ABUSE TRACKER

DEUTSCHLAND
MissBiT

Adenau / Eifel
1978/1980
Täter: Pastor, bekannt
Tatort: Sakristei
Opfer: Mädchen

Arzfeld
Die Ermittlungen laufen seit Anfang 2008: Ein 37-jähriger katholischer Priester aus dem Bistum Trier und aus der dortigen Verbandsgemeinde Arzfeld soll sich kinderpornografische Bilder aus dem Internet geladen haben, bestätigte der Saarbrücker Staatsanwalt B.M. Die Staatsanwaltschaft Saarbrücken war nach einem Hinweis des Bundeskriminalamtes auf den Geistlichen aufmerksam geworden. Die Taten sollen mehr als ein Jahr zurückliegen. Noch seien die Ermittlungen in dem Verfahren, das seit Anfang 2008 laufe, nicht abgeschlossen. Der 37-Jährige war zuvor 4 Jahre Priester im saarländischen Völklingen und wurde dann in die Eifel versetzt. Unterdessen wurde der Pfarrer vom Paderborner Erzbischof Hans-Josef Becker am 29. Oktober beurlaubt und aus seiner Gemeinde versetzt. In der betroffenen Pfarrei wurden die Gläubigen offenbar im Unklaren gelassen, warum ihr Pastor plötzlich keine Gottesdienste mehr hält. “Uns wurde gesagt, das habe psychische Gründe”, sagte der Großkampenberger Ortsbürgermeister Herbert Heinz.

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DEUTSCHLAND
De Redactie

Bei der Stiftung für vermisste und sexuell ausgebeutete Kinder, Child Focus, sind im vergangenen Jahr fünf Mal mehr Meldungen über möglichen sexuellen Missbrauch von Kindern eingegangen. Unter den tatsächlichen Missbrauchsfällen zählten 2011 vor allem Mädchen zu den Opfern. Das geht aus dem Jahresbericht der Stiftung hervor.

Das Tabu in Zusammenhang mit sexuellem Kindesmissbrauch ist viel kleiner geworden. Die Zahl der Akten bei der Stiftung für vermisste und sexuell ausgebeutete Kinder, Child Focus, nahm von 331 im Jahr 2010 auf 534 im letzten Jahr zu. Die Stiftung führt den Anstieg auf die Verfünffachung der Zahl präventiver Anrufe nach den Enthüllungen sexuellen Missbrauchs innerhalb der katholischen Kirche zurück.

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IRLAND
taz (Deutschland)

DUBLIN taz | Wenn er im Fernsehen auftritt, wirkt er unsympathisch und arrogant. Das ist Seán Brady auch. Er ist Kardinal und höchster Würdenträger der katholischen Kirche Irlands. Forderungen nach seinem Rücktritt wischt er lässig vom Tisch. Dabei hätte er allen Grund, sein Amt zur Verfügung zu stellen.

Die BBC hat jetzt aufgedeckt, dass Brady im Jahr 1975, als er noch einfacher Pfarrer war, von dem damals 14-jährigen Brendan Boland über die Machenschaften des pädokriminellen Pfarrers Brendan Smyth informiert worden war. Boland gab Brady die Namen von fünf weiteren Jugendlichen, die ebenfalls von Smyth vergewaltigt worden waren.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY, Religious Affairs Correspondent, and MARIE O’HALLORAN

MORE THAN 1,000 Catholic laity, priests and nuns called for dialogue in the Irish church at a day-long conference in Dublin yesterday.

Titled “Toward an Assembly of the Catholic Church”, the conference agreed such dialogue should “work towards establishing appropriate structures that would reflect the participation of all the baptised”.

It “should take place at parish, diocesan and national levels” and “address all issues facing our people at this time of crisis”.

The conference agreed on the need to recapture “as a matter of urgency” the reforming vision of the Second Vatican Council and called on all who were “concerned with the future of our church, including our church leaders, to participate in this dialogue.”

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IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Mark Hilliard
Tuesday, 8 May 2012

Silencing priests is not an appropriate method of ending disagreements within the church, the Association of Catholic Priests (ACP) said yesterday.

More than 1,000 people attended a meeting to discuss how to solve the church “crisis” that includes continuing abuse scandals and declining Mass attendance.

Fr Brendan Hoban of the ACP told the gathering at Dublin’s Regency Hotel that clamping down on “wayward” opinions was not the way to deal with issues.

He was referring to the recent censoring of a number of priests including Fr Brian D’Arcy and Fr Tony Flannery who voiced opinions unpopular with the hierarchy.

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IRELAND
Catholic Herald (United Kingdom)

Cardinal Brady’s situation is now irretrievable, and he would be wise, therefore, to retire; but the storm beating down on him is wholly undeserved

By William Oddie

I begin by quoting an article by Jenny McCartney in this week’s Sunday Telegraph. Firstly, because she is normally a fair-minded and well-informed commentator; secondly because she sums up well enough what seems to be the general tenor of the obloquy now raining down on the head of Cardinal Seán Brady. Jenny McCartney puts it like this: “It has become a painfully self-evident truth – surely, even to the silent onlookers at the Vatican – that the longer Cardinal Seán Brady stays in place as Primate of All Ireland, the greater the damage inflicted on the reputation of the Catholic Church in Ireland and beyond.”

I wonder, I really do wonder, if anyone has really thought through the implications of all this. What we have here, it seems to me, may well be nearer to the phenomenon we call today a “witch hunt” than to a common understanding based on an equitable understanding of the reality of the situation. The mass psychology of these affairs is rarely based on reason or justice; and such, I suggest, is the case here.

It may well be that Cardinal Brady, who is 72, should take early retirement, given the wholly intractable nature of the situation that has now arisen. It coud be that this is the only way forward, since fighting on is likely only to exacerbate the situation: he cannot expect to be listened to now, however reasonable his self-defence may be. Fr Vincent Twomey, the eminent retired professor of moral theology at Maynooth, says with some justice: “There is a sense of a Greek tragedy in all of this. In the Greek tragedy, people do things intending to do the good thing but instead some awful, dreadful things happen as a result of their actions and they have to pay for it… I think for the good of the Church, I’m afraid I am of the opinion that he should resign….”

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
Mo Rage

The reasons why our own Kansas City Star and SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) is correct, to date, about Bishop Finn, the Catholic Church and the abuse charges against this Bishop are because, first, the Star is merely reporting things as and when they happen. It’s called reporting. It’s what they’re supposed to do.

Should they take editorial stands on it?

Sure they should. It is, after all, adults sexually and/or physically abusing the students–children–they are supposed to be otherwise responsible for. That and they’re from their own churches and schools. What other stand should any people or organization take?

As for SNAP? Same thing. They’re trying to see to it that the sexual and physical abuse of students–children–isn’t left unpunished so that it doesn’t take place any longer.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Legal Intelligencer Blog

By Amaris Elliott-Engel
Of the Legal Staff

A retired FBI agent hired by the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia to look into alleged sex abuse by priests testified today that he had no background in investigating allegations of sex crimes and that he did not receive training on investigating possible sexual abuse.

Lawyers for Monsignor William J. Lynn, who is on trial for endangering the welfare of two men who say they were abused by priests as youths, have made the argument that Lynn also did not receive training as the personnel director for priests when he was assigned to look into allegations of abuse by priests.

The church investigator, Jack Rossiter, testified Monday that he believed the man who said Lynn’s co-defendant, the Rev. James Brennan, had abused him, even though the accuser had a criminal history. Rossiter said he weighed that factor in his analysis.

Rossiter has since been named in a civil lawsuit brought by the alleged victim, M.B., against church officials, Rossiter testified today. The Legal is not naming the alleged victims.

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IRELAND
The Guardian (United Kingdom)

Henry McDonald in Dublin
guardian.co.uk, Monday 7 May 2012

The embattled leader of Ireland’s Catholics, Cardinal Sean Brady, has issued a public apology to a man who revealed that he failed to report to police and parents a list of children who were being abused by a notorious paedophile priest.

But one victim has denounced the move, saying it was part of a survival strategy by Brady and the Irish Catholic hierarchy.

Andrew Madden, an abuse victim who detailed his ordeal at the hands of a north Dublin priest in his book Altar Boy, said Brady’s apology to Brendan Boland should not be used to help keep the cardinal in his position.

Madden said: “Ultimately it’s up to Brendan Boland to decide what he thinks of the apology, but it looks like a very self-serving one now that he is in so much trouble.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

By Fergus Finlay

Tuesday, May 08, 2012

I’VE been asked a lot during the last week whether I think Cardinal Brady should resign.

My instinctive answer has been yes, because I really don’t believe any renewal of the Church’s moral authority in Ireland is possible under his leadership.

Moral authority is a force for good. Not when it is exercised through power and oppressiveness, but when it is based on compassion and some degree of understanding. A society in transition, that is searching for values, needs to be able to turn to authority figures that have earned respect.

It’s that type and level of moral authority that needs to be renewed, and that is beyond the capacity of Cardinal Brady to deliver. That’s why, any time I’ve been asked, I have said he should go.

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IRELAND
Radio New Zealand

A group representing about a quarter of Roman Catholic priests in Ireland has called for radical reforms in the church.

The Association of Catholic Priests meeting in Dublin, says the reforms are needed to stem the Church’s decline in the wake of the long-running sexual abuse scandals.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

By Sean O’Riordan and Claire O’Sullivan

Tuesday, May 08, 2012

Three men have been arrested in connection with a major investigation into child sex abuse at a Co Cork school.

