ABUSE TRACKER

One sponsor says current law turns “a sacred space into an unsafe space.” A lawyer who opposes the bill calls it “anti-Catholic bigotry.”

The Roman Catholic Church has always considered the confidentiality of the confessional as sacrosanct.

In plain talk, that means whatever the confessor tells the priest must remain between them.

“The teaching of the church over these centuries has been that this is a moment in which that person is confessing that to God and is being absolved, is being forgiven  through the priest, for those sins,” says Bishop William Koenig of the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington.

Delaware lawmakers even enshrined that privacy mandate in a law that requires everyone else except attorneys and priests to report suspected or alleged child abuse or neglect, no matter how repulsive. The law also exempts priests from having to testify in court about child abuse or neglect.

Several state lawmakers, including…

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On Monday, a major step will be taken towards the release of a report detailing child sex abuse within the catholic church as the deadline comes for the Attorney General’s Office to present the redacted report to the Circuit Court.

The judge will then decide when the public can see the report on the Archdiocese of Baltimore. Monday, a Maryland judge will receive a pivotal report on a four-year grand jury investigation into sexual abuse inside the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

Those with the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, said it’d mean vindication for victims.

“The judge could look it over for hours, minutes, days; we just don’t know,” David Lorenz, the Maryland Director of SNAP, said.

Once the Attorney General’s Office hands over the redacted report, those named in it will be contacted, then the report can go public.

“The names…

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The President of the Portuguese Bishops’ Conference discusses the establishment of a new body to accompany survivors with the National Coordination Team of the Diocesan Commissions for the Protection of Minors.

Following the release, a month ago, of the final report of the Independent Commission (IC) for the Study of Sexual Abuse of Children in the Catholic Church in Portugal, the Portuguese Bishops’ Conference (CEP) plans to set up a new independent body charged with listening to and accompanying victims and collecting further reports.

The decision was the outcome of the recent Bishops’ Extraordinary Assembly convened to examine the report, and was discussed last week by CEP’s President, Bishop José Ornelas Carvalho of Leiria-Fátima, with the National Coordination Team of the Diocesan Commissions for the Protection of Minors.

An independent operative body

In an interview with the Portuguese Bishops’ Agency Ecclesia, Bishop Ornelas explained that the new…

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Francesca Chaouqui has claimed that Cardinal Becciu paid a private intelligence firm to “monitor and intervene” with the press, not to negotiate the release of a captured religious sister.

Francesca Chaouqui, the woman at the center of the 2015 Vatileaks scandal, has claimed that Cardinal Becciu paid hundreds of thousands of euros to a UK private intelligence firm to “monitor and intervene” with the press for him, and not to negotiate the release of a captured religious sister, as he has claimed.

In an interview with the Italian newspaper La Verita, published March 11, Chaouqui said that the Inkerman Group contacted her after being contracted by Cardinal Becciu through Cecelia Marogna, the self-described intelligence and security expert who worked for the cardinal.

She told the paper that while the UK based intelligence firm was “officially” contracted to arrange the release of kidnapped religious, “in reality” the group was tasked with…

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Survivors of alleged sexual abuse by priests in the Catholic Archdiocese of Baltimore say they are bracing for the release of a 456-page long report from the Maryland Attorney General’s Office that details a pattern of abuse in the church over the last 80 years.

The report implicates 158 priests and details the abuse of more than 600 children and young adults during that period.

Baltimore City Circuit Judge Robert K. Taylor Jr., who is overseeing the report on the Baltimore Archdiocese, gave attorneys until Monday to redact names from the report. Once he reviews the redactions the report will be made public.

Jean Hargadon Wehner, who went to a Catholic high school in Baltimore in the 1960s, says she is one of those 600 victims.

Hargadon Wehner alleges that Father Joseph Maskell, who died in 2001 at the age of 62, abused her throughout her teenage years.

“He raped…

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Today marks the 10th anniversary of the election of Pope Francis as the 265th successor of St. Peter. Here is a timeline of key events during his papacy:

2013

March 13 — About two weeks after Pope Benedict XVI steps down from the papacy, Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio is elected pope. He takes the papal name Francis in honor of St. Francis of Assisi and proclaims from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica: “Let us begin this journey, the bishop and people, this journey of the Church of Rome, which presides in charity over all the Churches, a journey of brotherhood in love, of mutual trust. Let us always pray for one another.”

March 14 — The day after he begins his pontificate, Pope Francis returns to his hotel to personally pay his hotel bill and collect his luggage.

July 8 — Pope Francis visits Italy’s island of Lampedusa and…

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Sixteen former Agape Boarding School students who sued for alleged abuse at the southwest Missouri school have settled their cases for undisclosed amounts.

The number represents about two-thirds of the two dozen lawsuits filed against Agape Baptist Church, the organization that operated the now-closed school near Stockton in Cedar County.

Court records show that the plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed their cases “with prejudice,” meaning the suits cannot be filed again. Four cases were dismissed in January and refiled in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri and four are pending in state court.

The newly settled cases, filed since February 2021 by former students from across the country, accused the school of negligence, infliction of emotional distress and battery by staff and fellow students. Some of the abuse, the suits alleged, involved sexual assault, torture, starvation and excruciating restraints of students.

“I’m super grateful to have…

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Spain’s ombudsman said Monday that an independent commission set up a year ago to investigate historic sex abuse by the Catholic church has collected testimonies from 445 victims, as the nation tackles an issue other European countries acted on long ago.

Spain’s parliament voted on March 10, 2022 to open the first official investigation, led by ombudsman Ángel Gabilondo, into the extent of sexual abuse committed by priests and church officials. The government was forced to act after allegations of abuse involving more than 1,200 victims were published in Spanish newspaper El País, provoking public outrage.

Testimonies were still being collected and an update would be issued in parliament before the current government’s term expires this year, Gabilondo’s office said in a statement. Although “satisfied” with the number of victims who felt able to come forward, “what really matters is to listen to the victims … with respect, seriousness, discretion…

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When Jose Bergolio became Pope ten years ago, he vowed to hundreds of thousands of survivors around the world that he would put an end to the church’s global system of clerical sex crimes and cover-up. To do that, he would need to do what his predecessors refused to do: make it a universal church law that if a priest sexually assaults a child, he will be removed from the priesthood. Furthermore, if his bishop covered up for him, the bishop would also be defrocked. It would take one paragraph and one stroke of the pen for Pope Francis to do this. The question survivors around the world are asking today is: after ten years, why does he continue to break the promise he made to us?

Without zero tolerance written into church law, no reforms of church abuse policies or management practices, papal prayers or expressions of remorse, prevention…

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The Diocese of Santa Rosa filed for bankruptcy Monday, citing new lawsuits from more than 200 survivors of child sexual abuse by Catholic priests.

ABC7 News spoke with Santa Rosa’s bishop but also to survivors and their attorneys who believe the church is trying to avoid responsibility for horrific abuse by priests.

RELATED: 14 California clergy members linked to Catholic church sex abuse scandal for 1st time

In this petition for Chapter 11 bankruptcy filed this morning, the Diocese of Santa Rosa estimates its assets between $10 and $50 million, and its liabilities to be the same because of a flood of new lawsuits from survivors of clergy sexual abuse. ABC7’s I-Team reporter Dan Noyes spoke with Santa Rosa Bishop Robert Vasa.

Noyes: “Why is bankruptcy necessary?”

Bishop Vasa: “Well, when the perceived claims against an entity exceed that entity’s ability to generate the capital to pay those claims, I don’t see any…

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Before the world’s cardinals entered into conclave in March 2013 to elect a successor to Pope Benedict XVI, they had a series of meetings together at the Vatican to discuss what the 1.3-billion-member Catholic Church might need most from its next leader. 

The late Havana Cardinal Jaime Ortega Alamino would later say that the most impactful moment in the meeting came when one Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio said a few brief words, calling for a church “which evangelizes and goes out of herself.”

Bergoglio, then 76 years old and preparing to retire as the archbishop of Buenos Aires, Argentina, used a particularly evocative image.  

Ortega recalled the full phrasing as: “In Revelation, Jesus says that he is at the door and knocks. Obviously, the text refers to his knocking from the outside in order to enter, but I think about the times in which Jesus knocks from within so…

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During his decade as head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has reformed the government of the Vatican, worked for peace and reconciliation, and has taken action against clerical child abuse.

During his decade as head of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has reformed the government of the Vatican, worked for peace and reconciliation, and has taken action against clerical child abuse.

Here are some of the 86-year-old’s main achievements ahead of the 10-year anniversary of his election on Monday.

From decentralising power, increasing transparency and providing greater roles for lay people and women, Francis has implemented fundamental reforms of the Roman Curia, the central government of the Holy See.

Despite internal opposition, the reforms were enshrined in a new constitution that came into force in 2022, reorganising the dicasteries (ministries) and putting at the heart of their mission the goal of spreading God’s message.

Francis particularly took aim at…

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Most of the successes have been of the optical sort and fleeting–moments truly magnificent to behold, occasionally terrible and always arresting–while his failures are rather olfactory and persistent.

Pope Francis’s ten years in office have given us some impressive successes and notable failures. Most of the successes have been of the optical sort and fleeting—moments truly magnificent to behold, occasionally terrible and always arresting—while his failures are rather olfactory and persistent.

