Berlin and Beyond: Meeting with monks

As Germany's Catholic church discusses how deal with child sex abuse at the hands of its clergy, Tamsin Walker went to visit a new monastery on the German-Polish border that's using community building to quietly set an example. There's something about monasteries. I remember being taken to their ruins as a child, clambering on the remains of walls whose fates had been sealed by Henry VIII's 16th century dissolutions. And I remember writing mental stories about the pious, minimalistic lives spent within what artist impressions assured me had once been magnificent buildings. I was captivated by the notion of grand but remote premises that accommodated self-sufficient brewers with their own hospitals. In many ways, I still am.

https://www.dw.com/en/berlin-and-beyond-meeting-with-monks/a-45671835 

This Lake Stevens High grad was believed; her abuser is in prison

A courageous voice. Thousands of listeners. An account of sexual abuse and survival. Issues surrounding Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, including Thursday’s appearance by his accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, before the Senate Judiciary Committee, have sparked a nationwide conversation about sexual assault and those who come forward to say they are victims. Allegations against Kavanaugh, chosen by President Donald Trump to fill retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy’s seat, have come at a time that’s seen Bill Cosby sentenced in a sexual assault case, disgraced sports doctor Larry Nassar sent to prison for molesting gymnasts, the ongoing Catholic Church child-abuse scandal, and career-dashing accusations against Hollywood and media industry stars and moguls.

https://www.heraldnet.com/news/this-lake-stevens-high-grad-was-believed-her-abuser-is-in-prison/ 

Concerning sexual abuse in Catholic Church

I’m writing in response to the Sept. 4 Insight article “Priests who abuse kids will suffer wrath of God.” There are several issues that I feel compelled to comment on as a Catholic who left the church after the revelations of systemic sexual abuse. First, news related to sexual abuse in the church continues to get regular media coverage because reports of abuse, and extensively detailed cover-ups by church leaders, continue to be exposed throughout the United States and around the world. While every priest may not be a predator, the actions that church leaders took to hide priests while silencing victims is abusive, dangerous and, most importantly, illegal.

http://www.newsminer.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/concerning-sexual-abuse-in-catholic-church/article_362ef6fc-c2f5-11e8-a8cb-1b98762da5df.html 

The paedophile priest who confessed 1500 times

The Catholic church in Australia is in crisis over the covering up of historic sex abuse. One of the most shocking revelations to shake the church was that of Father Michael McArdle, who in a sworn affidavit in 2004 said he confessed to child sex abuse over 1500 times to over 30 priests. Listen to presenter Janak Rogers question Archbishop Coleridge, the most senior Catholic in Australia, about how so many priests could have had knowledge about McArdle’s crimes and kept silent.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06mdsld 

Capitol Report

The state House of Representatives on Sept. 25 approved a measure to require persons to surrender their firearms within 24 hours of conviction on misdemeanor domestic violence charges or entry of a final protection from abuse order. House Bill 2060, sponsored by state Rep. Marguerite Quinn, R-Bucks, passed on a 131-62 vote. “The fact is that guns and domestic violence are a deadly mix,” Quinn said to The Associated Press. “The fact is that this bill does not apply to any reasonable gun owner. The fact is, if you don’t want to be told by the bench that you need to relinquish your guns, don’t commit a crime of domestic violence.”

https://www.law.com/thelegalintelligencer/2018/09/27/capitol-report-72/?slreturn=20180829232629 

German bishops apologize for thousands of sex abuse cases

The report was commissioned in 2014 by the Roman Catholic Church Bishops' conference in Germany. The apology came on the heels of a new report that found more than 3,600 children in German had been victimized by clergy members. "For too long, the church has denied abuse, looked away and covered it up", said Cardinal Reinhard Marx, left, who heads the German Bishops' Conference. Sexual abuse was crime, he said, and those guilty of it must be punished.

http://clicklancashire.com/2018/09/28/german-bishops-apologize-for-thousands-of-sex-abuse-cases.html 

Rape, then Drape the Truth: Catholic Church Modus Operandi

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The Kavanaugh sample and the lack of a moral standard from the religious right

I aggregate RSS feeds from the religious right. From the application I did a search on “Kavanaugh” and then opened the 20 21 (I intended to open 20) most recent posts from today in my browser. It is really eye-opening. From these folks who are obsessed with sanctimony there is not a single expression of concern about Kavanaugh. Reading through these, every article assumes that Kavanaugh's accusers are dishonest.

http://www.slowlyboiledfrog.com/2018/09/the-kavanaugh-sample-and-lack-of-moral.html 

Kids should not die in order to conform science to religion

Friday, American Family Association, with some help from another hate group publishes Transgender movement taking advantage of kids. AFA and American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) are anti-LGBT hate groups. They are claiming that LGBT activists are influencing young people to be transgender. Sure. Some boy is going to wear his sister's dress to school because he is fond of the inevitable derision and he enjoys the risk of violence towards him. Apparently that makes perfect sense to AFA's Charlie Butts and ACPeds' president, Michelle Cretella.

http://www.slowlyboiledfrog.com/2018/09/kids-should-not-die-in-order-to-conform.html 

Catholic Diocese releasing abuse victims from nondisclosure agreements

Vermont’s Catholic bishop is releasing abuse victims from nondisclosure agreements signed with the state’s largest religious denomination. “Since 2002, the Diocese of Burlington has not required any NDA with survivors as part of a legal settlement,” the Most Rev. Christopher J. Coyne said Friday. “It is my hope that this past action as well as the present one will allow the truth of what happened to survivors and their families to be heard.”

https://vtdigger.org/2018/09/28/catholic-diocese-releasing-abuse-victims-nondisclosure-agreements/

Bishops consider identifying clergy accused of sex abuse

When Louisiana’s five Catholic bishops met earlier this month in Lafayette for their regular quarterly meeting, there was no need to consult an agenda. Since their last meeting, news had spread of the New Orleans archdiocese settling several claims of abuse involving a defrocked Metairie deacon, George Brignac, without the church following its own guidelines for publicly reporting it. Then came the late July bombshell from a Pennsylvania grand jury, identifying what it said were credible allegations of abuse against more than 300 “predator priests” and involving more than 1,000 child victims across six of that state’s eight dioceses.