The arrests follow complaints made by nearly 20 former pupils of Sacred Heart College, Carrignavar.

Gardaí received the first of the complaints last August, when they were approached by a former boarder at the secondary school.

Two of the three men were arrested and questioned at Cobh Garda Station in Co Cork, while the third was detained in Dublin.

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IRELAND
Shropshire Star (United Kingdom0

Children across Ireland were raped and sexually abused by priests – some within the grounds of a church – yet it is those in charge today who remain the biggest threat to the Catholic faith, writes political correspondent Jason Lavan.

I was raised as a Catholic in Ireland and received Holy Communion and was Confirmed under the church. I also served as an altar boy. I no longer support the Catholic church.

For years in Ireland the horrifying details of children being raped have been revealed to the public by shocking accounts from victims – now suffering the devastating after effects of their terrifying ordeals.

Children were raped in churches, taken on trips by priests and sexually assaulted just hours after the victim’s parents waved them off from their front doors, believing them to be in the hands of god.

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UNITED STATES
SF Weekly

By Erin Sherbert
Mon., May 7 2012

As readers probably recall, nut job Pastor Sean Harris’ gay-children hating comments at a recent sermon made national headlines and sent Americans into a convulsing rage — and we’re not not just talking about liberals and gays.

It seems even the most faithful and godly can’t deal with the North Carolina Baptist preacher. To prove that he sure as hell doesn’t speak for all Christians, Faithful America, a faith-based Washington, D.C., nonprofit, has circulated a petition denouncing the pastor’s comments encouraging parents to attack and hit their young, effeminate sons. The comments came a week before state voters are to decide whether to ban gay marriage tomorrow.

According to the petition:

“Faithful Christians are appalled by Pastor Sean Harris’s hateful tirade urging violence against gay and lesbian youth. Violence and child abuse can never be justified by the teachings of Jesus Christ. All young people, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, should be assured in church that they are beloved children of God.”

More than 10,000 people have signed the petition, and many left little notes for Harris alongside their names, including this one:

“There is a special place in Hell for those who abuse children.” And probably for those who advocate it.

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UNITED STATES
Advocate

BY Neal Broverman.

May 07 2012

A group called Faithful America is circulating a message that condemns antigay pastor Sean Harris, who advocated punching gay-acting children in a recent sermon.

The letter, entitled “Abusing Gay Children Is Not Christian,” has received over 10,000 signatures, according to the Faith in Public Life website. The statement reads, “Faithful Christians are appalled by Pastor Sean Harris’s hateful tirade urging violence against gay and lesbian youth. Violence and child abuse can never be justified by the teachings of Jesus Christ. All young people, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, should be assured in church that they are beloved children of God.” Read more here.

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MINNESOTA
Bemidji Pioneer

By: Sasha Aslanian, Bemidji Pioneer

With more than 1 million members, the Catholic Church is the single largest religious denomination in Minnesota.

Catholics’ numbers, and their financial contributions, make them a powerful force in the debate over a constitutional amendment that would only allow marriage between men and women. If approved by voters this fall, the amendment would effectively write a ban on gay marriage into the state constitution.

Minnesota law already prohibits gay marriage. But Catholic bishops have made passage of the amendment a top political priority this year, so much so that the Catholic Church is putting a lot of money and prayers into the effort to pass the marriage amendment. …

The Duluth diocese has contributed $50,000 from the estate of a deceased priest. The New Ulm diocese has given another $50,000 from the sale of real estate.

But the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis donated $650,000 — the single largest contribution in the race so far….

Archdiocese officials declined to comment, but explained in a press release that the money came from investment income and not “from parish assessments, the Catholic Service Appeal, or donations to parishes or to the Archdiocese.” It also noted that contributions to Catholic Charities and Parochial Schools remained constant or increased.

Still, some Catholics aren’t happy with the big spending on the marriage issue.

“None of us knew that there was that large amount of money available to be used for any purpose,” said Bob Beutel, a St. Paul attorney who describes himself as a “cradle Catholic.”

A product of Catholic Schools, Beutel is a member of Catholic Coalition for Church Reform, a group that has pressed the church to disclose more information about its finances.

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
The Examiner

By The Examiner staff – localnews@examiner.net

Kansas City, MO —

Misdemeanor charges against Bishop Robert W. Finn and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph have been split into two different periods.

The motion to amend the misdemeanor charges pending against the metro area’s top Catholic official and the diocese was filed late Friday, Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker announced Monday.

If granted, Finn and the diocese would each face two misdemeanor counts, according to the prosecutor’s office.

If granted, the first new charge specifies the period of Dec. 17, 2010, to Feb. 10, 2011, while the second specifies Feb. 11, 2011, to May 18, 2011.

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VENICE (FL)
News-Press

[Read the decision by the Agency for Workforce Innovation reinstating Wilson’s unemployment (pdf)]

[Read fired teacher Chris Wilson’s lawsuit (pdf)]

[The report filed by Fort Myers Police (pdf)]

[Read the Diocese response to the Wilson appeal]

[Read the Supreme Court January decision upholding “ministerial exception” (pdf)]

[Read the letter sent by a church member to Bishop Dewane complaining about Wilson’s firing and bishop’s response (pdf)]

[Read the letter from canon lawyer Thomas Doyle to Bishop Dewane regarding Rev. Cory Mayer (pdf)]

Written by
Mary Wozniak

A lawsuit filed by a former Bishop Verot Catholic High School teacher, saying he was fired almost a year ago for reporting claims a priest asked inappropriate sexual questions of female students, could wind up testing a recent landmark religious ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In the lawsuit, former theology teacher Chris Wilson says he blew the whistle on the Rev. Cory Mayer, claiming the priest asked at least five teenage girls during confessions held at school whether they had sex or masturbated. When one girl balked, saying it was none of the priest’s business, Mayer reportedly said he would deny absolution for her sins unless she answered.

The Diocese of Venice says Mayer did nothing wrong. Bishop Frank Dewane, head of the diocese, said in a letter to a church member who complained about Wilson’s firing that some students felt “uncomfortable” with Mayer’s questions, but none reported feeling anything “inappropriate” happened. The priest never was charged with a crime, and Wilson was fired for what the diocese called “unprofessional behavior.”

“Mr. Wilson is a disgruntled former employee who was fired from Bishop Verot High School after demonstrating a history of unprofessional behavior which was officially documented,” Billy Atwell, diocese spokesman, wrote in emailed answers to questions from The News-Press. “After not being selected to be principal of the school, his frustration with school administration rose to the point that he yelled and screamed at the principal in front of other faculty and within earshot and view of students — totally unprofessional behavior.”

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VENICE (FL)
News-Press

Written by
Mary Wozniak

Canon law, the internal law of the Catholic Church, says this about the priest’s role in the sacrament of confession:

“In posing questions, the priest is to proceed with prudence and discretion, attentive to the condition and age of the penitent, and is to refrain from asking the name of an accomplice.”

Which raises the question: Is it prudent or discreet to ask teenage girls in the confessional if they’ve had sex or if they masturbate?

Fired Bishop Verot High School teacher Chris Wilson claims in a lawsuit the Rev. Cory Mayer asked those questions of at least five female students while hearing their confessions April 14, 2011. In at least one instance, Mayer said he would refuse absolution unless the questions were answered, Wilson said.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

Published on Tuesday 8 May 2012

CARDINAL Sean Brady has been unfairly singled out for criticism over child sex abuse cover-up allegations, according to the Auxiliary Bishop of Down and Connor.

Although he stopped short of defending the under-fire Cardinal’s actions, Bishop Donal McKeown has pointed an accusing finger at influential people in other spheres, saying some could be using the “pain of victims to further their own agendas”.

The Catholic Church in Ireland has been rocked by recent revelations that, in 1975, Cardinal Brady was involved in a secret Church inquiry into Fr Brendan Smyth’s sexual abuse of children.

Most damning of the allegations is that the then 36-year-old church legal expert failed to notify police or the parents of children at risk.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

In April, Gary Marx and David Jackson of the Chicago Tribune were named finalists for the Pulitzer Prize in investigative journalism “for their exposure of a neglectful state justice system that allowed dozens of brutal criminals to evade punishment by fleeing the country, sparking moves for corrective change.”

While their series (“Across the Border, Beyond the Law”) did not focus on the clerical abuse scandal, Marx and Jackson found that at least 32 priests facing allegations of sexual abuse have fled the United States since 1985.

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MINNESOTA
BishopAccountability.org – Assignment Record

Summary of Case: Heitzer was accused publicly in 2002 when a man told the story to the U.S. bishops gathered in Dallas of his having been sexually abused by Heitzer in 1968, when he was 11 years-old. The St. Paul and Minneapolis Vicar General stated at the same gathering that there was some indication that the archdiocese knew that about allegations that Heitzer had abused children. Heitzer died in 1969 while in treatment for alcoholism.

Ordained: 1944
Incardinated: St. Paul and Minneapolis
Died: Nov. 24, 1969

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

KITTY HOLLAND and PATSY McGARRY

THE CATHOLIC primate, Cardinal Seán Brady, has said parents of children he knew in 1975 had been abused by Fr Brendan Smyth should have been told.

“I regret very much that they weren’t, and obviously if we were in the same situation now we would insist they be informed,” he said yesterday.

Were it now, he would make it “absolutely certain” that parents were informed.

“It would be a matter of insisting that somebody should do it because the parents have a right to know, and obviously the fact that they weren’t informed was a great source of pain and further traumatisation to these children.”

