ABUSE TRACKER

CANADA
The News Watch

THUNDER BAY – A former bible-camp counsellor has pleaded guilty to 10 charges of sexually abusing underage victims.

Jeff Paxton, 48, on Tuesday pleaded guilty to six counts of sexual assault, three counts of gross indecency and one count of invitation to sexual touching that were filed against him in 2013.

At the time of his arrest city police said the charges relate to incidents from 1983 and 2004 with boys ranging in age from seven to 14 years old.

Police said Paxton had served as a counsellor at the Round Lake Bible Camp near Nolalu and had worked with other church groups. He had also been a babysitter.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

Newcastle Court has been told evidence relating to the character of Adelaide Catholic Archbishop Philip Wilson will be produced in his trial for concealing child sexual abuse.

Wilson was not in court today, as his barrister Simon Buchen and the Crown gave an update of proceedings.

Wilson has already pleaded not guilty to concealing the serious indictable offence of another person.

That person is the dead paedophile Hunter Valley priest Jim Fletcher.

The court has been told there are 52 potential witnesses, but not all will be called.

The case has been adjourned to September 23.

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LOS ANGELES (CA)
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on July 21, 2015

… the more they stay the same.

This morning the Vatican announced the appointments of three new auxiliary bishops for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

And one of them is a problem: vicar general and moderator of the Curia of the archdiocese Joseph Brennan.

LA’s vicars general have been a sorry lot.

Former vicar general Msgr. Michael Myers resigned in 2009 after a New York Times article showed that he allowed a self-admitted sex addict and molester to be a priest in the archdiocese.

Another former vicar general, Msgr. Richard Loomis testified in 2009 that “Mahony ordered him not to inform parishes of allegations against the now defrocked Rev. Michael Baker.”

So he didn’t. What did Brennan do as vicar general? Well, we know that he used LA’s Catholics to lobby lawmakers on behalf of Archbishop Gomez.

In a 2013 email, he asked Catholics to write and call their state representatives and tell them to vote no on SB131, the California Child Victims Act. If passed, it would have opened the doors of the civil courts to victims of child sexual abuse.

The bill ended up passing through both houses. It was vetoed by Governor Jerry Brown, at the behest of the bishops. It’s no secret why Gomez and Brennan lobbied so hard against the bill. A similar bill in Minnesota unearthed decades of child sex abuse and cover-up. The cover-up was so bad, in fact, that one archdiocese is subject to a criminal probe and St. Paul and Minneapolis Archbishop John Nienstadt just resigned in disgrace.

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UNITED STATES
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on July 21, 2015

I was in an interview the other day when I was asked whether SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (the group for whom I have volunteered for the past 12 years) paid me.

When I said, no—that I am, in fact, a volunteer with the organization—the writer said, “That’s good. You wouldn’t want to be seen as a professional victim.”

I swallowed hard, and let it drop.

Here’s the rub: SNAP is constantly being bashed by its opponents for being “professional victims.”

But since when is taking a stand, demanding change and accountability, and running an organization been “being a professional victim?”

No one looks at other great victim-based organizations like the National Center for Victims of Crime or RAINN: The Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network and says, “If you really care about the cause, you would work for free.” You certainly don’t look at your child’s teacher and say, “If you truly believed in education, you’d refuse a paycheck.”

So why do people look at SNAP’s full time, professional (and sorely underpaid) staff differently? It’s time for that view to end.

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NEW MEXICO
Gallup Independent

Published in the Gallup Independent, Gallup, N.M., July 20, 2015

By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Independent correspondent
religion@gallupindependent.com

ALBUQUERQUE — Attorneys for the Diocese of Gallup, along with attorneys for its insurance companies and attorneys for sex abuse claimants, are headed back into mediation with a new mediator.

At a status hearing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court Friday, Judge David T. Thuma, who noted he was “not a big fan of making people mediate if they don’t want to mediate,” told the attorneys he would be ordering them back into mediation, and he accepted their consensual recommendation for a new mediator, attorney Frank “Dirk” Murchison, of Taos.

“Let me leave you all with the notion that I’m going to enter an order to make you mediate with Mr. Murchison,” Thuma said at the conclusion of the hearing.

The new mediation session will be held in Albuquerque on dates that have yet to be determined. The Catholic Mutual insurance company, which insures the Gallup Diocese, has agreed to pay Murchison’s fees.

Last month’s unsuccessful mediation, conducted by retired U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Randall J. Newsome, was held in Phoenix June 10-11.

Conflicting views

Murchison’s selection as mediator was about the only subject all the attorneys could agree upon.

Much of the 68-minute hearing was devoted to discussions about the recently filed motions for relief from the automatic stay — although a hearing on that matter isn’t slated to be held until next month — and conflicting views about the Diocese of Gallup’s insurance coverage.

While attorneys for the diocese and the insurance companies had urged Thuma to order the parties back into mediation, attorneys representing sex abuse claimants expressed skepticism that mediation with the diocese and the insurance companies will be successful.

“This issue here, and I’m going to focus on the big issue that we have in reaching a settlement here, is the value of the damages here,” attorney Ilan D. Scharf said. “The dollar figure you’re going to put on the damages.”

Scharf, an attorney with the Unsecured Creditors Committee, stood in for the committee’s lead attorney James Stang. The committee represents the interests of sex abuse claimants in the case.

“The concern we have is that people on that side of the table, entities on that side of the table, do not view the value of the claims in the same universe that we’re looking at them,” Scharf said.

Understanding value

The Unsecured Creditors Committee recently filed a memorandum supporting motions by attorneys Robert E. Pastor and John Manly requesting Thuma lift the automatic stay in the bankruptcy case and allow three of their civil clergy sex abuse lawsuits to precede to trial in Arizona’s Coconino County Superior Court.

Taking the cases to trial, Scharf argued, would help all the parties involved in the bankruptcy to “get an understanding of what the value that a jury would grant” the sex abuse survivors.

Susan G. Boswell, the lead bankruptcy attorney for the diocese, disputed Scharf’s argument, and stated that one of the cases Pastor and Manly want to take to trial involves an uninsured claim.

“The claimant in that case can get, you know, I mean, name a number. Twenty million? Five million? Two million? It’s meaningless in the context of the assets of this case,” Boswell said, citing insurance coverage issues.

“We understand, your honor, the abuse is horrific,” Boswell added. “We understand that people deserve to be compensated, but we have to do it in the context of what there is here.”

“The value that a court or jury would give that claim will absolutely drive what the potential risk that every other entity involved, including the insurance companies and the debtors, sees with respect to what claims are really worth here,” Scharf responded.

Insurance issues

Although all the attorneys were careful not to disclose the confidential reasons why last month’s mediation was unsuccessful, Friday’s hearing made it apparent that insurance coverage — or lack of coverage in some cases — was an ongoing thorny issue.

“One of the difficulties that we have, your honor, is that we have coverage issues,” attorney Ed Mazel of the New Mexico Property Casualty Insurance Guaranty Association told Thuma. “And we have policy limit issues. And we have discrete issues that depend on interpretations of a contract. Not factual issues. Not valuing claims. We have discrete legal issues.”

Mazel, along with other insurance company attorneys Everett Cygal and Mark Ish, talked about various policies and coverage, statutory limits and aggregate limits, and the definition of insurance terms. Mazel expressed hope that Murchison, who has experience in insurance law, would be able to help the parties resolve the insurance issues.

According to Scharf, the Unsecured Creditors Committee had determined there was “substantial insurance” available for about one-third of the 57 sex abuse claims. A couple of claims involve some liability for the Franciscans, he said, a small subset involve potential contribution claims from other third parties, and another “15 or so” claims are covered by Catholic Mutual.

“We have done a top down analysis, claim by claim, and we think there is significant coverage here, you know, tens of millions of dollars of coverage available,” Scharf said of the Catholic Mutual claims.

No answers

Pastor, who filed 13 clergy sex abuse lawsuits against the Diocese of Gallup before Bishop James S. Wall halted the lawsuits by filing the Chapter 11 petition, said he and the other attorneys representing the sex abuse claimants weren’t buying the insurance companies’ arguments about coverage issues. Pastor asked Thuma to consider lifting the automatic stay if the mediation didn’t result in a settlement by a specific date.

“The coverage issues aren’t real,” Pastor said. “Intentional act exclusion, occurrence, stacking, not stacking — we’ve all dealt with them in every sex abuse case we have. And it’s my experience insurance companies, they need to feel that they’re going to be exposed to a significant risk before they move. And we need to have that backstop and that backstop is a jury trial.”

As the hearing concluded, Thuma wondered out loud to the attorneys what would happen if the second mediation fails.

“I don’t know what to do after that,” Thuma said. “Maybe we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

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MAINE
Portland Press Herald

BY SCOTT DOLAN STAFF WRITER

Freeport resident Paul Kendrick blames himself that an investigation by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security found no evidence to support his widely broadcast claim that the American founder of an orphanage in Haiti had sexually abused many of the boys in his care.

Kendrick, 65, testified Tuesday in his own defense during the third week of his trial in U.S. District Court in Portland on civil charges of defamation and false imprisonment brought against him by the 63-year-old orphanage director, Michael Geilenfeld.

Kendrick said that a group of former residents of St. Joseph’s Home for Boys had admitted to him and to his associates in Haiti that Geilenfeld had sexually abused them, but he had not anticipated that the men wouldn’t repeat those accusations when they were interviewed by a federal Homeland Security investigator who flew to Haiti to talk to them.

Kendrick’s testimony grew testy at times, especially as Geilenfeld’s attorney, Peter DeTroy, cross-examined him pointedly about the Homeland Security investigation. That investigation was closed in January 2013 without charges against Geilenfeld. DeTroy also questioned Kendrick about a failed lawsuit brought by Kendrick’s associates in the Haitian judicial system that put Geilenfeld in jail there for 237 days, before a Haitian judge dismissed the case.

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ROME
Chiesa

With twelve criteria for their selection. Proposed from Australia by Paul A. McGavin, theologian and economist

by Sandro Magister

ROME, July 21, 2015 – Rather than a streamlining of the curia, what is happening inside the Vatican walls is the opposite. It is a continual addition of new organisms to the existing ones.

The latest to be born, on June 27, was a secretariat for communication set up to oversee the pontifical council for social communications, the press office of the Holy See, the Vatican internet service, Vatican Radio, the Vatican Television Center, L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican print shop, the photographic service, the Libreria Editrice Vaticana.

As prefect of the newly created secretariat, Pope Francis appointed one of his closest collaborators and confidants, Monsignor Dario Edoardo Viganò, who also remains director of the Vatican television channel.

Viganò’s first sortie in his new garb, in “L’Osservatore Romano” of July 15, was a panegyric on the communicative “orality” of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, taking as an example one of his speeches in Paraguay:

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INDIANA
Indianapolis Star

Justin L. Mack, justin.mack@Indystar.com July 21, 2015

A longtime police chaplain is facing criminal charges after being accused of paying for sex with a prostitute.

John Robert Fiers, 53, Indianapolis, has been charged in Marion County with two counts of patronizing a prostitute and one count of intimidation, all misdemeanors.

The investigation began on April 22 when an IMPD vice officer conducted a human trafficking and prostitution investigation at a Motel 6 in the 8300 block of Bash Street.

A woman at the motel told police that she knew police were conducting the investigation even before she was arrested on a prostitution charge, court documents said.

She said that the day before a man she knew only as “Bob from Noblesville” showed her his IMPD badge and told her that he was a chaplain.

The woman told police that “Bob” made three appointments with her between April 16 and April 21 and that he paid $120 each time, court documents said. He told her he was a chaplain after having sex during the second appointment.

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

07/21/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

The Chancery of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis recently issued two notices related to the status of the vacant see. Both are interesting in their own right, but the second notice (about the portraits of the resigned bishops) has a humorous element as well. It seems to suggest that parishes have been mailing the portraits back to the Chancery in a manner similar to what many faithful did when they received Archbishop Nienstedt’s DVD on the proposed marriage amendment. Kudos to the pastors of the parishes that thought of it.

MEMORANDUM

Date: July 20, 2015 To: All Clergy From: Susan Mulheron, JCL, Chancellor for Canonical Affairs Re: Status of Vacant See
–
Vicars and Consultative Bodies

Many questions have been asked about how our status of a vacant see will affect various positions and consultative bodies. After conferring with Archbishop Hebda on each of these matters, I offer the following update and clarifications for your reference:

Canonical Authority of the Apostolic Administrator:

In the mandate given to Archbishop Hebda by the Holy See, he has been granted the “rights, duties, and faculties” of a diocesan bishop. This means that for as long as he remains in office as Apostolic Administrator, he would theoretically be able to take some actions that a typical diocesan administrator sede vacante would not be able to take. There is nonetheless a general principle of canon law that while the see is vacant no innovations should be made, and Archbishop Hebda has indicated that it his desire to abide by that as much as possible. It may be the case, however, that for the good of this local Church he will need to make some major decisions (e.g., when required by the Reorganization process or criminal proceedings that are currently underway). In general, if Archbishop Hebda is able to prudently defer a decision to the next Archbishop, he has stated that he intends to do so. During the vacant see, you may experience some delay in decisions that require the approval of the Archbishop, or the decision may be deferred entirely.

Presbyteral Council:

As you probably know, during a vacant see, the Presbyteral Council ceases. The College of Consultors, however, remains in place, and is to fulfill the role of the Presbyteral Council. Archbishop Hebda has indicated he plans to convene the College in early August to seek their counsel on a number of matters.

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UNITED STATES
Washington Post

By Sarah Pulliam Bailey July 21

Pope Francis has named Chicago priest Robert Barron one of three new assistant bishops of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, a move some insiders are calling noteworthy because of his wide social media presence.

Barron is well known among church-going Catholics, since his video series on Catholicism is regularly shown in churches across the U.S. His appointment is both surprising and not surprising, said James Martin, editor at large of America magazine.

“It’s surprising because bishops aren’t normally people who are so media savvy,” Martin said. “But given his talent and profile, I thought this was just a matter of time.”

Barron’s films, books and YouTube clips have made him a “household name” in some Catholic Church circles, Catholic blogger Rocco Palmo writes. Barron said in a news release that his own appointment came as “an enormous surprise.”

“I think in the past, church leaders have not fully appreciated the potential of all forms of media, including social media,” Martin said. “Bob has a big presence on YouTube that very few bishops can match.”

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Fox 2

JULY 21, 2015, BY KEVIN S. HELD

ST. LOUIS (KTVI) – In an unprecedented move, a priest who was accused of child sex abuse charges that were later dropped is now filing suit against his accusers.

Father Joseph Jiang is suing the alleged victim’s parents, SNAP, two police officers, and the City of St. Louis.

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FRANCE
20 Minutes

Vincent Vantighe
Publié le 20.07.

Il a dû remonter à la source du mal pour avoir une chance de guérir. Un homme a obtenu, le 7 juillet, la condamnation d’un prêtre de 82 ans qui l’avait agressé sexuellement dans un collège de Bourg-en-Bresse (Ain) en 1963. Si la peine civile, prononcée par le tribunal d’instance de Nantua (Ain), est d’un euro de dommages et intérêts, elle est loin d’être «symbolique» pour lui.

