ABUSE TRACKER

PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Reuters

PHILADELPHIA | BY PHILIP PULLELLA AND SCOTT MALONE

Pope Francis, speaking in America’s birthplace on Saturday, offered stout words of support to Hispanic and other immigrants in the United States, telling them not to be discouraged at a time when some prominent politicians are directing hostility toward them.

The 78-year-old Argentine pontiff toured Independence Hall in Philadelphia before addressing a crowd estimated at more than 40,000 outside the 18th century red brick building where basic American liberties were proclaimed and where independence from Britain was declared.

“Do not be discouraged by whatever challenges and hardships you face,” the pope told the many Hispanics and other recent immigrants to the United States in the crowd, adding that he felt “particular affection” toward them.

During his first visit to the United States, the leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics on Thursday had urged Americans in a historic speech to Congress to reject “a mindset of hostility” toward immigrants. He expanded on that issue in his Philadelphia speech, delivered in Spanish.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The New York Times

By JIM YARDLEY and DANIEL J. WAKIN
SEPT. 26, 2015

PHILADELPHIA — Standing near Independence Hall, where America’s founding documents were signed, Pope Francis on Saturday called religious freedom a “fundamental right” and laid out a broad and tolerant vision of what it should be, but also warned about its perversion “as a pretext for hatred and brutality.”

On the final leg of his first trip to the United States, Francis arrived in Philadelphia and went straight to the city’s Roman Catholic basilica, exhorting ordinary Catholics to bolster their role in sustaining the church. After a Mass before 2,400 people and a long midday rest, he traveled to Independence Mall and broadened his canvas: addressing the place of faith in a nation.

Religious freedom means the right to worship God, “as our consciences dictate,” Francis said. And, he went on, the principle goes beyond temples and the private sphere: Religion also serves society, especially as a bulwark “in the face of every claim to absolute power.”

Francis emerged from Independence Hall to the strains of Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man.” He stood at the lectern used by Abraham Lincoln to deliver the Gettysburg Address, and in his own address, Francis extolled the principles of the country’s founding fathers embodied by the Declaration of Independence signed in the building behind him.​

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Saturday, September 26, 2015

Statement by Barbara Blaine of Chicago, SNAP president (312-399-4747, bblaine@snapnetwork.org)

Today, Pope Francis con-celebrated mass with the disgraced former head of the Philadelphia archdiocese, Cardinal Justin Rigali. The other day, Francis brought with him to the White House the disgraced former head of the Los Angeles archdiocese, Cardinal Roger Mahony.

[CBS Los Angeles]

Seen at the papal festivities a few days ago was the disgraced Archbishop John Neinstedt. The St. Paul/Minneapolis archdiocese, which he headed for years, faces criminal prosecution for endangering kids.

The “take away” here is this: No matter how much you enable or hide predator priests, if you’re a bishop, you’ll always be welcome in and by the Catholic hierarchy. Never mind if your visibility rubs salt into deep wounds. Never mind if your grandstanding discourages others from reporting crimes. Once you’ve been let into our esteemed ranks, you’ll always be a part of this exclusive club and enjoy the many benefits such membership confers.

In 2011, nine years after bishops promised to “reform,” Rigali, under pressure, was forced to suspend 21 accused Philly priests on one day. These suspensions took place exactly one month after Rigali wrote his flock assuring them that there were no credibly-accused priests remaining within the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. In 2005, Rigali kept silent as his lawyer blasted prosecutors as “anti-Catholic” in the wake of a second scathing report about widespread clergy sex crimes and cover ups in his archdiocese.

At least Bishop Robert Finn, the only US bishop to be convicted of withholding evidence of child sex crimes from police, isn’t jumping on the papal bandwagon. (He’s in Spain now, probably at the urging of church public relations officials.)

Despite this callous behavior, we beg victims, witnesses and whistleblowers to keep speaking up, exposing wrongdoers, protecting kids, calling police, deterring cover ups and getting help.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Fiscal Times

By Sebastien Malo and Philip Pullella and Laila Kearney, Reuters

September 26, 2015

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – In a dense crowd gathered in central Philadelphia waiting for the arrival of Pope Francis on Saturday, lapsed Catholic Becky Ianni stood somberly with an oversized photo of herself at age nine, when she says a priest began sexually abusing her.

The U.S. Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal, which catapulted into public view in 2002, has continued to be an open wound for victims, who say the Church has not made the changes needed to protect children and punish offenders.

“Victims this week are really hurting and they need to know that we’re out here and they’re not alone,” said Ianni, 58, the Washington and Virginia chapter director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP).

The pontiff’s arrival in Philadelphia came amid suggestions from a high-ranking Church official that Francis could meet with abuse victims while in the city.

Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said at a news conference that if Francis met with victims, it would be a private encounter to protect victim privacy.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Washington Post

By Karen Heller, Frances Stead Sellers and Michael E. Ruane
September 26

PHILADELPHIA — Pope Francis made his way through a jubilant crowd here Saturday afternoon to the symbolic birthplace of the United States, and challenged the country to rededicate itself to the solemn promises of its past, including its commitment to religious liberty.

After being driven through the throng, with the popemobile stopping several times for Francis to kiss babies, the 78-year-old pontiff arrived at Independence Hall, where the U.S. Consitution and the Declaration of Independence were signed. “It was here,” Francis said, “that the freedoms which define this country were first proclaimed.”

Introduced by Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man,” the pope stood at a wooden lectern used by Abraham Lincoln for his Gettysbrg Address, and told the crowd assembled on Independence Mall that “history also shows that these or any truths must constantly be reaffirmed, re-appropriated and defended.” …

Yet not everyone shared in the joy of the pope’s presence. The placard outside the basilica about the sex abuse scandal was stenciled by Robert Hoatson, a 63-year-old former priest whose group, Road to Recovery, works with victims of the clergy sexual abuse scandal and who says he is a victim himself.

Hoatson, who lives in West Orange, N.J., said he followed the pope to Washington, New York and now Philadelphia with his message of holding the church “accountable” for the scandal.

It is not clear whether Francis will meet with survivors before he leaves for Rome Sunday. Earlier this week at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in the District, he praised the “courage” and pain” of U.S. bishops in dealing with the scandal. That prompted rebukes from some victims’ advocates, who criticized the pope for offering comfort and symphathy to the bishops, while saying little to address the suffering of clergy sex abuse survivors.

“It’s a tough week to be a victim,” said Barbara Dorris, spokesperson for Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. “They feel like once again they’ve been forgotten.”

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UNITED STATES
Huffington Post

By Jason Berry

PHILADELPHIA, WASHINGTON and NEW YORK — Maintaining a tireless pace, Pope Francis kept on point Saturday as he arrived in Philadelphia and celebrated a midday Mass while large, fervent crowds waited outside, entertained by Latin American music and white-clad dancers, before a papal address in the evening at historic Independence Hall.

Anticipation of a different kind was building among people who struggle in the role of church outcasts: victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests.

The Associated Press reported that Francis was expected to “talk privately with abuse victims this weekend.”

The Philadelphia archdiocese has been hit hard with prosecutions, grand jury investigations and civil cases involving more than three dozen alleged clergy perpetrators, and one monsignor who spent time in prison for complicity.

The flood of benevolent media coverage for Francis would seem a form of respite to the beleaguered archbishop of Philadelphia, Charles Chaput, who has closed parishes in dealing with deficits from scandal-driven legal bills.

But for David Clohessy, director of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), the prospects of Francis meeting with survivors held scant hope.

“The seven or eight previous meetings between popes [Benedict and Francis] have given short-term comfort for a handful of survivors and long-term feelings of betrayal,” Clohessy told GroundTruth before any confirmation of a meeting.

“It will reinforce the convenient narrative that abuse cover-ups are over and only healing is needed,” he said.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Magazine

By Joel Mathis | September 26, 2015

A Vatican spokesman was coy Saturday afternoon when asked if Pope Francis will meet with survivors of clergy sex abuse while in Philadelphia.

The Rev. Federico Lombardi noted that Pope Francis had met with abuse survivors on previous trips abroad, but the meetings had never been pre-publicized. He made the comments during a media briefing Saturday at the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

“These meetings have never been announced before,” he said, adding that the pope would seek a “personal encounter” and not a “media sensation” in the event of a meeting with abuse survivors. News of a meeting would emerge afterward, he suggested, but he declined to confirm or deny any such meetings in advance.

There are good reasons to think Pope Francis would seek such a meeting here, however. Vatican observers — including Philadelphia Vatican reporter Rocco Palmo, have suggested this trip to Philadelphia was meant in large part to try to reverse the damage and pain from a decade of sex scandals in the archdiocese.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
USA Today

John Bacon, USA TODAY September 26, 2015

PHILADELPHIA — Pope Francis is expected to hammer home his recurring themes of family and a welcoming church when he meets with bishops from around the globe Sunday at the World Meeting of Families.

That message may not sound too different from his speeches and homilies in Washington and New York this week, but the headline will be “more than selfies,” said Father James Bretzky, a theology professor at Boston College.

“It will be, in a certain sense, a collective reaffirmation of the importance of families,” he said.

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UNITED STATES
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

by Kristine Ward, September 26, 2015

Today, NSAC feels the need to present more images in a welcoming place that we hope will console the survivors and their families and combat the onslaught of images streaming across television screens of Pope Francis.

We place the images of Judy Jones, Steve Spaner, John Pilmaier, Peter Isley, Joelle Casteix, Sister Maureen Turlish, Becky Ianni, David Lorenz all of whom have taken to the streets in strong and determined witness of the truth. To speak for survivors. To banish the sought after “it’s history” approach of the hierarchy and its pontiff.

There are more images today because we believe there is more need for comfort for the survivors, particularly in light of Pope Francis’ second expansive praising of priests and religious sisters who the Pope said, “have suffered greatly” during the sexual abuse scandal.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Religion News Service

Taylor Nakagawa and Corie Wilkins | September 26, 2015

PHILADELPHIA (RNS) It’s been a frustrating week here for Barbara Dorris and Becky Ianni.

On Friday night (Sept. 25), the two co-directors of SNAP: Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, kept a lonely vigil, trying vainly to attract attention to their cause — recognition for clergy sex-abuse victims — outside the Cathedral Basilica of Sts. Peter and Paul, the site of Pope Francis’ Mass on Saturday morning.

Yet only a block away, several groups taking to the streets to fight for economic equality, an issue dear to the current pope, were able to bring together at least 300 marchers.

“We are here because it’s going to be a very difficult week for victims,” said Ianni, who was holding a photo taken of her at 9 years old, when she says she was abused by a priest. “Many victims have felt abandoned by their church, and whenever they turn on their TV this weekend they’re gonna see something about the pope.”

Ianni thinks her fight for awareness hasn’t received much attention this week because of Francis’ enormous popularity, both within the Catholic Church and outside of it.

“This pope is so well-liked that we are the negative side of that and it’s hard for people to say they think about abuse when so many people love this pope,” Ianni said.

Standing at Ianni’s side, Dorris said she wants to raise awareness about clergy sex abuse and call attention to what she sees as Francis’ lack of recognition of its victims. Earlier this week, Francis addressed bishops in Washington, D.C., on the issue and generally commended them for their handling of the years-long crisis.

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UNITED STATES
ABC News

By RACHEL ZOLL, AP RELIGION REPORTER
NEW YORK — Sep 26, 2015

U.S. Catholic bishops have called the scandal over clergy sex abuse the worst crisis ever to hit the church in America.

To restore public trust, church leaders have overhauled how they handled the cases, paid multimillion-dollar settlements to victims and apologized repeatedly for failing to protect children. Still, the scandal persists. A handful of dioceses remain in bankruptcy court, one diocese faces criminal prosecution, and advocates for victims are pressing lawmakers in several states to lift time limits so more people who were molested can be compensated.

Here’s a look at how the abuse scandal played out in the United States:

HISTORY OF SCANDAL: Clergy sex abuse first drew public attention in the 1980s, with the case of a pedophile priest in the Diocese of Lafayette, Louisiana. Over the next two decades, scandals arose in several dioceses. But it wasn’t until 2002, when The Boston Globe persuaded a judge to unseal personnel files in the Archdiocese of Boston, that a full-blown national crisis erupted. Revelations about bishops moving guilty priests among parishes without warning parents or police caused an uproar so intense that every American diocese was compelled to take an inventory of how they had dealt with abusers and treated victims going back decades.

BISHOPS RESPOND: Under enormous public pressure, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops adopted sweeping reforms in 2002 meant to safeguard children and restore trust in the church. The bishops created a streamlined process for removing any cleric who molested a child. Dioceses conducted background checks on priests and employees, trained teachers and volunteers on identifying abuse and set up programs meant to help victims. The bishops say they have spent tens of millions of dollars on child safety over the last decade. The Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, along with other advocates, say bishops often still treat victims as enemies, and note most dioceses have not released the names of perpetrators, which advocates say would help give other victims the courage to come forward.

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UNITED STATES
Huffington Post

Nancy Fornasiero

During his high-profile visit to the United States this week, Pope Francis is receiving an overwhelmingly warm welcome — from Catholics and non-Catholics alike. And rightly so. Whether through his views on environmental stewardship, his tough-love critiques of excessively capitalist societies, or his compassion for the poor and marginalized, he has become the darling of liberals of all stripes.

And yet, there is still one extremely large group of “God’s people” who are not on the receiving end of Pope’s insistence for equality and justice. Despite the undeniable facts (half of the world’s Catholics are female; most Sunday pews are occupied by women; the vast majority of North American Catholics support the idea of women’s ordination) Pope Francis’ 2013 assertion that the “door is closed” to women in the priesthood has remained unchanged.

As Lisa Miller, in her thoughtful overview of Pope Francis’s track record on the status Catholic women, puts it: “Francis, for all his forward thinking, entirely supports this professional sidelining of females.”

Case in point: Just this past Saturday, on September 20 2105, Fr. Jack McClure was told by the Archbishop of his diocese that he would no longer be permitted to minister to his parish. Why? During a panel held in Philadelphia, PA at the Women’s Ordination Worldwide Conference he publicly supported the idea that qualified Catholic women should be allowed to be priests.

