ABUSE TRACKER

UNITED STATES
Hamilton and Griffin on Rights

Over the past few months, the film “Spotlight” has justifiably garnered a lot of attention and praise. It’s about how a team of Boston Globe reporters shined a long-overdue “spotlight” on the Boston archdiocese and its decades of successfully hiding clergy sex crimes.

For a few years afterwards, to a much lesser degree, other journalists did similar investigations in other US Catholic dioceses.

But public attention wanes quickly. And bishops aren’t dumb. They responded by doubling down on secrecy and hiring more expert public relations firms. They launched, and still relentlessly implement, a shrewd PR campaign: admitting what couldn’t be denied but minimizing it, shifting blame, offering apologies and making promises, while clamping down an even-tighter lid on their long-held, potentially devastating secrets.

So much remains hidden.

Here are nine places where “spotlights” are sorely needed now:

1—Church staff and defenders TALK of “zero tolerance.” But that’s the official church policy in only a handful of western democracies (as our colleagues at BishopAccountability.org point out). Across the vast majority of the world, bishops refuse to even promise – much less implement – “zero tolerance.” Why have virtually no news outlets reported this simple but telling fact?

2—Hundreds of priests who’ve been convicted, suspended or accused in one country have been sent or have gone abroad, only to work or live among unsuspecting families and colleagues. Not a single bishop, as best we can tell, has yanked a single passport from a single predator priest. Why is that? Not a single discussion has been held (unless behind closed doors) among church officials about this disturbing and likely growing practice. Why have just a few journalists (Brooks Egerton, Will Carless) reported this?

3—“We didn’t understand. We’re learning.” That’s the carefully-crafted, oft-repeated but disingenuous mantra of Catholic officials across the US (and increasingly, the rest of the world). If that’s true, and evidence suggests it’s not, then why has that “learning” stopped? Where’s the evidence that weak, vague, hastily-adopted church abuse policies are being strengthened, as bishops supposedly “learn” more about predators? It’s not happening.

4—Remember the National Review Board? That’s the body that was set up in 2002 to allegedly monitor whether US bishops were honoring their pledges of reform. Heard anything about or from them for the last few years? We haven’t either. Despite initially hopeful signs, they’ve become a “toothless tiger.” The purported “watchdog” has become a “lap dog.”

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PENNSYLVANIA
Metro

Chester County police are searching for a pastor whom they say has fled after being charged with the rape of a teen he impregnated while she was living in his home.

Jacob Malone, who worked with Calvary Fellowship Church in Downingtown, was charged with rape and institutional sexual assault, CBS reported, adding that his whereabouts could be hard to determine because, as a pastor, he moved around frequently.

The charges against Malone stem from alleged sexual incidents with an 18-year-old woman who lived with him and his family in Exton, ABC reported. The woman has said Malone provided her with alcohol on two occasions and, in one instance, molested her while she was intoxicated.

The teen has told police that she is pregnant with the Malone’s child, investigators said to NBC.

Church leaders confronted Malone about the girl’s pregnancy in November, pastor Bill Bateman said in a related Philly.com article. When confronted, Malone admitted to impregnating her before resigning his position in mid-November.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Mittelbayerische

REGENSBURG.Der ehemalige Leiter der Regensburger Domspatzen, Georg Ratzinger, begrüßt die Aufarbeitung des Misshandlungs- und Missbrauchsskandals bei den Domspatzen. Das teilte der Sprecher des Bistums Regensburg, Clemens Neck, am Dienstagabend mit und trat damit einer Meldung des Bayerischen Rundfunks entgegen, wonach Ratzinger die Aufklärungsarbeit als „Irrsinn“ bezeichnet habe. Gegenüber der MZ teilte das Bistum mit, dass Ratzinger mit dem Vorgehen der Diözese uneingeschränkt einverstanden sei. Laut Neck hält es der ehemalige Chorleiter für richtig, dass alle Beschuldigungen rückhaltlos aufgeklärt werden. Ebenso befürworte Ratzinger, dass diese Aufgabe einem Rechtsanwalt übertragen worden sei, der unabhängig vom Bistum vorgehe.

Ratzinger war am Montag aus Rom von einem Besuch bei seinem Bruder Josef, dem früheren Papst Benedikt XVI., zurückgekommen.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Sueddeutsche Zeitung

[Georg Ratzinger called investigation of the Regensburg abuse scandal as “madness”.]

Von Andreas Glas, Regensburg

Der ehemalige Kapellmeister der Regensburger Domspatzen, Georg Ratzinger, hat die Aufklärung des Missbrauchsskandals als “Irrsinn” bezeichnet. “Diese Kampagne ist für mich ein Irrsinn. Es ist einfach Irrsinn, wie man über 40 Jahre hinweg überprüfen will, wie viele Ohrfeigen bei uns verteilt worden sind, so wie in anderen Einrichtungen auch”, sagte der 91-Jährige am Dienstag dem Bayerischen Rundfunk.

Für ihn sei das Thema abgeschlossen. Wenige Stunden später relativierte Ratzinger seine Aussage: Es sei richtig, alle Beschuldigungen rückhaltlos aufzuklären, heißt es in einer Stellungnahme des Bistums. Ratzinger, der den Knabenchor von 1964 bis 1994 geleitet hat, war am Montagabend aus Rom zurückgekehrt, von einem Besuch bei seinem Bruder, dem emeritierten Papst Benedikt XVI.

Körperlicher und sexueller Missbrauch in bis zu 700 Fällen

Am Freitag hatte ein unabhängiger Gutachter seinen Bericht vorgelegt, demzufolge wesentlich mehr Buben misshandelt wurden, als bis vor Kurzem bekannt war. Bis zu 700 Domspatzen sollen von Priestern und Lehrern körperlich oder sexuell missbraucht worden sein. In acht Monaten hat der Gutachter viermal so viele Fälle aufgedeckt wie das Bistum Regensburg in fünf Jahren.

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DEUTSCHLAND
BR

[Despite criticism from Georg Ratzinger, former director of the Regensburg boys choir, the diocese has stood by its decision to fully investigate the allegations of sexual abuse in which many instances of abuse occured during his time as director. Ratzinger said it was “madness” to investigate abuse that may have happened years ago.]

Im Zusammenhang mit dem Misshandlungs- und Missbrauchsskandal bei den Regensburger Domspatzen versucht das Bistum Regensburg, den in die Kritik geratenen früheren Domkapellmeister Georg Ratzinger aus der Schusslinie zu nehmen

Ratzinger habe auf Nachfrage erklärt, es sei richtig, alle Beschuldigungen rückhaltlos aufzuklären. Das teilte am Dienstagabend (12.01.16) der Sprecher der Diözese Regensburg, Clemens Neck, dem Bayerischen Rundfunk mit. Ratzinger sei mit dem Vorgehen des Bistums Regensburg uneingeschränkt einverstanden und er begrüße es, dass diese Aufgabe einem Rechtsanwalt übertragen sei, der unabhängig vom Bistum vorgehe.

Ratzinger sprach von “Irrsinn”

Bistumssprecher Neck sagte weiter, der 91 Jahre alte Ratzinger sei gesundheitlich angeschlagen. Damit relativiert das Bistum Regensburg Aussagen, die der Bruder von Papst Benedikt am Dienstagmorgen im Gespräch mit dem BR gemacht hatte. Georg Ratzinger hatte hier von einer “Kampagne” gesprochen. Wörtlich hatte er gesagt:

“Diese Kampagne ist für mich ein Irrsinn. Es ist einfach Irrsinn, wie man über 40 Jahre hinweg überprüfen will, wie viele Ohrfeigen bei uns verteilt worden sind, so wie in anderen Einrichtungen auch.”
Georg Ratzinger, 91

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RHODE ISLAND
Rhode Island Public Radio

By JOHN BENDER

A former Massachusetts Attorney General has been hired to spearhead a new investigation into allegations of sexual abuse at St. George’s prep school in Middletown, Rhode Island. Scott Harshbarger of Boston will take up the inquiry into the school.

A group of alumni has accused former teachers and faculty at the school of sexual misconduct in the 1970s and 80s.

That same group deemed an initial investigation not thorough or impartial enough, because the investigator worked for a law firm which also represented the school.

The alumni pressed the school for a new inquiry into the allegations with an investigator approved jointly by the group and the St. George’s board of trustees.

Harshbarger is a prominent Boston lawyer, and served as Attorney General of Massachusetts from 1991 to 1999.

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ALASKA
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

For immediate release: Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2016

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

Before praising Alaska Archbishop Francis Hurley too much, Catholics and citizens should recall that he repeatedly put children in harm’s way, by quietly bringing a Michigan predator priest and a New Mexico predator bishop to work in Alaska while warning no one about their crimes.

[BishopAccountability.org]

And just five years ago, he advocated returning some child molesting clerics to ministry and relaxing the church’s “zero tolerance” policy.

[BishopAccountability.org]

[SNAP]

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IRELAND
The Journal

FORMER PRIEST AND serial abuser Tony Walsh has received a sentence of one year’s imprisonment for the sexual assault of a child in the early 1970s.

Walsh was a seminarian at the time of the offence, which is the earliest recorded case of child abuse by him.

He went on to become known as the “Singing Priest” for his role in a travelling all-priest group before he was defrocked after his abuse of young boys began to emerge.

Walsh (61), formerly of North Circular Road, Dublin was convicted last December after a trial at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court of the indecent assault of a female at St Luke’s, Kilbarron Park, Kilmore, Dublin on an unknown date between 17 April, 1973 and 9 September, 1976.

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IRELAND
Kildare Nationalist

A former priest and serial child abuser will have to serve an extra year behind bars for the sexual assault of a young girl in the 1970s.

Tony Walsh of North Circular Road in Dublin is already serving a 16-year sentence for the rape and abuse of three schoolboys.

In the late 1970s, Tony Walsh used to perform as an Elvis impersonator with an All Priests Show and became known as the “singing priest”.

But away from the stage act, he was a child abuser, who was eventually defrocked by Pope John Paul II.

In 2010, the 61-year-old was jailed for 16 years for abusing boys in the 70s and 80s. He will now spend an extra year in prison for indecently assaulting a young girl.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Premier

4. Archbishop of Canterbury commissions an independent review into the handling of sex offence allegations made against a bishop 20yrs ago

Sex abuse scandals involving young males within faith-based organisations is something more commonly associated with the Catholic Church. However, in October last year Peter Ball, the former bishop of Lewes and Gloucester respectively, was arrested for a string of offences against teenagers and young men in the Church. The Archbishop of Canterbury launched an independent review into the abuse by Ball, after claims of a cover-up (with one of the victims accusing the senior clergy at the time of being more concerned with the Church’s reputation than the victims) (BBC News 16.12.15).

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 12 January 2016 (VIS) – The Holy Father has:

– appointed Fr. Euzebius Chinekezy Ogbonna Managwu as bishop of Port-Gentil (area 22,850, population 128,000, Catholics 71,770, priests 11, religious 11), Gabon. The bishop-elect was born in N’Djamena, Chad in 1959 and was ordained a priest in 1992. He holds a licentiate from the Pontifical Theological Faculty “Teresianum”, Rome and has served in a number of pastoral roles, including parish vicar, parish priest, spiritual director and rector of the Saint Jean minor seminary in Libreville. He is currently episcopal vicar of the diocese of Libreville and pastor of the parish of Notre Dame de l’Ogooue.

– given his assent to the appointment, by the Synod of Bishops of the major archiepiscopal Syro-Malabar church, gathered in Mount Saint Thomas, Kerala, India, of Fr. Jose Pulickal as auxiliary bishop of the eparchy of Kanjirapally of the Syro-Malabars (area 2,017, population 1,365,900, Catholics 225,950, priests 344, religious 2,087), India. The bishop-elect was born in Inchiyani, India in 1964 and was ordained a priest in 1991. He holds a doctorate in biblical theology from the Dharmaram Institute of Bangalore, and has served in a number of pastoral roles, including vicar of the cathedral of Kanjirapally, director of catechesis, eparchial vicar and consultor. He is currently protosyncellus with responsibilty for the clergy.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Join leading investigative journalists Nick McKenzie and Richard Baker at an exclusive screening of the Golden Globe-nominated Spotlight, an investigative thriller starring Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton and Rachel McAdams.

Spotlight tells the true story of a team of Boston Globe journalists who exposed one of the biggest cover-ups of modern times.

After the screening, award-winning journalists McKenzie and Baker will lead a lively Q&A discussion, offering a rare insider’s perspective on investigative journalism, how it has evolved over the years and what it will look like in the future. Sharing their own experiences of reporting on high-profile crime and corruption within places high and low, while also answering questions from the audience, this stimulating Q&A is one not to be missed.