« Mon client a lui-même été condamné à deux ans de prison ferme pour des attouchements sexuels sur mineurs, confie Emmanuel Ludot, son avocat. Et selon lui, il a agi de la sorte car il avait lui-même été victime de ce genre de faits durant son enfance. Cette reconnaissance par la justice va enfin lui permettre de se reconstruire… »

Le prêtre a reconnu « des caresses et des attouchements »

C’est du reste parce que « son travail de psychothérapie se poursuit » plus de cinquante ans après et que sa guérison n’est pas «consolidée» que Jean-Claude* a pu éviter que les faits ne soient considérés comme prescrits par la justice.

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FRANCE
L’Obs

L’homme ne compte pas en rester là et veut maintenant réclamer 50.000 euros d’indemnités au Vatican pour avoir “inoculé le virus de la pédophilie” au prêtre en question.

C’est une première en France. Un homme condamné pour actes pédophiles a obtenu le 7 juillet dernier la condamnation d’un prêtre de 82 ans qui l’avait lui-même agressé sexuellement dans un collège de Bourg-en-Bresse (Ain) en 1963 et qu’il juge responsable de sa déviance sexuelle, relève RTL.

Condamné il y a une dizaine d’années à deux ans de prison ferme pour des attouchements sexuels sur mineurs, l’homme en question avait justifié son geste en expliquant avoir été agressé par ce prêtre aumônier lorsqu’il avait une douzaine d’années. Une psychologue a confirmé que le religieux était responsable de la déviance de sa victime. Auditionné, l’ecclésiastique a fini par reconnaître des caresses et des attouchements, mais n’avait jamais été inquiété par la justice, les faits étant prescrits sur le plan pénal.

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FRANCE
International Business Times

By Tom Porter
July 21, 2015

A 64-year-old man in eastern France is suing the Vatican, claiming that abuse by a Catholic priest when he was a child turned him into a paedophile.

The man alleges that his boarding school chaplain began abusing him when he was 12, with the sexual assaults continuing for several years.

Recently, the victim was himself convicted of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl. He claims that the abuse he suffered caused him to become a paedophile.

He is demanding that the 82-year-old priest who abused him, who cannot be jailed due to the statute of limitations despite confessing to the crime, be punished for his deeds.

The priest, a former chaplain in Bourg-en-Bresse, Ain, was ordered to pay €1 in damages to his victim.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

Joseph O’Callaghan | Jul. 21, 2015 NCR Today

Robert Mickens’ column calling for a new way of choosing bishops is most timely. Although the Code of Canon Law of 1983 (c. 377) says that the pope freely appoints bishops, papal appointment is contrary to the church’s centurieslong tradition of the election of bishops by the clergy and people of the diocese.

Pope Leo I the Great emphatically affirmed that right when he declared: “The one who is to preside over all should be elected by all.” He added: “When the election of the chief priest is being considered, the one whom the unanimous consent of the clergy and people demands should be preferred. … No one who is unwanted and unasked for should be ordained, lest the city despise or hate a bishop whom they did not choose.”

The right of the clergy and people of the diocese to choose their bishops is hallowed by usage from the earliest times by canons enacted by church councils and by repeated papal affirmation.

Today, however, scarcely any vestige remains of that venerable custom. Rather, the pope, without the active participation of the clergy and people, appoints the bishops, choosing men known for their fidelity to the papacy and their doctrinal orthodoxy. The pope also exercises the right to transfer bishops, thereby encouraging the popular conception that they are merely branch managers of a centralized corporation whose primary allegiance will always be to the pope and not to the people they serve.

The transfer of bishops is so common that it seems like an embarrassing game of musical chairs. Bishops are seldom chosen to govern a diocese where they served as priests and thus are strangers to the priests and people committed to their care. Smaller dioceses are often viewed as stepping stones to more important prizes. In ancient times, the bishop was described as wedded to his diocese and his ring was the visible sign of that nuptial bond. Pope Callistus I described a bishop who transferred to another diocese as a “spiritual adulterer.”

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PENNSYLVANIA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Statement from Cappy Larson, Orthodox Christian Director of SNAP, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests

For more information: Cappy Larson (cappy@rlarson.com, 415-637-2006); David Clohessy, SNAP Director (davidgclohessy@gmail.com, 314-566-9790)

“Predator” bishop still on the job
Deemed guilty by colleagues, he’s now in a parish
His superiors claims “we haven’t put him to work there”
But controversial cleric is listed on PA church’s website
SNAP sends harsh message to hierarchs now meeting in Atlanta
“Block this dangerous, deceptive and callous move,” group pleads

A Chicago bishop found guilty of sexual misconduct and forced him to retire by his colleagues is now in charge of a western Pennsylvania parish and a support group for victims wants him ousted

[Chicago Tribune]

[Orthodox Church in America]

[Orthodox Church in America]

Leaders of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, are writing to bishops of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA) about Bishop Matthias Moriak who once headed the Chicago diocese. Moriak was retired by the synod of bishops in April 2013, after he was found to have engaged in sexual misconduct.

SNAP wants church officials to oust the bishop from active ministry.

Moriak recently began working in a parish in Hermitage, Pennsylvania. The OCA’s chancellor says that another bishop asked Moriak to take the position, but that this assignment had not been approved. He went on to say that the OCA synod would be meeting to consider the terms of Moriak’s retirement.

[Chicago Tribune]

Members of SNAP have written to the synod pleading with them to put the kibosh on this assignment. All of the bishops are in Atlanta from July 20-24, at the Hilton Atlanta Hotel, for their national council. The complete text of the letter, sent earlier today by email, can be found below.

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ISRAEL
Arutz Sheva

By Tova Dvorin
First Publish: 7/21/2015

Ezra Sheinberg, the prominent rabbi in Tzfat (Safed) accused by no fewer than ten women of sexual abuse over an extended period of time, has blamed ‘coerced confessions’ for his arrest Tuesday.

“A guiding hand has caused the complainants to complain against me; today is a holiday and the truth will come out,” Sheinberg claimed, during a court hearing in Tzfat. Sheinberg’s detention was extended by three days on Tuesday afternoon.

“One thing leads to another and one complainant comes forward, then another admits she was forced into saying what she said,” he insisted. “Things will become clearer soon.”

Sheinberg also denied reports that he threatened his prison guards, and said that he thanks them for the good treatment he has received.

Sheinberg was arrested while trying to flee Israel at Ben-Gurion Airport earlier this month.

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VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter

Robert Mickens | Jul. 21, 2015 A Roman Observer

The Vatican published its annual financial statement last week and Cardinal George Pell, prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy, says it’s the most accurate accounting of the money situation at Roman Catholic HQ ever.

Some of his admirers and scribes in the press called it the “most comprehensive and transparent balance sheet” the Vatican has ever published.

It is not at all clear where they got that notion, but Pell and his right-hand finance man, Danny Casey, are probably laughing. Yes, all the way to the bank.

The reality is that this newly published financial report is not at all transparent or detailed and probably not completely accurate — at least not in the information that has been made public.

The document released July 16 is the briefest of summaries (a bit more than a page and a half in English and about the same length in Italian) of two different financial statements.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

New court filing in priest’s “bizarre” lawsuit
In a “first,” he sues young alleged victim’s parents
He also alleges “conspiracy: folks, SNAP, cops & city
It’s because he’s from China, controversial cleric claims
SNAP says archbishop is backing this “vicious intimidation”
Group uses little-known state “anti-SLAPP” law to defend itself
And group asks judge to punish predator by making him pay fees

WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, an attorney and clergy abuse victims will discuss a new legal filing responding to an unprecedented recent federal lawsuit in which a twice-accused predator priest claims a young alleged victim’s parents, SNAP leaders, police officers and St. Louis city officials are conspiring against him.

In the new filing, attorneys for SNAP contend

–St. Louis’ archbishop is behind the priest’s unusual and “mean-spirited” lawsuit,
–criminal charges against the cleric were dropped because the young victim is struggling emotionally, &
The filing also says that the “conspiracy” accusations are impossible because SNAP leaders

–had no contact with law enforcement about the case and
–spoke with the young boy’s parents after the priest’s arrest.

They also

–ask the judge to essentially punish the priest by forcing him to pay for SNAP’s attorney fees.
–blast the archbishop for letting the priest sue his victim’s parents.

When:
TODAY, Tuesday, July 21 at 1:30 p.m.

Where:
Outside the St. Louis Cathedral, 4431 Lindell at Newstead in the city’s Central West End

Who:
An attorney and three-four members of a support group called SNAP (the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests)

Why:
Last month, prosecutors dropped child sex abuse charges against a twice-accused archdiocesan priest with close ties to St. Louis’ top Catholic official. They said, however, that they hope to re-file the case.

In an unprecedented move, the priest, Fr. Xiu Hui “Joseph” Jiang, is suing the alleged victim’s parents, SNAP, two police officers and the city of St. Louis claiming he’s the victim of a conspiracy to slander him and violate his religious freedom because he’s Chinese and Catholic.

[St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

Today, attorneys for SNAP are disclosing the first formal response to what they call Fr. Jiang’s “bizarre” suit. In it, they charge that Archbishop Robert Carlson is behind Fr. Jiang’s lawsuit, which is the first time in Missouri history (as best SNAP can tell) that a Catholic official sued a victim’s parents. (A similar suit filed by a California priest against SNAP resulted in an award of $120,000 for SNAP and against the cleric.)

SNAP also charges that Fr. Jiang’s legal move is a “SLAPP,” a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation, designed to scare and discourage victims, witnesses and whistleblowers into staying silent.

[Wikipedia]

Even though a civil child sex abuse case against the priest is pending, church staff have hinted that the suspended cleric may be put back to work in a parish. SNAP opposes that potential move and wants church staff to take the priest’s passport to prevent him from fleeing the US.

Despite an official national church policy mandating “openness” in pedophile priest cases, Archbishop Carlson refuses to reveal where Fr. Jiang is living, why he had a bedroom in Carlson’s home and why Fr. Jiang followed Carlson from city to city (a highly unusual arrangement in the Catholic church). Carlson also refuses to address an allegation that Fr. Jiang admitted to a Lincoln County girl’s parents that he’d molested their daughter and that Carlson tried to get the parents to return a $20,000 check that the priest reportedly left on their car windshield. SNAP wants Carlson to honor his pledges to be “transparent” and publicly disclose this information.

In June 2012, Fr. Jiang was arrested in for repeatedly molesting the Lincoln County girl numerous times (mostly in her home). He was charged with alleged child sex crimes and “victim tampering.” In November 2013, those charges were dismissed. In April 2014, he was arrested on charges of repeatedly molesting a St. Louis city boy between 2011-2012 (at a Catholic school). According to the suit, Carlson was “supervising Fr. Jiang very closely,” “knew that (he) was a danger to children” and abused the girl while “living in the archbishop’s home.”

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Berger’s Beat

July 21, 2015 7:50 am | Author: berger

Two attorneys are defending SNAP in a complicated defamation and “conspiracy” suit filed by accused predator priest Fr. Joseph Jiang. Previously big firm litigators, Daniel Carpenter and Amy Lorenz-Moser started their own firm earlier this year. She has 15 years of experience in civil litigation and longstanding pro bono practice advocating on behalf of victims of rape and abuse. That work has garnered her numerous awards and recognitions including Missouri Lawyer’s Weekly’s highest honor and the American Bar Association’s Pro Bono Publico Award. Carpenter has over 20 years experience in civil litigation and has been named a Super Lawyer every year since 2001. He is also a Super Lawyers Top 50 Lawyer for St. Louis.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

TESSA AKERMAN THE AUSTRALIAN JULY 22, 2015

The scandal-plagued Catholic Dio­cese of Ballarat has paid for a respected Victorian QC to intervene on behalf of its former ­bishop, Ronald Mulkearns, in a case against an alleged pedophile priest.

David Grace QC warned Geelong Magistrates Court against ­accepting the evidence of Bishop Mulkearns in its criminal proceedings against ­Robert Claffey, who is charged with historical sex offences. Magistrate John Lesser ordered that Bishop Mulkearns appear and give sworn evidence next week about the alleged pedophile activities of Mr Claffey, des­pite the objections of Mr Grace.

Bishop Mulkearns avoided ­giving evidence to the Victorian child-abuse inquiry following a ­report by a clinical neuropsychologist he had diminished capacity following a stroke in 1998.

Mr Grace said Bishop Mul­kearns could produce false memories when asked to recall events relating to the former priest.

The Geelong court heard an ­alleged teenage victim of Mr ­Claffey told his father of the abuse and that the father then went to Bishop Mulkearns.

This follows evidence heard by the royal commission in May that Bishop Mulkearns knew of Australia’s worst pedophile priest Gerald Ridsdale’s offending and moved him from parish to parish in the western Victorian diocese of Ballarat without informing the police.

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ITALY
Global Post

Valeria Fraschetti on Jul 21, 2015

CASERTA, Italy — Another woman had just knocked at the front door of Casa Ruth carrying a terrible, familiar burden. Fleeing the poverty of her country for the promise of a decent job, she ended up in Libya and was forced into sex work.

For two years the woman had been locked up in an apartment-turned-brothel with other Nigerian trafficking victims. One day Libyan militiamen entered and ransacked the house and 17 of them gang raped her, she said.

A few days later she was put on a boat to Italy with other African migrants hoping for a better life in Europe.

Italian authorities sent her to Casa Ruth, a shelter for migrant victims of sex trafficking in Caserta, just north of Naples. There she met Sister Rita Giaretta, a 58-year-old Ursuline nun who has been like a mother to many in this safe house that she started 20 years ago to provide the trafficking survivors with spiritual and legal help.

The young migrant woman is safe now, but devastated, and pregnant with a baby whose father is unknown.

“She keeps crying and saying that she does not want the baby,” said Sister Giaretta. “But two days ago she hugged me and told me, ‘Thank you, mum.’”

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 21 July 2015 (VIS) – The Holy Father has:

– accepted the resignation from the office of auxiliary of the archdiocese of Los Angeles, U.S.A., presented by Bishop Gerald E. Wilkerson upon reaching the age limit.

– appointed Msgr. Joseph V. Brennan, Msgr. David G. O’Connell, and Fr. Robert E. Barron as auxiliaries of the archdiocese of Los Angeles (area 14,019, population 11,852,427, Catholics 4,276,930, priests 1,111, permanent deacons 383, religious 2,229), U.S.A.

Bishop-elect Brennan was born in Van Nuys, U.S.A. in 1954 and was ordained a priest in 1980. He has served in a number of pastoral and administrative roles in the archdiocese of Los Angeles, including parish vicar, parish priest, chaplain, member of the presbyteral council, vicar general and moderator of the curia. In 2005 he was named Chaplain of His Holiness.

Bishop-elect O’Connell was born in Cork, Ireland in 1953 and was ordained a priest in 1979. He has served in a number of pastoral and administrative roles in the archdiocese of Los Angeles, including parish vicar, parish priest, dean and member of the presbyteral council and parish administrator. In 1999 he was named Prelate of Honour.

Bishop-elect Barron was born in Chicago, U.S.A. in 1959 and was ordained a priest in 1986. He holds a masters in philosophy from the Catholic University of America in Washington, a licentiate in theology from the University of St. Mary of the Lake, Chicago, and a doctorate in theology from the Institut Catholique, Paris, France. He has served in a number of pastoral and academic roles, including parish vicar, professor of systematic theology at the University of St. Mary of the Lake, founder and executive director of the Word on Fire Catholic Ministries, visiting professor at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana, and at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum) in Rome, scholar in residence at the Pontifical North American College in Rome and Francis Cardinal George Professor of Faith and Culture at the University of St. Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary. He is currently rector and president of the University of St. Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary.

