The appointment of Archbishop-elect Ferrada signifies a much greater recognition than the Chilean's recent work at the Vatican.

He was one of the first priests to publicly testify before Chile's justice system against Fernando Karadima, the most notorious figure in the country's huge clergy sex abuse scandal.

While Archbishop-elect Ferrada was never sexually assaulted by Karadima, he testified that the former priest had a manipulative personality and was capable of "exerting great influence on people".

This testimony was essential, as it confirmed the complaints of many victims. Read more

The deal's critics, including abuse survivors, say it unduly provides protections and privileges to the Church.

The agreement was signed on Tuesday by the national prosecutor, Jorge Abbott, and the secretary general of the Chilean bishops' conference, Bishop Fernando Ramos, who's one of ten bishops called to testify facing allegations of having covered up cases of abuse. Read more

A unanimous ruling says the Church must pay 100 million pesos ($146,000) for "moral damages" to each of his three victims. Read more

Ezzati's resignation came after he was placed under criminal investigation in the country's spiralling church sex abuse and cover-up scandal.

Spanish-born Capuchin friar and current bishop of Copiapo, Chile, Monsignor Celestino Aos Braco will replace Ezzati in the interim.

Ezzati, 77, is one of the 33 Chilean bishops who all offered their resignation to Francis last May amid accusations of cover-ups of sexual abuse by priests.

To date, Francis has accepted the resignations of eight bishops.

Ezzati is perceived as responsible for years of silence regarding 251 alleged crimes.

He denies that he had led a cover-up.

"I can say, with my head held high, that all the complaints that have reached the complaints office that I created in 2011 have been investigated, or are being investigated", he says.

"It's not enough to say that I have covered up (abuse), you have to prove it."

Ezzati had been linked to at least three cases of cover-ups.

One involved alleged abuse committed by former archdiocese chancellor Oscar Munoz who was in charge of the church's sexual abuse investigation files, and is currently under criminal investigation and under house arrest.

The Chilean abuse cases stretch back to the 1940s with the most recent being that of a homeless man who claims to have been drugged and raped by a priest in a dormitory inside the Cathedral of Santiago in 2015.

The accuser told the police he returned once to the Cathedral, where Ezzati hears confession from time to time, to tell him his story. He said he received a hug from the archbishop and was given the equivalent of $45 in Chilean pesos by another priest.

When asked about the homeless man, Ezzati told a local television station early this month: "I don't know him."

Victims rights activists say Francis's acceptance of Ezzati's resignation is a positive step.

"Cardinal Ezzati represents everything that we have fought against for years, especially the culture of abuse and cover-up," said Juan Carlos Cruz, James Hamilton and Jose Andres Murrillo in a statement.

The three are abuse survivors who have helped lead a campaign pressuring the Vatican to take action.

Source

• South China Morning PostImage:
• LA Times
• Daily Sabah

Juan Carlos Cruz, who is one of Karadima's abuse survivors, is grateful for Francis's decision.

In a statement on Twitter, he called Karadima "a criminal who has ruined so many people's lives with his abuse" and offered thanks to Francis, saying he hoped survivors "feel a bit of the relief I feel today."

The Vatican said laicising Karadima was an "exceptional decision" which Francis made "in conscience for the good of the Church," according to a statement from the Vatican.

Citing Canon 331 of the Code of Canon Law, the statement said that in making the decision Francis had "exercised his 'supreme, full, immediate, and universal ordinary power in the Church,' conscious of his service to the people of God as the successor of St Peter."

Although Francis initially sentenced the 88-year old Karadima to a life of prayer and penance, the Vatican has not cited any new evidence or crime that may have prompted Francis to revisit the case and impose what clergy consider to be the equivalent of a death sentence.

US canon lawyer Nick Cafardi says Francis was acting fully within his legal right to revisit the case since there's no such thing as double jeopardy in canon law.

"The pope has the ability to intensify a penalty," Cafardi says.

Papal spokesman Greg Burke says in removing Karadima from the priesthood "Pope Francis is acting as a pastor, as a father, for the good of the entire People of God."

"This is an exceptional measure, no doubt, but Karadima's serious crimes have done exceptional damage in Chile."