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NEDERLAND
NRC Handelsblad

door Joep Dohmen

Er zijn geen aanwijzingen dat in het katholieke zwakzinnigeninstituut St. Anna in het Limburgse Heel begin jaren vijftig meisjes een onnatuurlijke dood zijn gestorven. Ook zijn de sterftecijfers in die jaren niet significant hoger. Dat concludeert een commissie onder leiding van hoogleraar gezondheidsrecht Joep Hubben.

Het onderzoek (pdf) is uitgevoerd op verzoek van de raad van bestuur van de Stichting Koraal Groep, waartoe St. Anna behoort. De raad van bestuur gaf vorig jaar opdracht tot het onderzoek, na berichten in de media dat in 1952, 1953 en 1954 veertig minderjarige gehandicapte meisjes van St. Anna zouden zijn overleden.

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WISCONSIN
58 News

A defrocked priest convicted of molesting a child is getting out of prison after serving less than a quarter of his sentence. Tonight, the victim is warning local parishioners about it.
“He sexually abused me over the course of two months,” says David Schauer.

About eight years ago, David watched as a judge sentence the man who inappropriately touched him when he was ten. He never thought ex-priest Donald Buzanowski would get out of prison so soon. “I was devastated. It’s frustrating.”

The abuse happened in Green Bay in the late 80’s. Members of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, says Buzanowski was removed from the Green Bay Diocese and came to St. Pius Parish in Wauwatosa in the early 90’s. They say he work with young boys.

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NEDERLAND
Limburgs Dagblad

[Commissie onderzoek sterfte St. Anna te Heel, in de periode 1952 tot en met 1954]

De meisjes die begin jaren vijftig om het leven kwamen in de Heelse instelling Sint Anna zijn een natuurlijke dood gestorven. Dat concludeert hoogleraar gezondheidsrecht Joep Hubben die onderzoek deed namens de Koraal Groep waar Sint Anna nu onder valt. Er ontstond onrust over de sterftecijfers bij deze instelling nadat bekend werd dat justitie een onderzoek is gestart naar het overlijden van 34 jongens bij de andere Heelse instelling Sint Joseph. Dit onderzoek loopt nog.

Heel
Van onze verslaggever

De cijfers van Sint Anna en Sint Joseph leken op het eerste oog op elkaar. Toch waren er belangrijke verschillen. Zo overleden bij Sint Anna vooral kwetsbare zeer jonge kinderen, terwijl bij Sint Joseph vooral tienerjongens om het leven kwamen. Ook woonden er in Sint Anna veel meer mensen, waardoor het aantal overlijdens relatief veel lager was.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

Ronan McCoy Ardee, Co Louth

A Jesuit clerical student for two years Ronan is now an arts student in Galway.

“The Jesuits taught me to think for myself and reflect and made me realise I hadn’t been grown up enough to make it in an institution. I needed to step out of the establishment for a time.”

He had never thought of leaving the church until the last few weeks and the censuring of Fr Tony Flannery. He attended the conference because “even if I feel that nothing can change it’s important to come and see there are many people who are angry and want change”.

Carmel O’Connor Baldoyle, Dublin

Carmel attended the conference because “I want to support the people trying to bring about change, the people in the church trying to affect change.”

She believes “it’s absolutely wonderful that there are people prepared to speak out”.

Asked her view about Cardinal Seán Brady she said “I think for everyone’s sake Cardinal Brady would be better off standing down. That would be seen as a positive response to the situation.”

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

MARIE O’HALLORAN

SPEAKERS: FINE Gael general secretary Tom Curran, who helped organise the conference for the Association of Catholic Priests, said the leadership of the organisation had given him hope.

Mr Curran, who chaired one of the conference sessions, told the conference “I am an ordinary member of the church” in Enfield, Co Meath. “Today has made me a very happy person. It has given me hope.”

Speaking afterwards, Mr Curran said he was at the conference purely in a personal capacity and “absolutely in a non-political role”.

He said “I am a committed member of the church in my own parish.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

MARIE O’HALLORAN

‘VISION’ SESSION: CATHOLIC priests have “earned the right” to speak out, having been through so much in the past number of years, the conference organised by the Association of Catholic Priests (ACP) heard.

Fr Tony Butler SMA, Blackrock, Co Cork, said people speak out at times of crisis when they might not otherwise do, and Catholic priests were in a similar situation and could speak out and “say what we want”. He told the more than 1,000 people at the conference: “We have earned the right.”

Fr Butler said “no word of God is God’s last word” but because of fear that “non-conforming thought” was growing internationally, the church had reacted with a “colonial instinct for retribution” that was “well oiled”.

During a session at the conference entitled Vision, he said “believing that all things worth knowing are already known in life, church and society, creates a cultured ignorance which guarantees that mediocrity becomes a virtue”.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

ANALYSIS: Speakers showed the spirit of compassion unleashed by Vatican 11 remains alive, writes PATSY McGARRY

TWO OUTSTANDING characteristics were immediately evident at the “Toward an Assembly of the Catholic Church” event in Dublin yesterday morning.

One was the unexpectedly large number there. The other was their age profile. One of the organisers, Fr Brendan Hoban, parish priest in Moygownagh, Co Mayo, and a member of the Association of Catholic Priests leadership team, seemed taken aback. They had expected 200, he said, but “there are in excess of 900”.

The number increased to well over 1,000 and, unusually for a day-long conference, continued to grow as the day progressed. The attendance was, Fr Hoban felt, “a huge statement” of the desire of Catholics for change.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
WQOW

By MARYCLAIRE DALE
Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA (AP) – A Roman Catholic church official charged with handling child sexual-abuse complaints for more than a decade had little to no training on how to conduct the sensitive investigations, a jury heard Monday.

Monsignor William Lynn, 61, faces years in prison for allegedly helping the church keep accused predators in jobs around children. Excerpts of testimony from his 2004 testimony before a grand jury were read in court Monday during his child-endangerment trial.

In his testimony, Lynn said he attended at most a workshop or two on the sexual abuse of minors, but otherwise had no training on how to interview the priests, their accusers or other potential witnesses.

Lynn said a case he investigated in 1994 led him to scrutinize secret archives kept by the Philadelphia Archdiocese. Lynn, on the job two years, had wanted “to make sure we don’t have anybody in ministry that shouldn’t be.”

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter

by Joshua J. McElwee on May. 07, 2012 NCR Today

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Bishop Robert Finn, the first bishop to be criminally charged in the decades-long clergy sex abuse crisis, may face another charge of failure to report suspected child abuse when he stands trial in September.

Prosecutors in Jackson County, Mo., who charged Finn and his Kansas City-St.Joseph, Mo., diocese each with one count of failure to report suspected child abuse last October, have filed a request for separate second charges against both, The Kansas City Star reports this afternoon.

According to the Star report, prosecutors have also requested access to a “secret archive” of documents detailing the diocese’s responses to child abuse allegations both before and after Finn began serving in Kansas City in May 2004 as a coadjutor bishop.

According to the Star:
The proposed new charges, which Jackson County Circuit Judge John Torrence still must approve, would add an additional count of failure to report suspicions of child abuse to those that Finn and the diocese already face.

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NEW YORK
Huffington Post

Leah Vincent

Yoelly Twersky* grew up in the Hasidic community of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. His father wore a sleek fur hat, and his mother smelled of vegetable soup and rugalach. When Yoelly started eighth grade, his new teacher seemed to take an immediate dislike to him, striking him almost every morning.

“I thought the teacher knew what was best,” Yoelly says, thinking back. “Physical punishment was normal in my school, and I figured it had to be that I deserved it.”

Six months into the year, his teacher called him into the school’s boiler closet. In that dark dank room, the teacher pulled down both their pants, and raped the little boy.

“I was screaming the whole time,” Yoelly recalls. “When he finished, he went back to the classroom and I stayed where I was, in shock, gushing blood.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS Philly

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — The jury in the Philadelphia clergy abuse case heard today from a private investigator hired by the Philadelphia Archdiocese, who testified to finding credible allegations that one of the defendants had sexually abused a 14-year-old boy in 1996.

Former FBI agent John Rossiter told the jury that Father James Brennan denied the allegations even while admitting there was sex talk, that he had slept in the same bed with the teen, and conceded there could have been unintentional contact while the two slept in the priest’s apartment during an overnight visit.

Rossiter also says Brennan admitted that he had allowed the boy to look at pornography on the Internet — and that they watched it together — after the boy threatened to break the computer if he couldn’t look at porn.

In hindsight, Brennan said, he shouldn’t have done that.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By John P. Martin
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

A former FBI agent who investigated clergy sex abuse for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia concluded that a Bucks County man was telling the truth when he said the Rev. James J. Brennan tried to rape him when he was 14.

Testifying Monday at Brennan’s trial, the investigator, Jack Rossiter, said the priest consistently denied any “intentional” sexual contact with the teen.

But during three interviews with Rossiter a decade after the alleged 1996 assault at a West Chester townhouse, Brennan gave conflicting statements on why he had shared his bed with the boy, how long their visit lasted and his ties to another young man, Rossiter said.

In the end, Rossiter gave church officials a report that supported the accuser’s account. “It indicated I believed him,” Rossiter told the Common Pleas Court jury.

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MINNESOTA
BishopAccountability.org – Assignment Record

[Note: BishopAccountability.org is researching and posting the assignment histories of all the U.S. bishops known to have been accused of sexually abusing children.]