This exclusive event has limited seating, so get in quick!

Cost:
$15 for Fairfax readers including a glass of sparkling wine
$12.50 for Palace Movie Club members including a glass of sparkling wine
Where: Kino Cinema, Melbourne
When: 6:30pm, January 19th, 2016
Buy Now: Click here to buy tickets

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ROME
Crux

By John L. Allen Jr.
Associate editor January 12, 2016

ROME — Recently news broke in Germany about widespread sexual and physical abuse at a well-known Catholic boys’ choir, news that ricocheted around the world because when the abuse occurred, the choir was being directed by Monsignor Georg Ratzinger, the brother of emeritus Pope Benedict XVI.

The data was truly shocking: at least 231 children abused over four decades, from the 1950s to the 1990s, representing one out of every three boys in the famed Regensburg “Domspatzen” choir during that time.

A lawyer who compiled the report said that although there are no accusations of abuse against Ratzinger himself, who’s now 91, the research leads him to believe the pope’s brother must have known what was happening.

Around the same time, the Vatican was reeling from the latest twists in the “Vatileaks 2.0” saga, centering on leaks of secret papal documents revealing various kinds of financial corruption or dubious expenditures: cardinals living in swanky apartments, money being used to influence sainthood causes, all kinds of people who aren’t supposed to getting access to low-costs goods in the Vatican such as tobacco and gas, and so on.

(It’s called “2.0” in reference to the first Vatileaks scandal in 2012, involving the theft of documents from Pope Benedict by his then-butler.)

Both stories are embarrassing for the Vatican and for the Church, and both raise troubling questions: How could such misconduct have gone for so long without being detected, and what sort of accountability will be imposed so it doesn’t happen again?

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DEUTSCHLAND
BR

[George Ratzinger, former director of the Regensburg boys choir, said the campaign against abuse in the choir is “madness.” He said for him the issue is finished. He just returned from a visit with his brother, Emeritus Pope Benedict XIV. The lawyer who reported he found 231 victims of abuse – former choir members – said another 20 alleged victims have come forward since he gave his report.]

Der Regensburger Ex-Domkapellmeister Georg Ratzinger hat die Aufklärung des Missbrauchs- und Misshandlungsskandals bei seinem früheren Chor als “Irrsinn” bezeichnet. Das sagte er heute gegenüber dem Bayerischen Rundfunk.

“Für mich ist das Thema abgeschlossen”, sagte Ratzinger, der am Montagabend aus Rom von einem Besuch bei seinem Bruder Josef, dem früheren Papst Benedikt XVI., zurückkam.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Express

[The priest known as Georg K. was sentenced to six years in a German prison for abusing boys in South Africa. He appealed the sentence as being too harsh but this was rejected by the federal court. He now faces church action in Rome. The bishop has submitted his file to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.]

Willich/Aachen/Rom –
Wegen 25-fachen Missbrauchs von Jungen wurde der aus Südafrika ausgelieferte Willicher Sex-Priester Georg K. (40) zu sechs Jahren Gefängnis verurteilt.

Seine Revision gegen die „zu harte Strafe“ wurde vom Bundesgerichtshof abgewiesen. Jetzt muss er vors Kirchengericht in Rom. Sein Bischof hat seine Akte der Glaubenskongregation vorgelegt. K. droht die Entlassung aus dem Kirchendienst.

Nach den Missbrauchsfällen am Niederrhein hatte sich K. als Missionar nach Südafrika abgesetzt. Dort soll er sich erneut an Kommunionkindern vergriffen haben. Die Kirche ließ die Opfer alleine.

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UNITED STATES
Zen Peacemaker Order

Written by Roshi Eve Myonen Marko

Bernie and I went to the movies and saw “Spotlight” yesterday. It’s a terrific film about the group of Boston Globe journalists who reported on the extensive abuse of minors by many Catholic priests in Boston. I can’t recommend this movie highly enough.

I particularly appreciated that it didn’t portray the journalists as pure, white-horse knights going out to seek the truth and slay deniers and perpetrators. It showed, in fact, that they had received several tips in prior years about what was going on, and they’d shut their eyes to it, like many others, or didn’t bother to put the dots together and present the full story till much later, after many more children had been abused.

I thought of the abuse I’ve seen in dharma centers. It’s easy to say that it was nothing like the horrific scale of what went on in various Catholic dioceses across the world. It’s easy to point out that, at least in the West, children are almost never involved if only because most of our dharma centers don’t have family programs. But we’ve certainly had our share of abuse by teachers of students.

This morning I’m thinking about the silence that supports these things. I’m thinking about the subtle moments that some of us experienced, when there’s a dissonance between what I hear and what I see, and I withdraw and remain silent rather than ask uncomfortable questions. This goes both ways. I’ve watched teachers hide behind authority, and I’ve also seen students let go of responsibility. I’ve watched many practitioners, including me, seek in a like-minded group a refuge from living responsibly in the world, learning how to deal with money and each other, and accepting the consequences of our decisions and our actions. A place where we won’t have to grow up. Who has lived or practiced for years in a dharma center without witnessing some of these patterns?

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ALASKA
KTUU

Patrick Enslow, Multimedia Journalist and Weekend Producer, penslow@ktuu.com

ANCHORAGE –
Members of the Catholic Church and those around Anchorage are mourning the loss of former Archbishop of Anchorage Francis Hurley. The Archdiocese of Anchorage says the 88-year-old “peacefully passed away at home” on Jan. 10th.

Parishioners at Holy Family Cathedral in downtown Anchorage said a prayer for Hurley during mass on Monday. Down the road, those who knew him remember the legacy he left in Anchorage like the Brother Francis Shelter, Covenant House, and Clare House.

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GERMANY
Catholic News Agency

Regensburg, Germany, Jan 12, 2016 / 12:09 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The elder brother of retired Pope Benedict XVI said that he was unaware of any sexual abuse occurring at a choir boarding school he previously directed.

“These things were never discussed,” Fr. Georg Ratzinger told German newspaper Passauer Neue Presse. “The problem of sexual abuse that has now come to light was never spoken of.”

He also said that he was not aware of how serious physical abuse by one of the schoolmasters may have been, apologizing to victims.

His comments came after a lawyer charged by the Diocese of Regensburg with investigating alleged physical and sexual abuse at its cathedral’s children’s choir said his inquiry had found that more than 200 children may have been abused from the 1950s to the 1990s.

At a Jan. 8 press conference, Ulrich Weber said he had found 231 children who were allegedly physically or sexually abused by teachers or priests at the choir and its associated schools from 1953 to 1992.

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CHILE
La Nacion

[Priest Felipe Berrior said yesterday that the Catholic Church must break away from abuse of power.]

El sacerdote jesuita Felipe Berríos aseguró este lunes en el programa “Cadena nacional” del canal de cable Via X que para revertir la desaprobación, la Iglesia católica chilena necesita desprenderse del abuso de poder.

Al ser consultado por el periodista Francesco Gazzella por la relación de la Iglesia Católica chilena con sus seguidores y su baja en la aprobación ciudadana en algunas encuestas, sostuvo que para mejorar esto “no basta con que Karadima haya sido condenado, sino que también la Iglesia debe desprenderse de ese abuso de poder y eso, la jerarquía, todavía no lo hace”.

“Lo que comenzó a vivir la iglesia en los años 60 fue bruscamente frenado en los 70 incluso hubo un retroceso con Juan Pablo II como Papa (…) Nosotros vivimos eso en Chile, ese retroceso en la iglesia comprometida con los derechos humanos, alcanzamos a vivir esa primavera. Y ese retroceso lleva también a un abuso de poder”, agregó el sacerdote.

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NEDERLAND
Elsevier

door Emile Kossen 12 jan 2016

De Eritrees-orthodoxe kerk Tewahdo in Rotterdam is door het Centraal Orgaan opvang asielzoekers (COA) uitgeroepen tot verboden gebied voor minderjarige asielzoekers. Er zouden signalen zijn dat jonge vrouwelijke asielzoekers er op grote schaal werden misbruikt.

Hulporganisatie VluchtelingenWerk en voogdijinstelling Nidos klopten onafhankelijk bij het COA aan, meldde het Reformatorisch Dagblad maandag. Beiden spraken over een opvallend groot aantal ongewilde zwangerschappen bij jonge, gevluchte Eritrese vrouwen die de kerk in Rotterdam hadden bezocht.

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NETHERLAND
Sputnik International

The Dutch refugee agency COA advised unaccompanied minors against going to an Eritrean church in Rotterdam over sexual abuse concerns, local media reported Monday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The church came under scrutiny of the agency, responsible for the reception of asylum seekers, after over 20 Eritrean young girls who frequented it became pregnant, the Reformatorisch Dagblad newspaper reported.

Concerns are the girls may have been sexually abused within the church community. The church previously allowed for parishioners to stay at its premises overnight. These included refugees of either sex, as well as marital status.

Church spokesman Teklit Girmazion told the outlet he was shocked by the allegations.

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KENTUCKY
Ledger-Independent

VANCEBURG | A former Lewis County preacher, currently facing sexual abuse charges, has been scheduled for a competency hearing.

Duncan Aker, of Greensburg, Ind. and formerly, Vanceburg, will appear at the hearing on Feb. 3, at 10 a.m. in order for the court to decide if he is competent to stand trial for his charges.

A pretrial hearing has also been scheduled for March 4.

Aker was arrested in May 2015, and charged with five counts of sexual abuse and four counts of sodomy after a Lewis County grand jury handed down an indictment against him in April 2015.

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AUSTRALIA
Star Weekly

January 12, 2016
by Esther Lauaki

A Sunbury advocate for victims of sexual abuse by clergy is calling on the local Catholic diocese and Salesian College to pitch in for more men’s counselling services in the area.

Paul Levey, who was sexually assaulted by a priest based in Ballarat, has raised $11,000 to set up the Sunbury Men’s Survivors group, but he says this is not enough to sustain a service.

Mr Levey said the Centre Against Sexual Abuse (CASA) outreach clinic at Sunbury was under immense pressure, with only one counsellor on staff.

“You’re limited with the time you can see the counsellor in Sunbury because of the number of people he has to see.

“There are a lot of people out there who are looking for help and need to speak with a professional, and they don‘t know where to go.

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AUSTRALIA
Herald Sun

January 12, 2016
Shannon Deery
Herald Sun

THE Catholic Church is facing a potential multi-million dollar bill as dozens of angry sex assault victims sue, demanding it pay for their suffering.

In the last 12 months, 19 ­Supreme Court lawsuits have been filed against former Ballarat bishop Ronald Mulkearns, who was in charge when some of Australia’s most notorious paedophiles were active in his diocese.

Five previous lawsuits concerning the retired bishop have already been finalised.

In the latest case, filed last week, the bishop is being sued for an undisclosed sum for injuries, loss and damage as a result of sexual and psychological abuse dating to 1985.

In court documents, a male victim of Father Paul David Ryan says he was abused at locations including Warrnambool and Glen Waverley.

The writ alleges Fr Mulkearns, Ballarat’s bishop from 1971-97, owed him a duty of care but failed

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MICHIGAN
Up North Live

[with copy of the letter]

BY MEGHAN MORELLI MONDAY, JANUARY 11TH 2016

WPBN/WGTU — Eight years later, a Traverse City church is trying to address a sexual harassment situation involving a former interim priest and several church members.

7&4 News received an anonymous email on Monday that contained a letter from Grace Episcopal Church. The letter is dated for January 6th. Church spokesperson, John Strickler, says the letter was recently sent out to the entire congregation.

“Dear People of Grace,” the letter begins.

It’s followed by a bible passage, and continues on with, “It is with a heavy heart that we send this letter to you. But we know it is the right thing to do.”

The letter goes on revealing that three members of the church “were sexually harassed by The Rev. Bry Dennison, during his tenure as {the} interim priest in 2008-2009.”

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UNITED STATES
Reveal: The Center for Investigative Reporting

By Trey Bundy / January 11, 2016

A panel of judges in Philadelphia has ruled that Jehovah’s Witnesses used an “abusive tactic” to delay a trial in which a woman accused the religion’s leaders of covering up her abuse as a child.

The Witnesses’ parent corporation, the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, had won a motion in a lower court to move the case from Philadelphia to York County, which currently has the largest backlog of civil cases in Pennsylvania.

The Watchtower argued that holding the trial in Philadelphia would burden witnesses who would have to travel to testify. The appellate panel overruled the lower court, calling the Watchtower’s motion a “last-minute gambit to delay trial.”

In her opinion, Judge Patricia Jenkins refers to the Watchtower and other defendants as “the Congregations.”

