Survivor groups are not hopeful that the Royal Commission into the Abuse in Care will bring around change in churches. A spokesperson for the Network of Survivors of Abuse in Faith-Based Institutions, Liz Tonks, told RNZ that “victim-survivors were not hopeful because their experiences of churches is they have not been able to trust them Read more
A prominent Polish cardinal who was recently sanctioned by the Vatican over sexual abuse allegations has been hospitalized since last week and remains unconscious, Polish media reported Tuesday. Retired Archbishop Henryk Gulbinowicz was sanctioned by the Vatican last week after the 97-year-old was accused of sexually abusing a seminarian and of covering up abuse in Read more
More than 10 years after its final report, the commission set up by the Irish government to investigate claims of abuse in religious-run institutions has admitted that it overestimated the number of children in the homes. In a statement Nov. 25, the Commission to Inquire Into Child Abuse said the number of children housed in Read more
An Argentine court on Monday convicted two Roman Catholic priests and the former gardener of a church-run school for deaf students in the province of Mendoza on 28 counts of sexual abuse and corruption of minors. Priests Nicola Corradi and Horacio Corbacho were sentenced to 42 and 45 years in prison, respectively, while the school Read more
When the Vatican announced new procedures to hold bishops accountable in May, the main question was: Will it work? The legislation – called Vos Estis Lux Mundi – enacted what is known as the Metropolitan Model, in which archbishops would play a prominent role in policing those bishops in their ecclesiastical province. This week, the Read more
Pope Francis has released a new law making it mandatory for all clerics and members of religious orders to report cases of clerical sexual abuse to Church authorities. It also includes actions or omissions of bishops and religious superiors that in any way interfere with or fail to investigate abuse. “The crimes of sexual abuse Read more
It is not surprising that Catholics are furious about the latest sex abuse crisis. It began, most recently, with accusations of abuse and harassment against the former cardinal-archbishop of Washington, D.C., Theodore McCarrick deepened with the Pennsylvania grand jury report detailing 70 years of abuse in the Commonwealth and, intensified with the former Vatican nuncio Read more
The spotlight on sexual abuse within the Catholic Church is widening to include fresh allegations against the Christian Brothers in Dunedin. An Otago Daily Times Insight investigation, as part of the ongoing “Marked by the Cross” series, has uncovered allegations of historic sexual abuse, dating back to the 1970s, levelled against two Christian Brothers. Continue Read more
Victims want apologies and answers from former Australian Archbishop Philip Wilson. Wilson (67) has been convicted of concealing paedophile priest Jim Fletcher’s abusive behaviour in the 1970s. As Wilson was leaving the Newcastle Local Court after being sentenced on Tuesday, a group of victims was waiting for him. Peter Gogarty, who was one of Fletcher’s Read more
The revelation that 87-year-old retired Cardinal Theodore McCarrick has been removed from public ministry on charges that he twice molested a teenage boy in New York in 1970 and 1971 marks a new low for the Catholic Church in the United States. All these years, McCarrick apparently knew he was a ticking time bomb, a Read more