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UNITED STATES
Hamilton and Griffin on Rights

SNAP Update, Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is Off to an Impressive Start

A half a billion dollars. That’s how much Australian government officials will spend.

Five years (through 2017). That’s how long they’ll work.

Toward what end? Investigating, exposing – and hopefully preventing – future child sex crimes and cover ups in institutions.

A number of governmental bodies across the globe have done probes somewhat like this one. (Most notable, perhaps, is the work of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, which found that the Vatican “still places children in many countries at high risk of sexual abuse, as dozens of child sexual offenders are reported to be still in contact with children” and has “policies and practices which have led to the continuation of the abuse by and the impunity of the perpetrators.”)

So what makes this Australian initiative, Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, significant and different?

Well, look at the results so far:

–In part, because of pressure generated by the Commission, one Catholic bishop (Bishop Max Davis) has been arrested on charges that he molested a child 45 years ago, before he was even ordained.

–Another Catholic bishop (Bishop Philip Wilson) has been arrested on charges of failing to report child sex crimes by a colleague in the 1970s.

–The Commission has overruled or overridden a number of objections and “privileges” claimed by church officials in the hopes of continuing to keep their secrets secret.

–It is publishing some of the documentation it gets or finds online (though much more remains to be revealed).

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ISRAEL
YNet

Kobi Nachshoni
Published: 07.21.15

Rabbi Shalom Arush, one of the leaders of the Breslov Hasidic movement, has called on fellow rabbis not to meet with women seeking an advice or blessing from them, but to settle for a short correspondence with them.

According to Arush, it is also women’s responsibility not to meet with rabbis.

Kabbalist Rabbi Ezra Scheinberg, who founded a yeshiva and a devoted community in Safed and became famous across Israel for his alleged supernatural powers, tries to flee the country following suspicions that he raped and molested 10 women who sought his advice.

Last Thursday, it was cleared for publication that Ezra Sheinberg of Safed is the kabbalist rabbi suspected of raping some of his female followers.

In a lesson he delivered last week in his yeshiva, Chut Shel Chessed (“a touch of grace”), Rabbi Arush said: “You can’t twist the Torah. Our Sages of Blessed Memory said: ‘There is no guardian for promiscuity’ (i.e., person cannot trust himself not to engage in forbidden sex, and should therefore impose commands on himself to prevent it).”

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LOS ANGELES
Catholic Culture

Pope Francis has appointed Father Robert Barron, rector/president of Mundelein Seminary and the University of Saint Mary of the Lake in Chicago, as an auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles.

Father Barron, who is known for his commitment to evangelization, is the founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries and producer of the documentary series “Catholicism.”

Pope Francis also named Msgr. Joseph Brennan and Msgr. David O’Connell as auxiliary bishops of Los Angeles. The former is the archdiocese’s vicar general and moderator of the curia; the latter, pastor of a Los Angeles parish.

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NEW YORK
News 12

[with video]

NEW CITY – The defense began their case Monday in the high-profile sexual abuse trial of Rockland Rabbi Moshe Menachem Taubenfeld.

As News 12 has reported, Laiby Stern told the judge that Taubenfeld sexually molested him when he went for counseling after the Sept. 11. attacks. Stern, now 22, claims the abuse carried on for five years.

Defense attorney Gerard Damiani began Monday’s proceedings with a request to have the case tossed, claiming the victim lied about the timeline of reported abuse. The judge refused, much to the relief of child advocates who packed the courthouse.

As the court broke for lunch, other supporters of the alleged victim claimed they were harassed by religious men close to the rabbi.

Damiani told News 12 that he plans to call at least six more witnesses to the stand before he rests his case. It is not clear if Taubenfeld will take the stand.

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UNITED STATES
StAR

Kevin O’Brien

Bill Cosby is not a Catholic, so what does he have to do with the Catholic Church?

To answer that question, I am going to bring in Plato, Socrates, St. Bernadette and the now obscure comedian Professor Irwin Corey (pictured below).

It all began early this morning, when I woke up angry.

I was at the Super Eight in Higginsville, Missouri, which is bad enough, but the only reason I had spent the night there was that my wife had insisted that I not try to make it all the way home after last night’s show. I’m on the road every weekend, performing shows for one of my two theatrical companies, Upstage Productions or Theater of the Word Incorporated, and this weekend was no exception, featuring three performances in two days, with 14 hours of driving and 1,000 miles round trip in the car, along with my acting partner Maria Romine. My wife Karen remained at home, but insisted that I not try to push myself and make it all the way back to St. Louis after our Saturday night show in Kansas City. So, like a good husband, I did what my wife back home told me to do, and Maria and I got two rooms at the Super Eight in Higginsville, where I promptly fell asleep on Saturday night. But a crack of thunder woke me up Sunday morning at 5:45 am.

We’ve been having torrential downpours all spring and summer in Missouri (last month was the wettest June on record in St. Louis), and the storms are often so violent and the rainfall so heavy that it’s hazardous to drive – especially on the interstate. “If we had simply gone home last night we would have avoided this!” I said to myself as the rain began to pour. The radar on my phone showed lots of oranges and reds between Higginsville and home, and you don’t want to drive through the oranges or reds. But God has a plan for everything, so I decided that we’d roll with it (as the thunder rolls). “If we leave Higginsville by 7:00 am, we’ll make the Latin Mass in O’Fallon by 10:00, and even Confession, which begins at 9:30,” I said to myself, and texted this plan to my actress Maria, who was undoubtedly just getting up in her room down the hall.

Now, I’m not a big Latin Mass fan per se. What I seek are reverent Masses, in whatever language or form. I choose Latin when I can because Latin Masses are almost always reverent. But I’m on the road about fifty weekends out of the year, and fulfilling my Sunday obligation (with Maria, who is, like me, a Catholic convert) can be a real challenge. It’s always easy to find the nearest Catholic Church (with the help of masstimes.org), but finding a Mass that doesn’t ruin my day is not easy. I freely admit that attending an irreverent Mass should not necessarily be a near occasion of sin, making me curse under my breath and despise my neighbor in the next pew over, and that if I were a better Christian I could be more tolerant of what we experience on the road, but we experience some real horrors. And sometimes the Masses we attend are not merely irreverent but downright sacrilegious.

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UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture

By Phil Lawler Jul 20, 2015

Don’t let the understated headline fool you. There’s dynamite in this CWN headline story.

It’s not big news that the director of the Vatican press office admits he is “confused” by Pope Francis. We’re all confused. Join the club, Father Lombardi.

But when the Vatican’s chief spokesman reveals that he doesn’t know what’s on the Pope’s schedule—and no one else knows, either, except the Pope himself—that’s astonishing. Indeed all of the remarks by Father Federico Lombardi, as quoted in an otherwise unremarkable article in National Geographic are eye-opening. The papal spokesman limns a picture of a leader who doesn’t give clear directions, doesn’t communicate with his staff, and (at least in diplomatic affairs) doesn’t have a strategic vision.

“No one knows all of what he’s doing,” Lombardi says. “His personal secretary doesn’t even know. I have to call around: One person knows one part of his schedule, someone else knows another part.”
The job of a spokesman is to make his boss look good. These comments by Father Lombardi definitely do not make Pope Francis look good. What’s happening here?

* Has the frustration at the Vatican reached such a level that Father Lombardi feels that he can make critical comments about the Pontiff, knowing that other Vatican officials will back him? Or…

* Is Father Lombardi himself frustrated enough so that he’s willing to risk his job? Or…

* Does the papal spokesman—who knows the Pope much better than you and I do—feel confident that Pope Francis won’t be unhappy with the comments in National Geographic?

But what those remarkable quotes say about Father Lombardi is a secondary issue. What’s really important is what they say about Pope Francis.

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OHIO
Toledo Blade

BY RYAN DUNN
BLADE STAFF WRITER

A national advocacy group for victims of clergy abuse is criticizing the actions of the Rev. Samuel Punnoor and officials of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Toledo.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests said Monday that returning Father Punnoor to his home diocese in India is irresponsible behavior.

“This solves nothing. In fact, this increases the chances of kids getting hurt,” said Barbara Blaine, president of the Chicago-based group, in a written statement.

An ecclesiastical investigation of Father Punnoor determined he violated the diocese’s rules of harassment and physical contact with youth.

Citing the potential for other cases, Ms. Blaine asked Bishop Daniel Thomas to visit parishes where Father Punnoor worked and encourage whistle-blowers.

Father Punnoor served as vicar at Most Blessed Sacrament in Toledo and St. Joseph in Maumee. He was suspended May 22.

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PENNSYLVANIA
PennLive

By Matt Miller | mmiller@pennlive.com
on July 20, 2015

Claiming the abuse should have been prevented, a Dauphin County woman filed a lawsuit Monday against a former church youth leader and the East Shore church where he spent years molesting her.

The lead defendant in the county court case, Joshua Markelwitz, is serving a 12- to 24-year state prison term after pleading guilty last year to charges that he sexually abused the girl he met through a youth group at Charlton United Methodist Church in Lower Paxton Township.

The woman, who claims the molestation started in 2009 when she was 12, also is suing the Susquehanna Conference of the United Methodist Church.

She contends that church officials didn’t properly screen Markelwitz before allowing him to work with youth and violated their own policies that would have barred him from being alone with the girl on church property.

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UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune

Jul 20 2015

An arrest warrant was issued Monday for the former choir director of an Ogden church — charged with having sexual contact with a 12-year-old female parishioner — after he missed a court appearance.

Jose Manuel Zamarripa, 27, was charged last month in 2nd District Court with one count each of first-degree felony aggravated sexual abuse of a child, second-degree felony sexual exploitation of a minor and third-degree felony dealing in material harmful to a minor.

Charging documents say Zamarripa and the girl exchanged nude photos via text messaging during a five-month relationship, and that he admitted to police having sexual contact with the girl.

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PENNSYLVANIA
ABC 27

By Dennis Owens
Published: July 20, 2015

HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) – Joshua Mitchell Markelwitz is serving 12-24 years in state prison for sexually abusing an underage girl while serving as a youth leader at Charlton United Methodist Church in Lower Paxton Township.

The abuse started when the girl was 12 years old and continued for several years.

According to a civil lawsuit filed Monday in Dauphin County court, Markelwitz is not the only guilty party.

“We think there’s been a lack of institutional control,” Harrisburg attorney Benjamin Andreozzi said. “The church had several opportunities to prevent this abuse from happening.”

Andreozzi represents the victim. The lawsuit contends that Markelwitz has a prior felony conviction and served time while in the military and therefore should not have been hired by Charlton in the first place.

The lawsuit also names the Susquehanna Conference of the United Methodist Church, the church’s governing body.

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COLORADO
Daily Camera

By Mitchell Byars
Staff Writer

POSTED: 07/20/2015

Boulder prosecutors allege the four VineLife Church officials accused of covering up reports that a youth pastor at the church sexually assaulted a teenaged congregant have refused to accept responsibility for their actions and created a “disturbing culture of secrecy and non-disclosure” at the church.

“At the heart of this case is a local church’s coordinated effort to conceal a victim’s report of repeated acts of sexual abuse — perpetrated by a youth pastor, the son of one of the church’s elders — from the church’s own congregation, the local community and law enforcement in Boulder County,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed in the case.

VineLife pastors Walter Roberson and Robert Young, as well as church elders Warren Williams and Edward Bennell, are due in Boulder County Court for sentencing Wednesday after pleading no contest to failure to report child abuse, a Class 3 misdemeanor.

According to the memorandum prepared by the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office, prosecutors are asking a judge to sentence the four men to either eight days on a jail work crew or 100 hours of community service.

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AUSTRALIA
Red Flag

18 July 2015 | Robert Austin

Mick Armstrong’s article on Catholic and other church child abuse (Red Flag #49) is a worthy addition to his contributions to working class history over many years. However, Armstrong’s article can be pressed further.

The precursor to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was a NSW special commission of inquiry into high-level police and Catholic Church collaboration to protect paedophile priests in the Hunter region of NSW.

Commissioner Margaret Cuneen found no evidence to support the claim, but tried to discredit detective chief inspector Peter Fox, whose earlier investigations had revealed decades of church torture of children. His seniors stopped the investigations prematurely. Cuneen parroted the police view that Fox had “lost his objectivity” by empathising with victims.

Under the guise of bourgeois legality, Cuneen also provided a podium for senior police to attack Fairfax journalist Joanne McCarthy, whose investigative reports drew heavily on Fox’s, blew the lid off the cover-up and, combined with popular protest, forced the state to appear to be addressing the issue.

But a key volume of the commission’s four-volume report related to potential criminal charges has been embargoed.

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FRANCE
The Local

A 64-year-old man in eastern France wants to see his former school chaplain convicted for “turning him into a paedophile”, over 50 years after the cleric abused him.

The abuse began when the 64-year-old man was just a 12-year-old pupil.

His boarding school chaplain, who is now an 82-year-old retiree, would regularly subject him to sexual assault and the abuse carried for several years.

Decades later, the victim became a paedophile himself, and was convicted after fondling a 15-year-old girl in the street.

The man has since grown distant from his wife and two children, and moved back in with his mother in Ain, eastern France, as he tries to rebuild his life.

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MINNESOTA
The Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant
July 20, 2015

Yesturday , I wrote about the latest story in the Nienstedt case. I asked : What is unique?

Today let’s look at what he said in the article:

The former archbishop said he’d like his legacy to be the archdiocese’s strengthened child protection protocols developed with clergy abuse victims, the hiring of excellent leadership to oversee ministerial standards, and initiatives to strengthen parishes and schools.

Today I ask: Where was this protection and work in the New Ulm Dioceses. Because before he was the archbishop in Minneapolis and St Paul, he was the Bishop in New Ulm.

Look at the history. There was no stronger programs, release of names, or real (to say nothing of excellent) leadership. Now there was no Child Victims Act that was making the Church answer to survivors. So he wasn’t forced to released lists, or to even address the questions.

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UNITED STATES
Our Stories Untold

by RACHEL HALDER on Jul 18, 2015

Rae wrote a version of this piece, originally posted on Facebook, late on Friday, July 3, after attending the Mennonite Church USA’s “Service of Lament and Hope” for survivors of sexual abuse. The service came a day after MCUSA delegates passed two seemingly contradictory resolutions related to LGBTQ bodies. One, the “Resolution on Forbearance in the Midst of Difference,” submitted by a politically diverse coalition of pastors, asked Mennonite congregations to “forbear” with one another amidst their conflicts over “same-sex covenanted unions.”

The other, the “Resolution on the Status of the Membership Guidelines,” was submitted by the MCUSA Executive Board, and put forth its own interpretation of “forbearance,” stating, “In order to exercise forbearance on matters that divide us and to focus attention on the missional vision that unites us, the delegate assembly will not entertain changes to the Membership Guidelines for the next four years.” The Membership Guidelines of MCUSA condemn “homosexuality” and require MCUSA area conferences to “review” the ministerial credentials of any pastor performs a covenant or marriage ceremony for two people of the same gender.

