Paedophile priests in rehab: How the Vatican tries to 'cure' child sex abusers
By Elena Kaniadakis, Euronews
In this Monday, Dec. 9, 2019 photo, Monsignor John Kennedy, the head of the Congregation for
the Doctrine of the Faith, walks through a chapel as he speaks during an interview at the Vatican.
AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino
"We're a garage, we're not a junkyard. Those who want to trash the car don't need to come to us."
This is how deacon and psychotherapist Marco Ermes Luparia, 69, describes his recovery centre for priests suffering psychological and behavioural problems -- including paedophilia.
His team of five people has been welcoming ecclesiastics in a Rome-based facility for more than 20 years. Over the past 15 years, about 150 priests have been convicted of child sexual abuse in Italy. Last December, Pope Francis lifted papal secrecy in clergy sexual abuse cases.
John Joseph Kennedy, of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said there were about a thousand reports of sexual abuse in the Church worldwide in 2019.
But what happens to paedophile priests awaiting trial?
Euronews reports on the Church's rehab centres and the controversies surrounding them.
video 2:05 Italian with English subtitles
Rome summit to examine clerical sex abuse
by Christopher Lamb
The Tablet
Hans Zollner, of the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, pictured here with Cardinal Farrell, at a child protection meeting last summer. Photo: CNS/courtesy Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life
Rome is to host a summit examining how the clerical sexual abuse crisis is forcing the Church to go back to its core mission and re-think its model of the priesthood.
The gathering of around 90 theologians from across the world, hosted by the Centre for Child Protection at the Pontifical Gregorian University, will look at the ecclesiological impact of abuse, in a way that is not simply legal, or procedural. The 11-14 March meeting is to look clericalism, ecclesial reform and rediscovering the mission of Jesus in Church structures.
At a theological level, the abuse of children by priests, and the failure by bishops to respond adequately, is doubly shocking because it betrays the Church’s mission. Historians talk about it being the greatest crisis since the Reformation and for organisers of the forthcoming summit, the response to abuse requires deep soul searching about what it means to be the Church.
Wow, after all these years they are actually starting to think about what should have been obvious from the beginning.
But Fr Hans Zollner, the centre's director and the Church’s leading child protection expert, said that while the abuse crisis has been under discussion in the Church for 35 years there has been “very little attempt to do systematic theology” on it.
The aim, he said, was to bring “theological expertise and creativity” alongside the legal, practical and psychological work that had been done. Fr Zollner, a theologian and psychologist who sits on the papal child protection commission, is organising the gathering with a fellow Jesuit, Fr James Keenan, the Canisius Professor of theology at Boston College and esteemed moral theologian.
People may say: "Why are you dealing with this in a theological way? You should follow the law properly. Why do you spiritualise it again?” Zollner told The Tablet. “The response is ‘no’, we are trying to bring this to the attention of our faith, and reflection of the faith, a faith that says, first of all, Jesus himself was a victim of violence, he identified with the most vulnerable.”
He added: “What does our faith in Jesus Christ tell us about how we should meet with survivors of abuse inside and outside the Church? How do we talk about forgiveness in the face of horrible crimes? How do we talk about healing?
“How do we understand the Church that has shown to be for centuries a beacon of protection and support and care of the most vulnerable but at the same time it has also been – as we have seen in the last decades – a place where people have been taken advantage of in a horrific way?”
Now that's a whitewashed historical perspective, if I ever saw one! Good grief!
The discussion points include “punishment and reconciliation”, bringing justice to victims, moving the priesthood away from clericalism to a ministry of service, “rediscovering Jesus in ecclesiology” and seeing the Church’s mission as helping to guide reform.
Now that would be something! Of the hundreds of Catholic stories I've posted here, the Name of Jesus, or God, is almost never mentioned. His condemnation of those who cause little ones who believe in Jesus to stumble, should strike terror into the hearts of pedophile priests and Bishops who enable them. That it doesn't is all the more condemnation.
Church observers have pointed out that the abuse crisis is hastening the end of a clericalist system that placed protection of the institution as paramount, where priesthood was idealised and leaders were unaccountable. Pope Francis has talked about the clerical abuse scandal “purifying” the Church with the abuse crisis seeing bishops resign, a cardinal put into jail and another removed from the priesthood.
