News Archive

A digest of links to media coverage of clergy abuse. For recent coverage listed in this blog, read the full article in the newspaper or other media source by clicking “Read original article.” For earlier coverage, click the title to read the original article.

February 10, 2012

Assassination plot could kill Pope Benedict within a year, Cardinal warns

VATICAN CITY
National Post (Canada)

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI could be the target of an assassination plot, according to a document published on Friday by the Il Fatto Quotidiano daily which the Vatican dismissed as “delirious.”

The newspaper published a confidential document dated December 30, 2011 which was apparently sent by retired Colombian cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos to the Vatican warning of unspecified plans to kill the pope.

Castrillon Hoyos reportedly met the pope in January to discuss the threat.

The document from the Colombian cardinal says that the plot was mentioned by the archbishop of Palermo Paolo Romeo during a visit to China in November.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

Sexual Assault Victims Sue William Hodgson Marshall, Catholic Church

CANADA
The Windsor Star

By Dave Hall

WINDSOR, Ont. — Four more sexual assault victims of convicted pedophile Rev. William Hodgson Marshall, who preyed on his victims over a 30-year period, have launched separate $3-million lawsuits against the Basilian priest.

The civil suits by Greg McCullough, David D’Agnillo, Thomas Haberer and an unamed plaintiff also name the Basilian Fathers of Toronto, Catholic Bishop Ronald Fabbro and the Windsor-Essex Catholic District School Board, alleging none did anything to prevent Marshall from abusing children.

Marshall, now 89, was sentenced June 9 in a Windsor court to two years in prison for molesting children. He pleaded guilty to 17 counts of indecent assault between 1952 and 1985 in Windsor, Sudbury and Toronto where the Basilian taught.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

DA: Cardinal’s death in Pa. probed amid odd timing

PENNSYLVANIA
The Associated Press

By PATRICK WALTERS, Associated Press

NORRISTOWN, Pa. (AP) — A suburban Philadelphia prosecutor is investigating the recent death of a Roman Catholic cardinal because of what she called odd timing.

Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua (beh-vih-LAH’-kwah) died on Jan. 31 at age 88. Church officials say Bevilacqua was suffering from dementia and cancer.

A day earlier, a Philadelphia judge had found him competent to testify at the child-endangerment trial of his longtime aide. Defense lawyers for Monsignor William Lynn say he kept accused priests in ministry on orders from Bevilacqua.

District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman of Montgomery County said Friday she doesn’t want “speculation swirling” about how he died.

Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.

William Lynch Trial Now On Schedule

CALIFORNIA
Patch

The trial for a San Francisco man accused of beating a priest at the Los Gatos Sacred Heart Jesuit Center in May of 2010 is now scheduled to begin March 26.

Prosecutor Vicki Gemetti explained attorneys representing William Lynch didn’t appear as scheduled for a Feb. 2 hearing at the Santa Clara County Courthouse due to weather conditions.

Lynch, 44, is being represented by Pat Harris and Mark Geragos, with the Los Angeles-based law firm of Geragos & Geragos.

The hearing next month will set the trial in motion, beginning with pre-trial motions, jury selection and the presentation of the evidence, Gemetti explained.

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“Plot against Benedict XVI He will die in 12 months”

VATICAN CITY
Il Fatto Quotidiano

A note delivered to the Pontiff by cardinal Castrillon a month ago, reports what archbishop of Palermo, cardinal Romeo, said in one of his conversations in China last November: “His interlocutor thought, with fear, that the Pope would be the victim of an attack”. Scola could be his successor. The spokesman of the Holy See, Lombardi: “So incredible we cannot comment on”.

Mordkomplott. “Plot of death”. It is somehow unbelievable to read on a strictly confidential document how an influential Cardinal, such as archbishop of Palermo Paolo Romeo, predicts Pope Benedict’s death no further than November 2012. Being so sure about the death period he made the interlocutors think of the existence of a plot to kill Benedict XVI. The exclusive content published by Il Fatto Quotidiano reveals a note written by anonymous dated Dec. 30th 2011. In Early January, the note was delivered by Colombian Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos to the secretary of State and the secretary of the Pope. Castrillon also suggested making inquiries to understand whom exactly archbishop Romeo talked to while in China.

The Pontiff was told about the content of the note by cardinal Castrillon in person in mid January, during a private hearing. The document opens with a premise in upper case letters: “Stricly confidential”. Although many books have been written about Vatican conspiracies and the suspect death of John Paul I, these circumstances are surely uncommon. No one ever before putted on paper a plot to kill the Pope. A scheme that can have his final showdown in November, due to the deep divisions in the Holy corridors that picture the Pope opposed to secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone the day before an alleged succession.

THE PLOT AND ITS MAIN CHARACTERS.

Archbishop of Milan Angelo Scola will be Pope Ratzinger intended successor, the document says.

A document that is written completely in German, Pope Benedict’s mother language. The note has a long object line in bold: “Archbishop of Palermo, cardinal Paolo Romeo’s trip to Beijing on November 2011. During his hearings in China, cardinal Romeo foreshadows the death of Pope Benedict XVI within 12 months. Cardinal Romeo was told of a serious death plot by a well informed source. He was so sure and resolute, his interlocutors in China thought of the existence of an attack scheme against the Holy Father.”

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Il documento: “Strettamente confidenziale per il Santo Padre

CITTA DEL VATICAN
Il Fatto Quotidiano

[documento]

Sotto riportiamo il documento integrale tradotto dal tedesco, con in testa la scritta “strettamente confidenziale” e la data 30. 12. 2011

Oggetto: Viaggio del Cardinale Paolo Romeo (* 20 febbraio 1938 ad Acireale, Provincia di Catania, Italia), Arcivescovo di Palermo, a Pechino a novembre 2011.

Durante i suoi colloqui in Cina, il Cardinale Romeo ha profetizzato la morte di Papa Benedetto XVI entro i prossimi 12 mesi. Le dichiarazioni del Cardinale sono state esposte, da persona probabilmente informata di un serio complotto delittuoso, con tale sicurezza e fermezza, che i suoi interlocutori in Cina hanno pensato con spavento, che sia in programma un attentato contro il Santo Padre.

Viaggio a Pechino: Nel novembre 2011 il Cardinale Romeo si è recato con un visto turistico a Pechino, dove, di fatto, non ha incontrato nessun esponente della Chiesa Cattolica in Cina, bensì uomini d’affari italiani, che vivono o meglio lavorano a Pechino, e alcuni interlocutori cinesi. A Pechino il Cardinale Romeo ha dichiarato di essere stato inviato personalmente da Papa Benedetto XVI per proseguire, o meglio verificare i colloqui avviati dal Cardinale Dario Castrillón Hoyos a marzo 2010 in Cina. Inoltre ha affermato di essere l’interlocutore designato del Papa per occuparsi in futuro delle questioni fra la Cina e il Vaticano. In un colloquio confidenziale, il Cardinale Romeo ha informato i suoi interlocutori in Cina di aver curato durante la sua attività svolta per conto del Servizio diplomatico della Santa Sede presso le rappresentanze papali nelle Filippine, i contatti con la Chiesa Clandestina RKK 1 e di essere, in virtù di questa sua esperienza, l’interlocutore adatto per curare le questioni fra la Cina e il Vaticano.

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Un piano per uccidere il Papa, il Vaticano: “Documento esiste, ma sono farneticazioni”

CITTA DEL VATICANO
Il Fatto Quotidiano

Il documento esiste ed è stato consegnato ma “non è stato preso in alcun modo in considerazione, perché sono solo farneticazioni”, con queste parole padre Federico Lombardi, direttore della Sala Stampa vaticana, conferma lo scoop del Fatto Quotidiano su un presunto complotto ai danni di Benedetto XVI. In sostanza la Santa sede conferma l’appunto esclusivo pubblicato dal nostro giornale e nel quale si parla del cardinale siciliano Paolo Romeo che avrebbe rivelato quanto ascoltato in Cina durante un viaggio avvenuto a novembre: “Entro 12 mesi il Papa morirà”. Parole che sarebbero state raccolte dal cardinale Dario Castrillòn Hohyos che avrebbe redatto l’appunto a dicembre e lo avrebbe inviato a Benedetto XVI a gennaio.

“Sicuro di sé, come se lo sapesse con precisione – si legge nel documento pubblicato dal Fatto Quotidiano – il Cardinale Romeo ha annunciato che il Santo Padre avrebbe solo altri 12 mesi da vivere. Durante i suoi colloqui in Cina ha profetizzato la morte di Papa Bendetto XVI entro i prossimi 12 mesi. Le dichiarazioni del Cardinale sono state esposte da persona probabilmente informata di un serio complotto delittuoso con tale sicurezza e fermezza, che i suoi interlocutori in Cina hanno pensato con spavento, che sia in programma un attentato contro il Santo Padre”.

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Vatican: “Confidential” documents and that non-existent conspiracy

VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

An authentic, but obviously inconclusive, note unleashes a turmoil over a hypothetical conspiracy to possibly assassinate the Pope

Andrea Tornielli
Vatican City

Not a day goes by now without some sort of confidential note fromt he Vatican being leaked. What Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano publishes today is a document sent to the Pope on 30 December. It is a “confidential” note that Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, former Prefect of the Congregation of the Clergy, received from a friend and concerns the possibility of a “criminal conspiracy” to eliminatethe Pope. The alleged “source” cited in the text, is Cardinal Paolo Romeo, Archbishop of Palermo, a former nuncio in Italy, who, during a trip to Beijing in November 2011, had spoken with some Chinese interlocutors of the possibility that Benedict XVI will die within a year and the possibility that his successor will be the Italian Cardinal Angelo Scola, patriarch of Venice and a few months now, the new Archbishop of Milan.

It should be said firstly that the note published by the newspaper is authentic. It was actually received by the Secretary of State, where after a first reading and a few laughs, it was not given the least weight, even if it was sent to the Pope.

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Priest Abuse Trial: Jury Finds Archdiocese Negligent And Reckless

CONNECTICUT
The Hartford Courant

By EDMUND H. MAHONY, emahony@courant.com
The Hartford Courant

12:25 p.m. EST, February 10, 2012
WATERBURY —
A Superior Court jury decided Friday morning that the Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford had been reckless and negligent and that a former altar boy sexually abused three decades ago by a priest the church knew to be a pedophile should receive $1 million in damages.

The two men and four women on the jury deliberated for about two hours Thursday afternoon and an hour and a half Friday.

The now-adult victim, identified in his suit as Jacob Doe, said the verdict valdiates “that things that occurred in the past were not my fault or the fault of any of the victims. …This is the most important part of my healing process.”

Doe added: “This predator was placed in a position where he could harm me and my friend. … I’m hoping that other victims can begin their healing process, and the church does the right thing going forward.”

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Jury finds Hartford Archdiocese negligent in pedophile priest case, victim awarded $1 million

CONNECTICUT
The Republic

WATERBURY, Conn. — A jury has ruled that the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford should pay $1 million in damages to a former altar boy who was sexually abused by a priest decades ago.

The Hartford Courant (http://cour.at/ze6dww ) reports the Superior Court jury in Waterbury delivered the verdict Friday after about three and a half hours of deliberations.

The jury found the archdiocese was reckless and negligent in its handling of the priest, Ivan Ferguson.

The victim presented evidence that Ferguson was allowed contact with children in the early 1980s despite admitting earlier that he had sexually abused other boys.

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Zijn woorden als ‘spijt’, ‘vergeving’ en ‘genezing’ genoeg?

BELGIE
De Morgen

Journalist Roel Verschueren is de auteur van de International clergy sexual abuse news monitor. Hij is rechtspartij en bewindvoerder van de groepsvordering tegen de kerkelijke oversten.

Wat staat de Belgische slachtoffers van seksueel misbruik de komende maanden te wachten? Veel, zoveel is zeker. Er wordt verwacht dat ze beslissen. Waarschijnlijk een van de belangrijkste beslissingen uit hun leven en de tijd begint te lopen. De richtingen die ze uitkunnen op een rijtje.