Roy Bourgeois, a former Catholic priest excommunicated for his refusal to tow the Church’s party line of discrimination against women, is no stranger to the personal sacrifices that accompany following one’s own conscience on this issue. Bourgeois, author of My Journey from Silence to Solidarity, has issued the following respectful yet pointed letter to Pope Francis just in time for his historic visit.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

By Peter Smith / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Hours before the pope’s visit to Independence Mall, people have been steadily streaming along barricades toward the entrances to the event.

There were nuns in habits, children in strollers, visitors in lanyards, a little boy in suit and tie, middle-aged women in shirts that read: “This girl loves Pope Francis.” They walked past metal fencing with signs noting that drones are prohibited, where every so many feet orange-clad volunteers stand giving directions.

Volunteers and siblings Justin and Maryrose Owens arrived at their corner around 6:30 a.m., and said they have seen a steady stream of people since then. Pope Francis himself is scheduled to visit at 4:45 p.m.

“Everybody is in a very good mood,” he said. …

As for the more recent history of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, Pope Francis did not speak of the crisis of sexual abuse here. Grand jury reports in 2005 and 2011 revealed numerous cases of abusive priests whose superiors knew of their offenses but kept them in ministry. A priest in the archdiocese’s hierarchy is behind bars for his conviction for keeping a known abuser in a parish setting where he could and did molest again.

Francis has made only brief references to the abuse scandals in the church during his United States visit, telling bishops they had made great progress in reforming their responses and commending priests for enduring “the shame of some of your brothers who harmed and scandalized the Church in the most vulnerable of her members.”

Bishops have said they expect Francis, like Pope Benedict XVI before him, will meet privately with sexual-abuse survivors before the end of his trip on Sunday.

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AUSTRALIA
Courier Mail

DAVID MURRAY THE SUNDAY MAIL (QLD) SEPTEMBER 27, 2015

PREDATOR school counsellor Kevin Lynch used a remote control at his desk to lock his office door so he could sexually abuse students in total privacy.

Lynch’s reign of terror at St Paul’s School at Bald Hills and prestigious Brisbane Grammar School from the 1970s to 1990s will be aired at the child sex abuse royal commission.

A nine-day public hearing was announced on Friday, with past and present school principals expected to give evidence about their handling of historic and current abuse.

An appalling cover-up followed Lynch’s abuse, with both schools failing to check on the welfare of students he counselled after becoming aware of serious allegations against the counsellor.

Lynch counselled thousands of boys at Brisbane Grammar from 1972 to 1988 and then at St Paul’s from 1989 until his death in 1997.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
ABC News

Here is the full homily Pope Francis was slated to give at the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul, as translated by the Holy See:

This morning I learned something about the history of this beautiful Cathedral: the story behind its high walls and windows. I would like to think, though, that the history of the Church in this city and state is really a story not about building walls, but about breaking them down. It is a story about generation after generation of committed Catholics going out to the peripheries, and building communities of worship, education, charity and service to the larger society.

That story is seen in the many shrines which dot this city, and the many parish churches whose towers and steeples speak of God’s presence in the midst of our communities. It is seen in the efforts of all those dedicated priests, religious and laity who for over two centuries have ministered to the spiritual needs of the poor, the immigrant, the sick and those in prison. And it is seen in the hundreds of schools where religious brothers and sisters trained children to read and write, to love God and neighbor, and to contribute as good citizens to the life of American society. All of this is a great legacy which you have received, and which you have been called to enrich and pass on.

Most of you know the story of Saint Katharine Drexel, one of the great saints raised up by this local Church. When she spoke to Pope Leo XIII of the needs of the missions, the Pope – he was a very wise Pope! – asked her pointedly: “What about you? What are you going to do?”. Those words changed Katharine’s life, because they reminded her that, in the end, every Christian man and woman, by virtue of baptism, has received a mission. Each one of us has to respond, as best we can, to the Lord’s call to build up his Body, the Church.

“What about you?” I would like to dwell on two aspects of these words in the context of our particular mission to transmit the joy of the Gospel and to build up the Church, whether as priests, deacons, or members of institutes of consecrated life.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
CBS News

PHILADELPHIA — Pope Francis arrived in the City of Brotherly Love on Saturday for the final leg of his U.S. visit – a festive weekend devoted to celebrating Catholic families – and immediately called for the church to place greater value on women.

The pontiff’s plane touched down at the Philadelphia airport after takeoff from New York, bringing him to a city of blocked-off streets, sidewalks lined with portable potties, and checkpoints manned by police, National Guardsmen and border agents.

After speeches to Congress and the United Nations earlier this week aimed at spurring world leaders toward bold action on immigration and the environment, he is expected to focus more heavily on ordinary Catholics during his two days in Philadelphia.

On Friday night in New York, about 20,000 of the faithful packed into Madison Square Garden to witness the pope’s message about faith in the city, CBS News correspondent Chip Reid reports.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
New York Times

Sep 26, 2015

Jon Hurdle

Pope Francis arrived at the west door of the basilica at 10:17 and was greeted by applause and some cheers by more than 2,000 clergy members and lay Catholics who had been waiting for more than two hours in a side chapel.

He walked in a procession with other church leaders up the nave, as many clergy took photos of him. He raised his hand to greet them.

After briefly moving to a side room, the pope reappeared wearing a mitre and carrying a crucifix, accompanied by bishops.

The pope ascended to the altar and kissed a white-covered table before unsteadily descending several steps, held on both sides by church officials.

Speaking in heavily accented English, Pope Francis gave a blessing, and then delivered his homily in Spanish, pausing regularly for an English interpreter.

He called for a “much more active engagement on the part of the laity.”

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
New Zealand Herald

PHILADELPHIA (AP) ” Latest developments in Pope Francis’ visit to the United States. All times local:

12:15 p.m.

Pope Francis has finished celebrating a Mass, stopping to bless children in wheelchairs before leaving the cathedral in downtown Philadelphia.

Francis walked through a chapel adjacent to the main room in the cathedral on Saturday to greet ill and disabled parishioners, along with other visitors. He blessed the children and gave them a kiss on the head.

Francis delivered a homily in Spanish in front of about 1,600 people. He says the future of the church depends on an increased role for the laity and valuing the “immense contribution” of women.

He will spend a few hours at a seminary just outside of the city before giving a speech Saturday afternoon on religious freedom and immigration.
___

Noon

The former Archbishop of Philadelphia who retired in 2011 amid a scandal over clergy sex abuse is celebrating Mass with Pope Francis.

Cardinal Justin Rigali joined Francis and other bishops at the Mass Saturday on the pope’s first stop in Philadelphia.

Rigali’s successor, Archbishop Charles Chaput, also was on the altar in front of about 1,600 people at the main cathedral in downtown Philadelphia.

Rigali retired to the Diocese of Knoxville, Tennessee, months after a grand jury accused the Philadelphia archdiocese of sheltering more than three dozen credibly accused priests and lying about it to victims and others.

Later Saturday, Francis will give a speech on religious freedom and immigration and then join in the final night of the World Meeting of Families.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
PhillyVoice

BY CHRISTINA LOBRUTTO
PhillyVoice Staff

As Pope Francis came to Philadelphia to deliver his message of peace and justice Saturday, Robert M. Hoatson stood in the Ben Franklin Parkway with a message of his own.

A former priest in the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, he said he was hoping to get the pope to address prior sexual abuse by members of the clergy. He said he appreciates the pope’s pontifical commission to prevent new abuse, but said he has to address abuse in the past. Hoatson is the co-founder and president of Road to Recovery, a nonprofit in Livingston, New Jersey, that supports survivors of sexual abuse.

In a speech on Wednesday, the pope called America’s cardinals “courageous” in handling sex abuse cases.

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UNITED STATES
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Associate editor September 26, 2015

PHILADELPHIA – To be sure, Pope Francis did not come to the United States primarily to deliver a political message but to act as a pastor, encouraging Catholics to hold on to their faith and to put it into action. Like a mantra, he has told them over and over, “Go forth!”

Equally surely, however, politics has been part of the mix.

From his remarks on the South Lawn of the White House on Wednesday to his addresses to a joint meeting of Congress on Thursday and the United Nations on Friday, the pope has presented a bushel basket full of policy concerns, ranging from immigration and climate change to arms trafficking and the death penalty.

Francis has already changed the political landscape by apparently giving House Speaker John Boehner, second in the order of succession to the presidency, the interior peace to decide to resign.

As the trip enters the final stretch this weekend in Philadelphia, however, it’s possible that the most important long-term political subtext is still to come.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 26 September 2015 (VIS) – The Holy Father has appointed:

– Archbishop Paolo Rocco Gualtieri, apostolic nuncio in Madagascar, as apostolic nuncio in the Seychelles.

– Bishop Robert Francis Prevost, O.S.A., as bishop of Chiclayo (area 15,647, population 1,275,215, Catholics 1,132,202, priests 113, religious 171), Peru. Bishop Prevost is currently apostolic administrator of the same diocese.

– appointed Fr. Zbigniew Zielinski as auxiliary of Gdansk, (area 2,500, population 965,077, Catholics 900,608, priests 748, religious 689), Poland. The bishop-elect was born in Gdansk, Poland in 1965 and was ordained a priest in 1991. He holds a doctorate in pastoral theology from the Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University of Warsaw and has served in a number of pastoral and academic roles, pastor of the St. Michael parish and of the Cathedral of Gdansk-Oliwa and lecturer in sociology of religion at the state University of Gdansk. He is currently pastor of the con-Cathedral, lecturer in pastoral theology in the major seminary, and member of the Commission for canonical visits in the parishes, the presbyteral council, and the college of consultors. In 2007 he was named Chaplain of His Holiness.

– appointed Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, metropolitan archbishop of Bologna, and Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, patron of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, as members of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

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GERMANY
LifeSite News

REGENSBURG, Germany, September 8, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) — In a move that is making headlines in Germany, the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has said German bishops are leading the Church to a schism.

Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Mueller is warning that the tendency of German bishops to divide doctrine from pastoral practice is not unlike the abuses surrounding the Protestant split in 1517. One should “be very vigilant and not forget the lesson of Church history,” he said.

Last week, in a speech at the release of the German version of Cardinal Robert Sarah’s new book God or Nothing in Regensburg, Germany, Cardinal Mueller criticized “a climate of the German claim to leadership for the Universal Church.” According to the German newspaper Die Tagespost, Mueller said that he is frequently asked why German bishops claim to be leaders of the Catholic Church — while flouting teachings on marriage and sexuality — despite overseeing dramatic reductions in church attendance, shrinking numbers of seminarians, and a drop in vocations to religious orders.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
NBC News

by Alastair Jamieson, Katie Primm and Kasie Hunt

Crowds began to gather at dawn Saturday in Philadelphia as Pope Francis prepared to promote religious freedom in the birthplace of American independence.

The city awoke to eight-foot tall mesh fences, concrete barriers and bike racks lining the streets as airport-style security – including TSA agents – was installed for the pontiff’s visit.
Image: A nun being checked by a TSA agent in Philadelphia early Saturday.
A nun is checked by a TSA agent in Philadelphia Saturday. Elyse Perlmutter-Gumbiner / NBC News

Every few blocks along the Ben Franklin Parkway parade route, white tents have food for sale and official merchandise.

Outside the site of Independence Hall, where the United States Declaration of Independence and Constitution were adopted, crowds began to form at 7 a.m. – but they will have to wait until 4 p.m. to see the pontiff.

The 78-year-old Argentine is expected to hold a rally there with Hispanic and other immigrants on the theme of religious freedom. The event combines two issues about which Francis is most concerned: the plight of immigrants seeking a better life for themselves and their families, and the freedom to practice religion.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Washington Post

By Karen Heller and , Frances Stead Sellers and Joe Heim September 26

PHILADELPHIA — America’s birthplace of liberty has opened its arms for Pope Francis’s weekend visit by closing almost everything.

The 78-year-old pontiff is scheduled to arrive at 9:30 a.m. Saturday at Philadelphia International Airport, the final leg of his first visit to the United States. Over two days, he’ll celebrate two Masses, deliver a speech on religious liberty at Independence Hall, participate in two papal parades, and be serenaded by Aretha Franklin and Andrea Bocelli at a festival to cap the church’s World Meeting of Families, which began Tuesday.

On Saturday morning, with a huge swath of the city closed to traffic, an eerie quiet created a vague post-apocalyptic sense. On normally beeping, bustling Chestnut street the only audible sound was the hum of a cranky air conditioner and the quiet slap of a runner’s feet on the pavement.

Philadelphians who griped over the many inconveniences of hosting Francis have fled the city or settled in to watch the scenes unfolding on their doorsteps from the comfort of their sofas. On Saturday morning, the city’s streets began to swell with a chorus of more positive voices. Popetimism, some are calling it.

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UNITED STATES
Pope Francis CON-artist & Vicar of Plutocrats

Paris Arrow

Pope Francis is desperate to latch on to the fame of 9/11 because he knows the Vatican Titanic is sunken deep in the ocean of moral bankruptcy as a consequence of the Vatican crimes against humanity’s children during half-the-20th century – committed by the bestial JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army – in almost all dioceses across the USA. Pope Francis has no business meeting with 9/11 victims’ families – (3,000 victims were attacked by 19 Muslims) – because his first and foremost priority as Roman Pontiff should be spending time with Catholic victims raped by criminal heinous Catholic priests and punishing all evil bishops who aided and abetted them for decades. Francis should be spending time with SNAP, the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, who represent 100,000 victims of more than 6,500 pedophile priests in the USA alone. Why is Pope Francis embracing the victims’ families of 19 Muslims attackers but he doesn’t give a damn to victims of his own church – those bestial Catholic JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army named aptly after the pope who reigned the longest but said nothing and did nothing to save and protect children.

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TEXAS
Palestine Herald-Press

By Gary E. Lindsley

A Greenville, Texas minister, facing a multi-million dollar lawsuit alleging he sexually abused a teenager while at his former church in the 1990s, has resigned.

