Posts Tagged ‘Clerical sexual abuse’

Mandatory reporting of clerical sexual abuse

Friday, May 10th, 2019

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

The witch hunt for gay priests

Thursday, September 6th, 2018
gay priests

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

More allegations of historic sexual abuse in NZ

Monday, August 20th, 2018

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

Archbishop Wilson’s victims want apologies

Thursday, August 16th, 2018

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

Cardinal McCarrick and the Church’s ticking time bombs

Monday, July 2nd, 2018
time bombs

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

Chilean bishops and Pope discussing reforms following scandal

Monday, May 14th, 2018

Thirty Chilean bishops are in Rome to meet with Pope Francis. 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. Read more