http://www.dailycomet.com/news/20180922/bishops-consider-identifying-clergy-accused-of-sex-abuse 

Capitol Roundup: Rozzi to host news conference Monday on justice for clergy abuse victims

tate Rep. Mark Rozzi will host a legislator news conference at noon Monday in the Capitol Rotunda to push for legislative changes that will allow past victims of childhood sexual abuse to seek justice. On the heels of the two-year grand jury investigation into widespread sexual abuse of children in six dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church, Rozzi, D-Berks, will discuss his amendment to S.B. 261 — a statute of limitations reform bill. Rozzi’s amendment would create a two-year “window to justice” for now-adult victims of childhood sexual abuse who have aged out of their statute of limitations, allowing them to bring civil claims in court.

https://www.timesleader.com/news/719228/capitol-roundup-rozzi-to-host-news-conference-monday-on-justice-for-clergy-abuse-victims 

Angry parishioners blast San Jose Diocese, Catholic Church over sexual abuse allegations

Angry and hurt over national reports of clergy abuse that have again rocked the Catholic Church to its core, dozens of residents confronted Bishop Patrick McGrath Saturday to demand transparency as the Diocese of San Jose prepares to launch its own investigation. About 70 people — including alleged victims of abuse — gathered at Our Lady of the Rosary for a listening session hosted by the diocese to allow people to ask questions, express concerns and, in some cases, outrage over recent revelations of the sexual abuse of minors by Roman Catholic priests in Pennsylvania and beyond.

https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/09/22/horrified-parishioners-blast-san-jose-diocese-catholic-church-over-sexual-abuse-allegations/ 

Child abuse probe of Catholic Churches ordered

The Attorney General’s Office has opened an investigation into sexual abuse in the Catholic Church in Michigan, and is reportedly asking for victims in all seven diocese to come forward if they have allegations or been abused by church officials. It follows that investigation in Pennsylvania that implicated over three hundred priests. Bill Schuette says they will also be investigating to determine if there was any effort to cover up the abuse within the church. 14-priests in Michigan have already been outed. None of them are currently practicing, and no new allegations have gone public in the last 15-years.

https://wkzo.com/news/articles/2018/sep/22/child-abuse-probe-of-catholic-churches-ordered/ 

Pope Francis lets more bishops go as part of Chile sex abuse fallout

Pope Francis on Friday accepted the resignations of two more bishops in Chile as fallout mounted from widespread sex abuse scandals there. Without citing reasons, the Vatican said the latest to leave their posts were the bishops of San Bartolome de Chillan, Monsignor Carlos Eduardo Pellegrin Barrera, and of San Felipe, Monsignor Cristian Enrique Contreras Molina.

https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2018/09/21/pope-francis-lets-more/ 

Pope authorises US bishop investigation

Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of a West Virginia bishop, Michael Bransfield, and at the same time authorised a fellow bishop to investigate allegations that Bransfield sexually harassed adults. Bransfield had been implicated in 2012 in an infamous Philadelphia priestly sex abuse case, but he denied ever abusing anyone and claimed vindication years ago. He continued with his ministry until he offered to retire, as required, when he turned 75 last week.

https://www.news.com.au/world/breaking-news/pope-authorises-us-bishop-investigation/news-story/b32bd7bfa31197b5183865774b7ca4a3 

Germany’s Catholic Church ‘ashamed’ by child sex abuse

Germany’s Catholic Church said Wednesday it was “dismayed and ashamed” by decades of child sex abuse by priests, after a report was leaked showing that thousands of minors were assaulted. The study, commissioned by the German Bishops’ Conference, was due to be presented officially on September 25, but several local media published key conclusions, including the damning finding that more than 3,600 children were sexually assaulted by priests in Germany over nearly seven decades.

https://www.journalducameroun.com/en/germanys-catholic-church-ashamed-by-child-sex-abuse/ 

New Study Reveals 3,677 German Catholic Church Sex Abuse Cases Over Decades

A series of sex scandals has hit the church recently, with cases of the sexual abuse of thousands of minors and clerical cover-up emerging in the US, Australia, and Chile. The Pontiff himself has been accused of knowing about a disgraced US cardinal's sexual misconduct and doing nothing with it. The Catholic Church is now facing a series of sex scandals, this time in Germany. Der Spiegel magazine said on Wednesday that thousands of children had been sexually abused by the German Catholic clergy over a 70-year period.

https://sputniknews.com/europe/201809121067972814-sex-abuse-cases-german-catholic-church/ 

What victims want most: justice

Sitting in a small room listening to a victim of sexual abuse finally tell their story is a harrowing experience. The emotions are raw and the tears flow easily, even if the events described happened 40 years ago. For men like Paul Klemick, abused as a young pupil by a Catholic teacher at St Paul’s High School, what happened is not historic. It remains an everyday reality and as painful as it was when they were innocent children.

https://www.odt.co.nz/opinion/what-victims-want-most-justice 

Holier-than- thou? Take a look in the mirror

The recent visit by Pope Francis has given us all time for some necessary reflection. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar summed up the situation accurately, bravely, and succinctly and I paraphrase: “It is a history of sorrow and shame. In place of Christian charity, forgiveness and compassion, too often there was judgment, severity and cruelty, in particular, towards women and children and those on the margins. Magdalene Laundries, Mother and Baby Homes, industrial schools, illegal adoptions and clerical child abuse are stains on our State, society and the Catholic Church. Wounds are still open and there is much to be done to bring about justice and truth and healing.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/views/yourview/readers-blog-holier-than-thou-take-a-look-in-the-mirror-866290.html 

Churchgoer shouts 'shame on you' at Cardinal Wuerl during Mass

Protesters confronted the archbishop of Washington in Mass on Sunday as he addressed the ballooning sexual abuse scandal within the church. One parishioner shouted "shame on you" and walked out as Cardinal Donald Wuerl spoke about the scandal on Sunday, while another turned her back in protest of him, according to video posted on social media. "Yes, my brothers and sisters, shame. I wish I could redo everything over these 30 years as a bishop and each time get it always right," Wuerl said in response to the protesters.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/churchgoer-shouts-shame-cardinal-wuerl-mass/story?id=57570736