“The facts strongly suggest that the motion to transfer venue was the product of bad-faith collaboration between the Congregations and the four York County witnesses,” she wrote.

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RHODE ISLAND
Newport Buzz

CHRISTIAN WINTHROPJANUARY 11, 2016

Scott Harshbarger, a former attorney general of Massachusetts was named as the independent investigator into sexual abuse accusations spanning decades at St. George’s School.

St. George’s School and SGS for Healing, an organization of alumni survivors of abuse, jointly announced two agreements today.
—
The parties have agreed that Scott Harshbarger, Esq. of the Boston law firm Casner & Edwards has been jointly retained by the School and SGS for Healing as the Independent Investigator. Mr. Harshbarger, the former Middlesex County District Attorney and Attorney General of Massachusetts, is a recognized expert in independent investigations.

The parties have agreed to a comprehensive and independent program for mental health assistance in cooperation with Day One of Rhode Island, a non-profit provider of clinical, treatment, intervention, education, advocacy, and prevention services for victims of trauma. If an alumnus or alumna who was the victim of sexual abuse by faculty, staff, or students at St. George’s School needs crisis mental health assistance or a referral to a local mental health professional (to be paid for by the School), he or she may receive immediate help by contacting Day One. Any victim of sexual abuse by faculty, staff, or students at the School (whether or not affiliated with SGS for Healing) may avail him/herself of these services. The processing of payments to providers will be handled by an independent third-party administrator and the names of alumni receiving mental health assistance will not be revealed to the School or SGS for Healing.

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RHODE ISLAND
Boston Globe

By Bella English GLOBE STAFF JANUARY 12, 2016

Former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger was named on Monday to oversee a new investigation of the embattled St. George’s School, which has been mired in a sex abuse scandal dating back to the 1970s. Harshbarger, 74, was appointed after a day-long meeting between representatives of the victims and the board of trustees of the Middletown, R.I., prep school.

The two sides also agreed that Day One of Rhode Island, a non-profit organization that provides help for victims of trauma, will provide assistance to victims of sex abuse at the school, which will pay for the services. The payments will be handled by an independent third-party administrator and the names of alumni receiving mental health assistance will not be released to the school, according to the statement.

Since December, accounts of sexual abuse at St. George’s have mushroomed, with more than 40 alumni saying they were abused at the school, mostly in the 1970s and 1980s. Both the school and the victims’ attorneys say there were at least nine staff or student perpetrators.

The Monday announcement was made by Leslie Heaney, chair of the school’s board of trustees, and Anne Scott, who spoke on behalf of SGS for Healing, a group of victims and other alumni. “These preliminary agreements represent further progress for alumni victims,” Scott said in a statement.

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RHODE ISLAND
The New York Times

By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
JAN. 11, 2016

Scott Harshbarger, a former attorney general of Massachusetts and former president of Common Cause, was named on Monday as the independent investigator into sexual abuse accusations spanning decades at St. George’s School, an elite prep school in Middletown, R.I.

Mr. Harshbarger, a lawyer practicing in Boston, was retained by the school with the consent of a group of alumni who brought the accusations and had complained that an earlier investigation by the school had not been truly independent. They also agreed that any victim of abuse by teachers, staff members or students could receive treatment through Day One of Rhode Island, which treats victims of trauma, at the school’s expense.

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NEVADA
News3TV

Reported by: Sergio Avila Email: savila@sbgtv.com
Reported by: Sandra Gonzalez
Posted by: Jami Seymore

LAS VEGAS (KSNV News3LV) – The mother of one of the alleged victims in the case of a pastor accused of having sex with minors told the jury she thought her daughter was just receiving counseling.

In an audio recording played in court, former pastor Otis Holland is heard asking the mother if he has her permission to counsel her daughter about sex.

This victim’s mother told the jury Monday she was having trouble with her 15-year-old daughter’s behavior and sought out Holland and his church for help.

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RHODE ISLAND
The Good Men Project

By Steve LePore, Executive Director of 1in6, and Maile Zambuto, CEO of the Joyful Heart Foundation

The revelation last week about decades of unaddressed sexual abuse and assault at a New England school offers some important reminders about the power of community.

The voices of more than 40 men and women—all former students at St. George’s School, a prestigious boarding school in Middletown, Rhode Island—were represented at a press conference this week. They chronicled decades of sexual abuse by faculty and staff members of the school, as well as other students, and the school’s failure to take the allegations seriously.
Students place their trust in their teachers, coaches and mentors. The shame, secrecy, blame and/or fear that all survivors experience, can be even greater for children.

Having carried the weight of what was done to them alone, each of those St. George’s School alums first broke their silence about their experiences individually, and then within the embrace of a community of fellow survivors. Chances are that there are more—more survivors from the school who will add their voices, more people from across the country—world, even—who are reading about their stories and will think of their own experience. Tens of millions of men and women in the United States have been sexually abused before their 18th birthday. Not one of the 1 in 4 women and the 1 in every 6 men who have had that experience should ever have to feel alone again.

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RHODE ISLAND
GoLocalProv

Monday, January 11, 2016
GoLocalProv News Team

In a joint press release from St. George’s School and the victims of sexual abuse group (SGS for Healing), it was announced they have agreed to a lead investigator. The two groups have tapped former Massachusetts Attorney General and one-time candate for Governor Scott Harshbarger.
The release states:

The parties have agreed that Scott Harshbarger, Esq. of the Boston law firm Casner & Edwards has been jointly retained by the School and SGS for Healing as the Independent Investigator. Mr. Harshbarger, the former Middlesex County District Attorney and Attorney General of Massachusetts, is a recognized expert in in independent investigations.

The parties have agreed to a comprehensive and independent program for mental health assistance in cooperation with Day One of Rhode Island, a non-profit provider of clinical, treatment, intervention, education, advocacy, and prevention services t for victims of trauma. If an alumnus or alumna who was the victim of sexual abuse by faculty, staff, or students at St. George’s School needs crisis mental health assistance or a referral to a local mental health professional (to be paid for by the School), he or she may receive immediate help by contacting Day One. Any victim of sexual abuse by faculty, staff, or students at the School (whether or not affiliated with SGS for Healing) may avail him/herself of these services. The processing of payments to providers will be handled by an independent third-party administrator and the names of alumni receiving mental health assistance will not be revealed to the School or SGS for Healing.

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RHODE ISLAND/MASSACHUSETTS
WPRI

BOSTON (AP/WPRI) — A former Massachusetts attorney general has been hired to conduct an independent investigation into allegations of sexual abuse at a prestigious Rhode Island boarding school.

More than 40 former students at St. George’s School in Middletown have alleged they were molested or raped there, mostly in the 1970s and ’80s.

Last month, the school said an investigation found 26 students had been sexually abused by six former employees and several former students. The school acknowledged it didn’t report abusers to authorities at the time and apologized.

The school agreed to do a new investigation after many victims questioned the impartiality of the first one, which was led by the law partner and spouse of the school’s attorney.

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RHODE ISLAND
Turn to 10

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger has been hired by St. George’s School and SGS for Healing, the organization created for the survivors of the alleged abuse that took place at St. George’s School over many years.

Harshbarger, the former Middlesex County district attorney, is now an attorney with Casner & Edwards, a Boston law firm and will oversee the comprehensive investigation of sexual abuse allegations at the Middletown, Rhode Island, school.

The alumni/victim’s group SGS for Healing and the school last week announced a plan to hire a third-party investigator to oversee the allegations.

Harshbarger’s investigation will not be limited in scope or time period, according to the group and the school, and will be conducted in a way that is sensitive to victims who may have already provided information.

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RHODE ISLAND
Durso Law
St. George’s School
SGS for Healing

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Joint Press Release from St. George’s School and SGS for Healing

January 11, 2016 – St. George’s School and SGS for Healing, an organization of alumni survivors of abuse, jointly announced two agreements today.

The parties have agreed that Scott Harshbarger, Esq. of the Boston law firm Casner & Edwards has been jointly retained by the School and SGS for Healing as the Independent Investigator. Mr. Harshbarger, the former Middlesex County District Attorney and Attorney General of Massachusetts, is a recognized expert in independent investigations.

The parties have agreed to a comprehensive and independent program for mental health assistance in cooperation with Day One of Rhode Island, a non-profit provider of clinical, treatment, intervention, education, advocacy, and prevention services for victims of trauma. If an alumnus or alumna who was the victim of sexual abuse by faculty, staff, or students at St. George’s School needs crisis mental health assistance or a referral to a local mental health professional (to be paid for by the School), he or she may receive immediate help by contacting Day One. Any victim of sexual abuse by faculty, staff, or students at the School (whether or not affiliated with SGS for Healing) may avail him/herself of these services. The processing of payments to providers will be handled by an independent third-party administrator and the names of alumni receiving mental health assistance will not be revealed to the School or SGS for Healing.

Said Anne Scott of SGS for Healing: “These preliminary agreements represent further progress for alumni victims. While there is much more to be accomplished, we hope to work productively with the Board and new counsel for the School.”

Said Leslie Heaney, Chair of the School’s Board of Trustees: “The St. George’s School is committed to the truth and supporting alumni survivors who have been harmed by sexual abuse. Today’s announcement represents important steps toward healing for the survivors and the St. George’s community.”

###

For further information, please contact:
For St. George’s School: Joseph Baerlein, (617) 443-9933
For Anne Scott and SGS for healing: Anne Scott, (443) 282-4487, Eric MacLeish, (617) 817-1797 or Carmen Durso, (617) 728-9123.

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UNITED STATES
Pleasanton Weekly

Uploaded: Dec 8, 2015

By Tom Cushing

I’m going to perturb more than my usual percentage of the readership (with any luck, the early-morning academic spammers, as well), and admit that I have next-to-no interest in the inescapable Star Wars phenomenon. They lost me at light sabers, for which I think Indiana Jones had the appropriate response in a contemporary galaxy, close to home. What’s the point of them? Maybe somebody can try to set me straight in the Comments – it’s considered a noble calling among some regulars.
___

I did see ‘Spotlight’ recently – a thoughtful film about a difficult topic, that sticks with you long beyond the credit roll. (Warning — ahead there be spoilers.) It concerns the Boston Globe’s semi-recent investigation of child abuse by some priests in the Boston Arch-diocese.* Lest I now lose the loyally Catholic fraction of any remaining readers, this is not an anti-religion screed. It’s bigger than that. This blog, and the movie writ large, are about institutions and their inherent capacity to abuse our trust.

All-but-one of ‘Spotlight’s’ protagonists, the new Editor from out-of-town, are Catholic-raised; they are in various stages of lapse, but the Church permeates their identities – including loved ones, schools, their marriages, etc. As leaders in the community, they partake of lavish and imposing Church charity events, and rub elbows there with the city’s elite.

The Church is foundational, with influences in every corner of every element of the community. The incumbent Cardinal (Bernard Law) suggests to the new editor in an early introduction that Bostonians are well-served when his organization and The Globe work together. The newspaperman wisely demurs. The Church does much good, and is so deeply woven into the fabric that no one can conceive of the predatory wrongdoing that was also one of its darkest traditions.

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UNITED STATES
The Mennonite

1.11. 2016 Written By: Barbra Graber, Anabaptist Mennonite Chapter of SNAP*

*The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests is the world’s oldest and largest support group for sexual abuse victims and their loved ones. It was founded by victims of Catholic priests in 1988 and now has more than 21,000 members in over 79 countries. SNAP is open to all religious and nonreligious persons who were sexually violated by anyone inside or outside a faith community. The Anabaptist Mennonite Chapter of SNAP was established in early 2015. A confidential SNAP Survivors Support Group meets the first Thursday of every month in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Call or text 540-214-8874 for more information. You can also e-mail Mennonite@snapnetwork.org.

Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) in Harrisonburg, Va., has reported that its Vice President for Enrollment, Luke Hartman, was among those charged by the Harrisonburg Police Department for solicitation of prostitution. Hartman has since been suspended from his duties.

We do not presume Hartman’s innocence or guilt and have no reason to believe he hurt any EMU students. We hope that is not the case. A distinction should be made between solicitation of prostitution and abuse. A person who does one does not necessarily do the other.

However, research indicates many people engaged in prostitution are victims of sexual abuse. The average age of persons entering prostitution is 12. Sex trafficking is a major problem in the Shenandoah Valley [the region where EMU is located]. Research also finds that men who buy sex may have much in common with sexually coercive men.

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ILLINOIS
Radar Online

Duggar family mentor Bill Gothard was slapped with a $500,000 sex abuse lawsuit earlier this week— and the allegations are worse than any of the Christian minister’s followers could have ever imagined.

