The disposition of 150 sexual abuse lawsuits against the Catholic Church in Pennsylvania depends on how the state court rules.
Sexual Abuse
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Pope Francis replaces Polish bishop after sex abuse and cover-up scandal
To show how seriously he is taking reports of sexual abuse in Poland, Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of the archbishop of Gdansk and has immediately selected a temporary administrator pending a permanent replacement.
Posted inExplainer, Faith
Explainer: What the church has done to fight clergy sex abuse since 2018’s ‘summer of shame’
It has been two years since the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report was published, documenting in disturbing detail at least 1,000 cases of abuse by 300 predator priests spanning seven decades.
Posted inFaith, News
Dioceses restrict David Haas hymns and concerts after abuse accusations
Mr. Haas has denied any wrongdoing, calling the accusations “false, reckless and offensive.”
Posted inFaith, News
Archdiocese of Philadelphia grants over $50 million in financial reparations to survivors of sexual abuse
As the Sept. 30, 2019, deadline for filing the forms approached, program administrators reported a surge in claims, which totaled 616 as of May 30 of this year. Of those, “the overwhelming majority” have been “meritorious.”
Posted inNews, Politics & Society
Spotlight needed on abuse in women’s orders, says Jesuit journal
Novices and women religious, especially those who have been assigned to a country where they don’t know the language, can be particularly vulnerable to abuses of power and conscience by superiors, and sexual abuse by their formators, said an article in “La Civilta Cattolica.”
Posted inFaith, Vatican Dispatch
Former Vatican ambassador to stand trial in Paris on charges of ‘sexual aggression’ against four men
Pope Francis instructed the Vatican to remove Archbishop Luigi Ventura’s diplomatic immunity in July 2019. The archbishop will now have to respond to his accusers at a trial in November.
Posted inFaith, News
New sex abuse accusation surfaces against former cardinal Theodore McCarrick
The suit alleges that at age 11, the boy began to be sexually abused in 1978 by a priest at a New Jersey parish and the abuse continued at the hands of another cleric at the Catholic high school he attended, and then with McCarrick in 1982.
Posted inFaith, Podcasts
Podcast: The Vatican released its handbook for handling sexual abuse. Here’s what you need to know.
In this special update episode of “Inside the Vatican,” host Colleen Dulle unpacks what’s new in the handbook and why it took a year and a half for the Vatican to develop this document.
Posted inFaith, Vatican Dispatch
Vatican publishes handbook for bishops and religious superiors to guide response to abuse allegations
The handbook contain the most up-to-date norms and practices that bishops and superiors of religious orders should follow.