ABUSE TRACKER

Discussions with bishops happening to request residential school apology, return of records and cultural items

National Indigenous leaders are planning a visit to the Vatican this November to seek a papal apology for the Catholic Church’s role in running residential schools and other Canadian institutions that Indigenous students were forced to attend.

National Chief Perry Bellegarde of the Assembly of First Nations and Vice-President David Chartrand of the Métis National Council told CBC News their organizations are working with the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops to send delegations.

“It’s a very big part of healing,” Bellegarde said. “Our missing children have not received the same dignity nor respect in death or in life that every human being deserves.”

The leaders said the trip to the Vatican was supposed to have happened by now, but the pandemic pushed those plans back.

Now, with the discovery of what are believed…

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All of the dioceses that had residential schools and the religious orders involved apologized decades ago, and those expressions have been renewed in recent days

There has been much commentary about a Catholic apology for residential schools, even in these pages, that I prefer to think is ill-informed rather than ill-motivated.

While I speak for no one but myself, and certainly not for the Catholic bishops, much less the Holy See, it is understandable that many have asked me about how and where the Catholic Church should apologize for its role in the grave offences against human dignity that occurred in residential schools.

All three parts of that are important: “Catholic Church,” “how” and “where.”

Notice that “if” and “when” are not part of the question. The Catholic Church, like other Christian communities, has been engaged in reconciliation and healing for 30 years. It made sincere apologies not long after…

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‘It needed to happen then. It really needs to happen now,’ Chief Felix Thomas says

For a brief period in 2016, Chief Felix Thomas allowed himself to believe that Pope Francis would come to Saskatchewan.

“We were very hopeful. We thought it was going ahead,” said Thomas, chief of the Kinistin Saulteaux Nation.

Thomas and then-Saskatoon bishop Don Bolen, who is now archbishop of Regina, had worked for months building support across Canada among First Nations residential school survivors, church leaders and all levels of government to secure a papal visit to Wanuskewin Heritage Park, just outside Saskatoon.

There, the plan was that Francis would apologize for the Catholic Church’s central role in the Indian residential school system in Canada.

But their efforts failed, and Thomas said no reason was given.

“I guess they were just hoping people would forget about it,” he said Monday in an interview with CBC News.

Thomas…

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[VIDEO]

WARNING: This video contains details some viewers may find distressing. Cardinal Thomas Collins downplayed the need for a papal apology for residential schools after Pope Francis did not deliver one on Sunday when talking about the preliminary findings announced by the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation that indicated the remains of what could be 215 children buried on the site of a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C.

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There are growing calls among Canadian Catholics for Pope Francis to come to Canada and issue an apology for the church’s role in the residential school system.

More than 3,500 people have signed a petition on Change.org, calling on the church to take more accountability measures after the discovery of the remains of 215 Indigenous children on the site of a former Catholic residential school in Kamloops, B.C.

The signatories want the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops to invite the Pope to Canda and “make a public apology on behalf of the Church in Canada for our sins of commission and omission in the matter of Residential Schools.”

“We are a group of lay people and clergy who are deeply disappointed with our official church – hurt, ashamed and saddened at the discovery of the graves of 215 Indigenous children in Kamloops,” the petition says.

The petition was started…

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Liability concerns and paralysis over how to deal with issue of abuse cited as reasons

WARNING: This story contains distressing details.

When Pope Francis stood on his balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square on Sunday, he expressed “closeness to traumatized Canadians” over the discovery of what are believed to be the remains of an estimated 215 children buried on the grounds of a former Catholic-run residential school in Kamloops, B.C. 

Yet many Canadians reacted in anger and disappointment that among the phrases spoken by the Pope, the word “sorry” was not included.

Vatican observers, however, were far from surprised. They say the lack of a formal apology from both the Pope and Canadian bishops as a group reflects an ongoing paralysis within the Vatican hierarchy over how to deal with the issue of abuse, along with a Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops that one observer has called “tragically inadequate,” and liability concerns.

…

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A Catholic priest writing of his unwanted “sexual problem” left something crucial out of the passage, a jury has heard.

“In my dreams,” Anthony William Peter Caruana told Sydney’s District Court.

“When you talk about fondling young boys, is this referring to your dreams or real life?” the 79-year-old’s barrister Bernard Brassil said on Wednesday.

“My dreams,” Caruana said.

He further explained another passage in which he writes he would change “this feeling I have towards young boys,” if by magic he could, was also in reference to his “dreams”.

The former high school teacher has pleaded not guilty to 29 historical charges, including four counts of homosexual sex.

He is accused of sexually abusing boys in band practice, at rugby training, in dorm rooms, and other parts of Chevalier College in NSW Southern Highlands, in the 1980s.

He departed in 1989 following complaints about his conduct and filled out…

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A man who alleges a former Catholic priest repeatedly molested him when he was a young boy, then continued to be active at parishes within the Diocese of San Diego for decades, said Tuesday he decided to file a lawsuit to protect children.

Beau Potter, now 54 years old, alleges Father Ramon Marrufo molested him in Rialto over the course of several years in the 1970s, beginning when the plaintiff was in second grade. Prior to 1978, the Diocese of San Diego stretched into portions of San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

Marrufo was ordained in 1976 and was assigned to various locations across San Diego County, including churches in San Diego, Oceanside, Chula Vista, Vista, Fallbrook and Escondido, according to the lawsuit, which alleges his most recent assignment was at St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Parish and School in Fallbrook from 2010 until 2019.

Potter’s lawsuit names the Diocese of San Diego…

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WHAT: At a news conference tomorrow, survivor advocates and attorneys from the law firm of Jeff Anderson & Associates will reveal the filing of two child sex abuse lawsuits against the Fresno diocese and one of its most high-profile clerics.

WHEN: Wednesday, June 9, 2021 – 1:00 PM PST

WHERE: DoubleTree by Hilton Fresno Convention Center
2233 Ventura St.
Fresno, CA 93721
Room: Salon 1 A

Room: Salon 1 A

WHO: Attorneys from the law firm of Jeff Anderson & Associates, who represent the survivors filing lawsuits under the California Child Victims Act as Joseph Does. Survivor advocate Joelle Casteix will present survivors’ statements. Attorney Elizabeth del Cid will be available for Spanish-speakers and press.

WHY: Two civil child sexual abuse lawsuits will be filed accusing Fresno diocesan priest, Msgr. Craig Francis Harrison of sexually abusing boys and Fresno Catholic officials of ignoring and concealed his crimes.

Statement of Joseph Doe: “Msgr. Harrison hurt me when I was…

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A law firm announced it will file two lawsuits against former Bakersfield priest Craig Harrison of sexual abuse and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno of ignoring and concealing his actions.

Jeff Anderson & Associates will announce the two lawsuits tomorrow at a press conference in Fresno.

Harrison announced his resignation from his position as the Pastor of St. Francis Parish and from his obligations as a Catholic priest in February.

Harrison was the subject of several investigations after allegations of sexual misconduct surfaced against him in April 2019. The Bakersfield Police Department closed their investigation without forwarding it to the County DA, while the Fresno County DA and Merced County DA did not file criminal charges.

In May, a judge has dismissed Harrison’s defamation lawsuit filed against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno.

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Fr. Brent Shelton has admitted that he was targeted as a seminarian by Fr.Jose Saldana. Fr. Saldana, who was acknowledged as an abuser by the Catholic Diocese of Dallas in 2019, was reportedly removed from active ministry in 1998. The now deceased perpetrator had multiple allegations of sexually abusing other teens.

We know that it can take victims decades to come forward, and that delayed disclosure is the norm, not the exception. It is also quite common for a survivor to gather the courage to speak up once an abuser is outed. So we are not surprised that while Fr. Shelton “thought about that hotel incident every single day since it happened over 30 years ago,” he did not approach the Dallas Bishop until the Diocesan list of abusers was published in 2019.

