ABUSE TRACKER

Catholic church must reckon with its ‘painful errors’, pontiff tells crowd in Lourdes during four-day tour

The pope has called on the Catholic church to heal “deep wounds” and “painful errors”, before a meeting with survivors of child sexual abuse as he continues his four-day visit to France.

Addressing a crowd in a large field near the Catholic shrine of Lourdes on Sunday, Pope Leo XIV called on the church to reckon with its past, without directly referencing sexual abuse scandals in France that affected at least 330,000 children over seven decades.

“In order to heal the deep wounds, infidelities and ⁠painful errors that have occurred within [the church], we must humbly place ourselves under the Lord’s purifying gaze,” the first US pope told the estimated crowd of 150,000 people.

Leo is due to privately meet seven survivors of child sexual abuse by French clergy on Sunday after…

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The idea for the chaplaincy, inspired by similar projects in Ireland, emerged from the “collective thoughts of survivors living in the Diocese of Plymouth.”

The Diocese of Plymouth is developing the first chaplaincy in the English and Welsh Catholic Church for survivors of sexual, spiritual, emotional and institutional abuse.

It will be a “pastoral ministry that seeks to offer faith-sensitive, independent and survivor-centred support,” explained the diocesan safeguarding team in their summer newsletter.

“This ministry recognises that survivors’ journeys are complex and that the Church has a responsibility to respond with humility, care and integrity,” said the team.

“This project is truly unique in the Catholic Church in England and Wales seeking to achieve meaningful change in the way the Church responds to and supports those who have suffered harm,” the letter continued.

Martin Christmas-Nelson, head of safeguarding for the diocese, told The Tablet the concept of the chaplaincy “was  born…

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[See also the text of the letter by the Rupnik victims.]

In an open letter addressed to Pope Leo XIV, five alleged victims of sexual abuse at the hands of Slovenian Father Marko Rupnik said the silence and lack of information regarding the artist’s canonical trial added to their suffering.

The letter, which was shared with OSV News Sept. 23 by their lawyer, Laura Sgro, said the “prolonged silence” they have experienced was “a further and ongoing form of violence that bears down like a heavy boulder on the violence we have already endured.”

“Sexual, physical, psychological, and spiritual violence; an enduring violence inflicted upon the soul, to which is now added this new and agonizing violence of silence and abandonment by the justice system,” the alleged victims said.

The letter was signed by Gloria Branciani, Mirjam Kovac, Sister Samuelle, Vida Bernard and an anonymous alleged victim using the…

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Mosaics by Marko Rupnik, a Slovenian priest-artist, were covered up after at least 20 women accused him of sexual and psychological abuse. He is now on trial.

Paris – The gold-flecked mosaics adorning the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary were installed in 2008 for the 150th anniversary of what the Catholic Church recognizes as miraculous apparitions of the Virgin Mary in Lourdes — one of the faith’s most sacred pilgrimage sites.

But when Pope Leo XIV visits on Saturday, the mosaics will be conspicuously covered. Their creator, Slovenian priest-artist Marko Rupnik, has been accused by at least 20 women — including current and former Catholic nuns — of sexual, physical and psychological abuse.

Rupnik, 71, is one the most prominent living Catholic artists, and the mosaics in Lourdes are among his many works housed in more than 200 churches across the globe. He was openly celebrated and championed…

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Court in Mendoza sentences former nun Kumiko Kosaka to 20 years in prison for her role in the sexual abuse of deaf children at a religious Instituto Próvolo in Mendoza Province.

A court in Mendoza on Thursday sentenced former nun Kumiko Kosaka to 20 years in prison for sexually abusing deaf children at a religious institute in western province.

Kosaka, 51, was initially acquitted in 2023 of sex crimes committed against children at the Instituto Próvolo in Luján de Cuyo between 2005 and 2016.

But last month, Mendoza’s Supreme Court overturned the acquittal and ordered that she be sentenced.

She was found guilty of two counts of sexual abuse as an accomplice and three as the principal offender.

Kosaka, who left the religious order after she was accused, appeared in court accompanied only by her lawyer.

She was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, an AFP reporter observed.

After sentencing, she…

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A former Catholic nun was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment in Argentina on Thursday over a notorious clerical abuse scandal involving a boarding school for hearing-impaired children.

Kumiko Kosaka, a Japanese national who is now aged 51, was convicted at her second trial of aggravated sexual abuse and of covering up for priests who abused children aged between four and 17.

The Provolo affair, so-called after the Antonio Provolo Institute in Mendoza, where dozens of children suffered horrific abuse for decades, rocked Argentina when it came to light a decade ago.

At the first trial held in 2019, two priests, a gardener and a former choir boy were given prison sentences of between ten and 45 years.

Revelations from those proceedings led to a second trial in 2023 of a group of nuns and female staff members accused of being complicit in, and of covering up the abuse.

All nine,…

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Pope Leo XIV on Friday arrives in France for a four-day visit – his fifth Apostolic journey since becoming pontiff last year – during which he hopes to repair the Catholic Church’s standing after sexual abuse scandals while also addressing issues such as the need to regulate AI. FRANCE 24 guides you through his visit.

• Motto for the visit: “That the world may have life.” The motto, The Vatican News writes, is a “a call to hope and communion, encouraging people to overcome divisions in order to share peace, reconciliation, and fraternity, signs of new life in the world”.
• Main themes: Europe, peace and unity
• Security: In Paris alone, some 14,000 police officers, gendarmes, and military personnel and 2,500 firefighters will be on duty while the pope moves around the city on Friday. That number will only be slightly lower during his Mass at the…

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The Pope is making the first official papal visit to France in 18 years, during which he is expected to meet survivors of sexual abuse, EU leaders and large crowds of worshippers.

Church bells will quite literally be ringing across France this Friday morning as Pope Leo XIV lands on the tarmac of Paris-Orly airport for the first official papal visit to the country in 18 years.

The Bishops’ Conference of France (CEF) described the decision to ring bells for seven minutes “as a simple and symbolic gesture” to mark the beginning of the Pope’s apostolic journey and allow people “to take part” from wherever they are.

From addressing EU leaders and meeting with victims of sexual violence within the Church to parading through Paris on his popemobile, the pontiff has a packed four days ahead of him.

The paternal grandmother of the Chicago-Born Pope Leo XIV — who is…

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In short:

Former Catholic priest Robert Hickman has been jailed in Western Australia for sexually abusing two girls in Perth in 1990.

The 81-year-old was previously jailed in New South Wales for similar offences.

In a statement to the court, one of the victims described her abuser as a “very evil man”.

A former Catholic priest and serial paedophile who sexually abused two young girls in foster care 36 years ago has been jailed for more than two years.

Robert James Hickman, 81, was previously imprisoned for sexual offences in New South Wales against multiple victims.

Hickman had pleaded guilty to sexual penetration of a child, and indecent dealing with a child in Perth in 1990.

WA District Court Judge Karen Shepherd described his actions as a “breach of trust” given his position, and too serious to justify a suspended term.

He was sentenced to two years and six months…

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Pope Leo XIV is to begin an official visit to France on Friday, with several thorny issues hanging over the trip, from clerical sexual abuse to the country’s new assisted dying law.

Here are some of the key issues the pontiff is expected to face while on the first official visit to France by a head of the Roman Catholic Church in 18 years:

Clerical abuse

The Vatican announced in August that Pope Leo XIV will meet victims of clerical sexual abuse during his visit.

The leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics has promised to further efforts to reform the Church in the wake of the global sexual abuse scandal.

A 2021 inquiry found that clergy or lay members of the Church had abused about 330,000 people as minors in France, over the span of 70 years.

The Church’s reputation has since been hit by further scandals, including a…

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Wendy Little Bear is one of about 100 survivors of sexual abuse, including roughly 10 members of the Wabanaki Nations, who reached a recent multimillion-dollar settlement with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland.

For decades, Wendy Little Bear, 56, struggled to cross the bridge leading to Indian Island. Just over the bridge to the Penobscot Nation’s reservation stands St. Ann’s Catholic Church.

When Little Bear sees the church, she remembers the year she spent living on Indian Island with her family at age 7 — the year she said both a priest and a nun sexually abused her. Her family moved away after her father discovered the priest’s abuse, she explained on a recent morning, but the memories stayed with her.

Little Bear is one of about 100 survivors of sexual abuse, including roughly 10 members of the Wabanaki Nations, who reached a multimillion-dollar settlement with the Roman Catholic Diocese…

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It’s not clear when the Vatican will decide or whether the Vatican will reveal the results.

The interview phase of the Vatican’s investigation into how Baton Rouge Bishop Michael Duca handled an accusation of sexual misconduct by a priest has ended and the material has been sent to Rome, a witness told the Register.

Luke Zumo, who filed the complaint that triggered the investigation, said he received an email message Monday, Sept. 21, from New Orleans Archbishop James Checchio saying that the prelate has completed his report and sent it to the Vatican’s Dicastery for Bishops. The archbishop was responding to an email message Zumo sent late last week requesting an update, Zumo said.