Whether one thinks of the bracing first appearance from the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica, or his long, solitary walk up the steps of the sacratum at St. Peter’s Basilica to bless the city and the world, or of the sight of him with the stalwart people amid ruin in Mosul, Iraq, or of Pope Francis in prayer before the icon of the Salus populi Romani, or any of a thousand other images…

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A judge has authorized the Maryland Attorney General’s Office to release a redacted version of an investigative report into the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s alleged coverup of sexual abuse.

A report exposing decades of sexual abuse allegations within the Archdiocese of Baltimore is scheduled to be released Monday.

A redacted version of that report had been sealed to protect grand jury proceedings but a judge ruled last month, that it should be released to the public.

The Archdiocese of Baltimore previously had released a statement apologizing and saying it respects the court’s decision to release the report adding it prays this report brings some healing to the victims and survivors.

The report was sealed because it contains information collected from grand jury proceedings, which are considered confidential in Maryland.

However, since a grand jury resulted in one indictment and no more charges are expected, it cleared the…

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The Diocese of Steubenville announced on March 3 that they added a former priest to their list of clergy who were credibly accused of abuse, but SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused By Priests, says this declaration is “far too little and far too late.”

Jeffrey M. Monforton, Bishop of the Diocese of Steubenville announced in the diocese’s newspaper, The Steubenville Register, that Monsignor Mark J. Froelich, a retired diocesan priest, was added to the Diocese of Steubenville’s List of Priests Accused of Abuse.

The newspaper announcement says that Monforton removed Froelich from active ministry on May 22, 2018 due to “credible allegations of sexual abuse against him.”

In a statement to 7News, Dino Orsatti, Diocese of Steubenville Director of Communications and Editor of The Steubenville Register referred to the March 3 newspaper article on Froelich that stated, “Subsequent investigation has deemed these accusations to be…

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Guzman is accused of sexually abusing a minor as a layman more than 40 years ago – about 25 years before he entered Mundelein Seminary to prepare for the priesthood, Cupich noted.

A Catholic priest in south suburban Evergreen Park has agreed to step aside from ministry while authorities investigate an allegation that he sexually abused a minor as a layman decades ago, according to the Archdiocese of Chicago.

Rev. Paul Guzman serves as associate pastor Most Holy Redeemer Parish in Evergreen Park. Archbishop Blase Cupich informed parishioners of the claim in a letter, saying the Archdiocese was informed of the allegation while Guzman was overseas on military duty.

“In keeping with our child protection policies, I directed Father Guzman to step aside from ministry immediately and to live away from Most Holy Redeemer Parish when he returned…

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A Chicago priest is stepping away from the ministry over allegations of sex abuse dating back 40 years.

In a letter, Cardinal Blase Cupich said he asked Fr. Paul Guzman to step down his role as associate pastor at Most Holy Redeemer Parish immediately.

Guzman is currently on military duty overseas, and will live away from the parish when he returns.

Someone who was a minor at the time claims Guzman abused them about 40 years ago, 25 years before he entered the seminary to prepare for the priesthood.

In addition to an investigation by the archdiocese, the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services and Cook County State’s Attorney’s office are looking into the claims.

• Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago

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March 11, 2023

Dear Most Holy Redeemer Parish and School Family, 

I write to share some difficult news about your associate pastor, Father Paul Guzman. While Father Guzman was overseas on military duty, the Archdiocese received an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor from approximately 40 years ago when he was a layman, and 25 years before he entered Mundelein Seminary to prepare for the priesthood. In keeping with our child protection policies, I directed Father Guzman to step aside from ministry immediately and to live away from Most Holy Redeemer Parish when he returned from his military service. He agreed to cooperate with this direction. 

The allegation was reported to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) and the Cook County State’s Attorney. The person making the allegation has been offered the pastoral services of our Victim Assistance Ministry, and the opportunity to participate in the investigation…

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In a letter Saturday, Cardinal Blase Cupich said an accusation has been reported to the archdiocese that the Rev. Paul Guzman abused a minor when he was a layman — 25 years before entering Mundelein Seminary.

An Evergreen Park priest has stepped aside from the ministry after the Archdiocese of Chicago received an accusation of sexual abuse of a minor from about 40 years ago.

In a letter Saturday, Cardinal Blase Cupich said someone reported that the abuse had occurred when the Rev. Paul Guzman, an associate priest at Most Holy Redeemer Parish, was a layman, 25 years before he entered Mundelein Seminary to prepare for the priesthood.

The accusation was reported to the Illinois Department of Children & Family Services and the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office while Guzman was overseas on military duty, Cupich said.

Guzman has agreed to live away from the parish during the investigation, Cupich…

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We know too much for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland to stonewall allegations of abuse. If 20 complaints can’t change that, will anything?

People are fond of saying, “That wouldn’t happen today.”

Occasionally this is offered in wistful remembrance of one or other bygone practice. More often it’s said with relief, a reassuring statement, some clear contemplation of how much more we know, now, how far we have come, how thresholds of acceptability have changed.

Six civil complaints filed last week allege that the late Rev. Lawrence Sabatino abused plaintiffs in Lewiston and Portland when they were between 5 and 11 years old in the 1950s and 1960s. This brings to 20 the number of childhood sexual abuse lawsuits recently filed against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland.

In the offices of his law firm Wednesday, attorney Michael Bigos set out the infuriating, sickening arc of…

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Following are some of the major events of the life and ministry of Pope Francis, who marks the 10th anniversary of his election as pontiff on March 13.

[Original article links to video]

1936

Dec. 17 – Jorge Mario Bergoglio is born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the son of Italian immigrants.

1969

Dec. 13 – Ordained a priest.

1973

July 31 – Becomes head of the Jesuits in Argentina.

1992

May 20 – Appointed Bishop of Auca and Auxiliary of Buenos Aires.

1998

Feb. 28 – Appointed Archbishop, Primate of Argentina. He becomes famous for commuting to work on public transport, not living in the archbishop’s palace and cooking his own meals.

2001

Feb. 21 – Appointed a cardinal by Pope John Paul II.

2005

April 19 – Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger elected pope after four ballots, takes the name Benedict. Subsequent leaks show that Bergoglio came second in all…

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The Vatican and the Jesuits continue to deflect and deny, but the evidence is decades old and deeply troubling.

So, an accused sexual predator supposedly prohibited from saying Mass in public concelebrated a liturgy in Rome on Sunday.

The accused predator is the disgraced celebrity artist-priest and spiritual guru Fr. Marko Ivan Rupnik SJ, who came to Rome in the early 1990s to found a cultural center—the Centro Aletti–from which he produced artworks in mosaic and other media that now decorate major Catholic shrines and chapels from the Apostolic Palace to Australia, and dozens of places in between.

Rupnik is now facing an internal Jesuit process that could see him expelled from the order, but that development was a long time coming and is still far from a sure thing.

In short, Rupnik has been a very popular guy until…

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The Polish Bishops’ Conference says that “further archival research” is needed to fairly assess a new allegation, based on communist secret police records, that St. John Paul II covered up child sexual abuse by a priest while serving as the archbishop of Krakow, Poland, prior to becoming pope. 

The allegation was included in a documentary broadcast March 6 on Polish television channel TVN24.

The same TV report also cited two other instances where St. John Paul II, then Archbishop Karol Wojtyla, allegedly relocated Father Eugeniusz Surgent and Father Jozef Loranc to new parishes despite being aware that they had been accused of sexually abusing minors. However, those allegations, first made by a Dutch journalist on Dec. 2 of last year, were quickly refuted later that month by a pair of investigative journalists, the Polish bishops noted in a statement released March 7.

The journalists, Tomasz Krzyżak and Piotr…

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Sitting in her family home in East Los Angeles, Rosa Manriquez kept her eyes on the TV screen as a flood of white smoke came pouring out of the roof of the Sistine Chapel 6,300 miles away — a century-old signal that the cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church had chosen a new leader.

Manriquez, now 70, is the mother of two lesbian daughters who supports female ordination to the priesthood. On that day, 10 years ago, she waited impatiently to see who would emerge from behind the red curtain on a Vatican balcony as the head of the church she both loved and struggled against.

“So I see this man come out, and I think, ‘There’s something different about this guy,’” she said. “And then I was like, ‘He’s Latino! Oh my God!’”

A decade later, Manriquez says she does not agree with everything Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the former…

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SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

The Archdiocese of the Baltimore Catholic Church has been the subject of an investigation for sexual abuse. After a four-year grand jury investigation, a judge will soon release details of what children and young adults endured over the past 80 years. Member station WYPR’s Scott Maucione has our report. And please note there are details of sexual violence at moments over the next 3 1/2 minutes, and it may be unsuitable for some listeners.

SCOTT MAUCIONE, BYLINE: Jean Hargedon Wehner was just a teenager when Father Joseph Maskell allegedly abused her at a Baltimore high school in the 1960s.

JEAN HARGEDON WEHNER: He would put a gun to my temple. He prostituted me. He raped me.

