ABUSE TRACKER

SCOTLAND
Motherwell Times

By Mike McQuaid
Published on 24/07/2013

A priest from Uddingston has been chosen to succeed the disgraced Cardinal Keith O’Brien as Archbishop of Edinburgh and St Andrews.

Monsignor Leo Cushley (52) had been head of the English language section at the Vatican, a post he held for four years.

He was the official English translator for Pope Benedict, who stepped down earlier this year.

And when the newly-elected Pope Francis addressed cardinals for the first time in March, Mgr Cushley acted as his personal secretary.

Mgr Cushley, a former pupil at St John’s School in Uddingston, was ordained a priest in 1985. He served as a curate at Motherwell Cathedral and chaplain at St Aidan’s High School in Wishaw before moving to the Vatican’s diplomatic corps.

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SCOTLAND
The Tablet

Mgr Leo Cushley is to become the next archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, succeeding Cardinal Keith O’Brien who resigned in February amid revelations of sexual misconduct, the Vatican announced this morning.

Glasgow-born Mgr Cushley, 52, was ordained in 1985 and spent eight years as an assistant priest serving in the Diocese of Motherwell before he was called to Rome to be trained as a diplomat at the prestigious Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy.

His first posting in 1997 was to the troubled central African nation of Burundi. In 2001 he was sent to Portugal and in 2004 he moved to work at the Vatican’s diplomatic mission at the United Nations for three years. After a posting at the nunciature in South Africa he was asked back to work in the Vatican, where he has been head of the English-speaking section of the Secretariat of State.

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SCOTLAND
Edinburgh News

Pope Francis today appointed Monsignor Leo Cushley as the new Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh.

He will take over the governance of the Archdiocese from Archbishop Philip Tartaglia who has been Apostolic Administrator following the resignation of Cardinal Keith O’Brien, who was the most senior Catholic cleric in Britain.

Mgr Cushley, 52, is presently Head of the English-language section of the Vatican’s Secretariat of State and has been a close collaborator of

both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. In his capacity as Prelate of the Anticamera Mgr Cushley has been regularly involved in the visits of Heads of State and other important guests to the Holy See.

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SCOTLAND
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Andrews & Edinburgh

on Wednesday 24th July 2013

It is with great joy and gratitude that the priests and people of the Archdiocese received the news that Pope Francis has today nominated Monsignor Leo William Cushley as the 8th Archbishop and Metropolitan of St Andrews and Edinburgh.

Commenting on the news, Bishop Stephen Robson, the auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese, said ‘after months of prayer by the priests and people of the Archdiocese, we are so delighted to learn that God has given us Monsignor Cushley as our new chief pastor. We will now continue to be close to him in prayer in these coming months as he prepares for his ordination and to take on this great task which the Lord has entrusted to him.’

Monsignor Cushley was born at Wester Moffat, Lanarkshire in 1961. He attended Holy Cross High School, Hamilton and the National Minor Seminary of St Mary’s College, Blairs. He was a student at the Pontifical Scots College, the Pontifical Gregorian University and the Pontifical Liturgical Institute of Sant’ Anselmo. On 7th July 1985 he was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Motherwell at St John the Baptist Church, Uddingston by the Right Reverend Joseph Devine, Bishop of Motherwell. After ordination he was appointed curate at Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral, Motherwell and then at St Serf’s, Airdrie in 1988.

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SCOTLAND
Edinburgh Guide

By Barnaby Miln – Posted on 24 July 2013

Pope Francis has appointed Monsignor Leo Cushley as Roman Catholic Archbishop of St. Andrews & Edinburgh.

The new Archbishop will take over the governance of the Archdiocese from Archbishop Philip Tartaglia who has been Apostolic Administrator following the resignation of Cardinal Keith O’Brien, who was Archbishop from August 1985 until March 2013.

Mgr Cushley is presently Head of the English-language section of the Vatican’s Secretariat of State and has been a close collaborator of both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. In his capacity as Prelate of the Anticamera Mgr Cushley has been regularly involved in the visits of Heads of State and other important guests to the Holy See. Recently he has assisted as Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, the Archbishop of Canterbury and many other high profile visitors called upon the Pope.

As Head of the English section of the Secretariat of State it was his task to accompany the Holy Father to English-speaking countries. During 2010 he accompanied Pope Benedict to Malta and Cyprus as well as the United Kingdom. During that visit, at Bellahouston, Mgr Cushley had the pleasure of presenting his family to Pope Benedict.

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SCOTLAND
East Kilbride News

Jul 24 2013
Monsignor Leo Cushley has been appointed Archbishop of St Andrews & Edinburgh by the Roman Catholic Church, replacing Cardinal Keith O’Brien who left the post earlier this year after admitting inappropriate sexual conduct.

Mgr Cushley, 52, is currently head of the English language section of the Vatican’s Secretariat of State and returns to Scotland where he was born and ordained a priest in Uddingston, South Lanarkshire, in 1985.

He will be ordained as archbishop in St Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh, on September 21.

He said: “I am humbled that our Holy Father Pope Francis has nominated me for such an important task here in our ancient capital. I know it’s a delicate moment and that there is a lot to be done but, with God’s grace and the kind support of the clergy and people of Edinburgh, I will work cheerfully and willingly with all the energy I can muster.”

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SCOTLAND
The Guardian

Severin Carrell, Scotland correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 24 July 2013

A senior Vatican official has been appointed to replace the disgraced Scottish cardinal Keith O’Brien as archbishop of Edinburgh and St Andrews.

Monsignor Leo Cushley, 52, a close and influential adviser to Pope Benedict and his successor Pope Francis, is based in Rome as head of the English language section of the Vatican’s civil service, functioning as a senior career diplomat for the Holy See.

The appointment to succeed O’Brien, five months after he resigned in disgrace after the Observer revealed allegations of sexual impropriety, has come sooner than commentators had expected, suggesting the Vatican is keen to draw a line under the affair.

In a statement to mark his appointment, Cushley alluded to the O’Brien crisis by acknowledging it was a “delicate” time for the Scottish church, and warned he would need months to get to grips with his new post and the damage caused by the scandal.

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CANADA
Winnipeg Free Press

By: Don Marks

I will never forget the first time I heard about the horror of Indian residential schools. It was 1982 and I had been commissioned to write a play for the World Assembly of First Nations. A musical combining traditional native song and dance with contemporary rock, jazz, blues, classical and operatic styles, the play was to cover 500 years of history of First Nations in North America.

My script had to be checked by elders throughout Saskatchewan, and when I told them the play was going to be presented at the magnificent mainstream Saskatchewan Centre of the Arts, many of them told me this might be a fine opportunity to finally tell the world about their experiences at “boarding school.”

I had never heard about this sad chapter in Canada’s history and some of the stories went way beyond what we have since learned about physical and sexual abuse, cultural genocide and the latest revelation that entire communities were used as “laboratories” with people as guinea pigs for experiments about malnutrition.

My first reaction was one of horror, then shame, then guilt, even though I knew full well I would never be a part of such atrocities and I would never support such terrible behaviour. I was pretty sure I would do everything I could to expose such a wrong and try to get it stopped and prevent it from happening in the future.

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CANADA
Montreal Gazette

BY MICHAEL WOODS, POSTMEDIA NEWS JULY 23, 2013

OTTAWA — Grassroots indigenous activists are calling on the Harper government to honour the 2008 Indian residential schools apology, part of the ongoing fallout from news that aboriginal adults and children were unwitting subjects of nutritional experiments run by government bureaucrats in the 1940s and 1950s.

News of the experiments has provoked mass outrage and also led to renewed scrutiny of what critics see as the government’s lack of cooperation with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s (TRC) efforts to compile a historical record of Indian residential schools.

The experiments, which involved intentionally depriving 1,300 aboriginal people — including children in several residential schools — of important vitamins and leaving them malnourished between 1942 and 1952, were detailed in a research paper by University of Guelph food historian Ian Mosby.

The news provoked horror among non-aboriginal Canadians, and outrage coupled with a sad sense of familiarity among indigenous peoples whose relatives have told them of such horrors that took place at the government-funded, church-run residential schools.

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AUSTRALIA
J-Wire

July 24, 2013 by J-Wire Staff

53-yr-old convicted paedophile Rabbi David Kramer has been sentenced to a maximum of three years and four months for sexually abusing students at Melbourne’s Yeshiva Centre but will possibly be a free man in three months’ time given the time he has spent in detention…and one of his victims has made a statement.

Kramer had been a teacher at Melbourne’s Yeshivah Centre. Kramer was sentenced to a non-parole period of 18 months imprisonment but he has already served 457 days in pre-sentence detention.
Prior to the sentencing, one of the US-based victims requested to (belatedly) submit a Victim Impact Statement. We are thankful that the judge agreed to this request. The victim requested that Tzedek CEO Manny Waks read the statement on his behalf, which he did with great difficulty.

Tzedek CEO Manny Waks issued the following statement :

“Today is another important milestone for the Australian Jewish community. Justice has finally been served.

“We must acknowledge and thank the courageous victims in standing up to these heinous crimes that were committed against them when they were most vulnerable – as innocent children.

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AUSTRALIA
Australian

Melbourne’s Yeshivah College apologises for ‘protecting’ teacher jailed for sexual assault

A MELBOURNE Jewish school has apologised for not telling police of allegations against a teacher jailed today for sexually assaulting schoolboys.

David Kramer, 53, was today sentenced to three years and four months in prison for groping four boys through their clothing between 1990 and 1992 while a teacher at Yeshivah College.

Angry parents accused Yeshivah College of protecting Kramer by sending him to Israel after it was alerted to allegations against him, and today demanded an apology.

Following today’s sentencing, college principal Rabbi Yehoshua Smukler issued an “unreserved apology for any historical wrongs”.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

July 24, 2013

Stephen Cauchi

A Jewish teacher who molested four boys at Melbourne’s Yeshivah College over 20 years ago has been sentenced to three years and four months in jail.

But David Kramer, 52, could be out of jail in 100 days. He was sentenced to a non-parole period of 18 months but has already served 457 days in pre-sentence detention.

Kramer was sentenced in Melbourne’s County Court by Judge Michael Bourke on five counts of indecent assault and one of indecent acts against a child under 16.