Susan Vance sums it up well, “As a…

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While New Mexico’s attorney general has taken credit for securing Catholic Church documents on sex abuse by clergy, saying they will be released to the public soon, a spokesperson for the Las Cruces diocese said it provided the documents voluntarily out of a desire to address the “abhorrent crime” of sex abuse, not because of a search warrant or legal obligation.

“In September of 2018, the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office requested documents related to the potential abuse of children by priests,” a Las Cruces diocese spokesperson told CNA June 7. “The Diocese of Las Cruces immediately began the voluntary process of providing the requested documents. Any statement claiming that a search warrant was presented to the diocese for the requested documents is incorrect, as is the assertion that the Diocese of Las Cruces only responded due to a legal obligation.”

“In fact, the Diocese of Las Cruces fully and…

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Attorneys for survivors who have filed child sex abuse lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester say mediation has failed. Nearly 500 claims are part of a federal bankruptcy proceeding.

Now, in documents filed Tuesday, some are asking the judge to take a rather unusual step: to allow them to move their cases to a different court.

Since Carol Dupre first shared her story of sex abuse, the months now number years. “I keep adding a year on how long I’m going to have to wait, and then I think about after that year or two, how old I’m going to be,” she said.

Dupre says it appears as though many of the legal maneuvers are an attempt to stall the proceedings. She and the others petitioned the bankruptcy court 19 months ago.

“They’re waiting for us to say, ‘Okay, we don’t care, let’s get this over with,’” she…

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Man claims he, other boys abused repeatedly by unnamed camp counsellor

A B.C. man is suing the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver and its archbishop alleging a camp counsellor sexually abused him and others at a Bible camp.

Vernon Mulvahill, in a notice of civil claim filed in B.C. Supreme Court June 7, alleges a man named only as John Doe exposed his penis to him, touched him in a sexual manner, made other children perform sexual acts on him in the same room and made the plaintiff perform oral sex on him.

The events allegedly occurred at the archdiocese’s Gambier Island Camp Latona, property in 1978 or 1979.

The archbishop and archdiocese are named as defendants. They could not be immediately reached for comment.

Mulvahill alleges John Doe engaged in behaviour intended to make him confused and to believe obeying John Doe was the only option. He alleges John…

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[Note from BishopAccountability.org: This announcement appears in both Polish and English on the website of the Polish Bishops’ Conference. Both versions are posted here.]

After a thorough analysis of the collected documentation, the Apostolic See has recognized that the accusations against Archbishop Gądecki are unfounded – we can read in the communiqué of the Apostolic Nunciature in Poland of June 8 2021.

Following formal notifications, the Holy See has conducted an investigation into the alleged negligence of Archbishop Stanislaw Gądecki in cases of sexual abuse committed against minors by a priest of the Archdiocese of Poznan and a priest of the Diocese of Bielsko-Zywiec.

„After a thorough analysis of the collected documentation, the Holy See has found the above accusations to be unfounded, and therefore the complaints filed in these cases are dismissed, and the proceedings are considered concluded,” says the communiqué.

We are publishing the full text of the…

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The Vatican has ruled that accusations of negligence against the president of the Polish bishops’ conference are groundless.

A statement published June 8 by the apostolic nunciature in the Polish capital, Warsaw, said that the Vatican had investigated allegations that Archbishop Stanislaw Gądecki behaved negligently in two cases of clerical abuse against minors. 

The Vatican investigated the claims under the norms of the motu proprio Vos estis lux mundi, issued by Pope Francis in 2019 for an experimental period of three years.

“Acting on the basis of the provisions of the Code of Canon Law and Pope Francis’ motu proprio Vos estis lux mundi, the Holy See, following formal notifications, has conducted an investigation into the alleged negligence of Archbishop Stanislaw Gądecki in cases of sexual abuse committed against minors by one priest of the Archdiocese of Poznań and one priest of the Diocese of Bielsko-Żywiec,” the statement said.

“After a thorough analysis of…

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WHO: Representatives of Nate’s Mission, survivors of clergy abuse, Phillip Aaron (Attorney for Raphael Love), representative of Congresswoman Gwen Moore’s office

WHAT: A press conference in front of the Federal Courthouse in Downtown Milwaukee where survivors of clergy abuse and a representative from the office of a prominent Black state elected official who is a survivor of childhood sexual assault will discuss racial disparities in treatment of clergy abuse victims

WHEN: Tuesday, June 8th, 11:00am 

WHERE: Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse, 517 E. Wisconsin Ave, Milwaukee, WI 53202

WHY: A new lawsuit is being filed against the Franciscans of the Blessed Virgin Mary, headquartered in Franklin, Wisconsin, under the authority of the Milwaukee archdiocese, and the Diocese of Jackson, Mississippi in the case of former Franciscan Brother Paul West, alleging discrimination and racial disparities in the treatment of Raphael Love, a Black clergy abuse victim.

Raphael, along with his brother, Joshua Love, and cousin, La…

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German Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich and Freising, 67, has submitted his resignation to Pope Francis, saying that bishops must begin to accept responsibility for the institutional failures of the Church in handling the clerical sexual abuse crisis.

Cardinal Marx released a statement on June 4 and, with the Pope’s permission, a copy of the letter dated May 21, in which he told the Pope: “It is important to me to share the responsibility for the catastrophe of the sexual abuse perpetrated by representatives of the Church over the past decades.”

Pope Francis did not immediately accept the cardinal’s resignation. In his statement, the cardinal said Pope Francis asked him to continue his ministry as archbishop “until his decision is made”.

In his letter to the Pope, Cardinal Marx said that “the investigations and reports of the last 10 years have consistently shown that there have been many personal failures…

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They may have attracted positive PR for the Church, but the new measures for dealing with clerical abuse are a million miles away from being good enough

I don’t know whether he lacks the will or the courage, or whether he is incapable of asserting real and moral authority. I don’t know whether he has been undermined from within, or is just an old man incapable of seeing anything resembling a bigger picture.

I don’t know whether he or the people around him still regard the institution as more important than the people it is supposed to serve, but sometimes abuses. Or maybe it’s just — and I don’t know the answer to this either — he and those around him think we’re all fools.

Whatever the answer to those questions, I don’t believe it is possible to read the most recent changes to canon law — the law of…

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The shocking resignation of one of the most important cardinals in the Church today

It came as a complete shock.

Cardinal Reinhard Marx, arguably one of the Catholic Church’s most powerful prelates, publicly announced on Friday that he’s asked Pope Francis to accept his resignation as Archbishop of Munich and Freising.

Why is this so shocking?

Marx is only 67 years old — eight years short of reaching the normal retirement age — and he is one of the pope’s closest and most influential advisors.

And although it has not been reported with the attention it deserves, he’s also been one of the driving forces in getting the Vatican to devote time and resources to addressing the clergy sex abuse crisis.

He’s long advocated focusing on the needs of victims, rather than protecting the interests and image of the Church.

One of the Church’s most determined bishops

The hefty German…

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Pope Francis led hundreds of pilgrims and visitors in St. Peter’s Square in a moment of silent prayer for the Indigenous children who died in Canadian residential schools and for their grieving families.

After praying the Angelus June 6, the pope told the crowd, “With sorrow I am following the news from Canada about the shocking discovery of the remains of 215 children, pupils at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in the Province of British Columbia.”

“I join the Canadian bishops and the whole Catholic Church in Canada in expressing my closeness to the Canadian people who have been traumatized by this shocking news,” the pope said. “This sad discovery further heightens awareness of the pain and sufferings of the past.”

The Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation reported May 30 that using ground-penetrating radar an estimated 215 bodies had been found in unmarked graves at the site of the former…

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Survivors of child sex abuse in Pennsylvania have waited far too long for a chance to bring their abusers to court and finally begin the healing process. It has been 16 years since the first major grand jury report on sex abuse was released by District Attorney Lynne Abraham on the Philadelphia Archdiocese and nearly three years since Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s grand jury report that revealed the Catholic cover up was an ongoing problem across 6 other dioceses.