MAUCIONE: Hargedon Wehner was just one of the 600 alleged victims a Maryland attorney general’s report found during an investigation into the Archdiocese of Baltimore over the past 80 years. The…

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The victim was 8 and 9 years in religious ed classes through Holy Family Catholic Church and the Cathedral of St. Ray’s, the lawsuit noted.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet, the Cathedral of St. Raymond Nonnatus, Holy Family Catholic Church and deported pedophile priest, Father Alejandro Flores face a new Will County civil lawsuit filed on behalf of a young man who died last year.

The boy, identified in the Will County lawsuit as John Doe, was 8 and 9 years old and had attended religious education programs through St. Ray’s and Holy Family. Last year, at age 21, the sexual abuse victim of Father Flores died in California, the lawsuit stated.

John Doe suffered sexual violence, including manipulation, isolation, control, exploitation, abuse and assault abuse at Cathedral of St. Raymond Nonnatus by Father Alejandro Flores, the lawsuit contends. The plaintiff is represented by attorney Colleen Mixan Mikaitis of the Chicago…

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Original Air Date: June 06, 2022

A third-party investigation of the Southern Baptist Convention’s top governing body found that an influential group of leaders systematically ignored, belittled and intimidated survivors of sexual abuse for the past two decades while protecting the legal interests of churches accused of harboring abusers. Despite recent declines in membership, Southern Baptists are still the largest evangelical group in the United States, with more than 13 million members. How they respond to this moment is deeply consequential for America.

We speak with Robert Downen, a reporter at The Houston Chronicle, and Dr. Kristin Kobes Du Mez, professor of history and gender studies at Calvin University and author of “Jesus and John Wayne,” about the recent findings and the SBC’s response. We also hear from two survivors of abuse in the SBC, Hannah-Kate Williams and Christa Brown, about their long fights for justice and accountability. 

Melissa Harris-Perry: This is The Takeaway. I’m Melissa Harris-Perry. Today, we’re…

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As each Maryland senator with the Judicial Proceedings Committee cast their yes vote, David Lorenz cried and embraced his wife, Judy.

That’s because the committee voted 10-1 on Friday to advance a bill that would retroactively, as well as prospectively, repeal statutes of limitation on lawsuits by plaintiffs who claim they suffered child sexual abuse.

Lorenz, who pushed to get this legislation passed for 15 years, suffered abuse as a teenager when he attended a private school in Kentucky.

“I don’t get benefit from this bill one bit because my abuse took place in Kentucky. I have watched people come up here and testify. I know three of them who…passed away,” said Lorenz, the Maryland director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, also called SNAP. “This will give survivors, vindication, validation, they get to tell their story.”

Senate Bill 686 sponsored by Sen. William C. Smith Jr….

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When the voting started, one senator after another said “yes,” and there were tears and sobs in the gallery.

Two survivors hugged. For years, they had come to Annapolis and bared the childhood horrors they suffered at the hands of Catholic priests, only to see their bill stall in this Senate committee.

The Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee voted overwhelmingly Friday to advance the Child Victims Act of 2023, an incremental step — the bill must clear the full Senate and House still — yet one that has frustrated survivors in three previous years.

“It’s hard to put into words. I just welled up out of nowhere,” said David Lorenz, the Maryland director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. “This has always been the obstacle.”

The bill would give more survivors of child sexual abuse the legal right to sue the church and other institutions complicit…

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Calling it “unconstitutional” and “unfair,” the Maryland Catholic Conference expressed its continued opposition to legislation approved March 10 by a State Senate committee that would treat private institutions such as the Catholic Church differently from public institutions in civil liabilities faced for child sexual abuse.

The “Child Victims Act,” which passed the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee on a 10-1 vote, would remove the civil statute of limitations for lawsuits and allow a “lookback window” for survivors to take legal action no matter when the abuse occurred.

Currently, the law in Maryland allows victims until age 38 to file such claims, an extension – from age 25 – that was supported by the church in 2017.

“The draconian provision of an unlimited window for currently time-barred civil cases to be filed, regardless of when they occurred, is nearly unprecedented among similar laws passed in other states,” the March 10 Maryland Catholic…

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The Catholic church has delivered what’s been described as a ‘pretty low blow’ in order to avoid paying compensation to survivors of childhood sexual abuse.

The Marist Brothers is arguing in court that it is unable to defend civil proceedings brought by a survivor of child sexual abuse, who is known by the pseudonym of Mark Peters, because his abuser has died.

Mr Peters asserts he was abused by notorious child sexual offender, the Marist Brothers’ Brother Francis Cable from at least 1967, and that the organisation failed in its duty of care to prevent the abuse by failing to terminate his position let alone reporting the matter to police, despite having received multiple reports of abuse.

Brother Francis Cable – imprisoned for serial child sexual assault

Rather than taking action against the abuse, the Marist Brothers “shuffled around” Brother Cable to new locations when the complaints…

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The lead pastor of a prominent south Florida church has resigned, following a turbulent four-year tenure marked by allegations of lack of financial transparency and hundreds of members expelled or deciding to leave the church. 

On Wednesday, First Baptist Fort Lauderdale (FBFTL) announced that James Welch, who had been hired in February 2019, has departed. “(He) has resigned as lead pastor this week to pursue other interests,” said the statement from the church’s Trustee Board and Deacon Body. They added that a “plan of action to search for a new lead pastor” will be announced Sunday.

Affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, the historic church owns a seven-acre downtown campus reportedly worth over $120 million, including a main sanctuary that can seat over 2,500 people. However, in recent years, weekly attendance at FBFTL has dwindled to fewer than 200 people, according to multiple sources. 

Welch, who marked his…

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In her documentary, Manufacturing the Clerical Predator, director-activist Sarah Pearson puts the spotlight on Southeast Wisconsin, especially through the experience of Kevin Wester. Although he was molested repeatedly at age 12 by a Roman Catholic priest, he took the vows himself and served in the ministry for more than 10 years before being released from the priesthood in 2007. His account of the abuse he endured is harrowing, his fear of speaking up (it happened during the ‘70s in a small Catholic town) is revealing, and his eagerness to pursue the vocation a testimony to blinding power of faith.

Of course, the Catholic Church does things that are worth believing in, including feeding the hungry and maintaining hospitals and respected educational institutions. But the evidence of widespread clerical abuse points to a problem that has metastasized throughout the church’s system. Apparently, it’s not just a few rotten apples. Is the entire…

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A former teacher at Holy Cross Catholic School in Santa Cruz, a small community in far north Santa Fe County, faces counts of rape and molestation after a former student alleged he abused her in 2021, when she was 13.

According to an arrest warrant affidavit, the girl came forward in January in a safe house interview with accusations against Calvin Robinson of Española. Her brother was Robinson’s student at the time, she said.

The girl no longer attends Holy Cross, the affidavit said.

Online court records show Robinson was charged in February with second-degree criminal sexual penetration; three counts of second-degree criminal sexual contact of a minor; two counts of third-degree criminal sexual contact of a minor; and enticement of a child. His case, first filed in Santa Fe County Magistrate Court, was moved this week to the state’s First Judicial District Court.

He was arrested Feb. 14 and…

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A court in Indonesia’s Christian-majority East Nusa Tenggara province has sentenced to death a former Protestant seminarian for raping nine minor girls, reports say.

Sepriyanto Ayub Snae of the Evangelical Church in Timor was found guilty of sexual abuse of nine children by the panel of judges at the Kalabahi District Court in Alor Regency, Voice of Indonesia reported on March 9.

The verdict was pronounced on March 8 in the presence of the defendant, said the report, referring to Abdul Hakim, head of the provincial Information and Public Relations department.

The prosecution team has “legally and convincingly proven” that Snae had committed the crime, Hakim said.

Police arrested 36-year-old Snae last September after family members of the victims filed a criminal complaint against him.

He was accused of raping girls aged 15-16 several times between May 2021 and March 2022 on the premises of a church in Waisika village where he served as an assistant minister.

…

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There’s an old saying, “Watch what you ask for. You might just get it.” And so it is in the DioMass Title IV case involving Douglas Anderson, suspended rector of the Church of the Advent in Boston. He is accused of sexual misconduct while serving as rector of St. James, a Texarkana parish, and lying about his conduct.

And now, Rehill is looking for ways to out the victim and publicly identify her, despite the efforts of the Title IV disciplinary Hearing Panel to protect her identity.

Even worse, Rehill inexplicably asked to have his correspondence on this matter published. More on that in a moment, but for now, just keep in mind the word “dirtbag.”

To be clear, it’s a sad state of affairs when we find ourselves on the same side of an issue as corrupt bishop Alan Gates. But Anglican Watch wholeheartedly endorses the recent decision of…

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Schools founded by the controversial charismatic group, People of Praise are once again coming under fire—this time for the schools’ alleged mishandling of a teacher accused of sending “inappropriate communication” to a student.

People of Praise (POP) first captured headlines in 2020 during Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation hearings. Barrett spent many years inside the tight-knit POP community known for its communal living and strict male headship.

In 2020, the schools POP founded, Trinity Schools, made headlines for allowing a teacher to continue teaching from 2006 to 2011, despite a student’s allegation that he had molested her. At the time, Trinity Schools President Jon Balsbaugh said the school would handle the abuse report differently now.

But parents say the recent incident shows little has changed. Now, they’re calling on Trinity’s board to fire Balsbaugh.

