identified.

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