These survivors—not to mention the many more victims of abuse that occurred in every other context—remain barred from pursuing justice due to our commonwealth’s long-standing restrictive statutes of limitations (SOL).

The good news is the state House of Representatives recently passed—with overwhelming bipartisan support – H.B. 951, which would create a two-year civil liability window for child sex abuse survivors. Immediate passage of the bill presents the best…

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“Never let temporary situations determine eternal thinking about you and your life.”

[VIDEO]

Father Michael Pfleger spoke candidly about his return to Saint Sabina Catholic Church after being cleared of sex abuse allegations and the months he spent away from his congregation and his ministry while those allegations were investigated.

“Yesterday was great. First of all, I was nervous because I haven’t celebrated mass here in five months,” Pfleger said. “But as soon as I was out that door and people just started clapping and shouting, and you know, I felt at home.”

After five months away while the Archdiocese of Chicago investigated allegations of misconduct decades ago, Pfleger celebrated his first mass on Sunday after he was cleared of those accusations.

“I worked to say I’m going to forgive, I’m going to let it go, I’m going pray for them and all the others who were taking delight in…

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The sudden departure of Russell Moore is forcing an overdue conversation about the crises of American Christendom.

“The presenting issue here is that, first and foremost, of sexual abuse,” Moore wrote. “This Executive Committee, through their bylaws workgroup, ‘exonerated’ churches, in a spur-of-the-moment meeting, from serious charges of sexual abuse cover-up.”

At the ERLC’s National Conference in 2019, Moore interviewed Rachael Denhollander, a former gymnast who was the first woman to publicly accuse Larry Nassar, the USA Gymnastics doctor, of sexual assault. (Nassar was the perpetrator in the largest sexual-abuse scandal in sports history and will serve the rest of his life in prison.) In the interview, Denhollander criticized the executive committee for how it had handled the case of Jennifer Lyell, who had accused a Southern Baptist seminary professor of abuse.

“The story Rachael told is accurate,” Moore wrote, “and [my wife] and I know that because we were,…

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The Archdiocese of Milwaukee said Attorney General Josh Kaul doesn’t have the authority, and that the investigation is “anti-Catholic bigotry”

The Archdiocese of Milwaukee is pushing back against a recently announced attorney general investigation into sexual abuse by Catholic clergy, calling it a display of “anti-Catholic bigotry” and a violation of the First Amendment. 

In a letter from the archdiocese’s attorney, Frank LoCoco of the Milwaukee firm Husch Blackwell, contends Attorney General Josh Kaul doesn’t have the authority to investigate the Catholic dioceses of the state and that doing so would go against the U.S. Constitution and state laws. 

In the letter, LoCoco suggests that the investigation may be motivated by anti-religious sentiments, and that the probe is looking back too far in time. 

The first-term, Democratic attorney general announced the investigation in April. 

Led by Kaul’s Department of Justice, the probe focuses on abuse allegations against clergy and…

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The Church continues to pray for abuse survivors and keep their needs a priority

Just a few weeks ago, Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul issued a press release and held a news conference to announce that he was launching a review of old reports of clergy abuse within the Catholic Church. It is with sorrow and regret that once again I have to write to you on this topic.  When we received the request, I asked my staff to meet with the Attorney General to find a pathway for him to lawfully achieve his goal.  We believe we have offered a way to provide what the Attorney General has requested while continuing to walk with survivors, maintaining the Church’s rights and avoiding unnecessary expense.

The Church continues to pray for abuse survivors and keep their needs a priority. Since 1989, the Archdiocese of Milwaukee has continuously provided outreach to abuse…

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Archbishop Jerome E. Listecki’s recent blog post attempting to justify his refusal to cooperate with the Wisconsin Attorney General’s investigation into Catholic abuse is both disturbing and disingenuous. When the Archbishop writes that the scandal “was the fault of criminals who used the sanctity of the priesthood to commit crimes,” it seems to us that he is willfully ignoring the truths uncovered by earlier probes around the country and the world, such as the report issued in 2018 in Pennsylvania.

That is, the scandal was not just about the abusers; the bigger scandal was that Catholic officials used a “playbook” to conceal the truth from parishioners and the public. Bishops ignored the pain of the victims and the danger to other children. Instead, they purposely moved perpetrators from parish to parish. We are convinced that these cover ups continue to this day, and…

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Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Who shall watch over the Watchers? That is just one of the questions raised by the complex and deeply troubling circumstances of the Diocese of Knoxville, only some of which have been reported.

The Catholic Herald has learned significant details regarding several cases of clerical misconduct and mismanagement in Knoxville.

The details of one case in particular involve senior Church leaders in the US and abroad, and raise questions regarding oft-cited structural weaknesses in the Church’s new “metropolitan” system for investigating abuse and coverup allegations.

The overarching story of trouble in Knoxville is really the result of convergence.

At least two discrete stories, each with its own set of native complexities, are interwoven with one another and with the structural weaknesses in Pope Francis’s own highly publicized reform of the Church’s modes and methods of investigating and trying abuse and coverup allegations.

Those two stories both regard the…

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[AUDIO]

Host Evan Solomon discusses the week’s top political stories with AFN National Chief Perry Bellegarde and FSIN Chief Bobby Cameron, Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller, Mitchell Garabedian, a lawyer known for representing victims in the Boston Catholic priest sexual abuse scandal, and Professor Pam Palmater, from Ryerson University.

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By most accounts, Fran O’Connell seemed to have the world at his feet as a teen in the 1970s. But on one evening, he found himself holding his father’s gun to his temple.

At 14 years old, O’Connell was a brute of a boy. He stood over 6 feet tall and was a dominant athlete at Holyoke Catholic High School. He came from a large, Irish-Catholic family. A natural leader, he was the kid who organized neighborhood kickball and pick-up games. He turned his fair share of heads among his female classmates. His dad was among the Holyoke Police Department brass, serving as chief for a time.

These factors combined offered O’Connell a solid pedigree in a working-class city that valued family and faith — and applauded his thunder on the basketball court and football field.

But on that night, he took his father’s revolver down…

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The unwillingness or inability to do the hard work of healing from one’s past is fueling the crisis of abusive behavior among clergy, according to a seasoned traumatologist with theological training.

“As Richard Rohr has wisely noted, suffering that has not been transformed will be transmitted,” explained John Loren Dotson, a licensed psychotherapist and certified expert traumatologist who also is an ordained pastor.

Dotson added: “There is simply no substitute for doing the hard work of healing from one’s past.”

That’s why as he continues to hear weekly news about clergy sexual abuse and the abuse of power among both clergy and lay leaders within the church, he wants to get across one simple message: All pastors need therapeutic help to understand their past and how it influences their responses in the present.

Making this kind of mental and emotional work as essential as learning basic theology would dramatically reduce…

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Another Polish bishop has been sanctioned by the Vatican and ordered to withdraw from public life, for covering up sexual abuse of minors by clergy in the predominantly Catholic country. 

“Acting on the basis of Canon Law provisions and Pope Francis’ motu proprio Vos estis lux mundi, the Holy See conducted proceedings, following formal reports, into reported negligence by Bishop Tadeusz Rakoczy,” Poland’s southern Krakow Archdiocese said in a weekend communique. 

“As a result of the completed investigation, it has decided to ban him from participating in any public celebrations or meetings, to order him to lead a life of penance and prayer, and to prohibit his attending bishops’ conferences plenaries.” 

The disciplining of 83-year-old Rakoczy, who retired as bishop of Bielsko-Zywiec in 2013, is the latest blow to hit Poland’s bishops, several of whom were accused in 2019 and 2020 TV documentaries of violating Polish law and Vatican guidelines by brushing…

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Three priests — including one who long served in Olean — have been placed on leave in response to claims in a lawsuit filed last month that they sexually abused a boy in the 1990s, the Diocese of Buffalo announced over the weekend. 

Bishop Michael Fisher said Saturday the priests all “deny ever committing any acts of abuse” but were placed on leave pending an investigation. 