It's not even scratching the surface! Repentance must go much, much deeper.
Senior bishops and Vatican leaders are expected to be in the spotlight once again when a report into ex-cardinal and ex-priest Theodore McCarrick is published in the coming weeks.
The link between theology and safeguarding was looked at by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Australia, one of the most probing state inquiries to have taken place. In their final report, the commission sharply criticised clericalism but added that the Church’s understanding that an “ontological change” takes place at priestly ordination aggravated the problem. The commission also called for an end to mandatory clerical celibacy.
I might almost believe in the ontological change if I thought that most priests actually meant their commitment to celibacy. The frequency with which priests abandon that commitment to God reveals that there really is no ontological change.
The summit, which comes just over a year after the Pope's landmark meeting to discuss the issue in the Vatican last February, will be a chance for theologians, rather than secular officials, to look at these questions, although they are likely to take a more nuanced view than the royal commission.
Theologians from North America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America will attend the event, including four delegates from Australia and Professor Paul Murray and Dr Marcus Pound from the University of Durham in the UK.
Sex scandal shocks Mexico: The Vatican must probe cover-up of child sexual abuse
Written By: WION
Vatican Photograph:( Reuters )
Vatican reform process has failed to address one key area -
punishing known historic abusers and those who covered for them
Ten years after the Vatican took it over, the Legion of Christ religious order is in crisis again. This religious order in Mexico founded in 1941 was once powerful influential. But it now faces an existential crisis.
Its founder, a Paedophile, is said to have sexually abused more than 60 boys. And this latest scandal will raise questions that the Vatican will have to answer.
A Mexican TV host has revealed that she was sexually abused when she was 8 at an elite Catholic school in Cancun. 36-year-old Ana Lucia Salazar is a mother of 3 children. She was sexually abused at an elite Catholic school.
Legion of Christ was once an influential religious order which was founded by Marcial Maciel in 1941. He passed away in 2008. The Legion of Christ was taken over by the Vatican in 2010.
The administrator of the school in Cancun, Mexico used to take girls out of class and send them to the chapel, where the priest from the Legion of Christ religious order would sexually abuse them.
Salazar's horrific story has been corroborated by other victims and the legion itself. The revelations have sparked a new credibility crisis for the once-influential order.
A recent investigation has revealed that sexual abuse of minors was rife, especially among superiors of the legionaries of the ultraconservative religious order. 175 minors were victims of abuse by 33 priests and 71 seminarians. Most victims were boys between 11 and 16.
For decades the Vatican dismissed accusations that Maciel had abused them sexually. The Vatican first acknowledged Maciel's crimes in 2006, when former Pope Benedict ordered him to retire to a life of 'prayer and penitence.'
But he resisted calls for the order to be dissolved because it was toxic to the core. The Vatican instead took over the order in 2010 and began a process of reform.
Even as a gathering in Rome begins to choose new leaders for the Legion of Christ, Ana Lucia Salazar's confession has shaken the order's foundations and reverberations of the scandal will hit the Vatican.
Salazar’s case is particularly grave since her parents went to the bishop to denounce the priest, Fernando Martínez Suárez. Martínez was one of nearly a dozen legion priests who were childhood victims of the founder and went onto molest other minors.
It's clear that the Vatican reform process has failed to address one key area - punishing known historic abusers and the people who covered for them.
Historic Christian Brothers sexual abuse case receives letter admitting repeated rape of WA man
By Eliza Borrello
PHOTO: John Lawrence was abused from the age of nine at the hands of the Christian Brothers. (ABC News)
In an open letter, delivered on the eve of a WA trial, the Christian Brothers have admitted several brothers sexually abused child migrant John Thomas Lawrence for years from the age of nine in two Perth boys' homes.
WARNING: This story contains material that some readers may find upsetting
But a lawyer for the organisation has argued he deserves a lower compensation payout than what his lawyers have sought because his poor upbringing meant he had a low earning capacity, regardless of the abuse.
The case is the first of its kind to go to trial since Western Australia removed a time limit restricting when child sexual abuse cases could be brought.