Source

• National Catholic Reporter
• PBS News Hour
• Image: Al Jazeera

Francis's handwritten letter follows the bishops' formal, written apology for failing to listen to clerical abuse victims.

In addition to their apology, the bishops have made a number of changes to prevent charges of interfering with the pursuit of justice by alleged victims occurring in future.

These include:

• Promising to draw up a formal agreement with the national prosecutor's office to share information
• Vowing to release information on investigations carried out within their dioceses and urging the superiors of religious orders to do the same
• Expanding the competencies of their national review board and appointing a laywoman lawyer to lead it
• Appointing another laywoman to direct a new department within the bishops' conference for the Prevention of Abuse.

In his letter, Francis told the bishops he is "impressed by the reflection, discernment and decisions" they have taken.

"May the Lord reward you abundantly for this communal and pastoral effort," Francis said.

"The decisions (of the bishops) are realistic and concrete. I'm sure that they will decidedly help in this process."

Francis's response to the bishops is very different from his public denunciation of the "culture of abuse and cover-up" in Chile's Catholic Church in April this year.

At that time, Francis said he was ashamed that neither he nor Chilean Church leaders truly ever listened to victims as Chile's abuse scandal spread.

Source

• Crux Now
• Catholic Herald
• Image: TED Talks

The Chilean bishops failed to protect children from paedophile priests.

Goic has served as head of the Chilean church's child protection commission.

The extent of clerical paedophilia in Chile was detailed in a 2,300-page report compiled earlier this year at Francis's request by Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta and his aide, Fr Jordi Bertomeu.

Although almost every bishop in Chile offered his resignation to Pope Francis after a three-day meeting with him at the Vatican in May, he has accepted only individual resignations since the bishops returned to Chile.

So far he has accepted resignations from five bishops.

They include Bishop Juan Barros of Osorno, once a top aide to Chile's most notorious predator priest, Fernando Karadima.

Originally Francis strongly defended Barros, dismissing objections from many of Chile's faithful, including some church officials, who said the bishop was unfit for the office because he ignored Karadima's abuse.

After Scicluna's investigations, Barros's shielding of Karadima came to light.

It also became clear some bishops not only slowed an investigation into Karadima, but also tampered with evidence.

Source

• La Croix
• Catholic Herald
• LA Times
• Image: CNN.com

This includes removing bishops, reforming seminaries and paying financial reparation to victims of a clergy sex abuse and cover-up scandal.

Representatives say they are humbled, pained and shamed for their own errors in handling abuse cases. Read more

It's a bit of a head-scratcher.

The news was widely covered - but not by Vatican media.

The weekly Spanish-language edition of L'Osservatore Romano that came out last Friday had a piece that took note of the weekend meetings and briefly mentioned the Wednesday press conference.

Otherwise, crickets.

Sources inside the Secretariat for Communications, which oversees most of the Vatican's media and public relations apparatus, including the new Vatican News web portal, suggest the decision not to cover the event - which received worldwide press attention - was in keeping with the Holy Father's wishes that the meetings be private and reserved.

The acting head of the Secretariat for Communications, Mgr Lucio Ruiz, did not respond to repeated requests for a statement, while the Press Office of the Holy See declined to comment.

"It's a bit surprising," the Wall Street Journal's Vatican correspondent, Francis X Rocca, told the Catholic Herald.

"After the Pope's dramatic gesture, and given his willingness to field tough questions, it's puzzling that his own media apparatus would keep silent on such a major event and an important topic."

Rocca saw both sides of the question.

"I can understand the desire to exercise discretion, so as not to be seen to ‘spin' the event," he said.

On the other hand, the argument could be made that a brief statement acknowledging the presser might have shown the Pope's willingness to face criticism; it was a judgment call. Continue reading

• Christopher Altieri is a contributing editor of the Catholic Herald
• Image: Twitter

Francis summoned them to the Vatican last month.

He wants to discuss short, medium and long-term reforms to the church.

Francis has admitted he made "grave errors in judgment" about Bishop Juan Barros's role in covering up sexual abuse perpetrated by Fr Fernando Karadima.