Focus on the Children

What Pope Francis knew or didn’t know won’t cure what ails the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is exposed. A number of wide-ranging, deeply researched reports of molestation, rape, abuse, corruption, and concealment have been released in close enough time to one another that the magnitude of the horror might actually—for the average American, anyway—sink in. It all feels monumental, if also powered in part by coincidence. The recently published Pennsylvania report, in which a grand jury details the sexual abuse of more than 1,000 children by more than 300 priests and systematically argues that church officials were complicit, was two years in the making. It didn’t need to be released two weeks before BuzzFeed published Christine Kenneally’s yearslong investigation into the abuse of children—some of whom didn’t survive—by nuns and priests at St. Joseph’s Catholic orphanage.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/08/pennsylvania-report-on-catholic-church-abuse-dont-be-distracted-by-pope-francis.html 

The Catholic Church was given far too much power

On your letter column on August 28, Patrick Dalton wrote of us being collectively responsible for the society we live in – going on to say, “who said stop when families handed over their ‘fallen’ daughters to institutions? Who said stop when the State broke up struggling families and put their children into care? Who said stop when Irish priests, brothers and nuns abused these citizens?”

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/views/yourview/readers-blog-the-catholicchurch-was-given-far-too-much-power-867579.html 

Gov’t, police, politicians complicit in Catholic clergy child rape

More and more adult survivors of childhood rape are coming out against their abusers and rapists, the very religious leaders of the Catholic Church they trusted. After four decades of inaction, state governments are finally investigating these crimes. On Aug. 14, the Pennsylvania attorney general’s office released an 884-page report stemming from a two-year investigation from a 23-member grand jury. The report, based on investigations and victims’ testimony, presents evidence that over 300 priests and other clergy had molested, abused and raped more than 1,000 children in towns across Pennsylvania. The abusers had ties all the way up to the Vatican. The report also details a systematic cover-up of sexual predation by church officials. It says that there are “likely to be thousands more” victims.

https://www.liberationnews.org/children-raped-clergy-speak-demand-justice/

Priest carried out 'litany of offending against young boys' - New Zealand

Two Canterbury men are accusing the Catholic church of enabling a priest to carry out a string of child sex attacks in multiple South Island parishes. Documents show the church knew Father Cornelius O'Brien was a serial predator when, in 2007, it thanked him publicly for his service. See 'Priests from Ireland' on page eight of the Catholic Bishop of Christchurch's June 2007 newsletter Inform. His years of attacks on one boy, from age four, culminated in rape, said that victim, who RNZ has agreed not to name. This man won an apology and limited compensation after complaining in 2004.

https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/366584/priest-carried-out-litany-of-offending-against-young-boys-report 

We Saw Nuns Kill Children: The Ghosts of St. Joseph’s Catholic Orphanage

Sally figured the boy fell from the window in 1944 or so, because she was moving to the “big girls” dormitory that day. Girls usually moved when they were 6, though residents of St. Joseph’s Orphanage in Burlington, Vermont, did not always have a clear sense of their age — birthdays, like siblings and even names, being one of the many human attributes that were stripped from them when they passed through its doors. She recounted his fall in a deposition on Nov. 6, 1996, as part of a remarkable group of lawsuits that 28 former residents brought against the nuns, the diocese, and the social agency that oversaw the orphanage.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/christinekenneally/orphanage-death-catholic-abuse-nuns-st-josephs 

Vermont Catholic Church investigation faces challenges

BURLINGTON — State and local authorities say the passage of more than a half-century won’t stop them from investigating new allegations of past child abuse by Vermont Catholic Church personnel. “We know there are countless victims of abuse, physical and sexual abuse, that are still living in our state,” Attorney General TJ Donovan said Monday in announcing a joint law enforcement effort aimed at shedding new light on some old yet only recently reported criminal claims.

https://vtdigger.org/2018/09/10/vermont-catholic-church-investigation-faces-challenges/ 

Developer of former St. Joseph’s orphanage looks to erase ugly past

When local developer Eric Farrell purchased the Lake Champlain property owned for more than a century by Vermont’s Roman Catholic Diocese, he reached back a half-billion years to name his new development “Cambrian Rise” after the geological time period that shaped this waterfront property on Lake Champlain. But as Farrell begins work on a 700-unit “sustainable living community,” he’s also having to recast the recent history of a renovated orphanage on the property that was once the home of children who were abused by priests and nuns over many decades.

https://vtdigger.org/2018/09/16/developer-former-burlington-orphanage-looks-future/

Orphanage abuse: Vermont authorities to investigate survivors' stories

Local and state authorities plan to investigate the criminality of abuse against children at St. Joseph's Orphanage in Burlington that occurred decades ago. A joint state-local task force is to be announced 10 a.m. Monday at the Burlington Police Department, Vermont State Attorney General T.J. Donovan said Friday. The probe, first reported by Seven Days, is planned in the wake of last week's massive Buzzfeed News article by reporter Christine Kenneally about child abuse at Roman Catholic orphanages during the 20th century.

 https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/2018/09/07/burlington-orphanage-abuse-police-investigate-survivors-stories/1225843002/

"The Ghosts of the Orphanage."

Survivors' stories of child abuse at Burlington's St. Joseph's Orphanage decades ago have risen to the attention of state and local leaders in the criminal justice system -- a quarter century after they were first made public. Vermont Attorney General T.J. Donovan along with Burlington police announced the formation of a joint state-local task force on Monday. Investigators want to bring a "public accounting" of what occurred not just at St. Joseph's Orphanage, but at similar institutions around the state, the attorney general said.