The diocese also notified the Erie County District Attorney’s Office of the claims, which emerged in a lawsuit last month. 

Rev. Gregory Dobson, the former rector of Olean’s Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels, who is retired but continues to assist in various parishes of the diocese, was one of the priests placed on administrative leave.

The Revs. Adolph Kowalczyk, pastor of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Church in Orchard Park, and Mieczyslaw “Matt” Nycz, pastor of SS. Peter and Paul in…

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An activist Roman Catholic priest cleared by an Archdiocese of Chicago investigation into claims that he sexually abused several boys decades ago returned to the pulpit of his longtime church on Sunday for the first time in five months.

“It’s good to be home,” the Rev. Michael Pfleger repeatedly told congregants of the Faith Community of St. Sabina, describing his time away during the investigation as a “painful nightmare.”

Pfleger, 72, was placed on leave in January amid allegations from two brothers who said Pfleger sexually abused them as children starting in the 1970s. A third man later also alleged that Pfleger molested him once in 1979 when he was 18. Last month, the archdiocese concluded there was “insufficient reason to suspect” that Pfleger had abused children. A police investigation remains open.

His first service back at the largely Black church on Chicago’s South Side was as spirited as ever,…

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“It’s good to be home,” an emotional Rev. Michael Pfleger said to a packed and jubilant crowd Sunday at St. Sabina Church — his first time leading a congregation in five months.

The long-tenured South Side priest famous for his activism had been sidelined from the pulpit as the Archdiocese of Chicago investigated complaints by two brothers who alleged in January that Pfleger sexually abused them in the early 1970s when they were minors. Pfleger was reinstated in May as senior pastor at St. Sabina, which celebrated his anticipated return at a Sunday morning service.

“The last five months have been a roller coaster of hurt and anger and depression and pain,” the pastor said during the service, which featured spotlights, a full band and choir, and dancers. “I stand here this morning back with my church, family and friends, and I am grateful. … God is real.”

Parishioners expressed…

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VICTORIA’S Supreme Court has fined some of Australia’s biggest newspapers, websites and radio stations $1.1 million for their coverage of Cardinal George Pell’s now-overturned conviction in a sexual abuse case.

In all, 12 media groups admitted breaching a legal order in 2018 banning them from reporting the verdict at the time.

Justice John Dixon rejected arguments that their news reports – even though they did not name Cardinal Pell – were in the public interest.

Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, was fined about $430,000, for its reports on its news.com.au site, The Daily Telegraph and other newspapers, while Nine Entertainment, publisher of The Age newspaper and owner of Channel Nine, was fined over A$600,000 for its stories.

The Australian Financial Review received a $162,000 fine, and Nine’s Today Show received a $30,000 fine.

The reporting ban – enforced through a legal order – was introduced at the start of Cardinal Pell’s…

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After thousands of reported cases of sexual abuse, the Vatican has finally updated its canon laws for handling cases within the Church — standards which haven’t been touched since the 1980s.  The new canon laws, or a set of laws set by the Roman Catholic Church to be followed by members of the religion, sought to streamline and clarify how to deal with child sexual abuse. The biggest of these changes included requiring all priests and nuns to become mandated reporters, making grooming for sex or child pornography illegal, and enforcing punishment within the Church like defrocking.

Throughout all this time, the Catholic Church has spent over $400 billion in settlements to victims and their families. Over half of the nearly 40,000 priests in the U.S. have had at least one formal allegation of abuse against them. This wasn’t just one bad egg — this is an ongoing crisis. A crisis…

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Pontiff fails to issue direct apology for church’s role in residential schools where children were abused

Pope Francis has said he was pained by the discovery of the remains of 215 children at a former Catholic school for indigenous students in Canada and called for respect of the rights and cultures of native peoples, but stopped short of the direct apology some Canadians had demanded.

Speaking to pilgrims and tourists in St Peter’s Square in the Vatican during his weekly blessing, Francis urged Canadian political and Catholic religious leaders to “cooperate with determination” to shed light on the finding and to seek reconciliation and healing.

Francis said he felt close to “the Canadian people, who have been traumatised by the shocking news”.

Two days ago, the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, said the Catholic church must take responsibility for its role in running many of the schools.

The residential schools…

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Smith College knew two decades ago that a faculty member had been accused of sexually abusing a minor, but chose not to act on those allegations, allowing him to teach at the college until recently.

On Wednesday morning, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield released an expanded list of former employees who had been “credibly accused” of sexually abusing minors. The list included the name of Robert Ellis Hosmer Jr., a Smith lecturer from 1989 until 2016 who previously worked at Holyoke Catholic High School from 1968 to 1979.

Wednesday evening, Smith College President Kathleen McCartney and Provost and Dean of the Faculty Michael Thurston wrote in a letter to faculty, students, staff, and alumni that a review of Hosmer’s employment records revealed a 2001 letter from a person who said Hosmer abused him at a high school prior to Hosmer working at the college. McCartney and Thurston wrote that no allegations from anyone…

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Smith College said last week that it knew a faculty member was accused of sexually abusing a minor two decades ago and that it should have done something at the time. Instead, the instructor of English, Robert Ellis Hosmer, was allowed to teach at Smith until his retirement in 2016, and he’s taught on and off since then as well. The Daily Hampshire Gazette reported that Hosmer’s name was released by the Roman Catholic diocese this month on an expanded list of former employees credibly accused of sexual abuse, and that Hosmer worked at Holyoke Catholic High School near Smith from 1968 to 1979.

In response to the news, Smith president Kathleen McCartney and provost Michael Thurston wrote in an all-campus memo that they’d learned Hosmer’s personnel file included a 2001 letter from someone who said Hosmer had abused him in the 1970s, when he…

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Three Catholic priests provided an Orchard Park elementary school student with access to four girls and encouraged the children to participate in sexual acts that the victim fears were secretly filmed in the 1990s, according to a Child Victims Act lawsuit against the Buffalo Diocese.

Bishop Michael W. Fisher put the priests on administrative leave pending an investigation by the diocese’s Independent Review Board. In a statement issued Saturday by the diocese, the priests were identified as:

• Rev. Adolph Kowalczyk, pastor of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Church in Orchard Park.

• Rev. Gregory Dobson, who is retired but continues to assist in various parishes of the diocese.

• Rev. Mieczyslaw “Matt” Nycz, pastor of SS. Peter and Paul in Williamsville.

An attorney for the now 35-year-old Erie County man said Saturday that his client is worried that recordings of the incidents may still exist and could have…

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The Rev. James Altman calls himself “a lowly priest” serving a blue-collar city in western Wisconsin. But when his bishop demanded his resignation – after a series of divisive remarks about politics and the pandemic – Altman refused to oblige and has since raised more than $640,000 from his conservative supporters to defend himself.

While not unprecedented, a Catholic priest’s refusal to abide by a bishop’s call to resign is certainly rare. Altman’s case, which has garnered national attention and made him a celebrity of sorts among conservative Catholics, has further fueled the divide between them and those urging a more progressive, inclusive church.

Altman, pastor of St. James the Less Roman Catholic Church in La Crosse, first came into prominence before the 2020 election with a fiery video on YouTube.

“You cannot be Catholic and be a Democrat,” said Altman, admonishing people to “repent of…

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After spending seven years being abused at a residential school in Saskatchewan, Fred Gordon says he is not surprised that the remains of 215 children were found buried near a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C.

The residential school survivor told CTV News Channel on Monday that he attended Lebret Indian Industrial Residential School from 1944 to 1951. Gordon says he was kidnapped when he was nine years old and taken to the school.

“One day [my parents] were out picking berries, and I was playing with two other kids in the front yard of the house… when an RCMP, a priest and two nuns came and just grabbed me out of the yard and threw me in a wagon,” Gordon said in an interview from Duck Lake, Sask.

“That’s kidnapping. We had no say in those days,” he added.