He blames a "lack of truthful and balanced information" for his errors.

The executive committee of the Chilean bishops conference says the bishops came to Rome in "humility and hope."

Their meeting with Francis includes examining the clerical sex abuse cover-up.

The bishops have praised Francis's recent meetings with three of Karadima's survivors, saying his example "showed us the path that the Chilean church is called to follow."

The survivors, Juan Carlos Cruz, James Hamilton and Jose Andres Murillo, stayed with Francis as his guests early this month so he could listen to their testimony.

He personally apologised to them for having discredited them in January.

At that time he said their accusations against Barros's role in covering up sexual abuse were "calumny."

He had also demanded they provide proof of Barros's wrongdoing.

However, after receiving a 2,300-page report compiled by top Vatican investigators who traveled to Chile and interviewed victims, priests and lay Catholics, Francis realised he had been misled.

Source

• Washington Post
• Vatican News
• Image: Prensa Latina

Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati says Barros, who allegedly covered up abuse of minors, should 'without a doubt' resign.

He also says he would not judge whether Barros actually had covered up abuse by Fr Fernando Karadima.

"I'm not a judge" who can say if Barros in fact covered up or not.

Baross's diocese of Osorno released a statement on Thursday saying he has some "health difficulties," while reiterating that he's "permanently available to the directions of the Holy Father."

No details were given regarding his condition.

Last week Pope Francis admitted 'grave mistakes' in his handling of the abuse crisis.

After initially defending Barros and saying he had been slandered, Francis appointed Vatican-based sexual abuse investigator Archbishop Charles Scicluna to investigate the matter.

Scicluna went to Chile to meet with abuse victims and clergy to find out whether Barros did have a case to answer.

After reading Scicluna's 2,300-page report, which included the testimony of 64 individuals, Francis changed his mind about Barros.

He said the report caused him "pain and shame" and he apologised to everyone he offended by his earlier stance.

He acknowledged he made "serious errors of assessment and perception ... especially due to lack of truthful and balanced information."

Ezzati says Francis was "deceived" with the information given to him about Barros.

He says it is "a very serious fault to have misinformed the Holy Father," and noted he hadn't "deceived anyone" himself.

In his opinion the bishop's situation should have been resolved "years ago."

Source

• Christian Today
• The Tablet
• CruxNow
• Image: Alchetron

The call came a day after Pope Francis acknowledged "grave mistakes" in handling a sexual abuse crisis and summoned Church leaders to Rome.

At a meeting of Church leadership on Chile's central coast, Santiago Silva, the president of the Episcopal Conference, said change was inevitable.

"It's possible that the pope will ask some (bishops) to leave their diocese ... there must be a drastic solution, strong and decisive, that is for certain," Silva said. Read more

That question is making the rounds after the pope seemed completely unaware of the details of a Chilean sex abuse scandal, a failing that soured his recent trip there and forced him to do an about-face.

It also came up after his abrupt, no-explanation dismissal of a respected Vatican bank manager.

And it rose to the fore when he was accused by a cardinal of not realizing that his own diplomats were "selling out" the underground Catholic Church in China for the sake of political expediency.

Some Vatican observers now wonder if Francis is getting enough of the high-quality briefings one needs to be a world leader, or whether Francis is relying more on his own instincts and informants who slip him unofficial information on the side.

In his five years as pope, Francis has created an informal, parallel information structure that often rubs up against official Vatican channels.

That includes a papal kitchen cabinet of nine cardinal advisers who meet every three months at the Vatican and have the pope's ear, plus the regular briefings he receives from top Vatican brass.

The Vatican this week issued a remarkable defense of Francis' information flow and his grasp of the delicate China dossier.

The Holy See press office insisted that Francis followed the China negotiations closely, was being "faithfully" briefed by his advisers and was in complete agreement with his secretary of state on the topic.

"It is therefore surprising and regrettable that the contrary is affirmed by people in the church, thus fostering confusion and controversy," said Vatican spokesman Greg Burke.

Francis lives at the Vatican's Santa Marta hotel rather than the Apostolic Palace, where he can more easily keep his door open at all hours, and where a network of friends, informants and advisers provide back channels of information to him.