On Thursday afternoon, after the Membership Guidelines resolution was passed, dozens of Pink Menno supporters stood silently in the hallway of the convention hall for nearly an hour, facing the outgoing foot traffic from the delegate hall. In order to pass through the hallway, delegates had to navigate a maze of pink-clad bodies. Many stood in tears; some, including Rae, wore pink duct tape over their mouths to symbolize the ongoing silencing of queer voices.

On Friday morning, the delegate body passed another resolution, a “Churchwide Statement on Sexual Abuse.”

— Stephanie Krehbiel

_______________________________

The evening of July 3rd I walked into MCUSA’s “Service of Lament and Hope” hoping to find a space for healing that I could come to with my wounds. I left that space with deep pain and extreme rage—a rage I rarely, if ever, feel. I was pissed off. No, that’s an understatement: I was furious.

On July 2nd our church passed “A Churchwide Statement on Sexual Abuse.” Elizabeth Soto Albrect, moderator of Mennonite Church USA, asked the delegates to be mindful when speaking about the subject matter with fellow delegates, as many among them could be sexual abuse survivors. “Certain things may trigger painful memories,” she stated.

Well, that service more than triggered painful memories—it triggered my rage. I was triggered by having that above statement spat right back out at my face. I was triggered by Mennonite Church USA’s lack of mindfulness when speaking to their constituents. My pain from Thursday, of being told through the passage of the Forbearance and Membership Guidelines Resolutions that I am not a legitimate member of the church, and that this fact won’t be debated again for four years, was triggered. The memory that not a single LGBTQ person was invited to speak in the delegate hall, and that when they “forcefully” exerted themselves through guerrilla theater because they are done with not being invited they were met with extreme anger and a demand to have the doors locked to keep the queer folk out, was triggered. The memory of being declared not worthy of respect was triggered. The violence of not having my body and personhood recognized was triggered. The painful memories of standing in silent protest while delegates walked by making condescending statements such as “Don’t worry, things will get better!” or not even looking me in the eye was triggered. Being reminded of the sin I continue to see and experience against me was triggering.

Mennonite Church USA, your words spoken the night of the 3rd are empty. They mean nothing to me, a survivor of sexualized violence, and a survivor of continued sexualized violence systematically orchestrated by you. The longer I sat in that service and listened to those words, while stealing glances at my fellow Pink Menno friends sitting in the pews with pain clearly written on their faces, the more my blood began to boil. Every word you uttered in that service could be, should be, directed towards them—yet we weren’t even acknowledged as a possible component of the equation. Every word you uttered in that service was directed towards me, yet it was completely inauthentic as you only acknowledged a tiny slice of the sexualized violence I have and continue to experience by the hands of the church. How can you not acknowledge the continued sexualized violence you perpetrate against me with absolutely zero acknowledgment of the pain and trauma you are not only causing me, but hundreds of other Mennonites, thousands if we count the countless persons who have been hurt over the years and have left the church because of this continuing spiritual, emotional, and abusive violence.

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INDIANA
Chicago Tribune

By James D. Wolf Jr.
Post-Tribune

A Valparaiso man has been charged with two counts of rape and three counts of sexual battery for acts that allegedly happened between him and three developmentally disabled women at a Chesterton church after Bible study meetings.

Thomas Cooperider, 23, of the 800 block of Mirmar Drive in Valparaiso, is accused of committing the acts between November 2014 and April 2015 inside Liberty Bible Church, 824 N. Calumet Ave. in Chesterton, the probable cause affidavit states.

Cooperider said in a May 8 statement to police that contact was consensual, court documents state.

Porter County Sheriff’s Police Cmdr. Eric Jones became aware of the situation May 1 through an email sent by James Reeder, an Ogden Dunes police officer and Liberty Bible Church’s Safety Team coordinator, according to the probable cause affidavit filed by Porter County Sheriff’s Detective Brian Dziedzinski.

Reeder met with one of three of the Bible study leaders who had heard April 14 from one of the women that she had inappropriate contact with Cooperider, the affidavit states.

Although Reeder identified Cooperider as a former member and junior leader of the Bible study, John Duey, Director of Operations for Liberty Bible Church, stated in an email that Cooperider was someone who attended the study group and had no leadership position.

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INDIANA
The Raw Story

DAVID FERGUSON
20 JUL 2015

A Valparaiso, Indiana man has been charged with two counts of rape and three counts of sexual battery after he allegedly sexually assaulted multiple mentally disabled women after leading them in Bible study.

According to the Chicago Tribune, 23-year-old Thomas Cooperider of Liberty Bible Church in Chesterton reportedly committed the acts between November 2014 and March of 2015 on church grounds.

In a May 8 interview with the Porter County Sheriff’s Department, Cooperider — who told police that he has been accepted to the law program at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University — began his statement by stating, “Everything that did happen was consensual between adults.”

However, the Times of Northwest Indiana reported that all of the women have varying degrees of mental disability, one of whom has a functioning IQ of 57.

The three women’s guardians contacted church officials, who in turn went to the police. All three of the victims say that Cooperider led them to secluded areas of the church and touched them without their permission.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Oxford Mail

Monday 20 July 2015

Stephen Barber
Diocese of Oxford safeguarding advisor

The public inquiry into child sexual abuse has finally got off the ground.

At the third attempt, a chair was found: Justice Lowell Goddard, who is from New Zealand.

This means she is independent of the establishment in the UK, which could not be said of the previous candidates.

She is a judge, so used to hearing and assessing evidence.

She is a woman, which is important since some people suspect that some men do not take the sexual abuse of children as seriously as do most women.

The inquiry is into whether “public bodies and other non-state institutions have taken seriously their duty of care to protect children from sexual abuse in England and Wales”.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has asked for the Church of England to be examined first.

This is because we who work for the church know perfectly well that we have not always got it right, either in listening to survivors of abuse or in dealing effectively with perpetrators.

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

PHILIPPINES
Sun.Star

Monday, July 20, 2015

By
JUSTIN K. VESTIL

THE priest who allegedly molested a 16-year-old girl has been closely monitored by the Archdiocese of Cebu since June this year.

Msgr. Joseph Tan, Cebu Archdiocesan spokesperson, told Sun.Star Cebu that since June this year, they have been observing the priest after they received complaints from his parishioners in Aloguinsan, Cebu, including the present incident.

Sun.Star Cebu withholds the name of the priest pending his comment.

Tan said that Msgr. Rey Penagunda, the vicar general assigned to investigate the case, is closely monitoring the priest.

The priest has denied the allegations, based on Penagunda’s initial investigation, Tan said.
Tan said they are also seeking the cooperation of the 16-year-old girl’s parents to urge the victim to provide a testimony on what happened.

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ISRAEL
Times of Israel

Safed Rabbi Ezra Sheinberg, who is in detention after being accused of rape and sexual misconduct by numerous women, has been harassing prison guards ahead of his trial later this week.
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A number of guards and police officers lodged formal complaints with the Israel Prisons Service claiming Sheinberg attempted to intimidate them by placing a curse on them, Israel’s Army Radio reported Monday.

Staff at Tzalmon Prison, in the Galilee, said that Sheinberg singles out certain employees, copies down their names from their uniform name tags, and then declares, “I place on you a kepeida.” A kepeida is a spiritual curse falling on someone who has provoked anger or offense.

Religiously observant prison staff have become frightened of Sheinberg and are avoiding interacting with him.

Sheinberg also threatens staff by telling them he is a personal friend of the chief rabbi of the Israel Prison Service, Ofer Elimelech, and warning that Elimelech will see to it that they contract illnesses and suffer other misfortunes.

The IPS has opened an investigation.

Safed Chief Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, who also serves as Tzalmon’s chaplain, said he attempted in vain to intervene and stop Sheinberg’s intimidation and verbal harassment. “I asked him to stop threatening people, but it didn’t work,” he said. “I don’t believe that the Almighty pays attention to his curses, I’ve encouraged the staff not to be afraid of him,” Eliyahu said.

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ISRAEL
Arutz Sheva

Another woman has filed a complaint Monday against Rabbi Ezra Sheinberg of Tzfat, who is accused of raping and sexually abusing women who came to him for halachic guidance.

A total of 13 complainants has so far filed charges against Sheinberg for rape, sexual assault and threats. He will be brought Wednesday to the Nazareth Magistrate’s Court for a remand hearing.

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ISRAEL
Forward

July 20, 2015
By Elana Stzokman
Israel

Over the past week, two men heading religious institutions in Israel have been added to the notorious roster of suspected sex predators in the religious Jewish world.

Rabbi Ezra Scheinberg was caught by police two weeks ago at Ben Gurion airport trying to avoid arrest on charges of rape, sexual harassment and indecent assault. Ten women have come forward so far and the police expect more complaints now that the court lifted the ban on releasing his name. According to the complaints, Scheinberg would rape women who came to him for spiritual counseling, and told the women it was part of their healing treatment. The police conducted a search of his house and removed computers, cell phones and other equipment.

Scheinberg, the 47-year-old founding head of Orot Ha’ari yeshiva in Safed, is considered a leading religious Zionist kabbalist and was known for his mystical “blessings” and abilities to “see” into people’s souls. He was considered a protégé of the late chief rabbi Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, father of Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, the current chief rabbi of Safed. Eliyahu has since disassociated himself from Scheinberg, and ordered him to leave Safed and resign from his yeshivah post. Judge Uri Shoham allowed the publication of the rabbi’s name in order to “encourage other complainants, who have requested not to expose themselves until now, to testify about what the suspect did to theme. There is also room to warn the public against him.”

According to police reports, Scheinberg, who is married and has eight children, had a confrontation with one of his accusers earlier this week, in which he said the sex was consensual. The woman in turn called him “impure.” The woman wrote in a letter to Scheinberg , “Thank God I am free of you…Thanks to your arrest, we can lift our heads again…We know you’re the evil one and we are fine, that you are twisted and we are straight, you are impure and abominable and we are the victims…After all these years of your intimidations, we are no longer scared. Your scare-tactics no longer work on us….If you had one drop of integrity of justice, of truth you would ask for our forgiveness. But your heart was always made of stone”

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OHIO
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Monday, July 20

Statement by Statement by Barbara Blaine of Chicago, president of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (312-399-4747, bblaine@SNAPnetwork.org)

Toledo Catholic Bishop Daniel Thomas is sending a priest who has been accused of inappropriate acts with a child home to India. This is irresponsible. This solves nothing. In fact, this increases the chances of kids getting hurt.

[Toledo Blade]

[Toledo News Now]

Fr. Samuel Punnoor was caught having some kind of questionable, inappropriate physical contact with a child that didn’t rise to the level of a crime. But it’s unlikely this was a “one time” occurrence. In fact, we suspect that Fr. Punnoor HAS molested a child but hasn’t been caught yet.

Regardless, Toledo’s bishop should personally visit every parish where he worked, begging victims, witnesses & whistleblowers to call police. He should aggressively seek out – through pulpit announcements, church bulletins and parish websites across the whole diocese – anyone who may have

He should send letters to former parishioners and former parochial school students and staff (who may have quit in light of Fr. Punnoor’s misdeeds), prodding them to call law enforcement if they have any information that could help law enforcement.

Furthermore, he should put Fr. Punnoor in a remote, secure, independently-run treatment facility, at least for a few months, instead of throwing him on a plane home.

For more than two weeks, Toledo Catholic officials kept silent about the allegations against Fr. Punnoor.

Even now, they apparently refuse to give any details that might be helpful to parents, parishioners, police, prosecutors or the public. Shame on them.

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UNITED KINGDOM
International Business Times

By Ewan Palmer
July 20, 2015

Former home secretary Leon Brittan and ex-MI6 agent Peter Hayman are among the suspects who were involved in paedophile rings operating in the 1980s, according to reports.

The late Conservative MP and British diplomat were both named by alleged victims during an investigation by Australian current affairs programme 60 Minutes entitled Spies, Lords and Predators.

The show’s reporter, Ross Coulthart, said the allegations of a paedophile ring involving politicians, lords, the police and other high-profile names as “Britain’s biggest ever scandal”, which has the potential to “rock the establishment”.

One of those who spoke on the programme accused Brittan of regularly abusing children at the Dolphin Square estate in Pimlico in London – the guest house where former Liberal MP Cyril Smith is believed to have taken part in paedophile orgies.

The alleged victim, named only as Darren, told 60 Minutes: “[Lord Brittan] liked boys to dress in women’s underwear and he liked to be alone in the room to punish you for wearing underwear.”

Brittan, who died in January aged 75, was accused by Geoffrey Dickens of “mishandling” a dossier detailing allegations of a paedophile ring operating in the 1980s. Before his death, Brittan denied failing to sufficiency deal with the documents – which have since been lost – as well as being involved in a cover up of the abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

TESSA AKERMAN, RACHEL BAXENDALE THE AUSTRALIAN JULY 21, 2015

The bishop who failed to take ­action against Australia’s worst pedophile priest has been ordered to give court evidence next week, paving the way for him to face the child sex abuse royal commission.

Former bishop Ronald Mulkearns has for years avoided scrutiny over his alleged failure to curb systemic sex offending among his clergy in the west Victorian diocese of Ballarat, where the Catholic Church’s worst crimes were committed.

After having a stroke in 1998, Father Mulkearns avoided the Victorian parliamentary inquiry into child sex abuse in institutions, citing ill health, and had appeared unlikely to attend the royal ­commission into institutional res­ponses.

The Geelong Magistrates Court yesterday ordered Father Mulkearns to give evidence next week in the case of former priest Robert Claffey, who is charged with historical sex offences.

Father Mulkearns was the bishop overseeing Gerald Ridsdale when he allegedly abused possibly hundreds of children in the Ballarat diocese and shuffled him from parish to parish, as well as to Sydney, where he offended further.

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MASSACHUSETTS
WHDH

Updated: Jul 20, 2015

Scituate, Mass. (AP) –
Parishioners holding a round-the-clock protest in a closed Catholic church for nearly 11 years will have their day in court this week.

The Massachusetts Appeals Court hears arguments Wednesday in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston’s bid to evict the Friends of St. Frances X. Cabrini from the deconsecrated Scituate church.

A three-judge panel will only hear arguments; they are expected to issue a written decision at a later date.

The hearing comes after an appeals court judge in June ruled the protesters could continue their vigil while they appeal a lower court decision that declared them trespassers and ordered them to vacate.

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UNITED STATES
Inquisitr

A group of ex-Jehovah’s Witness members have assembled on Reddit to place a billboard calling out leadership in the church for failing to adequately address sexual abuse — and even for actively covering it up. The billboard points viewers to a website that offers evidence for the claims. The group hopes for the message to make an impact during upcoming conventions, which thousands will attend.

The goal isn’t to make more Jehovah’s Witnesses leave the religion, but to hold Elders accountable for failing to report sexual abuse. The website makes a case for failure to report incidents of sexual abuse, listing a number of cases in which victims were awarded large sums of money when courts determined that Jehovah’s Witness leaders failed to make a necessary report.

It goes on to explain that Elders are instructed to only turn over to authorities cases in which there are two witnesses — which means that in addition to the victim, either the perpetrator must confess, or the abuse must have been performed where another church member could witness it — something most sexual predators know to avoid.

In general, members of clergy are considered mandated reporters — that means that in most cases, if church Elders are aware of abuse, or have reason to believe a child is being abused, they’re expected to report it to authorities. This isn’t universal — state laws vary, and may include exemptions for “privileged” conversation, such as a confession of sin by the perpetrator. However, in many cases, simple failure to report may be a violation of law.