A spokesman for the Archdiocese of New Orleans declined comment Tuesday afternoon. A spokesman for the Diocese of Baton Rouge contacted Monday night did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Zumo told the Register…

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Addressing the scourge of sexual abuse, the archbishop of Panama requested the services of the Transparency Commission, a project sponsored by Notre Dame Law School and Madrid’s Villanueva University.

[See also the executive summary (in English) and the report (in Spanish).]

The archbishop of Panama, José Domingo Ulloa Mendieta, stated that “we cannot remain silent in the face of abuse” during his presentation of the report “Assessment of Institutional Responses (AIR) in cases of sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable persons” within the Archdiocese of Panama between 2001 and 2025.

The report by the Transparency Commission (TC), a pilot project and the first from an interdisciplinary group of independent experts on addressing and preventing abuse within ecclesial settings, was presented on Sept. 22 at the Santa María La Antigua University auditorium in Panama City.

Speaking during the presentation, Ulloa emphasized:…

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Statute of limitations reform may finally come to Ohio, but the Catholic Church lobby and the insurance industry will likely push back, fearing lawsuits from decades-old childhood sexual abuse cases

The controversial case of former priest and confessed rapist Geoff Drew could result in another law change in Ohio: statute of limitations reform.

Ohio Sen. Bill Blessing, a Republican from Colerain Township, said he is willing to sponsor legislation to allow prosecutors to file criminal charges in childhood sexual abuse cases regardless of when it happened. This comes after prosecutors could not charge Drew for sexually abusing a second alleged victim because the statute of limitations had expired.

“This issue just continues to fester,” Blessing said. “It’s not going to get any better for anyone until we move beyond that, and that includes the church.”

Blessing also wants to eliminate time limits for victims to sue their abusers and the…

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A janitor at Our Lady of Lourdes who said she was sexually assaulted and raped multiple times in 2025, claimed Father David Sanchez dismissed her concerns.

Father David Sanchez, the pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes, has resigned amid a lawsuit accusing church leadership and the Archdiocese of Louisville of mishandling allegations of sexual abuse.

According to a letter obtained by WHAS11 and distributed by Archbishop Shelton Fabre, Sanchez resigned as pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes effective Wednesday.

“I am fully aware that the past few days have been a difficult time,” Fabre wrote. “While Sanchez remains a priest in good standing, he does not want to be the source of further unrest in the parish.”

Fabre said he accepted Sanchez’s resignation and placed him on administrative leave.

Father John Schwartzlose, the parish’s associate pastor, has been appointed temporary administrator.

“These appointments will likely continue until July of 2027…

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Facing concerned parents and calls for reform, St. Tammany Parish School Board members plan to launch a districtwide investigation into how schools and administrators are complying with rules for reporting child abuse after two Lyon Elementary administrators pleaded guilty for failing to do so.

During a seven-hour special meeting Monday evening at the CJ Schoen Administrative Complex in Covington, the board said it will vote next month to hire a third-party firm to probe all 55 schools and the district’s central office for “compliance with administrative processes, communications and mandatory reporting.”

The school system confirmed Monday that Lauryn Faciane, 50, the former principal of Lyon, and Tonya Barth, 55, who previously served as the school’s assistant principal, are no longer employed by the district.

Both were arrested in May and later pleaded guilty to charges of failure to report abuse of a child. Each had been on administrative leave and…

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About 2,000 people who reported being sexually abused by priests or other church representatives have sought reparations from a French independent body created to address decades of abuse, the organization said Tuesday as it prepares to end its five-year mission.

The Independent National Authority for Recognition and Reparation, or INIRR, said its work extended beyond financial compensation to include psychological support.

INIRR’s report comes ahead of Pope Leo XIV’s four-day visit to France, beginning Friday, during which he is expected to meet privately with seven survivors of sexual abuse by priests and other Catholic personnel.

France’s Catholic bishops’ conference agreed to provide reparations after a 2021 report estimated some 330,000 children were sexually abused over 70 years by priests or other church-related figures in France. The report described a “systemic” cover-up by church officials and urged the French Catholic Church to respect the rule of law in France.

Here’s a…

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Two priests who served at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish in Springfield have been removed from ministry after separate allegations of improper relationships were reported to law enforcement, according to the Diocese of Springfield.

In a statement issued Friday, the diocese said the Rev. Paolo Bagattini was suspended July 22 after it received a report alleging improper behavior with a minor that began in late 2022 while he was serving at the parish.

“He remains suspended at this time,” the Diocese of Springfield said.

In an Aug. 30, 2026, church newsletter, Bagattini said he could not return to Springfield because of health issues.

He said he was experiencing macular degeneration in his left eye and a heart condition that had caused him to lose consciousness three times. The condition required him to slow down and avoid stress.

Bagattini said he was consulting with doctors and that…

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[See also the letter by the Rupnik victims.]

Pope Leo XIV’s visit to Lourdes this week will be key to his message of respect for human life in all stages and conditions, which is the theme of his Sept. 25–28 pastoral visit to France. Images of the pontiff meeting ailing pilgrims will complement the trip’s official motto: “That the World May Have Life.”

But the visit to the world-famous shrine will also be the moment where he will most directly address clerical sexual abuse, a crisis that has cast a shadow over the Church in France since a landmark abuse report in 2021.

Lourdes will be the setting Sept. 27 for the pope’s private meeting with sex abuse victims and a speech to the French Catholic bishops, who continue to deal with fallout from the abuse crisis. The shrine itself has been touched by controversy in recent years due…

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He trusted a Catholic priest with his secrets in the sacred space of a confessional, but at the same time, he claims the cleric was abusing him.

This, according to a 19-year-old man who recently disclosed that not one, but two priests at Our Lady of Mount Carmel church had taken advantage of him sexually during a particularly vulnerable period. The Republican does not identify alleged victims of sexual abuse.

One, the Rev. Paolo Bagattini, began abusing him when he was just 15, the victim alleges. He was the priest who took the boy’s confessions and sponsored him for his confirmation, an important rite of passage for Catholics.

The second, the Rev. Robert White, began abusing him only after he turned 18, according to the victim’s attorney.

“I have text messages from Father White to my client referencing coconut oil massages,” said Springfield…

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Saint Matthews KY – Louisville priest has resigned amid sexual abuse allegations against an employee at his Catholic church.

Gladis Garcia, who worked for Our Lady of Lourdes, claims in a lawsuit that she was raped and sexually harassed by her supervisor.

Her attorney, John Spalding, said when Garcia tried to report the abuse to the priest, he dismissed her claims and her employment was threatened.

“She went to the priest at Our Lady of Lourdes, Father David Sanchez, and reported it. And we allege that he didn’t do anything about it, that he did not believe her, that, in fact, he told her not to talk about it. Then he tried to silence her,” Spalding said.

“This case is about getting to the bottom of did they live up to their own standards, and if they did not, why not? and how can we prevent this from happening in…

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[This is a Google translation of the Italian text.]

Your Holiness,

We are five victims of Fr. Marko Ivan Rupnik: Gloria Branciani, Mirjam Kovac, Sister Samuelle, Vida Bernard, and Pia—the last of whom has chosen to use a pseudonym due to a well-founded fear of reprisals.

We decided to write to you on the occasion of your trip to France—and specifically your visit to Lourdes, where you will meet abuse victims like us—at a place where Fr. Rupnik’s mosaics will no longer be visible on the basilica’s façade, following the decision by His Excellency Monsignor Jean-Marc Micas, Bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes, to cover them permanently. This was a powerful and courageous gesture that we deeply appreciated, not least because we have never experienced an atmosphere of solidarity; on the contrary, we have always faced significant opposition and hostility.

We know only from media reports that a trial against…

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[See also the Italian text of the letter.]

Five alleged victims of abuse by a former Jesuit priest in Slovenia have demanded justice from the Vatican ahead of Pope Leo XIV’s trip to France this week.

In a letter published in Rome on Wednesday by the women’s lawyer, the former nuns from Slovenia appealed to the head of the Catholic Church to conclude ongoing proceedings against the mosaic artist and former clergyman Marko Rupnik in a special Vatican court.

The 71-year-old, also from Slovenia, is suspected of having sexually abused more than 20 women, the majority of whom are former nuns, in his religious community over several decades.

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Rupnik co-designed the main doors of the Basilica of Our Lady at the Marian pilgrimage site of Lourdes, one of the cities which Leo is expected to visit during his trip.

However, he will not see the mosaics. By decision…

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The Archdiocese of Panama is in need of significant new procedures to both prevent and respond to incidents of abuse, said an international research group in a new assessment.

Among the recommendations contained in the assessment are improved procedures for listening to abuse victims, better record-keeping, reparation measures for victims, and clear codes of conduct.

The evaluation was a pilot project for the Transparency Commission, an international group of experts on clerical abuse, which hopes to carry out similar assessments in other dioceses.

The independent commission, which is funded by Notre Dame Law School and the Universidad Villanueva Foundation in Spain, consists of more than a dozen experts from eight countries, specializing in the areas of canon law, theology, accountability, communications, sociology, and other fields.