Piste 1: niets doen
Met de sinds jaren opgebouwde degout tegenover welke niet-oplossing dan ook, kan een slachtoffer vandaag gewoon beslissen dat deze hele heisa aan hem/haar voorbij gaat. Vanuit de overtuiging dat niemand in staat is om voor de nodige erkenning en compensatie te zorgen die voor hem of haar te lang is uitgebleven. Nogal wat slachtoffers zijn moe, hebben niet de energie om de hele mallemolen (nog eens) te doorlopen. Ik ken ze, en respecteer hun mening. Deze overlevers moeten dan ook aanvaarden dat na 31 oktober 2012, de aangeboden pistes (arbitrage of mediatie) definitief gesloten zullen worden.

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Former State Workers Say Governor’s Office Was Warned About Alexander

HAWAII
Honolulu Civil Beat

By Chad Blair
02/10/2012

Gov. Neil Abercrombie’s office was warned in an email about inappropriate sexual behavior by Marc Alexander shortly after he was appointed homeless coordinator, two people who handled correspondence for the administration told Civil Beat.

Alexander resigned “to attend to personal matters” a year later after an activist threatened to make public a woman’s allegations against him when he was a Catholic priest.

Joseph Woodard and Carolyn Golojuch say they worked in the governor’s Office of Constituent Services when the email came in.

When Alexander resigned last month, the governor’s spokeswoman told Civil Beat he didn’t learn of the allegations until Mitch Kahle, leader of Hawaii Citizens for the Separation of State and Church, reached out recently.

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Quebec priest sentenced to three years in jail for sex assaults

CANADA
Nanaimo Daily News

Published: Friday, February 10, 2012

QUEBEC – A Quebec priest who pleaded guilty to multiple counts of sexual assault involving 13 boys who attended a private Catholic school during the 1970s and ’80s was sentenced Friday to three years in jail.

Raymond-Marie Lavoie was a teacher at Seminaire St-Alphonse, in Ste. Anne de Beaupre, just outside Quebec City, when the assaults took place.

The 71-year-old priest asked his victims for forgiveness and mercy when he pleaded guilty last fall.

Lavoie’s victims were all boarders at the college and were between the ages of 12 and 15 at the time.

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Belgian Catholics petition bishops to empower laymen

BELGIUM
Chicago Tribune

By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

PARIS, Feb 10 (Reuters) – Belgian Catholics have petitioned their bishops for reforms including ordaining women and married men and allowing laymen to lead church services as ways to counter their growing shortage of priests.

The petition, handed over on Thursday, represented yet another challenge to the Belgian Church, deeply shaken by revelations of clerical sexual abuse that prompted police to raid its offices across the country for evidence of crimes last month.

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The Vatican gets religion on fighting abuse

ROME
National Catholic Reporter

by John L Allen Jr on Feb. 10, 2012 All Things Catholic

I’ve been covering the “Toward Healing and Renewal” symposium this week, a major international summit on the sexual abuse crisis organized by Rome’s Jesuit-run Gregorian University and co-sponsored by several Vatican departments. It brought together roughly 100 bishops and religious superiors from around the world ahead of a May deadline from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for bishops’ conferences to submit their anti-abuse policies for review.

Although much of what’s been said was familiar to people who have been living with the crisis for the last decade, the idea was to share this experience with the rest of the Catholic world, especially places where the sexual abuse crisis has not yet exploded, in the hope that for once, church leaders can defuse the bomb before it goes off.

I’ve been filing stories along the way, and I won’t rehash that material here; links to everything are below. Instead, I’ll lay out the big picture to emerge from the summit, which I would express this way: The Vatican has gotten religion on the sexual abuse crisis.

When the scandals in the United States broke a decade ago, reaction in the Vatican was clearly divided between what one might loosely call the “reformers” and the “deniers.” What seems indisputable in the wake of this week’s event, though it was by no means preordained 10 years ago, is that the reformers now have the upper hand.

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Nalzaro: Minglanilla priests, lay ministers reconcile

PHILIPPINES
Sun.Star

By Bobby Nalzaro
Saksi

Saturday, February 11, 2012

ALL’S well that ends well, so to speak. The Team Ministry of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish in Minglanilla and lay ministers who demanded the transfer of the priests for committing immoral acts have reconciled.

This following a dialogue with Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma last Monday at the Cebu Catholic Television Network (CCTN) compound under the auspices of brother Dodong Limchua, who heads the Oasis of Love, a charismatic group associated with the Catholic Church.

In that dialogue, the priests headed by their team moderator, Fr. Scipio “Jojo” Deligero, promised the lay ministers and the acolytes that they can resume serving the church.

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DA: No criminal probe in Bevilacqua’s death

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman said today she suggested the county coroner conduct an examination of the body of Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua because the timing of his death struck her as “peculiar”

Ferman said her office is not conducting a criminal inquiry into the death.

The prosecutor addressed the issue a day after county coroner Walter I. Hofman confirmed he examined the body of the 88-year-old prelate and has deferred declaring a cause of death until he see toxicology test results.

Hofman said Thursday he had been asked to conduct the review because the cardinal died one day after a Philadelphia judge said he could be called to testify next month at the child sex abuse and endangerment trial of three current and former priests.

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Ex-priest James Donaghy sentenced to 10 years in prison

NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

A former priest has been jailed for 10 years after being convicted of 23 sex abuse charges against a young adult and two teenage altar boys

James Donaghy, 53, from Lady Wallace Drive in Lisburn, was described by the judge as a sexual predator whose victims were susceptible by virtue of their religious leanings.

Donaghy stepped down from the priesthood in 2004.

The Catholic Church is holding its own investigation.

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‘Sexual predator’ ex-priest jailed

NORTHERN IRELAND
UTV

A former priest who used his “ruthless” character, as well as “charm and humour”, to befriend and abuse three victims has been jailed for 10 years.

Judge Patrick Lynch QC told 53-year-old “sexual predator” James Martin Donaghy that his litany of offences and other similar offences had “seriously compromised, perhaps irrevocably” the trust in the priesthood in this country and others.

He also told Donaghy that he had damaged, not just his three victims, but also the reputation of the church and his colleagues – “the great majority of whom are beyond reproach”.

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A WEEK FULL of IT

UNITED STATES
National Survivors Advocates Coalition

Absence can speak with a megaphone.

It did this week in Rome at the symposium on sexual abuse.

It ran for fours days and ended with the opening of an “e-learning center” in Germany.

Pope Benedict XVI was nowhere to be seen. At the symposium, that is.

This symposium was not held in Shanghai, Sydney, Singapore, Seattle, Soweto or the south base camp of the South Pole.

It was held within the confines of the city of Rome.

A city where the Supreme Pontiff lives, works, has a car at his disposal for which he does not personally pay for the gas or the diesel fuel to run it.

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Lawyer: More than 8,000 children abused by Milwaukee archdiocese priests

MILWAUKEE (WI)
WTAQ

MILWAUKEE (WSAU) An attorney says at least 8,000 kids were sexually abused by over 100 priests and other offenders in the Milwaukee Catholic Diocese. Jeffrey Anderson made the assertion yesterday at a court hearing on the first compensation claims filed by abuse victims as part of church’s bankruptcy proceedings. Anderson told Judge Susan Kelley that sealed bankruptcy documents outlined the extent of the abuse. He said the offenders include 75 priests who have not been previously named by the archdiocese. Anderson represents over half of the 570 victims who filed for compensation.

Victims’ advocate Peter Isley of the Survivors Network questioned how eight-thousand crimes could be committed with no accountability. Isley speculates that some of the offenders belong to religious orders — and the archdiocese claims it’s not responsible for those groups, even though Catholics provide staffing for them. Isley called the matter a “public safety crisis.” The archdiocese said it did not have enough information to respond.

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Adelanto de La Segunda…

CHILE
La Segunda

Adelanto de La Segunda: A un año del fallo que condenó a Karadima las víctimas cuentan sus procesos de sanación

El próximo 18 de febrero se cumple el primer año desde que el Arzobispo de Santiago, monseñor Ricardo Ezzati, hiciera público el duro fallo del Vaticano contra el ex párroco de El Bosque, Fernando Karadima, por abusos sexuales reiterados contra menores.

Hoy “La Segunda” recoge el testimonio de José Andrés Murillo, Juan Carlos Cruz y Fernando Batlle, tres de los cuatro principales denunciantes: Critican en duros términos a la Iglesia chilena y cuentan la forma en que han intentado dar vuelta la página.

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Sacramento area pastor convicted in sex assault on minor

CALIFORNIA
The Sacramento Bee

Local pastor Cornelius Taylor was convicted Thursday on eight counts of sexual assault on a minor, the Sacramento County District Attorney’s office reported.

A troubled teen with no family support was befriended by Taylor at his church.

She moved in with the pastor and his wife when she was 16 years old, the district attorney’s office reported.

Taylor repeatedly sexually assaulted the girl in incidents that continued after she turned 18 years old.

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Judges hear church confession case

MICHIGAN
The Detroit News

By Candice Williams
The Detroit News

Detroit— Three Michigan Court of Appeals judges heard arguments Thursday in a case that could affect if and when church confessions can be used in court. The panel is expected to decide within a few weeks if the pastor of a Belleville church violated the state’s priest-penitent privilege when he testified against a church member during the preliminary exam for a rape case.

Pastor John Vaprezsan of Metro Baptist Church had testified in March that the defendant, Samuel D. Bragg, then 17, had admitted in 2009 to raping a 9-year-old girl two years earlier when she spent the night at his house.

Bragg’s mother was present for the meeting.

Raymond Cassar, Bragg’s defense attorney, said during Thursday’s hearing the confession was privileged communication and cannot be used in court.

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Religious confession likely to stay private in sexual assault

MICHIGAN
Detroit Free Press

By David Ashenfelter
Detroit Free Press Staff Writer

Three Michigan Court of Appeals judges appeared likely to apply Michigan’s priest-penitent privilege Thursday in a criminal case involving a Belleville teen who allegedly admitted to his pastor he had sexually assaulted a 9-year-old girl.

The judges in their comments seemed to reject arguments by Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Toni Odette that the privilege didn’t apply because the teen’s mother was present when he confessed and, as a result, his admission was not confidential.

Going along with the prosecution, two of the judges said, would create a nightmare for Michigan trial judges who would have to decide on a case-by-case, denomination-by-domination basis whether a pastor’s statements about such admissions could be used to prosecute a church member.

“I wonder if the real test is what the penitent thinks, not what the pastor thinks,” Judge Elizabeth Gleicher said during the hearing.

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Second priest takes court action over Prime Time allegations

IRELAND
Newstalk

It has emerged that another legal action is pending arising out of the Prime Time ‘Mission to Prey’ programme.

Fr. Kevin Reynolds has already been awarded substantial damages arising out of false allegations made about him in the show which was broadcast in May of last year.

Now fresh High Court proceedings are being taken by a former Catholic Archbishop who alleges he was defamed in the programme.

Richard Burke is originally from Co. Tipperary and is a member of the Catholic Missionary Society.

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Manila bishop deplores rising incidence of priest abuses

ROME
Manila Standard (Philippines)

ROME—A culture of silence across Asia may be keeping many victims of clergy sex abuse there from coming forward, a top Asian church official told a Vatican-backed conference on Thursday.

Monsignor Luis Antonio Tagle, the archbishop of Manila, said Asian deference to church authorities in places like the overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Philippines might also have contributed to keeping a lid on reports. He said more and more victims had spoken out in the past five years in the Philippines, but the incidents of priests keeping mistresses still far outpaced the reports of priests preying on children.

Tagle addressed priests and bishops from 110 dioceses and 30 religious orders around the world who came to the four-day conference in Rome to learn how to craft guidelines on how to care for victims, investigate abuse allegations, and keep pedophiles out of the priesthood. The Vatican has set a May deadline for the policies to be submitted to Rome for review.

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Do we have a church is schism?

UNITED STATES
Catholica (Australia)

Mark Day: Do you agree with the Swiss theologian Hans Kung who asserts that Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI, by opposing the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, created a schism in the Catholic Church?