According to Illinois’ DuPage County Circuit Court documents obtained by RadarOnline.com, ten women have accused the Institute in Basic Life Principles founder, 81, of sexually molesting, harassing, and even raping girls under the age of 18.

All of the plaintiffs were former participants of his religious ministry.

READ THE SHOCKING COURT DOCUMENTS

Former employee Gretchen Wilkinson claimed that Gothard placed his hands on her “breasts and on her thighs— up to her genitals” during unsupervised “counseling” sessions when she was a minor in the early 90s.

Another plaintiff, Jane Doe II, has among the most horrific stories. She said she was sold for sex and raped by her father and other relatives as a young girl— but found no solace in her church organization.

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MISSOURI
Berger’s Beat

January 11, 2016 10:38 am | Author: berger

A Minnesota prosecutor may file charges against four predator priests but has opted not to pursue Michael Charland, an accused abuser and former cleric who’s now a psychologist. Charland also worked for Catholic churches in Belleville, Sparta, Godfrey across the river and in Carthage, MO.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Fox 29

PHILADELPHIA- WTXF – A warrant has been issued for a 33-year-old pastor who West Whiteland Police say is being accused of rape and other charges.

According to the police department the pastor, Jacob “Jake” Malone, is accused of having inappropriate relations with a female victim, in multiple states and over a period of several years.

Police say the female alleged victim met Malone in Arizona when she was 12 years old and he was a pastor at a church in Mesa. Several years later, Malone invited the alleged victim to live with him in Minnesota, where he was working as a pastor, and began attempting to have inappropriate sexual contact with the then-17-year-old. He then arrived in Chester County in 2014, once again invited the victim to live with him and, police said, began sexually assaulting her in 2014.

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PENNSYLVANIA
Philadelphia Magazine

By Joel Mathis | January 11, 2016

A Chester County pastor is wanted on charges he sexually assaulted a teen girl who lived with his family.

Jacob “Jake” Malone, 33, Exton, had served on the staff of Calvary Fellowship in Downington. Officials who answered the phone at the church this morning said a member of the staff would offer comment later today.

According to the West Whiteland Township Police Department, Malone met the female at a church in Mesa, Arizona, when she was 12-years old; he was a pastor at a church she attended. When she was 17, he invited her to Minnesota — where he was then pastoring — to stay with his family.

“While in Minnesota, the victim alleged that Malone began trying to have inappropriate contact with her,” police say in their report.

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UNITED STATES
G. Wayne Miller

A shorter version of this ran on the op-ed pages of the January 10, 2016, Providence Journal.

Watching Spotlight, the Oscar-bound movie about The Boston Globe’s investigation of Massachusetts clergy who raped children, and reading about employees of St. George’s School in Middletown, Rhode Island, who sexually abused students has prompted memories of my 1960s and ‘70s childhood.

Only luck, I have concluded, spared me and my friends the fate of these many victims here in New England and others like them across America.

Back then, we were youngsters in a world where authority was accepted without question, and where certain authorities with sanctioned access to children – clergy, teachers, coaches and scout leaders among them – were almost god-like in stature. In the case of priests, they may as well have been God, at least in the view of adults like my mother, a daughter of Irish immigrants who was born and raised in Boston and who brought up her children with the Baltimore Catechism. You won’t find a hint that clergy could be anything but pure in that book.

It was a world of blind obedience and absolute trust of elders. And it was a world where monsters cloaked in authority roamed free, although no grownup warned us of that.

A resident of Wakefield, Mass., a suburb of Boston, from birth until college, I spent eight years at Saint Joseph parochial school and was an altar boy during much of that time at the parish church, which was under the control of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston. The priests I knew best at St. Joseph were good stewards, and one remained an acquaintance for decades. But another, William F. Maloney, who I saw only at Mass, was later publicly accused of sexually abusing someone in the late ‘60s at another parish in North Reading, four miles from my home.

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UNITED STATES
Labyrinthine Mind

Fr. Pablo

Several weeks ago I attended a screening of the movie Spotlight, a movie about the investigative reporting which led to the uncovering of the sex abuse cover up in Boston thirteen years ago. This same movie was a nominee last night for a Golden Globe Award for the best drama motion picture.

The movie was painful to watch. It vividly portrayed the unfathomable suffering of the sex abuse victims, the absolute failure of church leaders in dealing with and reporting predator priests, the outrage rightfully expressed by those uncovering the abuse, and finally the heartbreak of faithful believers whose faith in Jesus Christ was shaken and oftentimes crushed by the criminal behavior of priests and bishops.

Certainly this is not a Friday night, dinner-and-a-date type of movie. Spotlight, named after The Boston Globe’s team which led the investigation, slowly unravels a story revealing the inner workings of the newspaper. The movie is not only about the sex abuse scandal of Boston, but is very much also about The Boston Globe. The movie not only places responsibility on the Catholic Church for the abuse cover up, but on the whole community. A line in the movie that points to this is “if it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse one.” The movie shows how The Boston Globe itself had known about the abuse years before, but had not reported it effectively. Lawyers, parents, and prominent members of society had all known, and nobody had taken steps to weed it out.

I once heard that “getting caught” is an expression of God’s mercy since “getting caught” allows for repentance and a change in behavior. If a person does not get caught, the sin continues and the person’s soul remains in peril. This simple principle applies to what has happened to the Catholic Church in the United States. Disgracefully for a period of time, a number of priests abused children and their superiors did not respond as required by law. Now that the abuse has come to the light, the Catholic Church has been able to repent and change its behavior.

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GERMANY
National Catholic Reporter

Christa Pongratz-Lippitt | Jan. 11, 2016

Two hundred and thirty-one young members of the famous German “Regensburger Domspatzen” boys choir were abused between 1953 and 1992, three times the official number published in the diocesan report of February 2015, according to an independent lawyer.
At a press conference in Regensburg on Jan. 8, Ulrich Weber, an independent lawyer called in by the diocese in May 2015 to undertake further investigations of the abuse scandal, said he feared that the estimated number of unrecorded cases was far higher.

It is highly probable that every third pupil at the preparatory school for the boys’ choir was exposed to physical abuse consisting of violent beatings, withholding fluids for up to five days, forced feeding and sexual abuse “from fondling to rape” during those years.

Weber spoke of a “system of fear” which prevailed for decades at the school.

The perpetrators were a small circle of priests, teachers and employees which included, Fr. Johann Meier, headmaster of the preparatory school from 1953-1992, Weber said.

Weber’s figures are significantly higher than those officially published by the Regensburg diocese in February 2015 which found that 72 former members of the choir had been abused. Regensburg Bishop Rudolf Voderholzer apologized for the abuse at the time and offered each victim 2,500 euros (US$2,730) compensation.

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SOUTH CAROLINA
The Herald

BY ANDREW DYS
adys@heraldonline.com

The Rev. Johnny William “Bill” Cabe, the York County pastor who spent seven years in prison for stealing $8 million from church investors, will serve no prison time after pleading no contest Friday to 2010 charges alleging he claimed to be a doctor and performed exams on an 11-year-old boy he had befriended.

Cabe, 56, was charged twice in the 1990s on similar allegations of giving hernia exams and other improper contact with minor boys at Riverside Independent Baptist Church but was never convicted. On Friday, Cabe was sentenced to five years’ probation, yet he admitted no guilt in pleading no contest to five counts of unlawful practice of medicine for touching the boy’s private parts.

A negotiated plea deal between prosecutors and Cabe’s lawyers was for probation, yet Cabe must register with South Carolina’s child abuse registry. Cabe also can have no contact with non-family minors during the five years of probation.

The child abuse registry and probation deal “warns members of the community” of what Cabe did while claiming to be a doctor in a church office filled with medical equipment, prosecutor Erin Joyner said in court.

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CHILE
Christian Today

Ruth Gledhill CHRISTIAN TODAY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

Protestors in Chile have demanded the resignation of a bishop accused of concealing sex abuse allegations against a priest.

About 30 demonstrators stood outside St Matthew’s Cathedral in Orsono, carrying green balloons and signs demanding the resignation of Bishop Juan Barros. The protest last Saturday marked the first anniversary of the announcement of his appointment by Pope Francis in Rome. On the same day, a delegation of bishops from Chile had an audience with the Pope at the Vatican.

The protestors, who have formed a group called Lay Men and Women of Osorno, said in a statement: “We’re Catholics who oppose the pastoral exercise of Bishop Barros.” They described their protest as “liturgical occupation.” There are about 125,000 Catholics in the diocese.

Osorno is a small diocese in southern Chile with a Catholic population of roughly 125,000.

It has been alleged that Bishop Barros concealed sex abuse allegations against Father Fernando Karadima, a well-known local priest connected to Chile’s elite. In 2011, Karadima was sentenced by the Holy See to a life of “penance and prayer” after being found guilty of paedophilia and abuse of his position.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Christian Today

Ruth Gledhill CHRISTIAN TODAY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

A former Anglican bishop and monk was given a caution for sex abuse and not charged in order to minimise embarrassment to the Church of England, according to newly-released documents.

Peter Ball went from being Bishop of Lewes from 1977 to Bishop of Gloucester in 1992. He resigned just a year later in 1993 after receiving a poice caution for gross indecency with a teenage man, but was only jailed in October last year for a string of historic sex abuse offences.

Details have now been published of the 29-page dossier compiled by the two detectives who investigated Ball in 1992.

Ball, 83, was jailed for 32 months last year after he admitted 18 abuse offences against young men and teenagers between 1977 and 1992. One victim, Neil Todd, committed suicide in 2012.

The report by Detective Inspector Wayne Murdock and Acting Detective Sergeant Andrew Wasley, obtained by The Sunday Times under a Freedom of Information request, reveals that police were told Ball would resign and go abroad to work as a missionary in exchange for not being charged.

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UNITED STATES
Providence Journal

By G. Wayne Miller
Journal Staff Writer

Posted Jan. 10, 2016 at 2:01 AM

Watching “Spotlight,” the movie about The Boston Globe’s investigation of Massachusetts clergy who raped children, and reading about employees of St. George’s School in Middletown who sexually abused students, has prompted memories of my 1960s and ‘70s childhood.

Only luck, I have concluded, spared me and my friends the fate of these many victims.
Back then, we were youngsters in a world where authority was accepted without question, and where certain authorities with sanctioned access to children — clergy, teachers, coaches and scout leaders among them — were almost god-like in stature.

It was a world of blind obedience and absolute trust of elders. And it was a world where monsters cloaked in authority roamed free, although no grownup warned us of that.

A resident of Wakefield, Mass., a Boston suburb, I spent eight years at St. Joseph parochial school and was an altar boy during much of that time at the parish church, which was under the control of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston. The priests I knew best at St. Joseph were good stewards. But another, William F. Maloney, whom I saw only at Mass, was later accused of sexually abusing someone in the late 1960s at another parish in North Reading, four miles from my home.

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CIUDAD DEL VATICANO
El Tipografo

[Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, Bishop Alejandro Goic and Bishop Cristian Contreras Villarroel met privately on Saturday with Pope Francis at the Vatican. The meeting coincided with a new protest by lay people against Bishop Juan Barros in Osorno. Bishop Barros has been accused by layity of being an accessory to sexual abuse by priest Fernando Karadima.]

Monseñor Alejandro Goic, obispo de Rancagua, viajó en calidad de vicepresidente de la Conferencia Episcopal.

Luego que hace meses la Iglesia chilena solicitara la audiencia, este sábado se reunieron privadamente con el papa Francisco el presidente de la Conferencia Episcopal de Chile, cardenal Ricardo Ezzati, y el vicepresidente de la entidad, Alejandro Goic, obispo de Rancagua.

La reunión coincidió con una nueva protesta de los laicos de Osorno contra el obispo de la ciudad, Juan Barros.

El cuestionado religioso es sindicado por los fieles como un “encubridor” de los abusos sexuales del sacerdote Fernando Karadima.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 9 January 2016 (VIS) – The Holy Father has appointed Msgr. Antonio Augusto de Oliveira Azevedo as auxiliary of the diocese of Porto (area 3,010, population 2,106,000, Catholics 1,906,000, priests 423, permanent deacons 82, religious 892), Portugal. The bishop-elect was born in Sao Pedro de Avioso, Portugal in 1962 and was ordained a priest in 1986. He has served in a number of pastoral roles, including parish vicar, military chaplain, parish priest, parish administrator and diocesan assistant in the pastoral ministry of workers. He is currently rector of the major seminary of Nossa Senhora da Conceidao, diocesan assistant at the Centre for Preparation for Marriage, professor in the faculty of theology of the Catholic University of Porto, judge at the ecclesiastical tribunal and secretary of the presbyteral council.