Billy Bob Burge, a minister at Grace Community Church, resigned on Thursday, according to Lead Pastor Adam Brind.

Burge is accused of repeatedly sexually abusing John Jeremy Sweet-Gomez when he attended First Baptist Church of Rockwall, Texas as a teenager.

Sweet-Gomez, according to the lawsuit filed against Burge and First Baptist Church of Rockwall by his parents, Carla Sweet and Ed Gomez, committed suicide in January 2015.

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UNITED STATES
KUOW

By JEANNIE YANDEL & AMINA AL-SADI

Jeannie Yandel talks to Mary Dispenza, author and director of the Northwest branch of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, about Pope Francis’ visit to the United States.

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UNITED STATES
Valley News

Randall Balmer
For the Valley News
Saturday, September 26, 2015

Pope Francis’ triumphant visit to Cuba and the United States this week calls to mind the visit of John Paul II to America early in his papacy. In 1979, the charismatic new pontiff celebrated a Mass at Living History Farms outside of Des Moines, Iowa, and utterly charmed his audience, estimated at 350,000. “You’ve got a pope,” an Iowa farmer said to his Catholic neighbor, “who really knows how to pope.”

Despite the inevitable parallels between Francis and John Paul — the charisma, the disarming candor, the vigor that contrasted with their predecessors — a more accurate comparison, in my view, is with John XXIII. The cardinals chose both men, John XXIII and Francis, to be caretakers of the papacy. Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli, the primate of Venice, was elected to the papacy in 1958 on the 12th ballot and took the name John XXIII. His fellow cardinals figured that this mild-mannered prelate wouldn’t make a lot of waves and, considering his age, 76, they could revisit the matter of church leadership in a few years. …

Francis has a full agenda. Some studies suggest that fully 10 percent of Americans identify themselves as former Catholics, and a shortage of clergy here in the U.S. and around the world raises questions about clerical celibacy, which has been a requirement for only a millennium or so — a relative short duration for an institution that marks time in centuries. Regarding the ordination of women, the pontiff apparently feels blocked by the statements of his immediate predecessors. So far he has said, “That door is closed,” although the Irish Times has reported that Francis was considering the appointment of Mary McAleese, the former president of Ireland who has studied theology at the Gregorian University in Rome, to the College of Cardinals. (There is no gender-specific requirement for cardinal; the appointment is the pope’s alone, and apparently John Paul II once considered naming Mother Teresa to the College.)

The mention of McAleese brings us, finally, to the pope’s most pressing issue: the pedophilia scandal. When McAleese, then the president of Ireland, stopped in Boston during a state visit to the United States in 1998, she was browbeaten for her support for the ordination of women by none other than Bernard Law. The archbishop of Boston, McAleese recounted later, told her that he was “sorry for Catholic Ireland to have you as president.”

Law, however, was even then shielding pedophile priests in his archdiocese, shuffling them from one assignment to another. According to Spotlight, the recently released motion picture on the scandal, 294 priests under Law’s care have been identified as pedophiles. The tally of their victims now tops a thousand, and the archdiocese so far has doled out more than $85 million in settlements.

Law was forced to resign in 2002, whereupon he was named head of Santa Marie Maggiore, one of the most significant basilicas in Rome. He retired from that post in 2011 and, according to WGBH in Boston, lives a very comfortable life within the confines of the Vatican.

In 2012, Robert Finn, the bishop of Kansas City-St. Joseph, was found guilty and sentenced to two years’ probation for failing to report one of his pedophile priests to the authorities. The Vatican allowed Bishop Finn to continue in his post until his resignation from the diocese earlier this year. He remains a bishop.

Francis has begun to address the issue. He appointed a 17-member commission early in his papacy and established a Vatican tribunal in June. Still, as the very existence of the tribunal itself suggests, the Vatican clearly prefers to handle matters of sexual abuse internally rather turn them over to secular authorities.

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NEW YORK
The New Yorker

BY ADAM GOPNIK

New Yorkers personalize everything, and the shutdown of traffic around town this week was put personally on the head of our visitor, Pope Francis. A certain amount of the normal exasperation felt at out-of-towners was directed at the pontiff, as though the Pope were one of those tourists trying to stuff a dollar bill into the Metrocard slot. (God, or somebody, forbid he should try to work the new Rube Goldberg contraption for the crosstown bus.)

Yet given how disruptive he was to normal life, the tone of his visit was astonishingly welcoming, not least because this particular Pope lit up people who aren’t normally crazy about the papacy, while—and this is part of what brought joy to the first group—driving round the bend people who normally are more Catholic than he is. And yet this Pope is no more a “liberal” Pope than he is a secret Muslim Pope—he’s the Pope. His historic role, which he is playing, is to be a very well-dressed critic of the liberal state in all its forms. The trick about this Pope is not that he is a secret liberal but that he is such a thoroughgoing critic of liberalism and its dispensations that his assault takes in parts of our experience parochially described as conservative.

It would, to be sure, be a saintly liberal who didn’t feel a little schadenfreude on hearing the Pope contradict certain shibboleths of the self-described religious right. The very people—including members of the Catholic hierarchy—who, when it comes to women’s rights to make intimate reproductive decisions for themselves, have been most passionately devoted to the idea that one can’t be a “cafeteria Catholic,” picking and choosing doctrine as you like, are now loudly determined to, well, pick and choose among papal doctrines just as they like. Making metaphysical decisions about the status of embryos for women is one thing; being asked to condemn killing criminals and torturing prisoners and poisoning the Earth, these are, apparently, different—moral options on which man must be free to exercise his own conscience as he sees fit.

The pleasure one can’t help but feel is moderated, though, tempered by the truth that the extension of his causes and the reordering of his priorities does not alter Francis’s core beliefs. Nor should it be expected to do so. The Pope is still clearly against women’s reproductive rights, and as yet no friend to their ordination. Nor has he really addressed the sexual-abuse crisis, which has done so much to diminish the Church in America; his remarks on the subject in Washington were, as one survivor of priestly abuse said, in the Washington Post, “bizarre,” more devoted to praising the mostly invisible moral courage of the hierarchy that participated in the coverup than in addressing the evil done to the abused. A leader of SNAP, the victims’ organization, called Francis’s remarks “a slap in the face to all the victims, that we’re going to worry about how the poor bishop feels.” (It is a sign of the special moral exemption the Catholic Church receives that, had any other organization in the world engaged in the same activity, many of its leaders would be in prison.)

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UNITED STATES
The Open Tabernacle: Here Comes Everybody

Posted on September 26, 2015 by Betty Clermont

Today, Pope Francis heads to Philadelphia to lead the World Meeting of Families. Before leaving for this trip to Cuba and the US, he said, “The family, as God wants it, composed of a man and a woman for the good of the spouses … is deformed by powerful contrary projects.”

The Catechism states that homosexual acts are a “grave depravity.” Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger – then head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, later Pope Benedict XVI – added in 1997 that even the homosexual “inclination” is “objectively disordered.”

So Pope Francis can change this anytime he wants, but he won’t.

The pope said in February 2015, “Let’s think of the nuclear arms, of the possibility to annihilate in a few instants a very high number of human beings. Let’s think also of genetic manipulation, of the manipulation of life, or of the gender theory that does not recognize the order of creation.”

“The ‘gender theory’ Francis is denigrating is the medically and anthropologically supported concept that gender is a construct imposed by society. It is commonly cited in defense of transgender rights, since it shows gender can vary despite society’s expectations.”

Shortly after he became pope, Jorge Mario Bergoglio said “Who am I to judge” in defense of his appointment of Msgr. Battista Ricca as his watchdog at the Vatican Bank. Ricca had been outed for making a public display of his relationship with another male. The pope was responding to the question: “I would like to know, Holiness, what do you intend to do about this question of Msgr. Ricca and of the news of his private life?” No further questions were allowed.

Nevertheless, in this year alone:

Same-sex marriage “threatens to disfigure God’s plan,” the pope said. “The movement in many countries to accept same-sex marriage is an ‘ideological colonization that we have to be careful about that is trying to destroy the family,’” he continued.

After telling reporters about a public service officer who, in order to receive a loan to build schools, had to include a book on “gender theory” in her curriculum, the pope said: “Clever girl, she said ‘yes.’ And, as a result the goal of the financiers was achieved. This is ideological colonization.” (emphasis mine)

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NEW YORK
CBS New York

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — Pope Francis’ whirlwind tour of New York comes to an end this morning when he heads to Kennedy Airport to leave for Philadelphia, the final stop on his first-ever visit to the United States.

A few hundred people were seen waiting at JFK to say goodbye to the pope Friday morning, including a group of nuns holding white roses for the pontiff, CBS2’s Andrea Grymes reported.

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NEW YORK
News LI

by Nia Hamm

NEW YORK – The historic U.S. visit of Pope Francis has refocused attention on the Catholic Church’s sex-abuse scandal. Although the pontiff has vowed to root out child sex predators from the Church, which has cost billions in legal expenses, victims of clergy sexual abuse want the pope to do more.

In New York, Michael Mack, 58, who says he was abused by a priest when he was 11, hopes to bring more attention to the issue this week. He has written a one-man play, “Conversations with My Molester.”

“I truly believe that his intention is to heal around this process,” Mack said. “And since this play of mine really is all about healing – about my own personal healing journey, but also the journeys that it reflects for so many survivors – that it seemed like the timing was a natural.”

Mack, who began practicing Catholicism again about seven years ago, said reform efforts such as a Truth and Reconciliation Commission would give church sexual-abuse victims a true chance to heal. Mack’s play opened in New York City on Thursday, the same day Pope Francis arrived in the city.

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NEW YORK
Rome Reports

[with video]

The first stop during the Pope’s visit to New York was St. Patrick’s Cathedral. He presided over Vespers with priests and religious.

He first offered words of affection and closeness for the Muslims who were killed during a tragic stampede in Mecca. More than 700 are believed to have died.

His second message was one of gratitude. He thanked the American Catholics who stood by the Church, despite the sexual abuse scandal that shook the Church in recent years.

POPE FRANCIS

“You suffered greatly in the not distant past by having to bear the shame of some of your brothers who harmed and scandalized the Church in the most vulnerable of her members…I accompany you at this time of pain and difficulty.”

Giving thanks to the religious for their sacrifice, he asked them to not forget strength of their vocation. He told them not to turn off their love for God.

The Pope also wanted to send a more concrete message of support to specific audience: female religious. In 2008, the Vatican began a review of 341 female religious orders after complaints from some North American priests and bishops.

Last December, the Vatican announced the conclusions of the examination: It included a list of suggestions and, overall, was very positive in its message.

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UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News

A man who ran a Sunday school has been jailed for 16 years for historical sexual abuse against girls.

Alan Dawson, 64, of Newcroft Road, Urmston, was convicted of seven counts of indecent assault and one count of rape at Manchester Crown Court.

He was part of the congregation at Mauldeth Road Gospel Hall, Withington.

Police said he abused four girls between the 1960s and the 1980s, who were than aged between 11 and 16.

The abuse took place at Dawson’s home in Didsbury and at the homes of the girls.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Vatican Radio

[with audio]

(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis arrives in Philadelphia on Saturday, the final stop on his 10-day pastoral visit to Cuba and the United States. After meeting with Church leaders, visiting a high-security prison and greeting the city’s immigrant community, he’ll take part in a vigil and celebrate a concluding Mass for the 8th World Meeting of Families.

The city of Philadelphia has been preparing for this international gathering for the past three years since the venue was announced at the last World Meeting of Families in Milan in 2012. David O’Reilly is a veteran religion writer for the Philadelphia Inquirer and is travelling on the papal plane throughout the Pope’s visit. Just ahead of the trip, he sat down with Philippa Hitchen to talk about the way preparations for the Meeting has transformed the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

O’Reilly says for the past 10 years the city has had “a cloud over it of the most awful kind” following two grand jury investigations into the sexual abuse crisis. Those investigations revealed not only “extensive abuse of minors but also rather dreadful cover-ups by the leadership” which made “being Catholic in this city a sort of glum, dark thing for a lot of people”.

When Archbishop Chaput arrived in the city, O’Reilly continues, he also discovered all sorts of financial difficulties, including pension debts and a Catholic education system unable to support itself. O’Reilly recalls that the archbishop admitted publically “I’m not very happy to be here” and was unprepared for the announcement three years ago that his city would be the next site for the World Meeting of Families.

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NEW YORK
National Catholic Register

BY CNA/EWTN NEWS 09/24/2015

NEW YORK CITY — In his first address in New York, Pope Francis lamented the suffering caused by the sexual-abuse scandal in the United States — not only for the trauma inflicted on the Church’s most vulnerable members, but also for the shame it has brought to priests and religious in general.

“I know that, as a presbyterate in the midst of God’s people, you suffered greatly in the not-distant past by having to bear the shame of some of your brothers who harmed and scandalized the Church in the most vulnerable of her members,” he said addressing clergy and religious gathered for Evening Prayer at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City Sept. 24.

“I accompany you at this time of pain and difficulty, and I thank God for your faithful service to his people,” he said, adding they have “come forth from the great tribulation.”

Despite these difficulties, Pope Francis said, “Our vocation is to be lived in joy.”

New York is the second of three cities the Holy Father will stop in during his Sept. 22-27 visit to the United States. In his first leg of his trip, the Holy Father addressed a joint session of Congress and met briefly with President Obama in Washington. While in New York City, Pope Francis will address the United Nations, before heading to Philadelphia for the World Meeting of Families.

During his remarks Thursday evening, the Pope also took a moment to express his “esteem and gratitude” for women religious in America, calling them the “front line” of evangelization. “To you, religious women, sisters and mothers of this people, I wish to say ‘thank you,’ a big thank you, and to tell you that I love you very much,” he said.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

SEPTEMBER 26, 2015

Hedley Thomas
National Chief Correspondent
Brisbane

A child-sex abuse scandal and ensuing cover-up at two elite Brisbane schools that contributed to Australia’s governor-general quit­ting 12 years ago is being re­investigated by the royal commission into child sexual abuse.