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AUSTRALIA
9 News

Australia is ready for new laws to hold institutions criminally responsible for child sexual abuse, a report says.

In a comprehensive examination of the country’s criminal justice system, the sex abuse royal commission says Australian law punishes individual offenders but not organisations.

The report outlines possible new offences to cover organisational criminal liability for institutional abuse, which would make it less likely an organisation could plead that it, too, was a victim of rogue behaviour.

That has been an argument put by some of the churches and charities examined during the commission’s 28 public hearings.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 20 July 2015 (VIS) – The Holy Father has appointed Dr. Salvatore Vecchio, formerly director of Human Resources at the Bambino Gesu Paedatric Hospital, Rome, as director of the Labour Office of the Apostolic See.

On Saturday 18 July, the Holy Father:

– appointed Msgr. Claudio Cipolla as bishop of Padua (area 3,297, population 1,068,498, Catholics 1,004,088, priests 990, permanent deacons 49, religious 1976), Italy. The bishop-elect was born in Goito, Italy in 1955 and was ordained a priest in 1980. He has served in a number of roles in the diocese of Mantua, including parish vicar and director of diocesan Caritas. He is currently parish priest, episcopal vicar for the pastoral sector, and member of the college of consultors, the diocesan pastoral council and the commission for the continuing formation of the clergy. He is a “ratione officii” member of the episcopal council and the presbyteral council, and was named Chaplain of His Holiness in 2011. He succeeds bishop Antonio Mattiazzo, whose resignation from the pastoral care of the same diocese upon reaching the age limit was accepted by the Holy Father.

– appointed Fr. Basil Bhuriya, S.V.D., as bishop of Jhabua (area 21,366, population 5,812,071, Catholics 38,726, priests 68, religious 236), India. The bishop-elect was born in Panchjui, India in 1956, gave his solemn vows in 1985, and was ordained a priest in 1986. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Indore, India, and has served in an number of roles, including parish vicar in a number of parishes in the dioceses of Baroda, Indore and Jhabua and rector of the St. Thomas Seminary in Indore. He is currently parish priest and member of the Provincial Council of the Verbite Fathers in the Central Indian Province.

– appointed Fr. Corrado Melis as bishop of Ozieri (area 2,288, population 54,600, Catholics 54,200, priests 48, religious 54), Italy. The bishop elect was born in Sardara, Italy in 1963 and was ordained a priest in 1988. He holds a licentiate in theology from the Pontifical Theological Faculty of Sardinia in Cagliari, and has served in a number of pastoral roles in the diocese of Ales-Terralba, including parish vicar, vice rector of the diocesan seminary in Villacidro, director of the diocesan catechistic office, chaplain, parish administrator, and parish priest. He is currently parish priest of Santa Barbara in Villacidro, episcopal vicar for evangelisation and education, director of the diocesan office for family pastoral ministry, and director of the pastoral ministry of ecumenism. He is also a member of the college of consultors and the diocesan council for economic affairs.

– elevated Fr. Natale Paganelli, S.X., apostolic administrator of Makeni, Sierra Leone, to the dignity of bishop. The bishop-elect was born in Grignano di Brembate, Italy in 1956, gave his religious vows in 1979, and was ordained a priest in 1980.

– appointed Bishop Henry Akuna of Makeni, Sierra Leone, as auxiliary of the diocese of Kenema, (area 15,710, population 1,481,000, Catholics 87,000, priests 19, religious 32), Sierra Leone.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Kent and Sussex Courier

Paedophile teacher Christopher Howarth’s former school has paid tribute to the bravery of his victims who came forward to bring him to justice.

The ex-Uckfield Community Technology College deputy head teacher was convicted on Friday of 26 counts of abuse against two young boys.

It followed a two-week trial during which one of his victims said he was initially reluctant to come forward to police because of the 68-year-old’s status in the community.

The college today released a statement branding the actions of the former lay priest as “shocking and abhorrent”.

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NETHERLANDS
NL Times

Pastor Dominique Donders from Veldhoven has been reassigned as a chaplain in the Sint Anthonis municipality in Brabant. The priest was convicted and later acquitted of the possession of child pornography.

According to NOS, the diocese and parish believe that Donders deserves a second chance and he will soon preside over funerals and celebrations. The Sint Anthonis church appointed Donders at the request of the diocese. “Comments can certainly be made on his behavior in a moral sense”, the parish writes on its website. “But his pastoral integrity is not fundamentally at stake.”

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UNITED KINGDOM
Law Society Gazette

20 July 2015

By Joshua Rozenberg

Much is expected from the largest and most ambitious public inquiry ever established.

The independent inquiry into child sexual abuse seems to have got off to a good start. Lowell Goddard, who served as a high court judge in New Zealand for 20 years before being appointed to chair the inquiry in April, has not been wasting her time.

The government’s most important decision was to start the new statutory inquiry afresh – avoiding some of the pitfalls that beset the non-statutory panel headed first by Baroness Butler-Sloss and then Dame Fiona Woolf. Goddard (pictured below) is sitting with just four experts, three of them lawyers.

The panel no longer includes victims, although one member spent his childhood in care: Ivor Frank is a barrister who now has four decades of experience in child protection, human rights and family law.

The other three members are Professor Malcolm Evans, an international lawyer specialising in freedom of religion and prevention of torture; Drusilla Sharpling, a former chief Crown prosecutor who subsequently inspected policing responses to child abuse; and Professor Alexis Jay, a former director of social services who led the inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Rotherham. Ben Emmerson QC remains counsel to the inquiry and the highly experienced Martin Smith, a partner at Fieldfisher, is the inquiry’s solicitor.

Goddard was right to say that victims should be at the centre of the inquiry. But the officials who decided that victims should be members of the earlier inquiry team were misguided in thinking that people with a direct interest in child abuse could be judges in their own cause. Instead, victims and survivors have been appointed to a new consultative panel, which will offer Goddard and her colleagues advice and guidance. There is a separate victims’ and survivors’ liaison group.

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GUAM
Pacific News Center

Written by Janela Carrera

John Toves has previously accused Archbishop Anthony Apuron of molesting his cousin back in the 1980s.

Guam – Just when everything started to quiet down regarding allegations made against Archbishop Anthony Apuron of sexual abuse, the topic was once again brought up in the form of a letter.

John Toves, the man who brazenly accused the Archbishop of molesting his cousin back in the 1980s, sent PNC a copy of a letter he received from a law firm. It was signed by Attorney Michelle Neal, retained by Archbishop Apuron, ordering Toves to immediately “cease and desist from making any further defamatory comments or publications against Archbishop Apuron’s reputation and character.”

The letter further states “Your comments and published statements that Archbishop Apuron has engaged in unlawful conduct are patently false, and you have made these comments and published these statements with full knowledge of their falsity.”

However, Toves tells PNC that he’s not backing down and that he maintains his assertions.

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ISRAEL
Arutz Sheva

Rabbi Ezra Sheinberg, the rabbi from Tzfat (Safed) accused by no fewer than 11 women of sexual abuse, has been threatening prison guards at the Tzalmon Jail where he is currently being detailed, reports Army Radio.

According to the report Sheinberg has been taking the names of the guards from the name tags on their shirts and writing them on a note. He then goes on to recite: “I place on you a kapida,” a type of curse.

Several of the guards have been frightened by the curses, and are trying to avoid Sheinberg. The Israel Prison Service intends to investigate the complaints of the guards.

The Nazareth District Court last Friday shortened Sheinberg’s detention, moving up his release from this Thursday to Tuesday.

Several of his victims have come forward with complaints of severe sexual abuse they suffered after coming to him for advice.

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NEW YORK
Road to Recovery

Two Brooklyn Diocesan priests will be ordained bishops for the Brooklyn Diocese while two childhood sexual abuse victims of a deceased and dangerous pedophile priest are denied justice from the Brooklyn Diocese in their attempts to heal. The Brooklyn Diocese is hiding behind the antiquated and unfair New York State statute of limitations

Juan Rodriguez, who was sexually abused by Fr. Kenneth Wicks at St. Gabriel Parish in East New York, Brooklyn, and reported the abuse to Brooklyn Diocesan officials in the 1990s, will speak to the media about his twenty-year effort to hold his abuser and the Diocese of Brooklyn accountable

What
A demonstration and leafleting alerting Brooklyn Diocesan Catholics, the media, and the general public about the twenty-year attempt by childhood sexual abuse victims of Fr. Kenneth Wicks to receive justice from the Brooklyn Diocese

When
Monday, July 20, 2015 from 12:30 PM until 2:00 PM

Where
On the public sidewalk outside the Co-Cathedral of St. Joseph, 856 Pacific Street, Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, New York 11238 before the ordination of two new bishops for the Diocese of Brooklyn

Who
Juan Rodriguez, a community activist and leader of the 75th NYPD Precinct Community Board and childhood sexual abuse victim of Fr. Kenneth Wicks at St. Gabriel Parish in East New York, Brooklyn, NY; Members of Road to Recovery, Inc., including its co-founder and President, Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D.

Why
Two priests will be ordained bishops for the Diocese of Brooklyn while at least two childhood sexual abuse victims of Fr. Kenneth Wicks, who allegedly committed suicide in 1993, are denied justice by the Diocese of Brooklyn in their approximately twenty-year claims against Fr. Wicks and the Diocese of Brooklyn. Juan Rodriguez and Luis Ramos reported their sexual abuse by Fr. Kenneth Wicks to officials of the Diocese of Brooklyn approximately twenty years ago, and nothing has been done by officials of the Diocese of Brooklyn to help them heal and recover. The Diocese of Brooklyn has covered up the horrific sexually abusive activity of Fr. Kenneth Wicks, who abused children in St. Gabriel Parish in East New York and at his vacation home in upstate New York where he tied up children, plied them with alcohol, and sexually abused them. Demonstrators will call on the Brooklyn Diocese to do the right thing by compensating Juan Rodriguez, Luis Ramos and all clergy sexual abuse victims for the sexual abuse they endured. Such compensation helps victims try to heal and gain a degree of closure.

Contacts
Robert M. Hoatson, Ph.D. – Road to Recovery, Inc. – 862-368-2800
Attorney Mitchell Garabedian, Boston, MA – 617-523-6250

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MINNESOTA
Marshall Independent

July 19, 2015

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Former Twin Cities Archbishop John Nienstedt says he remains “dumbfounded” by allegations of personal misconduct that emerged last year during an internal church investigation.

In written responses, Nienstedt tells the Star Tribune (http://strib.mn/1MiDTyn ) it “pains” him that his reputation has been “put into question by allegations that are entirely false and based wholly on rumor, hearsay, or innuendo.”

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis commissioned the investigation. The Star Tribune reports the probe looked into claims that Nienstedt had engaged in behavior that was inappropriate for a priest.

Nienstedt resigned last month after prosecutors filed charges against the archdiocese for failing to protect children from a priest later convicted of molesting two boys.

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UNITED STATES
News Review

The Sins of Brother Curtis: A Story of Betrayal, Conviction, and the Mormon Church hits the bookstores today—and author Lisa Davis will be discussing the book and signing copies at the Borders on Fair Oaks tomorrow evening.

In The Sins of Brother Curtis, Davis details the career of one of the most prolific serial child molesters in the U.S., Frank Curtis. As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, he was “called” to serve as a Sunday School teacher and Boy Scout leader, which gave him ample access to children.

He molested boys in several Portland, Oregon wards from 1976 to 1991. It was the last victim who filed a lawsuit against the LDS Church—because a bishop had told his mother than they “knew” Curtis was a pedophile and hadn’t warned the family—that it was discovered that the church had, in fact, known for years that Curtis was a danger to children. He’d even been excommunicated, then re-baptized and returned to the positions from which he preyed upon children.

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UNITED STATES
The Museum of Americana

[with audio]

Norbert Krapf, former Indiana Poet Laureate and winner of the Glick Indiana Author Award, and veteran Indiana bluesman Gordon Bonham have been performing together since they were part of the Hoosier Dylan Show 2008-10. Norbert’s eleventh poetry collection is Catholic Boy Blues.

To read Krapf’s “B.B. King on His Bicycle,” click here.

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UNITED STATES
Questions from a Ewe

Dear Pope Francis,

I have written you a few letters but never received the favor of a reply. Nonetheless, I continue writing in hopes that someday we discuss pressing issues in the church.

I am inspired to write again now after listening to this weekend’s reading from Jeremiah, “Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the flock of my pasture, says the LORD (Jer 23:1).” With U.S. Catholics’ mere 25% Mass participation rate that’s dropping as I type, I am starting to wonder if it’s possible for the shepherds to destroy and scatter the flock much more than they’ve already done. Have we not suffered enough from their poor shepherding skills? Is it not time to stop doubling-down on the sheep-scattering tactics and exchange them for exemplary shepherding skills? …

Frank, simply put, what are you waiting for? Be the miracle you hope to see! Make the mess you hope gets made!

I offer ten suggestions of miracles and messes you could do today, by mere virtue of the white pointy hats you own and the fabulous chair you sit upon in St. John Lateran’s Basilica.

1. Re-institute married clergy. Nothing needed to do this but the stroke of a pen…specifically your pen. Please take it out, remove the cap, dip it in the papal ink well and scribble away…
2. Re-institute ordaining women as deacons. Again, there’s no obstruction to doing this. Benedict paved the way by declaring that deacons no longer act in persona Christi. While your pen is out please handle this one too.
3. Change Canon Law to remove ordaining women as a grave delict and instead add bishops who mishandle sexual abuse cases. Then please address the numerous bishops guilty of this grave delict.
4. Tell the truth. Dispense with clinging to false biological, medical and psychological teachings as foundations to establishing “truths” about human sexuality. You can’t say you’re the penultimate guardian of truth if you don’t tell it.
5. Change canon law to prevent Catholic employers from denying their employees access to medical care just because they fear it. The medications used to treat many female health issues can also be used for birth control. However, the medication itself is merely a tool. Indeed it is a tool often used to help conceive life. It is one particular usage of that tool to which you object, yet the tool is outright banned. Consistent application of this rule would see the rope cincture around your waist barred since many people have been hanged using ropes. Furthermore having episcopal review boards rather than medical ones determining whether or not women can have certain life-saving procedures performed at Catholic hospitals is just derelict. Stop this practice at once. Scribble that into canon law and make the U.S. bishops fix their medical ethics document to reflect the change.
6. Lift the excommunications hanging over all people. Grant general amnesty since, “Who are you to judge?”
7. Cancel any meetings in Philadelphia that lack women – laywomen – not cheerleaders for church status quo and not only religious women, but regular women who are mothers. They can teach you much about what it means to be a holy mother as you try to lead “Holy Mother Church.”
8. Cancel any meetings in Philly that are exclusively with clergy and all meetings with Archbishop Chaput unless he accompanies you to meet with groups such as Fortunate Families being barred from attending his World Meeting of Families.
9. Take time when you are in Philadelphia to meet with women with such a strong sense of calling that they are willing to endure scorn, rejection and excommunication… Yes, that’s right; meet with Catholic women priests. Understand why they do what they do after you listen to understand what they do. Then make them dinner and serve it to them. This can be done in person and thus save on those expensive charges for overseas cellphone calls you must be racking up with your spontaneous, surprise pope-calls.
10. Update the papal wardrobe to align with the poor – perhaps a nice pair of second hand jeans and a t-shirt from the St. Vincent de Paul store would be in order. These are practical work clothes and require far less bleach and fuss to clean than the flowing white gowns you currently wear… Maybe you can have a big garage sale at the Vatican and sell your white vestments to a traveling band of dentists in dire need of white fabric. It’s just a suggestion.