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/2018/09/10/vermont-catholic-orphanage-abuse-task-force-investigate-st-josephs/1253905002/ 

Reporting on the St. Joseph's Orphanage abuse: 'It just cried out for attention'

If the survivors of child abuse at St. Joseph's Orphanage in Burlington had emerged in 2018 instead of in the mid-1990s, their stories might well have been more believed, their treatment more just. That's the conclusion of two reporters who have covered the story extensively: BuzzFeed News reporter Christine Kenneally, whose "The Ghosts of the Orphanage" published recently, and longtime former Burlington Free Press reporter Sam Hemingway, who told many survivors' stories originally starting a quarter-century ago.

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/2018/09/07/orphanage-abuse-buzzfeed-news-and-burlington-free-press-reporters-discuss-st-josephs-cases/1214024002/ 

Orphanage abuse: 'Public accounting' sought by Vermont prosecutors, police

Survivors' stories of child abuse at Burlington's St. Joseph's Orphanage decades ago have risen to the attention of state and local leaders in the criminal justice system -- a quarter century after they were first made public. Vermont Attorney General T.J. Donovan along with Burlington police announced the formation of a joint state-local task force on Monday. Investigators want to bring a "public accounting" of what occurred not just at St. Joseph's Orphanage, but at similar institutions around the state, the attorney general said.

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/2018/09/10/vermont-catholic-orphanage-abuse-task-force-investigate-st-josephs/1253905002/ 

Orphanage abuse: Bishop Coyne pledges full cooperation with Vermont investigators

The Diocese of Burlington will cooperate fully with a joint state-local investigation into possible criminality stemming from the stories of abuse told by former residents of St. Joseph's Orphanage, Bishop Christopher Coyne said Sunday morning. Coynetold parishioners during Mass at St. Joseph's Cathedral, and then reporters at a rare press conference, that the church erred in the past with its legalistic approach to allegations of abuse by clergy. Both survivors and the faithful deserve a more compassionate response, he said.

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/vermont/2018/09/09/orphanage-abuse-burlingtons-bishop-coyne-discusses-new-investigation/1248104002/ 

Orphanage abuse: Former St. Joseph's residents relive painful memories

The calls to the Burlington Free Press newsroom keep coming. The voices are a bit shaky. The stories are all too familiar. The callers speak of childhoods filled with poverty and illness, of families separated for months or years and sometimes reunited. They recall events that as children they didn't have words for, or that they were told not to tell. They are former residents of St. Joseph's Orphanage, which operated on North Avenue from the 1880s until 1974 and was called home by a total of 13,000 people over the decades.

https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/vermont/2018/09/16/orphanage-abuse-former-st-josephs-residents-relive-painful-memories/1254265002/ 

3 Weeks Ago I Revealed I Was Abused By A Priest. Here’s How It Changed My Life.

About two years ago, my wife and I sat in our local pub during happy hour, lamenting the dwindling days of our 30s. A casual acquaintance who had recently turned 50 offered us a bit of wisdom: “Your 40s will be the best days of your lives. Everything comes together and you start to figure it out.” To me, this sounded like a well-meaning attempt to make a bad situation seem better than it really was — the same way people will tell you that money can’t buy happiness, or that being crapped on by a bird is good luck. But, as it turned out, she hit the nail on the head.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/sexual-abuse-catholic-church_us_5b9933f3e4b0511db3e83891 

Founded amid war in Guatemala, Missionaries of the Eucharist persevere

The Mayan people of Guatemala gave us one of our favorite indulgences: chocolate. Already by the year 600, they grew cocoa trees, roasted the beans, mixed them with water, added a bit of spice and made "the drink of the gods." They used the beans for currency: Four beans could buy a pumpkin, and 10, a rabbit. Guatemala is a country of entrepreneurs and is the biggest economy in Central America today, according to the World Bank. Sadly, it also has one of the highest inequality rates in Latin America, the World Bank reports, with "some of the worst poverty, malnutrition and maternal-child mortality rates in the region, especially in rural and indigenous areas." In 2014, 59.3 percent of the country lived in poverty, and 52 percent of those affected are indigenous.

https://www.globalsistersreport.org/blog/gsr-today/ministry/founded-amid-war-guatemala-missionaries-eucharist-persevere-55372 

Pope Francis calls for major global summit over child clerical sex abuse crisis

This unprecedented conference hints that the Church is finally taking the global crisis seriously. Catholic leaders from around the world will assemble at the Vatican this February for a summit to finally contend with the global crisis of child sex abuse at the hands of clerics. Leaders from each bishops’ conference around the world will convene at the Vatican for an emergency meeting to discuss the Church’s handling of widespread clerical sex abuse of children over the past several decades.

https://www.vox.com/identities/2018/9/13/17851680/pope-francis-global-summit-conference-child-sex-abuse 

Francis calls clergy abuse summit as issue imperils papacy

Pope Francis summoned the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences Wednesday to a summit on preventing clergy sex abuse and protecting children, responding to the greatest crisis of his papacy with the realization that Vatican inaction on the growing global scandal now threatens his legacy. Francis’ key cardinal advisers announced plans for the summit early next year the day before the pope meets with U.S. church leaders embroiled in their own credibility crisis from the latest accusations in the Catholic Church’s decades-long sex abuse scandal.

https://www.hjnews.com/news/world/francis-calls-clergy-abuse-summit-as-issue-imperils-papacy/article_4aafda1c-bc84-50b4-b175-6de60d3410c1.html 

The Business of Voluntourism: Do Western Do-Gooders Actually Do Harm?