Matthew Fox: Yes, absolutely. A council can trump a pope. A pope can’t trump a council. That’s good theology. What is clear is that these last two popes have broken with every major position the council authorized, including the power of national episcopacies to choose their own bishops, the role of the laity, ecumenism, the renewal of the liturgy, and the movement toward social justice. The Vatican is in schism. Catholics faithful to principles of the Council are not in schism.

Mark Day: You compare today’s church’s hierarchy and the Vatican to a “burning building.” You urge people to salvage only the essentials. What are they?

Matthew Fox: The greatest treasure the church is good people: Fr. Bede Griffiths, Dorothy Day, Meister Eckhart, Julian of Norwich, and so on. We don’t need to travel with basilicas on our backs. We only need are backpacks. The mystics and the prophets—how they did it with their practices and theologies—all this is really worth keeping. We need to preserve the teachings on the sacramentality of the universe, the wisdom tradition from which Jesus comes. And, of course, the tradition of the divine feminine. It is still present In Catholicism because it is pre-modern. The church did not throw out the goddess—but adopted her as the Mary principle.

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L’Eglise face à la pédophilie

ROME
La Croix (France)

Bousculé depuis une dizaine d’années par des affaires pédophiles, le Vatican a mis concrètement l’accent sur la parole des victimes à l’occasion d’un colloque organisé début février 2012 à Rome, où une célébration pénitentielle inédite a été organisée en présence de certaines d’entre elles.

Des Etats-Unis à l’ Irlande, en passant par la Belgique où l’Allemagne, ces affaires d’abus sexuels n’ont épargné ni le clergé diocésain ni les congrégations religieuses, notamment les Légionnaires du Christ, ou la communauté des Béatitudes, dont l’un des membres a été condamné à cinq ans de prison en décembre 2011 par le tribunal correctionnel de Rodez.

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Source: Autopsy Was Done On Bevilacqua

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
My Fox Philly

[with video]

Fox 29 has learned new details about the death of Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua.

The Montgomery County coroner now says he brought the Cardinal’s body to his offices for examination and toxicology tests.

The 88-year-old’s death came one day after a judge ruled the Cardinal may have to testify in the sex abuse scandal that rocked the Philadelphia archdiocese.

In the days before Cardinal Bevilacqua’s body was carried into the cathedral for his funeral and burial in a crypt, the Montgomery County coroner confirms for Fox 29 News he did call for an examination of the Cardinal’s remains and for some tests to be done.

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Report: MontCo Coroner Probing Bevilacqua Death

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Patch

By David Powell

Montgomery County Coroner Walter I. Hofman is probing the death of the late Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua at the request of Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Ferman’s office, according to a report published Thursday night by the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Bevilacqua died on Jan. 31 in Wynnewood at the age of 88, a day after Common Pleas Court Judge Teresa Sarmina ruled that he could be compelled to take the witness stand in the child sex abuse trial of three priests who served in the archdiocese during his 15-year leadership.

According to the Inquirer report, Hofman conducted a postmortem examination of Bevilacqua’s body after it had already been embalmed by a funeral home in Upper Darby. Hofman’s office returned Bevilacqua’s body to the funeral home Tuesday, prior to its interment later that day in the crypt of the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia.

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Montco. Coroner Conducts Toxicology Tests On Cardinal Bevilacqua’s Body

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Jim Melwert

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – KYW Newsradio has learned toxicology tests were done on the body of Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua following his death.

Toxicology tests were done the day after Cardinal Bevilacqua died.

Coroner Walter Hofman says he will not issue a cause of death until he sees the results, which he says will take a few weeks.

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Coroner examined body of Philadelphia cardinal …

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Washington Post

Coroner examined body of Philadelphia cardinal who died after being found competent to testify

By Associated Press, Updated: Friday, February 10

NORRISTOWN, Pa. — A county coroner says he examined the body of late Philadelphia Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua (beh-vih-LAH’-kwah) at the request of prosecutors because of the odd timing of his death a day after he was found competent to testify at a high-profile church sex abuse trial.

Montgomery County Coroner Walter Hofman says county prosecutors contacted him after the 88-year-old Bevilacqua died Jan. 31 at a Wynnewood seminary.

Hofman tells The Philadelphia Inquirer (http://bit.ly/w0PV93 ) he didn’t conduct an autopsy but did see Bevilacqua’s body and order toxicology tests. The test results are pending.

Church officials say Bevilacqua was suffering from cancer and dementia.

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Authorities Probe Cardinal Bevilacqua’s Death

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
NBC 10

[with video]

By Shelley Laurence and Dan Stamm

Friday, Feb 10, 2012

The day after Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua died, officials in Montgomery County asked the coroner to investigate the Catholic leader’s death.

The 88-year old Cardinal died on Jan. 31, a day after a judge found him competent to testify in the trial of a former aide.

That aide, Msgr. William Lynn, is accused of hiding predator priests by shuffling them from church to church. His trial is scheduled for next month. Bevilacqua wasn’t charged in the case.

Church officials say the Cardinal was suffering from cancer and dementia.

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“Simonis moet Albergenaren spijt betuigen”

NEDERLAND
RTV Oost

Het leed van de voormalige misdienaars van de parochie in Albergen, die seksueel zijn misbruikt, moet erkend worden. Ook moeten de aartsbisschop van Utrecht, het kerkbestuur van de parochie Albergen en kardinaal Simonis verontschuldigingen aanbieden en spijt betuigen. Dat oordeelt de klachtencommissie van het Meldpunt Seksueel Misbruik RKK.

De zaak in Albergen kwam aan het rollen nadat Frank Oude Geerdink begin 2010 openlijk in de media sprak over het misbruik. Daarna meldden meer slachtoffers zich. Ze waren allemaal slachtoffer van een inmiddels overleden pastoor die in 1974 werd benoemd. De inwoners van Albergen wisten bij zijn aanstelling niet dat de pastoor in zijn voormalige standplaats Arnhem als kapelaan was betrapt op seksueel misbruik van een minderjarige.

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Lawsuit filed against Catholic Diocese alleges abuse from now-dead priest

KANSAS CITY (MO)
KCTV

[with video]

By Laura McCallister, Multimedia Producer
By Jonathan Carter, Reporter

KANSAS CITY, MO (KCTV) –
Another lawsuit has been filed against the Kansas City area Catholic Diocese. The allegations accuse a now-dead priest of abusing a young boy in the 70s.

The lawsuit names the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph and, in particular, Father James Ford who died in 1992.

According to SNAP, the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, Ford abused the victim in the 70s. The group also alleges Ford, who left the priesthood in 1986, died of AIDS.

SNAP official Barbara Dorris said the lawsuit is the result of a broken trust between the diocese and the community.

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Nieuwe onthullingen over misbruik in bisdom Haarlem

NEDERLAND
Haarlems Dagblad

HAARLEM – De onthullingen over kindermisbruik in het rooms-katholieke bisdom Haarlem-Amsterdam breiden zich uit als een olievlek. Vooral het seminarie Hageveld wordt genoemd. In kindertehuis Het Witte Huis in Driehuis, geleid door de zusters van De Voorzienigheid, zouden drie zusjes door nonnen zijn misbruikt.

Bij de Koepelorganisatie Landelijk Overleg Kerkelijk Kindermisbruik (Klokk) lopen momenteel enkele ‘ten hemel schreiende zaken’ tegen het voormalige seminarie Hageveld in Heemstede. Het misbruik voltrok zich in de jaren zestig en zeventig.Machtspositie

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Group says child predators worked at Catholic school

HAWAII
HawaiiNewsNow

[with video]

By Jim Mendoza

KALIHI (HawaiiNewsNow) – In the 1950s, Brother Thomas Cuthbert Ford pleaded guilty to beating a boy in a New Jersey orphanage. He was Damien Memorial School’s dean from 1972 to 1975.

Brother Robert Brouilette was convicted of child porn after he taught religion and history at Damien in the seventies and eighties.

Father Gerald Funcheon was Damien’s chaplain and counselor from 1982 to 1984, and the subject of three child sex assault lawsuits on the mainland.

“These men were predators. They’re superiors knew that they were predators,” said Joelle Casteix, western regional director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP).

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Ireland, Bishops in front row against abuse

IRELAND
Vatican Insider

A note from the Bishops’ Conference, reported by the Sir, provides information and costs that prove the commitment of the national church

Vatican Insider Staff
Rome

Irish bishops deny the statement which circulated in Ireland and «greatly misrepresents reality», according to which victims of abuse have not received any apology, compensation and therapeutic aid.

In particular, it mentioned the “Towards Healing” service which is «jointly funded by bishops and religious congregations, provides all levels of confidential counseling and other support services to victims of abuse, with independent and fully accredited therapists».

The counseling is offered to victims within seven days after initial contact with the service. Since 1997, «Towards Healing» has provided counseling and other support services to over 5,000 victims of abuse committed by clergy and religious, for a total of 250,000 separate sessions.

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Brady talks of victims’ suffering

ROME
The Irish Times

PADDY AGNEW in Rome

THE PRIMATE of the Irish Church, Cardinal Seán Brady, yesterday expressed the hope that this week’s unprecedented symposium in Rome, Towards Healing and Renewal , might prove to be an “important step” on the Catholic Church’s long and difficult road to healing the damage done by the sex abuse crisis.

Speaking on the last day of the symposium, Cardinal Brady said that the presence of representatives of 110 bishops’ conferences, as well as experts and senior curia figures underlined the significance of the event.

“It is important that this symposium brings home to people how serious this problem is and just what the cost of it is, not just in financial terms but more importantly in moral terms, in terms of the damage, the scandal, the shame,” he continued.

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Strukturen der Sünde

ROM
Frankfurter Allgemeine

Von Daniel Deckers

Wo sollte der Gedanke ferner liegen, von einem historischen Ereignis zu sprechen, wenn nicht im Blick auf die katholische Kirche, in deren kulturellem Langzeitgedächtnis die Erfahrungen der Menschheit seit zweitausend Jahren gespeichert sind? Und doch drängt sich diese Kategorie in diesen Tagen auf. Denn das Symposion „Auf dem Weg zu Heilung und Erneuerung“, das am Donnerstag in der Päpstlichen Jesuitenuniversität Gregoriana in Rom zu Ende ging, sprengte in Form und Inhalt alles, was sich seit Menschengedenken im Schatten des Vatikans abgespielt hat: Annähernd zweihundert Kardinäle, Bischöfe, Ordensobere, Theologen und Wissenschaftler aus mehr als hundert Ländern gingen fast vier Tage lang miteinander darüber zu Rate, was weltweit aus dem Skandal sexueller Übergriffe von Geistlichen auf Minderjährige und Schutzbefohlene zu lernen sei.

Im siebten Jahr des Pontifikats von Papst Benedikt XVI. kann kein Zweifel mehr daran bestehen, dass der Papst und seine engsten Mitarbeiter verstanden haben, welche Zerstörungskraft dem sexuellen Fehlverhalten des Klerus innewohnt. So ist das Kirchenrecht auf Veranlassung des Papstes so modifiziert und mit Sanktionsmöglichkeiten versehen worden, dass die Hoffnung nicht unbegründet ist, es möge eine generalpräventive Wirkung entfalten. Alle Bischofskonferenzen sind außerdem dazu aufgerufen, Leitlinien zum Umgang mit Fällen sexuellen Missbrauchs einschließlich eines Präventionskonzeptes zu erarbeiten.

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Theologe fordert: Zwangszölibat aufheben

DEUTSCHLAND
dradio

[mit Audio]

Das Gespräch führte Jörg Degenhardt

In der Diskussion über Missbrauchsfälle in der Kirche fordert der Psychotherapeut und Theologe Wunibald Müller, einen offenen und selbstverständlichen Umgang mit der Sexualität. Zudem plädiert er dafür, die Homosexualität von Priestern offen anzuerkennen und den Zölibat aufzuheben.