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VATICAN CITY
Vatican Information Service

Vatican City, 9 January 2016 (VIS) – The Holy Father received in audience:

– Cardinal Marc Ouellet, prefect of the Congregation for Bishops;

– Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati Andrello, archbishop of Santiago de Chile, Chile, president of the Episcopal Conference of Chile, with Bishop Alejandro Goic Karmelic of Rancagua, deputy president, and Bishop Cristian Contreras Villarroel of Melipilla, general secretary;

– Fr. Adolfo Nicolas Pachon, prepositor general of the Society of Jesus, with Fr. Mauro Johri, minister general of the Franciscan Order of Capuchin Friars Minor, president of the Union of Superiors General (U.S.G.).;

– Nicola Zingarelli, president of the Latium region, Italy.

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DEUTSCHLAND
netzwerkB

[Forgotten how to cry]

Meine Eltern haben sich 1957 scheiden lassen. 1957 sind Mutter, eine meiner Schwestern und ich nach Westerland/Sylt zu meinen Großeltern gezogen und dort bin ich in Kampen eingeschult worden. 1961 ist meine Mutter mit meiner Schwester und mir nach Nürnberg gezogen weil sie hier Arbeit gefunden hatte. Ihre Wohnung war für uns 3 zu klein und so hat sie meine Schwester und mich ins Nürnberger Heim „Stapf“ getan. Und dann ging es los.

In dem Heim war es so dass unter den kleineren schon das Gesetz der Stärke herrschte. Die dortigen Nonnen haben als Erziehung Prügel ausgeteilt. Hunger war an der Tagesordnung und wenn man sich trotzdem mal was genommen hat musste man sich auf eine eingeschaltete Herdplatte setzen oder die Hand drauf legen. Als ich mal eine Außentreppe runtergefallen bin hab ich mir eine einigermaßen schwere Gehirnerschütterung geholt. Ein Arzt wurde nicht hinzugezogen, die Gehirnerschütterung musste so ausgeheilt werden. Als es mir aber immer schlechter ging durfte ich doch zum Arzt der einen Schädelbasisbruch festgestellt hatte. Ich landete endlich im Krankenhaus.

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DEUTSCHLAND
netzwerkB

[Georg Ratzinger rejects accusations]

netzwerkB Pressemitteilung vom 11.01.2016

Priester und Lehrer sollen bei den Regensburger Domspatzen von 1953 bis 1992 mindestens 231 Kinder misshandelt haben – 50 Kinder seien davon auch Opfer sexueller Gewalt geworden. Der Bruder des emeritierten Papstes Benedikt XVI. soll von den Vorgängen gewusst haben. Davon geht der von Bistum und Chor mit der Klärung des Skandals beauftragte Rechtsanwalt Ulrich Weber aus.

Ratzinger hat diese Vorwürfe zurückgewiesen, von den Missbrauchsfällen im Chor etwas gewusst zu haben.

Norbert Denef, Vorsitzender des Netzwerks Betroffener von sexualisierter Gewalt (netzwerkB), teilt hierzu mit:

Der Vorwurf, Ratzinger hätte von den Missbrauchsfällen im Chor etwas gewusst, wiegt schwer. Rechtsanwalt Ulrich Weber wird beweisen müssen, wenn er seine Behauptung aufrecht erhalten will.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Regensburg Digital

[The revelation of Ulrich Weber]

Wie um Gottes Willen konnte das Einsetzen eines unabhängigen Aufklärers zu unabhängiger Aufklärung führen? Da wird der Messwein im Kelch sauer. Wie konnte es zu diesem Fehler kommen und was bleiben dem Bistum nun für Optionen?

Von Martin Stein

Die Pressekonferenz des Ulrich Weber zu den Missbrauchsfällen unter den Regensburger Domspatzen stellt eine Zäsur in der deutschen Kirchengeschichte dar, einen Paukenschlag, einen Donnerhall, der hallt und hallt und immer noch hallt und noch lange hallen wird, und der in der Regensburger Diözese vor allem eine Frage aufwerfen wird, diese eine, einzige fragenswerte Frage: Wie, um Gottes Willen, konnte das Einsetzen eines unabhängigen Aufklärers dazu führen, dass unabhängig aufgeklärt wird?

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IRELAND
Christian Today

Ruth Gledhill CHRISTIAN TODAY CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

The founder of Ireland’s Association of Catholic Priests has said he has found it hard to maintain faith in the Church after being silenced four years ago.

Fr Flannery, a member of the Redemptorist Congregation, complained about the lack of support he had received and of the lack of process around his case at the Vatican, where the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith silenced him in 2012 for questioning whether Jesus founded the priesthood. He has also been criticised for his liberal views on women priests and homosexuality.

“I just think it’s so frustrating, the Irish bishops have never even contacted me in the last four years. Never shown me any element of support,” he told Miriam O’Callaghan on RTÉ Radio 1. “They are in senior positions in an institution that is conducting affairs in a totally unjust and abusive fashion and they do nothing about it and I find that intolerable.”

Last August he was prevented by a bishop from giving a talk in Cork because he was told he was not allowed to exercise a public ministry, the Irish Examiner reported.

The Association of Catholic Priests, a voluntary organisation set up in 2010 to reflect on the Catholic Church in Ireland and on society, has more than 1,000 members. It is not recognised by the Church, however, and has never been asked to meet the Papal Nuncio to Ireland.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Bianca Hall
Reporter for The Age

Men who rape children under 12 are less likely to be jailed in Victoria, and are being jailed for less time than those convicted of raping adults.

The shocking statistics have emerged as Victoria’s Sentencing Advisory Council launches an investigation into what the state’s courts are taking into account when judging the seriousness of sexual offences against children.

The council is due to report to Attorney-General Martin Pakula on the sentencing of offenders convicted of the sexual penetration of a child aged under 12 in June.

Its own data shows that between July 2009 and June 2014, 72 men were convicted in Victoria of sexually penetrating a child younger than 12 (no women were convicted of the same offence in that period).

Of those men, 75 per cent were jailed. The median length of jail sentences was four years.
Almost 14 per cent received a wholly suspended jail sentence, and another 8.4 per cent were handed partially suspended sentences, community-correction orders or community-based orders. Another 2.8 per cent either received youth justice orders or had their charges discharged or dismissed.

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UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

By David Clohessy

Ever seen that headline in your local newspaper? Me neither.

It’s absurd, isn’t it? There’s a word for a guy who uses a pistol or rifle to get what he wants from a bank teller. That word is “robber.”

There’s also a word for an adult who uses sex or power to get what he or she wants from a child. That word is “predator.”

OK, so why does my local newspaper have this headline today: “Woman accused of sex with boy.” Phrases like “sex with” imply consent. And consent is not possible in child sex cases. And it doesn’t matter whether the predator is male or female.

[St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

Again, does the bank teller have a “financial transaction with” the robber? Of course not.

Another pet peeve are phrases like “the girl performed oral sex on her teacher.” At best, that makes the child sound and seem like an equal partner. At worst, it makes the child sound and seem like the initiator.

The child is the victim. The abuse is perpetrated on him or her. The adult is the initiator. And the criminal. Period.

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UNITED KINGDOM
International Business Times

By Henry Austin
January 10, 2016

Paedophile bishop Peter Ball, who was jailed for 32 months in October 2015 after admitting he abused 18 young men between 1977 and 1992, was allowed to escape with a caution after the original investigation in the early 1990s under a deal allegedly agreed by police and the Church of England.

However, a 29-page report written by detectives investigating the allegations of sex abuse in 1992 and 1993 warned the then Bishop of Gloucester had “been less than truthful”.

“He has hidden his sexual desires behind the role of religion,” detective inspector Wayne Murdock and acting detective sergeant Andrew Wasley wrote in the dossier, which was obtained by The Sunday Times.

After meeting with the legal team of Ball, 83, the officers recorded that “the defendant would be prepared to accept a ‘formal caution’ for an offence of gross indecency”, would resign from the church and go abroad and do missionary work.

Charging Ball would “counter any possible suggestions of an establishment cover-up”, Murdock wrote, although he noted it would “probably have a devastating effect on the church, which is already in turmoil”.

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ITALIA
Rete L’Abuso

[A priest is accused of child abuse in Cosenza.]

COSENZA – Nessun indizio utile è affiorato dai computer sequestrati a un sacerdote cosentino accusato di molestie sessuali ai danni di un ragazzino di dodici anni (LEGGI LA NOTIZIA QUI e QUI). Nessun file scabroso, né tantomeno materiale pedopornografico. Nel frattempo, emergono nuovi dettagli sull’inchiesta, in particolare sulla denuncia che, alcuni mesi fa, ha dato il via all’inchiesta.

A quanto pare, infatti, un ruolo decisivo nel coinvolgimento degli inquirenti, sarebbe stato rivestito dalle suore della casa famiglia in cui vive il ragazzino, presunta parte offesa della vicenda. Sono queste le due novità filtrate dagli ambienti investigativi e relative all’indagine sul conto di un prete di 50 anni, fino a poco tempo fa insegnante di religione in una scuola media del centro città. E proprio in un’aula dell’istituto, lo scorso ottobre, si sarebbe verificato l’episodio incriminato, ovvero la molestia – consistita in una carezza nelle parti intime – che il giovane sostiene di aver ricevuto dal suo professore.

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GERMANIA
Rete L’Abuso

Un’inchiesta in Germania ha accertato 231 casi di abusi compiuti sui bambini del coro della cattedrale di Ratisbona negli anni in cui era diretto dal fratello di Benedetto XVI.

Pestaggi, torture, violenze. Pedofilia. Per almeno 40 anni i bambini del coro delle voci bianche della cattedrale di Ratisbona in Baviera hanno subito di tutto da alcuni dei loro educatori. In 231 sono stati sottoposti ad abusi di ogni genere al buio delle stanze della storica istituzione fondata nel 975 e diretta per 30 anni fino al 1994 da mons. Georg Ratzinger, fratello del papa emerito Benedetto XVI. Sono le conclusioni dell’inchiesta commissionata dalla direzione del Coro nel 2010 all’avvocato Ulrich Weber rese note venerdì 8 gennaio durante una conferenza stampa a Ratisbona. La notizia è velocemente rimbalzata dall’Europa negli Stati Uniti, dove il New York Times è uscito con un importante articolo, ma senza passare per l’Italia. Nessuna delle grandi testate nostrane le ha degnato la giusta attenzione. Non il Corriere, non Repubblica e nemmeno Vatican Insider de La Stampa. Strano, perché di solito non perdono occasione per sparare in prima anche i sacri starnuti vaticani.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Tammox Alternative

Mal wieder ein Update aus Regensburg.

Über Jahrzehnte waren die Regensburger Domspatzen die Wirkungsstätte des weltbekannten „Orgel-Ratz“, also dem heute fast 92-Jährigen Georg Ratzinger, der von 1964 bis 1994 als Domkapellmeister der Chef der Regensburger Domspatzen war.
Während seiner Zeit gabt es rund 2000 „Domspatzen“, von denen rund ein Drittel sexuell missbraucht wurde.

Ob der ältere Papstbruder womöglich selbst sexuell übergriffig wurde, ist nicht bekannt.
Vielfach berichtet wurde aber von seiner ausgesprochen sadistischen Ader.
Er geriet in regelrechte Prügelorgien, warf mit Stühlen nach zehnjährigen Schülern. Ratzinger prügelte so von Sinnen auf seine Schüler ein, daß ihm vor Wut das Gebiss rausflog und durchs Klassenzimmer geschleudert wurde.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Katholisch

[Georg Ratzinger, former choir director at Regenburg cathedral, said he knew nothing of sexual abuse of boys in the choir. They now know that more than 200 children were abused and the number could go higher.]

Georg Ratzinger, Bruder des emeritierten Papstes Benedikt XVI., hatte nach eigenem Bekunden keine Kenntnis von sexuellen Missbrauchsfällen bei den Regensburger Domspatzen. Davon habe er in seiner Zeit als Domkapellmeister “überhaupt nichts gehört”, sagte der Prälat der “Passauer Neuen Presse” (Montag).

Mit Blick auf die Prügelvorwürfe verwies der 91-Jährige darauf, Schläge und Ohrfeigen seien damals “in allen Erziehungsbereichen wie auch in den Familien üblich” gewesen. “Bei den Domspatzen hatten sie keine andere Bedeutung als in den genannten Bereichen auch”, so Georg Ratzinger, der von 1964 bis 1994 den weltberühmten Knabenchor leitete.