“His number one responsibility is to provide robust measures to…

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Prior to the start of his trial on financial malfeasance charges, Cardinal Angelo Becciu tried to get Pope Francis to confirm that he had authorized the financial transactions that led to Becciu’s prosecution.

The pope refused.

“I regret to inform you that I cannot comply with your request,” the pope wrote back.

The correspondence between the two, which took place in July 2021, was read and displayed in a Vatican court March 9 — an unexpected turn of events coming during the 50th hearing of the trial.

Promoter of Justice Alessandro Diddi obtained the three letters directly from the “sovereign authority,” that is, Pope Francis himself.

In one letter, dated July 20, 2021, Becciu asked the pope to confirm that he had given the go-ahead for an investment by the Secretariat of State in a luxury property in London in 2013. Not only that, Becciu also asked the pope…

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A documentary hit the airwaves this week in Poland alleging the former pope, Saint John Paul II, protected pedophile priests when he was Archbishop of Krakow in his native country. It has reignited a long-standing debate over whether John Paul II was made a saint too quickly. 

The report aired this week by Polish broadcaster TVN24 accuses John Paul of allowing three priests to continue working in the church in the 1970s despite knowing they had been accused of abusing minors. Two of the priests eventually served prison terms for their crimes.

Calls for John Paul II to be made a saint began at his funeral, on April 2, 2005, when cries of “Santo Subito” (or “sainthood immediately”) erupted from the half million pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican. Many held up banners calling for his sainthood.

The cries didn’t fall on deaf ears. Just days after his…

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So much for a short pontificate.

Pope Francis celebrates the 10th anniversary of his election Monday, far outpacing the “two or three” years he once envisioned for his papacy and showing no signs of slowing down.

On the contrary, with an agenda full of problems and plans and no longer encumbered by the shadow of Pope Benedict XVI, Francis, 86, has backed off from talking about retiring and recently described the papacy as a job for life.

History’s first Latin American pope already has made his mark and could have even more impact in the years to come. Yet a decade ago, the Argentine Jesuit was so convinced he wouldn’t be elected as pope that he nearly missed the final vote as he chatted with a fellow cardinal outside the Sistine Chapel.

“The master of ceremonies came out and said ‘Are you going in or not?’” Francis recalled in a…

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Polish lawmakers denounced a documentary alleging that when he was a cardinal and archbishop in Poland, Pope St. John Paul II covered up alleged child sexual abuse committed by priests.

“There are those who are trying to stir up not a military conflict, but a culture war here in Poland,” Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said in a video posted to Twitter March 8. “I stand in defense of our beloved pope, like most of my fellow citizens, because I know that as a nation we owe a lot to John Paul.”

On Thursday, Poland’s Parliament passed a resolution in defense of the former pope that “strongly condemns the disgraceful media smear campaign, largely based on the documents of communist Poland’s machinery of violence, against the great pope, St. John Paul II, the greatest Pole in history.”

Polish lawmakers in the Sejm, the national Parliament lower house, voted 271 to 43…

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Like Presidents, Prime Ministers and CEOs of all stripes, Popes rarely can be classified either as a complete success or an utter failure. Instead, a papacy almost always is a mixed bag filled with both big breakthroughs and major frustrations, perhaps even a few fiascos along the way.

In addition, papacies usually also feature a handful of enigmas – unexplained, puzzling situations that don’t appear to have any obvious explanation, and which therefore stir endless curiosity and debate.

Pope Francis is no exception. At the ten-year mark, here are four chronic question marks. Ironically, they represent a rare case of common ground in an oft-divided church, since papal allies and critics alike would love to have an explanation.

Zanchetta

One classic unanswered question for Pope Francis involves his old friend and countryman, Bishop Gustavo Zanchetta, the former bishop of the Diocese of Oran in northern Argentina, who has faced allegations…

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A group of philanthropists poured money into a Denver nonprofit that obtained dating and hookup app data and shared it with bishops around the country, a Post investigation has found’

A group of conservative ColoradoCatholics has spent millions of dollars to buy mobile app tracking data that identified priests who used gay dating and hookup apps and then shared it with bishops around the country.

The secretive effort was the work of a Denver nonprofit called Catholic Laity and Clergy for Renewal, whose trustees are philanthropists Mark Bauman, John Martin and Tim Reichert, according to public records, an audio recording of the nonprofit’s president discussing its mission and other documents. The use of data is emblematic of a new surveillance frontier in which private individuals can potentially track other Americans’ locations and activities using commercially available information. No U.S. data privacy laws prohibit the sale of this data.

The project’s…

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Bishops in Ireland have welcomed the announcement by the Irish government of a “scoping inquiry” to shape the government’s response to revelations of historical sexual abuse in schools run by religious orders.

Minister for Education Norma Foley announced the inquiry on Tuesday, saying it is “vitally important that survivors of historical child sexual abuse have the opportunity to be heard in full, and with appropriate respect and sensitivity.”

“The revelations of abuse in a number of schools are deeply disturbing and heart-breaking. I and indeed the whole of government are very conscious of the enormous trauma which has been endured by all survivors of abuse,” she said.

Last November, then-Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin announced the government would establish an enquiry after a report on state broadcaster RTÉ highlighted the historic sexual abuse at Blackrock College, an all-boys boarding high school in greater Dublin run by the Spiritan order.

Foley…

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Documentary on Priestly Abuse of Children Focuses on Wisconsin

In her documentary, Manufacturing the Clerical Predator, director-activist Sarah Pearson puts the spotlight on Southeast Wisconsin, especially through the experience of Kevin Wester. Although he was molested repeatedly at age 12 by a Roman Catholic priest, he took the vows himself and served in the ministry for more than 10 years before being released from the priesthood in 2007. His account of the abuse he endured is harrowing, his fear of speaking up (it happened during the ‘70s in a small Catholic town) is revealing, and his eagerness to pursue the vocation a testimony to blinding power of faith.

Of course, the Catholic Church does things that are worth believing in, including feeding the hungry and maintaining hospitals and respected educational institutions. But the evidence of widespread clerical abuse points to a problem that has metastasized throughout the church’s system. Apparently, it’s…

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f you or someone you know needs resources or support related to sexual violence, contact the Maine Coalition Against Sexual Assault’s 24/7 hotline at 800-871-7741.

Six more women have sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, alleging that a Portland priest abused them between 1958 and 1967 when they were between 5 and 11 years old.

Ann Allen, 64, of Scarborough  filed a suit in December, saying that the Rev. Lawrence Sabatino had assaulted her in the 1960s and that the church failed to prevent it. Allen’s suit names the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland and its head, Bishop Robert Deeley, as defendants.

Allen claims in her lawsuit that the Rev. Lawrence Sabatino sexually assaulted her when she was 7 and the priest was assigned to St. Peter Parish in Portland. She is seeking unspecified damages.

Six more people filed similar civil lawsuits against the church this week, claiming abuse by…

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A civil complaint details claims from six additional victims of abuse allegedly committed by Father Lawrence Sabatino from 1958 to 1967.

[Via WABI]

More sexual abuse survivors are suing the Maine Catholic Diocese.

A civil complaint details claims from six additional victims of abuse allegedly committed by Father Lawrence Sabatino from 1958 to 1967.

Sabatino died in 1990.

The survivors join Ann Allen, who was the first to file a suit against Sabatino in December.

These lawsuits now total 20 against the Diocese by law firm Berman and Simmons.

They say the Diocese failed to warn parishioners and their families about the sexual abuse allegations against the priest.

Survivors speaking out now to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

“I never thought this affected my life, but it affected everything in my life. I’m 70 years old and I’m finally realizing and putting the pieces together,” said Patricia Butkowski.

“It’s so…

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A key panel of Maryland lawmakers on Friday advanced a measure that would end the state’s statute of limitations for when civil lawsuits can be filed against public and private institutions related to child sexual abuse.

The Maryland Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee voted 10-1 to send the bill to the Maryland Senate. The vote is significant because the measure has passed the state’s House of Delegates in recent years, only to stall in the Senate.

“I’m feeling like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulder,” said David Lorenz, the Maryland leader of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, after the vote. “It is the biggest hurdle we’ve had.”

Currently, people in Maryland who say they were sexually abused as children can’t sue after they reach the age of 38. This year, state Sen. Will Smith, a Democrat who chairs the committee, sponsored the bill that would…

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Fallout from a TV report alleging that St. John Paul II covered up clergy sex abuse cases escalated Thursday, with Poland’s Catholic Church and lawmakers defending him as one of the greatest Poles ever and the government “inviting” the U.S. ambassador for talks.

A report this week on TVN24, which is owned by the U.S. company Warner Bros. Discovery, named three priests whom John Paul allegedly moved around during the 1970s after they were accused of abusing minors. At the time, he was still Archbishop Karol Wojtyla, the head of the church in Krakow in southern Poland.

John Paul is revered in the predominantly Roman Catholic country for his role in helping bring down communism, and the TVN report ignited a national debate at a time when the Polish Church has been undergoing a reckoning with its record of clergy sexual abuse. A heated debate erupted Thursday in parliament debating his…

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A group representing victims of child abuse in Argentina is calling on Pope Francis, a fellow Argentine, to invite it to the Vatican to hear their grievances.