Outside the court, Jewish child sexual abuse survivor and advocate Manny Waks said the sentence was “a little bit lower than we anticipated but justice has been served.”

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

July 24, 2013

Joel Cresswell
AAP

A Melbourne Jewish school has apologised for covering up the sexual abuse of students by a teacher.

David Kramer, 53, has been jailed for three years and four months for fondling four schoolboys between 1990 and 1992 while a teacher at Yeshivah College.

The St Kilda school did not alert police and sent Kramer to Israel when confronted by angry parents in 1993.

Yeshivah principal Rabbi Yehoshua Smukler unreservedly apologised for the “historical wrongs” after Kramer’s sentencing on Wednesday.

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“Yeshivah sincerely regrets and unreservedly apologises for not informing the police at the time the allegations arose,” Rabbi Smukler said in a statement.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

A former teacher at a Jewish primary school in Melbourne has been sentenced to three years and four months in jail for sexually assaulting four students.

David Kramer, 52, pleaded guilty to five charges of indecent assault and one of an indecent act with a child under 16.

The offences were committed against four boys aged between 10 and 11 at the Yeshivah College in St Kilda East between 1989 and 1992.

In his sentencing remarks the Victorian County Court judge revealed the college received complaints about Kramer’s offending at the time but no report was made to police.

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AUSTRALIA
Daily Telegraph

SHANNON DEERY HERALD SUN JULY 24, 2013

A JEWISH teacher who committed “unforgivable” crimes on four students at an orthodox Melbourne school has been jailed for a maximum of three years and four months.

But father of 11 Rabbi David Kramer could walk free from prison after just three months because of time already served in pre-sentence detention.

The 53-year-old paedophile is believed to be the first member of a Jewish institution in Australia to have admitted – and been sentenced for – child sex crimes.

The sentence was welcomed by victims, who said while it was lower than they had hoped, justice had been served.

Kramer pleaded guilty to molesting four boys while teaching at Yeshiva College in the early 1990s before fleeing to the US, where he was jailed for further offending.

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NEW JERSEY
Patch

Posted by Devin McGinley (Editor), July 22, 2013

Prosecutors voiced concerns about the proximity to children of Michael Fugee, the pastor accused more than a decade ago of groping a Wyckoff teenager, long before he was arrested in May for allegedly violating a court order to cease his work with minors, according to records obtained by Northjersey.com

Fugee was imprisoned in 2003 on charges of sexual misconduct, but his conviction was overturned due to a judicial error in 2006. Prosecutors opted not to retry Fugee, instead allowing him to return to the church under an agreement between the court, the priest and the Archdiocese of Newark that he concede to a lifelong ban on ministering to children.

Fugee now faces charges that he violated the order on seven occasions by hearing confessions from minors around the state, and according to a report by Northjersey.com prosecutors were concerned as early as 2009, the year Fugee began working again under the auspices of the church, that the supervision of the priest by the archdiocese was inadequate.

In a brief filed in 2010, which blocked an attempt by Fugee to expunge his conviction and seal evidence pertaining to the case, prosecutors told the court that “Fugee and the Archdiocese recently teetered on a potential violation of his agreed to restrictions” with a 2009 assignment to St. Michael’s Hospital in Newark.

In that instance, prosecutors wrote, authorities had been alerted to the potential violation only through news reports. Fugee’s alleged contact with children this year was again brought to light by news reports that the priest had accompanied youth retreats at various central New Jersey churches.

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013
BY JEFF GREEN
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD

Parishioners of an Oradell church were never told that a suspected child sex offender was allowed to live in the rectory, yet a Newark Archdiocese spokesman said the public was never at risk.

But public outcry about this incident, and two others involving a disgraced Wyckoff cleric, have underscored potential conflicts between church operations and the public’s right to know when troubled priests are in their midst.

The archdiocese’s mind-set, a Catholic church expert says, “flies in the face” of developments in criminal law — where sex offenders are required to register with authorities and to live certain distances from schools and child-care centers.

The Rev. Robert Chabak was stripped of priestly duties after church officials, investigating a complaint, found “sufficient evidence” that he abused a teenage boy in the 1970s. While he “vehemently denied” the accusations, he chose to resign in 2004 when the archdiocese planned to take action under church law, said Jim Goodness, a spokesman for the archdiocese. The statute of limitations had expired and Chabak was not criminally charged.

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AUSTRALIA
Maitland Mercury

By ELLE WATSON July 24, 2013

The priest who extracted a confession from paedohpile Denis McAlinden agreed it was his “published view” not to take notes of criminal admissions because it could be used as evidence in legal procedures.

During a morning of cross-examination at the Special Commission of Inquiry, Father Brian Lucas, the general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, gave a number of reasons why it would be counter-productive to create a “permanent record” of conversations with accused priests.

“If you’re sitting in front of him taking notes he isn’t going to say anything – that’s my experience,” said Father Lucas who went on to explain that evidence also could be inadmissible.

Senior counsel assisting the commission Julia Lonergan SC put it to Father Lucas the real reason he was adverse to taking notes is because he knew it could be used in legal procedures against the offending priests.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By IAN KIRKWOOD July 24, 2013

A SENIOR cleric has blamed his counterparts in the Philippines for letting disgraced paedophile Denis McAlinden act as a priest in a school with thousands of children.

Father Brian Lucas, general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, told the Special Commission of Inquiry sitting in Newcastle yesterday that he was absolutely disgusted that any bishop would allow someone in McAlinden’s position to work in the diocese.

Asked whether he knew the church this end had told the Philippinos about McAlinden’s offences, he said there was no need to because McAlinden should not have been able to work without the proper documents.

He said he was appalled the Philippino bishops would have been ‘‘so fundamentally careless’’ in not following the fundamentals of church policy.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

DAN BOX From: The Australian July 24, 2013

ONE of the most senior officials in the Catholic church personally interviewed dozens of alleged pedophile priests, many of whom admitted their crimes, but took no notes as they might have been used in legal action, an inquiry has heard.

Brian Lucas, the general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, told the NSW special commission of inquiry into church child abuse that his role was to “seduce them to resign.”

One of the priests Father Lucas interviewed, Denis McAlinden, was subsequently subject to an arrest warrant issued by NSW Police, but died before being charged, the inquiry has heard. Another is currently before the courts, charged with child sex abuse.

Giving evidence this morning, Father Lucas said McAlinden had admitted abusing children and he had been prepared to risk committing an offence himself by not reporting this to police.

Counsel assisting the inquiry, Julia Lonergan, asked Father Lucas if he did not take notes during these meetings as “you didn’t want it to have to be disclosed in any subsequent legal process?”

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VATICAN CITY
The Telegraph (UK)

By Damian Thompson
Last updated: July 23rd, 2013

The world’s press are – understandably – focussing on Pope Francis’s visit to World Youth Day in Brazil: it is nice to see such positive coverage of a Pope who deserves it, such is the freshness and vigour he has brought to his role. But I can’t help thinking that, if Benedict XVI were in Brazil, the media would talk about celebrations “overshadowed” by the extraordinary allegations facing Mgr Battista Ricca, the man appointed by Francis to oversee reform of the Vatican Bank. (For background, read my post here.)

The are reports that Ricca, 57, who was allegedly caught stuck in a lift with a rent boy, has tendered his resignation to the Pope. We don’t know if this is true, though the level of detail about Mgr Ricca’s allegedly flamboyant gay past supplied by leading Vaticanologist Sandro Magister suggests that his position is untenable. Should Francis accept a resignation, he’d leave people wondering why his own press officer brushed off the allegations against Ricca who, as director of the Domus Santa Marta hostel where the Pope lives, often eats with the Holy Father.

The following is from a well-connected priest source. It’s partly guesswork – but the Ricca affair is so mysterious, and its possible consequences so serious, that informed speculation needs to be taken seriously, at least by those commentators trying to work out whether Pope Francis will succeed in his mission to clean up the Vatican. The emphases in bold type are mine.

The first thing is that it is truly without precedent for someone like Magister, who is no tabloid sensationalizer, to put his career on the line in this way. I think he can be trusted, and ought to be supported. He is a loyal Ratzingerian, and was before it became fashionable. He is not naive. It is quite posssible that his sources are trying to use him, but he would not play such a hand with such decisive stakes unless he believed it was necessary for the good of the Church.

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VATICAN
Cath.ch

Rattrapé par des révélations sur son homosexualité, Mgr Ricca aurait présenté sa démission au pape

Après les révélations de l’hebdomadaire italien L’Espresso sur ses activités homosexuelles, Mgr Battista Ricca, récemment nommé prélat de l’Institut pour les œuvres de religions (IOR), aurait présenté sa démission au pape François, a appris l’agence I.MEDIA à Rome.

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VATICAN CITY
Pink News

by Scott Roberts
23 July 2013

The Prelate of the Vatican bank, Monsignor Battista Ricca, who is facing claims of inappropriate sexual behaviour, has offered to resign, according to an Italian news agency.

I Media, which specialises in covering the Vatican, say Monsignor Ricca offered his resignation to Pope Francis on Saturday, but it remains unknown if it’s been accepted.

Pope Francis, who appointed Monsignor Ricca to reform the Vatican bank in June, is currently on a tour of Brazil.

Earlier this month Italian journalist Sandro Magister, from the magazine L’Espresso, claimed Monsignor Ricca provided accommodation and a job for a male companion while he was assigned as a Vatican diplomat in Uruguay between 1999 and 2001.

According to Mr Magister, when Monsignor Ricca arrived he arranged for a male friend and captain in the Swiss army to live with him in the embassy, it is said that the “intimacy” of their relationship created a scandal.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Inquiry needed to compel congregations to reveal truth about treatment of Magdalenes

James S Smith

The Sisters of Mercy, Sisters of Charity, Sisters of Our Lady of Charity, and Good Shepherd Sisters will not apologise to survivors of the Magdalene laundries. As stated on RTÉ’s The God Slot programme (8th March), the nuns claim there is nothing to apologise for – they provided refuge to women abandoned by their families, the State and Irish society.

Neither will the congregations make a financial contribution to the Government’s reparations scheme, which was founded on the tenets of restorative justice. In holding to this position, the orders expose the Achilles heel of the Government’s Magdalene policy over the past two years – a policy dependent on the congregations’ voluntary co-operation.