Summary of Case: A parish priest of the archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for 25 years, Dudley was made an Auxilliary bishop of the archdiocese in 1977, then elevated to bishop of the Sioux Falls diocese in 1978. He retired in 1995 to his hometown of Northfield, MN. In 1999 a woman accused Dudley of having molested her in the 1970s. It was after he was accused in 2002 of having fondled an altar boy in the 1950s that Dudley resigned from ministry, vowing to return when he was exonerated. He strongly denied all allegations. A second woman came forward in 2002 alleging innapropriate behavior toward her by Dudley in the 1960s. An investigator hired by the archdiocese could not substantiate the accusations. Dudley died in November 2006.

Ordained: 1951
Episcopal Ordination: Jan. 25, 1977
Retired: 1995
Died: November 20, 2006

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KANSAS CITY (MO)
The Kansas City Star

By MARK MORRIS
The Kansas City Star

Jackson County prosecutors want to add additional misdemeanor criminal charges against Bishop Robert Finn and the diocese he serves.

The charge, failure to report suspicions of child abuse, is the same as the bishop and diocese already face.

Prosecutors also have asked a judge to approve a massive request for records from the diocese’s so-called “secret archive” detailing the diocese’s responses to child abuse allegations both before and after Finn began serving in Kansas City in May 2004.

Lawyer Gerald Handley, who represents Finn, said Monday that the bishop’s attorneys were pondering how to respond to the new filings, which prosecutors put into the record on Friday afternoon.

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WEST VIRGINIA
State Journal

By VICKI SMITH
Associated Press

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (AP) — A vice president of Wheeling Jesuit University who is under investigation for his handling of federal money is retiring.

Wheeling Jesuit President Rick Beyer sent an email to alumni May 7 informing them that J. Davitt McAteer is leaving the school June 30 when his contract expires. The Associated Press obtained a copy.

Spokeswoman Michelle Rejonis couldn’t comment on whether it’s related to the probe.

Wheeling Jesuit says a 2008 independent investigation of its billing practices under federal grants and programs found no violations of laws or regulations.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Huffington Post

By MARYCLAIRE DALE 05/07/12

PHILADELPHIA — Roman Catholic parishioners were told their priest had to leave his church in 1992 because he had Lyme disease, even though his removal actually came after an altar boy’s fondling complaint, a witness testified Monday.

Mary Mignogno, who knew about the boy’s complaint, didn’t know what to say to her children when she heard the lie from the pulpit.

A nurse and school volunteer, Mignogno had helped the boy tell his parents about the abuse. The boy said that the Rev. Robert L. Brennan routinely touched him inappropriately in exchange for candy or prizes. The parents had threatened to go public if Brennan wasn’t removed from their Schwenksville parish.

Mignogno testified as the seventh week got under way in the child-endangerment trial of Monsignor William Lynn, the secretary for clergy in Philadelphia from 1992 to 2004. Lynn is accused of helping the church transfer problem priests to new parishes.

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CANADA
Western Star

Published on May 7, 2012

Diane Crocker

When the case against a Roman Catholic priest is called in Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador next month the number of charges against him will increase.

The provincial Crown’s office is waiting for information from Nova Scotia to make its way into this province’s court system before proceeding with the case against George Ansel Smith.

Smith, 74,has been charged with 62-sex-related offences that are alleged to have occurred in six communities in this province from 1969 to 1989.

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CANADA
CBC News

Eric Jose Dejaeger will appear before the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit today.

The Roman Catholic priest, who served in Igloolik in the late 70s and 80s, is accused of sex crimes. He faces more than 35 charges.

In February, his appearance was delayed as police were doing an investigation in Igloolik.

He has also been charged in incidents that are alleged to have occurred in Edmonton between 1975 and 1978.

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IRELAND
BBC News

Cardinal Sean Brady has said he wants to personally apologise to a man who was abused as a 14-year-old boy by paedophile priest Brendan Smyth.

Cardinal Brady has come under pressure after a BBC documentary.

It accused him of failing to act on abuse allegations when he was a young priest.

He said he had no intention of stepping aside but hoped an assistant – with succession rights – would be quickly appointed to his archdiocese.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic League

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on editorials that appear today in the New York Times and Washington Post:

Both of these newspapers misstate the facts, fail to mention relevant data, and then make unfair accusations against the Catholic Church on the issue of sexual abuse.

Both newspapers today editorialize on the subject of “pedophile priests.” It is one of the biggest myths of our time that the Catholic Church has had a problem with pedophile priests: as the John Jay College for Criminal Justice showed in its 2011 report on this subject, less than 5 percent of the abusers were pedophiles. In almost all cases, the victims were adolescent males who were inappropriately touched by homosexual priests. Both newspapers cover this up, thus perpetuating a lie.

Today’s New York Times criticizes Timothy Cardinal Dolan for opposing legislation by Assemblywoman Margaret Markey which would lift the statute of limitations for one year on civil lawsuits involving the sexual abuse of a minor. Once again, we have a cover-up: what the editorial does not say is that this bill does not apply to the public schools.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Fox News

Published May 07, 2012

Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA – A former FBI agent hired by the Philadelphia archdiocese has testified that one priest accuser and his family had money and legal problems.

Prosecutors called Jack Rossiter to testify Monday about his 2006 interviews with the Rev. James Brennan. Brennan is on trial for the alleged 1996 sexual assault of a teenage boy.

Rossiter said he found the accuser credible, even though the man’s criminal record gave him pause.

On cross-examination, Rossiter said the man’s family had money problems when they came forward with the decade-old allegation about Brennan.

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MISSOURI
News-Tribune

By Gerry Tritz

Monday, May 7, 2012

A group dedicated to helping victims of clergy sex abuse is inviting the public to a roundtable discussion this evening on “pedophile priest culture and the diocese of Jefferson City.”

The event will be held from 7-9 p.m. at Lincoln University’s Inman Page Library.

It will be hosted by Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation, a nonprofit group based in Marion, Iowa.

Wegs’ group also says it plans a 10 a.m. news conference today to identify six new predatory priests and to review the casework of eight new victims of former Bishop Anthony J. O’Connell. On Sunday, Michael Wegs, the group’s secretary-treasurer, handed out leaflets to Immaculate Conception Church parishioners as they left church. The leaflets urged Catholic leaders to “break the silence” on the sexual molestation that took place at the St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Hannibal.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

May. 07, 2012
By Mary Gail Frawley-O’Dea

COMMENTARY

The Catholic hierarchy from the papacy on down seems to be roiling through a series of manic episodes in which they execute perverted power plays against those perceived as enemies. This kind of mania often is exhibited by large identity groups whose power has been threatened and who are unable to respond adaptively to that loss through a process of healthy mourning.

For decades now, the power of the Catholic monarchy to control the social, spiritual, and political lives of its members has been in decline. While Humane Vitae, the 1968 papal encyclical that upheld the church’s traditional ban on artificial contraceptioin, placed Catholic dissension (or perhaps spiritual maturation) in relief in the late 1960s, the sexual abuse crisis returned it to center stage throughout the past decade. In fact, Humane Vitae was only superficially about birth control and the sexual abuse crisis was only partially about sexual abuse. Both crises were fundamentally about power: who holds it, over whom, to what extent, in what areas of life.

Along with victims and advocates who have aggressively brought the church to task for the crimes of power inherent in sexual abuse, religious women — usually much closer to actual human beings trying to live their lives than are the ecclesiastical nobles — have raised powerful voices exhorting the Catholic community to attend better to the world’s suffering, especially that of the most marginalized. Even more recently, priests in some quarters have assumed a power to insist that attention be paid to the need and the rightness of expanding priestly ministry to the married and the female. In other words, the common citizens of the realm are calling out the royals on their failures to care well for those most in need — victims of hierarchical neglect and abuse inherent in the sexual abuse crisis; priests who cannot meet the needs of the flock; women speaking on behalf of women and children, minorities, the Earth, and the poor.

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IRELAND
TIME – Global Spin

By William Lee Adams | @willyleeadams | May 7, 2012

During the four decades that pedophile priest Brendan Smyth abused children, he frequently took them on driving excursions across Ireland. Brendan Boland, one of his victims, began going on those trips in the early 1970s when he was just 11 years old. On one outing, Father Smyth drove a group of children from Belfast, Northern Ireland, to Cavan, Ireland, some two hours away. He checked them in to a bed and breakfast. “There was two bedrooms…one for the girls and one for Father Smyth and the two boys,” Boland remembers in the BBC documentary The Shame of the Catholic Church. Boland was one of the boys sharing a room with Smyth. “He called me over first and he abused me the way he did before. And when he was finished with me I went back to the bed and then he called the other boy over and done the same with him and I — this time I was — I was in the bed watching. Well I was listening, I didn’t want to watch.”

Smyth, Ireland’s most notorious pedophile, died of a heart attack in 1997 while serving a 12-year sentence for abusing some 20 children. But time doesn’t heal all wounds. The BBC documentary, which aired on May 1, has re-ignited the furor over Smyth’s crimes—and the church’s alleged conspiracy in covering them up. Critics—who include former victims and top Irish politicians—now want Cardinal Sean Brady, the head of Ireland’s Catholic Church, to resign. That’s because in 1975 Boland came forward about the abuse. As the documentary reveals, Boland, then 14, gave testimony to Brady, then a canon lawyer, which included the names and addresses of other children Smyth had abused. Boland was sworn to secrecy about the hearing. And Brady never reported the information to police—or to the children’s parents.

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IRELAND
RTE nEWS

Cardinal Seán Brady has publicly apologised to Brendan Boland, a survivor of paedophile priest Fr Brendan Smyth.

Seán Brady has no intention of stepping aside

Speaking at Lough Derg following a penitential pilgrimage in advance of next month’s Eucharistic Congress, Dr Brady also said he had no intention of stepping aside, despite continuing calls for his resignation.