"The problem is he's the victim of the Santa Marta syndrome," said Massimo Franco, columnist for the Italian daily Corriere della Sera.

"The pope wanted to live there because he didn't want any filter from the secretary of state. But the other side of the coin is that he's condemned to receive quite casual information, and not always very accurate."

At Santa Marta, the pope sets his own agenda, makes his own phone calls and arranges his own visitors' schedule, often without the knowledge of the Vatican's protocol office. He neither watches TV nor browses the internet but reads the Rome daily Il Messaggero and a selection of press clippings for his non-Vatican news.

Some of his information arrives in person, some of it on paper, left for him in a red leather-bound folder at the Santa Marta front desk, brought upstairs by a Swiss Guard and handed over to one of the pope's two private secretaries.

Francis has two main gatekeepers, Monsignor Yoannis Lahzi Gaid, an Egyptian Copt who used to work in the Vatican's secretariat of state, and Monsignor Fabian Pedacchio, an Argentine priest who Francis, when he was archbishop of Buenos Aires, dispatched to Rome in 2007.

He also has the prefect of the papal household, Monsignor Georg Gaenswein, who arranges official audiences and decides who gets to greet the pope after his weekly Wednesday general audience.

Sometimes popes suffer when their gatekeepers fail them: Pope Benedict XVI famously lifted the excommunication of a Holocaust-denying bishop, unaware that a simple Google search would have turned up the bishop's belief that the Nazi gas chambers were a myth.

But more than his immediate predecessor Benedict, Francis still relies on a close circle of friends from his days in Argentina and as a high-ranking Jesuit to give him the pulse of what's going on.

And he can be fiercely stubborn once he has made up his mind based on information that does reach him, such as his recent dismissal of the respected No. 2 at the Vatican bank, Giulio Mattietti, who was fired without explanation at the end of the year.

In his subsequent Christmas address to the Vatican bureaucracy, Francis blasted Vatican staff who have been sidelined, saying "they wrongly declare themselves martyrs of the system, of a 'pope kept in the dark.'"

But with Chile's priest sex abuse scandal, Francis was forced to admit he had not only made a mistake, but maybe he was the one in the dark. Continue reading

Scicluna will travel to New York next week to interview the victim, Juan Carlos Cruz. The victim is at the centre of a scandal involving Pope Francis.

Cruz says a letter he wrote in 2015 asking Pope Francis to listen to his testimony about clergy abuse and its subsequent cover-up has been ignored.

The Associated Press (AP) claims Francis received the victim's letter in 2015, which detailed how a priest sexually abused him and how other Chilean clergy ignored it.

The AP statements contradict Francis's insistence that no victims had come forward to denounce the coverup.

If the APs statements are true, they could undermine Francis's assertions of "zero tolerance" for sexual abuse and those who seek to cover it up.

The accusations against Francis emerged last month during his trip to South America.

Francis said he had not heard from any victims about Bishop Juan Barros, who is accused of witnessing and ignoring abuse perpetrated by Fr. Fernando Karadima.

His response that the accusations were slanderous sparked an outcry in Chile.

Marie Collins, who was a founding member of Pope Francis's Commission for the Protection of Minors but who resigned in early 2017, says his handling of the Chilean abuse survivor's letter has "definitely undermined credibility, trust and hope" in Francis.

"He has said all the right things and he has expressed all the right views on abuse, and the harm and the hurt, but in this case at least it would seem his actions have not matched the words, and that is sad," she says.

Collins says she personally handed the letter from Cruz to Cardinal Sean O'Malley, who heads the Commission for the Protection of Minors.

"Cardinal O'Malley said he would hand it to the pope, and he told us later he had done so and that he had discussed the concerns with the pope himself," Collins says.

Francis told reporters on a flight back from South America that no victims had come forward to him about the case.

Source

• The Spec
• Crux Now
• The Star
• Image: Duna

Morales has asked for a papal envoy to help calm "rising tensions and a miscarriage of justice".

"I beg you to intervene in the best possible way to quickly resolve this case," he wrote to Francis last week.

"Justice must conclude with the liberation of nine Bolivian functionaries."