Co-operation voluntarily given does not compel the nuns in any legal sense. Their negative response invalidates the Government’s assertion that survivors are being afforded restorative justice. There is no justice without the nuns’ apology and/or financial reparation.

Minister for Justice Alan Shatter told the Dáil the nuns seek reconciliation with survivors. But the legal definition of reconciliation “ordinarily implies forgiveness for injuries on either or both sides”. Instead, the orders expect an amnesty for gross human rights violations.

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IRELAND
Galway Independent

Marie Madden

The treatment of the women of the Magdalene Laundries is a subject that continues to grip and horrify the nation, but one of the first true insights into the lives of these victims was written by a Galway woman and revealed to the nation in 1992.

The treatment of the women of the Magdalene Laundries is a subject that continues to grip and horrify the nation, but one of the first true insights into the lives of the survivors was written by a Galway woman and revealed to the nation in 1992.

‘Eclipsed’ by Patricia Burke Brogan tells the story of a young novice nun who is set to work in a Magdalene Laundry and is hugely troubled by her experiences. It draws on Ms Burke Brogan’s true-life experiences and aims to show the day-to-day reality of life for those interned in these religious prisons.

When first performed by Punchbag Theatre in 1992, the play drew scorn and abuse on the writer, with Ms Burke Brogan once telling me that someone had cut her picture out of the paper and drawn horns and different symbols on it before sending it to her home.

“I got up one morning and this had been thrown in the door, which was very upsetting and hard to handle. People thought I was being anti-Church but I wasn’t. Everyone blamed the sisters, but the State did nothing to intervene.”

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AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Andrew Hamilton | 24 July 2013

Geoffrey Robinson’s book ‘For Christ’s Sake’ features that title superimposed over the image of a person in silhouette holding up a crossCulture has become a popular word to analyse organisations whose members do bad things: football clubs whose players dismantle bars and their patrons; political parties whose members are paraded before courts; and churches in which sexual abuse has been rife.

The culture of an organisation comprises the shared attitudes, values, patterns of relationship and practices that make it more likely that members will act in particular ways. In an army unit where there is a culture of binge drinking and contempt for women, more incidents of sexual assault may well occur than in other units where these features are absent.

Bishop Geoffrey Robinson’s recent book on the culture of the Catholic Church carries on his critique of the factors that have contributed to clerical sexual abuse of children and to denial and concealment of it. The aspects of Catholic culture that he believes conducive to it include: a relationship with God dominated by fear; immaturity; compulsory clerical celibacy, an exclusively male caste standing over the church; a lonely way of life; a cult of privacy and secrecy; a compulsive need to defend the actions and attitudes of the Pope.

Together these things made it more likely that priests will be tempted to abuse children, will have the opportunity to do so, will abuse with impunity, and have their actions denied and covered up by others.

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VIRGINIA
NV Daily

By Joe Beck

A Page County grand jury Monday handed up indictments of 12 counts of aggravated sexual battery of a child less than 13 years old against the former pastor of a church in Shenandoah County.

Page County Sheriff John B. Thomas said the defendant, James Richard Daley, 70, now pastor of the Beth Eden Lutheran Church in Luray, was arrested after someone reported him to the Luray Police Department. Daley remained held without bond in the Page County Jail on Tuesday afternoon.

Daley was pastor at the Lebanon Lutheran Church in Lebanon Church for several years in the 1980s.

News of Daley’s indictments stunned John D. Cutlip, the current pastor of Lebanon Lutheran. Cutlip said he has been in sporadic contact with Daley through the years, most recently two or more years ago when they co-officiated at a wedding.

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AUSTRALIA
Blayney Chronicle

By Catherine Armitage July 24, 2013

One of the Australian Catholic Church’s most prominent and senior figures has admitted he advised other clergy it was a good idea not to take notes of interviews with priests accused of sexual abuse so they couldn’t be successfully used in legal action.

Father Brian Lucas, a frequent media spokesman for the archdiocese of Sydney and general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference said he had dealt with about 35 accused priests around NSW from 1990 to 1995 when he was part of a team whose job was to confront them and persuade them out of the ministry.

He gave evidence to the NSW government inquiry into alleged police and church cover-ups of sexual abuse by priests in the Hunter Valley that he had persuaded more than 10 of them to leave the ministry.

He said if he had taken notes fairness would have required that he check them with the accused for accuracy. Asked whether he had ever done that he said no.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Dan Cox

A senior Catholic Church official says he was willing to risk breaking the law by not reporting child sexual abuse allegations against a Hunter Valley priest.

Father Brian Lucas is a former lawyer and the current general secretary of the Australian Catholic Bishops conference.

He is giving evidence at the New South Wales inquiry investigating claims the church covered up abuse by two Maitland-Newcastle priests, Father James Fletcher and Father Denis McAlinden.

Father Lucas has told the inquiry he did not take notes during meetings to ensure they could not be used later in court.

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MICHIGAN
Desert Sun

Written by
Patricia Montemurri
Detroit Free Press Staff Writer

There was supposed to be someone from the Archdiocese of Detroit watching Timothy Murray of Novi, a Catholic priest banned from working in the Catholic Church because of sexual misconduct.

But the archdiocese did not know what Murray was doing inside his home. And last year, federal agents investigated him for possession and distribution of child pornography.

Today in federal court, Murray is scheduled to plead guilty to child pornography charges, which could put him in prison 20-30 years. According to court documents, he was in possession of sexually explicit videos of boys ages 6-16 and had downloaded roughly 500 images of child pornography from the Internet.

Murray told investigators that he viewed porn weekly and preferred 13-year-old males, court documents reported.

Murray’s case illustrates the conundrum facing the Catholic Church: What do you do with priests accused of long-ago sexual abuse? Because technically, the former pastor of St. Edith parish in Livonia is still a Catholic priest.

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AUSTRALIA
The Guardian (UK)

Australian Associated Press
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 24 July 2013

A Catholic priest who encouraged paedophile clergy in NSW and the ACT to resign has admitted he never took notes during confidential meetings with them.

Father Brian Lucas on Wednesday appeared at Newcastle supreme court for a special commission of inquiry into how church leaders and police handled child sexual abuse allegations against two Hunter Valley priests, Denis McAlinden and James Fletcher.

Barrister assisting the inquiry, Julia Lonergan, asked Lucas if he thought it was unwise to take notes during the meetings in case he had to make them public in subsequent legal proceedings.

“I think that would be reasonable comment,” Lucas answered.

Lucas said after discussions with paedophile priests he reported what was said to their bishops and left it to them and their advisers to take whatever action they considered appropriate.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

A paedophile NSW priest stripped of his authority allegedly pretended to be a cleric and became a school chaplain in the Philippines.

The claim has been revealed at an inquiry examining how church leaders and police handled reports of child sexual abuse by fathers Denis McAlinden and James Fletcher in the Hunter region of NSW.

Barrister assisting the inquiry, Julia Lonergan, said Fr McAlinden wrote to Maitland-Newcastle bishop Leo Clarke in 1995 claiming to have heard “no less than 10,000 confessions” in six months working in the Philippines’ San Pablo diocese.

In the letter, Fr McAlinden said he had made admissions of “past failings” to senior NSW Catholic priest Brian Lucas but, through prayer, was no longer that way inclined.

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SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland

Wednesday 24 July 2013

Monsignor Leo Cushley has been appointed Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh by the Catholic Church, replacing Cardinal Keith O’Brien, who left the post earlier this year after admitting inappropriate sexual conduct.

More soon…

Mgr Cushley, 52, is currently head of the English-language section of the Vatican’s Secretariat of State and has been a close collaborator of both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis.

In that capacity, Mgr Cushley has been regularly involved in the visits of heads of state and other important guests to the Holy See, inmcluding Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, and the Archbishop of Canterbury.

As head of the English section of the Secretariat of State it was his task to accompany the Holy Father to English-speaking countries.

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SCOTLAND
STV

The Catholic Church have named Monsignor Leo Cushley as the new Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh.

Cardinal Keith O’Brien stood down at the end of February amid allegations of “inappropriate behaviour”.

In Edinburgh on Wednesday, Archbishop Philip Tartaglia introduced Mgr Cushley as the new archbishop-elect.

Mgr Cushley works in the Vatican’s secretariat of state as a papal translator. As head of the English Language desk, he is responsible for relations with the English-speaking world.

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SCOTLAND
Catholic Herald

Pope Francis has named Mgr Leo Cushley as the new Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh.

The appointment was announced at noon today in Rome. The archbishop-elect succeeds Cardinal Keith O’Brien, who led the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh from 1985 until his resignation in February.

Mgr Cushley is currently head of the English-language section of the Vatican Secretariat of State and has been a close collaborator of both Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. In his capacity as Prelate of the Anticamera, Mgr Cushley has been involved in the visits of heads of state and other important guests to the Holy See. Recently he has assisted the German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev Justin Welby, and many other high-profile visitors to the Vatican.

As head of the English section of the Secretariat of State it was his task to accompany the Holy Father to English-speaking countries. In 2010 he accompanied Benedict XVI to Malta, Cyprus and Britain.

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BRAZIL
National Catholic Reporter

John L. Allen Jr. | Jul. 23, 2013 NCR Today

RIO DE JANEIRO Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia is renowned for speaking plainly, which in part means he’s often willing to say things out loud that others in his position may sense but are hesitant to acknowledge.

During an interview in Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday, for instance, Chaput bluntly tackled three questions about Pope Francis, his early record, and his current trip to Brazil:

* The 68-year-old Capuchin conceded that last night’s mob scene with the papal motorcade was a “frightening moment,” hinting that perhaps Francis could listen a bit more to handlers charged with his safety and saying, “There has to be some distance between the crowds and the Holy Father.”

* Chaput acknowledged that members of the right wing of the Catholic church “generally have not been really happy” with some aspects of Francis’ early months and said the pope will have to find a way “to care for them, too.”

* Chaput defended Francis on concerns in some circles that he’s been silent on abortion, gay marriage and euthanasia, saying, “I can’t imagine he won’t be as pro-life and pro-traditional marriage as any of the other popes.” He insisted the bishop of Rome “has to talk about those things.”

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TENNESSEE
WATE

By LAURA HALM
6 News Reporter

KNOXVILLE (WATE) – Attorneys for a former Knoxville priest convicted of child rape returned to a courtroom Tuesday to appeal his conviction.