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MINNESOTA
Legal Examiner

Posted by Mike Bryant
July 19, 2015

There is a longer story today in the Minneapolis Tribune about what is the latest in the Nienstedt Case. Looking at it, there clearly is a lot of issues up in the air. What struck me was the end of the article:

What the archdiocese decides to do with the investigation is being monitored by Twin Cities Catholics as well as national Catholic authorities, who say the St. Paul situation is extremely rare.

Facing scores of priest abuse claims, bankruptcy, civil and criminal charges — and the Nienstedt investigation controversy — the archdiocese is in uncharted terrain.

“I rarely say anything is unique in the Catholic Church, but this is a pretty unique situation,” said the Rev. Thomas Reese, senior analyst for National Catholic Reporter.

I got to ask: What is unique?

There are scores of abuse cases across the world. Thanks to the Child Victims Act survivors in Minnesota can do something about them.

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis is one of a number of diocese that have or are using the bankruptcy courts to limit their liability.

Civil claims have for the most part been the only way that survivors have been able to force the Church to do anything.

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DEUTSCHLAND
missbrauch-gelingt-grabosch.

[Dickert disappointed by the lack of reaction of the cardinal of Mainz]
ar apology to the Church and an honest handling of abuse cases (the LA) reported.

Briefwechsel zu Missbrauchsfällen und Rolle der Kirche – Gespräch in Mainz ohne Pfarrer lehnt Rathauschef ab

GREBENHAIN – (cke). Die Einstellung der Missbrauchsstudie durch die Katholische Kirche und die noch immer ausstehende Entschuldigung von Kirchenverantwortlichen aus dem Bistum Mainz gegenüber den Opfern, die vom ehemaligen Grebenhainer Pfarrer Wolfgang Grabosch sexuell missbraucht worden waren, hatten Grebenhains Bürgermeister Manfred Dickert im Februar veranlasst, einen Brief an den Mainzer Bischof, Kardinal Karl Lehmann, zu schreiben. Der Rathauschef, in dessen Gemeinde sich ein Teil der widerwärtigen Taten ereignet hatten, hatte in seinem Schreiben eine klare Entschuldigung der Kirche und einen ehrlichen Umgang mit den Missbrauchsfällen gefordert (der LA berichtete).

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ISRAEL
Arutz Sheva

By Haim Lev
First Publish: 7/19/2015

Haredi leaders appear to be taking stock of several recent sexual harassment scandals, Kikar Hashabbat reports Sunday.

On Sunday, Rabbi Shalom Arush, Breslov leader and head of the Chut Shel Chessed yeshiva (Torah academy), announced that he will stop meeting with women during public reception hours in light of the scandals.

Rabbi Arush explained that the move is to set a precedent for caution.

“The evil inclination of rabbis is even greater than that of other people,” he said, reflecting a Judaic concept that people with great potential also have greater challenges.

Therefore, he said, he will not see women in person anymore, even if they are accompanied by their husbands.

The decision was made against the backdrop of at least ten women accusing Rabbi Ezra Sheinberg of Tzfat (Safed) of sexual abuse in a religious context, which made headlines after Sheinberg attempted to flee Israel and was arrested before his departure.

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UNITED STATES
The Open Tabernacle: Here Comes Everybody

Posted on July 19, 2015 by Betty Clermont

“A measure calling for the statue of Father Junipero Serra in the U.S. Capitol to be replaced with one of NASA astronaut Sally Ride, the first American woman in space, was shelved in the Legislature on July 2. [Ride] would be the first woman to represent California in the collection and the first known gay person.” State legislatures have the authority to decide which two statues will represent their state at the U.S. Capitol.

The measure to replace Serra’s statue had already passed the California Senate in April. The Assembly vote was postponed because of the pope’s visit to the U.S. “Our concerns are mostly due to the timing of this legislative debate,” Sandra Palacios, associate director of governmental affairs at the California Catholic Conference, said at an Assembly committee hearing this week.” The U.S. bishops’ paid lobbyists in every state are called “Catholic Conferences.”

Pope Francis called Serra “one of the founding fathers of the United States, a saintly example of the Church’s universality, and special patron of the Hispanic people of the country.” The pope will canonize Serra in September in Washington D.C. The 18th century Spanish Franciscan friar founded the first nine of 21 Spanish missions in California. In a rare display of criticism for this pope, Native Americans and others protested honoring a man who participated in the brutalization of indigenous people. “By 1818 the percentage of Indians who died in the missions reached 86 percent. Over 81,000 Indian ‘converts’ eventually managed to successfully flee the missions.”

The postponement followed “a heavy campaign to save the statue. A Spanish-language website, ‘Salvemos a Serra’, or ‘Let’s Save Serra’, called on Californians to write their legislators in opposition to the resolution. … ‘Salvemos a Serra’ had also asked supporters of Blessed Serra to sign English- and Spanish-language petitions on the website CitizenGo.org. The petitions were posted by Alejandro Bermudez, executive director of Catholic News Agency. More than 47,000 did so.”

Within five days, the Catholic Church “notched [another] prominent win at the California statehouse.” The July 7 decision by a legislative committee to shelve a bill allowing terminally ill patients to legally end their lives “followed weeks of lobbying by competing interest groups over whether to make California the next state to allow physicians to legally prescribe fatal medication, following Oregon, Washington, Montana and Vermont.” “A new poll released by Compassion and Choices, the chief right-to-die advocacy group, suggests that 69 percent of Californians would vote for the bill if put in front of them.”

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AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites

By a Broken Rites researcher, article updated 1 July 2015

Former Catholic priest John Joseph Farrell appeared in Sydney’s Central Local Court on 30 June 2015, charged with 26 sexual offences which were allegedly committed against five boys between 1981 and 1984 in northern New South Wales. According to court documents, some of these 26 offences allegedly occurred while Father Farrell was based at the Moree parish (within the Armidale Catholic diocese); and some allegedly occurred when Father Farrell visited a parish at Tweed Heads (in the Lismore diocese) on the NSW north coast. The Sydney magistrate refused to suppress Farrell’s name. This court case is confined to these five children (and these 26 charges) and it does not include any charges which Farrell might face regarding any other children. Farrell was refused bail, and he will remain in custody pending his court proceedings.

Father John Joseph Farrell worked as a Catholic priest in the 1980s and the early 1990s. He later lived at a private address in the town of Armidale until late 2012. More recently, he has been living in the Harden area (between Young and Yass) in southern NSW.

In late June 2015 John Joseph Farrell was arrested at Harden by a Sydney-based specialist team of detectives from the Sex Crime Squad of the NSW Police. Police charged him with the 26 alleged offences, with no police bail. On June 25, he was taken in custody to a local court (at Wagga in southern NSW) to enable these 26 charges to be officially filed. Farrell entered the courtroom with two Corrective Services officers. Two specialist detectives were present in court.

In the June 25 hearing, Farrell’s lawyer applied for a media-suppression order which would prevent Farrell’s name from being published. He said that Farrell could be placed in danger if his identity were made public. He said the type of charges laid against Farrell generated vilification and outrage in the community.

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AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites

By a Broken Rites researcher (article updated 11 July 2015 )

A Catholic priest, Father Robert Claffey, indecently assaulted two boys after their sister died in a road accident, a court was told. The priest started visiting the boys’ house after the accident to “comfort” them at bed-time.

Father Robert Patrick Claffey was a priest of the Ballarat Diocese in western Victoria. He pleaded guilty in Ballarat Magistrates Court on 18 February 1998 to having indecently assaulted the two boys, brothers aged 12 and 13, by touching their bodies on several occasions in 1978 while the boys were in bed.

Neither brother knew that the other had been molested by Fr Bob Claffey until they discussed the matter in their twenties.

The boys were part of a devout Catholic family, which was friendly with Father (later Archbishop) George Pell and Father (later Bishop) Peter Connors.

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AUSTRALIA
Broken Rites

A Catholic priest in northern New South Wales, John Patrick Casey, 67, appeared in court on 10 July 2015, charged with sexual offences, allegedly committed against two young boys in the 1980s. Casey has been denied bail. A magistrate said the charges are serious and could bring a custodial sentence if there is a conviction.

John Patrick Casey is a priest of the Lismore diocese, which takes in the NSW north coast from the Queensland border to Camden Haven, south of Port Macquarie. The city of Lismore is where the diocese has its headquarters.

John Patrick Casey is currently a priest for the “Mary Help of Christians” parish at Sawtell, near Coffs Harbour. (After he was charged, the diocese announced that Father Casey is standing down from this position.)

The police investigation was conducted by detectives from the NSW Police’s Richmond Local Area Command, which has headquarters in Lismore. The detectives were investigating information which had been received by Australia’s national child-abuse Royal Commission.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail

Inquiry judge will hear 30,000 VICTIMS of predators – but Goddard probe says that’s less than 1% of adults who were abused as children

By David Rose for The Mail on Sunday

The landmark inquiry into historic child sexual abuse is braced to hear testimony from at least 30,000 victims, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

But that extraordinary number represents less than one per cent of the more than three million adults in Britain who were abused as children, according to the Goddard Inquiry.

The figures were disclosed to this newspaper by Ben Emmerson, the QC who is the chief lawyer for the vast investigation set up in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal and widespread allegations of abuse by politicians at Westminster.

In his first interview since he took up his post with the inquiry, Mr Emmerson has for the first time given details of the mammoth task it faces as it takes up evidence going back decades.

He admitted that the inquiry’s scope was ‘vast’, covering the handling of abuse by institutions including children’s homes, the military, youth groups, orchestras, doctors, Westminster, the police, prosecutors, internet service providers and the BBC. It has no past cut-off date.

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ISRAEL
Jerusalem Post

Rabbi Ezra Scheinberg is the rabbi from northern Israel accused of rape and other sexual offenses.

The name of Rabbi Scheinberg, a much respected yeshiva dean who was considered by some to be a mystic, has been released for publication as the rabbi from northern Israel accused of rape and other sexual offenses.

So far 10 separate complaints have been filed against the rabbi who was arrested July 2 at Ben-Gurion Airport and has been held in detention since. He is scheduled to be released to house arrest on Tuesday.

Scheinberg, 46, is married and has eight children. He is the founder of the Orot HaAri yeshiva in Safed, which he established in 1999, and was a respected and prominent figure in the national-religious community, lauded as a particularly spiritual rabbi with even preternatural abilities to see into the future and give advice on that basis.

According to a report on the Kipa national-religious news website, his students threw books he has authored into the garbage when the allegations against him were made public.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Fiction: The Ballroom Cafe: Secrets Can’t Last Forever, Ann O’Loughlin, Black and White Publishing, pbk, 322 pages, €11.28

Maggie Armstrong
PUBLISHED
19/07/2015

Irish people are only now learning about the forced adoption of babies born to unmarried mothers in mother-and-baby homes, a money-making scheme which may have gone on until the 1970s. Ann O’Loughlin quite fearlessly enters this little-explored ground in her first novel.

A long-time Irish Independent journalist and now reporter with the Irish Examiner, this time she bends the facts into a tale of scandal heaped upon scandal.

Setting her story in remote Co Wicklow in 2008, the author creates a home for our imagination in Roscarbury Hall, the tumbledown mansion shared by ageing sisters Ella and Roberta O’Callaghan.
Slow-marching, romantic prose draws us into an old world that is rustic, genteel, quaint – almost de Valera’s Ireland preserved in aspic.

Scandals lie in wait. It emerges the sisters don’t speak, they communicate through notes. (The many epistolary exchanges in the novel inspired the designers to add as many naff forms of handwriting. Though a book shouldn’t be judged on its fonts.) There is a “hard frost, thick and deep, between them”.

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OHIO
Toledo News Now

By Mark Bickle

MAUMEE, OH (Toledo News Now) –
The Diocese of Toledo has announced that a priest accused of violating Diocesan policy, in behavior involving children, will remain on leave from Saint Joseph’s Catholic Church in Maumee and be sent back to his home diocese in India.

In May, Reverend Samuel Punnoor was accused by a child of violations of the diocesan code of pastoral conduct; specifically, “Appendix A: Diocese of Toledo Code of Pastoral Conduct” of the diocesan “To Protect and to Heal: Policy on Sexual Abuse of Minors.”

The diocese says that an investigation by Lucas County Children Services found that Father Punnoor’s actions were not deemed to be sexual abuse but his behavior with the child did raise concerns.

A press release from the diocese states, “the agency’s assessment determined that Reverend Samuel Punnoor’s actions did not meet the definition of sexual abuse as defined by state law. The agency also indicated that it has concerns about Father Punnoor’s interactions with the victim and that he appears to have boundary issues in not recognizing appropriate interaction with this child.”

An investigation by the diocese concluded that a violation of the diocesan code of pastoral conduct had occurred.

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PHILIPPINES
Rappler

Dale G. Israel
Published July 19, 2015

CEBU CITY, Philippines – The Archdiocese of Cebu is investigating the parish priest of Aloguinsan town accused of molesting a girl who was part of the church choir.

A police report dated June 4, 2015 narrated an incident involving a 16-year-old female who was allegedly molested by Fr. Prudencio Operiano of the St. Raphael Archangel Parish Church on Christmas eve, December 24, 2014.

Together with a witness – the alleged victim’s 15-year-old female friend – the victim filed a complaint at the police station in Aloguinsan on June 4, 2015.

If found guilty, Operiano could be charged with violating Republic Act 7610 or the “Special Protection of Children Against Abuse, Exploitation and Discrimination Act.”

Monsignor Joseph Tan, spokesperson of the Archdiocese, said that even before local newspaper reports of the incident came out on Saturday, July 18, the church started a probe on the incident as early as the first week of June through vicar general Msgr. Rey Penagunda.

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MINNESOTA
Star Tribune

By Jean Hopfensperger and Tony Kennedy and Paul McEnroe Star Tribune staff

JULY 18, 2015

Former Archbishop John Nienstedt said he remains “dumbfounded” by the allegations of personal misconduct that emerged last year during an internal church investigation of his behavior — a report that the archdiocese now is considering making public.

“It pains me deeply that my good name and reputation have been put into question by allegations that are entirely false and based wholly on rumor, hearsay, or innuendo,” said Nienstedt last week, in written responses to questions from the Star Tribune.

Commissioned by the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, the probe looked into claims that Nienstedt had engaged in behavior that was inappropriate for a priest. The Star Tribune has learned that investigators collected affidavits from priests, former seminarians and a former priest alleging actions, some dating to the Detroit area in the early 1980s, that range from inappropriate touching to visiting a gay nightclub.

Nienstedt resigned June 15, after Ramsey County prosecutors filed criminal and civil charges against the archdiocese, alleging “failure to protect children.” Nienstedt said he hoped his resignation would “give the archdiocese a new beginning.”

But the existence of the investigation has become yet another dilemma for a church sharply criticized for its handling of dozens of cases of alleged sexual abuse by priests. Earlier this year it filed bankruptcy to help deal with the mounting financial toll of those cases.

