Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Catholic appeal update (Boston)
BCI is on an lighter blogging schedule this week due to some other pressing commitments. Today we share with you some details on how the 2011 Catholic Appeal is doing.
As we mentioned in Fundraising Fiefdom earlier this month, aside from expansion of the fundraising fiefdom, the results of the Catholic Appeal 2011 recently communicated to parishes show they are running about the same as the Catholic Appeal of 2010 in dollar-amount of pledges at this time in the year. That means that unless something dramatically changes, the appeal is likely to raise substantially less than the Catholic Appeal of 2009 for the second year in a row, and with several thousand fewer donors giving than in previous years.
Full article at Boston Catholic Insider
In wake of sex abuse scandals, priests to host Latin Mass
When Fr. Shawn Ratigan was arrested on child pornography charges and it turned out the diocese knew he was trouble for some time including having received a letter from the parish school principal saying teachers and parents were suspicious he was a molester, some insiders responded by assuming they could make everything better by - saying a Latin High Mass. Really, you couldn't make this stuff up, it wouldn't be believeable.
Joshua McElwee on Jun. 21, 2011
full article at National Catholic Reporter
Joshua McElwee on Jun. 21, 2011
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- With many questioning the Kansas City-St. Joseph diocese over allegations of sexual misconduct by clergy, and subsequent inaction by diocesan officials, several priests here are planning something they hope will "promote unity" among the faithful: A special Latin-language "Solemn High Mass."
The Mass, to be held June 29 at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church here, is to be celebrated in the "Extraordinary Form," or according to the 1962 edition of the Roman Missal, which typically includes prayers in Latin and the priest facing towards the altar during the celebration.
News of the Mass comes as the Kansas City diocese has been rocked by three cases of allegations of sexual misconduct by clergy in recent weeks.
One priest was arrested on charges of possession of child pornography May 19, but the diocese had waited five months before taking evidence to the police. Another pastor was removed from ministry June 3 over allegations of sexual abuse of minors dating back to the 1970s and '80s. It came to light June 9 that a man had accused the diocesan vicar general of sexual misconduct four years ago over an incident that had occurred in 1984.
Acknowledging the "discord and disunity during this present darkness," organizers of the Mass write that they want to "promote unity, which is borne of a common history or tradition -- hence why we have opted for a Solemn High (Traditional) Mass."
Announcement of the Mass came via an e-mail letter from the diocesan worship office yesterday.
"How glorious will it be to see those of your fold theretofore unacquainted...kneeling next to one another in the pews!" exhorts the letter. "Amidst all the discord and disunity during this present darkness, let there be light!"
Organizers say EWTN may shoot footage of the Mass for broadcast, which will be offered for the intentions of Bishop Robert Finn and for "unity among his flock."
Fr. Shawn Ratigan, a local pastor whose computer was found to contain child pornography in December, was moved to a religious sisters’ community in January. He lived there for five months before his May 19 arrest.
The Mass, to be held June 29 at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church here, is to be celebrated in the "Extraordinary Form," or according to the 1962 edition of the Roman Missal, which typically includes prayers in Latin and the priest facing towards the altar during the celebration.
News of the Mass comes as the Kansas City diocese has been rocked by three cases of allegations of sexual misconduct by clergy in recent weeks.
One priest was arrested on charges of possession of child pornography May 19, but the diocese had waited five months before taking evidence to the police. Another pastor was removed from ministry June 3 over allegations of sexual abuse of minors dating back to the 1970s and '80s. It came to light June 9 that a man had accused the diocesan vicar general of sexual misconduct four years ago over an incident that had occurred in 1984.
Acknowledging the "discord and disunity during this present darkness," organizers of the Mass write that they want to "promote unity, which is borne of a common history or tradition -- hence why we have opted for a Solemn High (Traditional) Mass."
Announcement of the Mass came via an e-mail letter from the diocesan worship office yesterday.