Der vom Bistum Regensburg beauftragte Rechtsanwalt Ulrich Weber hatte am Freitag einen Zwischenbericht zu den Prügel- und Missbrauchsvorwürfen gegeben. Er sprach von mindestens 231 Fällen von körperlicher Gewalt; in 62 Fällen kam es demnach zu sexuellen Übergriffen “vom Streicheln bis zur Vergewaltigung”. Weber schätzt, dass von den 2.100 Kindern in der Vorschule des Chors in Etterzhausen und Pielenhofen zwischen 1953 und 1992 rund ein Drittel geschlagen wurde.

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BOSTON (MA)
Boston.com

JANUARY 10, 2016

BY ALLISON POHLE

Stan Doherty didn’t believe what he was reading when he opened his copy of The Boston Globe on January 6, 2002. He saw the first article in a series about the widespread and systemic abuse of children by clergy members in the Catholic Church—a church he was part of. He closed the paper, incredulous.

That month, hundreds of his fellow parishioners began to gather outside the 11:30 a.m. mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston to demand the resignation of one of the church’s clergy members, Cardinal Bernard Law. The Globe found Law had kept abusive priests, including Rev. John Geoghan, in the ministry for years despite allegations of child sexual abuse. (Geoghan was accused of abusing more than 100 children.)

But Doherty couldn’t bring himself to join them. He didn’t want the allegations to be true.

That all changed after he read a story on one of the victims who killed himself because he couldn’t recover from the abuse he had experienced.

“After that, I went out in front of this church and decided I wasn’t going to let them get away with this,” Doherty said. “Well, turns out, they did.”

Doherty and a group of about a dozen survivors and advocates, who informally call themselves the “sidewalk family,” have held a vigil of hope in front of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross for more than 14 years. This Sunday was the last for Doherty, and fellow advocates Ken Scott and Paul Kellen, both of whom have been present for more than 650 Sundays.

They’ve run out of hope.

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UNITED KINGDOM
Mirror

11 JAN 2016

BY JAMES HORE , SOPHIE EVANS

Liam Cann, 22, from Essex, groomed and engaged in sexual activity with boys as young as eight after bribing them with FIFA points on Xbox online

A church bell-ringer who sexually abused young boys was caught after he repeatedly made the same typo when he hacked into a victim’s Facebook account to send messages proclaiming his innocence.

Liam Cann, 22, was jailed for 10 years after grooming children as young as eight by giving them money and bribing them with FIFA points – used to buy players and kit in the Xbox online game.

Once he had won their trust, he would then engage in sexual activity with them, prosecutors said.

When concerns were raised about Cann’s actions, the bell-ringer hacked the Facebook account of one of his six victims to send messages to his own Facebook account.

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UNITED STATES
Church Militant

Here’s the headline: As much as half of priests and bishops in the U.S. may be homosexual. Now the details.

Back in 2000, just as news of the homosexual priest sex abuse crisis was beginning to break, the Kansas City Star did an in-depth exposé on a horrible topic: the large number of homosexual priests dying of AIDS. The newspaper’s reporting brought to public light, for the first time on this kind of scale, the issue of homosexuality in the priesthood — albeit through the tragic lens of AIDS.

The newspaper conducted extensive research into the related issues of AIDS and homosexuality within clerical ranks and religious communities. Far from denying the paper’s stories, the bishop of Kansas City at the time, Raymond Boland, admitted the findings were true and said, “Much as we would regret it, it shows that human nature is human nature.”

The issue of the AIDS death aside (God rest their souls), it reveals the reality of homosexuality in the ranks of the ordained — and not just its presence, but its overwhelming presence.

The same time the KC Star was publishing its series of reports, another report, much less known, was also being circulated, this time in private meetings in the Church. It was prepared by the National Federation of Priests’ Councils, a group born from the liberal days of the Sexual Revolution in the wake of Vatican II.

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IRELAND
Irish Examiner

Monday, January 11, 2016

Niall Murray

Fr Tony Flannery has spoken about his frustration at the lack of support from the Catholic bishops since being withdrawn from public duties over his views on reforming the church.

The founder of the Association of Catholic Priests said his experience of the last four years, having been ordered by the Vatican not to minister publicly or to speak or write about his views, makes it hard to have much faith in the Church.

Fr Flannery spoke of the lack of process surrounding his dealings with the Vatican, which demanded he make public statements renouncing his views in relation to women priests and homosexuality, issues on which he opposes Catholic policy.

“I just think it’s so frustrating, the Irish bishops have never even contacted me in the last four years. Never shown me any element of support,” he told Miriam O’Callaghan on RTÉ Radio 1. “They are in senior positions in an institution that is conducting affairs in a totally unjust and abusive fashion and they do nothing about it and I find that intolerable.

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DEUTSCHLAND
Passauer Neue Presse

Der frühere Regensburger Domkapellmeister Georg Ratzinger (91) hat Vorwürfe gegen ihn im Zusammenhang mit Fällen von Missbrauch und Misshandlungen bei den Regensburger Domspatzen zurückgewiesen. Im PNP-Interview (Montagsausgabe) sagte der Bruder des emeritierten Papstes Benedikt XVI.: “Von sexuellen Missbräuchen habe ich überhaupt nichts gehört in meiner Zeit. Mir ist nicht bekannt geworden, dass sich damals ein sexueller Missbrauch ereignet hätte.” Ratzinger war von 1964 bis 1994 als Domkapellmeister Leiter der Regensburger Domspatzen.

Zur pädagogischen Praxis in der ehemaligen Internatsvorschule der Domspatzen, wo Schläge an der Tagesordnung waren, sagte der 91-Jährige: “Schläge, das heißt Ohrfeigen, waren nicht nur bei den Domspatzen, sondern in allen Erziehungsbereichen wie auch in den Familien üblich. Bei den Domspatzen hatten sie keine andere Bedeutung als in den genannten Bereichen auch.” Ratzinger, der sich zur Zeit in Rom aufhält, bekannte sich in einem Begleitschreiben zu dem schriftlich geführten Interview aber ausdrücklich zu Aussagen in einem früheren PNP-Interview aus dem Jahr 2010, wo er die Opfer sexuellen Missbrauchs und pädagogischer Gewalt bei den Regensburger Domspatzen um Verzeihung gebeten hatte.

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GERMANY
The New York Times

By MELISSA EDDY
JAN. 10, 2016

REGENSBURG, Germany — The Rev. Georg Ratzinger, the elder brother of former Pope Benedict XVI, said in an interview published Sunday that he had no knowledge that young boys in an internationally known German church choir he directed for 30 years had suffered sexual abuse.

“I did not hear anything at all about sexual abuse,” Father Ratzinger, 91, told a Bavarian regional newspaper, Passauer Neue Presse. “I was not aware that any sexual abuse was taking place at that time.”

Reports of physical and sexual abuse in the choir, the Regensburger Domspatzen in Bavaria, first emerged in 2010 as part of a nationwide wave of revelations linking officials of the Roman Catholic Church in Germany to the mistreatment of children. But an internal report by the church identified only 72 cases of abuse in the Regensburg Diocese, most involving severe corporal punishment.

Last week, Ulrich Weber, a lawyer commissioned by the choir to look into accusations of beatings, torture and sexual abuse, presented his initial findings, based on more than 140 interviews, roughly half of them with victims, and an examination of archives. Mr. Weber estimated that from 1953 to 1992, every third student at a school attached to the choir suffered some kind of physical abuse. He said the mistreatment at institutions linked to the Domspatzen included at least 40 cases of sexual violence.

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BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe

By Michael Levenson GLOBE STAFF JANUARY 10, 2016

They have become a familiar presence outside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston, a half-dozen men and women who gather every Sunday to protest what they call the Catholic Church’s inadequate response to the clergy sexual abuse crisis.

But now, 14 years after they launched the demonstration, several of the founding members said they are giving up, convinced the church will never take the steps necessary to protect children from abuse.

“I’ve decided that, after 14 years, the church is not going to change,” Kenneth Scott, 76, said as he staged his final protest with five others huddled under umbrellas outside the soaring cathedral on Sunday.

“I’m still a supporter of people who have been abused by the church and people who have been abused in general and will continue to help them,” said Scott, a retired investment analyst from Beacon Hill. “But I’m not going to stand out here in sleet, snow, rain, hail, and all that good stuff, because that’s clearly not an effective ministry.”

Brian Harlow, a 41-year-old North Cambridge resident who said he is a survivor of clergy sexual abuse, came Sunday to express his gratitude to the protesters, who stand silently on the sidewalk and hold signs displaying the photos of abuse victims.

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IRELAND
The Journal

UNTIL QUITE RECENTLY, the influence of the Catholic Church in Ireland could be felt in every town across the country.

The Church was respected, and somewhat feared, with the local priest being one of the most powerful people in the community who was never to be questioned.

After countless reports and tribunals into decades of systemic abuse within the Church, Irish people know all too well the devastating aftermath that relationship has had on communities.
It is something small Irish towns and villages have in common with the city of Boston.

The new award-winning Hollywood movie, Spotlight, starring Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Stanley Tucci and Rachel McAdams, focuses on the Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation carried out by the Boston Globe newspaper into the Catholic Church’s cover-up of child-molesting priests.

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IRELAND
Irish Independent

Nicola Anderson

PUBLISHED
10/01/2016

Fr Tony Flannery, the liberal Redemptorist priest who has been taken out of ministry by the Vatican for his outspoken views, has claimed that the Church would not talk to him when it came to addressing their complaints about articles he had written.

The cleric, who was taken out of ministry for writing articles the Vatican claimed were out of step with Church doctrine in the Redemptrist magazine revealed that the Papal Nuncio has “refused” to meet the Association of Catholic Priests which represents 1,000 priests across the country, while attending “every dog fight in the country.”

He was interviewed on RTE Radio One’s ‘Miriam Meets…’ programme, alongside his brother, the former Fine Gael director of elections, Frank Flannery.

Mr Flannery accompanied him to a couple of meetings in Rome when he was going through the ordeal and explained that: “You never know who your accusers are, there is no process,” describing it as: “beyond medieval.”

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CALIFORNIA
The Wrap

By Mikey Glazer on January 9, 2016

A continually updating diary of the who, what, when, where, and why around Los Angeles over Golden Globes weekend, from The Party Report’s Mikey Glazer

“Spotlight” star Rachel McAdams is bringing Sacha Pfeiffer, the woman she portrayed in the film, to the Golden Globes on Sunday, TheWrap’s Party Report has learned.

McAdams played the Boston Globe investigative journalist on the team that broke the sex abuse scandal and coverup in the Catholic church. The investigation and reporting plays out in Tom McCarthy’s Oscar-nominated drama, which is nominated for a “Best Picture – Drama” Golden Globe.

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VIRGINIA
WHSV

HARRISONBURG, Va. (WHSV)

In a press release, Eastern Mennonite University said:

“Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) has suspended Luke Hartman from his role as vice president for enrollment, effective immediately.”

“The suspension comes as a result of a January 8, 2016, misdemeanor charge of solicitation of prostitution following an investigation by the Harrisonburg Police Department and the Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office.”

“’We invite prayers for all those affected during this difficult time,’ said President Loren Swartzendruber.”

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VIRGINIA
The Mennonite

Luke Hartman, vice president of enrollment at Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) in Harrisonburg, Va., was charged Jan. 8 with solicitation of prostitution. In a statement released Jan. 9, EMU announced Hartman’s suspension, effective immediately. Hartman was one of 10 individuals charged as part of a sting operation conducted by the Harrisonburg Police Department and Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office.

According to Lieutenant Chris Rush of the Harrisonburg Police Department, Hartman was charged and released with a summons to appear back in court at a later date. In a Jan. 9 phone call, Rush said that this undercover operation was part of ongoing investigations in the Harrisonburg area.

Hartman began his role as a vice president at EMU in August 2011. Prior to this role, he served as assistant principal at Skyline Middle School in Harrisonburg and an educational consultant for Harrisonburg City Public Schools.

Hartman also served as associate director of admissions, men’s varsity basketball coach and taught in the education department at Hesston (Kan.) College from 1996-2004. He was also a popular speaker at Mennonite Church USA conventions, speaking most recently at the Phoenix 2013 gathering.

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VIRGINIA
DNR Online

Posted: January 9, 2016
By PETE DELEA

HARRISONBURG — Eastern Mennonite University announced Saturday it has suspended Luke Hartman from his role as vice president for enrollment, effective immediately.

The suspension comes after he was among 10 people charged Friday with solicitation of prostitution during a joint sting operation by the Harrisonburg Police Department and Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office.

“We invite prayers for all those affected during this difficult time,” said President Loren Swartzendruber, according to a statement.

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UNITED STATES
The New York Times

By KATE MURPHY JAN. 9, 2016

Tom McCarthy is the director and co-writer of “Spotlight,” a film about the journalists who exposed widespread sexual abuse of children by Roman Catholic priests in Boston and the wider institutional cover-up.