William Casey was convicted in 2011 in Sullivan County of criminal sexual conduct and aggravated rape in a case that dated back to the 1970s.

He was sentenced to a 35-year prison term.

The victim, Warren Tucker, is now in his forties. He says the abuse lasted for years.

The defense team is asking the Tennessee Court of Appeals judges to dismiss Casey’s conviction.

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TENNESSE
KnoxNews

By Jamie Satterfield
Posted July 23, 2013

The fate of a former Kingsport priest convicted in a decades-old molestation of an altar boy could rest on the shoulders of another Tennessee child rapist.

Attorneys for William “Bill” Casey, 79, on Tuesday asked a three-judge panel of the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals to toss out convictions the former priest received in the molestation of a then-teenager more than three decades ago. The victim, Warren Tucker, now in his late 40s, did not disclose the molestation to law enforcement until 2010.

Father and son defense team Rick Spivey and Matthew Spivey are relying in large part on a Wilson County child rape case in which the victim kept the rape quiet for 42 years in arguing Casey’s constitutional rights were violated, and the case should be thrown out.

It was 1950 when Harold Winter Gray allegedly raped his niece. It would be 1992 — when she said she became concerned about possible molestation of Gray’s granddaughter — before she went to authorities.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

The Government has confirmed that it does not think there is a basis to include the Bethany Home residents for compensation within the Residential Institutions Redress Scheme.

It’s also decided that it’s not going to introduce a specific scheme for the Bethany Home resident.

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IRELAND
RTE News

The Government has decided it will not be introducing a redress scheme for survivors of the Protestant Bethany Home.

However, it has said it is willing to look at the questions of a memorial and the availability of records with regard to the institution.

The Government said it had confirmed the view expressed by Minister Ruairi Quinn two years ago that there was no basis for revisiting the previous government’s decision not to include the Bethany Home within the Residential Institutions Redress Scheme.

The Bethany Survivors Group has strongly criticised the Government’s decision.

Chairperson of the group Derek Leinster said: “The offer to look at records production and “modest” funding for a memorial is an insult.

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IRELAND
Irish Times

Steven Carroll, Arthur Beesley

The Government has ruled out creating a redress scheme for former residents of the Bethany Mother and Child Home and stated that they will not be able to access existing compensation funds.

Minister for Justice Alan Shatter, who briefed Cabinet colleagues on the matter today, said he understood the decision would be “disappointing” for the former residents.

Mr Shatter said the Government was willing to look at developing a memorial and making records relating to the Protestant-run home available.

“I understand this is disappointing for the group involved but the Government has taken its time and arrived carefully at this decision,” he said.

The Bethany Home Survivors Group said an offer of “modest funding” towards a memorial and making records available was “an insult” and that it would continue its campaign for justice.

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TEXAS
Amarillo Globe-News

By Jim McBride
jim.mcbride@amarillo.com

An attorney representing a former Tulia priest facing child indecency charges has asked a judge to change the location of the trial, citing extensive local and national publicity.

Lubbock Attorney Rod Hobson said in court documents that John Anthony Salazar, 57, charged with indecency with a child for allegedly touching a 12-year-old boy’s genitals, cannot obtain a fair trial in Tulia. The alleged abuse began in 1997.

“It is feared that many, many people that would be potential jurors in this case have already made up their mind on Salazar’s guilt. There exists in the community such a great prejudice that the defendant cannot receive a fair and impartial trial in this county,” according to a motion for a change of venue.

The motion also includes statements from three Swisher County residents who agree that Salazar can’t receive a fair trial in Tulia.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

July 24, 2013

Catherine Armitage
Senior Writer

He has moved on with his life but even nine years after the court case, the man who endured years of “dreadful” abuse as a boy by a Catholic priest in the Hunter Valley could not keep the incredulity from his voice.

On that day in 2004 when Father James Fletcher was found guilty of all charges of sexually abusing him, Fletcher’s bishop, Michael Malone – “his” bishop, his father’s boss – rang his home and asked his father to put him on the phone.

“I still remember, he told me that Fletcher would never work in the diocese again and he asked me to keep my faith. To this day I wonder what faith he was talking about,” the man known as AH told the silent courtroom at the NSW government inquiry into alleged church and police cover-ups of child sexual abuse by priests in the Maitland-Newcastle diocese.

AH told of how he was “an innocent little kid with a big hope for the future” when Fletcher stole the promise from his life. He remembered other things in gut-wrenching detail. The priest’s number plate – JPF004 – ”will always be in my head”. He remembered how during the trial, clergy visited and supported Fletcher but none went near him and his family, they “didn’t want to look at us”. It was a feeling of two sides, he said, “completely opposite”.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

A victim of a Hunter Valley paedophile priest has praised the policeman who blew the whistle on an alleged cover-up of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

The inquiry is investigating allegations the Catholic church covered-up abuse by priests Denis McAlinden and James Fletcher.

Fletcher died in jail just two years into his 10-year sentence for abusing a victim, known as AH.

AH told the inquiry he wonders how different his life would be if senior clergy had taken action against Fletcher years before his abuse, instead of moving the priest from parish to parish.

“There are many, many more victims so I want the commission to uncover that,” he said.

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UNITED STATES
Washington Post

By Adelle M. Banks| Religion News Service, Tuesday, July 23

More than 1,200 people have signed an online petition decrying the “silence” and “inattention” of evangelical leaders to sexual abuse in their churches.

The statement was prompted by recent child abuse allegations against Sovereign Grace Ministries, an umbrella group of 80 Reformed evangelical churches based in Louisville, Ky.

“Recent allegations of sexual abuse and cover-up within a well known international ministry and subsequent public statements by several evangelical leaders have angered and distressed many, both inside and outside of the Church,” reads the three-page statement spearheaded by GRACE (Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment).

“These events expose the troubling reality that, far too often, the Church’s instincts are no different than from those of many other institutions, responding to such allegations by moving to protect her structures rather than her children.”

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CHILE
La Tercera

por Karen Soto Galindo – 23/07/2013

El ministro de fuero, Juan Manuel Muñoz, fijó para el próximo 8 de agosto la toma de declaración del sacerdote Fernando Karadima, en el marco de la indagatoria solicitada por los denunciantes, para luego interponer una demanda civil en contra del Arzobispado de Santiago.

La diligencia se realizará en un convento ubicado en Parque Bustamante de Santiago, donde el sacerdote cumple penitencia tras ser condenado por el Vaticano por el delito de abuso sexual.

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CHILE
Terra

Caso Karadima: juez fija para el 8 de agosto el interrogatorio a sacerdote en acción civil

El ministro de fuero, Juan Muñoz Pardo, reagendó todos los interrogatorios al sacerdote Fernando Karadima y otros dos sacerdotes por la demanda contra el Arzobispado de Santiago que presentaron tres de sus víctimas.

El magistrado fijó las diligencias para este jueves 8 de agosto, a las 16 horas, en el lugar de enclaustamiento eclesiástico contra el ex párroco de El Bosque.

En noviembre del año pasado, el médico James Hamilton, el filósofo Juan Andrés Murillo y el periodista Juan Carlos Cruz interpusieron una “pre demanda” civil por daños y perjuicios, en la que exigirán al Arzobispado de Santiago una indemnización económica.

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TENNESSEE
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: July 23, 2013

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 hope a judge will affirm the conviction of Father William Casey who sexually assaulted a boy and was found guilty in 2011. For the safety of kids, he should remain in prison.

We hope that other victims and witnesses will look to this case for the inspiration to come forward. Although putting a predator in prison doesn’t undo the crime, it does prevent the same from happening to other children.

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SCOTLAND
Scotsman

by STEPHEN MCGINTY
Published on the
23 July

THE new Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh is to be named tomorrow as the Vatican announces who will succeed Cardinal Keith O’Brien who resigned in disgrace after admitting inappropriate behaviour with a number of priests.

• Cardinal Keith O’Brien’s successor to be named tomorrow morning
• New Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh to be introduced by Archbishop Philip Tartaglia

Archbishop Philip Tartaglia, until now Apostolic Administrator of the Archdiocese, will introduce the new Archbishop-elect to the archdiocese at 11am.

The new Archbishop will answer questions and deliver his first message to the Archdiocese which has been shocked by the scandal surrounding Cardinal O’Brien who was revealed to have had a number of inappropriate relationships with priests and seminarians.

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TENNESSEE
WBIR

(WBIR-Knoxville) A Knoxville court will hear the appeal of a former East Tennessee priest convicted of sexually molesting an altar boy Tuesday afternoon.

A judge sentenced former priest William Casey to more than 30 years in prison in Nov. 2011. A Sullivan County jury convicted Casey of sexually molesting Warren Tucker between 1978 and 1980, while Tucker served as an alter boy.

Casey’s hearing to appeal the conviction is set for 1:30 p.m. in the court of criminal appeals.

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OHIO
NBC4i

By: Denise Yost, Multimedia Content Manager

COLUMBUS, Ohio –
The man accused of attempting to trade nude photos and sex acts for positions in the All Ohio State Fair Youth Choir was released on bond Monday afternoon.

Zachary Ruppel, 26, is facing two counts of disseminating matter harmful to juveniles and one count of compelling prostitution. He appeared in court for a preliminary hearing Monday afternoon, and two types of bond were set at $25,000.

Columbus police say Ruppel was soliciting nude pictures and sex acts in exchange for positions in the All Ohio State Fair Youth Choir from his St. Francis DeSales High School students, as well as other juveniles involved with the All Ohio State Fair Youth Choir in 2011.

Ruppel is no longer employed by the school.

Detectives searched Ruppel’s home after complaints were made to Ohio State Fair Choir staff about the allegations against Ruppel.

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OHIO
Columbus Dispatch

By Kathy Lynn Gray and Allison Manning
Tuesday July 23, 2013

Investigators are combing through a cache of nude photos that police suspect were solicited by a former youth choir director who is facing child-sex charges.

Already, Zachary R. Ruppel, 26, a former St. Francis DeSales High School choir director and former Ohio State Fair choir staff member, is charged with soliciting nude pictures and sex acts from two boys in exchange for membership in the state fair choir.

But Sgt. Terry McConnell, of the Columbus police sexual-assault unit, said there are many more victims.