He said there had also been “many many calls from people who want me to stay on.”

But he said he hoped a coadjutor – with succession rights – would be appointed to his archdiocese as soon as possible.

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GERMANY
The Local

A German Catholic boys’ school is fighting for its right to give its pupil’s suppositories, in the face of a city council report on the use of rectally-administered medication.

The Collegium Josephinum (CoJoBo) in Bonn, a private school for around 1,200 boys, is struggling to maintain its reputation for excellence. One of the teachers, who was also a priest, was recently suspended pending an investigation into allegations that he sexually abused two of its pupils.

The investigation threw a spotlight on the school’s medical service. For decades, the school followed the practice, common in Germany, of giving children painkiller suppositories for a variety of non-specific ailments – migraines, stomach aches, sprained joints.

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NEW YORK
Newd

By Alicia Ramsay
From celebrities to average individuals, friends to family members, sexual abuse and domestic violence have scarred the lives of thousands across the world. Many victims are forever silenced while some find the voice within them to speak up.

Take Back the Night, hosted by CUNY Lehman College in the Bronx, New York on Tuesday, April 24 served to support survivors, console them as they heal as well as bring awareness to students.

After introductory remarks by a campus counselor Nicole Madonna Rosario and Lehman’s vice president Jose Magdeleno and Dean John Holloway, attendees were reeled into the program with a student theatrical production called “The Witness.” It was written by Andre Bell and performed and directed by Lehman students.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Jewel Topsfield
May 8, 2012

ONE of Australia’s leading rabbis told a man whose son had been allegedly sexually abused by a youth group leader at a Melbourne Jewish school that the child would not need counselling because he was under eight years old, court documents say.

David Samuel Cyprys, a former security guard at the Yeshivah Centre in St Kilda East, has been charged with 53 offences, including six counts of rape, allegedly committed against 12 boys between 1982 and 1991.

He is contesting the allegations at a committal hearing in the Melbourne Magistrates Court.

In court documents, the parents of two separate boys said they went to Yeshivah Centre director Rabbi Yitzchok Dovid Groner in the 1980s to complain about alleged molestation.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC News

Politicians have shown a lack of “statesmanship” over the position of Cardinal Sean Brady, according to the Auxiliary Bishop of Down and Connor.

Bishop Donal McKeown said he was disappointed no-one had “dared to suggest that we might lift the focus from that narrow resignation question”.

Writing on his Facebook page, he said: “How many of us, who have lived in the NI glasshouse, are in a position to throw stones?

“That sort of comment would have been painfully honest, and helped us to face our very messy past.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Bilgrimage

As the week begins, another powerful and informative statement by Jerry Slevin. Jerry is commenting in this posting on the news conference of Philadelphia archbishop Chaput last Friday. What follows is Jerry’s posting:

In 1776 in Philadelphia the key grievances stressed in the Declaration of Independence included (1) the British monarch’s interference in the justice process, especially in law cases involving his officials’ misconduct, and (2) the monarch’s imposition of unjust legislation by undemocratic means. I t was then, and remains yet today, among the fundamental principles of natural justice that (A) one cannot be a fair judge of one’s own crimes or of crimes of others who serve on one’s behalf, and (B) the governed must have a meaningful say in making laws that govern them.

After a bloody Revolutionary War against a monarchy, the fundamental principles of an independent judiciary and a democratic legislature were soon incorporated into the US Constitution, along with related protections for freedom of speech and the press and for religious liberty, balanced by an obligatory separation of church and state. The Founding Fathers had painfully learned their lessons about European monarchical tyranny and religious zealotry and wanted to expel these evils forever from America’s shores.

In 2012 also in Philadelphia several of these U.S. Constitutional principles are being substantially challenged by the current papal monarch acting through his bishops, especially Archbishop Chaput, leader of the Philadelphia Archdiocese (the “Philly AD”). The pope and his subordinates are, in effect, interfering in Pennsylvania in the administration of justice in sexual abuse cases involving clerics; as well as opposing by excessive lobbying the popularly supported enactment of needed reforms of related child sexual abuse statute of limitation laws, often under the cynical guise of “religious liberty.”

These challenges were made abundantly clear in Chaput’s recent “press conference,” available in its entirety in audio here and in summary in video in this national CBS Evening News Report from Scott Pelley available here.

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IRELAND
Irish Central

By
PATRICK COUNIHAN,
IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Monday, May 7, 2012

A church leader who has admitted his failure in the Brendan Smyth case has refused to absolve Cardinal Sean Brady from blame and believes the Primate of All-Ireland should quit.

Father Kevin Smith was the abbot who transferred vile paedophile Smyth from parish to parish even after he was accused of child abuse.

The former head of the Norbertine Order, Fr Smith has confessed that he is partly responsible for the hundreds of rapes committed by the late Smyth.

Now he says that Cardinal Brady, leader of the Catholic Church in Ireland, must share some of the blame for failing to report the paedophile priest to the civil authorities.

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ROME
Vatican Insider

No peace for the movement now seeking new leaders

Andrés Beltramo Álvarez
Vatican City

The female branch of the Catholic movement Regnum Christi is seeking a few things. These days, the consecrated women must choose their new superior – but that is the least of their problems. For them, the real challenge will be to regain the serenity lost in an internal crisis that some members have been unable to withstand, falling into chronic physical illness or depression.

The “Regno” (as is well-known by now) is undergoing reforms, as are the Legionaries of Christ, the congregation it is tied to. The two institutions have been going through a true dark night of the soul because of the immoral actions of their founder, the Mexican priest Marcial Maciel Degollado. This has been publicly acknowledged by Cardinal Velasio De Paolis, the delegate appointed by the Pope to complete the transformation.

The crisis struck the Legion first, and then spread to Regnum Christi. In recent months, De Paolis pushed for some changes in the movement, but then lost control of the situation. Over the past three years, more than 200 consecrated have abandoned the work, but many others find themselves on the outside of their communities for the purposes of discernment.

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IRELAND
Vatican Insider

Diarmuid Martin has called for an independent commission to investigate the case of Father Brendan Smyth who abused more than 100 children over 40 years. Top politicians have called for Cardinal Brady’s resignation because of his involvement in this case

Gerard O’Connell
Rome

As the dramatic crisis in the Irish Catholic Church deepened with calls for Cardinal Brady’s resignation over his role in an inquiry into the abuse of children by the notorious pedophile priest – Fr Brendan Smyth, the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin has called for the setting up of “an independent commission of investigation” into the abuse of children by that priest as the best way to arrive at the whole truth.

Archbishop Martin made his proposal when responding to questions from journalists on the crisis after celebrating Mass at St. Francis Xavier church in Dublin, Sunday, May 6. Hours later, a spokesman for Cardinal Brady said he “welcomed and supported” the proposal.

“I really believe that we need an independent Commission of investigation into the activities of Brendan Smyth and how he was allowed to abuse for so many years,” Archbishop Martin stated.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Hannover Zeitung

Hannover – Was führt zu Pädophilie, was zu sexuellem Kindesmissbrauch? Diesen Fragen widmen sich Wissenschaftler von fünf Universitäten in einem Forschungsprojekt, das Professor Dr. Tillmann Krüger von der Medizinischen Hochschule Hannover (MHH) koordiniert. Das Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF) bewilligte für das Vorhaben “Neurobiologische Grundlagen von Pädophilie und sexuellem Missbrauchsverhalten gegen Kinder” (NeMUP) zwei Millionen Euro. Das Projekt beginnt im Mai 2012 und dauert drei Jahre.

“Wir wollen die Grundlagen von Pädophilie sowie von sexuellem Kindesmissbrauch besser verstehen, um die Diagnostik und die Therapie zu verbessern und Minderjährige vor sexuellen Übergriffen zu schützen”, sagt Professor Krüger, Oberarzt der MHH-Klinik für Psychiatrie, Sozialpsychiatrie und Psychotherapie.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Spiegel

Von Julia Jüttner

Eine katholische Jungenschule in Bonn verabreichte kranken Schülern jahrelang Zäpfchen. Die umstrittene Praxis wurde zwar eingestellt, ein Konzept zur Prävention von sexualisierter Gewalt erarbeitet. Doch die steht ausgerechnet unter der Leitung des Paters, der die Zäpfchen-Medikation befürwortete.

Das Collegium Josephinum im Norden von Bonn, CoJoBo genannt, kämpft um seinen bislang exzellenten Ruf. An der staatlich anerkannten katholischen Privatschule werden nur Jungen unterrichtet, 1200 insgesamt. Träger ist der Redemptoristenorden, einige Lehrer sind Patres. Einer von ihnen ist derzeit suspendiert. Zwei Elternpaare haben Anzeige erstattet, weil der Pater ihre Kinder missbraucht haben soll. Die Staatsanwaltschaft Bonn ermittelt.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Greg Harkin

Monday May 07 2012

THE abbot who moved paedophile priest Brendan Smyth from diocese to diocese but failed to prevent him abusing more children has said Cardinal Sean Brady must share some of the blame.

Father Kevin Smith is, by his own admission, partly responsible for the hundreds of crimes of child rape and abuse committed by Smyth.

But the former head of the Norbertine Order was also spreading the blame at the weekend.

Now 81 and forced out of his position as head of the order to which Smyth belonged, he called for Dr Brady to resign.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Paul Melia and Fiach Kelly

Monday May 07 2012

ALL staff involved in the production and broadcast of the ‘Prime Time Investigates’ programme into Fr Kevin Reynolds will be questioned as part of a probe into the affair.