Clerical sex abuse and cover-up scandals have for decades rocked the nearly 1.38-billion-member Roman Catholic Church, undercutting its moral authority and taking a toll on membership and coffers.

“We sent him a letter, we declared ourselves open to dialogue and meetings, but in 10 years of papacy … he has not made the public gesture of summoning us,” Sebastian Cuattromo told Reuters in Rome on Thursday.

The Vatican press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Pope Francis marks the 10th anniversary of his election on March 13. As pope, he has pledged “irreversible” action against clerical abuse. He has also acknowledged mistakes on the issue, most notably after a 2018 trip to Chile in which he initially stood by a bishop…

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The Catholic Church has a great challenge today addressing and ending child abuse among its clergy and in society. Abusing women and children is a centuries-old evil. With the coming of Jesus of Nazareth and his progressive teaching on the rights and dignity of women and children, there was little change.

Institutional religions throughout history ignored that teaching and focused on obscure theologizing and fighting bloody wars over their abstruse theologies and interpretation.

The Catholic Church became less of a church of the poor and the oppressed and one dominated and controlled by the elite. Bishops were landowners with vast wealth and flouting princes with political and economic power, all so far from the ideal of the Kingdom where the poor would inherit the earth and the mighty would be put down from their thrones.

Today there are dioceses with vast wealth and bishops and priests live lives of luxury.

…

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Faced with more than 200 new legal claims over childhood sexual abuse, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Santa Rosa plans to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Monday, automatically freezing all lawsuits so they can be settled through federal bankruptcy court.

The move, forecast in advance by Santa Rosa Bishop Robert Vasa last December, was announced Friday in a new release from the bishop reaffirming his belief he had no other choice given what he has called an “insurmountable number of claims” and too few financial resources to satisfy them individually.

That means the Santa Rosa Diocese will not face trial in any of what are currently 222 lawsuits involving priests and others at church-related institutions, said East Bay attorney Rick Simons. Simons is liaison counsel for all Northern California clergy abuse cases filed during a 3-year window waiving statute of limitations on child sex-abuse cases.

Instead of individual trials, the diocese,…

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My mother used to say that a man will sit in his living room and talk about how to save the world, while his wife is outside with a hammer and nails, fixing the front steps.

Ten years into the Francis papacy and this is how I feel, as a member of the church, and specifically as a woman in the church. We’ve been hearing these living room lectures for a decade now. We’ve heard about openness and going out to the margins and smelling like the sheep and not judging, and we’ve heard about reform.

How are the front steps? Do people take a look at the Catholic Church and think, “How safe and welcoming!”?

When Pope Francis was elected, I was thrilled. The photos and stories that circulated seized my heart and made me feel like something incredible was about to happen. I saw him riding incognito on…

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The victim was 8 and 9 years in religious ed classes through Holy Family Catholic Church and the Cathedral of St. Ray’s, the lawsuit noted.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet, the Cathedral of St. Raymond Nonnatus, Holy Family Catholic Church and deported pedophile priest, Father Alejandro Flores face a new Will County civil lawsuit filed on behalf of a young man who died last year.

The boy, identified in the Will County lawsuit as John Doe, was 8 and 9 years old and had attended religious education programs through St. Ray’s and Holy Family. Last year, at age 21, the sexual abuse victim of Father Flores died in California, the lawsuit stated.

John Doe suffered sexual violence, including manipulation, isolation, control, exploitation, abuse and assault abuse at Cathedral of St. Raymond Nonnatus by Father Alejandro Flores, the lawsuit contends. The plaintiff is represented by attorney Colleen Mixan Mikaitis of the Chicago…

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Two dioceses in Portugal decided to suspend priests accused of child abuse by an independent commission investigating decades of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

The Diocese of Angra, in the Azores, suspended two priests. The Diocese of Evora received charges against two priests as well, but one of them is deceased. The cases involve the sexual abuse of seminarians.

The commission, installed by the Portuguese episcopate in 2021, received hundreds of witness testimonies since January of last year. In February, the group, formed by professionals in different fields, announced that at least 4,815 cases of abuse occurred over 70 years in Catholic institutions.

Most of the accused abusers were priests – 77 percent. The average age of the victims was 11, and 52.7 percent of them were boys. The commission sent 25 cases to prosecutors along with the names of the accused.

While the Portuguese Bishops’ Conference declared there…

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“I came back to life.”

Like other victims of child abuse by priests, 52-year-old Stéphane said getting an official recognition from France’s Catholic Church of what happened is helping him get better, at last.

Stéphane is among 201 victims granted financial or other reparations from the church so far under a process launched last year by an independent French body leading a nationwide effort to address decades of long-hidden, widespread abuse. Hundreds of other people are awaiting review of their cases.

Reparations also may include non-financial support. Requests have included help for victims to write down their stories, organizing meetings with local church representatives, or installing a plaque in memory of victims. The head of the Independent National Authority for Recognition and Reparation, or INIRR, is also supporting a demand to change the name of a plaza named after an archbishop who actively covered up sexual abuse.

Stéphane said he was…

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Poland’s prime minister on Wednesday stepped in to defend the good name of St. John Paul II, a “great fellow-countryman,” following claims that he knew of sex abuse of minors by priests under his authority while archbishop in Poland and sought to conceal it.

The report aired this week on TVN24 struck at a highly respected figure in the predominantly Roman Catholic country. It provoked a mixed response, especially as some of the documentation it quoted came from the files of the communist-era secret security service that had been seeking to compromise the church.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, a Catholic, said in a video statement posted on his social media that proof cited against the late pontiff is “very dubious.” He also claimed the issue was raised by circles that want to wage a “cultural war” against Poles and turn their lives upside down.

Karol Wojtyla served as archbishop of Krakow,…

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Marist Brothers approach in seeking to halt a survivor’s case over a clergy member’s death would be ‘absolutely perverse’, court hears

A Catholic order allegedly sat on its hands for almost two years waiting for a notorious paedophile clergy member to die and is now using his death to claim it could no longer receive a fair trial against one of his victims, an approach described in court as “absolutely perverse”.

The Marist Brothers order is currently seeking to permanently halt a survivor’s case alleging abuse by the late Brother Francis “Romuald” Cable, arguing his death renders it unable to fairly defend itself because it can no longer call him as a witness.

Court documents allege Marist has known of abuse complaints against Cable, one of New South Wales’ worst Catholic school offenders, since 1967, but concealed his crimes from police and other authorities for decades and instead shuffled him between…

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In 2018, the scandal involving then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick shocked the Catholic world.  

McCarrick had a global presence; he operated at the highest levels of the Church, and he enjoyed the highest esteem—both among Catholics and more broadly. But then it was revealed that he had been grooming and sexually abusing young men for decades.  

It was yet another heart-wrenching wake-up call for a Church in need of reform, coming after earlier scandals of Church leaders who failed to protect the faithful from predators in her midst.  

Despite a slew of meetings, documents, and reforms from bishops on protecting minors and vulnerable adults, Catholics watched as the scandal deepened, and as pews continued to empty, costing souls. It became abundantly clear that the Church’s internal reform needed every hand to the pumps.

In turn, a group of Catholics explored ways in which the laity might better assist bishops to identify healthy…

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Addressing the scandal of abuse has been Pope Francis’ greatest challenge, a titanic struggle marked by resistance, failure, and conversion.

 The rainfall stopped minutes before he appeared at the balcony that night 10 years ago, his first time in papal white, the choice of the name “Francesco” another first, cheering Italians for his honouring of their popular saint. On a screen above the crowd at St Peter’s, Francesco purred “Buona sera” and gave a humble bow. 

The deft pastoral symbolism was soon followed by a descent into the snake pit. “The Roman Curia has always been a viper’s nest,” Church chronicler Vittorio Messori told La Stampa the previous spring. What he described as “the most efficient state organisation in the world” was rife with “rivalry, greed, maliciousness and infidelity”. Messori saw the so-called Vatileaks scandal breaking the support structure for “Number One”, as Church diplomats call the Pope. Benedict XVI’s…

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The civil complaints filed Wednesday all allege that the Rev. Lawrence Sabatino abused the plaintiffs, who were 5 to 11 years old at the time, in Lewiston and Portland from 1958 to 1967.

Patricia Harkins Butkowski named the priest who abused her when she first came forward nearly 20 years ago. But Maine law at the time said she couldn’t sue.

A recent change in state law removing the statute of limitations for claims of childhood sexual abuse changed that and Butkowski and five other women who say they were abused by the Rev. Lawrence Sabatino as children in the 1950s and 1960s filed civil lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland in Cumberland County Superior Court on Wednesday.

The diocese is challenging that law, and a Maine judge is weighing whether to send the question to Maine’s highest court for review.

Butkowski’s family reported the abuse immediately in…

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The Delaware General Assembly is considering a bill that would require Roman Catholic priests to break the seal of confession to report child abuse and neglect, prompting condemnation from the Diocese of Wilmington.

House Bill 74, the sponsors of which include state Senate President Pro Tempore David P. Sokola, could be heard before the House Judiciary Committee within weeks, according to OSV News.

The Diocese of Wilmington condemned the proposed law, noting that priests are bound by the sacrament of reconciliation from breaking the seal of confession, according to the outlet. Catholic canon law mandates that a priest who violates the seal of confession is automatically excommunicated.