"How glorious will it be to see those of your fold theretofore unacquainted...kneeling next to one another in the pews!" exhorts the letter. "Amidst all the discord and disunity during this present darkness, let there be light!"
Organizers say EWTN may shoot footage of the Mass for broadcast, which will be offered for the intentions of Bishop Robert Finn and for "unity among his flock."
Fr. Shawn Ratigan, a local pastor whose computer was found to contain child pornography in December, was moved to a religious sisters’ community in January. He lived there for five months before his May 19 arrest.
full article at National Catholic Reporter
Commonwealth's answer to Pretrial Motions
The Philadelphia prosecutors in the case against Msg. Lynn, a top diocesan official charged with criminal conspiracy in endangering children wanted to block the testimony of Cardinal Bevilaqua given previously on the grounds that the Cardinal is now ill and senile. The court denied this motion and some of the Cardinal's testimony was released publicly. Below is part of the argument of the State of Pennsylvania to release this testimony, essentially stating that the Archdiocese of Philadelphia acted like a criminal organization.
In the present case, when the crimes often involve agreeing to do nothing when action is called for to protect children - and when the co-conspirators worked for an organization that was systematically covering up evidence and producing documents using obscure language so that their true meaning could not be ascertained - the task is especially complex. The Commonwealth cannot point to merely a few pages in notes of testimony, or a handful of documents, to prove that the actions of Lynn and the priests in this case were part of a decades-long conspiracy that endangered children.
To understand Lynn's interactions with Avery and Brennan, a fact finder needs to look at the files of dozens of other priests whom Lynn supervised. What might look like an innocuous transfer, an accidental omission, or a mistake in judgment in a single case can only be understood as intentional when it is repeated over and over in the handling of other abusers in the priesthood.
The fact finder cannot fully comprehend the deliberate deception that Lynn and others employed to help sexual predators remain in assignments with access to children without reading the entire testimony of Archdiocese officials - including Lynn, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, Bishop Edward Cullen, and Bishop Joseph Cistone, - as they tried to explain their handling of known and admitted rapists and serial molesters. (Notes of their testimony before Grand Juries XVIII and XIX are included in this response as Appendices G, H, I, and J, and have been made available to defendants.) (Note 4: Notes of testimony cited in this response are included in Appendix F. They have been made available to defendants.) These are not witnesses who told the grand juries openly and honestly what they did and what they knew. There are no discreet passages in which they describe their common understanding that, rather than expose pedophiles or report them to police, they would instead choose to put parish children at risk. Their methods are revealed only in thousands of pages of documentary evidence - and in the church officials' dissembling, inconsistent, blameshifting, and evasive answers over numerous days of testimony.
Three grand juries spent over four years amassing the evidence that establishes the conspiracy between Lynn and the abusive priests he supervised. Judge Hughes reasonably found that repeating the evidence heard by the Grand Jury at a preliminary hearing, and then again at trial, would entail an enormous and unnecessary drain on judicial resources. Given that Judge Hughes's rulings have already established the law of the case, there is no reason for this Court to review all of the evidence of conspiracy. If it chooses to do so, however, the 2005 Grand Jury report and the presentment for this case detail the evidence that the Commonwealth relies on to support the charges. (Note 5: Attached to this memorandum are some of the documents from the Archdiocese's files on Avery and Brennan, which have been turned over to defense counsel (Appendix E). The 2005 Grand Jury report describes hundreds of similar documents for over a dozen priests who had similar interactions with Lynn.) [pp. 14-16]
The full testimony has been put online by the Philadelphia Inquirer
In the present case, when the crimes often involve agreeing to do nothing when action is called for to protect children - and when the co-conspirators worked for an organization that was systematically covering up evidence and producing documents using obscure language so that their true meaning could not be ascertained - the task is especially complex. The Commonwealth cannot point to merely a few pages in notes of testimony, or a handful of documents, to prove that the actions of Lynn and the priests in this case were part of a decades-long conspiracy that endangered children.