He explained that his aunt, Evelyn, was killed by the…

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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday he is “deeply disappointed” the Roman Catholic Church has not offered a formal apology and made amends for its role in Canada’s former system of church-run Indigenous boarding schools after the remains of 215 children were located at what was once the country’s largest such institution.

Trudeau called on the church to “step up” and take responsibility after years of silence.

“As a Catholic, I am deeply disappointed by the position that the Catholic Church has taken now and over the past many years,” Trudeau said.

“When I went to the Vatican a number of years ago I directly asked His Holiness, Pope Francis, to move forward on apologizing, on asking for forgiveness, on restitution, on making these records available, and we’re still seeing resistance from the church, possibly from the church in Canada.”

But Trudeau said the church is “silent” and “not…

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[Via Kamloops This Week]

The United Nations’ human-rights special rapporteurs are calling on Canada and the Catholic Church to conduct prompt and thorough investigations into the finding of an unmarked burial site believed to contain the remains of 215 Indigenous children at a British Columbia residential school.

The UN special rapporteurs said Friday the investigations should examine the circumstances and responsibilities surrounding these deaths, including forensic examinations of any remains to allow for the identification and registration of missing children.

“We urge the authorities to conduct full-fledged investigations,” said the UN experts in a statement.

“Large scale human rights violations have been committed against children belonging to Indigenous communities, it is inconceivable that Canada and the Holy See would leave such heinous crimes unaccounted for and without full redress.”

The Holy See is the central governing body of the Catholic Church.

The UN experts also called on Ottawa to undertake…

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The recent discovery of 215 childrens’ remains at a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia is strengthening the resolve of survivors to share their stories about the system and educate young people.

Rounded up on her northern Ontario first nation when she was just eight years old, Susan Hunter remembers well the day she left home.

“We left in a plane. It landed on its belly in Fort Albany and then, when the hatch was opened, there were canoes to take us the rest of the way to the residential school and the students were from all over Ontario,” Susan Hunter told CTV News Toronto Tuesday.

Hunter was there for seven years, she left at age 14.

“Just when you think getting on with your life, something else crops up to mess it up again,” Hunter said. “You get re-traumatized, but you have to tell your truth.”

That truth,…

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It was a spring day in 1883 when John A. Macdonald, Canada’s first prime minister now comfortably into his second stint in office, explained why it was so important that Indigenous children be separated from their parents, forcibly if need be.

“When the school is on the reserve, the child lives with its parents, who are savages. … He is simply a savage who can read and write,” he said, as quoted in the record of debates in the House of Commons.

“Indian children should be withdrawn as much as possible from the parental influence, and the only way to do that would be to put them in central training industrial schools, where they will acquire the habits and modes of thought of white men.”

So went the cruel racism that would set in motion decades of physical and sexual abuse at what are now known as residential schools.

A…

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[The Current on CBC Radio One, with audio]

Matt Galloway: Deep generational wounds have been opened yet again in this country, survivors, those who love them and many more Canadians are grieving. This week after the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc first Nation announced, a preliminary report shows the remains of 215 children unmarked on the site of the former Kamloops Indian residential school. Dennis Saddleman attended that same school for 11 years beginning in 1957. And the news wasn’t easy for him to process. But he has been reaching out, connecting with friends and continuing the work he started as a child to heal and stay, in his words, in balance. Part of that is through his poetry. You might have heard his voice on this show earlier this week, reading his powerful poem, Monster, about his experience at residential school. Dennis’s mother was Nlka’pamux and his father was Syilx and…

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[Via Yahoo News. With video and transcript.]

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: “As a Catholic, I am deeply disappointed by the position the Catholic Church has taken now and over the past many years…”

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Friday blasted the Catholic Church, saying it must take responsibility for its role running so-called residential schools for indigenous children, after the discovery of the remains of 215 children at one former school.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU : “We expect the Church to step up and take responsibility for its role in this.”

The discovery last week of the remains of the children – some as young as three years old – at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia which closed in 1978, has reopened old wounds and is fueling outrage about the lack of information and accountability.

Between 1831 and 1996, Canada’s residential school system forcibly separated about 150,000 children from their homes.

…

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A Roman Catholic pastor in Tennessee confessed in an open letter that as a 19-year-old seminarian he was the target of sexual advances by an older priest later accused of abusing other teens, and admits he failed to forcefully sound the alarm about this “troublesome person.”

Father Brent Shelton insisted he was “not a sexual abuse victim, as such, but I am a witness to priestly predation, which I was complicit in covering up.”

Shelton did not say in the letter why he chose this year to divulge that Father Jose Saldana, now deceased, allegedly “forced himself on top” of him at a Red Roof Inn in Texas more than three decades ago.

“I’ve thought about that hotel incident every single day since it happened over 30 years ago, but I cringe whenever any priest or bishop speaks of the need for ‘healing’ in these situations,” Shelton, who…

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In a letter to Pope Francis, Cardinal Reinhard Marx said he saw his resignation as an opportunity to take responsibility for the abuses of past decades.

[Includes video excerpts from the speech by Cardinal Marx.]

Cardinal Reinhard Marx, a leading figure in Germany’s Roman Catholic Church and a member of the Pope Francis’s advisory council, said on Friday that he had offered his resignation in a personal gesture to take responsibility for sexual abuses by priests over the past decades.

Speaking to reporters outside of the offices of the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising, the cardinal, who has not been accused of abuse, said he had been considering the decision for months. After spending the weeks leading up to Easter in prayer and reflection, he wrote a letter to the pope, asking to be relieved of his duties.

“It is important to me to share the responsibility for the…

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The Archdiocese of Minneapolis and St. Paul said Rev. Kevin McDonough should be barred from positions where he’s tasked at protecting kids.

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis has finished its review into Rev. Kevin McDonough, finding he “failed, albeit not intentionally, to adequately keep children safe.”

McDonough, who has not been accused of abuse, was the vicar general for the archdiocese from 1991-2008, and from 2008-2013 he was the delegate for safe environment. He was responsible for overseeing investigations related to reports of priest sexual abuse and misconduct, and providing support services to abuse survivors. 

The Archdiocesan Ministerial Review Board (MRB) conducted a “comprehensive investigation and examination” of McDonough’s role in the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse crisis, Tim O’Malley, director of ministerial standards and safe environment, said in a June 3 news release.

The MRB found McDonough “had not always demonstrated…

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The Archdiocese of Milwaukee will not turn over its sealed records to a state investigation into clergy sex abuse.

On Thursday, The Associated Press reported that the archdiocese refused to turn over its sealed records to the state Department of Justice as part of its investigation into clerical sex abuse. The archdiocese claimed the records were sealed as part of a 2012 bankruptcy case.

In April, Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul had announced the launch of an investigation into sexual abuse in the state’s Catholic dioceses and at least three religious orders. He asked representatives of the dioceses to an April 26 online meeting.

Four of the state’s five dioceses, as well as the Jesuits and the Norbertines, have already disclosed the names of priests credibly accused of sex abuse. The Diocese of Superior is gathering its own list, with the intent to publish it by the end of the…

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[See also the German text of the declaration, and the letter to Pope Francis.]

I have asked the Holy Father on May 21, 2021 to accept my resignation as Archbishop of Munich and Freising and handed over the decision about my further service to him. He has now informed me that this letter may be published and that I should keep performing my service as bishop until his decision is made.

In the past months, I have repeatedly thought about my resignation, introspected and tried to make the right decision in prayer and in the spiritual dialogue by „discerning the spirits“. The events and debates of the past weeks, however, only play a subordinate role in this context.

Over the past years, I have repeatedly been asked questions which I have always on my mind and which constantly challenge me. An American journalist asked me during a conversation…

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One of Germany’s most senior Catholic clerics has offered his resignation to Pope Francis. He said in his letter that he wanted to take a share of responsibility “for the catastrophe of sexual abuse” by church members.