“The sacrament of confession and its seal of confession is a fundamental aspect of the church’s sacramental theology and practice. It is non-negotiable,” the diocese said in a statement

“No Catholic priest or bishop would ever break the seal…

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[Via the Boston Pilot]

The Delaware General Assembly is taking aim at a basic tenet of the Catholic Church and wants to break the seal of confession between a priest and penitent.

House Bill 74 would do away with the privilege between priest and penitent in a sacramental confession by requiring priests to report information relating to child abuse and neglect that is shared in a confessional.

The Diocese of Wilmington said priests are prohibited from breaking the seal of confession and are bound to keep the confidence of penitents in the sacrament of reconciliation.

“The sacrament of confession and its seal of confession is a fundamental aspect of the church’s sacramental theology and practice. It is non-negotiable,” the diocese said in a prepared statement March 6.

“No Catholic priest or bishop would ever break the seal of confession under any circumstances. To do so would incur an automatic excommunication that could only be…

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Disgraced former cardinal Theodore McCarrick, whose attorneys have argued he should not stand trial due to “progressive and irreparable cognitive deficits,” recalled the name of the man he allegedly sexually abused as a child, although he denied the sexual assaults.

McCarrick, 92, was questioned by a NorthJersey.com reporter during a brief phone interview the day after his attorney filed a Feb. 27 motion in Dedham District Court in Massachusetts seeking to have the charges dismissed.

According to the report, the reporter called McCarrick at the assisted living facility where he resides in Missouri.

McCarrick admits remembering the man he’s accused of abusing as a child

During the conversation, McCarrick was informed the reporter wanted to ask about the abuse. Asked how he was feeling, McCarrick told the reporter he was “feeling well, considering that I am 92 years old. It’s not like I’m 40 or…

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A highly placed lay employee at the Diocese of Oakland’s Cathedral of Christ the Light was arrested by Walnut Creek police on January 6, 2023, on suspicion of possessing and sharing child pornography. SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, is appalled that, as far as we can determine, no outreach was done in the community or with the public in the ensuing 2 months.

Jeremiah York worked as the assistant to the Rector of the Cathedral. Until he was removed from that position in January, we believe that he may have had access to children at the parish. Hundreds of boys and girls attend the Cathedral’s CCD and related programs. York is also a photographer with photo credits showing Oakland Bishop, Michael Barber, performing various rites that included children.

While we are dismayed that an accused child pornographer had a job in the…

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As victims continue to struggle with the pain of past abuse, I urge Bishop Deeley to acknowledge them in his own voice, not that of an attorney.

In this morning’s Press Herald, the headline is that the Catholic Diocese of Maine is going to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court to try to deny the ability of people who were abused decades ago from suing for damages (“Diocese asks Maine’s top court to weigh child sexual abuse law,” March 4, Page A1). In this and all other stories on the subject, the only diocesan official quoted is the lawyer. The bishop is silent. A few weeks ago, “Maine Calling” had a show on this issue, and no diocesan officials would agree to participate. I can find no reference to the legal action on the diocesan website.

As a practicing Catholic who attends Mass every Sunday, I am deeply ashamed….

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After a Delaware state representative introduced a bill to abrogate the privilege between priest and penitent relating to suspected child abuse or neglect, the Diocese of Wilmington has pushed back that the confidentiality of the sacrament is a “non-negotiable.”

“The Sacrament of Confession and its seal of confession is a fundamental aspect of the Church’s sacramental theology and practice,” the diocese said in a March 7 statement. “It is non-negotiable.”

“No Catholic priest or bishop would ever break the seal of confession under any circumstances,” it added. “To do so would incur an automatic excommunication that could only be pardoned by the pope himself.”

The proposed bill, HB 74, was proposed by state Democratic Representative Eric Morrison on March 2. If eventually passed, it would amend Title 16 of the Delaware Code relating to mandatory reporting of child abuse.

Morrison did not return a Crux request for comment on the bill.

The…

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The Roman Catholic Church in Portugal has asked for forgiveness from the victims of sexual abuse that occurred within the Church.

The Portuguese Episcopal Conference (CEP) did so during a press conference last Friday, Vatican News reports. At the end of the meeting on the topic in the city of Fatima, the Church leadership read from a press release that “with pain that once again we ask for forgiveness from all the victims of sexual assault within the Catholic Church in Portugal.”

Last month, a commission of enquiry published a report that found that at least 4,815 children had been sexually abused in the Church since 1950. The researchers concluded that the hierarchy of the Church had covered up the crimes systematically. For their study, they collected more than 500 testimonies in a year, Le Journal writes. The report caused great upheaval in Portugal, where a…

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The unity of Spain’s first-ever coalition government faced its toughest test in three years in power Tuesday, with the two ruling left-wing parties at loggerheads over reforming a pioneering sexual violence law that has inadvertently led to the reduction of sentences for over 700 offenders and caused national outrage.

Both have said the coalition will stay intact and finish the legislature this year. But the wounds from the law’s fallout are so raw they could presage the ending of a successful partnership that has produced several progressive laws but risks being divided by its flagship cause.

The fight came the day before thousands of women, and men, planned to take to the streets of Madrid, Barcelona and other cities across Spain in what is annually one of the world’s largest rallies for International Women’s Day.

The Socialist Party of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and the anti-austerity United We Can movement…

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“I have lost faith in the Catholic Church as I question how a man of God could do these things.”

A ‘larger than life, cigar smoking’ former Peterborough priest has been jailed for six and a half years after being found guilty of child abuse.

Dennis Finbow served in as a priest in Dogsthorpe in Peterborough in the 1980s – but behind his trusted persona, he was a paedophile, who preyed on a young girl. Now he is behind bars after being found guilty of three counts of indecent assault on a child.

Finbow (74) of Bealings Road, Martlesham, Suffolk, was found guilty of the offences – which date back to the 1980s when he was a priest in Peterborough – at a trial in January.

Appearing at Cambridge Crown Court today (March 8), Finbow, wearing a blue sweatshirt, sat arms crossed in the dock as he was jailed.

Charles…

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The latest attempt to force members of the clergy to report information they learn in confidential settings is taking place in Vermont, and the sole Roman Catholic bishop in the state appeared before a legislative committee to argue against that effort.

Bishop Christopher Coyne of Burlington, Vermont, and two other Catholic priests sought to assure legislators that it’s possible to both protect vulnerable children and preserve religious liberty at the same time. 

Since the Catholic clergy sexual abuse scandal started making headlines in the early 2000s, quite a few state and federal governments have tried to eliminate exemptions to mandatory reporting laws that protect the clergy-penitent exemptions.

A bill introduced by Vermont State Senator Dick Sears, a Democrat from Bennington, would repeal the Green Mountain State’s exemption for clergy. Sears’ bill would remove language such as this from the state’s mandatory reporting law:

“A member of the clergy…

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In the wake of growing controversy, evangelical Reformed parachurch group The Gospel Coalition (TGC) has retracted an article that used explicit sexual language as a metaphor for salvation. However, some say the retraction does not address underlying issues of concern. 

The article published on March 1 compared the act of sexual consummation with the spiritual work of Christ. Arizona pastor Josh Butler, excerpting from his upcoming book Beautiful Union, wrote in part that “the fusing of two bodies as one . . . is a picture of the gospel.”

One passage described when “the groom goes into his bride” in explicit terms, referring to the “sanctuary of his spouse,” where the groom “ bestows an offering, a gift.” Butler continued the metaphor, saying the wife “gladly receives the warmth of his presence . . . Similarly, the church embraces Christ in salvation. . .” 

Many evangelical observers reacted swiftly.

“They…

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Mark Rivera, a former lay pastor in a conservative Anglican denomination who was convicted in December of felony child sexual abuse and assault, was sentenced today to 15 years in the department of corrections.

Judge John Barsanti of Illinois’ 16th Judicial Circuit Court in Kane County granted Rivera the minimum sentences for his crimes. The judge earlier found Rivera guilty of two counts of predatory sexual assault of a victim under 13 years old (a Class X felony) and three counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse of a victim under 13 (a Class 2 felony). Rivera will get credit for time already served in jail and spent under electronic monitoring and will be eligible for parole before completing his full sentence. 

During the first half of the sentencing hearing, which occurred on Feb. 24, Cherin Marie, the mother of the child Rivera was found guilty of abusing, read victim impact…

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Father Marko Rupnik concelebrated Mass at a basilica in Rome on Sunday despite restrictions prohibiting “any public ministerial and sacramental activity.”

The Jesuit priest and artist who has been accused of sexually and psychologically abusing consecrated women stood at the altar of the Basilica of Santa Prassede, a historic church popular with pilgrims located near the Basilica of St. Mary Major, at the 9 a.m. Sunday Mass on March 5, according to the Italian newspaper Domani.

When asked about the Mass, Rupnik’s superior, Jesuit Father Johan Verscheuren, said that Rupnik is only allowed “to concelebrate Masses in the context of the Aletti Center, which is his inner circle, his community.”

In comments to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language sister news agency, Verscheuren said that he had not been able to confirm the Italian media reports and preferred “not to make judgments about things that I am not absolutely sure about.”