Some 100 boys were abused over many years by a counsellor, Kevin “Skippy” Lynch, at Brisbane Grammar and, subsequently, St Paul’s. The wrongdoing was shielded from public scrutiny because leaders in both the Anglican diocese and the schools at the time kept the matters quiet.

The scandal was exposed by investigative reporting in Brisbane in the early 2000s, which showed senior figures including Brisbane’s Anglican Archbishop, Peter Hollingworth, were aware of evidence of the abuse, before Dr Hollingworth was appointed governor-general. He resigned in 2003 over his handling of a series of sex-abuse scandals.

The abuse was not reported or acknowledged by the church or the school until after a former Grammar student suspected of having been one of Lynch’s victims, Nigel Parodi, shot three people in a rampage that ended with the loner’s death in a police shootout in Brisbane.

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UNITED STATES
Aleteia

ZOE ROMANOWSKY SEPTEMBER 25, 2015

Archbishop William E. Lori was appointed the 16th Archbishop of Baltimore, the premier see of the Church in the United States, by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012. He spoke to Aleteia’s Zoe Romanowsky about the significance of Pope Francis’ visit and what the Holy Father’s message means for bishops and for all of the faithful. …

The pope’s talk to the U.S. bishops yesterday at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in D.C. was quite moving and there was a lot to unpack there. What struck you the most about his message?

Several things. First, as a bishop sitting there, I felt very, very encouraged. He thanked us for our service to the poor and immigrants and there was wonderful encouragement about our Catholic schools. He understood how difficult it’s been to deal with the tragic situation of clergy sexual abuse. In many ways I felt the Holy Father was expressing a great brotherly solidarity with us, as bishops. And I think it was important that he do so because sometimes people like to create a lot of tension between the pope and the bishops. But this was the opposite — fraternal solidarity.

At the same time, I think the Holy Father recognizes that operating in any culture, including our own, involves a lot of challenges, and as he has done in the other places, he encouraged us be pastors, with the deepest respect for our roots, to deal with our problems with creativity and dialogue, trying to understand people who differ with us.

So, there’s a lot to unpack. It was kind of a mini-summary of what the Church has been saying to bishops — very effective and very moving.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

A victim of child sexual abuse says he is hopeful Adelaide’s Archbishop will ultimately be forced to defend a charge of concealing abuse against children.

Philip Wilson, the Archbishop of Adelaide, is the most senior catholic official in the world accused of concealing child sexual abuse.

He pleaded not guilty at Newcastle Local Court yesterday with Wilson’s legal team calling for a permanent stay of proceedings.

The charge relates to when Wilson was an assistant parish priest in East Maitland in the 1970s and worked with paedophile priest James Fletcher.

The magistrate has set a date for a one-day hearing in December to hear the legal argument from both sides, with no witnesses to be called.

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UNITED STATES
Wall Street Journal

By JOE MORGENSTERN
Sept. 24, 2015

As horror upon horror unfolds in “Prophet’s Prey,” Amy Berg’s shocking documentary about the mad polygamist Warren Jeffs and his followers, one may marvel, in horror, at the elaborate forms that deviancy can take. The half-educated son of a crackpot father who ran a splinter group calling itself the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), Mr. Jeffs took over the church on his father’s death, declared himself a prophet, promoted polygamy that frequently involved underage girls, set up isolated communities throughout the vastness of the Southwest and reigned supreme over thousands of believers as a veritable godhead, All the while, the film contends persuasively, Mr. Jeffs’s rogue church was, fundamentally, a crime syndicate built by and for sexual predators.

Was, and by all accounts in “Prophet’s Prey,” still is—that’s the most shocking part. Mr. Jeffs is in prison for the rest of his life, having been captured in 2006 during a traffic stop near Las Vegas, and convicted, in 2007, of two felony counts of child assault. And some of the child victims were freed by authorities from what amounted to imprisonment and enslavement in FLDS compounds, thanks in large measure to an activist attorney general in Utah. (The Church of Latter-Day Saints renounced the doctrine of polygamy in 1890.)

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

SNAP: “Prelates fight secular child safety bills”
Battles are being waged in places Francis visits: PA, DC & NY
“Chaput uses flock’s donations to protect predators,” group says
It begs church-goers: “Donate elsewhere until real change happens”
SNAP: “As Francis talks of ‘protecting families,’ bishops ‘fight them in court’”

What:
Holding signs and childhood photos, after Francis’ mass, clergy sex abuse victims will

–urge the pope to make his bishops, in PA & elsewhere, stop blocking better child safety laws,
–urge lawmakers, in PA and elsewhere, to ignore bishops’ “self-serving” lobbying efforts, and
–urge Catholics to donate elsewhere until their church officials push for, not against, better laws that protect kids, expose predators and punish enablers.

(Such legislative struggles are pending in each place Francis is visiting: Pennsylvania, New York and DC.)

The victims will also urge all victims, witnesses and whistleblowers – in every institution that serves kids – to

–report everything they know, see or suspect to law enforcement,
–seek help from independent sources (not church, school, camp or coaching staff), and
–join the growing movement to end or extend archaic, predator-friendly statutes of limitations.

When:
Saturday, Sept. 26 at 1:30 p.m.

Where:
Outside St. Patrick Church, 242. S. 20th, in center city Philadelphia, PA (where a predator priest worked)

Who:
Three-four members of an international support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org), including a Missouri woman who is the organization’s long time outreach director

Why:
While clergy sex abuse and cover up lawsuits attract considerable media attention, most victims of pedophile priests can’t seek justice in court because bishops exploit archaic, predator-friendly deadlines called “statutes of limitations.” Worse, SNAP says, US bishops are spending “hundreds of thousands of dollars” on “high-priced lobbyists” to block moves to reform these rigid statutes that “give wrongdoers incentives to intimidate victims, threaten witnesses, discredit whistleblowers, destroy evidence and ‘run out the clock’ on child sex crimes and cover ups.”

In PA, a bill has been introduced that would give child sex abuse victims more time to file lawsuits. Catholic officials have fought hard and successfully against measures like this in Harrisburg and in every other state capitol where the issue has been raised, SNAP says.

SNAP wants Pope Francis to forbid such “reckless, callous expenditures” that “save bishops’ reputations but enable abuse and cover up to continue.” The group also wants state lawmakers to pass civil “window” laws that “make it easier for struggling victims to protect others, expose predators, deter cover ups and seek justice.”

(Four states have enacted civil “window” laws. As a result, hundreds of adults who committed and concealed child sex crimes have been exposed, fired, demoted or otherwise punished and dozens of criminal prosecutions have taken place that likely would not have, SNAP maintains. The group says “windows” are “the single quickest, safest and cheapest way to expose predators, safeguard kids and end cover ups of child sexual assaults.”)

Because bishops exploit tight statues of limitations, very few victims are able to “out” their perpetrators in court. That, in turn, helps predators continue molesting children, SNAP charges.

Catholic officials disingenuously claim “window” measures “unfairly target” churches, SNAP says. But they are “neutral” bills that usually include all private non-profits where child sex crimes are most often covered up. Bishops say over time “witnesses die, memories fade and evidence is lost.” SNAP says these factors just make it harder on victims, who face the burden of proof in such cases.

“By opposing these bills, Catholic officials are “putting more kids in harm’s way in all kinds of institutions, secular and religious,” says SNAP director David Clohessy. “And they contradict all the nice-sounding things Francis says about safeguarding the vulnerable and healing the wounded.”

The Hawaii and Minnesota windows are still “open.” The California and Delaware ones have closed. They range from one year (California) to three years (Minnesota).

Sponsors of the SOL window measure in PA include Reps. Mark Rizzo of Berks County (610-921-8921) and Louise Bishop (D-Philadelphia).

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PENNSYLVANIA
The Morning Call

By Sarah M. Wojcik
Of The Morning Call

Diocese of Allentown, Pius X, priest not liable for sexual abuse of S. Korean student, judge rules
The Diocese of Allentown is not liable for the sexual abuse of a South Korean exchange student inside a private dormitory where she stayed while attending Pius X High School, according to a ruling by Northampton County Judge Michael Koury Jr.

While the attorney representing the diocese praised Koury’s decision, Howard Myerowitz, representing the victim in the sex abuse case, voiced his deep disappointment.

“I have a lot of respect for Judge Koury, but I think he got it wrong. It shouldn’t have gone on,” Myerowitz said of the abuse endured by his client. “This was one of those strange cases where there was a disclosure (of the abuse), but it continued. And that’s what bothers me so much about it.”

The decision, handed down Thursday, exonerates the diocese, Pius X High School, Inc. and a priest identified only as Father Tom Doe, from liability, but the case against the owners of the dormitory and the abuser, Richard Kim, is still poised to move forward.

The victim was 14 when she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by 37-year-old Kim at the now-shuttered ACE Academy in Pen Argyl, where he was working as a tutor. At the time, the teenage girl was attending Pius X High School, which has since closed its doors due to lack of enrollment.

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UNITED STATES
Truthout

Friday, 25 September 2015

By William Rivers Pitt, Truthout | Op-Ed

So this guy in white robes showed up at the Capitol Building in Washington DC on Thursday, and the freak-out was comprehensive. Some 5,000 law enforcement officials were brought to bear in the name of “security” for the visit by Pope Francis, a number that sits in the shade of the 7,000 law enforcement officials prepared for his arrival in New York City. Both towns are effectively shut down; fences up, fences everywhere.

The pope’s speech before a joint session of congress was riveting television. The crowds outside were huge, and hugely enthusiastic. The cameras flashed to various crowd shots, one including Senator Ted Cruz looking like an extra from “Grease,” with Chris Matthews on MSNBC claiming that suddenly-retiring and very weepy House Speaker John Boehner “wanted personal help from the pope” at one notable point. Ponder that a moment.

The only person Francis personally greeted when he entered the chamber was John Kerry. When the pontiff assumed the podium, Speaker Boehner shook his hand and said, “Good luck.” It was not a jocular statement; Boehner delivered it in the tones of a World War I officer ordering a doughboy over the side of a trench and into machine-gun fire.

Pope Francis defended working people and retired people, invoked Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr. and Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton, defended religious freedom, intellectual freedom and individual freedoms while denouncing the “simplistic reductionism that sees only good or evil,” defended immigrants and immigration, made a stout argument in favor of the reality of climate change, described the profits made from weapons sales as “money drenched in blood,” and kicked the death penalty square in the ass.

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UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

William D. Lindsey

Joan Chittister to Pope Francis: “It Is Impossible, Holy Father, to Be Serious about Doing Anything for the Poor and at the Same Time Do Little or Nothing for Women”

Because I do remain a bit muzzy in the head due to my recent tooth issues (and, above all, the difficulty one has in sleeping as she/he deals with pain in the night), I don’t think I can write anything of great substance or length right now. (Lucky you, right?)

But I’ll share a few top-of-head thoughts with you. Much of value is being written in the past several days about what Pope Francis has been saying and doing in the U.S. I can’t give you a comprehensive report of everything that catches my eye.

I do, though, want to zero in on the following section of Tom Roberts’s National Catholic Reporter commentary on the pope’s remarks to U.S. bishops two days ago: Roberts writes that “Francis laid out an insistent call for dialogue – with everyone and in all directions,” as he emphasized:

The dialogue should be with everyone – among bishops, in their presbyterates, with lay persons, families and with society. “I cannot ever tire of encouraging you to dialogue fearlessly,” he said.

I want to zero in not only on this observation, but on the word everyone: Francis encouraged the bishops, according to Roberts, to build within the U.S. Catholic church dialogues that include everyone.

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CHILE
24 Horas

[Former pastor reveals details on possible negligence by the archbishop in the Fernando Karadima case.The former pastor of La Moneda, Percival Cowley, implicated Ricardo Ezzati and Francisco Javier Errazuriz as being possibly negligent.]

El ex párroco de La Moneda, Percival Cowley, reveló detalles que demostrarían la posible negligencia de Ricardo Ezzati y Francisco Javier Errázuriz sobre el caso Karadima.

Mediante las declaraciones por la demanda de las víctimas de Fernando Karadima -a las cuales tuvo acceso The Clinic- Cowley expresó que la cúpula católica omitió durante un tiempo los antecedentes que podrían haber acelerado la investigación.

Según el religioso, el mismo James Hamilton -víctima del otrora cura de El Bosque- le narró lo sucedido en 2003, por lo que prometió que se lo iba a comunicar el entonces obispo auxiliar de Santiago, Ricardo Ezzti.

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CANADA
Niagara Falls Review

By Alison Langley, Niagara Falls Review
Friday, September 25, 2015

A lawyer who represented three altar boys who were molested by Donald Grecco says he’s not surprised the defrocked Catholic priest now faces new sex-related charges involving young boys.

“It didn’t surprise me at all,” Rob Talach, of Ledroit Beckett Litigation Lawyers, a London, Ont., law firm, said Friday.

“I sensed there were more (victims). This is a confirmation of where my gut was all along.”

The Haldimand detachment of the Ontario Provincial Police this week arrested 75-year-old Grecco following an investigation into sexual abuse complaints involving two boys dating back almost 40 years.

Police allege the incidents occurred between 1977 and 1982 involving two boys ages 10 and 14 at locations in Niagara Falls, Haldimand County and the United States.

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CANADA
CTV

A former priest with the Roman Catholic Church faces new accusations of historical sexual assault involving two young boys.

Donald Grecco spent time in jail earlier this decade after being found guilty of sexual assaults involving altar boys in the 1970s and 1980s.

Haldimand County OPP say new allegations against Grecco came to light several months ago, prompting another investigation.

Grecco now faces new charges of gross indecency and indecent assault.

Police say the allegations relate to incidents that occurred between 19777 and 1982, in locations around Haldimand County, Niagara Region and the United States.

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CANADA
The Square

(MISSISSAUGA, ON) – The OPP have charged a 75 year-old former Catholic priest with several sex offences after conducting an historical sexual assault investigation in the Haldimand County and Niagara Region areas.