A similar case brought by a terminally ill man, Paul Bradshaw, was settled for $1 million before proceeding to trial in 2018.
PHOTO: Paul Bradshaw received a $1 million settlement after he was abused by the Christian Brothers. (ABC News: David Weber)
Mr Lawrence's trial was due to begin today, but his barrister, Tim Hammond, revealed the Christian Brothers had admitted "many facts" about the abuse at the Clontarf and Castledare orphanages in an open letter delivered on Monday night.
The facts Mr Hammond detailed included an incident at Castledare Boys' Home, which began when Mr Lawrence wet the bed.
Mr Hammond told the Perth District Court Mr Lawrence was nine at the time and his abuser, now deceased brother Lawrence Murphy, was in his mid-30s.
PHOTO: The Castledare Boys' Home was run by the Christian Brothers in Perth. (Wikimedia: Moondyne)
The court heard after Mr Lawrence wet the bed, Brother Murphy ordered him to take off his clothes.
Mr Hammond said Brother Murphy then raped him as Mr Lawrence cried and screamed. It was the first of six rapes Brother Murphy perpetrated against Mr Lawrence.
Molestation by multiple people
But Mr Hammond said the abuse was not contained to one offender. He said another brother, Francis Marques, who is also dead, molested Mr Lawrence while they watched movies.
In another case of abuse, a third now-deceased brother, Alonzo Angus, fondled his genitals.
In a fourth case, a lay teacher, Joey Jackson, who has also since died, made Mr Lawrence wear lipstick and a dress while he abused him.
Mr Hammond said Mr Lawrence, who is now 75, had attempted suicide many times throughout his life and struggled to hold down a job.
Losses estimated in the hundreds of thousands
Mr Lawrence's legal team estimated lost earnings to be worth between $715,000 and $850,000, with an estimated $48,000–$58,000 submitted regarding lost superannuation.
Bettina Mangan, the barrister representing the Christian Brothers, has indicated she would argue for a lower amount. Ms Mangan told the court Mr Lawrence would have had lower wage-earning capacity because of his poor upbringing, regardless of whether he was abused.
But were the Christian Brothers not responsible for that upbringing, and didn't they ensure he would never overcome that obstacle by sexually abusing him?
"It seems illogical and unfair," she conceded under questioning from Judge Mark Herron. "Brutal," he responded. "The court can't escape from the fact he didn't come from well-off, middle-class [parents]," Ms Mangan said.
A sum of $111,000 already paid to Mr Lawrence by the Christian Brothers for his abuse would be deducted from any compensation payment determined by the court.
The trial continues.
Diocese of Fall River, Mass, suspends 2 retired
Catholic priests over claims of child sex abuse
By Jackson Cote | jcote@masslive.com
Two retired Catholic priests were suspended from the ministry over allegations they sexually abused children decades ago, the Diocese of Fall River announced Sunday.
The suspended priests, James F. Buckley and Edward J. Byington, are not assigned to a parish but have assisted with masses at various churches since their retirements in the 2000s, the Diocese of Fall River said in a statement.
Byington has also taught German classes at St. Joseph’s School in West Warwick, Rhode Island. The Diocese of Providence was notified of Byington’s suspension, according to the Diocese of Fall River.
Diocese of La Crosse, Wis, releases list of
clergy accused of child sexual abuse
WAOW Staff
LA CROSSE, Wis. (WXOW) - The Diocese of La Crosse released a list of members of the clergy that have had credible allegations of child sexual abuse made against them.
The list contains 25 names. It is broken down into three sections: Diocesan clergy (18), Non-Diocesan clergy with a substantiated allegation in the Diocese of La Crosse (2), and Non-Diocesan clergy who spent time in the diocese and whose name appears on a list in another diocese or religious order (5).
Each person on the list had either a single or multiple allegations of abuse according to the diocese. Details on where the abuse occurred were not released.
In fact, it seems almost no details were released.
They defined an allegation as "deemed to be substantiated if it has been sufficiently confirmed so as to believe that abuse occurred. This determination follows a process of consultation and is not a legal judgment."
The diocese stated that none of the people listed are in public ministry.