German Cardinal Reinhard Marx has offered Pope Francis his resignation from his position as archbishop of Munich and Freising, saying the Catholic Church had reached a “dead point.” He said he hoped his resignation would help show that a new start was possible.

“In essence, for me it is about sharing responsibility for the catastrophe of sexual abuse by church officials in the past few decades,” Marx wrote to the pope, explaining his reasons for the decision.

Marx said investigations and reports of the past 10 years showed him there had not only been “a lot of personal failure and administrative errors,” but “also institutional and systemic failure” within the Catholic Church.

Recent discussions have shown “that some in the…

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[Via ABC News]

A leading German cardinal and confidant of Pope Francis has offered to resign over the church’s mishandling of clergy sexual abuse scandals and declared that the church had arrived at “a dead end.”

A leading German cardinal and confidant of Pope Francis, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, offered to resign Friday over the Catholic Church’s “catastrophic” mishandling of clergy sexual abuse cases, declaring in an extraordinary gesture that the scandals had brought the church to “a dead end.”

The archdiocese of Munich and Freising, where Marx has served as archbishop since 2007, published his resignation letter to the pope online, in multiple languages, and the cardinal said Francis had given him permission to make it public.

“It is important to me to share the responsibility for the catastrophe of the sexual abuse by Church officials over the past decades,” the 67-year-old Marx wrote in…

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German Cardinal Reinhard Marx, one of Pope Francis’ closest advisors, has asked the pontiff to allow him to resign as the leader of the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising as a sign of responsibility for the “systemic failure” of Catholic Church leaders over decades in responding to clergy sexual abuse.

In a shocking letter to Francis, which Marx released to journalists June 4, the cardinal says he wants to “share the responsibility” for the way priests and bishops mishandled abuse cases. He also admits he feels “personally guilty” for trying to protect the reputation of the church when dealing with victims.

“To assume responsibility, it is … not enough in my opinion to react only and exclusively if the files provide proof of the mistakes and failures of individuals,” writes Marx in the letter, dated May 21. “We as bishops have to make clear that we also…

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A Catholic priest in Sydney’s inner west and a police officer have been charged after an investigation into the alleged possession and distribution of child abuse material.

Father Joseph Kolodziej, the parish priest at All Hallows Catholic Parish Five Dock, was asked to step down from his public role at the parish and its neighbouring primary school this week after child abuse material was allegedly found on his phone.

The principal of All Hallows Catholic Primary School in Five Dock, Helen Elliott, wrote to parents saying Mr Kolodziej would not be involved with the school nor live at the parish next door while the police matter is investigated.

“I understand this news may come as a surprise, given Fr Kolodziej’s active involvement in our community, and you or your child may be experiencing feelings of disappointment and concern,” she wrote.

“Please be assured that the safety and wellbeing of our students…

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For decades, The Catholic Church’s darkest secrets have been kept in the shadows. But they will soon be exposed for everyone to see.

The documents contain details of sexual abuse.

“We will have these volumes available for the general public,” said New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas.

In 2018, Balderas forced the three catholic dioceses in New Mexico to turn over all of their documents about clergy sexual abuse to his office. The goal was to see if any living priest could be criminally prosecuted.

“I can assure you that had we not begun a criminal investigation, and that we forced a search warrant under the diocese, they would to this day, probably never released,” Balderas said. “A law enforcement office had to get involved and had to bring search warrants of which we had probable cause to get these documents in order to intervene on behalf of citizens.”

Knowing…

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An Australian court on Friday ordered a dozen media firms to pay a total of A$1.1 million ($842,000) in fines for breaching a suppression order on reporting the conviction, since overturned, of former Vatican treasurer George Pell for child sexual assault.

The 12 media outlets, mostly owned by Nine Entertainment Co (NEC.AX) and Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp (NWSA.O), pleaded guilty in February to breaching the gag order on reporting on the trial and conviction of the cardinal, after the state agreed to drop all charges against journalists and editors.

Reporters, editors and radio and television presenters had faced the threat of jail.

Supreme Court of Victoria Justice John Dixon convicted the media firms saying they had “frustrated the suppression order as they diminished its purpose or efficacy by reporting information contrary to the terms of the order”.

Pell’s conviction for abusing two choirboys was overturned…

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[Via iHeart Radio; nine-minute audio file.]

The Catholic Church is refusing to apologize for its role in residential schools and will not release the documents. Evan Solomon discusses this with Boston attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who has represented thousands of survivors in sexual abuse lawsuits against the Catholic Church. Garabedian is famously portrayed in the movie ‘Spotlight.’   Listen to The Evan Solomon Show podcast on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. 

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A former NSW Labor Party official and priest who abused boys on “abhorrent” child sex tourism trips in south-east Asia, during which he also produced abuse images, has been jailed for 17 years.

Peter Andrew Hansen pleaded guilty in February to 31 charges, including eight counts of engaging in sexual intercourse with children under 16 outside Australia, and 20 counts of producing child abuse material.

In addition to the Commonwealth offences relating to the production of child abuse material in Asia, the 31 charges include two counts of the NSW offence of possessing child abuse material. Hansen received a separate sentence for those counts of four years and three months, to be served concurrently with his 17-year sentence for the Commonwealth offences and backdated to his 2018 arrest at Sydney airport.

From 2014 until his arrest, Hansen used Facebook and an encrypted instant message program called Brosix to connect with…

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A plaque of a deceased Roman Catholic priest accused in a sex abuse scandal has been replaced with that of the Virgin Mary at the Long Island church he led worship in, according to a parishioner.

A plaque marking Msgr. Mario Costa’s contributions to St. Paul the Apostle in Old Brookville was covered up with white cardboard-like material that was held in place by blue contractor’s tape last month. Costa was accused in a clergy abuse scandal and was identified on a list of over 100 credibly accused clergy members, who attorneys for the Diocese of Rockville recently included in legal papers as part of a bankruptcy court filing, Newsday has reported.

The covered up plaque has since been replaced with a picture of the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ and a central figure of forgiveness in the Roman Catholic religion.

In a statement,…

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The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis said the Rev. Kevin McDonough is “fit for ministry” but will bar him from leadership positions involving the protection of children.

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis announced Thursday that it has completed an “exhaustive review” into the Rev. Kevin McDonough, concluding the former point person on clergy sex abuse for the archdiocese “failed, albeit not intentionally, to adequately keep children safe.”

As a result of the investigation, the archdiocese has deemed McDonough “fit for ministry” but will bar him from holding leadership positions involving protection of children. He will be allowed to continue his work as pastor of Incarnation Catholic Church in south Minneapolis.

McDonough was the vicar general of the archdiocese for nearly 20 years, responsible for investigating reports of misconduct and providing services to victims. He has not been accused of abuse, but rather of mishandling…

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Pope Francis on Tuesday promulgated the apostolic constitution Pascite gregem Dei, replacing Book VI of the Code of Canon Law, which codifies the penal law of the Latin Catholic Church. 

The revised text contains a number of important changes to the way in which penalties are applied in the Church, and the crimes which must be punished. It also includes the systematic incorporation of numerous laws promulgated in the Church in recent years, but not directly added to the Code of Canon Law.

Canonists and academics will likely spend months poring over the new canons, and unpacking the likely implications — both intended and unintended. 

But as they dive into the text, some changes will likely be regarded as laudable legal reforms, while others will eventually face criticism. And some aspects of the new law are already raising complex interpretative questions for canonists.

What will be praised? What will be…

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Boy Scouts of America, which filed for bankruptcy protection a year ago to guard against a flood of sexual-abuse lawsuits, now faces a new public relations problem in Michigan: a criminal investigation.

The state police and attorney general announced Tuesday the two law enforcement groups have launched a joint investigation targeting accusations of sex abuse in the Boy Scouts and are asking for tips that may lead to prosecutions.

In response, BSA said it “wholeheartedly shares in the Michigan attorney general’s commitment to provide support for survivors,” and agreed to share information and cooperate with the investigation.