Over the past several months police have been investigating a series of sexual assaults which had occurred between 1977 and 1982. They involved a then 10 year-old and 14 year-old boys. The assaults occurred at locations in Niagara Region, Haldimand County, and the United States.

As a result, Donald Grecco, 75, of Peel Region, has been charged with two counts each of Gross Indecency and Indecent Assault on a Male. Grecco will appear in Provincial Court in Cayuga on December 8, at 2:00 pm.

The incidents occurred while Grecco was a priest at St Stephen’s Roman Catholic Church, in Cayuga, at St Kevin’s Roman Catholic Church, in Welland, and at St Thomas More Roman Catholic Church, in Niagara Falls.

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NEW YORK
Huffington Post

As released by the Vatican.

Mr President,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you for your kind words. Once again, following a tradition by which I feel honored, the Secretary General of the United Nations has invited the Pope to address this distinguished assembly of nations. In my own name, and that of the entire Catholic community, I wish to express to you, Mr Ban Ki-moon, my heartfelt gratitude. I greet the Heads of State and Heads of Government present, as well as the ambassadors, diplomats and political and technical officials accompanying them, the personnel of the United Nations engaged in this 70th Session of the General Assembly, the personnel of the various programs and agencies of the United Nations family, and all those who, in one way or another, take part in this meeting. Through you, I also greet the citizens of all the nations represented in this hall. I thank you, each and all, for your efforts in the service of mankind.

This is the fifth time that a Pope has visited the United Nations. I follow in the footsteps of my predecessors Paul VI, in1965, John Paul II, in 1979 and 1995, and my most recent predecessor, now Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, in 2008. All of them expressed their great esteem for the Organization, which they considered the appropriate juridical and political response to this present moment of history, marked by our technical ability to overcome distances and frontiers and, apparently, to overcome all natural limits to the exercise of power. An essential response, inasmuch as technological power, in the hands of nationalistic or falsely universalist ideologies, is capable of perpetrating tremendous atrocities. I can only reiterate the appreciation expressed by my predecessors, in reaffirming the importance which the Catholic Church attaches to this Institution and the hope which she places in its activities.

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NEW YORK
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Friday, Sept. 25

Statement by David Clohessy of St. Louis, director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those abused by Priests (314 566 9790, davidgclohessy@gmail.com)

Twice in two days, Pope Francis has made vague and brief references to the on-going abuse and cover up crisis, mentioning the pain of church staff but not the pain of abused children and betrayed parishioners. He refuses to even call the scandal by its name.

[New York Times]

[Kern Golden Empire]

“In his homily before a crowd of priests and nuns,” reported CNN, Francis said “You suffered greatly in the not distant past by having to bear the shame of some of your brothers who harmed and scandalized the Church in the most vulnerable of her members,” and referred to a time of “pain and difficulty.”

Today’s Washington Post reports “At a news conference in New York, the Rev. Federico Lombardi was asked why the pope had spoken twice now — Wednesday to bishops and Thursday to seminarians and religious sisters, among others — about the abuse crisis, but never named it explicitly and focused on encouraging the clergy without speaking first about victims.”

[Washington Post]

And today’s New York Times noted the same troubling pattern – talking about how clergy child sex crimes and cover ups impact other clergy.

[New York Times]

Francis has made similar disturbing comments about the crisis before, claiming last year that “The Catholic Church is perhaps the only public institution to have moved with transparency and accountability” on abuse “Yet the Church is the only one to be attacked

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NEW YORK
Al Jazeera America

In rare public support group meeting, victims called Francis a ‘tranquilizer’ on issue of Catholic clergy sex abuse

September 25, 2015

by Renee Lewis @Renee5Lewis55

Pope Francis has been warmly welcomed by political leaders and thousands of ordinary people since arriving in New York City, but many survivors of sexual abuse by priests have had a different reaction.

“It’s been very difficult for Pope Francis to be in my backyard,” said Megan, a member of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP). “There’s still so much hurt.”

She and other survivors spoke to Al Jazeera at a rare public support group meeting in New York City on Tuesday, sharing their anger and frustration about what they say is a lack of substantive action by the Catholic Church to hold the priests who abused them accountable. All of them asked to be identified only by their first names.

For some survivors, the visit has triggered flashbacks. Peter said he was abused by a priest in his seminary boarding school starting from the age of 13. During the “kiss of peace” section of the service, the priest would come down from the altar to hug him, Peter said. When Pope Francis was met by President Barack Obama with a hug when he landed at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on Tuesday, Peter said those memories came flooding back.

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ST. LOUIS (MO)
Berger’s Beat

“NOT TO BE LOST IN POMP & CIRCUMSTANCE OF POPE FRANCIS’ first visit to Washington is the reality that the Catholic Church he oversees has become one of the largest recipients of federal largesse in America,” reports Kelly Riddell. “The church and related Catholic charities and schools have collected more than $1.6 billion since 2012 in U.S. contracts and grants in a far-reaching relationship that spans from school lunches for grammar school students to contracts across the globe to care for the poor and needy at the expense of Uncle Sam,” a Washington Times review of federal spending records shows.

MEANWHILE, our town’s Barbara Dorris of SNAP is dogging the pontiff, leading support group meetings, leafleting events and news conferences in D.C. and Philly while SNAP prez Barbara Blaine, a SLU alum, does the same in NYC.

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UNITED STATES
The Free Thinker (UK)

Pope Francis has been accused of grossly misrepresenting the Catholic Church’s reaction to clerical abuse in the US when he addressed hundreds of bishops at the Cathedral of St Matthew the Apostle in downtown Washington on Wednesday.

According to this report, he told the bishops that he was:

Conscious of the courage with which you have faced difficult moments in the recent history of the church in this country without fear of self-criticism and at the cost of mortification and great sacrifice.
He continued:

I realize how much the pain of recent years has weighed upon you, and I have supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims – in the knowledge that in healing we too are healed – and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated.

John Salveson, a 59-year-old Philadelphia businessman who was abused as a child by a priest, said:

The people he was talking to are the people who moved the pedophiles around to prey on kids. If you gave me 100 years to pick a word to describe the US bishops’ reaction to this crisis, ‘generous’ would never make the list.

Terry McKiernan, who runs BishopAccountability.org, a non-profit group that tracks the abuse scandal, said Francis failed to acknowledge that most dioceses across the country have not disclosed the names of abusers and continue to lobby against reforming statute of limitations laws that shield priests from prosecution for crimes committed many years ago.

It would be a shame if the Pope’s words were taken as encouragement by the bishops to continue that behavior.

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UNITED STATES
Ms. Magazine

In a statement released Wednesday by the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), president Barbara Blaine blasted Pope Francis for his praise of US bishops’ “courage,” accusing the pontiff of doing “little if anything” to meaningfully address the Catholic Church’s decades-long sex abuse crisis.

Pope Francis, in a homily delivered at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington, D.C., one of several stops on his first US tour, told the nearly 300 bishops in attendance that he was “conscious of the courage with which you have faced difficulty moments in the recent history of the Church in this country without fear of self-criticism and at the cost of mortification and great sacrifice.”

Blaine, who founded SNAP in 1988 as a self-help organization for victims of clergy sexual abuse, wasted no time in challenging the pope’s characterization of the Church’s disastrous handling of the scandals, noting no clergy have been “defrocked, demoted, disciplined or even publicly denounced” despite the revelation of at least 100,000 victims over the course of 30 years of known abuse.

“What sacrifice?,” questioned Blaine. “What bishop takes fewer vacations, drives a smaller car, does his own laundry or has been passed over for promotion because he’s shielding predators and endangering kids? None.”

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UNITED STATES
The Worthy Adversry

Posted by Joelle Casteix on September 25, 2015

You can listen to our discussion about sex abuse and cover-up, Roger Mahony, and protecting whistle-blowers here.

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UNITED STATES
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

by Kristine Ward, September 25, 2015

On this day, when Pope Francis will address the United Nations in New York, we present the images of courageous people who have preceded him in dealings with this international body.

See in the faces of leaders in the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP) Mary Caplan and Megan Peterson the nobility of rising from the hopelessness that molestation can impose as rigid bondage to the conquering of fear and rising to a summit place knowing that the foundation for the rise is truth. megan peterson

See in the face of Pamela Spees, an attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights, the combination of steel determination for justice and the honing of intellect to bring to bear on a world power, one which claims to be a moral guide for the planet, no less than accountability for what has happened and continues to happen to children by men and women in its ranks.

We place these images in our pages today in the hope that we may give strength and comfort to the survivors of sexual abuse who have been so cruelly treated by the pontiff by his choosing to pay tribute to the bishops of the United States in their handling of the sexual abuse crisis and to characterize them as being men of courage. Men, he said, who are selfless in divesting themselves of all unessentials in order to right the wrongs of the scandal.mary caplan

Nothing could be further from the truth.

With his words, the Pope abandoned the survivors to the barrios of inconsequentiality – the very place into which he reaches to lift all others up and to encourage and urge others to follow him.

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UNITED STATES
Washington Times

By Kelly Riddell – The Washington Times – Thursday, September 24, 2015

Not to be lost in the pomp and circumstance of Pope Francis’ first visit to Washington is the reality that the Catholic Church he oversees has become one of the largest recipients of federal largesse in America.

The Church and related Catholic charities and schools have collected more than $1.6 billion since 2012 in U.S. contracts and grants in a far-reaching relationship that spans from school lunches for grammar school students to contracts across the globe to care for the poor and needy at the expense of Uncle Sam, a Washington Times review of federal spending records shows.

Former Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York once famously noted in 1980 that the government funded 50 percent of Catholic Charities‘ budget, commenting “private institutions really aren’t private anymore.” Today, those estimates remain about the same, according to Leslie Lenkowsky, who served as the chief executive officer of the Corporation for National and Community Service under George W. Bush.

Catholic Charities USA, the largest charitable organization run by the church, receives about 65 percent of its annual budget from state and federal governments, making it an arm of the federal welfare state, said Brian Anderson, a researcher with the Manhattan Institute.

The federal government came to increasingly rely on the church to help it with Lyndon B. Johnson’s “War on Poverty,” and the charities “imbued with their new faith in the government’s potential to solve social problems, eagerly accepted government money,” Mr. Anderson wrote in an essay for the Manhattan Institute.

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UNITED STATES
Daily Kos

Betty Clermont

Today, Pope Francis is leading a multi-religious service at the 9/11 Memorial and Museum.

“Pope Francis’ decision that during the Jubilee Year of Mercy the faithful can receive absolution from priests of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) is the most recent attempt at reconciliation with the priestly society [and] can be seen in the context of a hope for full reconciliation.”

In June 2012, the Simon Wiesenthal Center named SSPX as influential within the French far-right, anti-Semitic party.

In January 2012, it was noted that British fascism posed a “real danger” and “might draw strength from the assiduous networking” of the SSPX. “Further connections are being built among the elite of British fascism, where far-right Catholics associated with the Society of St Pius X are increasingly active.”

When the fascist leader of the SSPX, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, consecrated four bishops without the permission of Pope John Paul II in 1988, the illicit consecration resulted in the excommunication of the five bishops. The excommunications were lifted in 2009 by Benedict XVI amid a media outcry because one of the bishops was a Holocaust-denier.

In Buenos Aires, Catholics, Jews and Protestants hold an annual ceremony in the Metropolitan Cathedral “to mark Kristallnacht, the Nazi-led mob violence in 1938 when about 1,000 Jewish synagogues were burned and thousands of Jews were forced into concentration camps, launching the genocide that killed 6 million Jews.” SSPX members disrupted the Nov. 13, 2013, ceremony by shouting the rosary and the “Our Father” and distributed pamphlets stating, “followers of false gods must be kept out of the sacred temple.” Fr. Christian Bouchacourt, leader of the SSPX in South America, said his organization had the right to feel outraged when rabbis preside over a ceremony in a Catholic cathedral.

Talks between the SSPX and the Vatican resumed in 2014 at the direction of Pope Francis.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Statement by Councilmember At-Large David Grosso

Today, at 2:30pm, Councilmember David Grosso (I-At Large) will join victims of sexual abuse at the hands of priests at a rally in front of the Wilson Building. In advance of the rally, Grosso released the following statement:

“In his prayer meeting with U.S. bishops yesterday, Pope Francis spoke of a ‘generous commitment to bring healing’- this stance must extend to those who have suffered sexual abuse. I am calling on the Pope to hold the bishops of the Catholic Church accountable for abuse committed on their watch. It is past time for the Church to support better laws that protect children, expose predators, and punish enablers.

Earlier this year I introduced the ‘Childhood Protection Against Sexual Abuse Amendment Act’ to give child victims of sexual abuse more time to file a civil lawsuit against perpetrators. Our current laws unjustly protect predators, and too often the Church has opposed legal reform. If the Catholic Church is truly committed to healing and forgiveness, then it will support this legislation and efforts to protect children from harm.”

Today, at 2:30pm, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) will rally in support of Grosso’s legislation on the steps of the John A. Wilson Building, 1350 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW. The Childhood Protection Against Sexual Abuse Amendment Act, introduced by Grosso in March 2015, would eliminate the civil statute of limitations for recovery of damages arising out of child sexual abuse claims. Additionally, the bill creates a two-year window for individuals whose claims of child sexual abuse were previously time-barred, enabling victims to begin the long road to recovery. The legislation is currently awaiting a hearing in the D.C. Council’s Committee on the Judiciary.

Councilmember At-Large David Grosso
1350 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Suite 402
Washington, D.C. 20004
Office: 202-724-8194
http://www.davidgrosso.org/

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UNITED STATES
Pope Francis CON-artist & Vicar of Plutocrats

Paris Arrow

Below are our rebuttals on the pope’s speech in congress. But first we’d like to point out some related matters. In his speech before 300 bishops yesterday, Pope Francis cold-heartedly ignored and insulted SNAP and thousands of victims of pedophile priests – by praising the bishops — who battled against these victims via expensive lawyers and deprived them of justice. We wrote that, “This time Pope Francis proved how out-of-touch with reality (VA) Vatican Autocracy is in his tiny fake country”. With today’s events at Capitol Hill and canonization of Junipero Serra, we realize that — it isn’t that the Vatican and Pope Francis are out-of-touch with reality – but rather – they can astutely manipulate, tamper, corrupt and distort reality – and they disingenuously make what is evil look good – and what is false appear like truth. Francis made those evil bishops look good as he lauded them for their “courage” and for their “without fear of self-criticism and at the cost of mortification and great sacrifice” – which are all false because they protected bestial predator priests for decades.