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OHIO
Roman Catholic Diocese of Toledo

The Diocese of Toledo is announcing today a decision regarding Reverend Samuel Punnoor, who was placed on administrative leave as a result of a May 2015 allegation from a minor that he violated the diocesan code of pastoral conduct.

Following its investigation of the allegation, Lucas County Children Services informed the Diocese that Father Punnoor’s actions were not deemed to be sexual abuse but his behavior with this child raised concerns.

After the necessary ecclesiastical investigation, the Diocesan Review Board unanimously concluded that a violation of the diocesan code of pastoral conduct had occurred. Bishop Daniel Thomas has accepted the Board’s recommendations that Father Punnoor should remain on administrative leave, have no priestly ministry in the Diocese of Toledo, have no access to children and return to his home diocese in India.

Background

On May 22, 2015, the Diocese of Toledo announced that Reverend Samuel Punnoor, a priest of the Diocese of Pathanamthitta (India) who up until that time was serving in the Diocese of Toledo, was that day placed on administrative leave following an allegation that he violated “Appendix A: Diocese of Toledo Code of Pastoral Conduct” of the diocesan To Protect and to Heal: Policy on Sexual Abuse of Minors.

The announcement stated that the Diocese reported the allegation the day it was received to the appropriate civil authorities and placed Father Punnoor on administrative leave pending the results of the civil investigation to be followed by the ecclesiastical investigation.

Findings

Upon the conclusion of the civil investigation, the Diocese of Toledo received correspondence from Lucas County Children Services that the agency’s assessment determined that Reverend Samuel Punnoor’s actions did not meet the definition of sexual abuse as defined by state law. The agency also indicated that it has concerns about Father Punnoor’s interactions with the victim and that he appears to have boundary issues in not recognizing appropriate interaction with this child.

The Diocese of Toledo undertook its own investigation, presenting all findings as required to the Diocesan Review Board. After serious deliberation and consideration of the results of this phase of the ecclesiastical investigation, the Diocesan Review Board concluded its process and presented its report to Bishop Daniel Thomas. The Board unanimously concluded that Father Punnoor violated the following standards in “Appendix A: Diocese of Toledo Code of Pastoral Conduct:”

3.2 – Physical contact with youth can be misconstrued and should occur (a) only when completely non-sexual and otherwise appropriate and (b) never in private.

5.2 – Harassment encompasses a broad range of physical, written or verbal behavior, including without limitation the following: unwelcome sexual advances or touching.

Based on its review of the findings from the ecclesiastical investigation, the Diocesan Review Board unanimously recommended to Bishop Thomas that Father Punnoor’s behavior warrants that he not continue in ministry in the Diocese of Toledo. In addition, the Board recommended that Father Punnoor remain on administrative leave, have no faculties for ministry in the Diocese of Toledo, be monitored and restricted from any access to children and return to his home diocese in India.

Bishop Thomas accepted the recommendations from the Diocesan Review Board and has fully informed the Bishop of Pathanamthitta, Father Punnoor’s Bishop, of the outcome of the investigations. And, as required, Bishop Thomas will forward all findings of the investigations to the Holy See for a final determination.

The Diocese of Toledo has communicated all findings and decisions regarding this case to Lucas County Children Services and the Lucas County Prosecutor’s Office.

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OHIO
Toledo Blade

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Toledo has determined that a priest placed on administrative leave two months ago, after a child complained of improper conduct, should return to his home diocese in India and have no priestly ministry or access to children in Toledo in the meantime.

The Toledo diocese had suspended the Rev. Samuel Punnoor on May 22 following the allegation that he had violated the diocesan code of pastoral conduct as it pertained to sexual abuse of minors. Since then, according to a diocesan statement, a Lucas County Children Services investigation found no actions meeting the statutory definition of sexual abuse.

But an ecclesiastical investigation submitted to the Diocesan Review Board resulted in findings that Father Punnoor violated two standards relating to physical contact with youth and sexual harassment, with the latter including unwanted sexual advances or touching, according to the statement. Bishop Daniel Thomas has accepted the review board’s recommendation that Father Punnoor remain on administrative leave and return to his home country, the diocese said.

Announcements regarding the decision will be made Sunday at two churches where Father Punnoor served as vicar: Most Blessed Sacrament in Toledo and St. Joseph in Maumee. Notices also will be sent to parents or guardians of students at Blessed Sacrament and St. Joseph schools and Central Catholic High School, where the priest formerly served as a faculty member, the diocese said.

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CALIFORNIA
Los Angeles Times

By STEPHEN CEASAR

Nuns locked in a dispute with the Los Angeles Archdiocese over the proposed sale of their convent to singer Katy Perry filed legal papers Friday accusing the archbishop of acting “as if he were above the rules and immune from the obligations of civil law.”

The dispute centers on who has legal authority to sell the villa-style hilltop property in Los Feliz, which spans several acres with expansive views of downtown Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Mountains.

The Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary contend that they have the legal authority to sell the property and that their sale agreement with restaurateur Dana Hollister for $15.5 million is legal.

The Los Angeles Archdiocese, however, sued to stop the sale, arguing that the church has legal authority over the property and that the nuns’ sale was unauthorized. The archdiocese’s agreement to sell the convent to Perry – for $14.5 million in cash – is legally sound, the archdiocese argued.

In documents filed in court Friday, attorneys representing the sisters contended that the archdiocese never sought to established legal control over the order’s nonprofit institute until June, when it installed officers to oversee the institute. That move, however, was illegal and a “hostile takeover” by the bishop of the order of nuns, the attorneys wrote.

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PHILIPPINES
Sun.Star

Friday, July 17, 2015

By KEVIN A. LAGUNDA
JUSTIN K. VESTIL

A PRIEST from a parish in the southwestern town of Aloguinsan, Cebu is accused of sexually molesting a 16-year-old girl.

Shirley (real name withheld) said the incident happened last Christmas Eve, when she was a trainee at the church choir.

Before the incident happened, the priest told her to get fruits inside his car. She obliged.
After she entered the car, the priest followed suit, she said.

Massage

“Iyaha kong gigunitan ug iyaha kong gipalingkod sa iyang paa. Mao tong nihangyo siya mo-kiss nako (He held on to me and asked me to sit on his lap. Then he asked me if he could kiss me),” Shirley said in radio dyHP report.

The girl said she refused his advances.

Her two cousins and an altar boy allegedly saw the priest hugging her.

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CONNECTICUT
The Valley Gazette

Fr. Honore Kombo of St. Augustine Seymour has been removed from his post while an investigation into financial irregularities continues. The parish sent the following letter to parishioners yesterday:

Saint Augustine Church
Seymour, Connecticut
July , 2015

Dear Parishioners,

Because of the news about Father Kombo last weekend many of you were surprised, upset, or had many questions. We are now hearing more questions and unreliable stories that are “floating” around our community of faith.

Although, at this point in time, we can not relate the entire story to you as it would jeopardize the on-going investigation, we were given permission by Reverend Shawn Daly, the Vicar for Priests, to give you a synopsis of what has been happening.

At the beginning of the 2015 year, your Finance Council, the Church Trustees, and the Parish Office began to notice discrepancies in the church’s 2014 financial reports.

After a number of meetings we determined that this was a situation that we did not clearly understand nor were we able to grasp the depth of what was happening. It was decided that we needed to alert several key offices at the Chancery as to what we were finding. Representatives from the Financial Office in Hartford immediately came down to St. Augustine’s and conducted a comprehensive forensic audit of all our accounts, reports and financial paperwork.

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UNITED STATES
The Daily Beast

Isabel Schwab

A few days before Oprah was scheduled to host the Duggar family on her show in December 2006, her production company, Harpo Studios, received a very strange, anonymous email.

At the time, the Arkansas family was best known for starring in the 2004 documentary 14 Kids and Pregnant Again! and for espousing ultra-conservative Christian values, particularly during patriarch Jim Bob’s run for U.S. Senate in 2002. And yet, despite the family’s super clean public image, the email accused the Duggar’s eldest son, Josh, of molesting girls, and his parents, Michelle and Jim Bob, of covering up his actions.

“I think that you should know the truth before they make a complete fool of you and your show,” read the email. “They have been on TV before and come across as a perfect family, which couldn’t be further from the truth. They jump from show to show to receive gifts for their family and to make them look really good. Please consider this and confront them about their secret.”

Oprah did not end up confronting the Duggars about the allegations on her show (she canceled their appearance), but her studio did pass along the email to the Department of Human Services, who opened up a police investigation. Though the police filed a report, by that point, three years had passed since the crimes were committed, which meant that the statute of limitations had expired on prosecuting Josh. So nothing happened.

Well, not nothing: the Duggars went on to act exactly as the email predicted, starring in the incredibly popular TLC reality show, 19 Kids and Counting (formerly 17 and then 18 kids) starting in 2008. Oprah may have been spared from being made a “complete fool,” but TLC either didn’t receive a similar email, or they chose to ignore it.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

July 19, 2015

Eamonn Duff
Sun-Herald senior investigative writer

A Catholic priest has been found guilty of common assault and dismissed from his Sydney parish after he smacked a child in church.

Three days before Holy Communion, eight-year-old Peter* was “grabbed” in the St John Vianney Catholic Church at Greenacre by Father Terrence Millard, “positioned” in front of a symbolic image of Jesus Christ being nailed to the cross and then punished with a “smack” to the upper buttocks for perceived bad behaviour.

When an alarmed teacher reported the incident to the school principal, it triggered a domino effect involving the Catholic Education Office, the NSW Police Force, criminal charges and a court case in which a finding of guilt was delivered – with no conviction recorded against the priest.

After a turbulent 10 months, Peter’s distraught parents were happy with the judgement and thought they had found closure.

They were wrong.

A fortnight ago, and just days after the magistrate’s ruling, the boy’s family became aware of a buzz of chatter among the church community that the priest had “won the case.”

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MASSACHUSETTS
Telegram & Gazette

By Samantha Allen
Telegram & Gazette

Posted Jul. 17, 2015

WORCESTER – The dismissal of charges alleging a man raped a woman in a Worcester alley in 1999 has prompted a state senator to propose the elimination of the time limit to prosecute rape cases altogether.

Sen. Jennifer L. Flanagan, D-Leominster, filed legislation this week to end the 15-year statute of limitations after learning Rudolph A. Williams, 43, with an address listed in Leominster, won’t be prosecuted in Worcester Superior Court for rape and two counts of assault and battery.

Two months ago Mr. Williams was arraigned for a case 16 years old, revived by discovery of a DNA match. The Worcester Police Department received a grant to review old evidence, according to the Worcester District Attorney’s office. When officers got a hit, they tracked Mr. Williams to Palm Beach, Florida, and extradited him back to Worcester County.

District Attorney Joseph D. Early Jr. said even though he knew the January 1999 case fell outside the 15-year limit, if prosecutors could prove the man had been living out of state for any length of time in the last decade-and-a-half, the case could be “tolled,” meaning the statute clock wouldn’t run during those times.

But Mr. Williams kept his Massachusetts address all these years, Mr. Early said, still registering as a Level 1 sex offender in a separate case and paying Massachusetts taxes. When officers found Mr. Williams in Florida, Mr. Early said the suspect claimed to have been on vacation. A judge ruled prosecutors failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt Mr. Williams had lived outside the state.

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NEW YORK
The Journal News

Jane Lerner, jlerner@lohud.com July 17, 2015

The case is being closely watched in the Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish communities, which have long struggled with allegations that victims of sexual abuse are discouraged from reporting the crimes.

A New Square man recalled in excruciating detail Friday how a New Square educator instructed him to take off his pants and began molesting him on Sept. 11, 2001, when he was 8 years old.

The alleged abuse didn’t stop until he moved out of the village more than five years later, the victim, now in his 20s, said as he took the stand for a second day in the trial of Moshe Menachem Taubenfeld, 55, a family friend.

Taubenfeld, also known as Mendel Zarkowsky, is charged with second-degree course of sexual conduct against a child, a felony. He has denied the charges.

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NEW YORK
Forward

Frimet Goldberger
July 17, 2015

A man testified that he suffered years of child sexual abuse after visiting a respected member of his upstate New York Hasidic community for comfort on the day of the September 11 terror attacks.

Laiby Stern told a court that he was sexually molested for five years from 2001 until his bar mitzvah by Moshe Menachem Taubenfeld, whom he described as one of “the most powerful men” in his Skverer Hasidic-dominated Rockland County community of New Square.

Stern told a packed courtroom that Taubenfeld first molested him when the boy sought reassurance after after hearing about the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

“He called me into his office, closed the door and told me to pull my pants and underpants down,” Stern, now 22, recounted multiple times during his testimony, pausing regularly to regain his composure.

Taubenfeld then allegedly proceeded to rub the boy’s penis. “He then told me to lay flat on the desk and inserted a finger in my anus,” he told the rapt courtroom.

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ITALIA
Il Fatto Quotidiano

[On the eve of the first hearing, the former nuncio was hospitalized. The Holy See spoke of intensive care, but in reality the former archbishop Jozef Wesolowski had arrived in a daze (apparently from a mix of alcohol and drugs) and discharged after three days. As is evident in ilfattoquotidiano.it, Papa Francesco is very upset about the stop in the proceedings. And rumors abound.]

Vaticano, veleni e sospetti dietro la frenata del processo per pedofilia e pedopornografia a Wesolowski

On the eve of the first hearing, the former nuncio was hospitalized. From the Holy See spoke intensive care, but in reality the former archbishop had arrived in a daze (apparently for a mix of alcohol and drugs) and discharged after three days. As is evident in ilfattoquotidiano.it, Papa Francesco is very upset about the stop. And there are those in the corridors of St. Peter speaks of the Polish lobby as principal of referrals

Alla vigilia della prima udienza, l’ex nunzio è stato ricoverato in ospedale. Dalla Santa Sede parlavano di terapia intensiva, ma in realtà l’ex arcivescovo era arrivato in stato confusionale (pare per un mix di alcol e farmaci) e dimesso dopo tre giorni. Secondo quanto risulta a ilfattoquotidiano.it, Papa Francesco è molto irritato per lo stop. E c’è chi tra i corridoi di San Pietro parla della lobby polacca come mandante dei rinvii

di Francesco Antonio Grana | 17 luglio 2015

Il “mistero Wesolowski” si infittisce. Chi c’è dietro la brusca frenata del processo penale vaticano che vede per la prima volta un ex nunzio ed ex arcivescovo alla sbarra per pedofilia e pedopornografia? Ilfattoquotidiano.it ha raccolto tutte le indiscrezioni sulla situazione attuale di Jozef Wesolowski. L’ex nunzio è stato ricoverato al Policlinico Gemelli di Roma, il “Vaticano III” secondo la celebre espressione di Karol Wojtyla, nel pomeriggio del 10 luglio 2015, vigilia dell’apertura del processo penale in cui era imputato con ben cinque capi di accusa: detenzione di materiale pedopornografico; pedofilia, in un caso in concorso con il suo assistente ed amante, l’ex diacono Francisco Occi Reyes; ricettazione di materiale pedopornografico; lesioni gravi alle sue vittime adolescenti; condotta che offende la religione e la morale cristiana per aver visitato siti pornografici.