Baby rescue is the ultimate volunteer experience. At Hope of Life International, a Christian mission in rural Guatemala, a rescue team springs into action when news arrives that a baby is dangerously ill in a nearby mountain village. The mission, which hosts hundreds of volunteers from North America every month, sends a caravan of Jeeps, canoes and an ambulance to bring the child to its hospital. On the charity’s website, you can see photos of volunteers, their faces rapt with grim determination, walking down a steep mountain path or fording a river, holding tiny babies wrapped in blankets.

http://pulitzercenter.org/reporting/business-voluntourism-do-western-do-gooders-actually-do-harm 

Pope urges Irish church to make reparations over mass grave

Pope Francis has urged the Irish church to make reparations for its role in the scandal of a Catholic-run orphanage where a mass grave containing the remains of hundreds of children was discovered. Francis made the appeal while meeting with Jesuits during his Aug. 25-26 visit to Ireland. A transcript of his remarks was released Thursday by the Jesuit journal La Civilta Cattolica.

https://ottawacitizen.com/pmn/news-pmn/pope-urges-irish-church-to-make-reparations-over-mass-grave/wcm/d03b74f0-6cac-4a80-99dc-cef0618434c9 

Utah’s Catholic Diocese has received ‘credible allegations’ of sexual abuse against 16 priests since 1990 — two of them this year

In the past three decades, the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City has received “credible allegations” of sexual abuse involving 16 priests. Two of those allegations were received just this year — with one case revealed publicly for the first time Thursday in a letter to Catholics from Bishop Oscar A. Solis. The letter, called “Report to the People of God of the Diocese of Salt Lake City,” is likely the first time Utah Catholics have received this type of accounting of sex abuse allegations against priests, said diocese spokeswoman Jean Hill.

https://www.sltrib.com/news/2018/09/13/utahs-catholic-diocese/ 

Call for St Bede's College rector to resign after teacher who confessed sex abuse continued working

A man who was sexually abused by a former teacher of a Christchurch catholic school is calling for its rector to resign after he allowed the confessed offender to continue teaching. Peter Boock, 64, laid a complaint against Robin Pettit with St Bede's College rector Justin Boyle in 2011. Boock was 13-years-old and Pettit was 19 when the abuse occurred for almost a year in Dunedin, between 1967-68.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/107042771/call-for-st-bedes-college-rector-to-resign-after-teacher-who-confessed-sex-abuse-continued-working 

Erie Catholic churches open for prayer amid ‘darkness’

Churches will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday in an event that Persico announced in August, when abuse report was released. The Catholic Diocese of Erie’s response to the church’s abuse crisis continues with a day of prayer on Saturday. As Bishop Lawrence Persico announced a month ago, upon the release of the grand jury report on child sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in Pennsylvania, all 97 churches in the 13-county Diocese of Erie will be open for prayer from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday.

http://www.goerie.com/news/20180914/erie-catholic-churches-open-for-prayer-amid-darkness 

Orphanage Task Force

It’s time for our community to learn the full truth, no matter how horrifying or painful those details might be. This week, state, county and city authorities announced a task force to investigate decades-old abuse at St. Joseph’s Orphanage on North Avenue in Burlington. Although the orphanage closed in 1974, the scandal remains and has hung over our community for decades. Advertisement Children who lived at the orphanage reported physical and sexual abuse, even accounts of murder at the hands of nuns and priests.

https://www.mynbc5.com/article/nbc5-editorial-orphanage-task-force/23134368 

Renewing the Emerald Isle

“I hope today will be the day we forgive,” said a middle-aged Irish man on his way to attend the closing Mass of World Meeting of Families with Pope Francis Aug. 26. Around 300,000 attendees at Phoenix Park, many of them Irish, stood in the cold rain to attend the Mass celebrated by the head of the Catholic Church, a monumental moment that hasn’t happened since Pope John Paul II visited the same park in 1979. However, people say this Ireland is not like the one of 39 years ago.

https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/renewing-the-emerald-isle

Is a priest accused of abuse one of your neighbors? It's up to you to find out.

When Nancy Worley closed on a house on a rural road in Adams County in July, she hoped she’d be able to renovate and get it on the market to rent in a matter of months. A mother to three sons, Worley wanted to create a home suitable for a family, a place where her future tenants could live comfortably and peacefully. That was a month before a Pennsylvania grand jury report into allegations of child sexual abuse in six Catholic dioceses would name one of Worley’s neighbors among the 301 priests accused of abuse.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/08/31/catholic-priest-abuse-accused-not-listed-megans-law/1167562002/ 

Report: Catholic Bishop Shuffled Pervert Priest Around in New York

In part one of their two-part expose, "Unmasking the Predatory Priest Cover-Up," on the sex abuse scandal rocking the Catholic Church, The Station of the Cross Catholic Radio Network released a detailed report on a major sex scandal in the New York diocese and called for Bishop Richard Joseph Malone of Buffalo to resign. The report is full of letters from Bishop Malone, detailing the sexual exploits of one Fr. Smith, who was accused of grooming and touching minors and young people at an alarming rate. What's especially shocking about these allegations is that they are not many decades old, but range from 2004 until as recently as 2017.

https://pjmedia.com/faith/report-catholic-bishop-in-new-york-shuffled-pervert-priest-around/ 

Abuse of power applies to all institutions

Abuse of power applies to all institutions The Roman Catholic church is taking flak from the mass media. The most recent attacks follow revelations from a grand jury in Philadelphia, described by Pennsylvania’s Attorney General as the "largest, most comprehensive report into child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church ever produced in the United States." According to the report, more than 300 "predator priests" in six Pennsylvania dioceses have been credibly accused of sexually abusing more than 1,000 child victims over 70 years -- prior to 2002, when scandals involving Cardinal Bernard Law in Boston forced the U.S. Catholic bishops to adopt new rules for reporting abuse.

http://www.kelownadailycourier.ca/opinion/article_8ea9ecd8-ae2d-11e8-909d-3b8ec3400195.html 

Baby shoes from papal protest to be presented at ‘healing’ Mass

A priest in the Cloyne diocese is to commemorate victims of clerical abuse with a Mass featuring children’s shoes that protesters tied to church railings during the Pope’s visit.
The Very Rev Canon David Herlihy has arranged for the shoes to be brought to the altar during the offertory procession at noon Mass in St Mary’s, Youghal, tomorrow.
He said that it would be a “tiny, tiny gesture” to the victims of mother's and babies home

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/baby-shoes-from-papal-protest-to-be-presented-at-healing-mass-nbhdr9sn8