READING Between work and kids, I’m not reading as much as I’d like, which is why I’m leaning into short stories. My wife, who is also a writer, turned me on to “Tenth of December,” a collection by George Saunders. Sometimes it feels very realistic and then it will jump into feeling more fantastical. I’m always interested in people who can subtly, or maybe not so subtly, play with genre.

I’m also reading “The Hug Machine,” by Scott Campbell, because it’s my daughter’s favorite book. It’s about a little boy who will hug anything, whether a tree or a porcupine. He’s not afraid of hugging. A friend of mine gave it to me. When you get a good children’s book from a fellow parent who loves books, it’s such a treat.

LISTENING Brian Koppelman’s podcast, “The Moment.” He’s a writer and director who has been around a long time and has a very impressive résumé. He just really enjoys talking about the creative process and digging in deep.

For music, I listen to the National all the time. Their album “High Violet” may be one of my favorite albums of the last decade. I reached out to them when I was directing “Win Win” and they ended up writing a song for the closing credits of the film. There’s something very sophisticated about their sound; something very orchestral. There’s a density to their music that’s highly effective.

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NEW YORK
Church Militant

by Peter O’Dwyer • ChurchMilitant.com • January 10, 2016

A group of parishioners from a Catholic church in the Bronx have filed a lawsuit against their own pastor as well as the archdiocese of New York and Cdl. Timothy Dolan, claiming to be victims of both financial fraud as well as a diocesan-wide cover-up.

Father Peter Miqueli is alleged to have stolen more than $1 million to pay for a drug-fueled lifestyle over a 10-year period at two parishes: St. Francis Cabrini on Roosevelt Island and St. Frances de Chantel in the Bronx.

Father Miqueli is accused of skimming money off the collections and using it to purchase sex sessions with a gay-for-pay prostitute named Keith Crist. The stolen money was also allegedly spent on illegally obtaining drugs and purchasing a house in New Jersey.

The archdiocese of New York, including Cdl. Dolan, was notified repeatedly of Fr. Miqueli’s misbehavior, but each time the parishioners were stonewalled and Fr. Miqueli was left essentiall unpunished. In one case, a worker is reported to have been fired after meeting with auxiliary bishop Gerald Walsh, in retaliation for attempting to blow the whistle on Miqueli.

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CHILE
24 Horas

Cerca de treinta personas se mantiene al interior de la iglesia y aseguran que se quedarán ahí durante toda la jornada.

Un grupo de personas se tomó la catedral de Osorno para exigir la renuncia del Obispo Juan Barros, quien ha sido vinculado y acusado de ser encubridor de los abusos de Fernando Karadima.

Cerca de treinta personas fueron las que ingresaron a la iglesia portando un lienzo y pancartas pidiendo la salida del obispo designado en la diócesis local por el Papa Francisco.

En un comunicado los manifestantes explicaron que llevaron a cabo la “ocupación litúrgica, dada la grave e insostenible que afecta a la Iglesia de Osorno desde el nombramiento de don Juan de la Cruz Barros”, publica Emol.

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CHILE
La Nacion

Un grupo de laicos y laicas de la ciudad de Osorno ocupó la catedral de la localidad para manifestarse en contra del obispo Juan Barros, a quien acusan de ser encubridor de los abusos cometidos por Fernando Karadima.

Portando lienzos y entonando cánticos, los manifestantes protestaron pacíficamente debido a “la grave e insostenible crisis que afecta a la Iglesia de Osorno desde el nombramiento el 10 de enero de 2015 de don Juan de la Cruz Barros como obispo”, según informaron a través de un comunicado.

En uno de los lienzos ingresados a la catedral se leía: “Juan Barros, hermano nuestro en la fe, por amor a la iglesia chilena, te suplicamos, te exhortamos, te exigimos tu renuncia”.

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CHILE
Bio Bio

[A victim of priest Fernando Karadima insists that the Pope should apologize to people of Osorno for his defense of Bishop Juan Barros.]

El Papa Francisco mantuvo una reunión privada con el Cardenal Ricardo Ezzati en el marco del Sínodo de la Familia durante la jornada de ayer. A esta cita también asistieron los obispos de Rancagua y Melipilla, Alejandro Goic y Cristián Contreras.

Este encuentro, que se mantuvo en las dependencias del Vaticano, se dio meses después de la controversia por un video difundido donde el Papa realiza una defensa abierta al Obispo de Osorno, Juan Barros, indicando que la ciudad chilena sufre por “tonta”.

En ese contexto y frente la toma de la Catedral de Osorno, en la que fieles pedían la renuncia del Obispo Barros, Juan Carlos Cruz, víctima de Karadima afirmó que los fieles osorninos no son tontos y que el Pontífice debiese pedir perdón a la ciudad de Osorno.

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CHILE
Crux

By Inés San Martín
Vatican correspondent January 10, 2016

ROME — Laypeople in Chile opposed to Pope Francis’ appointment of a bishop with ties to the country’s most notorious abuser priest have occupied the local cathedral, demanding the bishop’s resignation.

The demonstration came on Saturday, the anniversary of the day Pope Francis announced the appointment one year ago.

“We’re Catholics who oppose the pastoral exercise of Bishop [Juan de la Cruz] Barros,” the group, which calls itself the “Lay Men and Women of Osorno,” write in a statement issued Saturday night.

Osorno is a small diocese in southern Chile with a Catholic population of roughly 125,000. Francis appointed Barros its bishop in January 2015.

On Saturday, Osorno’s Cathedral of St. Matthew was occupied by some 30 people carrying signs demanding Barros’s resignation. On the same day, Pope Francis welcomed the top three representatives of the Chilean Catholic hierarchy to the Vatican, presumably, in part, to discuss the controversy around Barros.

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RHODE ISLAND
Providence Journal

Posted Jan. 10, 2016

Evidence of serious crimes at St. George’s School, an elite private Episcopalian boarding school in Middletown, has come to light — after the school despicably left families, students and the public in the dark for decades. The full truth must come out, and school officials and advisers must accept full responsibility for their role.

Early last year, St. George’s began its own investigation into accusations of systematic sexual assault at the school during the 1970s and ’80s, a time when such matters were far more likely to be kept quiet. In a Dec. 23 report to alumni, Headmaster Eric Peterson and board chair Leslie Heaney apologized for sexual abuse by several former staff and students.

“The School underscores its regret, sorrow and shame that students in our care were hurt,” the two wrote in the 11-page report. “We commit ourselves to taking responsibility; to healing those wounds, and to making every effort to mend the fabric of the St. George’s community.”

Those are welcome words, but there are still grim questions to be answered.

The investigation, basing its finding on “credible first-hand accounts,” identified 26 victims of abuse by staff, 23 of them by three employees. Lawyers for the victims say the number is even higher — that more than 40 victims have come forward in the two weeks since the news came out. The school’s former legal counsel — Rhode Island Supreme Court Justice William Robinson — was also involved in putting pressure on a teen who complained of wronging, one victim and her lawyer charged.

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SCOTLAND
Scotsman

CHRIS MARSHALL
Saturday 09 January 2016

BISHOPS who allegedly colluded in the cover-up of child abuse are maintaining their “iron grip” on the way the Catholic Church treats victims, it has been claimed.

The Church recently published details of how it plans to implement the recommendations of the McLellan Commission, which called for an “unmistakable and unequivocal” apology for victims. But despite a “profound apology” issued by Archbishop Philip Tartaglia, survivors of abuse say the Church is continuing to fail them.

In an open letter, In-Care Abuse Survivors (Incas) said those who had been abused by priests had not been consulted in the drawing-up of the plan which sets out how the Church will implement the McLellan recommendations.

Last August, Archbishop Tartaglia begged forgiveness from victims, saying the Church had been “shamed and pained” by what had happened.

It followed the publication of the report by the Very Rev Andrew McLellan, a former Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, who said safeguarding victims and potential victims was the “greatest challenge” facing the Church.

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GERMANY
The Daily Beast

Barbie Latza Nadeau

An investigation has revealed hundreds of young choirboys may have been abused in sadistic rituals at a choir run by Pope Benedict’s Brother.

ROME—The priests at the Regensburg, Bavaria boarding school for boys liked to make the students take off their clothes and bend over for either a violent whipping or forcible anal sex. Sometimes the priests made them drink red wine. Sometimes the priests masturbated in front of the children. Other times they made the children masturbate for them, perform oral sex or fondle each other.

The complaint is not about just one or two isolated cases. At least 231 and more likely as many as 700 boys who attended the school between 1953 and 1992 were subjected to what has been described by the victims as “ritual abuse,” according to Ulrich Weber, a German lawyer commissioned by the choir who represents the alleged victims. “I have here 231 reports of physical abuse,” Weber told reporters at a press conference in Regensburg on Friday when he presented a report based on an eight-month investigation into the alleged abuse. “The abuse ranges from sexual assault and rape to food deprivation to the boys who were less cooperative.”

The bulk of the abuse, which also included canings, forced gluttony and anal penetration with foreign objects, happened in the mid-1970s to boys being groomed for the world-famous Domspatzen boys choir of Regensberg’s St. Peter’s Cathedral during the time when a certain Father Georg Ratzinger was the choir leader. Ratzinger, who will turn 92 next month, is the elder brother of Josef Ratzinger, better known as Pope Benedict XVI. He conducted the choir from 1964 to 1994. When asked if Ratzinger knew what was going on, Weber said “After my research, I must assume so.”

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ROME
Irish Independent

Michael Kelly on the real-life Vatican scandal that has rocked the Church in Rome to its core and reads like a raunchy ‘Da Vinci Code’ sequel

If novelist Dan Browne penned a tome, the gist of which had a female aide of the Pope seducing a monsignor to steal Vatican secrets, papal spokesmen would be aghast. Dismissals of the book as “mere fantasy” would surely be immediately forthcoming.

But more often than not, fact is stranger than fiction, and the latest dispatches from Rome make for salacious reading. Francesca Chaouqui, who was a key adviser to Pope Francis on economic reform, now stands accused of sleeping with Spanish priest Msgr Lucio Ángel Vallejo Balda on the pretext of receiving documents about alleged financial mismanagement which prosecutors claim she duly leaked to the press.

Chaouqui strenuously denies the sexual relationship and that she leaked any documents. The fact that Balda is linked to the notoriously secretive Opus Dei movement within the Church has only added to the intrigue. It was Browne’s The Da Vinci Code that made famous in the popular imagination Opus Dei by way of the character of the murderous monk Silas. But not even Browne’s stretched imagination could scarcely have written the latest saga.

Vatileaks has become the byword for scandals that have rocked the Holy See in recent years. Pope Benedict XVI resigned just weeks after receiving a 300-page dossier on the scandal that reached its height under his tenure with the trial and imprisonment of his butler, Paolo Gabriele, for stealing files from the papal apartment.

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UNITED STATES
The Open Tabernacle: Here Comes Everybody

Posted on January 10, 2016 by Betty Clermont

For over three decades, the Republican Party has used the Religious Right to energize conservative Christians to political activism and to get out the vote. Republicans running for office in numerous states and the U.S. Congress are preparing for battles in 2016 over discrimination protection for LBGT persons, religious exemptions for nonprofits and businesses objecting to gay marriage and contraception, and greater restrictions on abortion and Planned Parenthood.

At the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) annual General Assembly in November, “their first assembly since gay marriage became legal nationwide, they vowed to uphold marriage as only the union of a man and a woman and to seek legal protections for those who share that view. Some bishops said they were committed to reversing the U.S. Supreme Court same-sex marriage ruling last June … Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City said a concerted effort was needed to ‘build a consensus’ to do so. As a model, he pointed to new state laws that have made it harder to obtain an abortion.”

USCCB president, Archbishop Joseph Kurtz, “highlighted the bishops’ push for religious exemptions for charities, schools and individual for-profit business owners who oppose gay marriage and other laws and regulations.”The assembly “also heard an address from Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, the Vatican’s U.S. ambassador who was behind Pope Francis’ controversial meeting with Kim Davis, the Kentucky clerk who briefly went to jail rather than comply with a court order to issue same-sex marriage licenses … The ambassador received two standing ovations from the bishops.”

Confirming the reason for his “secret, emotionally charged” meeting with Davis, Pope Francis stated that “conscientious objection” by “government employees” is a “human right” on the flight back to Rome.

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UNITED KINGDOM
The Sunday Times

Jonathan Corke and James Gillespie Published: 10 January 2016

FULL details of a deal agreed by police and the Church of England to caution a paedophile cleric rather than charge him are revealed today in a dossier obtained by The Sunday Times.