Investigators are trying to identify the boys in photos found on Ruppel’s cellphone and iPad, using school yearbooks and, when possible, school staff members to review cropped photos. Some victims, officials say, were DeSales students; some were choir members.

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SCOTLAND
Edinburgh News

A NEW Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh is to be announced tomorrow to replace shamed Cardinal Keith O’Brien, the former head of the church in Scotland.

The Catholic Church in Scotland said it would make the announcement at 11am in Edinburgh.

Archbishop Philip Tartaglia, until now Apostolic Administrator of the Archdiocese, will introduce the new Archbishop-elect who will then speak to clergy, staff and media and deliver his first message to the Archdiocese.

Since being ordered to leave Scotland by the Vatican around two months ago, it is understood Cardinal O’Brien has been staying at an enclosed abbey in the English midlands.

The Papal nuncio to the UK said on a recent visit that he hopes a new Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh will be appointed soon.

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CANADA
APTN

By Jorge Barrera
APTN National News

The commission created to delve into the dark history of residential schools has been in possession of documents related to nutritional experiments conducted on First Nations people for at least three years, according to Aboriginal Affairs Minister Bernard Valcourt’s office.

Valcourt’s office said most of the 900 documents were turned over to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2010 and the rest in 2011. The documents are all related to nutritional experiments conducted on First Nations people and children in residential schools between 1942 and 1952.

“These are abhorrent examples of the dark pagers of the residential schools’ legacy,” said Andrea Richer, in an email to APTN National News.

A spokesperson for the TRC confirmed the commission is in possession of the documents. The spokesperson said TRC Commissioner Justice Murray Sinclair believes the commission’s researchers need to take a thorough look at the documents before issuing any comment.

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ARIZONA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, July 23

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 862 7688 home, 314 503 0003 cell, SNAPdorris@gmail.com)

In what an expert calls a “highly unusual move,” a predator priest – who has quietly been living in Phoenix and is licensed to teach in Arizona – is seeking $450,000 in “back pay,” from his Catholic supervisors.

[Merced Sun-Star]

Fr. Marvin T. Knighton was tried on two child sexual abuse charges in Milwaukee in 2003. The statute of limitation had expired on one of the charges. Knighton was acquitted on the other charge.

But Milwaukee Catholic officials dismissed him because they found at least two of his four victims credible.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Cardinal Newman Society

July 23, 2013, at 9:08 AM | By Matthew Archbold

“Where has obedience got us?”

That was the question posed by Fr. Helmut Schüller in a speech at Chestnut Hill College, according to The National Catholic Reporter which covered the event.

OrdinationThe Cardinal Newman Society exclusively reported earlier this month that Fr. Schüller was barred from speaking at any parish or diocesan-related facility in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia because of his views that, according to the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, “diverge very seriously from Catholic belief and practice” including female ordination.

The Archdiocese released a statement earlier this month, saying that Schüller’s presence on the campus of a Catholic college “inevitably damages the unity of the local Church.” Archbishop Chaput’s concerns were communicated to the college and the Sisters of St. Joseph who run the college to no avail.

Father Schüller, founder of the Austrian Priest Initiative, was a leader in a movement that issued a “Call to Disobedience,” which advocated for the ability of divorced and remarried Catholics to receive sacraments as well as the ordination of women and married men.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Yorkshire Post

THE Archbishop of York has stressed the Church of England will learn from any failings after announcing the team who will lead an independent inquiry into allegations of child abuse against a former cathedral dean.

Dr John Sentamu revealed yesterday that members of the independent inquiry will report back to him with recommendations by the end of October after conducting the investigation into the allegations against Robert Waddington, a former Dean of Manchester Cathedral.

Dr Sentamu’s predecessor, Lord Hope of Thornes, has denied suggestions he covered up allegations against Mr Waddington, who died from cancer five years ago.

The Times has claimed that Lord Hope, who was Archbishop of York between 1995 and 2005, was twice informed about allegations against Mr Waddington, who is said to have abused a chorister in Manchester in the 1980s and a schoolboy in Australia.

The paper said the former Archbishop spoke to Mr Waddington and banned him from taking services but did not report him to the police.

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CANADA
Times Colonist

The abuses in Canada’s Indian residential schools have been a stain on the country’s history, but the experiments carried out on unwitting children in the schools and on adults outside are staggering in their callousness.

It is not enough to say, as is often said in other cases, that times were different and we cannot judge previous generations by current standards. Even in the 1940s and 1950s, experimenting on people without their knowledge or consent was wrong. To do it to children was monstrous.

Ian Mosby, a food historian from the University of Guelph, has uncovered documents showing that between 1942 and 1952, malnourished people were subjected to nutrition experiments at the Alberni Indian Residential School, five other residential schools across Canada and reserves in northern Manitoba.

The projects began in March 1942, when researchers descended on several northern Manitoba reserves. They were headed by Dr. Percy Moore, Indian Affairs Branch superintendent of medical services, and RCAF Wing Commander Dr. Frederick Tisdall, the co-inventor of Pablum, who was described as Canada’s leading nutrition expert

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NEW JERSEY
The Record

TUESDAY JULY 23, 2013
THE RECORD

A PASTOR in Oradell allowed a priest to stay in his rectory who had been accused of sexually molesting a teenage boy. The Rev. Thomas Iwanowski and a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Newark said allowing Monsignor Robert Chabak to stay at St. Joseph’s rectory was “an act of compassion.” We ask: “To whom?”

Certainly not to the boy who was allegedly molested in the 1970s. The archdiocese removed Chabak from ministry in 2004 after it determined there was credible evidence to support the allegations. The statute of limitations had passed, and no criminal charges were filed. In May, the archdiocese was made aware of a second allegation regarding Chabak.

Iwanowski has known Chabak for more than 40 years; they met in seminary. When Chabak’s home in Toms River was damaged by Superstorm Sandy, the archdiocese gave him permission to stay at the rectory in Oradell. St. Joseph School is a block away.

The church’s pastor has resigned effective July 31, saying it was a mutual decision between him and the archdiocese and had nothing to do with the Chabak incident. Some disagree that the resignation had nothing to do with Chabak. It is a small point either way.

What is not so small is that the archdiocese thought it was appropriate to allow someone it had removed from active ministry because of a credible sexual-abuse allegation to live in a parish rectory near a school and not tell parishioners or be concerned that the priest could venture out. Chabak was not under house arrest; he was free to go wherever he chose, and the archdiocese continues to minimize the potential risks this raised for children and, of lesser consequence, the damage these kinds of decisions have on the Catholic Church’s reputation.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

A priest was terminated from his position at the Santa Barbara Catholic Church because he failed to follow a direct order that related to the safety of children, according to the Archdiocese of Agana.

Father Paul Gofigan was asked to terminate the employment of an employee publically known to have a sex offense on his record, the Archdiocese stated.

Gofigan, in a letter he disseminated on Saturday to the Dededo parishioners said he did terminate the employee. He noted that the crime had been committed more than 32 years ago.

The Archdiocese said an investigation showed the person continued to have an active presence at the parish as a volunteer.

“The person had keys to the facilities and had an active role on church grounds in different ways,” the Archdiocese stated.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By IAN KIRKWOOD July 23, 2013

A VICTIM of paedophile priest Jim Fletcher known as AH has given an emotional statement to the special commission of inquiry in Newcastle about the impact Fletcher’s abuse has had on his life.

The case of AH, who cannot be named, has been a centrepiece of this inquiry and his appearance in the witness box had been long anticipated.

The commission room, including Commissioner Margaret Cunneen, broke into applause at the end of his statement.

Commissioner Cunneen reminded AH that no shame remained with him under the shame was properly wear it now lay.

AH began by telling the commission of the difficulty he had in telling people about the abuse.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

VIDEO: Father Paul Believes His Canonical Rights as a Priest Were Violated

Guam – Father Paul Gofigan, the overthrown priest of Santa Barbara Catholic Church in Dededo, has spoken out about the controversy over his defiance from the Archdiocese, saying he believes his canonical rights as a priest were violated.

The Archdiocese of Agana, however, says the decision to replace father Paul was out made of concern for the safety of the children.

“I just would like to say that I didn’t really mean for this to escalate as far as it did but there is a point to be made here that my office as pastor of Santa Barbara is a canonical one and therefore being canonical, removing a pastor from a parish has its own canonical process,” says Father Paul Gofigan.

Father Paul believes his rights were violated when Archbishop Anthony Apuron forced him to resign without fair warning. The controversy stems from a decision Father Paul made about two years ago to hire a convicted sex offender at the Santa Barbara Church. The crime was rape and it was committed over 32 years ago when the man was about 21 years old. His victim at the time was an 18 year old female. About two years ago, in 2011, Archbishop Apuron warned Father Paul about that decision.

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OHIO
Coshocton Tribune

Choir volunteer charged with soliciting nude photos, sexual favors passed four background checks, fair spokeswoman says

Written by
Valerie Boateng and Elizabeth Dickson
Staff Writers

COLUMBUS — A man accused of soliciting nude photos and sexual favors in regard to the All-Ohio State Fair Youth Choir had volunteered with the organization for only one year.

Zachary Ruppel, 26, of Columbus, was arrested and charged with disseminating matter harmful to juveniles and compelling prostitution involving a minor in regard to the All-Ohio State Fair Youth Choir.

Ruppel was an unpaid volunteer in 2011 and has not been a volunteer or had official contact with the fair since, said Alicia Shoults, state fair spokeswoman. Shoults said Ruppel passed four rounds of background checks before he was allowed to become a volunteer.

Those reviews included a check with the sex offender registry and the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction as well as a drug test and background check.

Columbus Police Department Sgt. Terry McConnell said complaints were made to the All-Ohio State Fair Youth Choir staff that Ruppel was soliciting nude photos and sex acts in exchange for positions in the choir from his St. Francis DeSales High School students as well as other juveniles involved with the All-Ohio State Fair Youth Choir dating back to 2011.

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ILLINOIS
Lake County News-Sun

By Jim Newton jnewton@stmedianetwork.com July 22, 2013

Several defense motions, including a request to dismiss the case against a Benedictine monk accused of child abduction attempts in the Antioch area, will be the focus of a hearing Aug. 21 in Lake County Circuit Court.