Stars sing at rally in support of abuse victims

A crowd of around 5,000 attended the Stand 4 Truth rally to highlight the plight of those affected by clerical abuse. The event was timed to coincide with the Papal Mass at the Phoenix Park. Stars including Hozier, Mary Black, Mary Coughlan and Liam Ó Maonlaí performed at the rally, which was held at the Garden of Remembrance in the heart of Dublin's north inner city. Hozier told the Irish Independent that he had felt compelled to attend the event and "stand with" those who had suffered due to clerical abuse.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/pope-francis-in-ireland/stars-sing-at-rally-in-support-of-abuse-victims-37255019.html 

Pope Francis visit reveals a Catholic Church on life support in Ireland

“Imagine for a moment that a big, admired multinational corporation, one selling a beloved product, was employing large numbers of male pedophiles and rapists, operating in rings all over the world, and that their crimes had been uncovered in Australia, Ireland, Canada, the Philippines, Belgium, France, Austria, New Zealand, Argentina, Chile, Britain, Germany and the United States, and, further, that senior executives had systematically covered up and suppressed evidence, transferring and enabling hundreds of predators, betraying thousands of victims.”

https://www.irishcentral.com/opinion/niallodowd/pope-francis-visit-catholic-ireland-dead 

Marie Collins: With Irish survivors, Francis said he's not considering new accountability tribunal

One of the eight Irish abuse survivors who met with Pope Francis Aug. 25 says that during the meeting the pontiff told the group he is not planning to implement new procedures to hold bishops who cover-up clergy abuse to account, citing measures the Catholic Church already has in place to do so. "In answer to [my] question of setting up a tribunal and what sort of concrete measures there's going to be, it would appear that there's not going to be anything more," Marie Collins, a former member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, told NCR.

https://www.ncronline.org/news/accountability/marie-collins-irish-survivors-francis-said-hes-not-considering-new 

Illinois attorney general to meet church officials on abuse

Illinois' attorney general is planning to meet with Chicago Archdiocese officials to discuss seven priests with links to the state who were included in a scathing Pennsylvania grand jury report on clergy sex abuse. The report released this month found that about 300 Catholic priests abused at least 1,000 children over the past 70 years, with claims of a systematic cover-up by senior church leaders that used similar methods unearthed in the initial clergy sex-abuse story that broke nationwide in 2002.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12113362 

Nuns Of Shuttered Vermont Orphanage Could Face Murder Charges

Investigators will look at decades-old allegations into the mistreatment of children at the shuttered St. Joseph's Orphanage, authorities said Monday in Burlington. An investigative reporting piece published last month by BuzzFeed News detailed stories from adults who grew up at the Burlington orphanage accusing the Sisters of Providence of beating and burning children, keeping them in seclusion, and restraining them for hours or days.

https://patch.com/vermont/burlington-vt/nuns-shuttered-vermont-orphanage-could-face-murder-charges 

Smyllum nuns spend more on legal fees at Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry than compensation alleged victims will receive

NUNS who ran Smyllum Park orphanage spent nearly £300,000 on legal fees at the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry – more than the maximum amount of compensation its alleged victims could receive for a lifetime of suffering. The running of two Daughters of Charity children’s homes was examined as part of a case study at the inquiry between November 28, 2017 and January 20 this year. And newly-released accounts show how the order racked up £287,000 in “professional fees” connected to the Edinburgh hearings.

https://www.sundaypost.com/fp/n0909smyllumbo/ 

Pennsylvania grand jury finds some police and district attorneys helped Catholic church cover up priest abuse

As he began a blistering presentation of a grand jury report into decades of child sex abuse by priests in Pennsylvania earlier this month, Attorney General Josh Shapiro singled out two groups — the Catholic Church hierarchy and law enforcement — for sometimes working in tandem to keep the accusations from the public. “The abuse scarred every diocese,” he said. “The cover-up was sophisticated. The church protected the institution at all costs.” But the findings, identifying 301 predator priests, also showed a “failure of law enforcement,” Shapiro said. The investigation found that while the church leadership was consistently involved in protecting offenders, it sometimes had assistance from police or district attorneys who looked the other way.

http://www.mcall.com/news/nationworld/pennsylvania/mc-nws-grand-jury-law-enforcement-priests-20180823-story.html

. The ghosts of the orphanage

It was a late summer afternoon, Sally Dale recalled, when the boy was thrown through the fourth-floor window. “He kind of hit, and— ” she placed both hands palm-down before her. Her right hand slapped down on the left, rebounded up a little, then landed again. For just a moment, the room was still. “Bounced?” one of the many lawyers present asked. “Well, I guess you’d call it — it was a bounce,” she replied. “And then he laid still.” Sally, who was speaking under oath, tried to explain it. She started again. “The first thing I saw was looking up, hearing the crash of the window, and then him going down, but my eyes were still glued—.” She pointed up at where the broken window would have been and then she pointed at her own face and drew circles around it. “That habit thing, whatever it is, that they wear, stuck out like a sore thumb.”

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/christinekenneally/orphanage-death-catholic-abuse-nuns-st-josephs 

Focus on the Children. What Pope Francis knew or didn’t know won’t cure what ails the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church is exposed. A number of wide-ranging, deeply researched reports of molestation, rape, abuse, corruption, and concealment have been released in close enough time to one another that the magnitude of the horror might actually—for the average American, anyway—sink in. It all feels monumental, if also powered in part by coincidence. The recently published Pennsylvania report, in which a grand jury details the sexual abuse of more than 1,000 children by more than 300 priests and systematically argues that church officials were complicit, was two years in the making. It didn’t need to be released two weeks before BuzzFeed published Christine Kenneally’s yearslong investigation into the abuse of children—some of whom didn’t survive—by nuns and priests at St. Joseph’s Catholic orphanage.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/08/pennsylvania-report-on-catholic-church-abuse-dont-be-distracted-by-pope-francis.html 

Commentary: How to save the Catholic Church

When the pope is given a cool, even combative, welcome in the Republic of Ireland, the Roman Catholic Church is in trouble. The country had been – from its founding as the Irish Free State in the early 1920s after a violent break with the United Kingdom – deeply influenced by Catholic teaching in the framing of its laws and the management of its institutions. It is now solidly secular – and it has a list of hard questions to put to the Church. When Pope John Paul II visited Ireland in 1979, over 1 million people gathered to see him in Dublin’s Phoenix Park alone.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-lloyd-ireland-commentary/commentary-how-to-save-the-catholic-church-idUSKCN1LG2IN 