The third and final probe into the Fr Kevin Reynolds affair is expected to be completed within the next month.

An external inquiry commissioned by RTE to examine personnel matters arising from the ‘Mission to Prey’ programme is expected to make its recommendations before the summer, it emerged last night.

Chaired by former senator and Northern Ireland ombudsman, Maurice Hayes, it was asked last month to investigate and make recommendations about RTE personnel involved in the programme.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Sentinel

DETECTIVES have closed their investigation into paedophile priest Bede Walsh – unless any more victims come forward.

Walsh is currently serving 22 years in prison after sexually abusing eight boys during an 18-year period.

Four more men came forward during the course of this year’s trial at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court to claim they had also been sexually abused by Walsh.

But Staffordshire Police today confirmed they are not pursuing those complaints.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY and GERRY MORIARTY

CATHOLIC PRIMATE Cardinal Seán Brady has welcomed yesterday’s call for an independent inquiry into Fr Brendan Smyth’s abuse of children in Ireland and elsewhere over a 40-year period.

A spokesman for the cardinal said last night that he “welcomed and supported” the proposal made by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin.

Speaking after Mass at St Francis Xavier Church on Dublin’s Gardiner Street, Dr Martin said: “We’re getting all these bits and pieces of information about a horrible situation, what Brendan Smyth did to children.”

He believed “that until all of this story in its entirety comes out, we are not doing justice to those who were abused and we’re not really getting at the truth”.

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IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

By Alf McCreary
Monday, 7 May 2012

One of the saddest sights this week has been watching Cardinal Sean Brady trying to defend the indefensible. He is a good man caught up in a public struggle for the soul of the Irish Catholic Church, and he is now well out of his depth.

Two years ago when the story broke about his involvement in a secret meeting with a young victim of the paedophile Brendan Smyth, I was one of the few commentators to suggest publicly that Cardinal Brady should resign.

Even then it was obvious to me that the game was up, and afterwards a number of prominent people told me privately that they agreed with my view.

However, Cardinal Brady chose to struggle on, in an attempt to spearhead reforms as a “wounded healer”. He has tried to do so with dignity and courage, and his many friends inside and outside the Catholic Church wince for this decent human being who became the wrong man in the wrong place at the wrong time.

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MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe

By Katie Johnston
Globe Staff / May 7, 2012

The state on Monday launches a new online system to check criminal backgrounds that would provide wider and easier access for employers, but limit their searches of criminal history to 10 years back.

That limit, part of a new law that updates the system known as CORI, for Criminal Offender Record Information, is sparking a debate that pits the rights of employers to know the history of job applicants against the needs of people with decades-old convictions to work and move ahead with their lives.

It is also raising questions about the role of lightly regulated background-screening companies, which can dig far back into court records, sometimes reporting erroneous information about applicants to employers.

A coalition of 125 community organizations, religious institutions, and labor unions has proposed barring screening companies from using the state’s central system if they continue to rely on court records to gather more information than they can get in the registry. No other state has prohibited screening companies from using its CORI system if they also use the courts.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter

Published on Monday 7 May 2012

THIS is what I wrote in this column on March 22, 2010: “It has been an awfully bad week for the Catholic Church: which is really saying something when you consider its centuries’ long history of brutality, bullying, intimidation, suppression, corruption, war-mongering and persecution.

“I know one should always avoid the temptation to judge any organisation or religion by the actions of a few individuals, but what do you do when hundreds (maybe thousands) of individuals have betrayed their positions of trust and responsibility and when there is very clear evidence that their activities have been covered-up by their superiors?

“And what do you do when it is equally clear that the needs of the Catholic Church outweigh the hurt of the abuse victims?

“This isn’t just about a ‘few rotten apples’ in the bottom of the barrel, either. This is a scandal which embraces every level of the Catholic Church from the Pope himself to priests in the backs of cars and in the laundry rooms of orphanages. It’s about a culture of secrecy. It’s about the systematic abuse of the vulnerable.

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IRELAND
BBC News

An organisation which represents more than 850 priests in Ireland will hold a meeting on Monday to discuss the future direction of the Catholic Church.

The Vatican has recently criticised leading members of the Association of Catholic Priests (ACP) for expressing views which contradict Church teaching.

The ACP meeting comes at a turbulent time for the Church in Ireland.

Its leader, Cardinal Sean Brady, is facing calls to resign over his handling of a clerical sex abuse case.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

By Louise Hogan and Sean Ryan

Monday May 07 2012

A PRIEST has returned to the pulpit after taking a leave of absence while an allegation against him was investigated.

A large congregation gathered in the Church of the Assumption in Mooncoin, Co Kilkenny, as parish priest, Fr Peter Muldowney, returned to perform Mass for the first time since stepping down last September.

Fr Muldowney said last night he was “absolutely delighted, relieved and very happy to be back”.

Bishop Seamus Freeman, from the Diocese of Ossory, confirmed Fr Muldowney had sought a leave of absence from ministry to allow the diocese to investigate a “safeguarding matter” it had received concerning him. The bishop yesterday confirmed the “safeguarding matter has been withdrawn”.

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AUSTRALIA
The Courier

BY PAT NOLAN AND THE AGE

07 May, 2012

THE parliamentary inquiry into clergy sexual abuse has had its funding cut, upsetting Ballarat-based victims and advocacy groups.

Victims say it is hardly a surprise to hear of the cut, claiming the inquiry was doomed to fail from the start.

Budget papers reveal the parliamentary committee in charge of the long-awaited inquiry into clergy sexual abuse has had its budget slashed by $200,000. Funding for all State Parliament committees has been trimmed from $6.9 million this financial year to $6.7 million for next financial year.

The cuts come just weeks after Premier Ted Baillieu announced the inquiry would take place.

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IRELAND
Scotsman

Published on Monday 7 May 2012

One of the highest ranking members of the Catholic Church in Ireland has called for an independent investigation into past allegations of clerical sex abuse.

As Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin spoke out against the past failings of the Church, another bishop defended Cardinal Sean Brady, whose involvement in a secret 1975 probe into allegations of abuse has come under fire.

Archbishop Martin said a commission should be set up to examine all accusations against paedophile priest Brendan Smyth. …

But Bishop of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise Colm O’Reilly said while the abuse carried out by Smyth was appalling, Cardinal Brady acted appropriately and should not resign.

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UNITED STATES
The New York Times

Editorial

Hawaii significantly strengthened its protections against child sexual abuse last month when Gov. Neil Abercrombie signed a measure extending the statute of limitations for civil lawsuits filed by child victims. At least as important, it opens a one-time two-year window to allow victims to file suits against their abusers even if the time limit had expired under the old law.

Like similar laws in California and Delaware, the Hawaii measure recognizes some wrenching realities. It can take many years, even decades, before child abuse victims are emotionally ready to come forward and tell their stories in court. But by then, they may be barred from suing by the statute of limitations. For example, many suits against the Catholic Church have been blocked because the church’s covering up for pedophile priests made it hard for victims to come forward until long past the time limit for bringing civil claims.

Hawaii’s new law allows child victims to bring suits up to the age of 26 (it was 20), or three years from the time the victim realizes the abuse caused injury. The law’s leading opponent was the Roman Catholic Church, which has been working hard to defeat statute of limitations reform across the country.

Lobbying by the church recently succeeded in blocking reform in Pennsylvania. But lawmakers in Massachusetts seem ready to follow Hawaii’s example by passing similar reforms.

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IRELAND
RTE News

At least 900 people are expected to attend a conference in Dublin today which aims to plot a way forward for the Catholic Church here.

The event’s main organiser is the Association of Catholic Priests, which has been at the centre of controversy in recent weeks

Its principal organiser, the Association of Catholic Priests in Ireland, has been at the centre of controversy since it became known that the Vatican has been censoring at least five of its members.

The principal organiser, Fr Tony Flannery, will not be speaking because he has been silenced by the Vatican and ordered to spend six weeks praying and reflecting on some of his writings, which Rome consider unorthodox.

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MARYLAND
Patch

By Brian Hooks

Mary-Marguerite Kohn, co-rector of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Ellicott City, has died of injuries suffered in a shooting Thursday night in which a church administrator was also killed, Howard County police said Sunday.

A man whose body was found nearby is believed to have shot the women and then turned the gun on himself, police said.

Kohn, 62, of Arbutus, was pronounced dead at the University of Maryland Shock Trauma unit Saturday night, police said. …

Kohn was listed as an affiliate faculty member at the Loyola Graduate School of pastoral counseling. Part of her studies involved researching the needs of survivors of clergy sexual abuse, according to the Sirdan Institute, a non-profit organization based in Brooklandville that helps people recover from traumatic events.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
KSDK

Written by
Courtney Gousman

St. Louis (KSDK)– Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York City, is also facing some scrutiny from a national group that deals with sexual abuse allegations surrounding Catholic clergy, while returning home to St. Louis. The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priest, or S.N.A.P., protested Sunday afternoon outside Cardinal Dolan’s mass.

Sunday, it became very clear that both Cardinal Dolan and S.N.A.P. have their differences.

About a half dozen people backing S.N.A.P. protested outside the Cathedral Basilica in St. Louis this afternoon. Leaders of the group handed out about 200 flyers to parishioners on their way into mass. The flyers expressed the group’s disapproval with Cardinal Dolan’s track record when involved with clergy sexual abuse cases.

S.N.A.P. supporters spoke specifically of one case based out of New York City that they believe Cardinal Dolan is not taking seriously.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Daily Times

Published: Monday, May 07, 2012

There is no simple way to ease the pain of child abuse.