The Transparency Commission was tasked last year by Archbishop José Domingo Ulloa Mendieta of Panama to evaluate the local Church’s management of abuse complaints over…

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Universities’ review of Panama Church abuse highlights underreporting, failures

[See also the report (in Spanish).]

The Catholic Church in Panama has recorded dozens of complaints alleging sexual abuse of minors and other vulnerable people by priests, according to a report released Tuesday.

Prepared by two Catholic universities at the request of the church, the report found 37 complaints for sexual abuse were filed against clergy members between 2001 and 2025.

The Archbishop of Panama City, Jose Domingo Ulloa, said in a presentation of the report that it sought to determine how the church had managed “this entire reality of sexual abuse against minors.”

He repeated an apology he made in 2023 to the victims and said five clergy members were defrocked after being convicted of sexual abuse.

Around the world, the Catholic Church has been tainted by scandals involving decades of child sexual abuse by pedophile priests.

The Panama…

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[See also the report (in Spanish).]

Archbishop José Domingo Ulloa Mendieta of Panama reiterated the Church’s commitment to safeguarding and accountability after an independent inquiry he ordered revealed decades of negligent record-keeping and a system that prioritized perpetrators rather than victims.

At a Sept. 22 press conference at the Catholic University of Santa Maria La Antigua (USMA), Archbishop Ulloa said he didn’t request the inquiry “to defend ourselves, to justify past decisions, and much less to protect the image of our institution.”

“We have done it because we know that only by sincerely recognizing our successes, our weaknesses, and our mistakes can we strengthen a true culture of care, prevention, and protection,” he said.

The Transparency Commission, an international, multidisciplinary group of experts in canon law, theology, communications, clinical psychology, sociology, and institutional accountability, conducted the inquiry.

Led by Father Jordi Pujol, a canon lawyer and professor of…

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Five victims of ⁠alleged ⁠abuse by a prominent priest ⁠with Vatican ties urged Pope Leo on Wednesday to press ​for the conclusion of a nearly year-long Church trial of the cleric, saying a ‌lengthy and secret process was ‌denying them justice.

In an open letter ahead of Leo’s four-day visit to France, ⁠where ⁠the pope is hoping to repair the Church’s standing after abuse ​scandals there, victims of Rev. Marko Rupnik said their treatment reflects poorly on the Church’s commitment to helping victims.

“This is the message being conveyed … that it is useless to ​report abuse to ecclesiastical authorities, because nothing happens anyway and no one will ⁠be ⁠held accountable,” read the letter.

The ⁠victims ​said they had received no updates about the Church trial and had not been ​able to offer testimony. 

They ⁠urged Leo to press for a fair trial “so that the judgment and its outcome,…

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When an ailing Pope John Paul II visited the French shrine at Lourdes in 2004, on his last foreign trip, he delivered a forceful condemnation of abortion and euthanasia as he gasped for air during Mass.

Pope Leo XIV is expected to make a similar appeal to protect life when he visits France this weekend and also prays at Lourdes. One of Christianity’s most-visited pilgrimage destinations is especially popular for sick people because of its association with miraculous cures.

Leo’s message will likely land differently, since France’s National Assembly in 2024 enshrined abortion as a constitutional right and recently gave final approval to a bill allowing adults with incurable illnesses to receive lethal medication. It was the culmination of years of debate over end-of-life care in France and comes as other countries in Europe and the Americas have increasingly legalized assisted dying, though British lawmakers recently voted down a bill allowing it.

Catholic teaching…

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Pope Leo XIV, during his four-day visit to France beginning Friday, will meet privately with seven survivors of sexual abuse by priests and other Catholic personnel. The outcome will be closely watched by critics who say the church has not done enough to confront the problem.

The meeting is scheduled for Sunday in Lourdes, one of Catholicism’s most important pilgrimage sites. Some survivors’ groups have criticized the decision to select individuals rather than representatives of established organizations.

The seven survivors said in a joint statement last week that they do not claim to represent all survivors.

“Engaging in dialogue does not mean endorsing,” they said. “Being received does not mean abandoning our demands.”

“Each of us is taking part in this meeting in our own name, free to express our own views, convictions and choices,” they added.

The French Bishops’ Conference said the group includes people who were abused as minors…

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The charity arm of a cloistered New Zealand commune was stripped of its tax-exempt status Tuesday after an investigation found the trust’s funds enabled “serious wrongdoing” by the religious group, including the use of child labor and failing to report sexual crime.

Gloriavale, a conservative Christian sect, is based on a sprawling ranch on New Zealand’s South Island, where about 600 people live on land owned by the Christian Church Community Trust and work as volunteers at the trust’s businesses.

The government’s Charities Registration Board said Tuesday that the group’s charitable status will be revoked for three years beginning Sept. 23.

Funds provided by Gloriavale’s trust allowed the group “to operate in ways found to be unlawful and inconsistent with the wellbeing of trust beneficiaries,” the charities board said in a statement.

Calls to remove the group’s charitable status grew after the former leader Howard Temple was convicted in 2025 of sexually…

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• Summary

• Pope Leo leaves on Friday for three-city tour of France
• First US pope expected to address AI, future of Europe
• Trip five years after crushing report on abuse by French clergy
• Church has been ‘deeply wounded’ by scandals, bishop says

Pope Leo heads to France on Friday for the first formal visit by a pope in nearly 20 ​years, which Catholic leaders hope will repair the Church’s standing after a crushing 2021 report on child abuse by priests sparked nationwide shock.

Leo, who will meet abuse ‌survivors during the four-day trip, is also expected to draw large crowds for an outdoor Mass in central Paris and will address French, UN and European leaders in separate events on his whirlwind, three-city tour.

“Pope Leo’s visit to France has sparked a real tidal wave” of interest, retired French Bishop Marc Stenger told Reuters. Some 600,000 people…

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Ghislaine Magoarou, 65, was 9 years old when her teacher, Brother Gabriel Girard, pulled shut the curtains of their classroom in a fishing town in northwest France and raped her.

That incident marked the start of a months-long cycle of abuse at the now-shuttered Catholic school that eventually led Magoarou to attempt suicide by throwing herself ​into the sea.

“I had gone swimming with friends and simply let myself sink,” Magoarou recalled during a walk along the beach in Loctudy with three other survivors. “I ‌let the waves carry me away, and I had absolutely no desire to come back up. I felt at peace in the water, as if I were being cleansed.”

POPE DUE TO MEET FRENCH SURVIVORS

Magoarou is one of at least 330,000 French minors who were abused between 1950 and 2020 by priests, religious figures, or laypeople working in Church institutions. Those figures were revealed…

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Understanding Trauma Bonds in Spiritual Contexts:

A trauma bond is a strong emotional attachment that forms between a person who has been harmed and the person harming them.

Note: Please be aware that this article contains discussion of spiritual abuse and grooming, and their psychological effects. Readers who have experienced grooming or abuse in religious settings may find some content activating. If you are currently working with a therapist or psychologist, you may find it helpful to read this alongside that support. If you are not, and you find the content distressing, please consider reaching out to a mental health professional. Support is available through: Lifeline: 13 11 14 (24 hours) Beyond Blue: 1300 22 4636 (24 hours) 1800RESPECT: 1800 737 732 (national sexual assault, domestic and family violence counselling service, 24 hours). Full Stop Australia: 1800 385 578 (24 hours, formerly CASA). Beyond Blue online chat: beyondblue.org.au 1800RESPECT…

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Paula Kaempffer

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Office of Ministerial Standards & Safe Environment
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Gemma Hoskins, Baltimore teacher who investigated murder of nun in Netflix’s ‘The Keepers,’ diesCayla HarrisMay 3, 2023
Gemma Hoskins, an advocate for survivors of sexual abuse, speaks during a press event for “The Keepers” in 2021. (Kaitlin Newman/The Baltimore Banner)

Gemma Hoskins, a former Maryland Teacher of the Year known for investigating the local murder of a nun in Netflix’s 2017 documentary series “The Keepers,” died Sunday.

Her death was announced on social media Monday morning by podcaster Shane Waters, a frequent collaborator with whom she co-hosted “Foul Play: Who Killed Sister Cathy?”

Hoskins was a student of Sister Cathy Cesnik at Archbishop Keough High School and spent years investigating Cesnik’s 1969 murder even before being featured as an advocate in the Netflix series. Hoskins and other students believed Cesnik’s murder may have been covered up by authorities because the nun suspected Father A. Joseph Maskell, a chaplain and counselor at…

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Former Broome Bishop Christopher Alan Saunders faces sentencing after a Western Australian jury found him guilty of 13 charges against Aboriginal men.

Christopher Alan Saunders, the former Catholic Bishop of Broome, faces immediate imprisonment after a Western Australian jury found him guilty of 13 sex offences against young Aboriginal men. The verdict establishes the 76-year-old as the highest-ranking Australian cleric to be convicted of sexual abuse.

The convictions, which follow a rigorous three-week trial in the Western Australian District Court, conclude a years-long investigation into Saunders’ systemic abuse of power between 2008 and 2019. Prosecutors successfully demonstrated that the bishop exploited his ecclesiastical authority and church resources to groom vulnerable Indigenous men.