Morales told Francis those arrested were being "deprived of their human rights in Iquique, Chile."

The prisoners include seven customs workers and two soldiers. They were arrested in March and accused of robbery, carrying weapons and importing contraband.

This is not the first time Morales has sought Francis's help.

When he hosted Francis during his 2015 visit, he said in his welcoming address "You have arrived in a country mutilated by its lack of access to the sea,".

He then gave him a gift, the "Book of the Sea."

Pope Francis answered, saying "Dialogue is indispensable," and "building bridges instead of building walls."

Bolivia and Chile share a border that is about 650 kilometres long. They don't have diplomatic relations and don't get on well.

Bolivia has not had access to sea routes since 1879, which is part of the problem it has with Chile.

Source

• National Catholic Register
• Crux
• CatholicPhilly
• Image: The New York Times

"The Church's job is to reflect the point of view of her head and founder: Jesus Christ," Cardinal Gerhard Müller said in Chile earlier this month.

The cardinal was speaking at a Mass during a plenary assembly of Chile's bishops' conference.

"The Lord did not follow the world's ‘marketing' plan with all its loud and annoying methods," Cardinal Müller said.

"He did not write a book, rather he founded a community, the Church, which is his body."

"Jesus never wrote a book, neither did he leave any object related with his person.

"Rather, he directed his teachings to his disciples, specifically to twelve regular men of his day, and he told them to evangelise the whole world."

"Much confidence is required to understand how such an improbably method could have succeeded," the cardinal said.

He then addressed the issue of the shrinking proportion of Catholics in Chile, down from 70 per cent of the population in 2002 to only 55 per cent in 2015.

"Today, a painful purification is in course," he said, "but it is the same as when Jesus overturned the tables."

"Purification is painful and disquieting. May it do its work. Let us remain faithful and not become discouraged. Some left, but we must remain faithful in dialogue with Jesus in his Church."

Meanwhile, Pope Francis told Slovakia's bishops that youth are tempted to "hedonism, mediocrity and instant success".

The Pope told the bishops visiting Rome for their ad limina visit that "young people need to have from you clear instructions about doctrine and morals, to build, in the city of man, the city of God".

"In our day, it is even more necessary to illuminate the path of people with Christian principles, seizing the opportunity the current situation offers to develop a new evangelisation, which, with a new language, makes it easier to understand Christ's message," he added.

Sources

• Vatican Radio
• Catholic World News
• Image: Mumbai Laity

In a video taken of a conversation in St Peter's Square five months ago, Francis mentioned the case of Bishop Juan Barros Madrid of Osorno.

"Don't be led around by the nose by these leftists who are the ones who put this [opposition] together," the Pope is heard saying to a former spokesman for Chile's bishops.

"Osorno suffers for being stupid because it has not opened its heart to what God says," Francis also said in the video.

Abuse survivor and member of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors Marie Collins tweeted that she was "saddened and disappointed" at the Pope's comments.

Continue reading

Late last month, the university's chancellor Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati Andrello removed Professor Jorge Costadoat, SJ, from the role.

In a letter to the university's council, Cardinal Ezzati stated Fr Costadoat's academic path "included unwise affirmations that blurred the magisterial teaching of the Church".

The cardinal reportedly told the theologian to reread Ex Corde Ecclesiae, to meditate on it, and then he could reapply to teach theology next year.

Professor Costadoat wrote to a local newspaper that he did not know what he had been accused of.

This led to speculation that the ousting was due to his progressive views on interreligious dialogue, the social mission of the Catholic Church and his call for freedom of thought in Catholic universities and for the relaxation of the Church's views on sexual morality.

Professor Coastadoat had been under investigation by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for several years for his writings on liberation theology.

But the CDF had taken no action.

Following the barring of Fr Costadoat, there was an uproar about academic freedom in Chile.

A letter from Cardinal Ezzati in El Mercurio newspaper on April 3 stated that Fr Costadoat, who taught Christology, had not followed the programme of study and had failed to cover most of the essential contents of the course.

Therefore, to expect him to do so was not "to disregard his academic freedom but to demand from him a minimum of rigour".