In fact, fifteen of the eighteen listed in the Diocesan Clergy section have passed away.
One of the clergy on the list, Father Patrick Umberger, was arrested in 2010 on a charge of possession of child pornography. He died later that year.
The list is the end work of an external audit done by a Texas firm, Defenbaugh & Associates, Inc. The diocese said that they are a firm comprised of retired FBI agents.
Here is the list:
Diocesan Clergy:
Bruce Ball
Raymond Bornbach
Eugene Comiskey
Thomas Dempsey
James Ennis
James Finucan
John Thomas Finucan*
Tom Garthwaite
Richard Herrmann
William Hertzenberg
Thomas Langer
James E. Mason
Garland Muller
Charles Rasmussen
Albert Sonnberger
James Stauber
Patrick Umberger
Raymond J. Wagner
Non-Diocesan clergy with a substantiated allegation in the Diocese of La Crosse
Timothy Svea
Bogdan Werra
Non-Diocesan clergy who spent time in the diocese and whose name appears on a list in another diocese or religious order
Dennis Bouche
Daniel Budzynski
Orville Munie
Joseph Smetana
Francis Zimmerer
LA CROSSE, Wis. (WKBT)– A former Viterbo University president is among the clergy with a substantiated allegation of child sexual abuse. On Saturday, the Diocese of La Crosse released a list of clergy who had substantiated accusations of child sexual abuse against them.
The late J. Thomas Finucan (see photo above) was included with the names and pastoral information of 24 other priests and deacons. Finucan served as the university’s president from 1970 to 1980, according to a Viterbo University statement. He then became a member of the board of trustees.
Finucan was ordained on Dec. 17, 1955, according to the Diocese. He served in a variety of roles both inside and outside of the Diocese of La Crosse.
Pastoral Assignments, per the report:
Immaculate Conception, Fountain City
Viterbo University, La Crosse
Most Sacred Heart, Pine Creek
Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Richland Center
St. Stanislaus, Stevens Point
St. Mary (Immaculate Conception), Wausau – Newman High School
St. Lawrence, Wisconsin Rapids – Assumption High School
Outside Diocese of La Crosse – College Seminary Study
University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee
Archdiocese of St. Paul/Minneapolis, St. Paul, MN
St. Mary’s College of Minnesota, Winona, MN
He had one substantiated allegation. However, the diocese said not all accusations were included. Further, the report does not say when or where the conduct occurred.
The dark and secret shame of New Norcia,
WA’s child sex-abuse capital
In the Benedictine Community of New Norcia, one priest in fives was accused of sex abuse.
Michael Ramsey, The New Daily
A spiritual sanctuary for Benedictine monks and an enduring tourist attraction, New Norcia is also a town haunted by its past.
A two-hour drive north of Perth, the town of New Norcia – Australia’s only monastic town – has been run by Roman Catholic monks since its establishment in 1847.
Thousands visit each year drawn to its unique history, local produce and Spanish-influenced architecture amid the parched Wheatbelt terrain.
For others, it’s a place of trauma.
One in five Benedictine priests between 1950 and 2010
were alleged child abusers
For more than a century, the town hosted institutions – misleadingly labelled “orphanages” – for Aboriginal boys and girls, as well as boarding schools for white children.
They were overseen by the Benedictine Community of New Norcia, which was identified by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse as one of the nation’s worst historical child sex offenders.
The commission found one in five Benedictine priests between 1950 and 2010 were alleged child abusers – triple the national average for Catholic institutions.
Some survivors believe the present-day Benedictine Community has failed to sufficiently acknowledge the abuse that occurred in New Norcia.
Noongar woman Dallas Phillips says the abuse she suffered at the St Joseph’s girls’ institution caused lifelong damage.
“I felt isolated, alone and, at times, distraught,” Ms Phillips told AAP.
“I would cry at night because I wanted to be at home with my family. There was no love, no compassion from the nuns. They were hard, they were unforgiving.”
Data collected by the royal commission in 2017 showed the Benedictine Community reported 65 claims of child sexual abuse, resulting in a total payment of $869,000. The highest number of claims made against a single alleged perpetrator was 26.