When the source of that abuse is one of the most trusted figures in a child’s life, it would seem recovery is almost an impossible task.

So Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput should not be surprised if the faithful in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia are less than thrilled by the progress made in the archdiocese’s investigation of 26 priests suspended last year over allegations of sexual misconduct with children.

On Friday, nearly 14 months after former Philadelphia archbishop Cardinal Justin Rigali placed the 26 priests on administrative leave while complaints against them were reviewed by a team headed by former Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney Gina Maisto Smith, Chaput announced that only eight cases had been resolved.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Coventry Telegraph

By Tina Junday
May 7 2012

A LETTER has revealed the Catholic Church knew a paedophile priest had an “unwholesome relationship” with a man – 25 years before he was jailed for sexually abusing boys.

James Robinson, who worked as a priest in several parishes across the Midlands, including St Elizabeth’s Church, in Foleshill, Coventry fled to America in 1985 – days after police were first alerted by a victim about being abused by the ex-priest when he was a child.

But in October that year, a letter – which has been obtained by the Sunday Mercury – was sent on behalf of the Archbishop of Birmingham, Maurice Couve de Murville to Reverend Monsignor John Rawden, Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

It was written by Monsignor Canon Daniel Leonard, Vicar General of the Archdiocese, who made no reference to the shocking allegations of child sexual abuse against Robinson and later proven, in his correspondence.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

SEÁN KEANE

A CO KILKENNY priest falsely accused of child abuse has returned to his parish after taking leave of absence while the matter was investigated.

The Church of the Assumption in Mooncoin was full on Saturday night as Fr Peter Muldowney returned to say Mass for the first time since September 24th, 2011, when he asked for leave.

He was assisted in the Mass by his bishop, Dr Séamus Freeman, who welcomed the Kilmanagh native back to the parish.

Addressing parishioners, Fr Muldowney thanked them for their support and invited everyone back to the parochial house. He received a round of applause from the congregation.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY, Religious Affairs Correspondent

THE CONFERENCE room at the Regency Hotel on Dublin’s Swords Road has a capacity of 735. It is where an event the Association of Catholic Priests (ACP) entitles “Towards an Assembly of the Irish Catholic Church” is to take place from today.

The room may not be big enough this morning. Aimed at laity and clergy alike, it is expected to be “a sellout”, as one priest said at the weekend. Bishops, too, have been invited.

There are 815 priest members of the association alone. But, following recent disclosures of the censuring of Irish priests by Rome in the BBC This World documentary last week, which detailed Cardinal Seán Brady’s inquiries into serial paedophile Fr Brendan Smyth, what was expected to be a well-attended event now looks like being overcrowded.

That one of those priests censured by Rome is Fr Tony Flannery of the ACP leadership team will serve as just another incentive for restive Catholics to attend this gathering on what is also a bank holiday Monday.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

PATSY McGARRY, Religious Affairs Correspondent

IT WAS June 7th, 2001, at the cathedral in Cavan town and the Catholic primate Archbishop (as he still was) Seán Brady was in jovial mood. At a Mass marking the golden jubilee of the ordination of his old boss Bishop Francis McKiernan, who retired in 1998, he began a warm tribute by saying he was “tempted to offer the prayer of the man who fell into the vat of stout in Guinness’s brewery. He prayed, ‘Lord give me a mouth worthy of this glorious opportunity’.”

Archbishop Brady recalled that it was “some 49 years since I first met the then Fr McKiernan. He was in St Patrick’s College, [Cavan] for the second time, I, for the first – he as teacher, I as student”. As Fr Brady, he returned to teach at St Patrick’s in 1967 and was there until 1980. During that time he was secretary to Bishop McKiernan, based too in Cavan town. In 1975, Fr Brady conducted the two inquiries which led to faculties to minister in Kilmore diocese being withdrawn from child abuser Brendan Smyth.

But apart from the teacher-pupil, bishop-secretary relationship he had with Bishop McKiernan, in June 2001 Archbishop Brady had another reason to be grateful to his old mentor. Bishop McKiernan had kept his name out of the loop when the sky fell in following the 1994 jailing of Fr Brendan Smyth in Belfast.

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NORTHERN IRELAND
The Irish Times

GERRY MORIARTY Northern Editor, in Armagh

“THERE IS too much Churchianity in the Catholic Church and not enough Christianity,” said Mary O Vallely outside St Patrick’s Cathedral in Armagh as Mass-goers left 11.30am Mass yesterday.

There was no sign of Catholic Primate of All Ireland Cardinal Seán Brady at either of the two morning Masses in the cathedral, 9am or 11.30am. The chief celebrant for the later Mass was the cathedral’s administrator, Fr Eugene Sweeney.

A spokesman for the cardinal said he was in the diocese and had celebrated Mass yesterday, although he did not know where.

Fr Sweeney made no reference to the controversy surrounding Cardinal Brady to the hundreds of people in the cathedral, except obliquely during the prayers of the faithful when he prayed for all those who were anxious and hurt at the “legacy” of the clerical child sex abuse scandals.

There were mixed views among the faithful outside the cathedral. Some would not offer any comments apart from criticising the media for covering the issue. Others felt he had failed children who were abused by paedophile priest Brendan Smyth, while others again felt fault lay not with him but with superiors to whom he reported the abuse in 1975.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

MARIE O’HALLORAN

UNION REACTION: THE Broadcasting Authority of Ireland report into RTÉ’s Mission to Prey programme gave the impression that reporter Aoife Kavanagh had a “degree of executive responsibility that she did not have”, according to National Union of Journalists Irish secretary Séamus Dooley.

“You could get the impression from the report that Aoife Kavanagh was going on some kind of solo run in the legal aspects of the programme, and nothing could be further from the truth,” said Mr Dooley, who is the union representative for Ms Kavanagh and former current affairs editor Ken O’Shea.

The Prime Time Investigates documentary libelled Fr Kevin Reynolds, claiming he had sexually abused a young girl and fathered her child while a missionary in Kenya. The BAI report was highly critical of journalistic standards involved in the broadcast and found a significant failure of editorial and managerial control within RTÉ.

“Our concern is in relation to post-transmission events,” Mr Dooley said. He said one of the issues involved a letter in reply to Fr Reynolds’s solicitors Fair & Murtagh that was signed by the reporter.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

HARRY McGEE

BACKGROUND: Four members of ‘Mission to Prey’ team argued over findings on journalistic standards

SUBMISSIONS MADE by the team involved with RTÉ’s Mission to Prey to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland made detailed defences of its journalistic standards and some key editorial decisions, while conceding the programme had seriously defamed Fr Kevin Reynolds.

Four members of the production team made submissions following the completion of a draft report by investigating officer Anne Carragher in February and took issue with some of its findings. The submissions were made by reporter Aoife Kavanagh; producer Mark Lappin; executive producer Brian Páircéir; and head of current affairs Ken O’Shea.

The submissions were not released by the authority but the details strongly defended key decision-making processes and challenged conclusions reached by Ms Carragher’s draft reports. None of the submissions altered the final report or findings, save for a brief paragraph summarising what was said.

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IRELAND
The Irish Times

MARIE O’HALLORAN

THE MEETING between Minister for Communications Pat Rabbitte and the RTÉ board tomorrow should not be turned into a sacking issue, said Simon Coveney.

The Minister for Agriculture said Mr Rabbitte would come to Cabinet with “some views and recommendations” after the meeting. It follows publication of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland’s investigation report into the Mission to Prey documentary, which libelled Fr Kevin Reynolds.

“Legally the position is clear,” Mr Coveney said. “The board and board members ultimately have responsibility for editorial management and programming in RTÉ.” But “that isn’t to suggest that sacking the board will solve all problems”.

Mr Coveney said on RTÉ radio: “I don’t think people should build this up into whether or not the board is going to be sacked.”

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UNITED STATES
Washington Post

By Editorial Board, Sunday, May 6

BY THE CATHOLIC Church’s reckoning, it has undergone a sea change since the days when sexual predators in clerical collars sexually abused young boys with scant fear of dismissal, reprimand or even excessive concern by their supervisors. American dioceses have paid billions of dollars in compensation to victims, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has issued what amounts to a zero-tolerance policy and Pope Benedict XVI has apologized to victims of clergy sexual abuse here and in Ireland.

Yet despite the hierarchy’s insistence that it is investigating and rooting out sex criminals, the church often seems stuck in a defensive crouch. Too often it has failed to move against abusers and those who tolerate them until forced to do so by legal action or the threat of full-blown scandal.

In its reluctance to discipline Catholic leaders who covered up or ignored sex crimes, the church also deepens the impression that it remains focused more on safeguarding its image than protecting victims.

That’s the lesson in the story of the Rev. Bradley M. Schaeffer, for many years one of the most prominent Jesuit leaders in America. As the Boston Globe reported last month, Mr. Schaeffer, as leader of the Jesuits in Chicago in the 1990s, was presented with credible complaints from family members that a priest under his supervision was sexually abusing young boys. The priest, Donald J. McGuire, had been the subject of similar reports going back to the 1960s.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philadelphia Inquirer

A photo caption with a chart in Saturday’s Inquirer misstated the background of a suspended priest who has been restored to active ministry. Msgr. Michael Flood has been pastor of St. Luke the Evangelist Church in Glenside, Montgomery County, since 1995.

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GLENSIDE (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer

By Jeremy Roebuck
Inquirer Staff Writer

“We are born from the darkness,” read the sign out front at St. Luke the Evangelist Church on Saturday, a reference to the Catholic teachings of original sin and salvation.