Thomas Chmura is charged with four counts of child abduction, a felony punishable with up to three years in prison, related to his alleged offering of rides to a number of girls whose ages ranged from 11 to 14 on April 25 and April 26.

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FLORIDA
WPTV

[with video]

By: Marissa Bagg
BOCA RATON, Fla. – Members of the Boca Raton Synagogue remain on edge as a longtime member of their congregation was named in a sex abuse lawsuit.

19 former students of the Yeshiva University school in New York City claim they were repeatedly abused by two rabbis and a youth volunteer in the 1970’s and 1980’s.

“He’s a good person, he does good things in the community, but you never know,” said Boca Raton Synagogue member Eyal Cohen.

The lawsuit alleges Richard Andron molested high school students while working as a volunteer at the school in Manhattan.

Andron briefly spoke with NewsChannel 5 off-camera at his Boca Raton home Monday about the allegations. He said he was cooperating with the investigation but had no other comment.

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TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
Trinidad Express

By Joel Julien joel.julien@trinidadexpress.com
Story Created: Jul 22, 2013

An official of the Roman Catholic Church in the Vatican, who was once stationed in Trinidad and Tobago, has been named in a “gay lobby” scandal currently affecting the church.

On June 15, Pope Francis appointed Monsignor Battista Ricca the Prelate of the Institute for Works of Religion (IOR), commonly known as the Vatican Bank.

The Italian news magazine L’Espresso on Friday published an article which linked Ricca to the “gay lobby” and revealed he has been involved in several relationships with men.

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BRAZIL
ABC News (US)

By SANTIAGO WILLS
July 22, 2013

A group of Brazilian women will wear suggestive nun outfits and other erotic attire when they march in Rio this week during Pope Francis’ first visit to Brazil. The protest — called “SlutWalk” — is part of an international rally that began in Toronto in 2011 against sexual profiling and sexual abuse.

“We’ve decided to organize SlutWalk during the Pope’s visit to establish a political counterpoint,” Rogeria Peixinho, an activist from the Association of Brazilian Women, told EFE. “We want to show that there’s another youth and another way of thinking that is against oppression and the control of female sexuality.”

The pope is set to land in Brazil today to celebrate World Youth Day, a five-day gathering between the pope and Catholic youth from all around the globe that takes place every two or three years.

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NEW JERSEY
Herald News

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013
HERALD NEWS

A PASTOR in Oradell allowed a priest to stay in his rectory who had been accused of sexually molesting a teenage boy. The Rev. Thomas Iwanowski and a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Newark said allowing Monsignor Robert Chabak to stay at St. Joseph’s rectory was “an act of compassion.” We ask: “To whom?”

Certainly not to the boy who was allegedly molested in the 1970s. The archdiocese removed Chabak from ministry in 2004 after it determined there was credible evidence to support the allegations. The statute of limitations had passed and no criminal charges were filed. This May, the archdiocese was made aware of a second allegation regarding Chabak.

Iwanowski has known Chabak for more than 40 years; they met in seminary. When Chabak’s home in Toms River was damaged by Superstorm Sandy, the archdiocese gave him permission to stay at the rectory in Oradell. St. Joseph School is a block away.

The church’s pastor has resigned effective July 31, saying it was a mutual decision between him and the archdiocese and had nothing to do with the Chabak incident. Some disagree that the resignation had nothing to do with Chabak. It is a small point either way.

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AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

By IAN KIRKWOOD July 23, 2013

A VICTIM of paedophile priest Jim Fletcher has given an emotional statement to the special commission of inquiry in Newcastle about the impact that the abuse has had on his life.

The abuse of the victim, known in proceedings as AH, has been a centrepiece of this inquiry and his appearance in the witness box had been long anticipated.

The commission room broke into applause at the end of his statement.

Commissioner Cunneen reminded AH that that ‘‘no shame’’ was attached to him and that his courage had ‘‘placed the same where it belongs’’.

AH began by telling the commission of the difficulty he had in telling people about the abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

BY PAUL MAGUIRE AAP JULY 23, 2013

A WITNESS has drawn tears from the public gallery and applause from the commissioner of a special inquiry as he told his story of abuse at the hands of a NSW Catholic priest.

The man, now 37, flew to Newcastle from interstate to tell how abuse at the hands of Father James Fletcher had contributed to his alcohol use, relationship breakdowns, depression, business failure and a suicide attempt.

He questioned how different his life would have turned out if the church “had done something about Fletcher years ago instead of moving him around. Would he have got to me?'”

He said Fr Fletcher did “a terrible job on me.”

“I had tried to block it out but there were many times I was tormented by memories and the shame, anger and embarrassment which had a really bad effect on me,” he told the inquiry into the police handling of child sexual abuse allegations involving Hunter Valley priests, Fr Denis McAlinden and Fr Fletcher.

“The breach of trust I have experienced at the hands of the Catholic church will affect me forever as I was an innocent little kid with a big hope for the future…I expected that when I finally got the courage to tell someone about it the church would not let me down…

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WASHINGTON
Thomson Reuters Foundation

By Elaine Porterfield

SEATTLE, July 22 (Reuters) – A registered sex offender has been jailed on suspicion of sexually assaulting a woman as she was in the midst of prayer during Sunday church services in Seattle, police said on Monday.

The suspect was subdued inside the sanctuary by several of the victim’s relatives, who restrained the man until police arrived on the scene of what officers called one of the most outrageous sexual assault cases they had ever encountered, Seattle Police spokeswoman detective Renee Witt said.

“We’ve all seen and heard some pretty bizarre and egregious things, but this … it just kind of blows your mind,” Witt said.

The 25-year-old victim was accosted while attending services with her family and boyfriend on Sunday morning at Saint Spiridon Russian Orthodox Cathedral, a church just north of downtown Seattle familiar for its blue, onion-shaped domes.

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AUSTRALIA
Border Mail

By MICK McGLONE July 23, 2013

IT’S not easy being a Catholic, even for those of us who don’t involve themselves in the strict rituals of the church, such as attending Mass on Saturday or Sunday or on holy days of obligation.

It has become fashionable in recent times for the Catholic Church to be the target of all sorts of vicious and often ignorant comments, many of them of a sneering, vitriolic nature.

Quite often weaknesses or flaws of the whole Christian movement are sheeted home solely to the Catholic Church because it suits the motivations of many of its critics.

But Catholics must share the shame of the evil of child sexual abuse that has been perpetrated by some of its clergy over many years.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Norwich Evening News

Peter Walsh
Tuesday, July 23, 2013

A Norfolk Roman Catholic priest has been charged in relation to alleged historic sexual abuse at a children’s home.

Father Anthony McSweeney, 66, of St George’s Church in Norwich, was charged with three counts of indecent assault, three of making indecent images of a child, one count of taking indecent images of a child and one of possessing indecent images of a child following an investigation into abuse alleged to have taken place at Grafton Close Children’s Home in Hounslow, west London, the Metropolitan Police said.

A second man, John Stingemore, 71, was charged with eight counts of indecent assault, two of taking indecent images of a child and one count of conspiracy with persons unknown to commit buggery.

The charges relate to seven victims, all of whom were aged between nine and 15 when the offences are alleged to have taken place during the 1970s and 80s.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By Dan Cox

A victim of a Hunter Valley paedophile priest says a Catholic bishop told him to “keep the faith” the day his abuser was found guilty.

The man known as AH was abused by Maitland-Newcastle priest James Fletcher and is the first victim to have given evidence at the New South Wales Special Commission of Inquiry’s public hearings in Newcastle.

The inquiry is investigating claims the Catholic church covered up the crimes of Fletcher and another priest, Denis McAlinden.

AH said those responsible for the alleged cover-up of child sexual abuse by clergy must be held accountable.

He told the inquiry the day Fletcher was found guilty of abusing him, the bishop at the time Michael Malone rang and asked him to “keep the faith”.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

July 23, 2013

Catherine Armitage
Senior Writer

The black-haired man with sparkling eyes sat nervously in the witness stand, his voice faltering as he tried to count the cost to his life and his family of years of sexual abuse by a Catholic priest when he was a boy.

By the time he was finished the courtroom was weeping with him – at the bar table, in the public gallery, in the media seats. The room erupted in applause.

The victim, whose name is suppressed, told the state government inquiry into church and police cover-ups of sexual abuse in the Hunter Valley that he had been “an innocent little kid with a big hope for the future” when Father James Fletcher began sexually abusing him. Fletcher was convicted of the abuse in 2004 and died in jail in 2006.

The abuse left his victim feeling as an adult that he was “just stuffing up my life”. AH, as he is known at the inquiry, eyeballed his younger brothers, there in the court to support him with his mother and father, and confessed he was sometimes jealous of them.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Littlehampton Gazette

A Roman Catholic priest from West Sussex has been charged in relation to alleged historic sexual abuse at a children’s home, police said.

Father Anthony McSweeney, 66, was charged with three counts of indecent assault, three of making indecent images of a child, one count of taking indecent images of a child and one of possessing indecent images of a child following an investigation into abuse alleged to have taken place at Grafton Close Children’s Home in Hounslow, west London, the Metropolitan Police said.

A second man, John Stingemore, 71, was charged with eight counts of indecent assault, two of taking indecent images of a child and one count of conspiracy with persons unknown to commit buggery.

The charges relate to seven victims, all of whom were aged between nine and 15 when the offences are alleged to have taken place during the 1970s and 80s.

McSweeney, of Old Brighton Road North, Pease Pottage, West Sussex, and Stingemore, of Stonehouse Drive, St Leonards on Sea, East Sussex, are due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on September 4.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Archdiocese Says Sex Offender Continued to Work at Santa Barbabra Church as Volunteer, After His Dismissal

Guam – The Archdiocese of Agana maintains that an investigation by Church officials showed that a convicted sex offender continued to work as a volunteer at Dededo’s Santa Barbara Church, even after the Archbishop ordered Father Paul Gofigan to fire him.

A news release from the Archdiocese Monday night, defends the decision to replace Father Paul as Pastor of the Church and insists that the safety of children is foremost.

Archdiocese Archbishop Anthony is off-island and the release was issued by Vicar General Monsignor David Quitugua on behalf of the Archdiocese following the public disclosure of a July 16th letter from the Archbishop to Father Gofigan demanding his resignation, and Father Gofigan’s July 20th letter to parishioners refusing to resign.