Rupnik…

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As of November 24, the Adult Survivors Act (ASA) went into effect in New York State, allowing survivors of sexual offenses one year to file civil claims for cases that occurred even decades ago. The Adult Survivors Act was signed into law in May and removes the statute of limitations for certain civil claims regarding past sexual offenses between November 24, 2022, and November 24, 2023, regardless of when the alleged crime took place. If you were raped or abused, at or after age 18, anywhere in New York state, at any time, by anyone, you now have a chance to file a civil lawsuit. Yes, no matter who hurt you, or when, or how old you are now, if you were sexually assaulted, fondled, raped, or abused in any way when you were 18 years old or older by anyone in the state of New York, a dramatic change in the law…

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Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine release statement on funding process, accepting new applications

Restitution for dozens of child abuse victims from a former home for kids in Parma is starting to arrive in mailboxes. The payment is very different than what was initially spelled out by the Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine for those who suffered at the Parmadale Children’s Village of St. Vincent de Paul decades ago. We have reaction to the payments, reaction to the process and how some are taking their complaints to the next level.

News 5 Investigators have been bringing you stories about children abused by some nuns at the former orphanage. Our reporting led to the Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine that ran Parmadale finally admitting the abuse, apologizing for it, and creating a victims’ assistance fund to help people heal.

VICTIM: NUNS NOT TAKING THIS SERIOUSLY

“Do you feel they’re taking…

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Quick Take

Efforts to stop child sex trafficking in the U.S. have been underway for decades, led by presidents including Joe Biden. But an Instagram post makes the false claims that former President Donald Trump was the first to “acknowledge that children are being sold for sex in the U.S.” and that Biden “rescinded” a Trump order addressing the problem.

Full Story

The conspiracy theory movement known as QAnon has spread the baseless claim that former President Donald Trump is battling a child sex-trafficking ring led by prominent Democrats and Hollywood stars, as we’ve previously written.

Trump’s role in the fight against sex trafficking is further distorted in a Feb. 26 Instagram post, which falsely claims Trump was the “1st President in U.S. History to acknowledge that children are being sold for sex in the U.S.”

The post also…

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You were our coaches, teachers, Boy Scout leaders, preachers, future politicians. You were neighbors, family friends, family members, always charming and trusted with our care. You took us on detours after practice on the way home, you snuck us into empty classrooms, equipment rooms, and offices on school campus. You found ways into our tents on camp outs and our bedrooms and basements at home. You cruised the malls where we spent hours shopping at The Limited and hanging out at the food court. You groomed us. You targeted us. You sexually assaulted us.

You were the exception to the many fine adults among us, but you sentenced us to a lifetime of damage.

Our parents were hard working, divorced, single, widowed, distracted. Some were alcoholic or workaholics. Others sick or dying of cancer.

We were good students and bad students. Star athletes and musicians. Geeks…

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In describing the pontificate of Pope Francis, now at its 10-year mark, cardinals, bishops and lay leaders alike are unanimous: The Holy Father has advanced a vision of the Church that reaches out to the world, with a special attentiveness to those on the peripheries of society.

“I think he has brought an awareness that we need to be mindful of those who are forgotten and are not valued: the poor, the immigrant, and those who just feel alienated from the love of God,” said Bishop James Conley of the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, in a comment representative of this chorus. 

In a similar vein, Cardinal Marc Ouellet said that Francis has generated a new interest in the Church outside of her walls.

“That’s the sign of his missionary style,” said the Canadian cardinal, who heads the Vatican’s Dicastery for Bishops, in a Feb. 23 interview with EWTN News in…

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The head of the Roman Catholic Church in Vermont told state lawmakers Friday that the church opposes a bill that would remove clergy exemptions for reporting cases of child abuse and neglect to police.

Bishop Christopher Coyne, who has served as the bishop of the Diocese of Burlington since 2015, testified before the Vermont Senate Judiciary Committee that the church’s rite of confession must remain confidential — even when cases of child abuse are revealed.

“A priest faces excommunication if he discloses the communication made to him during confession,” Coyne said. “And the sacramental seal of confession is the worldwide law of the Catholic Church, not just the diocese of Burlington, Vermont.”

The Diocese of Burlington serves all 14 counties of the state of Vermont.

According to current state law, members of the clergy are obligated to report abuse and neglect, but it adds an exemption for when…

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For the first time since criminal court proceedings began against him, former cardinal Theodore McCarrick spoke publicly about allegations that he sexually abused a teenager at a wedding ceremony in the 1970s in Wellesley, Massachusetts.

In an interview with NorthJersey.com, McCarrick said the alleged victim’s testimony was “not true.” The telephone conversation took place one day after McCarrick filed a motion claiming he is unfit to stand trial due to dementia.

The alleged victim in the case against McCarrick was also identified by NorthJersey.com for the first time as James Grein, a 64-year-old former New Jersey resident. Grein went public in 2018 to the New York Times, which referred to him only by his first name, with allegations that the now-laicized clergyman had serially sexually abused him beginning when he was 11.

McCarrick, laicized by Pope Francis in 2019, held one of the highest offices in the Catholic…

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This commentary is by Maura Labelle of Colchester, who was a resident of St. Joseph’s Orphanage in the 1960s.

Here we go again! 

First, the local Roman Catholic Diocese wanted to demolish the former Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception to make sure the property would not be used for anything outside the teaching of the Catholic Church. This, despite the fact that no fewer than 10 priests there were on Bishop Christopher Coyne’s list of Catholic clergy credibly accused of sexual abuse. 

Now, it’s St. Stephen’s Church in Winooski that may be demolished for the same reason. At St. Stephen’s, four priests made Coyne’s list. 

Winooski was also home to the Sisters of Providence, who abused children at St. Joseph’s Orphanage, including me. According to a Feb. 16 report on WCAX, just as in Burlington, a group of Winooski citizens is trying to stop demolition of the church. 

Does anyone seriously…

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A lay official with the Diocese of Oakland has been arrested on suspicion of possessing and sharing child pornography, NBC Bay Area’s Investigative Unit has confirmed via local law enforcement.

Jeremiah York, 24, worked as the Director of Liturgical Ministries and the Executive Assistant to the Rector at the Cathedral of Christ the Light in Oakland, which is also known as the Oakland Cathedral.

Walnut Creek police told NBC Bay Area that they arrested York, a Walnut Creek resident, on Jan. 6.

The case remains under investigation and has not yet been referred to the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office, according to a police spokesperson.

NBC Bay Area could not reach York for comment.

The Diocese of Oakland has not publicly announced the arrest, and York’s photo and employment information remained on the Cathedral’s website until Friday. It was then taken down shortly after NBC Bay Area’s inquiry about…

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The future Pope John Paul II, while still archbishop of Kraków, knew of sexual abuse by priests subordinate to him but allowed them to continue working in the church and may even have tried to prevent the authorities from learning of their crimes, a new report by Polish broadcaster TVN claims.

The revelations come amid debate in Poland over the legacy of John Paul II – a national hero not only for his spiritual leadership but also for the role he played in inspiring opposition to the communist regime – with regard to historical abuse cases in the Catholic church.

The former pope’s defenders, led by the Polish episcopate, have often argued that John Paul II was unaware of the scale of abuse being covered up in the church and that the first signs began to reach him when he was already severely ill.

TVN – which has previously broadcast claims that John…

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Assumption University has donated more than $30,000 in contributions to the university from a retired priest named in a public 2018 Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report on clerical sexual abuse of children in the state to abuse survivors, Assumption President Gregory Weiner said in a message to the university community.

According to Weiner, the unnamed priest made a bequest commitment to Assumption University’s capital campaign in September 2021.

Weiner, who was named university president in October after serving as its interim leader since April 2022, said he learned in the fall of the gift and the priest’s appearance in the grand jury report as someone credibly accused of child sexual abuse.

Weiner said he has since directed the university administration to both review its internal processes for evaluating major gifts and to formally inform the priest that the university will not accept the bequest.

Instead, Weiner said, the university…

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Disgraced former cardinal Theodore McCarrick, whose attorneys have argued he should not stand trial due to “progressive and irreparable cognitive deficits,” recalled the name of the man he allegedly sexually abused as a child, although he denied the sexual assaults.

McCarrick, 92, was questioned by a NorthJersey.com reporter during a brief phone interview the day after his attorney filed a Feb. 27 motion in Dedham District Court in Massachusetts seeking to have the charges dismissed.

According to the report, the reporter called McCarrick at the assisted living facility where he resides in Missouri.

During the conversation, McCarrick was informed the reporter wanted to ask about the abuse. Asked how he was feeling, McCarrick told the reporter he was “feeling well, considering that I am 92 years old. It’s not like I’m 40 or 50 anymore.”

Asked if he remembered the man he is accused of abusing as a child…

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Pope St. John Paul II knew about sexual abuse of children by priests under his authority and sought to conceal it when he was an archbishop in his native Poland, according to a television news report.

In a story that aired late Monday, Polish channel TVN24 named three priests whom the future pope then known as Archbishop Karol Wojtyla had moved among parishes or sent to a cloister during the 1970s, including one who was sent to Austria, after they were accused of abusing minors.

Two of the priests, Eugeniusz Surgent and Jozef Loranc, eventually served short prison terms for the abuse, TVN24 said its investigation found. Wojtyla served as archbishop of Krakow from 1964 to 1978, when he became Pope John Paul II. He died in 2005 and was declared a saint in 2014 following a fast-tracked process.