Al Gemelli, raccontano a ilfattoquotidiano.it, Wesolowski è arrivato in stato confusionale a seguito dell’assunzione di farmaci e alcol ed è stato tenuto in osservazione per un banale calo pressorio. Non è mai stato in terapia intensiva, come invece dichiarato dal Vaticano, né in rianimazione, né in codice rosso. Dopo appena tre giorni di ricovero, il 13 luglio 2015 l’ex nunzio avrebbe lasciato l’ospedale e sarebbe tornato in Vaticano nella stanza numero 5 del Collegio dei Penitenzieri, di fronte Casa Santa Marta, la residenza di Papa Francesco. La Santa Sede continua a smentire e a sostenere che Wesolowski sarebbe ancora ricoverato in terapia intensiva.

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MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation

07/17/2015

Jennifer Haselberger

This week has seen another wave of disheartening reports about the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis. From updated information about the number of claims filed to the addition of more than a hundred parishes as claimants to the ongoing controversy about the filing deadline, there has been much to trouble us. However, the story that I found most disturbing was the confirmed abuse of elderly and vulnerable residents at Saint Therese nursing home in New Hope.

Earlier this week the Star Tribune reported that two nursing assistants employed at Saint Therese were arrested after family members of residents used hidden cameras to uncover and report the assistants’ physical abuse of the residents. In addition to the abuse caught on camera, family members of at least two residents reported having seen numerous bruises and cuts that were ‘too numerous to ignore’. St Therese responded by firing the two nursing assistants as well nine others who the facility believes failed to report the abuse or otherwise violated the terms of the care they were to be providing.

The Star Tribune report also noted that this is the second time in less than a year that a Saint Therese facility has been investigated for alleged abuse of a resident. According to the report, in early 2014 a staff member at Saint Therese at Oxbow Lake slapped a resident who was suffering from severe dementia. And, many of you will recall that in 2009 Archdiocesan priest and military chaplain Father Tim Vakoc died following a fall he sustained while a resident of the St Therese, New Hope facility. Vakoc, who was critically injured while serving with the Army in Iraq, died when two nursing assistants caused him to fall head-first to the floor as they were transferring him from his wheelchair to his bed. A subsequent investigation by the Office of Health Facility Complaints determined that the nursing assistants were negligent in their care of Vakoc and responsible for his fall.

This type of failure to care for and protect the elderly and vulnerable is abhorrent anywhere, but it is especially disturbing when it occurs at a Catholic institution. Saint Therese has been a ministry of the Catholic Church since its establishment, with the permission of the Archdiocese, in 1964. Moreover, with the rapid expansion of Catholic facilities for the elderly, and especially the increase in the development of senior housing and nursing facilities on parish campuses, the Church must ensure that the services it is providing truly reflect its core belief in the dignity of all people.

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NEW YORK
News 12

NEW CITY – The prosecution finished presenting its case Friday in the sexual molestation trial of a prominent Rockland County rabbi.

Laiby Stern, who wants to be identified, told the judge that Rabbi Moshe Taubenfeld sexually molested him when he went for counseling after the Sept. 11. attacks. Stern, now 22, claims the abuse carried on for five years.

He told the court that the rabbi gave him $20 as hush money after each alleged assault.

Taubenfeld has been described as one of the “most powerful men” in one of the most religious communities in America.

During cross-examination, Taubenfeld’s lawyer, Gerard Damiani, tried to show that Stern was not telling the truth. He also tried to get Stern to say he was coached in his testimony by victims’ advocates. Stern denied the allegation.

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CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune

By Manya Brachear Pashman
Chicago Tribune

The former Chicago bishop of the Orthodox Church in America who was asked to retire amid allegations of sexual misconduct two years ago has been serving as a parish priest in eastern Pennsylvania without permission from the national church.

Bishop Matthias, born David Lawrence Moriak, has been serving at the parish in Hermitage, Pa., at the request of another bishop, said a church official. He stepped down from his post as head of the Midwest diocese in April 2013 after the church deemed sexual misconduct what he described as “unwelcome written and spoken comments to a woman that she regarded as an inappropriate crossing of personal boundaries.”

“I do repent of using poor judgment, of using inappropriate words that I thought were being received as humorous,” Matthias said at the time of his ouster. “It was never my intention to cause a complaint of any harm or discomfort. In fact, I was quite concerned for her health and well-being. I am sorry that my kindness and generosity to this person was viewed with suspicion and ulterior motives.”

At the time, Metropolitan Tikhon, leader of the denomination in North America, said Matthias would not return to his leadership post in Chicago. Whether he would be allowed to serve in a ministry role during his retirement was unclear.

“The healing of the diocese and of the complainant as well as Bishop Matthias’ own healing would not be possible should he be returned to the diocese as a ruling hierarch,” the Metropolitan said in a statement at the time. “The Holy Synod offered him some time to reflect upon this action and to plan for his transition.”

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ALABAMA
The Alabama Baptist

After a warrant for his arrest was issued, former Alabama Baptist youth pastor Ryan Scott Rodgers turned himself in to the New Orleans police June 26.

Rodgers was arrested for one count of sexual battery and seven counts of indecent behavior with juveniles, reportedly having molested two teenage boys in New Orleans over the course of one year while working as a youth minister for churches in Orleans, Jefferson and Plaquemines parishes in Louisiana.

He had served as youth pastor at Liberty Park Baptist Church, Vestavia Hills, from 2003 to 2009.

Pastor Scott Guffin told The Alabama Baptist, “No allegations of criminal wrongdoing were made against Ryan Rodgers during his time at Liberty Park Baptist (LPBC).

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CHICAGO (IL)
National Catholic Reporter

Tom Gallagher | Jul. 17, 2015 NCR Today

Moody’s Investors Service affirms the Chicago archdiocese’s A1 rating on its privately placed Series 2012 and Series 2013 Unsecured Notes.

Moody’s defines an A1 rating as “obligations rated A are judged to be upper-medium grade and are subject to low credit risk.” A triple-A rating is the highest followed by Aa1, Aa2, Aa3, and then A1. The A1 rating is considered an investment grade rating.

The total amount of the notes still outstanding is approximately $154 million. (See the archdiocese’s most recent independent accountants’ review report by Deloitte & Touche, LLP.)

The notes are a general obligation of the archdiocese and will be paid from funds of the chancery and Catholic cemeteries, but the archdiocese can access other funds as available to meet debt service payments on the notes.

The outlook is negative is due in part to weak operations, along with uncertainty around the potential impact of priest sex abuse settlements. In many respects, this is unsurprising.

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VATICAN CITY
National Geographic

By Robert Draper
Photographs by Dave Yoder

When about 7,000 awed strangers first encounter him on the public stage, he is not yet the pope—but like a chrysalis stirring, something astounding is already present in the man. Inside Stadium Luna Park, in downtown Buenos Aires, Argentina, Roman Catholics and evangelical Christians have gathered for an ecumenical event. From the stage, a pastor calls out for the city’s archbishop to come up and say a few words. The audience reacts with surprise, because the man striding to the front had been sitting in the back all this time, for hours, like no one of any importance. Though a cardinal, he is not wearing the traditional pectoral cross around his neck, just a black clerical shirt and a blazer, looking like the simple priest he was decades ago. He is gaunt and elderly with a somber countenance, and at this moment nine years ago it is hard to imagine such an unassuming, funereal Argentine being known one day, in every corner of the world, as a figure of radiance and charisma.

He speaks—quietly at first, though with steady nerves—in his native tongue, Spanish. He has no notes. The archbishop makes no mention of the days when he regarded the evangelical movement in the dismissive way many Latin American Catholic priests do, as an escuela de samba—an unserious happening akin to rehearsals at a samba school. Instead the most powerful Argentine in the Catholic Church, which asserts that it is the only true Christian church, says that no such distinctions matter to God. “How nice,” he says, “that brothers are united, that brothers pray together. How nice to see that nobody negotiates their history on the path of faith—that we are diverse but that we want to be, and are already beginning to be, a reconciled diversity.”

Hands outstretched, his face suddenly alive, and his voice quavering with passion, he calls out to God: “Father, we are divided. Unite us!”

Those who know the archbishop are astonished, since his implacable expression has earned him nicknames like “Mona Lisa” and “Carucha” (for his bulldog-like jowls). But what will also be remembered about that day occurs immediately after he stops talking. He drops slowly to his knees, onstage—a plea for the attendees to pray for him. After a startled pause, they do so, led by an evangelical minister. The image of the archbishop kneeling among men of lesser status, a posture of supplication at once meek and awesome, will make the front pages in Argentina.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Kent and Sussex Courier

A former Uckfield teacher and lay priest who claimed he was too fat to abuse young boys has been convicted of 26 offences.

Ex-Uckfield Community College deputy headteacher Christopher Howarth stood trial on a string of sexual offences against two young boys.

One of his victims told the court how Howarth was considered a “legend” in the community and that he was initially apprehensive about going to the police, fearing no one would believe the accusations.

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IOWA
WCF Courier

By Pat Kinney

WATERLOO | A former Dubuque man who alleges he was sexually abused by a priest as fourth-grader in 1985 says the Archdiocese of Dubuque prematurely concluded its investigation of the incident in clearing the priest.

“It is clear that the archdiocese chose to make this decision before receiving all the facts,” Jeff Buchheit said in a statement released through the Waterloo law firm of Dutton, Braun, Staack & Hellman, which is representing him in his claims against the archdiocese. “Clearly, the investigator was told by the archdiocese to stop working on the matter before all of his work on the case was complete.”

Earlier this week, Dubuque Archbishop Michael Jackels said the Archdiocesan Review Board considered evidence against the Rev. Leo Riley and that church officials hired a licensed private investigator to interview Riley and Bucheit, who is now 39 and made the accusations in March.

Jackels said in a Sunday letter to parishioners that “the best information available does not support a reasonable belief that the allegation is true.”

“Unless additional evidence is presented, there is no need to pursue it any further,” Jackels said.

Riley had served as a Church of Resurrection associate pastor in 1985 and 1986. He was placed on leave as a pastor in the Diocese of Venice, Fla., after the allegations surfaced.

“Jackels’ letter to the parishioners came out only five days after my lengthy interview” by the investigator, Buchheit said.

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NEW JERSEY
Press of Atlantic City

Press staff reports

A priest ousted from the church due to sex abuse allegations years ago has found a new career as a family counselor in Vineland.

Edward Igle has been a licensed therapist since the 1980s, and now runs a practice on Landis Avenue, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

Claims by two men who said Igle had abused them in the 1970s were deemed credible; one victim told the newspaper that Igle paid a $7,000 settlement. The church permanently removed him in 2000.

Igle, now 68, told the Inquirer that he never abused anyone. He also said that he never meets alone with children he counsels, and he sometimes mentions the accusations when he teaches professionals about sex abuse.

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CALIFORNIA
News 10

SACRAMENTO (AP) – California defendants accused of sexually abusing children will no longer be able to use a consent defense in civil cases.

Gov. Jerry Brown announced Thursday he signed legislation introduced after Los Angeles Unified School District avoided liability for a teacher having sex with a 14-year-old girl.

The teacher was sentenced to three years in prison in 2011 for lewd acts against a child. The district avoided having to pay the victim money in the subsequent civil case after its attorney argued the girl shared responsibility by consenting.

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CALIFORNIA
The Raw Story

BETHANIA PALMA MARKUS
16 JUL 2015

A California youth pastor has been accused of sexually abusing a 13-year-old girl after police found him in the backseat of a car with her on a highway turn out.

Yanhao “Eric” Ren, 24, of the Los Angeles County community known as Rowland Heights, was arrested Monday on suspicion of a number of sex crimes with a child, local station KTLA reports.

Ren has been a pastor for Evangelical Formosan Church of Rowland Heights for two years and has allegedly carried out a sexual relationship with the child since May, the station reports.

On Sunday just before midnight, the California Highway Patrol found him parked with the girl off of Highway 330, a low-traffic road that runs through the Angeles National Forrest, the Highland Community News reports.

According to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, which lead the investigation, the Highway Patrol conducted a welfare check on the car. Both Ren and the girl told investigators they had a sexual relationship. The victim met Ren while attending youth programs at the church.

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GUAM
Pacific Daily News

Archbishop Anthony Apuron has retained an attorney to warn an accuser to stop ruining the name of the island’s Catholic church and its leader.

“This letter serves as a demand to you to immediately cease and desist from making any further defamatory comments or publications against Archbishop Apuron’s reputation and character,” wrote Michelle R. Neal, a Sacramento, Calif., attorney whose expertise includes sexual harassment claim prevention and investigations.

“Your conduct has caused and continues to cause grave harm not only to Archbishop Apuron and the church in Guam, but also to the universal church,” Neal wrote to Toves on July 5.

The accuser, John C. Toves, a native of Guam who lives in California, said Friday he won’t stop publicly questioning Apuron because he believes he’s saving the church by calling for a change in leadership.

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MINNEOSOTA
St. Cloud Times

Bishop Donald Kettler of the Diocese of St. Cloud will have a series of listening sessions in August following allegations of sexual abuse committed by three priests of the diocese.

Four civil lawsuits allege abuse by the Revs. Robert Smith, William Wey and James Thoennes. The suits name the Diocese of St. Cloud as a defendant.

Smith and Wey have been dead for more than 25 years. Thoennes lives in St. Cloud under restrictions.

The listening sessions will be at parishes in areas of the diocese where the three men served. According to a news release from the diocese, the gatherings are “an opportunity for the bishop to acknowledge the accusations, listen and answer questions, and encourage any other abuse victims to come forward.”

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MINNESOTA
KSTP

By: Jennie Lissarrague

The Diocese of Saint Cloud will host a series of listening sessions this summer after allegations of sexual abuse against three priests of the diocese.

Four civil lawsuits claim abuse by the Revs. Robert Smith, William Wey and James Thoennes; the Diocese of St. Cloud is named as a defendant.

The sessions will be hosted in August by Bishop Donald Kettler.

The bishop says the listening sessions will be a chance for him to acknowledge the accusations, answer questions and encourage other victims to come forward. Similar sessions were held in the past after other allegations of abuse in St. Cloud. Between 2002 and 2013, about 60 listening sessions were conducted under the leadership of Bishop John Kinney, the diocese says.

According to the diocese, Smith and Wey have been dead for more than 25 years, and Thoennes is living in St. Cloud under restrictions.

Smith, who died in July 1987, served at Holy Angels Church, St. Cloud; Holy Family Church, Belle Prairie; Our Lady of Victory Church, Fergus Falls; St. Leonard Church, Pelican Rapids; St. Paul Church, Sauk Centre; chaplain, Poor Clare Sisters, Sauk Rapids; Holy Cross Church, North Prairie; and St. Stanislaus Church, Sobieski.

Wey, who died in July 1988, served at St. Mary’s Cathedral, St. Cloud; St. Donatus Church, Brooten; Immaculate Conception Church, Sedan; St. Gall Church, Tintah; Sacred Heart Church, Dent; St. Peter Church, Dumont; and St. Patrick Church, Collis.

Thoennes served at St. Anthony Church, St. Cloud; St. Mary Church, Melrose; St. Joseph Church, Waite Park; St. John Church, Foley; St. Anne Church, Kimball; Sacred Heart Church, Dent; St. Leonard Church, Pelican Rapids; St. Joseph Church, Bertha; St. Edward Church, Henning; Chaplain, St. Mary’s Villa, Pierz.

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