In his letter to parishioners issued last Saturday, Father Paul said that instead of complying with the Archbishop’s demand for his resignation he has decided instead to seek a canonical hearing so he can “defend himself and save my vocation as a priest.” Father Paul insisted in his letter to parishioners that he had complied with the Archbishop’s 2011 order that he fire a registered sex offender.

But in his release Monday night, the Archbishop However, our investigation has revealed that the person continued to have an active presence at the parish as a volunteer. The person had keys to the facilities and had an active role on church grounds in different ways.

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OHIO
NBC4i

By: Alex Carbello

COLUMBUS, Ohio –
A man who volunteered with the All Ohio State Fair Youth Choir is facing two counts of disseminating matter harmful to juveniles and one count of compelling prostitution.

Columbus police say Zachary R. Ruppel, 26, was soliciting nude pictures and sex acts in exchange for positions in the All Ohio State Fair Youth Choir from his St. Francis DeSales High School students, as well as other juveniles involved with the All Ohio State Fair Youth Choir in 2011.

Detectives searched Ruppel’s home after complaints were made to Ohio State Fair Choir staff about the allegations against Ruppel.

The two victims in the most recent incident are a 15-year-old boy and 17-year-old boy, according to a Columbus police report.

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OHIO
The Columbus Dispatch

By Kathy Lynn Gray
The Columbus Dispatch
Monday July 22, 2013

The former St. Francis DeSales High School in Columbus choir director and former Ohio State Fair choir staff member has been arrested on child sex charges.

Zachary R. Ruppel, 26, was charged yesterday by Columbus police for soliciting nude pictures and sex acts from DeSales students and other juveniles in exchange for membership in the State Fair choir dating back to 2011. Choir directors across the state recommend students for membership in the state fair choir.

Ruppel, of 4906 Lunar Dr., was a member of the state fair choir staff that year. He was the DeSales choir director until he resigned at the end of the school year, according to a DeSales student who answered the phone at the school on Friday.

The director of the choir, Charles R. Snyder, was put on leave on July 11 by fair manager Virgil Strickler because of the investigation. Sgt. Terry McConnell of the Police Division’s sexual-assault unit said Friday that Snyder has not been cleared in the investigation.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

One of Australia’s most senior Catholic church officials is scheduled to front an inquiry into an alleged cover-up of child sexual abuse by clergy in the New South Wales Hunter Valley.

Catholic Church documents tendered to the inquiry show the general secretary of the Catholic Bishops Conference, father Brian Lucas, knew about abuse by Denis McAlinden, one of the two priests at the centre of the investigation.

Father Lucas is scheduled to give evidence later today or tomorrow.

The documents show there was “a possible confession” by McAlinden to Father Lucas in 1993, and that McAlinden was asked by the bishop to retire because of his “ill health”.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Religion News Service

Kevin Eckstrom | Jul 22, 2013

WASHINGTON (RNS) An Austrian priest who’s been banned from speaking at Roman Catholic churches during his three-week U.S. tour said Pope Francis could be an ally in reforming the Catholic Church, but said it will take more than the pope to open the priesthood to married men and women.

The Rev. Helmut Schuller, founder of the Austrian Priests’ Initiative, has been drawing crowds of several hundred people with his call for greater participation from the church’s lay “citizens” and a married priesthood.

“We are trying to open the church to a real approach to modern society,” Schuller said Monday (July 22) in a speech at the National Press Club. “There are a lot of questions to our church in these times, and the answers are really old-fashioned.”

Schuller is the key organizer behind a group of about 430 Austrian priests who are openly challenging the hierarchy on allowing women priests, married priests, same-sex marriages and lay Catholics’ voice in the election of bishops.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
National Catholic Reporter

Caitlin Hendel | Jul. 22, 2013

WASHINGTON Women who have chosen to become ordained Catholic priests are “very prophetic,” Fr. Helmut Schüller told a group of journalists Monday, but he said the focus still should be on opening up the entire priesthood to women.

“It’s a system we have to change,” he said during a press conference at the National Press Club here. “It’s a question of strategy.”

Even so, “we see in these women who are ordained already very prophetic women,” Schüller said.

He also is wary of any moves to allow women to become deacons, saying he has heard the Vatican is trying to degrade the structure of the deaconate, possibly as a preparatory strategy before making such a change. “I’m warning sometimes: Pay attention, as it could be a threat,” he said.

Washington is the fifth stop on Schüller’s 15-city, coast-to-coast tour of the United States that began July 16. He speaks Monday night at the Augustana Lutheran Church in Washington. His appearances in New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Baltimore have attracted crowds of 300 to 700 people, with several hundred spilling out of a small church in the sweltering heat of Boston last week.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

By SARA SMYTH

A 66-year-old priest and 71-year-old man have been charged in relation to alleged historic sexual abuse at a children’s home in Hounslow, police said tonight.

Father Anthony McSweeney was today charged with three counts of indecent assault, three of making indecent images of a child, one count of taking indecent images of a child and one of possessing indecent images of a child.

The arrests follow an investigation into the abuse alleged to have taken place at Grafton Close Children’s Home in west London.

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BRAZIL
Huffington Post

A bomb has been found at a shrine that Pope Francis was due to visit on Wednesday and hold a mass.

The homemade explosive device was discovered in the bathroom of the shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida, in the parking lot, reports ABC.es.

The Sao Paulo military police detonated the bomb, which had a fuse and a dynamite-like covering, after members of the Brazilian Air Force found it while conducting a security inspection.

A statement released by the police said, “”It was a home-made device with little potential to cause fatalities,” with “a plastic body and wrapped with adhesive tape.”

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BRAZIL
France 24

AFP – A homemade explosive device was discovered in the bathroom of the parking garage of the Brazilian shrine that Pope Francis will visit this week, the military said Monday.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Berger’s Beat

. . . According to today’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, more than a decade ago,then-Archbishop Timothy Dolan acknowledged in a letter that most accused predator priests “painfully and admirably admit” their own guilt. The letter, recently disclosed because victims pushed to get church records released, goes on to urge forgiveness for the offenders. . .

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VATICAN CITY
Irish Times

Paddy Agnew

Mon, Jul 22, 2013

On the eve of the departure of Pope Francis this morning for the week-long World Youth Day celebrations in Brazil, Italian weekly news magazine L’Espresso suggested he has just made the first serious error of his pontificate.

The report claims he recently and unknowingly appointed an actively gay Vatican monsignor to a senior post in the Vatican bank, IOR.

L’Espresso claims Msgr Battista Ricca (57), who last month was nominated as secretary to the commission of cardinals who oversee the affairs of IOR, has a colourful and well-documented gay past.

Although the concerns raised in the article about Msgr Ricca seem legitimate, Vatican observers last night suggested the report might be intended as a Curia shot across the bows of the reform-minded pope.

L’Espresso claims that in 1999 to 2000, when Msgr Ricca served as pro-nuncio in Uruguay, he had a “ménage à deux” in the Vatican nunciature with his then lover, Swiss army captain Patrick Haari. It also claims he was involved in a brawl at a gay bar in 2001.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Belfast Telegraph

22 JULY 2013

A Roman Catholic priest has been charged in relation to alleged historic sexual abuse at a children’s home, police said.

Father Anthony McSweeney, 66, was charged with three counts of indecent assault, three of making indecent images of a child, one count of taking indecent images of a child and one of possessing indecent images of a child following an investigation into abuse alleged to have taken place at Grafton Close Children’s Home in Hounslow, west London, the Metropolitan Police said.

A second man, John Stingemore, 71, was charged with eight counts of indecent assault, two of taking indecent images of a child and one count of conspiracy with persons unknown to commit buggery.

The charges relate to seven victims, all of whom were aged between nine and 15 when the offences are alleged to have taken place during the 1970s and 80s.

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AUSTRALIA
lewisblayse.net

The NSW government enquiry into child sexual abuse by priests in the Newcastle-Maitland diocese had a non-hearing day today. The rest of the week is largely taken up by clergy, Hart, Searle, Lucas and Harrigan. Friday should see priest, Burston (he of the poor memory), finally front the enquiry after having been excused, last Friday, by Commissioner Cunneen, because he was stressed by victim protests.

During the week, evidence will be heard from Elizabeth Doyle and Patricia Feenan. Ms. Feenan, whose son Daniel was abused, has written a book, “Holy Hell” (available at http://www.holyhell.com.au/).

Hart has already given some evidence. He was asked by the Commissioner about a letter stating an abusive priest was “ill”. She said, “And this reference to health in the first sentence of the letter, could it be a coy way to refer to his propensity to the sexual abuse of children?” Hart simply answered “Yes”. Earlier in the day, he had said that he was unaware of any confidential files held by the diocese leaders involving allegations of sexual abuse by the region’s priests. He only learned of their existence when he went to Sydney this year to discuss his evidence to the commission with a legal representative.

Harrigan was an old friend of serial abuser, Fr.Fletcher. He conducted the funeral service for Fletcher, who had died in prison. Father Harrigan, who was reported as being visibly upset at the end of proceedings, asked the congregation to pray for Fletcher and his family. He prayed for Fletcher to be forgiven his sins.

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CALIFORNIA
10 News

Posted: 07/22/2013

Mitch Blacher

SAN DIEGO – Team 10 has obtained a video that some people say helps to prove Jehovah’s Witnesses covered up child abuse for years.

In a video deposition taken in 2011 during a civil lawsuit, admitted serial pedophile Gonzalo Campos said he abused several children in his San Diego congregation from the early 1980’s through the mid 90’s.

“I did abuse him,” said Campos in the video. “I touched his private parts.”

((See the video deposition today on 10News At 5:00.))

His on-camera admissions and a confidential settlement worth millions, may have to be enough for his victims. The Jehovah’s Witnesses never told police about Campos, who was a church elder. He’s never been charged with a crime and he may never see the inside of a prison cell. He has fled the country and now is in Mexico. He also still is a member of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

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UNITED KINGDOM
This is Local London

The former deputy head of Richmond Council’s Grafton Close children’s home has been charged with offences on boys aged nine to 15.

John Stingemore, 71, was today charged along with Father Anthony McSweeney, 66, with indecent assault and making indecent images of children.

