The Australian Catholic Church wealth has been investigated by media. The amount the investigation turned up is significantly greater than the Church admits. The Age – a daily newspaper that has been published in Melbourne since 1854 – undertook the six-month investigation. It found the Church is far wealthier than it asserted to the Royal Commission Read more
There was a catastrophic failure of leadership in the Catholic Diocese of Ballarat’s handling of clergy child sex abuse, says Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Child Sexual Abuse. The Commission’s report says a culture of secrecy and failures in the church’s structure led to children being abused across the diocese over a number of decades. Read more
During the past 12 months, Australia’s Catholic Church has had to face several moral issues. These include a sex abuse crisis as the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse published reports about abuse at Catholic schools and institutions, losing the same-sex marriage referendum and Victoria government’s upper house voting to allow euthanasia. Read more
Child sex abuse is a national tragedy, says Justice Peter McClellan. McClellan is the Chair of Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. The Commission learned that child sex abuse has occurred in almost every type of institution where children lived or attended. Furthermore, “it is not a case of a few Read more
A Canberra group called “Concerned Catholics” is lobbying for structural change to address disillusion and disaffection in the Australian Catholic Church. Chair of the group, emeritus professor John Warhurst, says Catholic leaders in Australia must begin work to give parishioners an effective role and voice in the Church’s direction and provide greater accountability and inclusive Read more
Australia’s Truth Justice and Healing Council vice chair, Elizabeth Proust, says she’s “pessimistic” about the Catholic Church’s willingness to reform now the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has finished. Proust, whose role on the Council is to supervise and coordinate the Church’s response to the Commission and its recommendations, says she fears Read more
Controversy has broken out in Australia since the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse published recommendations saying priests should break the confessional seal when child sexual abuse is confessed. The Commission wants legislation introduced to jail people who fail to report child sexual abuse, including priests. In response, Australian Catholic Bishops Conference Read more
We have just emerged from what the media calls ‘the Catholic wrap up’ at the Royal Commission. This three-week hearing culminated in the joint appearance of the five most senior bishops in our Australian Church. They apologised not just for the sins of those church personnel who violated children, the most vulnerable members of our Read more
Australia’s archbishops expressed very different views on whether information children “confess” about abuse should be kept private, last week. They were being quizzed at the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. One of the questions they were asked related to a fictional child called ‘Sally’ who reported abuse to them in Read more
The victims of clergy and religious sexual abuse are not historical cases they are people who, as it were, were abused by God himself. Some of these victims perceive that both humanity and God abandoned them in the formative parts of their lives. Most of those who haven’t committed suicide or died at the end of Read more