“I’m so grateful to the royal commission because I finally got to tell my story, and otherwise I would have taken it to the grave,” Ms Phillips said.
Prior to being sent to New Norcia, Ms Phillips says she was abused by a priest in her nearby hometown of Goomalling.
Now 59 and a doting grandmother, she still struggles with her time at St Joseph’s where she was put to work and given only basic schooling.
“It’s followed me all my life,” she said. “I’ve had the most wonderful and happy times when my granddaughter was born but it was always in the back of my head.
“I thought I was being taken there to be educated, to make me a stronger person for the world. But that’s a load of bulls**t, because they did feast on kids like myself.”
Her sister, Lesley, who struggled with rheumatic fever as a child, also attended St Joseph’s. As an adult, Lesley “hit the drink” and rarely spoke about her experiences, dying at just 34.
At the New Norcia museum, a permanent exhibition paints a largely positive picture of life at St Joseph’s in the building that housed the girls until its closure in 1974.
Tucked towards the back, a poster acknowledges some of the girls having experienced “a material and human environment” in which unspecified “neglect and abuse” occurred.
The Abbot of New Norcia, Father John Herbert, declined to be interviewed but provided written responses to a series of questions.
He said the New Norcia Aboriginal Corporation had extensive input into the museum exhibition, as well as hosting an annual reunion and healing weekend which included an acknowledgement and apology from the Benedictine Community.
The stately exterior of New Norcia’s monastery concealed a multitude of sins. Photo: Google
He added that the community intended to establish a “Rock of Remembrance” memorial alongside the church abbey explicitly recognising the victims of child sexual abuse.
Western Australia has been slow to acknowledge elements of its history, particularly when it comes to the treatment of indigenous Australians.
Substantial efforts have only recently been made to recognise the grim past of the iconic Rottnest Island, where hundreds of Aboriginal men and boys from across WA died and thousands more were imprisoned in dire conditions.
Until its closure in mid-2018, one of the main prison buildings dating back to 1864 was still being used as holiday accommodation.
There have also been calls for more substantive recognition of the Pinjarra massacre south of Perth in 1834, which saw dozens of Noongar men, women and children slaughtered.
For survivors of abuse in New Norcia, plans for a public memorial are welcome but long overdue.
“I want something there to acknowledge it but it will never bring me comfort, because that place took my being a kid,” Ms Phillips said. “It damaged me for life.”
New Norcia (top) and Rottnest Island (just off Perth)
Michigan Attorney General charges two priests
from U.P. with child sexual abuse
Daily Press
LANSING — Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Friday criminal sexual conduct charges have been filed against two more priests by her department’s Clergy Abuse Investigation Team.
Multiple charges have been filed in three Upper Peninsula counties against Gary Allen Jacobs and Roy Joseph, both former priests associated with the Catholic Diocese of Marquette.
Gary Allen Jacobs, 74, of Albuquerque, N.M., is charged with multiple criminal sexual conduct counts, with incidents reportedly occurring between Jan. 1, 1981, and Dec. 31, 1984, in Ontonagon County and between March 1, 1984, and April 30, 1984, in Dickinson County.
Jacobs faces a total of seven charges in two separate cases in Ontonagon County. He’s being charged with six counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a child between the ages of 13 and 16 and one count of second-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a child between the ages of 13 and 16. In Dickinson County, Jacobs faces one count of second-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a person under 13 years old.
Jacobs faces up to life in prison and a lifetime of electronic monitoring for each of the first-degree criminal sexual conduct charges, and up to 15 years in prison for each second-degree criminal sexual conduct charge. He was arrested Friday, Jan. 17 in New Mexico and will face extradition to Michigan to face the charges.
Roy Joseph, 52, previously of Marquette, has been charged in Marquette County with one count of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. The incident reportedly occurred on or about Feb. 21, 2006, while Joseph served as a priest in Marquette County. The felony crime is punishable by up to life in prison and a lifetime of electronic monitoring. He currently resides in India.
“Our team continues to vigorously pursue this investigation to ensure justice for the victims who courageously come forward and identify their abusers,” said Nessel. “Our team of investigators are working day in and day out to hold these defendants accountable.”
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