To understand Lynn's interactions with Avery and Brennan, a fact finder needs to look at the files of dozens of other priests whom Lynn supervised. What might look like an innocuous transfer, an accidental omission, or a mistake in judgment in a single case can only be understood as intentional when it is repeated over and over in the handling of other abusers in the priesthood.
The fact finder cannot fully comprehend the deliberate deception that Lynn and others employed to help sexual predators remain in assignments with access to children without reading the entire testimony of Archdiocese officials - including Lynn, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, Bishop Edward Cullen, and Bishop Joseph Cistone, - as they tried to explain their handling of known and admitted rapists and serial molesters. (Notes of their testimony before Grand Juries XVIII and XIX are included in this response as Appendices G, H, I, and J, and have been made available to defendants.) (Note 4: Notes of testimony cited in this response are included in Appendix F. They have been made available to defendants.) These are not witnesses who told the grand juries openly and honestly what they did and what they knew. There are no discreet passages in which they describe their common understanding that, rather than expose pedophiles or report them to police, they would instead choose to put parish children at risk. Their methods are revealed only in thousands of pages of documentary evidence - and in the church officials' dissembling, inconsistent, blameshifting, and evasive answers over numerous days of testimony.
Three grand juries spent over four years amassing the evidence that establishes the conspiracy between Lynn and the abusive priests he supervised. Judge Hughes reasonably found that repeating the evidence heard by the Grand Jury at a preliminary hearing, and then again at trial, would entail an enormous and unnecessary drain on judicial resources. Given that Judge Hughes's rulings have already established the law of the case, there is no reason for this Court to review all of the evidence of conspiracy. If it chooses to do so, however, the 2005 Grand Jury report and the presentment for this case detail the evidence that the Commonwealth relies on to support the charges. (Note 5: Attached to this memorandum are some of the documents from the Archdiocese's files on Avery and Brennan, which have been turned over to defense counsel (Appendix E). The 2005 Grand Jury report describes hundreds of similar documents for over a dozen priests who had similar interactions with Lynn.) [pp. 14-16]
The full testimony has been put online by the Philadelphia Inquirer
Arrest Bishop John Magee for Cloyne coverup
editorial from Irish Central
Aug. 24, 2011
The spectacle of Bishop John Magee abjectly apologizing this week for his utter failure to curb pedophile priests in his Cork diocese makes the blood run cold.
Magee bolted out of the country when the Cloyne report was made public. It was a devastating document, detailing in great precision the horrific cover-up.
Magee has now admitted his actions, which came after the flood of sexual abuse stories had been made public in Ireland.
In other words, Magee is culpable for placing children in harm’s way, and he has now admitted this. The next step should be to arrest the bishop.
If he was a school principal who knowingly ignored sexual abuse of pupils he undoubtedly would be apprehended.
If he was head of a brothel which knowingly trafficked in underage children he would be arrested. If he was head of a sect of child abusers and knowingly covered up their activities he would be put away.
The clerical collar should be no reason not to do the right thing.
........
What else do we need to know about him?
It is also the case that every other priest and bishop in Ireland are being tarred by the refusal to cast out this evil among them.
If the church is ever to regain its reputation it must act to differentiate between those bishops and priests who do their best to act on their holy orders, and a runaway bishop who was openly condoning pedophile priests in his district.
Magee, no doubt, has powerful friends in the Vatican where he was secretary to three popes, but given the Vatican’s attempts to dictate even to Irish bishops who wanted to expose the sex abuse cases, that should not be enough to prevent prosecution.
Magee should be made an example of in a disgraceful episode that has scarred countless lives.
Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Enda Kenny has referred to the “sacred space” of childhood and the need to protect children.
What greater message could Irish authorities send than to arrest Magee as a child sex enabler, which he clearly was?
Full article at Irish Central
Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald founded order
Huffington Post (April 1, 2010) -- The story of the Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald, a pioneering priest whose name surfaced this week as one of the first clergymen to repeatedly warn the Vatican about pedophile priests, started off as heroically as a Bing Crosby movie.