Both were arrested under the Metropolitan Police’s Operation Fernbridge, which is investigating historic allegations of sexual abuse at Elm Guest House in Barnes.

They were charged today and will appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on bail on September 4.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

A priest was terminated from his position at the Santa Barbara Catholic Church because he failed to follow a direct order that related to the safety of children, according to the Archdiocese of Agana.

Father Paul Gofigan was asked to terminate the employment of an employee publically known to have a sex offense on his record, the Archdiocese stated.

Gofigan, in a letter he disseminated on Saturday to the Dededo parishioners said he did terminate the employee. He noted that the crime had been committed more than 32 years ago.

The Archdiocese said an investigation showed the person continued to have an active presence at the parish as a volunteer.

“The person had keys to the facilities and had an active role on church grounds in different ways,” the Archdiocese stated.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Chackes, Carlson and Halquist

CCH FILES LAWSUIT ALLEGING DIRECT INVOLVEMENT BY ARCHBISHOP OF ST LOUIS IN FAILING TO SUPERVISE ABUSIVE PRIEST

CCH attorneys Ken Chackes and Nicole Gorovsky filed a new lawsuit on behalf of a young teenage girl and her parents, seeking to hold the Archdiocese of St Louis and Archbishop Robert Carlson responsible for the injuries they caused due to sexual abuse of the young girl by a priest. The accused priest, Fr. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang, was personally supervised by Archbishop Carlson since the priest was moved from China to the United States, while Carlson was a Bishop in Michigan. Fr. Jiang moved with Carlson to St Louis when he became Archbishop, and lived in the Archbishop’s residence.

The young girl first met Jiang when she was fifteen years old and she attended church with her family at the Cathedral Basilica in St. Louis. Jiang became very close to the family and he regularly visited their home in Lincoln County, Missouri.

The Archdiocese and Archbishop had at least two warnings about Jiang. During the time that Jiang was getting close to the young girl, he reported to his superiors that he needed a reassignment because he was having personal problems. But despite the warnings, Jiang was allowed to resume unlimited access to this young girl and her family.

After the parents discovered the abuse, they confronted Fr. Jiang about it, and Jiang admitted it to them. He then tried to give them a $20,000 check. Archbishop Carlson soon called the parents and told them that Fr Jiang also admitted the wrongdoing to him. During that conversation, the mother asked Carlson if Jiang would be removed from the priesthood and Archbishop Carlson responded that he would remove Jiang if he “had sex” with the child, but not for activities other than that. Archbishop Carlson then suggested that the parents return the $20,000 check to him.

Instead, the parents turned the matter over to the police. Jiang is now being prosecuted criminally for two felonies, for engaging in sexual conduct with the child and for victim tampering by trying to pay the family to let the matter drop. The criminal case is being prosecuted by the Prosecuting Attorney of Lincoln County.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
National Catholic Reporter

Patricia Lefevere | Jul. 22, 2013

PHILADELPHIA
At best, the Catholic church has five to six years before the shortage of clergy members plays itself out in unknown ways in Europe and North America. This is the so-called “Catholic Tipping Point” foreseen by Austrian Fr. Helmut Schüller, one of the most vocal advocates for new models of leadership in the church. The remarks came in an extended interview with NCR before his Friday evening address at Chestnut Hill College here.

Schüller and approximately 400 Austrian priests — about 10 percent of the nation’s total Catholic clergy — launched the Austrian Priests’ Initiative in 2006 following worry and discussions about who would care for their parishes when there were not enough priests to take over after they retire. In 2011, they issued an “Appeal to Disobedience” in which they pledged, among other things, not to celebrate multiple Sunday Masses. The movement seeks to open the priesthood to each person suited for the office, including women and married men.

Schüller, 60, said the word “disobedience” upsets many people, but he showed no sign of finding a less troublesome word. “Where has obedience got us?” he asked, reviewing his own priesthood of 36 years. “I feel the church often misuses obedience to keep people down.”

In an afternoon meeting with 20 priests of the Philadelphia archdiocese at Chestnut Hill College, the Austrian cleric said he found “a lot of sympathy” and “very supportive” comments from local priests. Some, he said, shared experiences similar to his in Vienna and told Schüller how their work had, at times, brought them into conflict with church authorities.

He pointed to growing frustrations among priests who are asked to pastor three or four cluster parishes. “There is the tension of having to do the same thing continually and not having sufficient time to get to know parishioners,” he said, adding that he thought the idea of such a ministry impeded men from joining the priesthood. “My hope is that these potential candidates will not leave the church but will become engaged lay leaders.”

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MASSACHUSETTS
PRWeb

Beyond the Bridge, the prequel to Tom MacDonald’s award winning debut novel, The Charlestown Connection, will be officially released on August 6, 2013.

Fans of MacDonald, his novels, and his Irish/Micmac Indian protagonist, Dermot Sparhawk, are invited to the Charlestown launch on Sunday July 28th, from 1:00 to 4:00 at:

Knights of Columbus
545 Medford St.
Charlestown, MA
Entertainment provided by:
Irish Band: The Old Brigade

The author will be on hand to sign copies of his novels which will be available for purchase.

Oceanview Publishing provided the following synopsis from Beyond the Bridge:

“Dermot Sparhawk, a former all-American football star at Boston College, returns in Beyond the Bridge, the prequel to Tom MacDonald’s award-winning debut novel, The Charlestown Connection.

In Beyond the Bridge, Sparhawk, a struggling alcoholic, agrees to help find the killer of an accused pedophile priest. When two more priests are slain in Boston’s Charlestown neighborhood, it becomes evident that it is the work of a sadistic serial killer who crucifies his prey after killing them.

Sparhawk blazes an unconventional trail to the killer that puts him at odds with the very people he is trying to help and initiates a turf war with law enforcement.

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NEW YORK
Failed Messiah

In a major blow to Brooklyn District Attorney Charles J. Hynes, New York City’s largest labor union, 1199/SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, today announced its unanimous endorsement Ken Thompson for Brooklyn District Attorney. Representing over 220,000 members in New York City and 100,000 members and retirees in Brooklyn alone, the union cited Ken Thompson’s commitment to justice as the major reason for its endorsement of Thompson and rejection of Hynes, whose sloppy prosecutions and shady tactics have brought condemnation from diverse political leaders, legal scholars and community activists alike.

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OSTERREICH
Kurier

Sie deckte auf, dass Kinder in einer kirchlichen Behinderteneinrichtung in Tirol schwer misshandelt wurden. Dafür musste Brigitte Wanker allerdings bitter büßen. Das System schlug mit einer Wucht zurück, mit der sie nicht gerechnet hatte. Sie wollte Missstände aufzeigen und wurde als Nestbeschmutzerin bezichtigt und gezwungen, ihr Heimatland Tirol zu verlassen. Jetzt, 33 Jahre später, soll sie geehrt werden.

1980 nahm die gelernte Weberin Wanker, damals 22 Jahre alt, eine Stelle im St. Josephs Institut, geführt vom Orden der Barmherzigen Schwestern in Mils in Tirol an. Ihre Schilderungen über die brutalen Misshandlungen behinderter Kinder durch die Klosterschwestern sind erschütternd (siehe Zusatzbericht unten).

„Verbrennen“
Wanker wusste, so kann man Kinder nicht behandeln. Verzweifelt suchte sie jemanden, dem sie sich anvertrauen konnte. „Ich habe mein Tagebuch genommen und bin damit zum Leiter des Innsbrucker Jugendamtes gegangen“, sagt Wanker. Der Herr Rat wollte von den Missständen freilich nichts wissen. „Er hat mich aufgefordert, das Tagebuch zu verbrennen.“ Sie sei zu sensibel für den Beruf und solle kündigen, waren die Ratschläge, die ihr der Amtsleiter mit auf den Weg gab.

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NEW JERSEY
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, July 22, 2013

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

A Newark archdiocesan priest secretly let a suspended predator priest live in a parish across the street from an elementary school. He did so with the approval of his church supervisors.

Yet no one is being punished. The priest is just being moved to a new parish. The supervisors aren’t even being identified. And the predator remains on the payroll.

Without consulting with or telling St. Joseph’s parishioners, Fr. Thomas Iwanowski let Fr. Chabak live in the rectory for eight months. Fr. Chabak is a credibly accused child molester. He’s suspended from ministry.

So Newark Catholic officials again quietly put kids in danger.

That’s incredibly reckless and callous.

As he’s done time and time before, Newark’s Archbishop John Myers did nothing until this inexcusable move became public. And when it did, Myers did next to nothing.

He’s moving Iwanowski to a new parish.

No wrongdoer is facing real consequences. And we don’t even know who some of the wrongdoers are. Did Myers himself personally tell Iwanowski it was OK to let a suspended pedophile priest live in a parish? Or was it another archdiocesan supervisor?

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GUAM
KUAM

by Sabrina Salas Matanane

Guam – Father Paul Gofigan has been asked to resign as the Pastor of Santa Barbara Catholic Church. According to a letter Father Gofigan addressed to his parishioners dated July 20th, he explained why he has been replaced by Father Dan Bien as the temporary Parochial Administrator or Santa Barbara Church.

According to the letter he was asked by the Archbishop to resign because he believes that he is still employing an individual he was directed two years ago to terminate. The individual, according to the letter, committed a crime more than 32 years ago. “I knew this individual had paid his debt to society, and had fully repented, and he and his wife and their two daughters were eager to return to the Church and embrace their Catholic faith. Although I disagreed with this decision, out of obedience to the Archbishop, I had to comply,” Fr. Gofigan wrote.

Fr. Gofigan stated the Archbishop and his advisors are under the mistaken belief that the individual was not terminated and as a result on July 16th was asked in a letter from the Archbishop to resign or “experience a more arduous and painful closure to your assignment at Santa Barbara Church.”

Fr. Gofigan says the matter could have been cleared up if they had simply spoken to him and conducted a basic investigation. He added that he could have easly accepted the Archbishop and his advisors demand to resign or follow the more difficult path which will “ultimately lead to the truth”. He said after much prayer and quiet reflection he has decided not to take the easy path and instead request for a hearing so that he can be allowed to defend himself and to save his vocation as a priest, “I cannot in good conscience accede to their demands without defending my vocation as a priest and allowing the truth to be heard,” he wrote.

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