Jörg Degenhardt: Der Missbrauchsskandal hat die katholische Kirche vor zwei Jahren in eine tiefe Krise gestürzt. Vor allem in Irland, den USA, Belgien und Deutschland wurden seinerzeit zahlreiche Fälle bekannt. Der Papst hat den Kampf gegen diese – wie er sagt – Sünde in der Kirche zur Priorität erklärt. In Rom hat es an der Päpstlichen Universität eine internationale Konferenz dazu gegeben, vornehmlich zu der Frage, wie Missbrauchsfälle weiter aufgearbeitet und künftig verhindert werden können. Gestern ging sie zu Ende – bevor wir darüber reden, fasst Tilmann Kleinjung die Ergebnisse zusammen.

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“Ich wurde wie ein Tier angekettet”

OSTERREICH
Kleine Zeitung

Ein ehemaliger Kärntner Heimzögling bricht nach 50 Jahren sein Schweigen. Er erzählt, dass er im Landesjugendheim Görtschach mehrmals am Hals angekettet und dann sexuell missbraucht worden ist. Kein Einzelfall.

Nachdem bekannt wurde, dass Heimkinder in Wien in den 1960er-Jahren absichtlich mit Malaria infiziert worden sind (wir berichteten), erschüttert jetzt ein Fall aus Kärnten: Im Landesjugendheim in Görtschach bei Ferlach kam es in den 1950er- und 60er-Jahren offenbar mehrfach vor, dass Kinder im Stall wie Tiere am Hals angekettet und dann sexuell missbraucht worden sind. Erstmals hat ein Ex-Heimbewohner (Zögling Nr. 44) sein Schweigen gebrochen. Der heute 62-jährige Künstler sagt: “Ich bin mindestens 20 Mal vom Stallknecht angekettet worden. Mehrmals musste ich auch zusehen, wie er die Tiere sexuell missbraucht. Wenn ich brav war, durfte ich das Futter von den Schweinen essen.”

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Church pursues paedophiles via Internet

ROME
Digital Life (South Africa)

By Reuters
Rome, 10 Feb 2012

Roman Catholic Church leaders unveiled an Internet teaching project on Thursday to help clergy around the world root out paedophiles in their ranks and protect children from potential abusers.

Ending a four-day conference on child abuse in Rome, Father Francois-Xavier Dumortier said the €1.2 million ($1.60 million) project would provide multilingual advice and access to research on paedophilia and how to respond to the problem.

“It will help to develop a culture of listening…a different face to the culture of silence,” said Dumortier, who is rector at the Pontifical Gregorian University where the conference was held.

An association for victims of abuse, while not commenting directly on the Internet project, has dismissed the conference as “window dressing” and said the Vatican should publish its documentation on abuse and hand it over to the International Criminal Court in the Hague.

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Coroner probing Bevilacqua’s cause of death

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin, INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Montgomery County authorities asked the county coroner to examine the body of Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua last week to ensure the 88-year-old prelate died of natural causes, not foul play.

Coroner Walter I. Hofman said county prosecutors made the request because Bevilacqua died barely a day after a judge said the former leader of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia might have to testify at next month’s child sex-abuse and endangerment trial for three current and former priests.

“They wanted to make sure there were no intervening events that could have speeded up that demise,” Hofman said.

For now, the cause of death is pending. Hofman said the exam was not an autopsy, but he declined to elaborate or say if he saw signs of foul play. He also said he would not issue the cause of the cardinal’s death until he sees the results of toxicology tests in a few weeks.

Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman and her first assistant, Kevin Steele, did not respond to requests for comment late Thursday.

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Church abuse summit raises hope for change

ROME
The Windsor Star (Canada)

Agence France-presse
February 10, 2012

Catholic leaders voiced hope on Thursday that the Vatican’s first summit on clerical child abuse will mark a radical turnaround for the church after decades of cover-ups.

The four-day meeting opened with a message from Pope Benedict XVI, who has faced thousands of abuse scandals in Europe and the United States since becoming pontiff, calling for “profound renewal of the church at every level.”

Bishops, cardinals and heads of religious orders gathered for frank discussions which stressed the importance of applying the church’s experience in western countries to other parts of the world.

Vatican prosecutor Charles Scicluna said he had received over 4,000 reports of abuse over the past decade including 1,000 in the past two years, and warned bishops would be held to account if they ignored new anti-abuse rules. He said no-one will be able to hide behind “omerta,” or a code of silence, any longer.

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Lawsuit accuses St. Luke pastor of homosexual harassment

DALLAS (TX)
Dallas Voice

DAVID WEBB | Contributing Writer
davidwaynewebb@hotmail.com

A lawsuit filed against St. Luke Community United Methodist Church in Dallas and its former senior pastor, the Rev. Tyrone D. Gordon, portrays the pastoral office of the predominantly African-American church in Southeast Dallas as a hotbed of homosexual harassment.

St. Luke, with 5,000 members, is one of the largest African-American churches in the North Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, which is also named as a defendant in the lawsuit. St. Luke isn’t one of the six gay-affirming Methodist churches in the Dallas area, but its congregation includes some LGBT members.

The Rev. Zan Holmes, who preceded Gordon’s appointment in 2002 as senior pastor at St. Luke, is a respected civil rights leader. The church is known as a center for community activism, and it has attracted prominent members such as Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price and former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk, a U.S. trade representative appointed by President Barack Obama.

Thus far, church leaders at St. Luke and the North Texas Conference have remained silent about the lawsuit, as has Gordon, who announced his resignation as senior pastor from St. Luke in January to take effect on Wednesday, Feb. 15. On that date Holmes, who has also kept silent, will return as interim minister.

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8,000 instances of abuse alleged in Archdiocese bankruptcy hearing

MILWAUKEE (WI)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

By Annysa Johnson of the Journal Sentinel

Feb. 9, 2012

Sealed documents filed in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee bankruptcy identify at least 8,000 instances of child sexual abuse and 100 alleged offenders – 75 of them priests – who have not previously been named by the archdiocese, a victims’ attorney said Thursday.

Archdiocese spokeswoman Julie Wolf said she did not have enough information to respond to the assertion, made by attorney Jeffrey Anderson during a pivotal hearing before U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Susan V. Kelley. Anderson represents about 350 of the 570 victim-survivors who have filed claims in the case.

But Peter Isely of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests speculated that some are likely members of religious orders, such as Capuchins or Franciscans. Order officials do not typically make public the names of their accused members, and the archdiocese claims it is not responsible for them, though they have historically helped to staff its parishes and schools.

“This is a public safety crisis, a child safety crisis that needs to be investigated,” Isely said at a news conference on the federal courthouse steps, surrounded by fellow survivors and reporters.

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Judge leaves abuse claims against Milwaukee Church in limbo

MILWAUKEE (WI)
Reuters

By Geoff Davidian

MILWAUKEE | Thu Feb 9, 2012

(Reuters) – A judge on Thursday denied a bid by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese in Milwaukee to dismiss two fraud claims by sexual abuse victims, ruling it remains to be determined whether the claims were filed too late and the statute of limitations has run out.

But U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Susan Kelley threw out a third case because the claimant had already entered into a settlement with the Church and promised to not seek further compensation, and failed to prove he was fraudulently induced into settling.

The archdiocese’s lawyers had asked Kelley to decide summarily to throw out three test claims, reasoning that her ruling would apply to hundreds of other claims.

“I deny summary judgment on the statute of limitations,” Kelley told a courtroom crowded with alleged victims, none of whom testified at the hearing.

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Lawyers accuse Pennsylvania judge in abuse trial of bias

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Reuters

By Dave Warner

PHILADELPHIA | Thu Feb 9, 2012

(Reuters) – A Philadelphia judge presiding over a Catholic church sex abuse trial should step down because her comment that there is widespread sexual abuse in the church shows a bias against a Monsignor accused in the case, a lawyer said in a court filing.

Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina said in court last week: “Anybody that doesn’t think there is widespread sexual abuse within the Catholic Church is living on another planet.”

Monsignor William Lynn, the highest ranking Philadelphia Archdiocese cleric accused in the case, is charged with child endangerment and conspiracy over allegations he allowed predator priests to continue involvement with children.

“This statement by the court raises concerns that it harbors a firm predisposed opinion against the Catholic Church and its representatives,” Lynn attorneys Thomas Bergstrom and Jeffrey Lindy wrote in a petition filed on Wednesday requesting the judge recuse herself from the case.

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Priest asks cardinal to delay mergers

MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe

By Jay Lindsay
| Associated Press
February 10, 2012

A proposal by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston to cut costs by organizing its 290 parishes into 125 groups that share resources could crush its pastors, who now face a bleak future after sustaining the church through the clergy sexual abuse scandal, a veteran priest wrote in a letter to Cardinal Sean O’Malley obtained by Associated Press.

“I can well imagine that the very process of implementing such a proposal would result in serious psychological and even physical sickness,’’ wrote Monsignor William M. Helmick, pastor of Saint Theresa of Avila in West Roxbury.

The priests “would feel as if they and what they have done and continue to do is of no value and is not appreciated,’’ wrote Helmick, who recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of his ordination.

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Pope’s healing call for abuse victims

VATICAN CITY
Scottish Catholic Observer

The Holy Father called for healing for abuse victims and a major renewal within the Church as a historic summit on protecting children and vulnerable adults began at the Vatican.

“Healing for victims must be of paramount concern in the Christian community, and it must go hand in hand with a profound renewal of the Church at every level,” Pope Benedict XVI said in a statement released to mark the start of the summit on Monday.

Bishops from more than 100 countries and the 32 heads of religious orders gathered at the Vatican this week for the Towards Healing and Renewal symposium at the Pontifical Gregorian University. They heard testimony from an abuse victim as the Church attempts to produce guidelines on tackling abusive priests and help police to prosecute the crime.

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February 9, 2012

Does the hierarchy’s getting together mean it’s falling apart?

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Eugene Cullen Kennedy on Feb. 09, 2012 Bulletins from the Human Side

“It’s not easy being green,” they sing on the soothing fantasy byway of Sesame Street. It is even harder being violet or crimson for church officials struggling to extricate themselves from the pile-up car wreck of the sex abuse crisis on the all-too-real road to Rome.

This gathering of hierarchs to discuss the still-unsettled problem comes a decade after The Boston Globe exposed the depth, extent and ecclesiastical chessboard, move-them-here-and-move- them-there handling of priests accused of sexually abusing those in their charge.

It has been 10 years since Pope John Paul II, acting as shocked as Casablanca’s Capt. Louis Renault on discovering gambling at Rick’s Place, summoned American cardinals to Rome to express his dismay at the revelation of what high-powered churchmen, including then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, blamed alternately on America or the media or a combination of both.

Now leaders of the church have gathered at a meeting at Rome’s Pontifical Gregorian University to hear, as if for the first time, that child abuse is a crime that should be reported to and handled by the police. This is hardly a startling piece of news for anybody with at least an eighth-grade education and is the principle American bishops rallied around at their June 2002 meeting in Dallas to discuss and be instructed on the subject.

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Milwaukee bankruptcy judge’s ruling…

MILWAUKEE (WI)
SNAP Wisconsin

Milwaukee bankruptcy judge’s ruling will allow vast majority of the 570 victim claims to go forward against archdiocese

SNAPwisconsin.com
February 9, 2012
Statement by John Pilmaier, SNAP Wisconsin Director
CONTACT: 414.336.8575

A survey of 350 of the claims reveal at least 100 newly identified sex offenders who committed over 8,000 acts of child sex assault

70 of the newly identified are priests not listed on the archdiocesan so-called “official list” of child molesting clerics

In a stunning moment today in Milwaukee federal bankruptcy court, attorneys speaking on behalf of at least 350 victim/survivors stated that at least 100 never before publically identified child sex offenders working or volunteering in the archdiocese over the past several decades have committed over 8,000 criminal sex acts against children or minors. The sheer magnitude of these numbers and the extent of these crimes constitute a public and child safety crisis.

The numbers were revealed today as Judge Susan V. Kelley ruled against a motion by the archdiocese that would have thrown out the vast majority of the 570 victims claims that have filed into the bankruptcy court. In other words, nearly all of the 570 victim claims will be moving forward through the bankruptcy process.