The case marks a watershed moment for institutional accountability within the Australian Catholic Church. It also highlights the severe, enduring trauma inflicted upon isolated First Nations communities in the Kimberley region, where Saunders had operated with near-total impunity…

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The disgraced former bishop of Broome who used church funds and properties to target vulnerable Aboriginal men will learn his prison sentence next month.

Christopher Alan Saunders, 76, appeared in WA District Court on Monday after he was found guilty by a jury on 13 charges including unlawful and indecent assault and penetration without consent in August.

The trial, which ran for three weeks, found Saunders had committed the offences against two Aboriginal men who were devout Catholics and lived in the Kimberley diocese where he was the senior-most Catholic in the northern WA district.

The jury found Saunders had engaged in systemic grooming of the two victims, including instances where the bishop would use church funds and church-owned properties to have alcohol-fuelled “shirts-off” parties.

Saunders was set down to learn his fate on Monday morning, but District Court Judge Martin Flynn flagged early in the hearing he would not be…

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A diocesan bishop will usually undertake a lengthy investigation and administrative process when responding to misconduct or abuse allegations.

News headlines in recent years have periodically reported on Catholic priests accused of various types of misconduct, including financial crimes and sexual abuse, among other allegations.

Much of the public will only be aware of the beginning and the end of such controversies — when a clergyman is accused of a misdeed and when he is ultimately either found guilty of it or cleared of any wrongdoing.

But U.S. dioceses have complex and at times lengthy ways of addressing such allegations — processes that ensure both a full treatment of the alleged misconduct and the rights of priests to be presumed innocent until proven otherwise.

‘The smoke of truth’

Monsignor William King, JCD, serves as an assistant professor of canon law at The Catholic University of America. His academic expertise includes…

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Pope Leo XIV is set to begin an official visit to France on 25 September, with several thorny issues hanging over the trip, from clerical sexual abuse to the country’s new assisted dying law.

Here are some of the key issues the pontiff is expected to face while on the first official visit to France by a head of the Catholic Church in 18 years:

The Vatican announced in August that Pope Leo XIV will meet victims of clerical sexual abuse during his visit.

The leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics has promised to further efforts to reform the Church in the wake of the global sexual abuse scandal.

A 2021 inquiry found that clergy or lay members of the Church had abused about 330,000 people as minors in France, over the span of 70 years.

The Church’s reputation has since been hit by further scandals, including a raft…

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REFLECTIONS

THE sexual abuse of Filipino children, especially those committed online, continues to spread; so is their exploitation by not only their parents and relatives but also executives, telecommunications companies (telcos) and the clergy. Children’s rights advocate Dr. Murray Heasley — about whom we will discuss later — is challenging clerical abuse. We need to take a cue from him and challenge telcos like PLDT, Globe Telecom and Dito Telecommunity, as well as other corporations, over their abuse. One of them, the Zambales II Electric Cooperative Inc. (Zameco II), is refusing to replace a busted transformer until our Preda children’s home in Nagbayan village, Castillejos town, agrees to pay P125,123 for it, which is illegal. Unless you agree to pay, you get no power, the electric cooperative (EC) seemed to say. That seemed like blackmail.

The EC has been rocked by consumer complaints of overcharging and other issues, as well…

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One of Father Rupnik’s victims accuses Portuguese Church of “complicit silence”

While the Portuguese Catholic Church is already receiving very negative PR from victims of sexual abuse as children, the case of a panel of mosaics, on display in the Holy Shrine of Fátima, created by a priest accused of sexually, psychologically and physically abusing around 30 women, is adding to the pressure – particularly as hopes are for a visit to Fátima next year by Pope Leo XIV.

Expresso explains the delicate situation. It came on the wings of a decision by a French bishop to completely cover Rupnik’s mosaics in the Holy Shrine of Lourdes, due to the Slovenian priest’s fall from grace – and a pending visit (on September 26) by the Pope. The bishop has stressed that the covering is “permanent”.

One of the many disturbing parts of this story appears to be that Rupnik is understood…

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“These are proven facts.”

Fabrizia Raguso has known Father Marko Rupnik for more than 30 years, and has come forward publicly to allege the priest spiritually and psychologically abused her.

Raguso moved to Portugal as a sister of the Loyola Community in 2000, and though she left the order in 2021 she continues to live in the Portuguese city of Braga.

Raguso believes the Shrine of Fátima must undergo a process of discernment regarding what to do with the 500 square-meter mosaic inside the Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity. But as the question is deliberated, Raguso says she has not been contacted by Portuguese ecclesiastical authorities to share her experiences as a victim.

Rupnik is currently being subjected to a canonical trial at the Vatican, accused of abusing dozens of women sexually, spiritually and psychologically.

This interview was conducted in Portuguese and has been edited for length and clarity.

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A pastor of a Central Florida church was arrested, according to local law enforcement.

The Polk County Sheriff’s Office Special Victims Unit arrested and charged 42-year-old Timothy Chaneyfield, the pastor at St. James United American Free Will Baptist Church in Central Florida.

According to law enforcement, he was arrested last month after the investigation began upon receipt of a cyber tip regarding inappropriate contact he was having with a child.

During an interview, the 14-year-old victim disclosed that he and Chaneyfield met on a dating mobile app, and then continued to chat via Instagram, which is where the National Center for Missing and Endangered Children tip was generated.

According to local law enforcement, Chaneyfield picked up the victim on three consecutive days at the entrance to the victim’s subdivision, then drove the victim to his house in Winter Haven, where he had sex with the victim each day. During a…

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A victim of Church sexual abuse in Spain, never answered after requesting an audience with Pope Leo XIV, asks why some survivors are received while others are met with silence.

Just a few months ago, I publicly wrote a letter during Pope Leo XIV’s visit to Spain. I did so as a victim of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church and as someone who walks independently, without representing any association or claiming to speak on anyone’s behalf.

I had previously written to the Apostolic Nunciature (the Vatican’s diplomatic representation in Spain).

I had respectfully requested an audience. I had written a letter to the Holy Father explaining who I was, what I had suffered and why, for me, being heard for a few minutes could have profound reparative value.

When I received no response, I insisted. The response was silence. I was not the only one.

While the…

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The Diocese of Springfield has suspended two Stigmatine priests assigned to Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish following separate reports of alleged improper behavior, including one involving a minor.Springfield man charged in connection with deadly Main Street shooting

The Diocese announced Friday that Stigmatine Father Paolo Bagattini was suspended after receiving a report in July concerning improper behavior with a minor that allegedly began in late 2022 and occurred during his time at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish in Springfield.

The Diocese said it immediately shared the report with civil authorities, including the Hampden County District Attorney’s Office, upon receiving it.

Bishop William D. Byrne suspended Bagattini’s faculties within the Diocese of Springfield on July 22, 2026. He remains suspended.

On Thursday, Sept. 17, the Diocese said it received a second report involving Stigmatine Father Robert White. The report was made by an adult and concerned an alleged improper relationship.

The…

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Former pastor Robert Morris pleaded guilty to five counts of child sex abuse last year after Cindy Clemishire accused him of sexually abusing her as a child in the 1980s.

Cindy Clemishire, the woman whose accusations against former Gateway Church leader Robert Morris led to his guilty plea to five charges of child sex abuse last year, will ask the Texas Supreme Court to review her defamation lawsuit against the church and Morris. 

Last month, the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas dismissed almost all of the claims in the lawsuit Clemishire first filed in 2025, citing religious liberty doctrine. Clemishire’s attorneys will ask the Texas Supreme Court to review the case in a filing Thursday, arguing that the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine does not give churches immunity from civil law that applies to other institutions. 

“Religious liberty is one of our most fundamental freedoms. But religious liberty cannot mean…

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Rep. Leach filed a petition after an appeals court dismissed nearly all of Clemishire’s defamation claims against Robert Morris and Gateway Church.

Attorneys for Cindy Clemishire say they’re seeking the Supreme Court of Texas’ input to continue the now-dismissed defamation case against Robert Morris and Gateway Church. 

Texas State Representative Jeff Leach, who represents Clemishire, said he filed a petition with the Supreme Court of Texas Thursday on her behalf in her defamation case against Robert Morris, Gateway Church and others.

The move comes after a state appeals court granted a motion in August to dismiss nearly all of Clemishire’s claims against Morris, Gateway Church and the elders who served on the church’s board when the abuse came to light.

The development also comes as Morris re-verified his registration on the Texas Public Sex Offender Website in Palo Pinto County on Tuesday.

In a press conference, Leach…

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Survivors launch Protestant Accountability, naming more than 2,700 people accused across 100-plus denominations.

A new multidenominational database aims to identify, track and expose abusers within the Christian church.

Named Protestant Accountability, the nonprofit database launched in August after merging with a similar resource, Baptist Accountability. Its mission is to reveal hidden abuse and misconduct and to “promote transparency, accountability and the protection of those at risk.” The database includes photos of those accused or found guilty of sexual abuse, along with their denomination, positions held and supporting documentation. It currently lists more than 2,700 people from more than 100 denominations, including nondenominational, Pentecostal and Methodist churches.