TVN24 quoted from documents of Poland’s communist-era secret security services,…

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A priest convicted of sexually abusing four girls in Scotland has been spared jail.

Father Neil McGarrity, 58, was found guilty at Glasgow Sheriff Court in January of four sexual assaults and one charge of engaging in sexual activity.

On Friday, he was sentenced to 250 hours of unpaid work and put under supervision for three years.

Fr McGarrity was also placed on the sex offenders’ register for five years and subject to a curfew between 7pm and 7am for nine months.

BBC News reports that the charges relate to the period from December 2017 to February 2020 and occurred at two churches in Glasgow and his parish home.

The victims were aged between 10 and 16 at the time and the incidents involved touching of a sexual nature.

Some of the incidents reported by the victims included being repeated hugged by Fr McGarrity, as well as…

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[Via Inquirer]

The late Polish pope John Paul II knew about child abuse in Poland’s Catholic church years before becoming pontiff and helped cover it up, private broadcaster TVN reported Sunday.

Michal Gutowski, the investigator behind the broadcast, said that Karol Wojtyla, as he then was, knew of cases of pedophile priests within the church while still a cardinal in Krakow.

He transferred the priests to other dioceses — one as far away as Austria — to ensure no scandal ensued, he said.

Wojtyla, who was pope for 27 years from 1978 until his death in 2005, wrote a letter of recommendation for a priest accused of abuse to Vienna cardinal Franz Koenig, without mentioning the accusations, says Gutowski.

During his investigation, Gutowski says he spoke to victims of pedophile priests, their families and former church diocese employees.

He cites documents from the former Communist-era SB secret police and rare…

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The insurance carrier for the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego filed a lawsuit Friday contending that because the diocese violated the terms of its insurance policies, the company should not have to pay out any money to settle claims from hundreds of people alleging they were victims of sexual abuse by clergy over the last several decades.

The lawsuit was filed in San Diego federal court by Catholic Mutual Relief Society of America, the insurance provider for San Diego and other Catholic dioceses. The company wants a judge to order that it has no duty to “defend or indemnify” the diocese or any parish against claims of sexual abuse by clergy from 1958 through 1990.

It is not clear why the lawsuit gives that time frame. The lawyer for Catholic Mutual did not respond to messages seeking comment Friday.

However, many of the 400 claims that are currently pending…

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Bishops conference to outline measures falls dismally short

The long awaited press conference tipped to outline measures the Portuguese Catholic Church will be taking in the wake of the findings of the Independent Commission into child sex abuse within the institution fell dismally short of expectations yesterday evening.

Victims associations – particularly Quebrar o Silêncio, which has specificially petitioned the Church to come up with immediate solutions for the 106 priests still in active service against whom allegations of abuse have been made – reacted with dismay, saying the message given was ‘ambiguous’ at best.

On another level “ethical, moral questions” seemed to have been completely buried. There were myriad references to the fact that pedophilia is not confined to the Church. Victims’ associations points are that the Church cannot be likened to lay society, by dint of its values – and that therefore betrayal of such values is a…

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Despite being in a sacred and very holy position, some church officials and priests have been prosecuted because of sexually abusing some of the church members, leaving their integrity in a bad state.

The bishops of Portugal have started taking action in response to a report that exposed the extent of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in the country. The report estimated that more than 4,000 children had been abuse victims since the 1950s.

Bishops of Portugal Drives Measures to Put an End to Sexual Abuse in Religious Institutions

According to the Catholic News Agency, the bishops held a plenary assembly in Fátima, announcing the creation of all-lay diocesan commissions and a memorial to the victims. These measures will be unveiled during World Youth Day in Lisbon from August 1 to 6. Father Manuel Barbosa, a spokesman for the bishops’ conference, expressed gratitude to the victims…

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Priests charged or convicted of child sexual abuse are still active in dioceses under the protection of bishops

Some of the best and well written-child protection laws are in the Philippines. However, it is enforcement that is lacking. There are few convictions of child abusers. Without the rule of law being enforced, there will never be an end to child sexual abuse. Right now, the Philippines is like “a fun house of sexual abuse” with international connections through online abuse.

At a recent meeting with five judges in Cebu, the Preda Foundation’s president, Francis Bermido Jr., and Executive Director Emmanuel Drewery were earnestly requested to open a therapeutic healing center/home for girl victims of sexual abuse and exploitation in the city.

The Preda Foundation with German partner Aktionsgruppe already manages a successful home for boys in Liloan, Cebu. That project rescues teenagers from horrible subhuman conditions in government detention cells…

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A report on the handling of abuse cases in the Diocese of Mainz heavily criticized the late Cardinal Karl Lehmann.

An influential German cardinal failed for decades to respond effectively to sexual abuse in his diocese, according to a study released Friday.

Cardinal Karl Lehmann, considered one of Germany’s leading churchmen until his death in 2018, was heavily criticized in the report on the handling of abuse cases in the Diocese of Mainz issued March 3.

Lehmann, who served as president of the German bishops’ conference for 20 years, led the diocese in west-central Germany, which serves around 667,000 Catholics, from 1983 to 2016.

The more than 1,000-page report, known as the EVV study, also highlighted the failures of Lehmann’s predecessors, Bishop Albert Stohr (who oversaw the diocese from 1935 to 1961) and Cardinal Hermann Volk (1962-1982).

The study’s authors said they initially identified 657 possible victims and 392 suspected perpetrators…

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Clergy abuse survivors and advocates featured in heart-wrenching remembrances

Dr. Frank Schindler, a Maryland-based clinical psychologist, vividly recalls – more than 60 years later – the threat from his priest/school counselor/molester, who had his way with him for months when he was a five-year-old: “I was taught he was God on earth, that he could do no wrong, and these were secrets between the two of us and God; to break that seal would be a mortal sin and you’d go straight to hell.” Dr. Schindler joins a group of other survivors and advocates in the new online series, Survivors Stories, launching today/yesterday ahead of the start next week of Maryland legislative hearings on the long awaited child abuse victims reform measures aimed at providing a path to justice for all survivors, regardless when the abuse occurred. Link to this opening episode and hear more about his fight…

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Donna Von Den Bosch will never forget the time in seventh grade Fr. Joseph Maskell, her school’s notorious, serial predator-priest, just before one of the numerous times he sexually abused her in his counseling office, said, “I’ll teach you a father’s love.” Her repeated pleas for help – including to teachers and the school nurse – were all ignored. And survivor Kurt Rupprecht, who recalled his abusive priest at St. Frances de Sales Catholic Church, Salisbury, telling him, at ages 8 and 9, that submission “would make God happy,” and threatening, “If you ever tell anyone, God will kill you.”

Ms. Von Den Bosch and Mr. Rupprecht courageously share their harrowing accounts of repeated childhood sexual abuse in the latest episode of Survivors Stories, a series of short videos presented as a public service by sexual abuse attorneys/advocates from Jenner Law and Grant &…

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One of Pope Francis’ key advisors on clergy sexual abuse admitted that the pontiff’s signature effort to confront abuse and cover-up is “very often” not working, as part of a virtual conversation with Catholic abuse survivors on March 2.

Jesuit Fr. Hans Zollner spoke about Vos estis lux mundi, a sweeping set of laws issued by Francis in 2019, as part of a question-and-answer session with survivors of clergy sexual abuse sponsored by Awake Milwaukee, a Catholic group focused on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

Zollner, a member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, responded to a variety of questions from survivors Esther Harber and Mike Koplinka-Loehr and then took questions from anonymous survivors in the audience.

When he was asked whether there was recourse for survivors who feel their cases have not been properly handled, Zollner explained that there are theoretically a variety of…

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Portugal’s Catholic Church announced a handful of steps on Friday to tackle child sexual abuse within the Church – but it said suspected priests still in active roles would not be suspended unless the facts against them were clearly established.

The head of Portugal’s Bishops’ Conference (CEP), Jose Ornelas, also said that the Church would not pay reparations to victims.

The CEP met on Friday to discuss ways to tackle the issue after a report last month said at least 4,815 children were sexually abused by members of the Roman Catholic Church in Portugal – mostly priests – over 70 years.

That report by a Church-funded, one-year commission added that its findings were the “tip of the iceberg”, and commission head Pedro Strecht said more than 100 priests suspected of child sexual abuse remained active in Church roles.

Ornelas – who is himself being investigated by public prosecutors for covering up sex…

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The bishops of Portugal on Friday began taking concrete steps to respond to a damning investigative report last month that estimated well over 4,000 children have been victims of sexual abuse within the country’s Catholic Church since the 1950s.

Meeting in a plenary assembly in Fátima, the Portuguese Episcopal Conference announced the creation of all-lay diocesan commissions and a memorial to victims that will be unveiled during World Youth Day, taking place in Lisbon Aug. 1–6, among other measures.

“We reiterate our deep gratitude to all the victims who have given their testimony over the last year. Without you, it would not have been possible to reach today. Thank you,” said Father Manuel Barbosa, a spokesman for the bishops’ conference.

“We also want to leave a word of courage to all the victims who still harbor the pain in the depths of their hearts,” he added, announcing that…

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