The youth organization also said it requires all employees and volunteers to “promptly report any allegation or suspicion of abuse to law enforcement so that allegations can be investigated by experts,” and asserted that incidents described in the claims filed in its bankruptcy case “have already been reported to local Michigan law enforcement.” 

Tuesday’s announcement came after a holiday weekend in which scouts across the…

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Pope Francis has changed the Roman Catholic Church’s laws to explicitly criminalise sexual abuse.

It is the biggest overhaul of the criminal code for nearly 40 years.

The new rules make sexual abuse, grooming minors for sex, possessing child pornography and covering up abuse a criminal offence under Vatican law.

The Pope said one aim was to “reduce the number of cases in which the… penalty was left to the discretion of authorities”.

The changes to the Code of Canon Law took 11 years to develop and included input from canonist and criminal law experts.

The Catholic Church has been rocked in recent years by thousands of reports of historic sexual abuse by priests, and cover-ups by senior clergy, around the world.

Victims and critics had complained for decades that the previous laws were outdated, designed to protect perpetrators and were open to interpretation.

The new code replaces the last…

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Pope Francis on Tuesday issued a major revision of Catholic Church laws regulating clerical sex abuse, fraud and the attempt to ordain women. It is known as an apostolic constitution with the title, Pascite Gregem Dei, or “Tend the Flock.”

In the works since 2009, the revision is the first in four decades since the version Pope John Paul II approved in 1983. And it appears to be in response to numerous clerical sex abuse and financial scandals that have rocked the church and shaken the trust of the faithful across the world over the last quarter century.

After handling scandals secretively with murky decision-making, and treating sexual relationships between priests and consenting adults as sinful but not a crime, the revisions reflect a new understanding in the church that abuse of power is an underlying cause of sexual abuse.

Church law now explicitly criminalizes the sexual abuse of adults…

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 In a long-awaited reform of the Catholic Church’s penal code, Pope Francis on Tuesday (June 1) issued stronger penalties for crimes including sexual abuse, financial malfeasance and female ordination, applying the principle that “mercy requires correction.”

More than 70% of the canons on the code of canon law were changed by the reform, with only 17 articles remaining untouched. The punishments are “applied with canonical equity and having in mind the restoration of justice, the reform of the offender, and the repair of scandal,” the document reads.

If a cleric is found guilty of sexually abusing a minor, canon law will require that he be stripped of his office and, if necessary, defrocked. According to current church legislation, put in place by St. John Paul II in 1983, bishops were allowed more discretion in applying canon law, resulting in a patchwork accountability system.

The new rule also applies to clerics who…

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A priest from LaSalette Missionaries serving as pastor for St. Mary’s Church in Amsterdam and St. Stephen’s Church in Hagaman has been placed on administrative leave for alleged sexual abuse of a minor.

Rev. Jeffrey L’Arche was put on leave by Bishop Edward Scharfenberger immediately after the diocese learned L’Arche was on the Diocese of Springfield’s clergy offenders list, the Albany Diocese said Wednesday. The list was released on June 2.

There was evidence that L’Arche was involved in the sexual abuse of a minor between 1976-1981, alleged the Diocese of Springfield’s Misconduct Commission.

An investigation by Praesidium Inc., at the behest of the LaSalette congregation, said the allegation was “highly questionable” and deemed not credible. Subsequently, L’Arche was added to the Diocese of Springfield’s offender list albeit with an asterisk and explanation of the investigation findings.

L’Arche denies the sexual abuse allegation.

The reverend, who was born in Guilderland…

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[For other episodes, listen here. See also a transcript of this episode.]

The world’s most admired woman lived a life dedicated to helping the poor – but was it always in their best interest? 

After Mother Teresa became famous, controversial claims about her work began to emerge. Dangerous medical practices? Secret baptisms? In this episode, we meet Mother Teresa’s biggest critics and hear from sisters who were there.

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[This is a transcript of the podcast.]

ERIKA LANTZ: The day after Mother Teresa died, her body lay on a bed of ice in the Mother House in Kolkata. Hundreds of people stood outside in the rain. Some were crying. Inside, sisters knelt or stood around her body. They prayed the rosary aloud and approached one at a time to kiss her feet.

The chapel was too small for all the visitors who wanted to pay their respects, so her body was carried through the streets in an open coffin to a church, where she lay in state for a week. Her funeral was in a sports arena in Kolkata. Some 15,000 people attended, including dignitaries from around the world: the presidents of Albania, of Ghana, of Italy. The Queen of Spain. The Queen of Belgium. The Queen of Jordan. First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.

The Prime Minister of…

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Hundreds of clergy sexual abuse survivors, who had filed claims against the Archdiocese of New Orleans after it declared bankruptcy, were surprised to receive letters from the church’s lawyers last month. 

The letters included personal information, like the full names and addresses of the survivors, and three “requests”, which the letter stressed required no action on the parts of survivors. 

The requests included the “Request by Original Committee and Consent” which came from the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors, the “Request by Commercial Committee and Consent,” which came from the Official Committee of Unsecured Commercial Creditors, and “Request by Debtor and Consent,” which came from The Roman Catholic Church of the Archdiocese of New Orleans. 

The letters sparked fear for survivors, who were not expecting to be contacted directly by the Archdiocese. “Some of my clients were uncomfortable with the fact that this letter was sent directly to them.” Kristi…

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[This page also includes a video message from Bishop William Byrne.]

To download and print the complete report, please click here.

[The following letter appears as an embedded PDF on the page.]

May 24, 2021

Dear Friends in Christ,

Since my arrival in the Diocese of Springfield, I have been committed to transparency and communication particularly with regard to the scandal of the sexual abuse of minors by clergy, religious and lay church staff. It is an open wound that has remained for far too long.

Today I am writing to address these painful sins and crimes that have broken countless hearts, shattered lives and have cast a dark shadow over our Church.

In recent months I have met with many survivors and family members. I have heard from these courageous individuals that the way the diocese responded to their reports of abuse was…

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It took David O’Regan 40 years, he says, to build the courage to admit that, as a boy in 1962, he was abused sexually by a priest.

Michael Carpino says he was abused by the same priest in 1973, and the Diocese of Springfield paid him a $75,000 settlement in 2008. But, it wasn’t until Wednesday that Carpino and O’Regan could find the name of their abuser on the diocese’s list of credibly accused abusers.

The late Richard Ahern, who served at Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Pittsfield from 1970 to 1976, was among the 41 names that the diocese added Wednesday to its list, which now stands at 61.

Ahern’s inclusion on the expanded list Wednesday brought “some closure,” but it didn’t erase the hurt of the decades during which the diocese refused to publicly acknowledge…

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Pledging a new era of transparency and healing, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield on Wednesday released an updated list of clergy and nonreligious personnel accused of sexual abuse dating back 80 years.

The new accounting represents a significant policy shift for the diocese. The list grew from 21 to 61 after officials opted to add previously excluded categories of the accused, including dead priests, laity and clergy from religious orders who were not ordained in the Springfield diocese but served in various assignments locally. (Scroll down to see the full list below.)

In addition to adding new names, the updated list breaks down each entry with the accused’s former role in the diocese, assignments within the diocese, time working in the organization, the nature of the “reported conduct,” the timeframe of the allegations and whether the priest or layperson had more than one credible…

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The Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield has released an expanded list of church officials and employees who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse.

The diocese — comprising 79 parishes and seven missions across Berkshire, Franklin, Hampden and Hampshire counties — released its updated list of credible allegations on Wednesday. At a press conference, Bishop William Byrne noted that the list now contains 61 names, an increase from the 21 previously included on the list. Byrne said the list is part of his commitment to transparency and healing.

“‘I’m well aware that the past efforts in the Diocese of Springfield have not achieved that outcome,” Byrne said. “Make no mistake about it, we still have far to come.”

The expanded list now includes categories of church employees not previously included among those credibly accused of sexually abusing a minor: priests who were deceased when an allegation was made, those who…

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The Irish religious sister and doctor Maura O’Donohue campaigned against abuse of power by priests around the world. She helped survivors with discipline and sensitivity.