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UNITED STATES
Associated Press

Some survivors of abuse by Catholic priests say the pope should be doing more to confront child abuse within the church. (Sept. 24)

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TEXAS
Herald Banner

By Gary E. Lindsley

A Greenville minister, facing a multi-million dollar lawsuit alleging he sexually abused a teenager at First Baptist Church of Rockwall in the 1990s, has resigned.

Billy Bob Burge, connect minister at Grace Community Church, resigned on Thursday, according to Lead Pastor Adam Brind.

Burge is accused of repeatedly sexually abusing John Jeremy Sweet-Gomez when he attended the church in Rockwall as a teenager.

Sweet-Gomez, according to the lawsuit filed in Dallas County District Court by his parents, Carla Sweet and Ed Gomez, committed suicide in January 2015.

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UNITED STATES
CBS News

By ROBERT HENNELLY MONEYWATCH September 25, 2015

Critics of Pope Francis have cast him as anti-capitalist, seizing on his warnings about global warming and the corrosive effects of inequality. But the reality is more complex, as shown by his efforts to turn the scandal-plagued Vatican bank into a more efficient — and profitable — financial institution.

Under Pope Francis’ watch the secretive bank, long linked to money laundering and tax evasion, is for the first time in its 73-year-history complying with international banking standards and other transparency rules, advancing reform efforts started by his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI. Francis upped the ante on the campaign by replacing many of the bank’s top advisers.

The Institute for the Works of Religion, as the bank is officially known, is also seeing its earnings rebound, which some commercial bankers might view as a kind of miracle given the financial industry’s aversion to regulations.

The bank’s profits have gone from $3.9 million in 2013, when the pontiff — born Jorge Mario Bergoglio — was elected Pope to $75.5 million last year. Other standard benchmarks of bank profitability also highlight the Institute’s gains. Both the Vatican bank’s average return on its holdings and its profit margin on interest-bearing assets have climbed since 2012, according to SNL Financial. The bank’s so-called Tier 1 capital ratio — for regulators, the most important measure of a lender’s financial strength — has also risen over that time.

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UNITED STATES
National Catholic Register

by Edward Pentin 09/24/2015

Further serious concerns are being raised about Cardinal Godfried Danneels, one of the papal delegates chosen to attend the upcoming Ordinary Synod on the Family, after the archbishop emeritus of Brussels confessed this week to being part of a radical “mafia” reformist group opposed to Benedict XVI.

It was also revealed this week that he once wrote a letter to the Belgium government favoring same-sex “marriage” legislation because it ended discrimination against LGBT groups.

The cardinal is already known for having once advised the king of Belgium to sign an abortion law in 1990, for telling a victim of clerical sex abuse to keep quiet, and for refusing to forbid pornographic, “educational” materials being used in Belgian Catholic schools.

He also once said same-sex “marriage” was a “positive development,” although he has sought to distinguish such a union from the Church’s understanding of marriage.

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UNITED STATES
Religion News Service – Spiritual Politics

Mark Silk | Sep 24, 2015

Church spokesmen and mainstream religion reporters like to make the point that the pope — any pope — hews not to a liberal or conservative line in secular politics, but marches to the distinctively different beat of Catholic social doctrine. And the point is sufficiently true that woe to those who deny it.

But the fact remains that popes, through what they choose to emphasize and how they choose to emphasize it, may offer more aid and comfort to one side of the political divide than the other. And at the end of Pope Francis’ Washington innings my scorecard reads: Liberals 7, Conservatives 2, with innumerable hits and one error.

On the liberal side, I score runs on immigration, climate change, the death penalty, caring for the poor, assuring the common good, ending the culture war, and political over economic decision-making. Conservatives scored on abortion and religious liberty.

Of course, conservatives will argue that they also care about the poor. They just don’t believe in robust government programs to help them. If anyone doubts that Pope Francis was sending anything but that message, I suggest a rereading of his speech Congress. As in: “I would encourage you to keep in mind all those people around us who are trapped in a cycle of poverty. They too need to be given hope. The fight against poverty and hunger must be fought constantly and on many fronts, especially in its causes.”

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NEW YORK
New York Times

Pope Again Sympathizes With Church Leaders over Abuse Fallout

“I know that, as a presbyterate in the midst of God’s people, you suffered greatly in the not distant past by having to bear the shame of some of your brothers who harmed and scandalized the Church in the most vulnerable of her members… In the words of the Book of Revelation, I know well that you ‘have come forth from the great tribulation.’ I accompany you at this time of pain and difficulty, and I thank God for your faithful service to his people.”

In the remarks he is delivering at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Francis is echoing the remarks he made on the church’s abuse scandals on Wednesday, when he told American bishops that he “supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims – in the knowledge that in healing we, too, are healed – and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated.” He also praised them for their “courage” and the “great sacrifice” they had made.

Advocates for the victims of sexual abuse by priests have condemned his words. They also questioned why Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, the former archbishop of Los Angeles who was relieved of ministry duties over revelations that he had covered up for abusive priests, was traveling with Francis.

“Once again, he seems to be talking about the pain and embarrassment of the bishops, as opposed to the pain and embarrassment of the victims, who’ve been raped and sodomized,” said Barbara Dorris, the victims outreach director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. “Well, they created this crisis by protecting predators; children didn’t ask to be raped. So to compare the two things is grossly unjust.”

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NEW YORK
Washington Post

By Michelle Boorstein September 24

Defending Pope Francis’ comments in the United States on clergy sex abuse, his spokesman Thursday night hinted that the pope will meet with survivors during this visit. U.S. church leaders had said similar things in the months leading up to this visit, but not a concrete way at such a precise time.

At a news conference in New York, the Rev. Federico Lombardi was asked why the pope had spoken twice now — Wednesday to bishops and Thursday to seminarians and religious sisters, among others — about the abuse crisis, but never named it explicitly and focused on encouraging the clergy without speaking first about victims.

“It isn’t totally true what you say. He has spoken of ‘crimes,’ and said the bishops have to engage to avoid these crimes can happen again ..it is an incredible, terrible, terrible thing,” the Italian priest said in slightly broken English. “It may be the trip is not to end now, the pope has already said speaking to bishops, to the priests, maybe he will also have other occasions to approach this problem that was and is very big.”

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NEW YORK
San Diego Union-Tribune

NEW YORK (AP) — Latest developments in Pope Francis’ visit to the United States. All times local: …

10:20 p.m.

The Vatican spokesman has denied claims by advocates for victims that the pope has given short shrift to their suffering in his remarks on the clergy sex-abuse crisis.

The Rev. Federico Lombardi says Pope Francis has acknowledged victims by referring to children as the most vulnerable members of the church and speaking of child molestation as a crime.

Lombardi also noted Thursday that the pope has three more days of public events in the U.S., suggesting that further comments are ahead.

In two separate speeches, the pope has commended U.S. bishops for their response to victims and said he understood clergy had “suffered greatly” because of the shame from the scandal.

The crisis erupted in 2002 in the Archdiocese of Boston, then spread across the country and overseas.

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AUSTRALIA
Sydney Morning Herald

September 25, 2015

Jane Lee
Legal affairs, industrial relations and science correspondent

The states and territories have challenged Commonwealth Attorney-General George Brandis to say whether the Turnbull government will support a $4.01 billion national redress scheme for survivors of child sexual abuse.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Child Sexual Abuse recommended last week, on the day Mr Turnbull ousted Tony Abbott as prime minister, that the federal government set up a scheme for about 60,000 survivors across Australia.

Attorneys-general of all states and territories except the Northern Territory said in a joint letter to Senator Brandis on Friday that the commission had “identified a clear role” for the federal government in the redress scheme, including giving it a deadline of the end of 2015 to announce whether it would establish a national scheme.

While institutions where historic child abuse occurred should bear most of the redress cost, the commission said in its report that federal, state and territory governments should cover any shortfall as “funders of last resort”. It estimated that this would be about $613 million, or 15 per cent of total redress funding

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NEW YORK
The New York Times

Pope Francis is warning clergy members, nuns and brothers that taking a business-inspired approach to their ministries can dampen their spirit of “generous self-sacrifice.”

The Archdiocese of New York has been going through a reorganization that has resulted in the closing of nearly 40 churches, and some have criticized the closures for being motivated by business rather than pastoral priorities. The pope’s comment will likely be welcomed by those critics.

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NEW YORK
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Sep. 24, 2015

NEW YORK
A Vatican spokesman has said that Pope Francis may yet have another opportunity during his continuing visit to the U.S. to address the sexual abuse crisis, in what could be a reference to an upcoming but unannounced meeting with abuse survivors.

The pope may “have other occasions to approach this problem,” Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi said at a press conference Thursday evening. Francis’ six-day, three-city trip to the U.S., he said, “is not to an end now.”

Lombardi was responding to an NCR question at the briefing regarding two speeches given by the pope Wednesday in Washington and Thursday in New York.

Both speeches addressed the sexual abuse crisis obliquely, and acknowledged the struggles faced by church officials in handling the issue but not the pain of survivors.

Speaking to some 300 U.S. bishops Wednesday, Francis told them: “I realize how much the pain of recent years has weighed upon you.”

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NEW YORK
News LI

by Nia Hamm

NEW YORK – The historic U.S. visit of Pope Francis has refocused attention on the Catholic Church’s sex-abuse scandal. Although the pontiff has vowed to root out child sex predators from the Church, which has cost billions in legal expenses, victims of clergy sexual abuse want the pope to do more.

In New York, Michael Mack, 58, who says he was abused by a priest when he was 11, hopes to bring more attention to the issue this week. He has written a one-man play, “Conversations with My Molester.”

“I truly believe that his intention is to heal around this process,” Mack said. “And since this play of mine really is all about healing – about my own personal healing journey, but also the journeys that it reflects for so many survivors – that it seemed like the timing was a natural.”

Mack, who began practicing Catholicism again about seven years ago, said reform efforts such as a Truth and Reconciliation Commission would give church sexual-abuse victims a true chance to heal. Mack’s play opened in New York City on Thursday, the same day Pope Francis arrived in the city.

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UNITED STATES
International Business Times

By Julia Glum

Bernie McDaid remembers staring at the stained glass the first time his Catholic priest molested him. He said he was about 12 years old, an altar boy standing in the sacristy of St. James’ Church outside of Boston, when the Rev. Joseph E. Birmingham grabbed him, started tickling and then put his hands down McDaid’s pants.

McDaid soon began skipping Mass, hoping to avoid the older man. When Birmingham realized he wasn’t seeing the boy in church, he started organizing beach trips with McDaid and his classmates. McDaid would try to hide in the bushes in front of his house when Birmingham’s gold Plymouth Fury came cruising down the street to pick him up. Once in the car, he and his friends would scramble to jump out at every stop, because if they were left alone, Birmingham would ask whether they’d been masturbating, McDaid said. Sometimes, he’d scream at them.

Since then, more than 30 men have reportedly come forward claiming Birmingham abused them as kids, and the Archdiocese of Boston settled on the grounds of at least one such victim’s claims in 1996. Birmingham died in 1989.

Years later, McDaid — no longer a Catholic — sat next to his mother in Nationals Park in Washington, D.C., watching as Pope Benedict XVI rode around in the popemobile. It was 2008, and McDaid said he had tears in his eyes as Benedict waved to the 46,000 cheering people packed into the stands for Mass. “The crowd treated him like a rock star, and I couldn’t get over that,” McDaid said. “He’s not God. He’s not a rock star.”

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NEW YORK
National Catholic Reporter

Joshua J. McElwee | Sep. 24, 2015

NEW YORK
Pope Francis has poignantly thanked U.S. Catholic women religious — until recently the subject of two controversial Vatican investigations — for their work in building and maintaining the church throughout the country.

But the pontiff has also made his second statement in as many days that only obliquely mentions the clergy sexual abuse crisis, and refers to the shame brought upon priests and religious due to the perpetrators but not the pain faced by survivors.

In a prayer service with priests and members of religious orders at St. Patrick’s Cathedral here Thursday evening, Francis said he wanted to express his “esteem and gratitude” to women religious of the United States “in a special way.”…

The pontiff opened his remarks inside the cathedral with an unplanned moment expressing condolences and prayers for the hundreds of people who were killed in a stampede in Mecca Thursday, during part of the traditional pilgrimage for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.

The pope expressed sentiments for our “Muslim brothers and sisters” and said he wished he could greet them under warmer circumstances. He asked those in the church to unite in prayer with him for them. …

Francis had previously spoken obliquely about the sexual abuse crisis in Washington Wednesday during a speech to some 300 U.S. bishops in the Cathedral of St. Matthew.

On that occasion, he told the bishops: “I realize how much the pain of recent years has weighed upon you.”

“I have supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims — in the knowledge that in healing we too are healed — and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated,” the pope said.

Survivors’ advocates widely criticized those words, saying they insufficiently addressed the scope of the clergy abuse crisis in the U.S. The National Survivor Advocates Coalition even said the pope had “described a fairy tale” of the bishops’ handling of abuse.

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AUSTRALIA
The Canberra Times

September 25, 2015

Christopher Knaus
Reporter for The Canberra Times.

Catholic community leaders told an alleged ACT child abuse victim to “forgive” her father and removed the religious mentor the girl had worked up the courage to confide in, police say.

The alleged abuser, now 73, was a leading member of a Canberra religious community closely linked to the Catholic Church, and stands accused of abusing a number of girls, including two of his own daughters.

The man, who has not been identified to protect his daughter, appeared in the ACT Magistrates Court on Friday, represented by lawyer Peter Woodhouse, and was committed for trial in the ACT Supreme Court after pleading not guilty to all charges.