Kelley also threw out one claim, narrowly, of a victim that had a prior settlement with the archdiocese. The victim, whose name was kept confidential, submitted an affidavit showing that while in mediation the archdiocese lied to him about their prior knowledge of the priest that assaulted him as a 7 year old. Kelley ruled that the victim needed to have indicated that he would not have signed a legal release if he knew he was lied to, a point not made clear in his court document. It’s unknown how many victims in the current bankruptcy court had prior settlements, likely less than 100, but the ruling today means that many of them as well—if they would not have entered settlements with knowledge that the offending cleric had a prior history of abuse–will also have their claims move forward.

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Judge Rules Fraud Cases Against Milwaukee Archdiocese Can More Forward

MILWAUKEE (WI)
WISN

MILWAUKEE — Victims who say they have been abused by members of the Catholic Church said they won in federal court Thursday.

A federal bankruptcy judge has ruled more than 500 cases of fraud will be allowed to go to trial.

These new cases expose 100 additional alleged abusers, 70 of them priests, who have never been named before.

The claims come from representatives of abuse survivors who are trying to sue the Milwaukee archdiocese in federal bankruptcy court.

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Archdiocese bankruptcy judge allows two claims to stand

MILWAUKEE (WI)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

By Annysa Johnson of the Journal Sentinel

Feb. 9, 2012

The federal judge in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee bankruptcy case offered a split decision in a pivotal hearing Thursday, allowing two child sex abuse claims to stand. A third, filed by a man who had previously received a $100,000 settlement, was disalowed.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Susan V. Kelley made it clear her decision to allow the two claims to stand doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be paid. At issue is when the clock should have started ticking on the fraud allegations, and that is a question for trial, she said.

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Judge allows 2 claims in archdiocese bankruptcy

MILWAUKEE (WI)
WXOW

MILWAUKEE (AP) – A federal judge is allowing two claims to go forward against the Archdiocese of Milwaukee for alleged sexual abuse by clergy.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Susan Kelley on Thursday dismissed a third claim because that person already had entered into a settlement.

The archdiocese argued the two claims were filed beyond the statute of limitations. The archdiocese filed for bankruptcy protection last year, saying pending sex-abuse lawsuits could leave it in debt. About 570 people filed restitution claims by the Feb. 1 deadline.

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Clergy must abide by child protection guides

ROME
RTE News

The Vatican’s chief prosecutor has said it is unacceptable for bishops or clergy not to abide by “set standards” on child protection within the church.

Monsignor Charles Scicluna said it was possible that clergy or bishops could face sanction under canon law if the non-application of set standards was a result of “malice or fraudulent negligence”.

He added that disciplining bishops was a matter for Pope Benedict on a case-by-case basis.

It is unclear, however if Msgr Scicluna was suggesting that the non-observance of the 1996 Irish church guidelines on child protection, as was claimed in the Cloyne report, could have been a breach of canon law.

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Bischof Küng: Kirche will “aus Fehlern lernen”

OSTERREICH
Die Presse

Bei der Missbrauchskonferenz im Vatikan übt der Münchner Erzbischof Marx Kritik an der Ignoranz gegenüber den Opfern. Die Missbrauchsskandale haben der Kirche Schäden in Milliardenhöhe verursacht.

Im Vatikan geht die Konferenz gegen Missbrauch zu Ende. Der Vertreter der österreichischen Bischofskonferenz, Bischof Klaus Küng, sieht ein klares Signal für den entschlossenen Willen der katholischen Kirche, aus Fehlern im Umgang mit Missbrauch zu lernen und neue Missbrauchsfälle im kirchlichen Bereich zu verhindern. Der deutsche Kardinal Reinhard Marx sieht hingegen kein Ende der Krise und der Missbrauchsskandale, die die Kirche Milliarden Euro gekostet haben.

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Mahnung an Kirche: Blick nicht verengen

DEUTSCHLAND
Osnabrucker Zeitung

Osnabrück. Mahnende Worte aus Deutschland begleiten die Konferenz im Vatikan zu den Missbrauchsfällen in Einrichtungen der katholischen Kirche.

In einem Gespräch mit unserer Zeitung forderte der Missbrauchsbeauftragte der Bundesregierung, Johannes-Wilhelm Rörig: „Auf dem Weg zur Heilung und Erneuerung, so der Titel des Symposiums, darf der Blick auf die Vergangenheit nicht verloren gehen. Die Strukturen, die den jahrzehntelangen sexuellen Missbrauch erst möglich gemacht haben, müssen umfassend aufgedeckt und aufgearbeitet werden.“

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Missbrauch wird aufgearbeitet

DEUTSCHLAND
Mittelbayerische

Regensburg. Der Regensburger Bischof Gerhard Ludwig Müller hat davor gewarnt, wegen des Missbrauchsskandals in der katholischen Kirche alle Priester vorzuverurteilen. „Wir haben keinen umfassenden Missbrauchskomplex, sondern wir haben verteilt über Jahrzehnte Einzelfälle – die schauen jetzt aus wie ein einziger monolithischer Block“, sagte er in Regensburg. Verantwortlich für die Straftaten und die Diskreditierung des eigenen Berufsstandes sei der Täter. „Wenn ein Lehrer an einer Schule einem Kind etwas antut, ist ja nicht die Schule oder das Kultusministerium verantwortlich.“

In den Diözesen und Orden sei alles Notwendige getan worden. „Was soll man eigentlich tun?“, fragte Müller. Der Tatbestand als solcher sei schließlich nicht mehr rückgängig zu machen. „Von den Personalverantwortlichen zu der jeweiligen Zeit sind die Einzelfälle bearbeitet worden, mehr oder weniger gut.“ In allen Feldern der Pädagogik, in denen Erwachsene mit Kindern oder Jugendlichen zu tun hätten, gebe es ein gewisses Gefahrenpotenzial. „Ich warne aber davor, den Umkehrschluss zu ziehen, dass man jetzt von vornherein alle Eltern, Priester, Lehrer oder Sporttrainer unter einen Vorverdacht stellt“, sagte Müller.

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Pedophilia, Catholicism and the First Amendment in Vermont

VERMONT
Philosopher’s Haze

There is one thing we all know, whether we happen to be religious or non-religious in nature: if I break the law and in a court it can be shown that I broke the law, I am found guilty and must pay the prescribed penalty. Though this should come as no surprise to anyone, there are some who do not think that this is fair. In the case of organizations, there are some who believe that in the event they are found to have systemically violated a particular law that they should only be penalized for some of the wrongdoing. This is the case of the roman catholic diocese of Vermont: they have already paid out millions of dollars in law suits because they employed pedophilic clergy, but do not think it is fair that further suits will place the future of the diocese in jeopardy. That’s right folks! The roman catholic diocese of Vermont wants to actually evade their responsibility to suffer penalties for committing crimes. Sure…it might be bad that children were raped and scarred for life, but for a diocese to go bankrupt for these crimes is unacceptable!

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Third Person Claims Sex Abuse By S. Fla. Youth Pastor

FLORIDA
CBS Miami

FT. LAUDERDALE (CBSMiami) – A third person has come forward to say he was sexually abused by a South Florida youth pastor already charged with the sexual molestation of two boys, according to the Broward Sheriff’s Office.

BSO investigators say the most recent victim is 26-years-old but was 8-years-old at the time of the alleged abuse. The boy had been in the care of Jeffery London, 48, after his mother passed away.

London was first charged in January with the sexual molestation of a boy who is now 18 but was 10 at the time of the alleged abuse.

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Diocesan Financial Statements

ARKANSAS
Arkansas Catholic

The complete Diocese of Little Rock Auditor’s Report and Financial Statements for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2011, were published in the Feb. 11, 2012 issue of Arkansas Catholic. You may download a PDF file of the report, below.

Dear Friends in Christ:

I am pleased to present to you the annual financial report of the Diocese of Little Rock that is published in Arkansas Catholic.

Those who manage the finances of the diocese are always aware for the need to exhibit great stewardship and responsibility. These men and women work quietly behind the scenes and rarely get recognition for their work watching over the financial resources of the Catholic Church in Arkansas. The finance office has been led by Greg Wolfe for more than 10 years. He is assisted by Kelley Renard, Allan Berry, Roseanne Sampson, Jim Driedric, Mimi Bibb, Laura Lock, Sue Mullins and Cheryl Smith. They recognize that the material and financial gifts entrusted to the diocese come from God. They exhibit high levels of faith, skill and ethics every day.

I also want to thank you, the Catholic families and individuals in the state who have been so generous to the diocese and your parishes and schools. You have made it possible to maintain and grow our diocesan programs and ministries. You are in my daily prayers.

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Bishop updates diocese on result of allegation against priest

ARKANSAS
Arkansas Catholic

Published: February 11, 2012

By Bishop Anthony B. Taylor

Bishop Anthony B. Taylor issued a letter Jan. 31 to update Catholics in Arkansas on the removal of Father Laurent Demets, FSSP. The Diocese of Little Rock announced Nov. 14 that Father Demets was removed as the founding chaplain of the St. Pio de Pietrelcina Latin Mass Community in Cherokee Village after credible allegation of suspected child abuse — slapping a child — was made. The priest of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter first served at St. John the Baptist Latin Mass Community in North Little Rock in 2007.

As bishop of the Diocese of Little Rock, I take seriously my responsibility to shepherd and protect the flock entrusted to my care. One of my obligations upon receiving credible allegations of misconduct on the part of Church employees and volunteers is to comply with the requirements of Church law and the laws of the state of Arkansas regarding how these cases should be handled.

The reporting mandate of Arkansas law for suspected mistreatment of minors requires us to report not only cases of sexual abuse, but also cases of physical mistreatment –such as incidents in which a child is believed to have been hit or slapped by an adult. The civil investigation to substantiate such cases depends in part on the willingness of the alleged victim and any witnesses to cooperate.

Church law requires that the diocese conduct its own investigation of credibly alleged incidents, following the procedures specified in our policy for handling such cases, including:

1. Automatic temporary suspension of the subject of an allegation from Church ministry pending the outcome of the civil and ecclesiastical investigations,

2. Public announcement that an allegation has been received, naming the subject of the allegation and the nature of the incident, asking any who have information to come forward — including other possible victims, if there are any.

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Former Priest Convicted Of 21 Counts Of Child Abuse

UNITED KINGDOM
Irwin Mitchell

Sentencing In Case Adjourned

09/02/2012

A former Roman Catholic priest has been convicted of 21 counts of child abuse following a 10-day trial at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court.

Alexander Bede Walsh, 58, was found guilty of two serious sexual offences and 19 counts of indecent assault in relation to time when he was working at children’s homes and churches across Warwickshire, Staffordshire and Coventry in both the 1970s and 1990s.

He was arrested in 2006 after two men came forward to police with claims about abuse when they were children. Sentencing in the case has been adjourned.

Law firm Irwin Mitchell, which acts for those who have suffered serious physical and psychological trauma as a result of child abuse, has been approached by people who were abused by Mr Walsh.

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Priest Sex Abuse Destroyed Victim’s Spirit, Lawyer Says

CONNECTICUT
The Hartford Courant

By EDMUND H. MAHONY, emahony@courant.com
The Hartford Courant

3:06 p.m. EST, February 9, 2012
WATERBURY —
The lawyer representing a former altar boy suing the Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford for sexual abuse by a priest three decades ago told jurors Thursday that the victim probably can never be compensated for the “amputation of his spirit.”

“You can’t put a price on that,” attorney Thomas McNamara told a Superior Court jury in his closing argument. “It’s worth more than $1 million. It’s worth more than $2 million. Not even $3 million will compensate him.”

The now-adult victim, identified in his suit as Jacob Doe, has accused the church of negligence and recklessness. The victim presented evidence during a week-long trial that senior church officials put Father Ivan Ferguson in a position where he could abuse Doe in spite of Ferguson’s admission two years earlier that he had sexually abused other boys.