Dominique “Dom” Benninger, a co-founder of Baptist Accountability and a current board member of Protestant Accountability, said the database’s primary focus is on sexual abusers, but it also includes people who enabled abusive behavior or tried to cover…

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According to the lawsuit, the woman’s job and family were threatened if she reported the abuse.

A woman filed a lawsuit against her supervisor, a Catholic priest, a church, and the Archdiocese of Louisville Thursday after she was allegedly raped for months.

The woman accepted a janitor position with Our Lady of Lourdes in April 2025 and is in the United States on a green card, the lawsuit stated.

Shortly after she started working there, her direct supervisor started making sexual advances that quickly escalated to sexual assaults in the boiler and maintenance room, according to the lawsuit. He threatened her by saying if she reported the abuse, she would be fired.

The abuse happened so frequently that a delivery person walked in and saw the supervisor’s exposed genitalia in the lunchroom, according to the lawsuit.

She decided in June 2025 to report the abuse to the priest at the…

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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has spent more than a decade cultivating a political alliance with Paul Pressler, the once-revered Southern Baptist power broker who was accused by at least eight men of sexually abusing them, and with the two men most closely tied to covering for him. Even after the allegations became public, Paxton kept taking their money, kept using their endorsements, and kept standing by them.

Pressler was one of the architects of the conservative takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention in the late 20th century and a mentor to a generation of Texas Republicans, including Ted Cruz and Paxton himself. But behind that reputation, according to Texas Monthly’s investigation, “abundant suspicions” about his relationships with young men circulated for decades, beginning in the late 1970s when he was quietly pushed out of a church youth ministry after an alleged incident at his home. Those…

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Prior to Pope Leo XIV’s arrival to Lourdes Sept. 26, the sanctuary covered the mosaics of Father Marko Rupnik, the spokesman of the sanctuary confirmed to OSV News, sharing pictures of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary with mosaics entirely covered.

They “will remain covered after the event,” David Torchala shared in the message sent to OSV News. “This measure is intended to be a long-term solution and not merely a temporary decoration” for the papal visit, he said, adding that “the search for a permanent solution will continue in consultation with the bishop and the committee that has been in place since 2024.”

Pope Leo will arrive in Lourdes in the evening of Sept. 26 and will concelebrate Sunday Mass Sept. 27 on the meadow facing the grotto where the Virgin Mary appeared to St. Bernadette Soubirous in 1858.  

Father Rupnik’s mosaics were — until fully covered Sept. 18…

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Next week (21-25 September 2026), the members of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) will gather in Montreal, Quebec, for the annual meeting of the Plenary Assembly. Through prayer, discussion, and decision-making, the Bishops will consider matters concerning the Church’s mission that benefit from their common reflection and action at the national level.

The following are among the principal agenda items and topics to be considered during the week, in a spirit of prayer and discernment:

• Celebration of the Eucharist – Each day will begin with the celebration of the Eucharist, the source and summit of the Catholic faith. The President of the CCCB and Bishops ordained since the last Plenary will preside at these celebrations. A celebration of the Eucharist in the Armenian Rite will also take place, presided by the Most Rev. Mikaël Mouradian.
• 500th Anniversary of the Apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe – The Most Rev….

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The Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church Abroad has dismissed pastor Rolands Eimanis, ruling his conduct harmful to the Church, after new facts surfaced regarding sexual abuse allegations that emerged this summer.

The Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church Abroad (LELBP) has decided to dismiss pastor Rolands Eimanis from his duties, following public allegations this summer that he sexually abused underage girls. The decision was made at an LELBP Presidium meeting on September 10 and took effect immediately.

Church leadership based the decision on a provision in its bylaws allowing dismissal of clergy for conduct harmful to the Church. The Presidium said the ruling rested not only on allegations made public in the summer but also on additional, previously unknown information about the pastor that has recently come to light. The Church has not disclosed specifics of the newly revealed facts, since Presidium sessions are closed.

Allegations and investigation

In June, two women told…

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Marko Rupnik, a controversial priest and mosaic artist, is accused of multiple sexual, psychological and spiritual abuses

While France’s Lourdes shrine moves to cover mosaics by Father Marko Rupnik, Brazil’s National Shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida in São Paulo celebrated new installations by the artist, who faces decades of allegations of sexual, spiritual and psychological abuse.

Much like its elaborate inauguration ceremony in May 2025 for the shrine’s eastern facade, the celebration which included music, prayers, biblical dramatizations and fireworks was held Sept. 12 for the western facade.

The installation, which surrounds the entire basilica, is credited to the Centro Aletti, the art studio founded by Father Rupnik, whose canonical trial is still under review by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

However, a recent video posted online raised questions regarding the controversial priest’s participation in installing the mosaics despite the accusations of abusing women while working on similar projects in…

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https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/video/9.7346742

A clergy abuse survivor is calling on the Catholic church to release information from the personnel files of abusive priests. The man, who cannot be identified, wants to see the church open up about its use of a clergy therapy centre in Ontario. Ryan Cooke reports.

Related Stories

• ‘It should be exposed’: Survivor calls on church to release treatment records of abusive priests
• After lengthy wait, victims of priest abuse in N.S. to finally receive payouts
• ‘To avoid scandal’: Unearthed letters show how N.L. bishop handled allegations in Baie Verte
• Former Montreal priest imprisoned for sexually abusing boys facing new charges
• Edmonton woman says she was ‘unpersoned’ by church after accusing Orthodox clergyman of sexual assault

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Alleged offences not related to students from Catholic school board, police say

A vice-principal with the Waterloo Catholic District School Board (WCDSB) is expected to enter a plea in a Kitchener court in October.

Michel Pleau, 50, from Cambridge was charged and arrested in February following a child luring and sexual exploitation investigation by Waterloo regional police that also involved police services in Toronto and Sudbury.

Police said Pleau is facing half a dozen charges that include possession, production and distribution of child sexual assault and abuse material, invitation to sexual touching and luring a child under the age of 16.

Police say the alleged offences are not related to students from WCDSB. The school board said in February it would co-operate with police.

In an email to CBC News Thursday, a spokesperson for the board said Pleau has “been placed on unpaid suspension” and does not have access…

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Key takeaways:

• Archdiocese filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2023 over abuse claims
• Baltimore Catholic school enrollment down 80% since mid-1960s peak
• Mercy High School enrollment grew 50% since 2017
• Judge Michelle Harner rejected reorganization plans in August

The Archdiocese of Baltimore began the 2026-27 school year with one less school than it operated last year. The closure of St. Michael-St. Clement School — a Pre-K3 through eighth grade school borne of consolidation of the two schools about a decade ago — comes amid decades of declining enrollment and other hurdles that have forced several area Catholic schools to close in the past 15 years.

A glance at numbers from the National Catholic Education Association tells that basic story of enrollment: The U.S. peak in the mid-1960s reached 12,893 schools with enrollment of 5,253,000; today, those numbers have plummeted to 5,828 schools with 1,675,000 students.

Today in Baltimore, there are…

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Shrine leaders: “We are not considering removing the mosaic panel”

Despite apparent papal approval for plans to cover mosaics by the disgraced Fr. Marko Rupnik in other cities, the international Marian shrine of Fátima, Portugal, does not plan to remove or cover a massive Rupnik mosaic.

While Church leaders in Fátima say they do not plan to cover the Rupnik mosaic, some Portuguese ecclesiastical leaders have told The Pillar that they believe that art from the allegedly sexual abusive Rupnik should be judged distinctly from the man who created it.

With the prospect of a papal visit to Fátima next year, it is possible the shrine will face ongoing questions over the controversial mosaics.

Rupnik is currently on trial in the Vatican, accused of multiple counts of sexual, spiritual, and psychological abuse of dozens of women. Some cases of abuse are alleged to have taken place as part of the creation process…

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Fort Worth pastor Diego Fuller has been arrested again over a second bond violation amid his ongoing sexual assault case.

Fuller, 40, was arrested Tuesday following a warrant filed for his arrest Sept. 3, court records show. Fuller is accused of entering an exclusion zone — which are specific places or areas an individual is prohibited from entering as part of their bond conditions. It’s not clear where Fuller was when he violated this condition.

Fuller is the lead pastor of Journey Fort Worth Church. He was initially arrested Sept. 1 last year on a sexual assault charge and indicted March 26 with an additional charge of child grooming, court records show. He denied the charges against him during a church service, where he put his mugshot up during the sermon.

He was arrested again May 5 over a bond violation after allegedly…

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Police received tip from a U.S.-based centre for exploited children about a B.C. IP address

A Christian school teacher in Campbell River, B.C., has been sentenced to 18 months in jail after pleading guilty to possession of “child pornography,” now called child sexual abuse and exploitation material.

The B.C. Prosecution Service said in an emailed statement that Jeffrey Falk’s sentence would be followed by a two-year probation order.

At the sentencing on Tuesday, the court also imposed a DNA order, a forfeiture order and a prohibition order, which includes prohibiting Falk from attending a public park or public swimming area where people under 18 years old are or could be present, in addition to prohibiting him from daycares, schoolgrounds, playgrounds and community centres.