Court documents allege the crimes took place in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, but were only brought to light recently as part of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philly.com

By Andrea Vettori
and Margie Winters

At a time when so many Catholics feel a sense of renewed pride and excitement about their faith because of Pope Francis and his message of acceptance and inclusion, we in Philadelphia are painfully reminded of the arrogance and abuse of power that laid the foundation for the sex-abuse scandal and that continues to afflict this diocese.

Once again, the church attempts to quiet the voices and experiences of the faithful by citing doctrine and creating policy. The most recent example is Archbishop Charles J. Chaput’s “memorandum of understanding” requiring parents of Catholic school children to sign a pledge of loyalty to the Catholic identity of the institution, as defined by the archbishop.

Such a policy is poorly supported by theological and historical realities and ignores the diversity of thought and practice among the faithful. With seeming indifference to the growing loss of moral authority engendered by the legacy of the sexual abuse of children, the archdiocese continues to create an adversarial relationship with its people.

The women and men of this archdiocese strongly lay claim to their Catholic identity and root their lives in its traditions. With pride and spiritual longing, we educate ourselves in our faith, immersed in Scripture and teachings rich in social justice, concern for the poor, and the dignity of the human person, even as we acknowledge the sins committed in our name. We own our baptismal call to be priest and prophet, challenging church teaching when it contradicts our understanding of God and the human person, a right of informed conscience bestowed on us through the catechism.

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AUSTRALIA
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

25 September, 2015

The Royal Commission is holding a public hearing in Brisbane commencing on Tuesday, 3 November 2015 at the Brisbane Magistrates Court.

The scope and purpose of the public hearing is to inquire into:

1.The experience of former students of Brisbane Grammar School in Spring Hill, Queensland.

2.The experience of former students at St Paul’s School in Bald Hills, Queensland.

3.The response of the Board of Trustees, Headmasters and other members of staff of Brisbane Grammar School to complaints about the behaviour of Kevin Lynch, a former school counsellor at Brisbane Grammar School.

4.The responses of the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane Diocese, the School Council, Headmasters and other members of staff of St Paul’s School to concerns raised, or complaints made, about the behaviour of Kevin Lynch and Gregory Knight, former members of staff at St Paul’s School.

5.The past and current systems, practices, policies and procedures in place at Brisbane Grammar School and St Paul’s School in relation to raising and responding to concerns and complaints about child sexual abuse.

6.The circumstances relating to Gregory Knight’s employment and registration as a teacher in Queensland.

7. Any related matters.

Any person or institution who believes that they have a direct and substantial interest in the scope and purpose of the public hearing is invited to lodge a written application for leave to appear at the public hearing by 16 October 2015.

Applications for leave to appear should be made using the form available on the Royal Commission website.

Leave to appear will generally be granted when an applicant:
a. has been summoned to give evidence
b. is an institution, or is a representative of an institution, that is subject to the inquiry to be undertaken
c. may be the subject of an adverse allegation.

It is not essential for a person who will appear as a witness in a hearing to apply for leave to appear – witnesses may appear and give evidence without applying for leave.

The form should be lodged with the Royal Commission via:
Email: solicitor@childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au or
Mail: GPO Box 5283, Sydney NSW 2001.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

Brisbane Grammar School (BGS) has reiterated its apology to former students who were sexually abused by a school counsellor, as a royal commission announces a public hearing in the city later this year.

The public hearings will provide an important opportunity for those who have suffered pain and hurt to be heard, and we acknowledge their courage in coming forward … It is important we hear these courageous men tell their stories.

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse said BGS, also known as Grammar, at Spring Hill, and St Paul’s School, at Bald Hills, would be the focus of public hearings on November 3 at the Brisbane Magistrates Court.

About 70 former students sued BGS in the early 2000s, alleging former school counsellor Kevin Lynch sexually abused them during counselling sessions between 1975 and 1988.

The commission will inquire into the responses of the board of trustees, headmasters and other members and staff at BGS to complaints about the behaviour of Mr Lynch.

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NEW YORK
WRVO

[with audio]

By TOM MAGNARELLI

Victims of past sexual abuse by Catholic priests in central New York are calling for justice as Pope Francis makes his visit to America. But the victims are limited in what they can do by New York State law.

Victim Kevin Braney started an online petition on Change.org calling for the removal of Bishop Robert Cunningham of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse for his refusal to release the names of priests with credible allegations of sexual abuse against them.

“It’s not fair for us to stand in front of people and publicly have to describe what’s happened to us and face the shame and scrutiny that comes with it,” Braney said.

Braney and others have more than 1,200 signatures and want to present their petition to Pope Francis as he visits New York City. Braney’s allegations occurred past the statute of limitations in New York state for criminal and civil prosecutions of sex crimes against minors. Currently, the law only allows for a claim to be made up to five years after the victim turns 18.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Western Daily Press

A senior Church of England clergyman has been charged with eight sexual offences against children.

Peter Keeley-Pannett, 71, a non-stipendiary deacon in the Diocese of Chichester, is accused of making 150 indecent images of children.

He also faces two counts of causing a boy, aged 13 to 15, to watch images of sexual activity, and two charges of causing or inciting a boy, aged 14, to engage in sexual activity.

He is further accused of attempting to cause a boy over 13 to engage in sexual activity.

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NEW YORK
Grand Island Independent

NEW YORK (AP) — Pope Francis made a rousing show of gratitude for American nuns on Thursday while thanking clergy for persevering through the priest sex abuse scandal, seemingly intent on moving the U.S. church beyond recent crises.

The pope called religious sisters “women of strength” and “fighters” who had a “spirit of courage” as they served at the forefront of the church.

Six months ago, Francis abruptly ended a contentious Vatican overhaul of the leading umbrella group for U.S. nuns that had started under his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI. The Vatican accused the Leadership Conference of Women Religious of straying far from church teaching, which the nuns denied, and overemphasizing social justice over abortion. The sisters received a wave of popular support, including parish vigils, protests outside the Vatican embassy in Washington and a congressional resolution commending the sisters for their service to the country.

“To you, religious women, sisters and mothers of this people, I wish to say thank you, a big thank you and to tell you that I love you very much,” Francis, an Argentine, said in his native Spanish, to applause from worshippers in an evening prayer service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

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AUSTRALIA
ABC News

By David Marchese

The lawyer acting for a Catholic Archbishop accused of concealing child sexual abuse is calling for a permanent stay of proceedings.

Adelaide’s Archbishop Philip Wilson has previously pleaded not guilty to concealing the serious indictable offence of another person.

The charge relates to when Wilson was an assistant parish priest in East Maitland in the 1970s and worked with paedophile priest James Fletcher.

Wilson’s lawyer Simon Buchen today sought a permanent stay of proceedings.

He also told Newcastle Local Court he would be filing an application seeking a court attendance notice be quashed.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

Catholic Adelaide Archbishop Philip Wilson moves to stop criminal case over sexual abuse by colleague

AAP

Adelaide’s Catholic Archbishop is attempting to permanently halt criminal proceedings against him for allegedly concealing a colleague’s sexual abuse of a young boy.

Archbishop Philip Wilson was charged in March with concealing information about the 1971 sex assault of a 10-year-old boy by pedophile priest James Fletcher in the NSW town of Maitland.

The 64-year-old, who has pleaded not guilty, applied on Friday for a permanent stay of the proceedings against him when his matter came before Newcastle Local Court.

Both parties are expected to argue the application at a hearing in the local court in December.

Police allege Wilson became aware of the abuse between 2004 and 2006 when both men worked in the Maitland Diocese, in the NSW Hunter region.

They claim he concealed the information.

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NEW YORK
York Daily Record

By Rick Hampson, USA TODAY

NEW YORK – Pope Francis arrived here amid throngs of cheering, flag-waving fans for a historic visit to the Big Apple.

The pope stepped through the huge, recently renovated bronze doors of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, as a congregation of about 2,500 greeted him with a roar and the choir sang a sacred piece by Mozart written for evening prayer.

Francis walked down the center aisle of the church, sprinkling holy water on those gathered.

The pope entered midtown in his signature Fiat but moved to his Popemobile for the last few blocks down Fifth Avenue to the cathedral, waving to crowds en route. Church Bells chimed; the pope waved; the crowd roared.

In his homily, he avoided political issues and spoke instead to Roman Catholics, particularly the many priests, nuns and brothers in his audience, about spiritual issues.

Speaking in Spanish from a lectern on the high altar of St. Patrick’s, the pope focused on a call for “gratitude and hard work,” which he called “pillars of the spiritual life.”

But he was twice interrupted by loud applause when he praised U.S. nuns, who’d been the subject of a Vatican investigation that Francis closed after taking office in 2013 following the sudden resignation of Benedict XVI.

When he was a powerful member of the Vatican Curia and enforcer of church doctrine, Benedict – then Cardinal Ratzinger – was thought to look askance at American nuns who took liberal political and ecclesiastical stands.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
WAMU

By: Katie Davis
September 24, 2015

These past three days, we’ve been hearing loud cheers for Pope Francis. But this afternoon, a sharper call was made in Washington — this one for justice.

D.C. Council member David Grosso (I-At Large) joined a rally of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests at the Wilson Building today.

Grosso says he listened to Pope Francis’ message to the Catholic Bishops yesterday. He says he was hoping the pope would hold them accountable for abuse committed in the church, but came away disappointed.

“Basically the pope thanked for efforts, which is not an accurate assessment. They have done everything they can to stop, across the country, a real open conversation around how we heal from this sexual violence,” he says.

Grosso is adamant, and he doesn’t just want an open conversation about the issue. He introduced legislation earlier this year that would eliminate the statute of limitations for the recovery of damages arising out of sexual abuse that occurred when a victim was a minor.

He says that the bill came out of a personal experience.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Yahoo! News

Amy Sullivan
September 24, 2015

A seat for Pope Francis’ address to Congress on Thursday was one of the most sought-after tickets in this town’s history, with each member of Congress allowed to bring along just one guest.

But in the packed House chamber, there were three noticeable vacancies right in the front row. Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas — all conservative Catholics — took a pass on the opportunity to hear from the leader of their church.

It’s possible that all three had scheduling conflicts. Perhaps they were finally able to score tickets to “Hamilton” and decided to make a day of it in the Big Apple. The three have skipped the State of the Union in the past (Alito calls it “a childish spectacle”), objecting to the partisan nature of that gathering.

More likely, however, the three justices were simply more discreet than Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., who announced to media this week that he was boycotting the pope’s talk over concerns that the pontiff was acting “like a leftist politician.”

The conspicuous absences were a bit surprising, given that the current Supreme Court is sometimes characterized as the “Catholic court.” Six of the nine justices are Catholic — the other three, John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy and Sonia Sotomayor, were in attendance — and the most conservative members of the court have not been shy about identifying with their church.

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Institute for Public Policy

September 24, 2015

COLMAN McCARTHY, cmccarthy at starpower.net
A former Washington Post columnist, McCarthy is founder and director of the Center for Teaching Peace in Washington, D.C., and the author of the book I’d Rather Teach Peace. He recently wrote the piece “Francis Needs to go Beyond his Play-it-Safe Verbiage” for the National Catholic Reporter.

McCarthy said today about Pope Francis’ speech before Congress: “I thought it over emphasized meaningless pieties.” While the speech referred to stopping the arms trade, McCarthy noted “it didn’t refer to the militarism of U.S. government itself. It didn’t talk about lowering the military budget. He quoted from [Martin Luther] King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech, but not King’s calling the U.S. government ‘the greatest purveyor of violence‘ — as King did. He mentioned Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton, but they too spoke out against U.S. militarism. He should have quoted Dorothy Day and her commitment to pacifism.” See McCarthy’s piece on Dorothy Day in the Washington Post from 1980 just after her death. See also McCarthy’s piece “Rediscovering Thomas Merton.”

BARBARA BLAINE, bblaine at snapnetwork.org, @BarbaraBlaine

Blaine is with Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, which just released the statement “Chicago Abuse Victims Blast New Papal Remarks,” which says that the pope “speaks of some alleged ‘great sacrifice‘ made by bishops because of the abuse and cover up crisis. What sacrifice? What bishop takes fewer vacations, drives a smaller car, does his own laundry or has been passed over for promotion because he’s shielding predators and endangering kids? None.” Blaine said today: “If you’re a woman, you can’t be a priest, if you’re married, you can’t be a priest, but if you’ve raped children, you can still be a priest.” The group has put out 20 steps the pope could take on the child sex abuse scandal.” Blaine appeared in The Real News segment yesterday “The Pope is Dishonest About Zero Tolerance for Child Sex Abuse.”

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CAMDEN (NJ)
Catholic Star Herald

by Carmela Malerba September 24, 2015

The Office of Child and Youth Protection is announcing CAP (Child Assault Prevention) sessions. CAP is the safe environment training program for adults who have regular contact with minors. Attendance is required in order to comply with the USCCB’s Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People. The policy of the Diocese of Camden is that adults will attend CAP once every five years.

CAP 1 teaches attendees to recognize child abuse and neglect and how to report to the proper authorities. Adults are taught that children have the right to be safe, strong and free. CAP 1 is for new volunteers and employees.

CAP 2 is called CAP’s Bullying Prevention Program and is a workshop addressing bullying awareness and bullying prevention. Cyber-bullying is also presented.

CAP 3 is called Cyber-Empowerment and is a workshop which promotes adults understanding of cyber activity of youth while teaching them realistic ways to help children keep their own rights and guard the rights of others in the cyber-sphere.

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MASSACHUSETTS
The Catholic Free Press

By Tanya Connor

“It’s been wonderful, absolutely wonderful!”

That’s how Bishop McManus started his account of being with Pope Francis in Washington, D.C., as he spoke with The Catholic Free Press by telephone Thursday morning.

“The excitement in the city of Washington was palpable,” he said.

It started before he got there, as strangers in T.F. Green Airport in Providence asked if he was going to see the pope and requested his prayers, he said. And the stewardess commented, “Oh what a privilege!”