Editorial: NJ needs own grand jury to look at clergy sex abuse

Irish-American former auxiliary bishop of Washington Cardinal Kevin Farrell has denied any involvement in the scandal that brought Pope Francis to strip US prelate Theodore McCarrick of his cardinal's title following sexual abuse allegations. Sen. Joseph Vitale, long a champion on issues related to the health and general welfare of all New Jerseyans, has now stepped head-on into the gathering storm that is a widening sex abuse scandal within the Catholic Church. His call to action is heartening to hear, and was no doubt influenced, in part, by recent grand jury findings in Pennsylvania that showed Church leaders in that state covered up child sexual abuse by more than 300 priests over a period of 70 years. The report also identified more than 1,000 victims.

https://www.northjersey.com/story/opinion/editorials/2018/09/01/editorial-nj-needs-own-grand-jury-look-clergy-sex-abuse/1160299002/ 

News Podcast: Abuse In Catholic Orphanages

In The Lede, investigative editor Mark Schoofs talks to contributing editor Christine Kenneally about her reporting on the child abuse that took place at St. Joseph's Catholic Orphanage in Burlington, VT. Host Julia Furlan interviews Charlie Warzel about the horrifying world of deepfakes. In What in the World, world editor Miriam Elder breaks down some of the week's world news.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/alexslaughlin/news-podcast-nafta-orphanage-deepfake 

Another woman arrested over historical child abuse claims at orphanage

A twelfth woman has been arrested in connection with alleged historical abuse of children at Smyllum Park orphanage. Police Scotland said on Friday, a 76-year-old woman has now been charged in connection ‘with the non-recent abuse of children’. Eleven women and one man, aged between 62 and 85, have already been arrested as part of an investigation into the orphanage at the Lanark home which was run by the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul until it closed in 1981.

https://metro.co.uk/2018/08/31/another-woman-arrested-over-historical-child-abuse-claims-at-orphanage-7902138/ 

Zappone asks Pope for €2.5m to give Tuam babies 'dignity'

Children's Minister Katherine Zappone wants the Vatican to contribute up to €2.5m as part reparation for its role in the Tuam mother and baby home scandal. In a two-page letter to Pope Francis, the minister asked the Church to "contribute substantially" to one of five potential options for dealing with the home's legacy. The Government is weeks away from deciding on the future of the site, with options ranging from a simple memorial to a full-scale forensic and archaeological excavation.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/pope-francis-in-ireland/zappone-asks-pope-for-25m-to-give-tuam-babies-dignity-37258951.html 

'Pontiff was out of touch' - abuse survivors

Survivors of clerical abuse branded the visit of Pope Francis as "abysmal and appalling" as he failed to identify an action plan on how to address the hurt caused by the Church in Ireland. Speaking after the pontiff admitted he was not aware of the Magdalene laundries or the mother and baby homes, they questioned how he could be so out of touch with the deep pain and ongoing anguish that emanated from such institutions.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/pope-francis-in-ireland/pontiff-was-out-of-touch-abuse-survivors-37258958.html 

No sin for birth mothers to seek children'

It was never a mortal sin for adopted children or their birth mothers to seek one another, Pope Francis has told survivors of institutional abuse. During Saturday's meeting with the Coalition of Mother and Baby Home Survivors (CMABS), the pontiff moved to reassure both birth mothers and children who were adopted out by the Catholic Church that there was nothing sinful in trying to contact each other. In fact, it appears the opposite was true, he alluded to in reference to the Fourth Commandment in the Bible to 'honour thy mother and father'.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/pope-francis-in-ireland/no-sin-for-birth-mothers-to-seek-children-37258929.html 

Vermont’s Attorney General Says He’s “Horrified” About The Abusive Orphanage — But Makes No Promises To Investigate

“We will continue to discuss what steps, if any, the Vermont Attorney General’s office will take in response to these allegations,” Vermont Attorney General T.J. Donovan said. Vermont’s attorney general on Wednesday said he was “horrified” about the abusive Catholic orphanage that was the subject of a multiyear BuzzFeed News investigation — but made no promises to do anything about it. “I am horrified and angry by the abuse of innocent children that occurred at St. Joseph's Orphanage. My heart breaks for all the victims that endured and suffered this abuse,” Attorney General T.J. Donovan said.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ellievhall/vermont-attorney-vermont-orphanage-nun-abuse 

BuzzFeed Investigation Details Decades Of Systemic Child Abuse At Vermont Orphanage

BuzzFeed contributor Christine Kenneally about her article investigating physical and sexual abuse by nuns at St. Joseph's Orphanage in Burlington, Vt. ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: Over the last few years, the U.S. has come to terms with patterns of child abuse in the Catholic Church. In other countries, these investigations have extended to Catholic orphanages. Canada, Australia, the U.K. and other European countries have conducted government investigations that exposed patterns of horrific abuse at Catholic orphanages. The U.S. has never had such a comprehensive accounting. And now a major investigation by BuzzFeed gives reason to believe that the same problems may have existed here in American orphanages. Christine Kenneally is an investigative reporter who spent years researching this story. Welcome to the program.

https://www.npr.org/2018/08/29/643062117/buzzfeed-investigation-details-decades-of-systemic-child-abuse-at-vermont-orphan 

Children murdered & sexualy abused in Catholic orphanage

'We saw nuns kill children': Horror claims about torture, sexual abuse and MURDER in Catholic orphanage in Vermont surface decades on ...

https://america.easybranches.com/vermont/1422851 

At a Catholic Orphanage in Vermont, Sex Abuse and Torture Ran Rampant

An investigative reporter for BuzzFeed News says she uncovered rampant abuse, including allegations of torture and murder, at a now-defunct Catholic orphanage in Vermont. She also claims the abuse was widespread in similar facilities across the entire United States. The in-depth report comes from Christine Kenneally describes a horrific situation at St. Joseph’s Orphanage in Burlington, Vermont, including anecdotes involving nuns physically abusing kids and — in one case — ordering older boys to “rape” a younger boy named Joseph. At a reunion for “survivors” of St. Joseph’s, several former residents shared their stories. Among the victims were Sally Dale, who reportedly went into the orphanage at age two and didn’t leave for another 20 years, and a man by the name of Joseph Barquin.