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Retired priest walks free

AUSTRALIA
Newcastle Herald

BY JOANNE MCCARTHY

10 Feb, 2012

A JURY has found a retired Catholic priest not guilty of allegations he molested a 12-year-old boy while serving at the St Pius X parish at Windale more than two decades ago.

Dennis John Corrigan, 69, walked free from Sydney District Court yesterday after the jury took two hours to reach its verdict.

Mr Corrigan, of Thomas Street, Mayfield, had pleaded not guilty to two counts of indecent assault that were alleged to have occurred between late 1987 and early 1988, including one incident at the Windale presbytery when he invited the boy to stay overnight.

Mr Corrigan, dressed in a suit, displayed little emotion as the verdicts were read out.

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Catholic Church launches global centre against child abuse

VATICAN CITY
AFP

VATICAN CITY — The Catholic Church launched an international Internet centre against paedophilia on Thursday at the close of a four-day Vatican summit aimed at ending decades of abuses and cover-ups.

The new e-learning Centre for Child Protection will be based in Germany, with partners in Argentina, Ecuador, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Italy and Kenya, seeking to bring together research and ways to prevent clerical abuse.

The centre “is only one part of a renewal of the Church,” Cardinal Reinhard Marx, the archbishop of Munich, said at a press conference.

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Opening of the Centre for Child Protection

ROME/GERMANY
Pontifical Gregorian University Centre for Child Protection

A consortium has been formed between the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome (Prof. Dr. Pater Hans Zollner SJ), the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising (Monsignore Klaus Peter Franzl) and the Department for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy of the University Clinic of Ulm (Medical Director: Prof. Dr. med. Jörg Fegert). The Centre for Child Protection is to be established for three years (January 1st, 2012 through December 31st, 2014) by the Institute of Psychology at the Pontifical Gregorian University (Rome) under the sponsorship of the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising and in cooperation with the Department for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at the University Clinic of Ulm based in Munich. The goal is to develop and implement an E-Learning programme totalling 30 hours in four languages (English, German, Italian and Spanish). This programme will draw on a related public-sponsored programme for educational and health care professionals in Germany (Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF)), but will incorporate an emphasis on the cultural and theological diversity of the Catholic Church. The project is directed by a Steering Committee while the content development is supported by a Scientific Advisory Board.

The Pontifical Gregorian University will supervise this project and appoints as director of the Centre Prof. inv. Dr. Hubert Liebhardt – educational scientist, deacon and research-group leader at the University Clinic of Ulm. His scientific working group comprises various professions (educational sciences, psychology, psychotherapy, theology).

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Vatican abuse summit: Web-based ‘Center for Child Protection’ launched

ROME
National Catholic Reporter

by John L Allen Jr on Feb. 09, 2012 NCR Today

ROME — As the final act of a four-day Vatican summit on the sexual abuse crisis, a new internet-based “Center for Child Protection” was unveiled this afternoon in Rome, designed to educate priests, deacons, and other church personnel in fighting child abuse.

According to German Deacon Hubert Liebhardt, an educational scientist who serves as director of the new center, its aim is “to promote a culture of vigilance in Catholic environments.”

With a budget of $1.6 million over its first three years, the center will provide on-line training and certification programs in German, English, Italian and Spanish. It’s a joint project of the Jesuit-run Gregorian University in Rome, the Munich archdiocese, and the University of Ulm in Germany.

Information on the center can be found here: www.elearning-childprotection.com

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Alleged sex abuse victim of Brother Louis Meinhardt speaks out

MISSOURI
KSDK

[with video]

By Courtney Gousman

Creve Coeur, MO (KSDK) – Decades after alleged sex abuse, a former student at Chaminade College Preparatory student is speaking out for the first time.

This is a story that’s both shocking and heart wrenching, and really changed the life of an innocent young man. NewsChannel 5 has this exclusive story.

This is such an emotional issue for the man we talked to, that he couldn’t bring himself to meet face-to-face. He says he’s been so rattled for the lasted few days when this news went public. So Wednesday night, he shared his story by phone.

Louis J. Meinhardt was a teacher at Chaminade for more than three decades from 1941 to 1948, and then again from 1958 through 1982. He also coached young men on the school’s basketball and football teams.

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Catholic Church launches global centre against child abuse

Bangkok Post

The Catholic Church launched an international Internet centre against paedophilia on Thursday at the close of a four-day Vatican summit aimed at ending decades of abuses and cover-ups.

The new e-learning Centre for Child Protection will be based in Germany, with partners in Argentina, Ecuador, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Italy and Kenya, seeking to bring together research and ways to prevent clerical abuse.

The centre “is only one part of a renewal of the Church,” Cardinal Reinhard Marx, the archbishop of Munich, said at a press conference.

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Vatican abuse summit: A ‘new baseline’ for the church

ROME
National Catholic Reporter

by John L Allen Jr on Feb. 09, 2012 NCR Today

ROME — A four-day Vatican summit on the sexual abuse crisis signals “a new baseline”, meaning a new “agreed standard of the Roman Catholic Church” in dealing with the issue, according to one of the participants.

Fr. Brendan Geary, a Scottish member of the Marist order who works in the United States, defined that baseline in the following terms:

•“We start by listening to victims, and we honor their experience.”
•“We’re trying to become leaders in the world in the protection of children, not following behind others.”
•“In the words of Pope John Paul II, there is no place in the Catholic church for those who would abuse children.”

Commitment to those three principles, Geary said, “came across clearly from every part of the world” during the Feb. 6-9 event.

Geary spoke in a session with reporters on the final day of the four-day symposium, titled “Towards Healing and Renewal.” It has been held at Rome’s Jesuit-run Gregorian University, in cooperation with several Vatican departments.

Claretian Fr. Paul Smyth stressed that this new baseline did not begin at this summit, but is instead “the fruit of several decades of work” – which doesn’t mean, he stressed, that the job is finished.

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South Dakota Legislature Quashes New Childhood-Sexual-Abuse Bill

SOUTH DAKOTA
Indian Country Today Media Network

By Stephanie Woodard
February 9, 2012

“It was a sad day,” said Mary Jane Wanna, Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate, of the South Dakota House Judiciary Committee killing a bill to remove the statute of limitations for lawsuits alleging childhood sexual abuse. The measure was presented on February 6, by Representative Steve Hickey, Republican from Minnehaha County, and co-sponsored by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Proponents, opponents and spectators packing the committee room heard emotional testimony from victims, who recounted sex trafficking as well as brutal serial sexual assaults. Afterward, abuse survivors wept openly in the hallway.

Hickey’s new bill had proposed eliminating the statute of limitations for childhood-sexual-abuse complaints in the state. It was intended to remedy a 2010 measure that added restrictions to such suits, banning victims over age 40 from suing institutions (such as churches and schools). The 2010 law was written as a “constituent bill” by Steve Smith, an attorney representing an institution—Congregation of Priests of the Sacred Heart, which runs St. Joseph’s Indian School, in Chamberlain—and defending about a dozen such cases.

During Smith’s 2010 testimony to the legislature, the transcript shows he told the group that the perpetrators in such cases were typically “long dead” and “can’t defend themselves,” but neglected to say that his cases in fact included living alleged perpetrators, including Brother Matthew Miles (who had already told a South Dakota court he had pled guilty to sodomizing young boys in another jurisdiction), John Donadio, Father Thomas Lind and Father William Pitcavage. About 10 other living persons have been accused in current South Dakota-related childhood-sexual-abuse cases.

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Bridgeport Diocese reacts to Egan: Abuse apology still stands

CONNECTICUT
Darien Times

Written by Susan Shultz
Thursday, February 09, 2012

The Diocese of Bridgeport, which includes Darien’s two Roman Catholic parishes, is distancing itself from comments made by its former leader, Cardinal Edward Egan, to Connecticut Magazine.

In the magazine’s February edition, Cardinal Egan, who left the Diocese of Bridgeport in 2002 to become Archbishop of New York, said he retracted his apology for sexual abuse that reportedly occurred in the diocese.

“I never should have said that. I did say if we did anything wrong, I’m sorry, but I don’t think we did anything wrong,” Egan said.

Brian Wallace, spokesman for the Diocese of Bridgeport and its current leader, Bishop William E. Lori, told The Darien Times that “our apology stands. There’s no denial it happened, and it was a tragedy.”

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ULTERIORE DICHIARAZIONE DELLA SALA STAMPA A PROPOSITO DI AFFERMAZIONI INFONDATE SU I.O.R. E A.I.F. , 09.02.2012

CITTA DEL VATICANO
Bolletino

In fine mattinata la Sala Stampa della Santa Sede ha rilasciato la seguente dichiarazione:

Nella trasmissione “Gli Intoccabili” di La 7 di ieri, mercoledì 8 febbraio, sono state fatte affermazioni infondate e diffuse informazioni false sull’Istituto per le Opere di Religione e l’Autorità di Informazione Finanziaria.

Al riguardo, facendo seguito a quanto già specificato nella Dichiarazione della Sala Stampa della Santa Sede di ieri, 8 febbraio, si precisa quanto segue:

1. L’affermazione che lo I.O.R. è una banca non corrisponde a verità; lo I.O.R. è una Fondazione di diritto sia civile che canonico regolata da un proprio statuto; non mantiene riserve e non concede prestiti come una banca. Tanto meno è una “banca off-shore”. Di fatto, nella citata trasmissione viene usato tale termine non per illustrare il vero carattere e la funzione dello I.O.R., ma per creare un’impressione di illegalità. Lo I.O.R. si trova all’interno di una giurisdizione sovrana e opera in un quadro normativo e regolamentare, che comprende anche la legge antiriciclaggio vaticana. Quest’ultima, la Legge CXXVII, è stata adottata proprio per essere in linea con gli standard internazionali.

[English translation via Vatican Information Service]

COMMUNIQUE ON CLAIMS IN AN ITALIAN TELEVISION PROGRAMME ABOUT THE IOR AND THE AIF

Vatican City, (VIS) – Given below is the text of a communique issued early this afternoon by the Holy See Press Office.

“The television programme, ‘Gli intoccabili’, transmitted yesterday evening by Italy’s ‘La7’ television network, included unfounded claims and false information about the Institute for the Works of Religion and(IOR) and the Vatican Financial Information Authority.

“On this subject, and with reference to the declaration issued by the Holy See Press Office yesterday 8 February, the following points must be made:

“(1) The affirmation that the IOR is a bank is incorrect. The IOR is a foundation in both civil and canon law, regulated by its own statutes. It does not hold reserves or grant loans as a bank does. Even less so is it an ‘offshore bank’, and the aforementioned television programme used that term not to illustrate the true nature and function of the IOR but to create an impression of illegality. The IOR lies within a sovereign jurisdiction and operates on the basis of a framework of norms and rules which include the Vatican’s anti-money laundering legislation: Law No. 127, adopted precisely in order to conform to international standards.

“(2) The insinuation that Vatican norms do not allow for investigations or criminal procedures regarding the period prior to the coming into force of Law No. 127 on 1 April 2011, is untrue.

“The discussion during the aforesaid programme referred to words contained in a ‘private memo’. That document has no official value and merely reflects the opinions of the individual who wrote it. Moreover, it does not state that investigations or criminal procedures regarding the period prior to 1 April 2011 are impossible, or suggest that the IOR is unwilling to collaborate in investigations or criminal procedures on events prior to 1 April 2011. As regards cooperation between the IOR and the AIF, the IOR has cooperated in providing information on transactions that took place before that date.

“Therefore, the claims made during the programme are untrue. According to Vatican anti-money laundering norms, the Vatican judicial authorities have the power to investigate suspect transactions that took place during the period prior to 1 April 2011, also in the framework of international cooperation with judges in other States, including Italy.

“(3) Relations between the IOR and non-Italian banks have always been active and, contrary to the claims made, activity with Italian banks has been reduced only to a limited extent. The IOR, like Italian financial institutions, uses the services of foreign banks (Italian and non-Italian) when they are more efficient or cost less. Moreover, all movements in cash are certified with customs documents. As standard practice, all movements of money are regularly traced and archived.