One report stated that Fr Costadoat didn't teaching the early Church councils in his Christology course.

The next day, the Cardinal stated he had gone out on a limb for Fr Costadoat at the Congregation for Catholic Education in Rome and at the CDF, and obtained for him "the necessary teaching authority that he did not have".

Cardinal Ezzati was appointed the Congregation for Catholic Education by Pope Francis.

Fr Costadoat will be allowed to continue research at the university.

Sources

• University World News
• Cardinal Newman Society
• Image: Latercera

The Vatican press office stated: "Prior to the recent appointment of His Excellency Msgr Juan de la Cruz Barros Madrid as bishop of Osorno, Chile, the Congregation for Bishops carefully examined the prelate's candidature and did not find objective reasons to preclude the appointment."

Bishop Barros's installation Mass last month was cut short after protests at the cathedral in Osorno.

Chilean clergy sexual abuse survivors accuse Bishop Barros of covering up abuse by Fr Fernando Karadima when Bishop Barros was a priest.

Fr Karadima, a once-renowned spiritual leader, was found guilty by the Vatican in 2011 of sexually abusing minors.

He was ordered to retire to a life of penitence and prayer.

Chilean criminal charges against Fr Karadima were dropped because of technicalities, including the expiry of the statute of limitations time period since the crimes.

Survivors say that as a priest, Bishop Barros not only worked to cover up Fr Karadima's crimes, but witnessed some of them as they happened.

Bishop Barros, who previously served as the head of Chile's diocese for the military, has denied the claims.

He said he "never had knowledge or imagined the serious abuses that this priest [Karadima] committed with his victim".

Five members of the Pontificial Commission for the Protection of Minors have expressed "concern and incredulity" at Bishop Barros's appointment.

Commission member and abuse survivor Marie Collins from Ireland said: "The voice of the survivors is being ignored."

She added that " . . . the safety of children in this diocese is being left in the hands of a bishop about whom there are grave concerns for his commitment to child protection".

Another commission member and abuse survivor, Peter Saunders, has said he might have to quit the commission unless Pope Francis withdraws the Barros appointment.

Both Pope Francis and commission head Cardinal Sean O'Malley have previously pledged that gaps around bishops' accountability on abuse cover ups will be filled.

Sources:

• The Tablet
• National Catholic Reporter
• Crux
• BBC
• Image: Catholic News Agency

An estimated 4000 protesters tried to block Bishop Juan Barros Madrid from entering the cathedral in Osorno on March 21.

Inside the cathedral, there were clashes between the bishop's opponents, carrying black balloons, and supporters, carrying white ones.

While Bishop Barros was celebrating the Mass, many kept screaming "Paedophile!" and "Get out!".

The celebration had to be cut short, skipping the homily, Communion, and other parts of the liturgy.

Bishop Barros was escorted out of a side-door under police guard.

Three people were arrested for disorderly conduct.

Weeks of protests, candlelight vigils and letters to Pope Francis were not enough to persuade him to rescind his decision in January to appoint Bishop Barros.

Bishop Barros was a close associate of the Fr Fernando Karadima, a Santiago priest whom the Vatican found guilty of sexual abuse in 2011.

The abuse took place in the 1980s and 1990s.

Fr Karadima was ordered to retire to a "life of prayer and penitence".

Three of Fr Karadima's victims have accused four Chilean prelates, including Bishop Barros, of covering up for Fr Karadima and of being present while he abused them.

One victim accused Bishop Barros of threatening seminarians if they spoke out.

Another accusation charges that Bishop Barros, while serving as secretary to a cardinal, destroyed letters addressed to him reporting the abuses.

Bishop Barros has denied any knowledge of the abuses.

One victim, Juan Carlos Cruz, said the Pope's decision to appoint Bishop Barros was a slap in the face.

To date, the Vatican has made no statement in response to the criticism of his appointment.

Chilean Archbishop Fernando Chomalí discussed the Barros appointment and the subsequent reaction with the Pope in Rome on March 6.

The archbishop said the Pope was very well informed about the situation and had told him he found no reason to reverse his decision.

Sources

• Crux
• New York Times
• Image: Sydney Morning Herald