The 29-page report details the conclusions of two detectives who investigated Peter Ball, then Bishop of Gloucester, in 1992-3 over allegations of sex abuse. Ball received a police caution at the time and was brought to court only last October, when he admitted the abuse of 18 young men between 1977 and 1992. He was given a 32-month prison sentence.

One of his victims, Neil Todd, killed himself in 2012.

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VIRGINIA
13NewsNow

[with video]

Eric Kane, 13NewsNow.com

PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WVEC) — Police have charged a Chesapeake church elder with sexually assaulting a teenage boy for more than a year.

Following a nearly month-long investigation, police arrested Jason N. Ellis, 40, on November 19.

He faces nine felony sexual assault charges in connection to multiple encounters he had with the teen dating back to 2014.

In some cases Ellis forced himself upon the boy, showed him pornography, asked for sex and touched him inappropriately, according to court documents.

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GERMANY
The Independent (UK)

Lizzie Dearden @lizziedearden

More than 200 children in a choir formerly conducted by the former Pope’s brother may have been beaten and sexually abused over almost four decades in Germany.

There is no suggestion that Georg Ratzinger was involved in the alleged crimes, which are now the subject of an investigation, and he denies knowledge of the incidents.

Mr Ratzinger, the elder brother of Pope Benedict XVI, was a led the Regensburger Domspatzen boys’ choir from 1964 to 1994.

The choir, based at St Peter’s Cathedral in Regensburg, Bavaria, traces its origins back to the 900s and is famous throughout Germany and beyond, performing for the Queen during a state visit and being commemorated with a 2003 postage stamp.

Ulrich Weber, a lawyer leading the probe commissioned by the Catholic diocese of Regensburg, said the 231 alleged victims included 50 who made “plausible” claims of sexual abuse at the choir and two associated boarding schools between 1953 and 1992.

More than 140 people were interviewed as part of his eight-month investigation, which included that almost a third of all pupils at the schools in Etterzhausen and Pielenhofen suffered some form of abuse, including sexual assault ranging from touching to rape.

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GERMANY
Newser

By Michael Harthorne, Newser Staff
Posted Jan 9, 2016

(NEWSER) – At least 231 members of a Catholic boys’ choir in Germany were physically abused over four decades—largely while the choir was conducted by the brother of former Pope Benedict XVI, the New York Times reports. That number comes from Ulrich Weber, a lawyer hired by the Regensburger Domspatzen choir to investigate abuse allegations that arose in 2010, according to AFP. Previously, the local Catholic Diocese had capped the number of victims at 72 and offered $2,700 in compensation, the Times reports. According to AFP, the abuse—which included “severe beatings and food deprivation”—started as early as 1945 and lasted until 1992. Weber says at least 40 of the 231 cases are instances of sexual abuse, including rape, the Times reports.

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MORE than 200 children may have been abused, some sexually, by adults working with a Catholic children’s choir run by the brother of Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI.
GERMANY
Herald Sun (Australia)

German lawyer Ulrich Weber said the 231 alleged victims included 50 who made “plausible” claims of sexual abuse at the Regensburger Domspatzen boys’ choir and two associated boarding schools between 1953 and 1992.

Weber, who was commissioned by the Catholic diocese of Regensburg, said that former Domspatzen conductor Georg Ratzinger must have known of at least some of the abuses. Ratzinger, the older brother of Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI, has previously denied knowledge of the incidents.

Allegations of abuse surfaced several years ago, at a time when the Catholic Church’s handling of such claims was being widely scrutinised following a series of high-profile cases in Europe and the United States.

Weber said his eight-month investigation involved interviews with more than 140 people, including 70 alleged victims. He concluded that almost a third of all pupils at two primary feeder schools for the choir, one in Etterzhausen and one in Pielenhofen, suffered some form of abuse.

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PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philly.com

JANUARY 10, 2016

by Mike Newall, Inquirer Columnist.

Brian McDonnell lies in his small, dark room under the crucifix on his wall, praying Hail Marys on his blue plastic rosary beads. Symbols of a church that had forsaken him, but one that he has never abandoned.

He worries that he is dying. It is all he thinks about.

“I don’t know how long I’m going to last,” he said the other afternoon. “I just feel like I’m fading quick. I just fall asleep saying Hail Marys.”

Brian suffers from schizophrenia, dementia, and depression. The manifestations of his mental illness are inextricably intertwined with the sexual abuse he suffered at the hands of a priest as an altar boy at now-closed St. Gregory’s in West Philadelphia.

“He suffers delusions because he cannot reconcile his faith in the Church with what happened to him,” prosecutors wrote in the 2003 Philadelphia grand jury report on sexual abuse in the archdiocese.

Brian is wasting away.

He is 70. He believes he’s 121. He believes he is “half Jesus” and “100 percent Michael the Archangel.” He believes he has raised the dead.

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GERMANY
International Business Times

BY AMY NORDRUM @AMYNORDRUM ON 01/09/16

An attorney has indicated the number of children physically or sexually abused by priests while serving in a choir run by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s brother at their Roman Catholic school in the German city of Regensburg totals 231. That’s more than three times as many cases as had been reported previously by the church.

Ulrich Weber, a lawyer hired by the church, announced the new cases Friday in conjunction with his investigation into the scandal centered on the Domspatzen (Cathedral Sparrows), which is the official choir at the Regensburg Cathedral dedicated to St. Peter in Bavaria state. The first allegations of sexual abuse there were made public in 2010 when a well-known composer named Franz Wittenbrink told the German magazine Der Spiegel he had been abused while enrolled at the boarding school.

Weber said the reported sexual abuse encompassed offenses such as fondling and rape, while the reported physical abuse included beatings and the withholding of food. He said victims named 10 perpetrators, according to Agence France-Presse.

The alleged abuse occurred between 1953 and 1992. For 30 of those years, the choir was run by the older brother of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, who resigned as pontiff in 2013 due to declining health.

Overall, 2,100 students participated in the choir during that period. Weber said he expects as many as one-third of its participants may have been abused over the years. Last year, the church began paying compensation of 2,500 euros ($2,730) to each victim.

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UNITED STATES
The Worthy Adversary

Posted by Joelle Casteix on January 9, 2016

On Sunday, the Chicago Tribune ran a page-one piece about the case of Fr. Bruce Wellems, a Chicago priest who admitted to luring a seven-year-old boy from basketball games and then sexually abusing him multiple times during the course of a year.

Wellems was an older teenager at the time. Did the Claretians (the religious order to which Wellems belongs) adhere to their promises of transparency and tell Catholics about Wellems? No … in fact, Claretian officials ordered their priests to destroy emails about Wellems and his crimes.

In 2014, did the Archdiocese of Los Angeles adhere to their promises of transparency and give parishioners in San Gabriel the correct information about Wellems? Did they post information about Wellems’ admission on their website, the parish website, or attempt to reach out to other potential victims?

No. They made one announcement from the pulpit, and then kept parishioners in the dark about the allegations. In fact, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and Archbishop Jose Gomez allowed parishioners to believe that the allegations and admissions stemmed from a “consensual dating relationship.”

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TEXAS
KLTV

SMITH COUNTY, TX (KLTV) –
A Lindale pastor has resigned after being arrested on a prostitution charge.

Ronald Wayne Stribble, 66, of Lindale, was arrested Jan. 6 and booked into Smith County Jail. He was later released on $500 bond.

Tyler Police spokesperson Don Martin says Stribble had been communicating with a woman on social media earlier in the week and agreed to meet her at the LaQuinta Inn on Loop 323 in Tyler. Police were tipped off about the meeting by an anonymous source and sent an undercover officer to meet with the pastor on Wednesday.

Martin says Stribble gave the undercover officer enough information to have him arrested at the scene for soliciting prostitution.

Stribble is a senior adult pastor with First Baptist Church of Lindale. According to the church’s website, Stribble has been affiliated with the church since 1990 and has served as the music pastor for 20 years.

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UNITED STATES
PopeCrimes& Vatican Evils.

Paris Arrow

Ulrich Weber, the lawyer representing the alleged victims from the Regensburger Domspatzen boys’ choir in Bavaria (which traces its roots to the year 975), said the longtime head of the cathedral choir, Georg Ratzinger – (brother of former Pope Benedict XVI-RATzinger ) — must have known of the numerous cases of sexual and physical mistreatments as he was the head of the prestigious choir from the mid-60s to the mid-90s — during the period of almost four decades of sex abuses. Weber said, “After my research, I must assume so.”

Weber said, I have here 231 reports of physical abuse…. 50 victims spoke of 10 perpetrators…victims could go up to 700 because at least every third child out of the 2,100 pupils in the choir and an attached school suffered and had been subjected to physical violence. These ranged from beatings to food deprivation, sexual assault and rape. However, the actual number of victims could be much higher.

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GERMANY
USA Today

David Gibson, Religion News Service January 9, 2016

Allegations that more than 200 boys in a Catholic-run choir and two connected schools in Germany were abused over the span of several decades, some of them sexually, have brought the church’s abuse scandal uncomfortably close to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, whose older brother directed the famous Bavarian choir during that time.

The allegations were reported by an attorney, Ulrich Weber, who had been hired by the Diocese of Regensburg last year to investigate claims of abuse at the Regensburger Domspatzen choir and two feeder schools between 1953 and 1992.

Weber told a news conference in Berlin on Friday that at least 50 of the 231 alleged victims made “plausible” claims of sexual abuse.

Benedict’s brother, Monsignor Georg Ratzinger, conducted the historic choir from 1964 to 1994. Asked if Ratzinger, now 92 and still living in Regensburg, had known of the abuse, Weber said: “After my research, I must assume so.”

“The events were known internally and criticized, but they had almost no consequences,” Weber said. The cases are too old to be prosecuted, he said.

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VATICAN CITY
Catholic World Report

Vatican City, Jan 9, 2016 / 06:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Amid the lengthy process of reforming Vatican communications, the Secretariat of State has stated that the Holy See press office’s administrative and human resources branches are to be handed over to the new Secretariat for Communications.

The announcement came in a Dec. 21, 2015 letter signed by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican Secretary of State.

The letter also noted that the press office’s Bollettino, used to deliver official information, will remain under the control of the state secretariat, in accordance with Pastor bonus, the 1988 apostolic constitution of St. John Paul II which regulates the functions and tasks of the Roman Curia’s dicasteries and departments.

The Holy See press office’s other activities, however, will be coordinated with the communications secretariat so as to “secure the unification of all the communications processes, which are within the competence of the Secretariat for Communications.”

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CHICAGO (IL)
Blackbird PR News

Posted on: January 9, 2016

CHICAGO, Jan. 8, 2016 /satPRnews.com/ — The Archdiocese of Chicago today announced the appointment of Mary Ann Hynes as its general counsel. Ms. Hynes was the first female general counsel of a Fortune 500 company and has most recently been senior counsel at the Chicago office of Dentons, the world’s largest law firm by number of lawyers.

“Mary Ann brings enormous experience and a solid record of high performance that has won her the admiration of her colleagues and community leaders,” said Archbishop Blase J. Cupich. “We welcome her to our team and look forward to the contribution she will make to our mission.”

Ms. Hynes, who joined Dentons in 2013 is a governance and compliance expert with more than 20 years of service on the boards of Fortune 500 companies and nonprofit organizations. She is a seasoned strategist with extensive mergers and acquisitions and integration experience and a focus on mining, high tech aerospace and industrial products, commodity-based manufacturing and media /software companies. She worked for seven years at Ingredion, Inc., (formerly Corn Products International), as a senior vice president, general counsel and chief compliance officer. Ms. Hynes began her career and spent 25 years at CCH, a WoLTErs Kluwer business, rising to the rank of vice president and general counsel.

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AUSTRALIA
The Age

Catholic Church spent millions providing for paedophile priests

January 10, 2016

Chris Vedelago, Cameron Houston

The archdiocese of Melbourne funnelled nearly $200,000 to a suspected paedophile after he fled overseas, funding his “retirement” for nearly a decade while he was hiding from authorities.

Father Ronald Pickering, who is known to have abused at least 16 children, successfully evaded justice in Australia and died in Britain in 2009.

In early 1993, Pickering “retired” from his Melbourne parish and fled to England in the face of mounting allegations of sexual abuse.

Despite being personally aware of complaints as early as 1986, then Melbourne Archbishop Frank Little ordered Pickering’s retirement entitlements be boosted in the wake of his impromptu departure.

“At this time the Archbishop does not intend appointing Father Pickering as Pastor Emeritus. However, he would appreciate your regarding Father Pickering, in this exceptional case, as qualifying for receipt of those monies which would normally be granted to PEs,” the Priests Retirement Foundation was instructed.

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