“(4) As regards the norm regulating the movement of money in cash, it must be made clear that the IOR monitors, and has monitored, step transactions for a total of euro 15,000 in ten consecutive days. Furthermore, article 28 paragraph 1(b) of the new text of Law No. 127, modified by Decree of the President of the Governorate on 26 January 2012, states that the parties subject to that Law (including the IOR) must honour ‘their obligation of adequate monitoring … when they carry out occasional transactions the value of which is equal to or more than euro 15,000, irrespective of whether they are carried out in a single transaction or with a number of interconnected transactions’.

“(5) The affirmation made by the magistrate, Luca Tescaroli, according to which the Vatican failed to respond to rogatory letters concerning the case of the Banco Ambrosiano and Roberto Calvi, is untrue. On this subject, it must be made clear that there is no record of the rogatory letter of 2002 having reached the Vatican. Nor, following a preliminary search in the archives, is there any record of the international rogatory letter presented by the Tribunal of Rome in 2002 ever having reached the Italian embassy to the Holy See. The other two rogatory letters received a regular reply, addressed to the Italian embassy to the Holy See. As yesterday’s declaration said, the Holy See and the Vatican authorities have duly cooperated with magistrates and other Italian authorities, and this is evident from documentation in the possession of officials both of the Holy See and of the Republic of Italy.

“The facts described above show that the presentation given in the aforementioned programme was biased and does not contribute to forming an objective picture of events”.

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Vatican: “It is not true we are obstructing the investigations on the IOR”

VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

New reply from the Vatican Press Office to the TV show ‘Gli Intoccabili’ (The Untouchables). According to the Holy See the show shows only partial reconstructions of events

Vatican Insider Staff
Rome

It’s one denial after another. Only a few hours after the note written by the Vatican to disclaim some information published in the last few days, in particular an article by the Italian daily newspaper L’Unità entitled “Money laundering. Four priests under investigation. The Vatican keeps quiet.” Father Lombardi talked once more about the IOR (the ‘Pope’s bank’) which was the main topic of the talk show “Gli Intoccabili” (The Untouchables) aired yesterday 8 February on the La7 television channel. The spokesman of the Vatican defined the show as ‘partial’ and said that in his opinion the show does not give an ‘objective picture of the realities it describes.’

“The IOR,” stated the Vatican Press office, “is not a bank. It is a foundation founded on civil and canonical law with its own regulations. It does not have reserve funds and does not lend money like a bank”. “It’s also not an off-shore bank –“ continued the statement released by the Vatican. In truth the television show used that expression not to illustrate the true character and function of the IOR, but to give a sense of unlawfulness. The IOR is under the jurisdiction of a sovereign state, the Vatican, and it operates within laws and regulations that include the new Vatican law against money laundering.” This rule, Law CXXVII was introduced by the Vatican to comply with international standards.

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Sexual predator trial off for ex-priest

WISCONSIN
Fox 11

OSHKOSH – A trial to determine if a former priest should be committed as a sexual predator has been taken off the calendar, as a deal may be in the works.

Norbert Maday was convicted in Winnebago County in 1994 of sexually assaulting teenage boys. His criminal sentence has been completed for several years, but the state is trying to have him committed civilly as a sexual predator.

A trial on the issue was scheduled for Feb. 14, but the trial has been removed from Judge Daniel Bissett’s calendar.

According to online court records, “parties agree that jury trial shall be taken off court calendar and a pretrial conference shall be scheduled to ascertain whether there is a mutually agreed upon settlement or if a jury trial will need to be rescheduled.”

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Teaneck rabbi indicted on sex charges

NEW JERSEY
The Record

BY KIBRET MARKOS
STAFF WRITER
The Record

A 64-year-old Teaneck rabbi was indicted on Wednesday on charges that he molested two 13-year-old boys at his home.

The indictment charges that Rabbi Uzi Rivlin made sexual contact with the two boys on several occasions in 2009 and 2010.

Authorities have said the boys were visiting from Israel and stayed at the rabbi’s home during two summers as part of a scholarship program Rivlin had helped set up. Rivlin also was a teacher at the Temple Beth Abraham in Tarrytown, N.Y., they said.

Bergen County prosecutors said that after the boys returned to Israel, they complained separately to Israeli authorities that Rivlin had molested them.

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Rabbi Indicted on Sex Abuse Charges

TEANECK (NJ)
Patch

By Patch Staff

A Teaneck rabbi was indicted Wednesday on charges he sexually abused two boys who were visiting from Israel as part of a scholarship program, northjersey.com reported.

Rabbi Uzi Rivlin, 64, was arrested in August after the FBI alerted Teaneck and Bergen County investigators to the sexual abuse allegations, authorities said at the time. The two boys first made separate complaints to Israeli police, prosecutors said.

Rivlin, who is married, met the boys through the Scholarship Fund for the Advancement of Children in Israel, which he partly sponsored, the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office said. The program brings children from Israel to stay in the United States over the summer.

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Experts say 100,000 US kids abused by priests; SNAP responds

UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Dorris on February 09, 2012

Two US experts told Vatican officials yesterday that roughly 100,000 boys and girls in America have been sexually violated by Catholic priests. We believe that this is a very low estimate, especially since there are an estimated 6,000 predator priests in the US. (see: BishopAccountability.org )

This is almost ten times the estimate that has been offered by US bishops for the past six or seven years. It’s a dreadfully sobering figure. Our hearts ache for these wounded men, women, teens and children.

We hope that this staggering estimate prods secular authorities to step up their efforts to expose child molesting clerics and the corrupt church officials who continue to move and hide and protect and enable them.

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Sexueller Missbrauch: Papst will Erneuerung der Kirche

ROM
Die Presse

Mehr als 100 Bischöfe nehmen bis Donnerstag an der Konferenz “Heilung und Erneuerung” in der Gregoriana-Universität in Rom teil. Benedikt XVI. fordert den effektiven Schutz und Hilfe für die Opfer.

Zum Auftakt einer Konferenz der katholischen Kirche zum Thema Kindesmissbrauch hat Papst Benedikt XVI. eine “tiefgehende Erneuerung” der Kirche gefordert. Die “Heilung” der Opfer müsse für die christliche Gemeinschaft von größter Bedeutung sein und Hand in Hand mit einer Erneuerung der Kirche “auf allen Ebenen” gehen, hieß es in einem Grußwort des Papstes an die Teilnehmer der am Montag in Rom begonnenen Konferenz. Benedikt XVI. mahnte in der vom Vatikan veröffentlichten Botschaft zudem eine “rigorose Kultur des effektiven Schutzes und der Hilfe für Opfer” an.

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Pfarrer zu sechs Jahren Haft verurteilt

DEUTSCHLAND
Wolfaburger Allgemeine

Der wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs vor dem Landgericht Braunschweig angeklagte katholische Priester ist am Donnerstag zu sechs Jahren Haft verurteilt worden. Der 46-Jährige hatte zugegeben, sich zwischen 2004 und 2011 in 280 Fällen an drei Jungen zwischen neun und 15 Jahren vergangen zu haben. Bedeutsam für das Urteil sind 250 Taten. Der Pfarrer war früher auch in Wolfsburg tätig gewesen.

In 214 Fällen liegt laut Gericht ein schwerer sexueller Missbrauch von Kindern vor. Allein 229 Taten richteten sich gegen ein einziges Opfer. Nach Angaben des Vorsitzenden Richters, Manfred Teiwes, gründet sich das Urteil vor allem auf das Geständnis des Angeklagten, das durch Zeugenaussagen untermauert wurde. „Der Angeklagte hat bei allen Opfern und ihren Eltern einen besonderen Vertrauensvorschuss missbraucht, der auch in seinem Priesteramt begründet lag“, sagte Teiwes.

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Priester missbrauchte Sohn der Haushälterin

DEUTSCHLAND
Nord Bayern

Würzburg – Ein 56 Jahre alter Priester hat den Druck seines schlechten Gewissens nicht länger ausgehalten und gestanden: Jahrelang habe er den kleinen Sohn seiner Haushälterin sexuell missbraucht. Nun hat die Würzburger Staatsanwaltschaft Anklage erhoben.

Weil er den kleinen Sohn seiner Haushälterin jahrelang missbraucht haben soll, soll ein 56 Jahre alter katholischer Priester vor Gericht gestellt werden. Die Staatsanwaltschaft Würzburg erhob Anklage wegen sexuellen Kindesmissbrauchs, wie der Leitende Oberstaatsanwalt Dietrich Geuder mitteilte. Der Priester hatte sich im März 2011 dem Missbrauchsbeauftragten des Deutschen Ordens in Mainz offenbart und sich selbst angezeigt.

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“Die Opfer leben von Hartz IV”

ROM
Spiegel (Deutschland)

Von Hans-Jürgen Schlamp

Zu Tausenden sind Kinder und Jugendliche von katholischen Priestern missbraucht worden. Auf einem Kongress in Rom wollen ranghohe Kirchenleute aus aller Welt zusammen mit Wissenschaftlern nun die über Jahrzehnte begangenen Verbrechen aufarbeiten. Das Ergebnis dürfte enttäuschend sein.

Die Kirchenoberen sind, trotz allen göttlichen Beistands in sonstigen Fragen, bei diesem Thema ratlos. Seit Jahren brechen immer neue Enthüllungen über den sexuellen Missbrauch Jugendlicher und Kinder in der Sakristei, im katholischen Internat oder auch im Ferienheim über sie herein. Und sie wissen nicht, was sie tun sollen.

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Italiens Kirche will “Heilung und Erneuerung”

ROM
Zeit (Deutchland)

Erstmals befasst sich der Vatikan öffentlich mit Missbrauchsvorwürfen gegen Amtsträger. Doch die italienischen Bischöfe vertuschen immer noch viele Fälle.

Im öffentlichen Leben Italiens genießen katholische Würdenträger immer noch hohes Ansehen. Entsprechend schwer tut sich die Kirche mit der Aufarbeitung sexuellen Missbrauchs innerhalb der Glaubensgemeinschaft. Doch so langsam tut sich was: In den Gemeinden würden Missbrauchsfälle immer weniger verschwiegen, sagte neulich auch Charles J. Scicluna, Chefankläger der vatikanischen Glaubenskongregation, der italienischen Presseagentur AGI.

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Former NY Cardinal denies knowledge of sexual abuse and regrets apologizing

UNITED STATES
Irish Central

By
ANTOINETTE KELLY,
IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Thursday, February 9, 2012

A former New York Cardinal has come under fire after admitting he regrets apologizing over the sex abuse scandal in his diocese.

Former Cardinal Edward Egan, who was at the center of the priest abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport, told Connecticut Magazine that he believes there is no legal requirement for reporting abuse cases in Connecticut.

Referring to his original apology, the former bishop of Bridgepoint said, “first of all, I should have never said that”.

“I did say if we did anything wrong, I’m sorry, but I don’t think we did anything wrong.”

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Bishop Accountability

UNITED STATES
Spiritual Politics

Mark Silk|Feb 9, 2012

In the year 355, as Christianity was in the process of becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire, the imperial brothers Constans and Constantius II issued an edict prohibiting bishops from being haled into civil court (“lest there should be an unrestrained opportunity for fanatical spirits to accuse them”). This privilege, which was extended to all clergy in 412, placed responsibility for handling complaints against church hierarchs with the hierarchs themselves, and not surprisingly the hierarchs have cherished it devoutly ever since. With some notable exceptions (viz. Henry II of England), civil authorities over the centuries have also tended to respect it.

Until the past year, that is. For the first time, prosecutors in the U.S. (Philadelphia, Kansas City) have begun to file criminal complaints against high church officials for failing to report allegations of sexual abuse by clergy to the civil authorities. This has led their stalwart condottiero Bill Donohue to take up arms against such fanatical spirits as the Kansas City Star and the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (“anti-Catholic”) and Assistant District Attorney Mark Cipolletti of Philadelphia (“malicious”). For its part, the Vatican seems to have come to the realization that the Constantinian dispensation is finally at an end.