The order also prohibits Falk from seeking employment or volunteering in a capacity that involves “being in a position of trust or authority” for people under 18.

…

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Seven survivors of sexual violence in the Catholic Church who are due to meet Pope Leo XIV during his visit to France later this month have insisted the talks will not weaken their demands, as five publicly identified themselves on Wednesday.

The group will meet the Pope privately in Lourdes, in south-western France, on 27 September.

Two participants will remain anonymous, including a person who says they were abused by Abbé Pierre, the late French Catholic priest and founder of the Emmaus charity movement who has been accused of sexually abusing women and girls.

“Dialogue does not mean endorsement. Being received does not mean giving up our demands,” the seven said in a joint statement.

The planned meeting has drawn criticism from survivor groups that were not invited, with some questioning its limited format and how the church selected the participants.

Pope Leo XIV to meet survivors of clerical…

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For decades, Richard kept the pain and shame from being molested by notorious pedophile priest John Geoghan to himself, sharing it with only a few family members and friends.

He declined to join the more than 120 others who filed claims against the Archdiocese of Boston, who also said they were sexually abused by Geoghan. He wasn’t ready.

He first, a few years ago, said he called the Archdiocese and asked for an apology. But, he said, none came. Then he asked police and prosecutors if they could do anything, but Geoghan died in 2003, killed by a fellow inmate in prison.

So that’s how he came to be at the State House one day this month, talking to 5 Investigates about what Geoghan did to him and why state law is blocking the last recourse he feels he has: suing.

To try and persuade lawmakers to change the law…

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“Entire process has been carried out behind closed doors”, stresses association

The Coração Silenciado association, which represents victims of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, is petitioning President of the Republic, António José Seguro, to promote an audit of the tortuous compensation process underway, asking him to bring an end to statutes of limitations for these cases.

“We are going to present a proposal to review and audit the process of financial compensation and support for victims of sexual abuse in the context of the Catholic Church in Portugal, because we believe that after this entire process developed behind closed doors, initiated on its own behalf and closed on its own behalf, it is up to the State to carry out some verification, some audit of the entire way in which it took place”, the association’s spokesperson, António Grosso, tells Lusa.

After having cancelled, in July, a meeting in Belém…

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On 7 September, the ABC’s Four Corners aired an investigation into Christian Brothers, exposing what it called “aggressive legal strategies” used by the Catholic order to push back against victim-survivors fighting for compensation.

The investigation not only covered the controversial litigation tactics in Australia, but also similar strategies used in Ireland, and the re-traumatisation the order was subjecting victim-survivors to.

Christian Brothers was founded in 1802 in Ireland to provide for poor boys’ education and welfare. A group of Christian Brothers travelled to Australia in 1843, later establishing a permanent presence, and spreading to New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, and Timor-Leste.

When the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was published, it was estimated that 22 per cent of the Brothers were alleged perpetrators of sexual abuse. This figure was second to the Brothers of St John of God. Likewise, an entire case study in the Commission was…

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The St. Labre Indian School has recently come under scrutiny due to alarming reports of deaths, questionable fundraising practices, and allegations of abuse. How did a school intended to uplift Native American youth become a focal point of such serious concerns? In this article, we will explore the troubling issues surrounding the school, examine the implications for the community, and discuss potential pathways for healing and accountability.

Background of St. Labre Indian School

St. Labre Indian School, located in Ashland, Montana, has a long history that intertwines education and Native American culture. Established in 1884, the school was initially founded to provide a Catholic education to Indigenous children. The mission was to offer academic opportunities while also integrating aspects of Western culture. Over the years, the school has expanded its programs and facilities, attempting to adapt to the changing needs of its students and their communities.

Despite its educational goals,…

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The Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno is dealing with a new set of financial troubles, one that’s unrelated to the sexual abuse claims that last year prompted it to file bankruptcy — and this time the problem directly impacts former and current church workers.

Bishop Joseph Brennan sent a letter last month to members of its retirement plan saying their pensions will be reduced because the benefit is “significantly underfunded,” along with those of tens of thousands of other enrollees around the country.

He noted that accrued benefits under the plan were frozen effective June 30, meaning that despite their continued contributions, active employees’ pensions have not risen in value since then.

At the heart of the issue is an estimated $800 million gap between assets held by the pension fund’s manager and the liabilities it faces. If U.S. dioceses don’t greatly increase their contributions to the benefit — and…

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Legal point system valued one survivor’s abuse at $1.6 million. He received about $40,000.

Lee Forbes always intended to keep what happened to him a secret.

“Decades,” he said, when asked how long he stayed quiet about the abuse he incurred as a young Boy Scout.

“How do you sit and, you know, let the world know that you were a victim? It’s not comfortable,” Forbes explained.

See original article for video: Survivors of Boy Scout abuse frustrated by low payouts, long delays

Forbes, who was raised by a single mom in California, started in the Scouts when he was just a child — first as a Cub Scout and then as a Boy Scout with the Explorer Program. That’s when, he said, a young Scout leader, fresh out of the Navy, targeted him and sexually abused him.

“Somewhere between a year-and-a-half and two years. It was a very slow…

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A former youth pastor at a northern Virginia church appeared in court Monday after being indicted on charges of sexually abusing children, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Authorities said Jeffrey Turner Taylor, 66, served as a youth pastor at a church in Falls Church from 1990 to 2002. During that time, Taylor allegedly groomed multiple boys by presenting his conduct as spiritual guidance.

“His alleged grooming behaviors included sexual horseplay, probing inquiries into the sexual secrets and habits of boys, and detailed revelations about his own sexual experiences,” the states attorney’s office wrote in a press release sent to 7News.

Authorities said Taylor allegedly took boys to ministry events in other states and countries with the intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct, and on several occasions sexually abused or attempted to sexually abuse multiple boys.

SEE ALSO…

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Tazewell County’s chief prosecutor tells 25News a former pastor’s conviction for distributing harmful materials to a minor does not rise to the level under state law of requiring he register as a sex offender.

Former Riverside Community Church lead pastor Michael Ritchason was charged late last year and eventually pleaded guilty to the least serious Class 4 felony.

“The offense of Harmful Material is not a registrable offense under Illinois law,” said Tazewell County State’s Attorney Kevin Johnson in a statement to 25News.

Ritchason, 48, pled guilty Sept. 10 to distributing harmful materials to a minor after authorities said he sent graphic photos of himself to a minor through Snapchat.

Ritchason was placed on two years of sex offender probation, which includes six months in the county jail. However, he will have to serve only the first two months if he successfully completes sex offender treatment.

Get 25NewsStreaming on your smart…

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Late one night in October 1992 television viewers across the United States watched – some in disbelief, others in anger – as one of the musical guests on Saturday Night Live did something shocking.

The guest was Sinead O’Connor. Paul Elie of Georgetown University recalled the scene in his 2025 book “The Last Supper.”

“She produced a photograph of Pope John Paul II, held it up the way a priest elevates the Eucharist, and tore it in half and then again and again, scattering the pieces on the stage.”

As Elie said, it was more than “a desecration of the pope.” It was a potent very public sign of the distance that had opened up between the Church in Ireland and the growing number of disaffected Catholics. 

Sinead O’Connor doesn’t immediately come to mind in the context of Church-State relations, even in circumstances where citizens of the State had turned…

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A Lebanon program for teen girls has closed its doors, Indiana’s I-Team has learned.

Refuge Girls Academy, formerly known as Teen Challenge, and its residents began moving out several weeks ago, according to an attorney for the program, Jeffrey Roberts.

“The parent organization determined that operating the Lebanon academy was unfortunately no longer tenable due to the present environment, namely, the resources required for a faith-based non-profit to defend a lawsuit filed by girls who were there, in some cases, up to a decade ago, now seeking eight-figure monetary sums, and its ability to secure necessary insurance coverage to continue operation,” Roberts said in an email to Indiana’s I-Team. 

“The girls who were in the midst of addiction treatment either returned home to their families or moved to other voluntary faith-based residential facilities with the help of the Indiana Teen Challenge staff who had been working with them in Lebanon,…

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Father George Ansel Smith sent for therapy in 1992, returned to work for nearly 20 years

A man who was abused by a notorious Catholic priest in Newfoundland is joining other voices calling on the church to release its records on abusive priests sent away for treatment.

The man can only be identified as John Doe. He was abused by Father George Ansel Smith as a young boy on the west coast of Newfoundland in the 1970s.

Court records show Smith was sent to the Southdown Institute — an Ontario therapy centre offering a range of services for priests dealing with issues ranging from depression and alcoholism to pedophilia — in 1992.

He returned to the priesthood for nearly 20 years, until John Doe and a dozen other men came forward with allegations starting in 2011.

“I think it should be exposed for everybody to see the truth,” John Doe…

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A new court filing claims the Archdiocese of New Orleans is not meeting certain nonmonetary obligations under its bankruptcy settlement with clergy sexual-abuse survivors.

Donald Massey, the settlement trustee, raises several concerns in his latest filing.

“ANO flatly refuses to conduct IRB investigations of the alleged perpetrators,” Massey alleges in the filing.

“It is believed that some of these clergy are still alive. Yet somehow, these individuals have not been investigated or added to the list,” the filing alleges.