http://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/08/30/at-a-catholic-orphanage-in-vermont-sex-abuse-and-torture-ran-rampant/ 

Time is running out for the pope to pacify the faithful’s anger

The waves of scandal over clerical sexual abuse, and the Vatican’s weak response, are pushing lay Catholics to breaking point Harriet Sherwood @harrietsherwood Sun 26 Aug 2018 07.00 BST Last modified on Sun 26 Aug 2018 08.32 BST Shares 641 The pope being greeted at Dublin airport on Saturday The pope being greeted at Dublin airport on Saturday Photograph: Paul Faith/AFP/Getty Images When Pope Francis ascends the steps of his plane at Dublin airport on Sunday evening at the end of his 36-hour trip to Ireland, even he – the people’s pontiff, the champion of the poor – might feel a sense of relief on entering the cocoon of Aer Lingus’s business class.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/26/pope-time-running-out-pacify-faithful-anger-clerical-sexual-abuse

Ex-Vatican official accuses Pope Francis of covering up McCarrick’s sex abuse

A former high-ranking Vatican official says Pope Francis should step down from the papacy because he knew about sexual abuse allegations against an influential American cardinal — and participated in covering them up. Carlo Maria Viganò, a former papal nuncio (an ambassador-like position), wrote an 11-page open letter alleging that both Pope Francis and his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, knew about decades’ worth of allegations against Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, the former archbishop of Washington, DC. McCarrick was removed from active ministry in June and later resigned his cardinalship after revelations emerged that he had sexually abused generations’ worth of junior seminarians and young priests as a priest and then bishop in New Jersey. He is also accused of having sexually abused at least two minors.

https://www.vox.com/2018/8/26/17783168/pope-francis-vigano-cover-up-accusation-sex-abuse 

Francis meets eight Irish survivors, reportedly calls abuse cover-up 'caca'

Pope  Francis met eight survivors of clergy and institutional abuse on the first of his two-day visit to Ireland, in a 90-minute encounter several in the meeting called "cordial and polite." Support independent Catholic journalism. Among those included in the Aug. 25 meeting were Marie Collins, who resigned in frustration from the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors in 2017, and two persons who were forcibly separated from their mothers as babies at church-run institutional homes. "Pope Francis condemned corruption and cover up within the church as 'caca,' " said a statement made by the latter two survivors after the meeting. It specified: "Literally filth as one sees in a toilet, his translator clarified."

https://www.ncronline.org/news/accountability/francis-meets-eight-irish-survivors-reportedly-calls-abuse-cover-caca 

Pope in Ireland: Pope Francis begs for forgiveness for ‘open wound’ of church abuse

POPE Francis has begged for forgiveness from God for the "sins" committed by the Catholic Church in the abuse scandal as he called for firm action in pursuing justice for church abuse victims in Ireland. The Pope, 81, is on the first papal visit to Ireland in 39 years, one which has been full of painful reminders of his church’s disgraceful history in the country. Speaking today at the Marian shrine in Knock, Co Mayo Pope Francis told crowds that historic abuses by the Catholic Church were an “open wound” in Ireland. Pope Francis said: “This open wound challenges us to be firm and decisive in the pursuit of truth and justice. “I beg the Lord's forgiveness for these sins and for the scandal and betrayal felt by so many others in God's family.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1008665/pope-ireland-pope-francis-catholic-church-abuse 

Penitent Pope Francis describes paedophile priest cover-up as 'Caca - filth one sees in the toilet'

Pope Francis has met victims of abuse and mistreatment in Ireland, telling them that those who abuse children were the equivalent of human excrement. He spent 90 minutes speaking with eight Irish survivors of clerical, religious and institutional abuse during the first papal visit to Ireland since 1979. The Pontiff told of the two abuse survivors that 'those involved in corruption and cover up within the church are 'caca", with his translator clarifying: 'Literally filth as one sees in the toilet'.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6097159/Smiling-Pope-Francis-steps-plane-Dublin-papal-visit-Ireland.html 

The Latest: Irish adoptee demands apology from Catholic nuns

DUBLIN (AP) — The Latest on Pope Francis' trip to Ireland (all times local): 8:20 p.m. Some of the Irish victims who met with Pope Francis are children who were forced to be adopted because they were born to single mothers or lived in Ireland's notorious "mother and baby homes." In a statement Saturday, they said they urged the pope to publicly state that their mothers had done nothing wrong and to encourage reconciliation between them. They said the pope apologized on behalf of the church. Paul Redmond, who was born in a home and given up for adoption at 17 days, urged the pope to publicly call on the six orders of Catholic nuns who ran the homes to accept responsibility for the traumas they caused, issue an apology, and pay for the costs of reconciliation inquiries.

https://www.tampabay.com/the-latest-irish-adoptee-demands-apology-from-catholic-nuns-ap_national6d8d944db47b46c3811641e342071b23 

Soft Cover Book: They Promised Heaven, But Led me To Hell.

This is a true story base on actual events of a New Zealand girl from birth, her young years in two catholic church orphanages. My crime, in the eyes of the catholic church nuns, was that I was born to an unwed mother who was raped and I was a daughter of the devil. The punishments for my sins started when I was eighteen months old in the nursery by three ladies workers for the nuns which were repeated most nights up to the age of five years old. My childhood was a life of abuse by nuns, the workers, older girls and a priest, the only way I could get through this was to be by myself or run away and hide, go and stay in the church and also climb as high as I could in the trees or jump the fences and hide in long grass. I also went to the police but that did me no good I was thrashed by the nuns when the police took me back to the orphanage.

https://store.bookbaby.com//bookshop/book/index.aspx?bookURL=They-Promised-Heaven-But-Led-Me-to-Hell2&b=p_fr-ve-bl