One of the many peculiar things about Catholicism is that even the outstanding women of this church remain almost unknown. One of them is the Irish nun Maura O’Donohue of the Medical Missionaries of Mary. Unusually for a woman of her generation, she had an academic degree, was appointed to management positions in her mid-twenties, spoke several languages, and managed a budget of millions. But what is possibly her greatest distinction of all, where she seems at first glance to have failed: in the fight against sexual abuse. This failure cannot be blamed on her, because survivors could not have found a more competent, committed, and better networked advocate than she.

The life and actions of O’Donohue, who died in 2015, were characterized by loyalty…

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[Via San Francisco Chronicle]

The Vatican on Tuesday released a long-awaited update to the criminal section of its Code of Canon Law, the internal legal system that regulates the life of the 1.3 billion-member Catholic Church and operates independently from laws in the secular world.

In this, the oldest continuously operating legal system in the Western world, the stiffest penalties include being defrocked, excommunicated, fired or fined — or being forbidden from living in a particular place. The aim of the punishments is to “repair the scandal, restore justice and reform the offender.”

The last time the code was rewritten was in 1983, and before that in 1917. The changes published Tuesday concern only one of the code’s seven sections, or books: the penal law section, or Book VI.

In many ways the changes published Tuesday integrate piecemeal reforms that have been made over the years to address clergy sexual…

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The new rules explicitly criminalize the sexual exploitation of adults by priests who abuse their authority, and the changes also apply to laypeople with power in the church.

[Note: This article was included in Abuse Tracker yesterday, but we are including it again because it has been revised significantly.]

Pope Francis has broadened the Roman Catholic Church’s definition of sexual abuse by revising its penal code to explicitly acknowledge that adults, and not only children, can be victimized by priests and powerful laypeople who abuse their offices.

The Vatican announced on Tuesday that Francis had made changes to the Vatican’s Code of Canon Law, the legal framework for the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics, after years of consultations.

The revisions — the first since 1983 — are part of the church’s continued process of seeking to address gaps in its response to the sexual abuse scandal that has devastated the Catholic…

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Pope Francis has ordered a sweeping revision of the Church’s Canon Law, toughening up regulations on abuse which now include lay people who commit offences while in office. 

The changes were made after a 14-year process of study of the Church’s laws, and is the most significant updating of Canon Law since the 1983 code was published. The revisions concern book VI of the code, which covers penal law, and are significant as Canon Law is the tool which regulates Church discipline.  

The revisions make clear that abuse can be committed by a cleric against an adult, and not just a minor, and states that “any one of the faithful who enjoys a dignity or performs an office or function in the Church” can be punished for abuse. Any priest, it says, who abuses his authority to force someone to engage in sexual…

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On Tuesday the Vatican published a long-awaited revision of Book VI of the Code of Canon Law, unveiling a brand-new penal system including a handful of new crimes and making punishment for offenses an obligation, rather than a suggestion.

According to officials who worked on the project, the core idea is to overcome the idea that punishment for crime is somehow unmerciful or unpastoral, transforming the administration of justice into a routine feature of the life of the church.

One of the most highly anticipated changes to the code was its language and handling of the crime of sexual abuse, which was previously included under the umbrella of sins committed “against the sixth commandment.”

Under the new version of the code, which was promulgated Tuesday in an apostolic constitution titled Pascite Gregem Dei, or “Tend the Flock,” there is now an entire chapter dedicated to the issue under the title of,…

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Msgr. Markus Graulich, under-secretary of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, discusses how the revisions aim to bring greater justice in the context of other offenses and grave delicts as well as those involving clerical sexual abuse.

After thirteen years of consultation, reviews, and deliberations the Vatican today published Pascite gregem Dei (Tend the Flock of God), Pope Francis’ new apostolic constitution containing revisions to the section of the Code of Canon Law dealing with crimes and penalties, including those related to clerical sexual abuse. 

Signed on the Solemnity of Pentecost, the Holy Father said he hoped the 21 pages of revised norms would “prove to be an instrument for the good of souls” and that pastors would apply them “with justice and mercy, in the knowledge that it belongs to their ministry, as a duty of justice — an eminent cardinal virtue — to impose penalties when the good of the faithful demands…

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The new rules explicitly criminalize sexual exploitation of adults by priests who abuse their authority and also apply to lay people with power in the church.

Pope Francis has broadened the Roman Catholic Church’s definition of sexual abuse by revising its penal code to explicitly acknowledge that adults, and not only children, can be victimized by priests and powerful laypeople who abuse their offices and standing among the faithful.

The Vatican announced on Tuesday that Francis had made changes to the Vatican’s Code of Canon Law, the legal framework for the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics, after years of consultations. The revisions are part of the church’s continued process of seeking to address gaps in its response to the sexual abuse scandal that has devastated the Roman Catholic faith over the last quarter century.

While they incorporate recent rules already in force, the changes also go beyond, to reflect a new…

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The Vatican said Tuesday that Pope Francis has signed off on a rewrite of the universal Catholic Church’s internal penal system, updating a version in place since the 1980s and laying out clearer penalties for the sexual abuse of minors.

The changes, although years in the making, are in part a response to the church’s raft of abuse and financial scandals — which have often been magnified by secretive, highly subjective decision-making about how and whether to apply punishments.

Pope Francis, in a letter accompanying the revisions, said the laws were intended to be clearer and simpler, while reducing the number of instances in which penalties are left to the “discretion of authorities.”

“It is necessary that these norms be closely related to social changes and the new needs of the People of God,” the pope wrote.

The changes give church authorities — whether in the Vatican or a far-flung parish —…

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Pope Francis on Tuesday issued the most extensive revision to Catholic Church law in four decades, insisting that bishops take action against clerics who abuse minors and vulnerable adults, commit fraud or attempt to ordain women.

The revision, which has been in the works since 2009, involves all of section six of the Church’s Code of Canon Law, a seven-book code of about 1,750 articles. It replaced the code approved by Pope John Paul II in 1983 and will take effect on Dec. 8.

The revised section, involving about 90 articles concerning crime and punishment, incorporates many existing changes made to Church law by Francis and his predecessor Benedict XVI.

It introduces new categories and clearer, more specific language in an attempt to give bishops less wiggle room.

In a separate accompanying document, the pope reminded bishops that they were responsible for following the letter of the law.

One aim…

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A Press Conference in the Holy See Press Office highlights the changes made to Book VI of the Code of Canon Law.

Changes made to Book VI of the Code of Canon Law were discussed on Tuesday morning at a press conference in the Holy See Press Office.

Speakers included Bishop Juan Ignacio Arrieta, Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Legislative texts, and Archbishop Filippo Iannone, President of the same council.

Goal of the changes

Archbishop Iannone noted that, in recent years, “the relationship of interpenetration between justice and mercy has at times been misinterpreted” and this has “fed a climate of laxity” in the application of criminal law. However, recent scandals and irregular situations have led to the need to reinvigorate canonical penal law. 

The reform, presented on Tuesday and considered necessary and long overdue, “aims to make universal penal norms ever more suitable for the protection of the common…

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With the Apostolic Constitution “Pascite Gregem Dei,” Pope Francis reforms Book VI of the Code of Canon Law, continuing a revision begun by Benedict XVI and applying penal sanctions to more criminal offenses. The new text is a more agile tool for correction, which is to be applied promptly to “avoid more serious evils and to soothe the wounds caused by human weakness.”

“Tend the flock of God, guarding it not by constraint but willingly, as it pleases God” (cf. 1 Pet 5:2). The Apostolic Constitution “Pascite Gregem Dei”, with which Pope Francis reforms Book VI of the Code of Canon Law on penal sanctions in the Church, begins with these words of the Apostle Peter. The new text, presented on Tuesday in the Holy See Press Office, enters into force on 8 December.

“In order to respond adequately to the needs of the Church throughout the world,” explains Pope…

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