As part of the court-approved settlement plan, the Archdiocese agreed to new child-protection measures and changes to how it handles reports of sexual abuse. Those provisions include reporting and investigation protocols, outside oversight, survivor protections and the creation of a public document archive. The filing says that archive is not yet publicly available, although the Archdiocese has begun providing documents to LSU for review and preparation, records show.

Massey also accuses…

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The church is in bankruptcy, and settlement negotiations could conclude this month

The Archdiocese of Baltimore’s ambitious effort to halve the number of Catholic churches in America’s oldest diocese has brought in nearly $10 million. Yet the plaintiffs seeking settlements from the church for decades-ago sexual abuse may never see that money — or millions more from properties soon to hit the market.

That’s because U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Michelle Harner ruled earlier this year that the properties are separate from the archdiocese, and that their sale proceeds are not part of the bankruptcy estate available to pay sexual abuse survivors’ claims.

At stake is whether the archdiocese will have enough money to satisfy the survivors and settle the case that began on Sept. 29, 2023, when archdiocesan leaders filed for bankruptcy. And the clock is ticking — if the parties can’t reach a settlement in bankruptcy court by Sept….

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A newly released book is urging the Catholic Church to rethink how it communicates during clergy sexual abuse crises.

In “Truth Heals: Clergy Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church’s Response,” author Paulina Guzik argues that communications must be treated as a central part of safeguarding, not an afterthought.

Drawing on examples of both effective and failed communication from around the world, the book’s author, who is international editor for OSV News and professor of media studies and communications at the Pontifical University of John Paul II in Kraków, Poland, said she wanted to fill the gap between existing safeguarding elements and one element that is visibly still pending — communications.

“From John Paul II to Francis, popes have helped transform — although slowly and quite often urged by external pressure — the Church’s law and culture. But clear guidance on what to communicate, how to communicate it and when…

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A former head pastor of a Downtown Peoria church is serving a two-month jail sentence after pleading guilty last week to sending illicit material to an underage person.

Michael S. Ritchason, 48, of Pekin, began serving his sentence Friday, a day after he pleaded guilty in Tazewell County Circuit Court to the single felony count of dissemination of harmful materials, a felony that could have sent him to prison for up to three years.

His actual jail time is about 30 days as he’s eligible for day for day “good-time” credit.Former Peoria pastor arraigned for dissemination of harmful materials

Instead, the former pastor at Riverside Community Church was sentenced to two years of sex offender probation, which mandates sex offender treatment. He also has restrictions on being around children as well as using the internet, according to court records.

He doesn’t have to register as a sex offender because…

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Carlos Ramos coached in a North Texas youth football league before his August arrest.

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly named a church at which the accused allegedly volunteered. The identity of the church has yet to be independently confirmed by Chron or police.

A former assistant coach in a Texas youth football league and volunteer church youth leader has been arrested on charges of sexual abuse of a child 

On Tuesday morning, the Grapevine Police Department (GPD) announced that Carlos Ernesto Ramos, 39, had been brought in on Aug. 26 in connection with an alleged continuous sexual abuse of a child under 14 that occurred in 2023. Detectives are investigating whether there may be additional victims. 

According to the police department’s statement, Ramos coached for an unspecified youth football league in North Texas from 2022 to 2024. Police also alleged Ramos volunteered as…

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Prosecutor Matthew Rodgers: ‘This case is about a side of the defendant he kept from the world’

The investigation of a former Geneva-area pastor in connection with alleged child sexual abuse material began with a tip from afellow church minister to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, according to court testimony Monday.

The former youth minister at the now-closed Rejoice Lutheran Church testified that in April 2023, she received text images and videos from the cellphone belonging to Michael C. Willis, 46, of Campton Hills, a pastor at the same church. The images were sent to the youth minister from Willis’s phone by a third party, according to testimony.

Willis, 46, was charged June 26, 2023, and later indicted on two counts of disseminating child child sexual abuse material, three counts of possessing child sexual abuse…

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Leaders in a local school district were aware of questionable incidents that occurred with a substitute teacher prior to his arrest for allegedly physically abusing a student.

Local 12 obtained the employee file of the Covington Public Schools substitute and discovered the incidents. We looked into the file because police arrested 61-year-old Bryan Bundy 11 days ago for “criminal abuse in the second degree with a child 12 or under.”

Police say the felony occurred when Bundy grabbed a non-verbal 5-year-old boy by the arm, dragged him down a hall, then flung him toward a wall. They say he kicked the boy’s communication device, striking the wall. Then, he kicked the boy towards the wall with his foot.

An open records request was filed with the school district to obtain Bundy’s employee file and found two previous incidents of potentially inappropriate behavior.

Bundy’s file showed he has been with Covington…

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Key Takeaways

• Texarkana police arrested 87-year-old Louie B. George II, longtime pastor of Oak Street Baptist Church, on a charge of sexual assault of a child, on September 9, 2026. 
• George is a pastor at a local church, and, according to authorities, was a pastor in the 1990s when the alleged victim attended the church as a child. 
• Investigators say they have since identified at least two additional alleged victims and are concerned there may be others who have not yet come forward.
• Civil lawsuits can help survivors to seek accountability from churches or other institutions that failed to take reasonable steps to protect them from sexual abuse. 

Authorities Arrest Louie B. George II

An 87-year-old pastor in Texarkana was arrested on a charge of sexual assault of a child on Wednesday, September, 9, 2026. 

The Texarkana Texas Police Department announced on Thursday, September 10, 2026,…

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A retired New Orleans Catholic priest, whose prolific sexual abuse of children in the local deaf community was known for at least four decades by the city’s archdiocese without meaningful consequence, has died after evidently falling in his Texas apartment.

Gerard Joseph “Jerry” Howell was found dead at about 5 p.m. on Sept. 8 by Austin Police Department officers who were responding to a welfare check on the block listed for the senior living community where he had been residing, the agency said in a statement. The statement – which didn’t name Howell but was provided when police were asked about his death specifically – said first responders had gone to the block to investigate a report that an 87-year-old individual had fallen. 

Local emergency medical services personnel soon arrived to provide medical aid to that individual, but he stopped breathing and was pronounced dead at the scene, police said. 

The…

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A lawyer, who represented more than 25 sexual abuse victims or survivors of Ronald H. Paquin, said Monday the death of the 83-year-old former priest while in prison will bring “relief.”

Paquin, who was once assigned to St. John The Baptist Parish in Haverhill and St. Monica’s Parish in Methuen, died during the afternoon last Friday, Sept. 11, at Mountain View Correctional Facility in Charleston, Maine. Attorney Mitchell Garabedian said “Paquin sexually abused my clients as children from about 1973 to 1990.”

“The death of Father Paquin brings a measure of relief to many clergy sexual abuse victims and survivors because they feel as though Father Paquin will no longer be able to sexually abuse children and destroy innocent lives. With all due respect, society has not lost a great human being,” Garabedian said in a statement emailed to WHAV.

As WHAV reported at the time, Paquin…

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Born in Vélez-Rubio, Almería, Cristóbal López Romero became archbishop of Rabat in 2017 and was made a cardinal in 2019, later figuring among the possible successors to Pope Francis.

Cardinal Cristóbal López Romero has told the Catholics of Rabat that he is waiting for a Vatican hearing on sexual assault accusations against him, in a letter that also announced his eventual successor.

Writing “from Spain, but close in heart,” the archbishop of Rabat addressed his diocese on Saturday, September 12, to confirm the appointment of Father Mario León Dorado as coadjutor archbishop. The new title, he explained, means Dorado “will remain in the service of the diocese permanently,” after a short spell as apostolic administrator that began in early August.

López Romero framed the appointment as the answer to a request he had made well before the current crisis. He received it “with great joy…

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Bankruptcy courts and mediated agreements are venues of cold calculation designed to bring a measure of justice in the form of financial settlements, a term seductively suggestive of conclusion. When employed as a tactic in the Catholic Church’s ongoing sexual abuse scandal, however, it is clear that such settlements leave the faithful with far more questions than answers.

The legal processes accomplish what they are designed to do, exact a bit of retribution on behalf of victims. They do not, however, restore or transform survivors. They don’t erase haunting, debilitating memories. And they do little to address the most searing questions for which the faithful still await an answer: How did this happen? How could the chief shepherds allow the most vulnerable in the flock to be preyed upon?

As Charles Nadeau, a court-appointed representative of survivors, explained: “Bankruptcy is not inherently unjust. It exists to ensure…

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The Archdiocese of New Orleans disputed claims that it hadn’t probed abuse claims, calling them a ‘misrepresentation of the facts.’

The trustee overseeing the bankruptcy settlement between the Archdiocese of New Orleans and hundreds of clergy sex abuse survivors is questioning the local Roman Catholic Church’s commitment to provisions of the settlement aimed at ending decades of secrecy around child sexual abuse by clergy.

In a 45-page court filing on Monday, Don Massey, the independent trustee, told the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New Orleans that the archdiocese has “flatly refused” his request that they investigate 11 clergy members accused of child sexual abuse that surfaced during the bankruptcy claims review process.