At St. Matthew Cathedral in Washington, Pope Francis gave a beautiful address to the United States bishops, Bishop McManus said. He said as a bishop he found the Holy Father’s words powerful; he assured the bishops he’s walking with them and recommended that they be courageous and welcome immigrants.

“His pastoral zeal really is an example to us bishops and priests,” Bishop McManus said. “It was like a 12-hour retreat, just listening to his message, his emphasis on joy and hope. We get bogged down in the complexities of running a diocese, a parish.”

The pope was a good example for a bishop “to stand with his priests and support them, especially when they need it most,” he said.

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RHODE ISLAND
Providence Journal

By 
John Hill and Donita Naylor
Journal Staff Writers

Posted Sep. 23, 2015

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Of the hundreds of Rhode Islanders who traveled to the nation’s capital Wednesday to see Pope Francis, among the most interested was Providence Bishop Thomas Tobin.

The bishop, who in addition to watching the events also participated in many of them, said one thing that particularly struck him, besides the enthusiasm of the crowds, was the pope’s stamina.
At the end of the day, he said of the bishops, “we were very tired, and we didn’t do anything.”

Earlier in the day, in an address to the bishops who were in Washington, Francis spoke of the church’s handling of sexual abuse involving priests. His remarks were widely criticized by victim support groups and others as overly sympathetic to the bishops, who are often blamed for hiding reports of abuse for, in some cases, years.

Tobin said he did not think the address to the bishops was meant to be Francis’ only comment on the issue.

“I had to remind myself, this is only his first speech,” he said. “He’s going to be making a number of them. I would tell everyone they should stay tuned. We’re only in the first inning.”

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington City Paper

Posted by Andrew Giambrone on September 24, 2015

Just a couple of hours after Pope Francis served lunch to 300 District homeless people outside of St. Patrick’s Church, a group of sexual-abuse survivors gathered outside of the Wilson Building to urge him to hold the clergy accountable, and to highlight legislation before the D.C. Council that would eliminate the statute of limitations on sex crimes committed against children.

The rally, organized by the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), a group with more than 10,000 members, was attended by six survivors who held pictures of themselves taken during the years they had been abused, and who gave candid testimony of their experiences. The survivors said the pope’s visit to the U.S. offers a unique opportunity to remind people that the Catholic Church has resisted confronting the sins of some of its priests, actively protecting them from prosecution and failing to explicitly punish bishops who have tried to cover up any scandal.

“I want to make sure victims know that they’re not alone out there,” says Becky Ianni, SNAP director for the District and Virginia. “And I think it’s really hard when every store you go into, there’s a poster of the pope. And that when the pope speaks out to Congress and to the bishops, [he does so] instead of speaking or reaching out to victims and telling them they’re courageous.”

During his speech to U.S. bishops at St. Matthew’s on Wednesday, Pope Francis remarked that clergymen had shown “courage” through the Church’s child-sex-abuse scandal. “I have supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims—in the knowledge that in healing, we too are healed—and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated,” he said. The Guardian reports that U.S. dioceses paid $1.7 billion in settlements between 2004 and 2013.

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NEW YORK
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Thursday, Sept. 24, 2015

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 503 0003, bdorris@SNAPnetwork.org)

Yesterday, Pope Francis refused to criticize, even obliquely, even one US Catholic official yesterday for words or deeds that hurt innocent kids or wounded victims.

So today, while he’s in New York, we hope the pope will discipline or at least denounce two Syracuse bishops who have blamed victims of predator priests for their victimization. (This news just came to light last week. )

[Syracuse.com]

In 2011, current Syracuse Bishop Robert Cunningham was asked a clear, simple question, under oath: “did the (abused) boy commit a sin?” He made a clear, simple reply: “The boy is culpable.” He later used the word “accomplice.”

And his predecessor, Bishop James Moynihan, told abuse victim Charles Bailey ‘The age of reason is 7, so if you’re at least 7 you’re culpable for your actions.’

These are inexcusable, irresponsible comments from powerful, smart men. They will deter others who were raped and sodomized from reporting criminals and protecting kids.

Pope Francis should punish these prelates or at least harshly and publicly criticize them so that other bishops might think twice before uttering such callous views in the future.

This warped, self-serving view – that a child is to blame for his or her victimization by a priest – stems from the exalted and ‘superior’ status clerics give themselves. Bishops think this way because they’ve been indoctrinated since childhood to believe that the ordained are ‘above’ the common folk.

Bishops often talk of “the dignity of every person.” But deep down, many of them are convinced that they really are better than the rest of us, which is why many of them almost compulsively blame others when clerics commit crimes.

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UNITED STATES
Press TV (Iran)

Pope Francis is sidestepping the widespread sexual abuse committed by Christian priests in the US Catholic Church, as he visits the United States for the first time, a writer and activist in Boston says.

The pope’s remarks to US bishops in Washington on Wednesday praising their response to the sex scandal while failing to mention the words sexual abuse is “extremely disappointing for the victims of clergy sex abuse,” said Daniel Patrick Welch.

“The pope is more or less sidestepping what is the biggest issue for American Catholics in the last 50 years; it dwarfs everything else,” Welch told Press TV on Thursday.

“It’s not a scandal of course, it’s a crime, it’s a huge crime and the cover up is also a crime,” he added.

Allegations of sexual abuse by the Christian clergy go back decades, but exploded into a full-blown crisis in 2002 when US media revealed widespread abuse and cover-ups by bishops.

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UNITED STATES
PBS – Frontline

Pope Francis’ arrival in the United States this week has focused the nation’s attention on the man who two-and-a-half years ago became the spiritual leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics.

Francis inherited a church beset by scandal and many Americans are wondering what comes next. What has Francis done to reform the church? What do some of his early statements on issues like the environment and income inequality mean for the future of the faith? And what impact could his address to Congress on Thursday — the first ever by a pontiff in U.S. history — have on the nation’s political landscape?

For the answer to some of these questions, FRONTLINE spoke recently with John Thavis, the former Rome bureau chief for the Catholic News Service. Thavis is the author of The Vatican Diaries: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Power, Personalities and Politics at the Heart of the Catholic Church, and the recently released follow-up, The Vatican Prophecies: Investigating Supernatural Signs, Apparitions, and Miracles in the Modern Age.

The pope has arrived in the U.S. after only two-and-a-half years at the Vatican. He inherited a long list of problems and set out on a pretty ambitious reform agenda it seems. What have we learned about him so far?

I think we’ve learned first of all that he’s very determined. A lot of popes have been elected and come in with vague ideas of instituting reforms. I think Pope Francis came in with a mandate to institute reforms, and he’s taken it very seriously. And I think to a great degree he’s had a level of success that no previous pope has really enjoyed.

I would say that his greatest accomplishment so far in the area of reform has been bringing transparency and accountability to the Vatican’s financial operation.

In a sense that was the easiest task facing him, because he had the most support for that. Although there was some Vatican resistance, in this day and age it’s kind of hard to resist the idea of transparency in financial operations, and it’s hard to resist the idea that the Vatican bank and other entities should be in line with international guidelines and regulations.

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AUSTRALIA
The Australian

KATHERINE TOWERS
THE AUSTRALIAN
SEPTEMBER 25, 2015 1

Police will not investigate members of the Adass Israel School board for squirrelling headmistress and serial sex abuser Malka Leifer out of Australia to avoid ­investigators, despite law experts saying it is a clear case of criminal behaviour.

Victorian Supreme Court judge Jack Rush was scathing in a judgment delivered last week on the actions of some members of the board for their role in helping Leifer flee Australia, despite knowing she might have sexually ­abused more than eight female students at the ultra-orthodox school.

Police confirmed yesterday that they had not, or would not, ­investigate those members even though Justice Rush made it clear that board members helped and funded Leifer out of the country to avoid an investigation.

In one of the biggest payouts in Australian history for a sex-abuse case, Justice Rush awarded more than $1.2 million to a former ­student who was abused by Leifer.

Rob Melasecca, a former head of the criminal law section of the Victorian Law Institute and criminal law expert, said yesterday that at “a bare minimum” the actions of individual board members in helping Leifer out of the country in the middle of the night “warranted a serious investigation”.

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UNITED STATES
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

by Kristine Ward, September 24, 2015

We welcome sexual abuse survivors and their families and all men and women of goodwill to our pages today as a safety spot, a haven, a place to know that you are not alone in the midst of the massive news coverage of the visit of Pope Francis to the United States.

We chose the images of the good people of BishopAccountability.org Terry McKiernan, Anne Barrett Doyle, Suzy Nauman for the images today because of BishopAccountability.org’s relentless, vital, intense, hard work in building the repository of the documents that chronicle this crushing crisis.anne barrett doyle

The truth lives in the documents.

The truth is sacred.

Without the documents, and the depositions, and the testimonies of the survivors, the scandal would remain as bishops and the Vatican intended for it to remain: hidden.

We believe this because it is in legislative bodies across the breadth of this country and in United States territories that Roman Catholic bishops and many of their Church’s adherents have blocked, sucker punched, delayed, watered down and deep sixed statute of limitation reforms for victims of sexual abuse – not only those raped and sodomized by Roman Catholic clergy and religious sisters and religious brothers but any citizen of the United States and its territories who have been so violated.

The largest lobbying group against statute of limitation reform is the band of brothers that Pope Francis calls his own and to whom he addressed these incredulous words yesterday at the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, DC:

I am also conscious of the courage with which you have faced difficult moments in the recent history of the Church in this country without fear of self-criticism and at the cost of mortification and great sacrifice. Nor have you been afraid to divest whatever is unessential in order to regain the authority and trust which is demanded of ministers of Christ and rightly expected by the faithful. I realize how much the pain of recent years has weighed upon you and I have supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims – in the knowledge that in healing we too are healed – and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated.

This, dear readers of NSAC News and all persons to whom these words reach, is a fairy tale.

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NEW YORK
New York Daily News

BY ADAM EDELMAN NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Thursday, September 24, 2015

Timothy Cardinal Dolan on Thursday praised Pope Francis’ speech to his brother Bishops about their handling of the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal as “beautiful.”

“He spoke about the courage, he spoke about the ongoing sorrow, and most importantly he spoke about the fact that we can never drop our vigilance, that we’ve always got to be as vigorous as we now are,” Dolan said on NBC’s “TODAY” about Francis’ approval a day earlier of how the Church has tried to restore order and make peace with victims.

“He is for us bishops what we’re supposed be for our people. He’s the bishop of bishops,” Dolan said. “He spoke to us in a very affirming, yet challenging way, like a father, like sheppard, and that moved me very much.”

On Wednesday, during a speech to Catholic bishops, Francis offered praise for a “generous commitment to bring healing to victims” and for acting “without fear of self-criticism.”

The remarks drew a slew of criticism from an organization that represents abuse victims.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Magazine

By Victor Fiorillo | September 24, 2015

On Wednesday, Pope Francis addressed the United States bishops at the Cathedral of Saint Matthew the Apostle in Washington, D.C., and the subject of the clergy sex abuse scandal came up, though he steered clear of using the words “sexual abuse.”

Pope Francis praised the bishops for their “courage” and “great sacrifice,” and seemed to recognize the bishops themselves and the church as additional victims, saying, “I realize how much the pain of recent years has weighed upon you and I have supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims – in the knowledge that in healing we, too, are healed – and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated.”

None of this sat very well with Bryn Mawr’s John Salveson, who was sexually abused by a Catholic priest when he was a teenager. These days, Salveson is the co-founder of Radnor executive-search firm Salveson Stetson Group and president of the Foundation to Abolish Child Sexual Abuse. We got him on the phone for his reaction to Pope Francis’ comments.

Were you surprised that Pope Francis addressed clergy sex abuse with the U.S. bishops in the way that he did?

I was very surprised by his comments. Really shocked. Now, I’m a bit of an outlier on this, but I’m not one of those people holding their breath for the pope to do something to make everything better. The object is not to get the Catholic church to be good to people again, to take care of victims, or to do the right thing.

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UNITED STATES
TWC News

By Erin Clarke
Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Pope Francis is widely viewed as progressive, but advocates say the pontiff needs to do more to stop priest sex abuse in the church. Erin Clarke reports.

(Efforts to reach the Vatican for comment on this story were unsuccessful.)

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WASHINGTON (DC)
Washington Post

September 24

The following is the prepared text of Pope Francis’s address to a joint meeting of Congress, delivered Thursday in Washington. (Follow our liveblog for the latest)

Mr. Vice-President,

Mr. Speaker,

Honorable Members of Congress,

Dear Friends,

I am most grateful for your invitation to address this Joint Session of Congress in “the land of the free and the home of the brave”. I would like to think that the reason for this is that I too am a son of this great continent, from which we have all received so much and toward which we share a common responsibility.

Each son or daughter of a given country has a mission, a personal and social responsibility. Your own responsibility as members of Congress is to enable this country, by your legislative activity, to grow as a nation. You are the face of its people, their representatives. You are called to defend and preserve the dignity of your fellow citizens in the tireless and demanding pursuit of the common good, for this is the chief aim of all politics. A political society endures when it seeks, as a vocation, to satisfy common needs by stimulating the growth of all its members, especially those in situations of greater vulnerability or risk. Legislative activity is always based on care for the people. To this you have been invited, called and convened by those who elected you.

Yours is a work which makes me reflect in two ways on the figure of Moses. On the one hand, the patriarch and lawgiver of the people of Israel symbolizes the need of peoples to keep alive their sense of unity by means of just legislation. On the other, the figure of Moses leads us directly to God and thus to the transcendent dignity of the human being. Moses provides us with a good synthesis of your work: you are asked to protect, by means of the law, the image and likeness fashioned by God on every human face.

Today I would like not only to address you, but through you the entire people of the United States. Here, together with their representatives, I would like to take this opportunity to dialogue with the many thousands of men and women who strive each day to do an honest day’s work, to bring home their daily bread, to save money and –one step at a time – to build a better life for their families. These are men and women who are not concerned simply with paying their taxes, but in their own quiet way sustain the life of society. They generate solidarity by their actions, and they create organizations which offer a helping hand to those most in need.

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