At least that’s how I read the public remarks of the Holy See’s own chief prosecutor, Msgr. Charles Scicluna, at the conference on the sexual abuse crisis in Rome yesterday. Decrying the bishops’ Mafia-like code of silence (yes, omertà was the word he used), Scicluna announced that they should not consider themselves beyond the reach of discipline for failing to abide by official protocols for the handling of abuse cases. As NCR’s John Allen reported:

Scicluna said there are actually already provisions in church law to sanction bishops for “negligence and malice in exercising one’s duties,” suggesting this provision should be more strenuously applied. (He appeared to be referring to canon 128 of the Code of Canon Law, which reads: “Whoever illegitimately inflicts damage upon someone by a juridic act or by any other act placed with malice or negligence is obliged to repair the damage inflicted.”)

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Fr. Tim Moyle: Catholic voices silenced by unfair abuse accusations

CANADA
National Post

Father Tim Moyle Feb 9, 2012

I noted with sadness the other day obituaries published in the wake of the death of Angelo Dundee, the man who trained Muhammad Ali to become heavyweight boxing champion of the world more than once. From the ‘float like a butterfly’ days of his early victories over Sonny Liston and Joe Frasier, to the ‘rope-a-dope’ tactics that felled the Goliath George Foreman, all the way to the spanking of Leon Spinks, Dundee guided Ali to victory after victory. Those epic contests of brawn and will captured the attention and admiration of the world like no other sporting event, lifting Ali to a status unmatched as a global icon. And he couldn’t have done it without Dundee.

Given the body shots that the Roman Catholic Church has been absorbing through the ‘Long Lent’ of the sex abuse scandals, Angelo would be a welcome voice at the current Vatican conference designed to share best practices and protocols throughout the Church. Seeming to reel after being pummeled by the multiple revelations of clergy malfeasance, the faithful in Canada can ill afford to receive any below the belt shots as she has suffered at the hands of some who are trying to knock them out of the fight altogether.

Such is the case recently on a Canadian blog dedicated to exposing these scandals and the indolent manner in which they have been handled by bishops in times past. Springing out of the Cornwall Abuses allegations and Inquiry in the 1990’s, its author Sylvia MacEachern has successfully held Canadian bishops feet to the fire to ensure they put into practice the justice they promise to bring to wounded victims. She’s been an effective ‘cut-man’ in the Church’s corner. However, she may have crossed a line recently with recent allegations she has published involving a Maritime bishop and a local accused priest.

Bishop Robert Harris of St. John, New Brunswick is accused on the blog of placing the city’s children at risk by not directly taking to the priest’s parish to indicate that he was being removed due to allegations of child abuse. Instead, he fulfilled both the letter and spirit of Church protocol for removing any accused cleric from office and public ministry. Bishop Harris chose to do so without inflicting a body blow to the priest’s reputation that comes with the taint of scandal until a complete police investigation was conducted. He permitted the priest to step aside on leave for ‘personal reasons’ which preserved the priest’s reputation and the safety of the congregation’s children. Any priest in such a situation is denied the right to publicly minister or celebrate the sacraments effectively removing his from coming into contact with children throughout the Diocese.

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Ior. The Vatican defends itself

VATICAN CITY
Vatican Insider

Father Lombardi answers those who cast doubts over the Vatican’s will to be transparent.”We are working together with Italian authorities”. The Public Prosecutor office in Rome says “ several millions euro have been transferred abroad”

Andrea Tornielli
Vatican City

On the 8th of February, a few minutes before the La7 TV-channel aired an episode of the talk-show “The untouchables” (Gli Intoccabili) the first half of which was dedicated to the IOR (Institute for Works of Religion) commonly called the “Pope’s bank”, The Vatican intervened to disclaim some information published in last few days, in particular an article of the newspaper L’Unità (The Unity). Father Federico Lombardi in a note that included the name of the journalist responsible declared that “The article entitled ‘Money laundering. Four priests under investigation. The Vatican keeps quiet about the checks’ shows a serious lack of diligence in the research done by the author”.

L’Unità, discussing the cases of priests investigated by the Italian judiciary system for mobilizing large sums of money which were held in Italian bank accounts linked to the Ior, claimed (just like the La7 talk show did in the evening of the 8th) that the AIF, the Vatican internal information authority for the inspection of financial activities, created by the Vatican itself to comply with the new European laws against money laundering and headed by Cardinal Attilio Nicora, did not give any answers to the Bank of Italy, except in one case.

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Bishop warns of priest sex abuse cases in Asia

ROME
The Associated Press

By NICOLE WINFIELD, Associated Press

ROME (AP) — A top Asian church official told a Vatican-backed conference on fighting priestly sex abuse Thursday that a culture of silence prevalent on the continent has kept many victims from coming forward, as concerns rise that Asia may be the next ground zero in the abuse scandal.

Monsignor Luis Antonio Tagle, archbishop of Manila, Philippines, said deference to church authorities in places like the overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Philippines may also have contributed to keeping a lid on reports. He said more and more victims have come forward in the past five years in the Philippines, but that incidents of priests keeping mistresses still far outpace reports of priests preying on children.

Tagle addressed the conference, which is aimed at helping bishops and religious superiors around the world craft guidelines on how to care for victims and keep abusers out of the priesthood. The Vatican has set a May deadline for the policies to be submitted for review.

Tagle’s presentation made clear that the sex abuse scandal — which first erupted in Ireland in the 1990s, the United States in 2002, and Europe at large in 2010 — hadn’t yet reached Asia. But the concern is very real that it might: In November, the federation of Asian bishops’ conferences said the church has to take “drastic and immediate measures” to contain the problem before it gets out of hand.

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Catholic archbishop urges new anti-abuse rules in Asia

ROME
Inquirer (Philippines)

VATICAN CITY—The Catholic Church in Asia has a “pressing need” for rules against child abuse by priests as the issue has been hidden by “a culture of shame,” the archbishop of Manila said on Thursday.

“There is a pressing need to formulate national pastoral guidelines for handling such cases,” Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle said on the final day of a summit on the clergy abuse scandals at the Vatican’s Gregorian University.

“The relative silence with which the victims and Asian Catholics face the scandal is partly due to the culture of shame that holds dearly one’s humanity, honor and dignity,” Tagle told bishops and cardinals from around the world.

Tagle said Asian Catholics had initially looked on the scandals as a problem “mainly tied to Western cultures.”

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Lo Ior abbandona le banche italiane

ITALIA
la Repubblica

MILANO – Lo Ior, Istituto per le opere di religione non è più cliente di banche italiane ed ha trasferito gran parte delle proprie attività finanziarie in Germania, da circa un anno, ossia da quando Bankitalia ha imposto agli istituti di credito di considerarlo alla stregua di una banca extracomunitaria. Il progressivo azzeramento dell’operatività (nove gli istituti di credito italiani con i quali lo Ior era in rapporti, tra i quali Unicredit e Intesa), è emerso dall’esame dei rapporti finanziari acquisiti dalla procura di Roma nell’ambito dell’inchiesta su presunte attività di riciclaggio legate ad operazioni avviate dalla banca vaticana. Inchiesta scaturita dal maxisequestro di 23 milioni di euro (settembre 2010) dello Ior ritenuti dalla procura oggetto di una movimentazione caratterizzata da omissioni punite dalle norme antiriciclaggio.

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Riciclaggio di denari? No, di accuse, dicono in Vaticano

ITALIA
L’Expresso

“Gli intoccabili” hanno colpito ancora. La trasmissione di Gianluigi Nuzzi su “la 7″ che ha già fatto tremare le autorità vaticane rendendo pubbliche le lettere d’accusa dell’attuale nunzio a Washington Carlo Maria Viganò, è tornata la sera di mercoledì 8 febbraio a chiamare in causa l’Istituto per le Opere di Religione.

L’ha fatto sulla scia di un articolo di Angela Camuso uscito la mattina stessa su “L’Unità”:

> Riciclaggio, quattro preti indagati. I silenzi del Vaticano sui controlli

Nella tarda serata dello stesso 8 febbraio, la sala stampa vaticana ha replicato con la dichiarazione riportata qui di seguito.

Là dove vi si legge che lo IOR “ha fornito informazioni anche al di fuori dei canali formali” ai magistrati italiani l’allusione è all’interrogatorio spontaneo al quale si è sottoposto il 30 settembre 2011 il presidente della banca vaticana, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi. La sua rinuncia alle procedure di rogatoria internazionale tra Stati esteri fu molto criticata dalle autorità vaticane.

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Dealing with abusive priests

ROME
Guardian Media (Trinidad)

A call has come from within the Catholic Church for trained secular authorities to be the ones to make a determination on whether or not allegations of sexual abuse against priests are sufficiently founded in reality to warrant investigation and possible prosecution. Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, a psychologist who ran a centre for ten years in the United States attempting to cure priests of their abusive patterns of sexual behaviour, told a conference on the subject in the Vatican Tuesday that priests, like alcoholics, lie, con, manipulate when confronted with allegations of sexual abuse.

“There are false allegations to be sure and it is critical to restore a priest’s good name when he has been cleared, but decades of experience tell us that the vast majority of allegations—over 95 per cent—are founded,” Monsignor Rossetti told reporters at a news conference in Rome. To better ensure that the allegations against the priests are exposed to people who are not disposed to protecting the church and fellow priests, Monsignor Rossetti says trained civil authorities, not bishops, should make decisions having heard the allegations. The Vatican is decidedly against going civil, preferring to leave it to the discernment of bishops to decide on whether or not to go forward with the allegations. Surely, while the Vatican has responsibility over the priests within the church, sexual abuse of young boys by men (whatever their vocation) falls squarely with civil authorities. Therefore, the monsignor, based on his understanding of abusive priests and his knowledge of psychology, prefers professionals to make the determination.

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Bishop warns of priest sex abuse cases in Asia

ROME
Huffington Post

February 9, 2012

ROME — A top Asian church official has told a Vatican-backed conference on priestly sex abuse that a culture of silence prevalent on the continent has kept many victims from coming forward, as concerns rise that Asia may be the next ground zero in the abuse scandal.

The archbishop of Manila, Philippines, Luis Antonio Tagle, said a widespread deference to the church in places like the Philippines may also have kept a lid on reports. He said more and more people have come forward in the past five years, but that reports of priests keeping mistresses still far outpace reports of pedophiles.

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Cost of infallibility

IRELAND
Irish Independent

Thursday February 09 2012

Those Fine Gael TDs who have been loud in their protestations on the decision last year to close the Irish embassy in the Vatican need to get some backbone.

They are worried that they may lose their seats in the next General Election, with traditional Catholic votes in rural Ireland going elsewhere. They have not that many options of political parties to move to.

There are Irish Catholics who were not happy with the closure, but I don’t think it is permanent. It may be re-opened in the next few years, after some rapprochement between the country and the Vatican — and it is the Vatican, not the Government, that has the making-up to do.

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Vatican official: Culture of silence is deadly for handling abuse claims

ROME
Catholic News Agency

By David Kerr

Rome, Italy, Feb 9, 2012 / 03:05 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican’s sex crimes prosecutor says the Church should fight against a culture of silence as it combats the “sad phenomenon” of sexual abuse in society.

“The teaching of Blessed John Paul II that truth is at the basis of justice explains why a deadly culture of silence or ‘omertà’ is in itself wrong and unjust,” said Monsignor Charles J. Scicluna, Promoter of Justice at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, on Feb 8.

“Omertà” is a term that describes the code of silence practiced by members of the Mafia.

The 52-year-old Maltese cleric was addressing the “Towards Healing and Renewal” symposium being hosted the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome from Feb 6-9. The gathering has brought together over 140 representatives from bishops’ conferences and 30 religious orders worldwide.

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Cardinal raises hopes of visit by the Pope

IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Nick Bramhill

Thursday February 09 2012

HOPES that the Pope will travel to Ireland this year have been raised after Cardinal Sean Brady said the timing is right.

The Primate of All Ireland said he is hopeful that the first papal visit for more than 30 years would take place in 2012.

Last weekend, the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, downplayed the prospect of a visit by Pope Benedict.

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