Massey said the allegations against the clergy members were previously found by the archdiocese’s own Internal Review Board to be credible but that they were never added to the official credibly accused clergy list and that they…

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A sexual assault trial started Monday for a New Hampshire man whose arrest more than seven years ago kicked off one of the biggest youth detention scandals in U.S. history.

Former youth counselor Jeffrey Buskey, 60, of Litchfield, faces allegations involving four boys held at the Youth Development Center in Manchester in the late 1990s. In the first of his cases to go to trial, he is charged with 21 counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault involving David Meehan, who was 14 when he arrived at the facility now called the Sununu Youth Services Center in 1995.

Meehan filed the first of more than 1,100 lawsuits alleging physical, sexual or emotional abuse spanning six decades. His allegations led to the arrest of Buskey and another former worker in 2019, an unprecedented criminal investigation, nine additional arrests, and the establishment of a settlement fund to compensate victims.

As testimony got underway Monday, prosecutor Audriana…

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A former Massachusetts priest who was convicted of sexually abusing an altar boy died Friday afternoon at a Maine correctional facility, according to a statement from the Maine Department of Corrections.

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Parole Board of Canada imposes stricter conditions on Brian Boucher, 64

A former Montreal priest allegedly viewed suspected child sexual abuse material on public transit while serving his sentence for sexually assaulting two boys, says the Parole Board of Canada in a recent decision.

The board revoked 64-year-old Brian Boucher’s statutory release last week, concluding a series of incidents and new charges of child sexual abuse and exploitation material showed a return to what it called his “crime cycle.”

Boucher is serving an eight-year sentence for sexually abusing two boys he met through his work as a priest. He had been living at a Montreal community correctional centre since his statutory release in July 2024.

According to the board’s decision, authorities received a tip in April 2026 that Boucher had been seen viewing pornographic material, possibly child sexual abuse material, on public transit.

Boucher was arrested April 9 and charged…

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The Archdiocese of Chicago said it has paid out more than $400 million to abuse survivors, with the announcement coming on the heels of a St. Paul, Minnesota-based firm’s recent settlement announcement that also unveiled a national database of clergy it says are credibly abused of sexual abuse.

Attorney Jeff Anderson of Jeff Anderson and Associates said the latest $5.475 million in settlements, involving nine cases, were finalized in the two weeks ahead of his firm’s Sept. 10 announcement.

In a statement sent on the same day to OSV News, the Archdiocese of Chicago (for the first time) disclosed a figure related to its settlements.

“We have paid more than $400 million to survivors and continue to ask for survivors to come forward. They will be received with dignity and compassion,” said the archdiocese.

‘Incidents alleged to have happened 50 to 30 years ago’

“The ‘new’ settlements presented today arose from…

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Ronald Paquin was serving a 16-year sentence for sexually abusing an altar boy.

CHARLESTON, Maine —

Ronald Paquin died Friday afternoon at the Mountain View Correctional Facility, according to a statement from the Maine Department of Corrections. He was 83 years old.

Paquin was a defrocked priest from Massachusetts, serving a 16-year sentence for sexually abusing an altar boy during trips to Maine in the 1980s. He had previously served more than 10 years in a Massachusetts prison for sexually abusing an altar boy there. He was released in 2015 and then taken into custody in Maine.

On Monday, an attorney representing those who were abused by Paquin released a statement.

“Fr. Paquin sexually abused my clients as children from about 1973 to 1990 when he was assigned to either St. Monica’s Parish in Methuen, MA, or St. John The Baptist Parish in Haverhill, MA,” said Mitchell Garabedian. “The…

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A former priest convicted of sexually abusing a child in Maine roughly 40 years ago has died in prison.

Ronald Paquin was incarcerated at Mountain View Correctional Facility in Charleston.

The Maine Department of Corrections says he died in custody on Friday afternoon.

Paquin began serving a 16-year sentence in 2019. He was convicted by a jury for gross sexual misconduct, which happened in Kennebunkport in the 1980s.

He was convicted of similar charges in Massachusetts and spent a decade behind bars there.

“I have represented more than 25 clergy sexual abuse victims or survivors of Fr. Ronald Paquin. Fr. Paquin sexually abused my clients as children from about 1973 to 1990 when he was assigned to either St. Monica’s Parish in Methuen, MA, or St. John The Baptist Parish in Haverhill, MA. The death of Fr. Paquin brings a measure of relief to many clergy sexual abuse victims and…

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Charleston, Maine – A former Massachusetts priest who was convicted of sexually abusing an altar boy died Friday afternoon at a Maine correctional facility, according to a statement from the Maine Department of Corrections.

Ronald Paquin, 83, was a defrocked priest from Massachusetts, serving a 16-year sentence for sexually abusing an altar boy during trips to Maine in the 1980s.

He had previously served more than 10 years in a Massachusetts prison for sexually abusing an altar boy.

“The survivors, the victims are relieved that he’s passed away because children are safer. There was no limit to his sexual abuse of children. It was awful. It was evil. It was disgusting. It was garbage,” said Mitchell Garabedian, an attorney for survivors of clergy sex abuse.

He was released in 2015 and then taken into custody in Maine, where he began serving his sentence in 2019.

Paquin served in…

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But some experts are hesitant to consider policy changes based on scattered reports of erroneous allegations.

More than 20 years after the abuse crisis first roiled the U.S. Catholic Church, the response this summer from one accused priest was dramatic and unprecedented. Father Michael Pfleger, the at-times controversial leader of a South Side Chicago parish, fiercely objected to an archdiocesan letter that disclosed an allegation of a decades-old incident of sexual assault on a child.

“Let me be clear, sexual abuse is wrong and I realize that the Catholic Church has a long history of not dealing with accusations and has spent a number of years putting strong policies in place, but I have said countless times I believe the current policy is wrong and unfair to the accused priest,” Father Pfleger wrote on July 11, responding in a statement to media the same day his suspension from ministry at the…

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Charleston, Maine — Ronald Paquin, the defrocked priest who served parishes in Methuen and Haverhill before being convicted of sexually abusing an altar boy, has died in prison in Maine.

Paquin, 83, whose case was a critical piece of a sexual abuse scandal that consumed the Archdiocese of Boston, died Friday afternoon at Mountain View Correctional Facility in Charleston, according to a press release from the Maine Department of Corrections. No cause of death was announced.

The Catholic priest was portrayed in the movie “Spotlight” about the Boston Globe investigation into clergy sex abuse and served more than 10 years in prison in Massachusetts.

Following his release in 2015, he was taken in custody by Maine authorities and began serving 16 years in prison in 2019.

Paquin served at St. John the Baptist Church in Haverhill from 1981 to 1990, and St. Monica Church in Methuen from 1974 to 1980.

…

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“Nobody’s paying that kind of money for something that didn’t happen,” said Marc Pearlman, one of the lawyers in the case.

The Archdiocese of Chicago recently settled out of court with nine people who accused eight Chicago-area priests of sexually abusing them decades ago.

The settlements, totaling $5.4 million, were all reached in the last two weeks, according to the attorneys representing the victims.

“Nobody’s paying that kind of money for something that didn’t happen,” said Marc Pearlman, one of the victim’s attorneys, during a Thursday news conference announcing the settlements. “This is validation that it happened.”

The allegations date as far back as the early 1970s and as recently as the late 1990s. The victims’ ages at the time of the abuse ranged from 6 to 14 years old.

The list of accused priests, most of whom have died, and their Chicago-area parishes are:

• Michael Cepon,…

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“Truth Heals”: Why the Church Must Put Victims Before Its Reputation

For the Catholic Church, the credibility crisis caused by clerical sexual abuse cannot be solved by finding better words after a scandal breaks. The deeper challenge is to change the way the institution listens, decides, accepts responsibility and communicates long before a crisis reaches the headlines.

That is the argument of Paulina Guzik, professor of media and communication studies at the Pontifical University of John Paul II in Krakow, in her new book Truth Heals: Communication, Trust and the Catholic Church’s Response to Clerical Sexual Abuse. Drawing on five years of research, the book proposes a model in which communication is not a public-relations operation added to crisis management, but part of the Church’s responsibility toward victims and its own institutional reform.

Guzik’s starting point is deliberately uncomfortable: survivors must never be treated primarily as a legal, financial or…

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Charleston, Maine — A former Catholic priest from Massachusetts, who was serving a 20-year sentence for gross sexual misconduct, has died in a Maine Department of Corrections prison facility.

Ronald Paquin, 83, died Friday around 4:15 p.m. at the Mountain View Correctional Facility in Charleston, according to a release from the MDOC. His death was “attended by medical personnel,” the release stated. The Attorney General’s Office and the Medical Examiner were notified. 

In 2018, a jury convicted Paquin of repeatedly assaulting an altar boy in Maine during the 1980s. He was involved in the Boston Archdiocese abuse scandal in 2002 when the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigation exposed widespread clergy sexual abuse and cover-ups within the Archdiocese of Boston. 

Paquin was sentenced in 2019 to 20 years in prison, with 16 years suspended, followed by three years of probation. Two men testified that they were altar boys when Paquin invited…

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