But a day after the Glenside parish’s popular pastor, Msgr. Michael Flood, was cleared to return to his post, the message could have described the mood of his waiting congregants as well.

“It’s like we’ve been under this dark cloud,” said John Ginty, 48, a lifelong parishioner. “I can’t wait to see him again and give him a big hug.”

Flood, 72, was one of three priests reinstated Friday after archdiocesan officials cleared them of allegations of sexual abuse or misconduct with minors. And though the monsignor did not attend Saturday Mass in his parish – the first since his restoration to active ministry – his presence permeated the service.

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SALINA (KS)
Roman Catholic Diocese of Salina

Written by Doug Weller

Thursday, 26 April 2012

Salina — Bishop-elect Edward Weisenburger celebrated all of the weekend Masses at Sacred Heart Cathedral and took the opportunity to talk to parishioners about their pastor, Father Allen Scheer, who has been placed on administrative leave.

Father Scheer, 49, was charged April 18 with a misdemeanor count of inappropriate sexual contact with an adult man in Salina.

He pleaded not guilty April 20 in Saline County District Court and requested a jury trial, which was set for 9 a.m. Aug. 15.

Father Randall Weber, who is moderator of the diocesan curia, was named temporary administrator of the cathedral parish after Father Scheer was placed on leave, in accord with standard diocesan policies.

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IRELAND
The Journal

THE ARCHBISHOP OF Dublin has called for an independent commission to investigate the abuse of children by Fr Brendan Smyth.

Diarmuid Martin said only a full inquiry would reveal the “full story” of Fr Smyth’s crimes, and how he was allowed to continue abusing for so long.

He said the abuse was of “such a dimension” – taking place in the Republic, Northern Ireland and the US – that only an international investigation would be sufficient.

Speaking on RTÉ’s This Week, Martin said he was calling for:

An independent commission of investigation into the activities of Brendan Smyth, as to how he was allowed to abuse for so many years. A commission that would look north and south, Church and State.

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IRELAND
RTE News

The Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Diarmuid Martin, has called for an independent international commission of inquiry into the crimes of Fr Brendan Smyth, the late paedophile priest.

Dr Martin said such an inquiry was owed to victims and that it would be in the public interest that the full story, and not bits and pieces, should come out.

Meanwhile, Bishop of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise Colm O’Reilly has described as “bizarre” the interview methods used by Cardinal Seán Brady during a Church inquiry into clerical child sexual abuse in the 1970s.

However, he said he felt Cardinal Brady should not stand aside as Catholic Primate of Ireland as he believed the then Fr Brady acted conscientiously.

Speaking on RTÉ’s This Week, Bishop O’Reilly also said he did not know why there is a difficulty with Cardinal Brady making a public apology to Brendan Boland, who was abused by Fr Smyth.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Sunday, May 06, 2012

Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin has called for an independent investigation into past allegations of clerical sex abuse.

As Archbishop Martin spoke out against the past failings of the Church, another bishop defended Cardinal Sean Brady, whose involvement in a secret 1975 probe into allegations of abuse has come under fire.

Archbishop Martin said a commission should be set up to examine all accusations against paedophile priest Brendan Smyth.

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IRELAND
The Independent (United Kingdom)

Lyndsey Telford

Sunday 06 May 2012

One of the highest ranking members of the Catholic Church in Ireland has called for an independent investigation into past allegations of clerical sex abuse.

As Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin spoke out against the past failings of the Church, another bishop defended Cardinal Sean Brady, whose involvement in a secret 1975 probe into allegations of abuse has come under fire.

Archbishop Martin said a commission should be set up to examine all accusations against paedophile priest Brendan Smyth.

“I know it’s not fashionable to talk about commissions, but I believe an independent commission to investigate the activities of Brendan Smyth, as to how he was allowed to abuse for so many years – north and south, church and state,” Archbishop Martin told RTE.

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ROME
Irish Central

By
DARA KELLY,
IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Sunday, May 6, 2012

Controversial former Boston archbishop Cardinal Bernard F. Law reportedly pressed the Vatican to investigate the largest association of Catholic nuns in the United States, according to Boston.com.

On April 18, the Vatican announced its initiative to ensure U.S. nuns conform to Church doctrine.

The Vatican has accused the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, which is based in Silver Spring, Md., and represents about 57,000 nuns, of undermining Roman Catholic teaching on the priesthood and homosexuality.

Robert Mickens, a columnist for The Tablet, a British Catholic weekly, reported that the Vatican’s crackdown was petitioned by Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori and that Law was “the person in Rome most forcefully supporting Bishop Lori’s proposal.”

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NORTHERN IRELAND
Tyrone Times

Published on Sunday 6 May 2012

A POMEROY priest, who “inadvertently” showed indecent images during a presentation at a primary school, is to take sabbatical leave from his parish.

In a statement which was published in the weekend church bulletin, Fr Martin

McVeigh said he had asked Cardinal Sean Brady to allow him to leave the parish of Pomeroy and to take sabbatical leave.

He said the last month had been “the most difficult of my life”.

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NEDERLAND
Katholiek Nieuws

Wim Deetman had het al gezegd: het seksueel misbruik in de katholieke Kerk vormt ‘slechts’ een fractie van een veel bredere maatschappelijke realiteit. En dat je het celibaat niet de schuld van het misbruik kunt geven.

‘Dat zegt ie natuurlijk om zijn kerkelijke opdrachtgevers een beetje te troosten’, hoorde je sommigen denken. Maar is seksueel misbruik voornamelijk een ding uit het verleden; toen de roomse nog onaantastbare clerici nog veel invloed hadden op alle plekken in de samenleving?

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BELGIE
De Standaard

[mit video]

De Katholieke Universiteit Leuven heeft vier proffen weggestuurd door klachten over seksueel misbruik. De zaken zijn ondertussen verjaard. De slachtoffers kwamen er pas een paar jaar geleden mee naar buiten. Ze deden dat in de nasleep van andere gevallen van seksueel misbruik, zoals de pedofilieschandalen in de kerk. De universiteit sluit niet uit dat er nu nog andere gevallen zullen opduiken. Ze verzekeren dat ze alle klachten serieus zullen nemen.

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VATICAN CITY
Canada.com

Agence France-Presse
May 6, 2012

VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI called Sunday on charities to join the fight against child abuse, singling out an Italian anti-pedophilia group for praise.

“I address my cordial salute in particular to the association Meter, which promotes engagement in favour of child victims of violence,” the pope told thousands of worshippers gathered at Saint Peter’s Square on a rainy Sunday.

The Catholic community has been rocked by sex-abuse scandals dating back decades, and Meter is a pioneer in Italy in terms of work against abuse by priests.

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IRELAND
Irish Central

By
CATHY HAYES,
IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Sunday, May 6, 2012,

Young and old alike were signing a national petition launched on Friday by concerned local people in Donegal calling on Cardinal Sean Brady to resign from his post as Primate of All Ireland.

The online version of the petition has already been by people within Ireland, but also in England, Spain and the United States. Aside from individual concerns, no specific organization or group was behind the initiative, which comes at a time of social and spiritual uncertainty in the county and the country.

Entitled the “Peoples’ Petition,” the campaign was launched in the town of Falcarragh in the western part of the county, an area where multiple instances of child sex abuse by priests has taken place over the years, especially at the hands of convicted pedophile and former priest Eugene Green, found to have abused more than 26 children.

Sean Hillen one of the leaders behind the initiative, explained the reason for what he termed the “Peoples’ Petition.”

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IRELAND
BBC News

The Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Diarmuid Martin, has called for an independent international commission of inquiry into the crimes of paedophile priest, the late Fr Brendan Smyth.

Dr Diarmuid Martin said Smyth’s victims were owed such an inquiry.

It would be in the public interest that the full story came out, not bits and pieces, he told RTE Radio 1 on Sunday.

His comments follow a week when the Irish Primate came under pressure over his role in a 1975 inquiry into Smyth.

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UNITED KINGDOM/UNITED STATES
BBC News

The Catholic Archdiocese in Birmingham has defended the way it deals with cases of sexual abuse involving priests.

It comes after a letter leaked to the media suggesting the church knew a former Coventry priest had been in an “unwholesome relationship”.

The letter concerned former priest James Robinson who was jailed in 2010 for 21 years over sexual offences.

Peter Jennings from the diocese told the BBC he knew nothing of the letter.

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IRELAND
UTV

Published Sunday, 06 May 2012

The Archbishop of Dublin is calling for a full independent inquiry into the activities of paedophile priest Father Brendan Smyth.

It comes in the wake of this week’s BBC documentary, centred on All-Ireland primate Cardinal Sean Brady’s role in the church’s initial investigation in 1975.

The programme included claims that then Fr Brady failed to adequately protect children against the notorious child molester.

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin says a full commission of investigation should take place, covering both Northern Ireland and the Republic.

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IRELAND
Huffington Post

One of the highest ranking members of the Catholic Church in Ireland has called for an independent investigation into past allegations of clerical sex abuse.

As Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin spoke out against the past failings of the Church, another bishop defended Cardinal Sean Brady, whose involvement in a secret 1975 probe into allegations of abuse has come under fire.

Archbishop Martin said a commission should be set up to examine all accusations against paedophile priest Brendan Smyth.

“I know it’s not fashionable to talk about commissions, but I believe an independent commission to investigate the activities of Brendan Smyth, as to how he was allowed to abuse for so many years – north and south, church and state,” Archbishop Martin told RTE, Ireland’s national broadcaster.

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