Prosecutors investigating a sexual abuse case against a Houston-area priest searched the offices Wednesday of the local archdiocese, which is led by the cardinal who is heading the Roman Catholic Church’s response in the U.S. to sexual misconduct.
Bishops
Posted inFaith, Features
#ChurchToo: How can we prevent the abuse of women by the clergy?
Is the Catholic Church doing enough to prevent the abuse of women by clergy?
Posted inFaith, Short Take
How pastoral failures in communication are provoking a crisis of faith
The tragedy of the last week is that the faithful are left to read tea leaves to understand what their bishops and their pope are trying to do in the first place. The Vatican’s action, which in the past could have been interpreted and explained over time, instead provokes a crisis of faith in church leadership.
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Cardinal says he leaves U.S.C.C.B. assembly more hopeful than when it started
Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston said in remarks closing the assembly that his hope was primarily grounded in Christ as well as realizing that the body of bishops was on the road to implementing protocols to boost the accountability of bishops to laypeople and survivors of clergy sex abuse.
Posted inDispatches, Faith
No major action on sex abuse accountability at U.S. bishops’ meeting
At the request of the Vatican, the U.S. bishops postponed a vote on a set of proposals aimed at holding themselves accountable over sexual abuse.
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Psychologist addresses bishops on helping abuse victims to heal
It begins with listening, understanding, offering responses showing that they, the victim-survivors, are believed, she said.
Posted inFaith, News Analysis
U.S. bishops adopt new anti-racism letter, first in almost 40 years
The U.S. Catholic bishops voted to accept the first pastoral letter against racism in almost 40 years.
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Bishops’ abuse response must trump all other issues, advisory group says
A group that has been advising the U.S. bishops for 50 years on multiple issues chose to speak to the bishops in Baltimore Nov. 13 on just one issue: the clergy sexual abuse crisis itself and ways to move forward from it.
Posted inFaith, News
How the Great War gave us the U.S.C.C.B.
The “war to end all wars,” whose armistice took effect at 11 a.m. on Nov. 11, 1918, was a global conflagration that birthed the modern world — but it also gave birth to the national Catholic hierarchy charged with raising the place and the power of Catholics in America.
Posted inDispatches, Faith
Bishop McElroy: ‘Compromised’ bishops contributed to U.S. church’s sex abuse crisis
“This hypothesis—that the reality of personal sexual misconduct by bishops…was a factor which inclined some bishops not to vigorously pursue allegations of abuse among their clergy—I believe that this is a valid hypothesis.”