The Boston-born Fitzgerald drove from Massachusetts to a deserted, picturesque canyon in New Mexico where he founded the Roman Catholic Church's first order for wayward priests in 1947, three years after Crosby starred as a young, idealistic priest in "Going My Way."
But in the end, things did not go the way Fitzgerald had planned for his Jemez Springs order, called the Servants of the Paraclete. He had envisioned a place for the healing and renewal of priests with alcohol problems and other emotional issues easily identifiable in the 1940s. He never expected that many of the priests who would come to his new retreat would be pedophiles.
Courtesy of Valles Caldera Trust / AP
The Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald headed the Servants of the Paraclete, which housed wayward priests. The Jemez Springs, N.M., facility is now used as a science and education center.
In an especially ironic twist, Fitzgerald's prescient warnings about pedophile priests came true in what happened to his own order after he was forced out in a power struggle around 1965. The battle revolved in part around his belief that pedophile priests were incurable. He suggested they be housed on an island for treatment.
Fitzgerald wrote a follow-up letter to Pope Paul VI in 1963 after he went to Rome to warn the pontiff that pedophile priests were dangerous and should be removed from the ministry.
The letter is among documentation used in litigation by lawyers for California clergy abuse victims. It has been analyzed this week as questions surrounding how much the Vatican knew about child sex abuse and how much it may have helped cover it up increase.
The Paracletes eventually became known as "Club Ped," or as one lawyer termed it, "a dumping ground for toxic ecclesiastical waste."
........
Fitzgerald, who died in 1969, never expected to deal with the serious issues presented by the pedophile priests who began arriving at the Jemez Springs order in the late 1940s, said the Rev. Liam Hoare, vicar general of the Servants of the Paraclete. He runs what is left of the order in the United States, a small retreat for troubled priests in Dittmer, Mo.
"They came on Greyhound buses, by trains, often sent by bishops who never told the Paracletes what their real problems were," Hoare said in a telephone interview with AOL News. "Back in the '40s nobody talked about this. You can't look at it through 2010 lenses."
Fitzgerald became so alarmed by the gravity of pedophiliac priests' disorders that he wrote letters for years to U.S. bishops and met with Pope Paul VI in Rome warning that such priests were "devils" and should be defrocked.
"These men, Your Excellency, are devils and the wrath of God is upon them and if I were a bishop I would tremble when I failed to report them to Rome for involuntary layization," Fitzgerald wrote in a 1957 letter to an unnamed archbishop.
Nor did he want them at his retreat, Hoare said. Fitzgerald even tried to buy a Caribbean island where they could be treated in isolation without fear they could harm children.
"It is for this class of rattlesnake I have always wished the island retreat -- but even an island is too good for these vipers of whom the Gentle Master said it were better they had not been born -- this is an indirect way of saying damned, is it not?" Fitzgerald wrote in the same letter.
.....................
The Boston-born Fitzgerald drove from Massachusetts to a deserted, picturesque canyon in New Mexico where he founded the Roman Catholic Church's first order for wayward priests in 1947, three years after Crosby starred as a young, idealistic priest in "Going My Way."
But in the end, things did not go the way Fitzgerald had planned for his Jemez Springs order, called the Servants of the Paraclete. He had envisioned a place for the healing and renewal of priests with alcohol problems and other emotional issues easily identifiable in the 1940s. He never expected that many of the priests who would come to his new retreat would be pedophiles.
Courtesy of Valles Caldera Trust / AP
The Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald headed the Servants of the Paraclete, which housed wayward priests. The Jemez Springs, N.M., facility is now used as a science and education center.
In an especially ironic twist, Fitzgerald's prescient warnings about pedophile priests came true in what happened to his own order after he was forced out in a power struggle around 1965. The battle revolved in part around his belief that pedophile priests were incurable. He suggested they be housed on an island for treatment.
Fitzgerald wrote a follow-up letter to Pope Paul VI in 1963 after he went to Rome to warn the pontiff that pedophile priests were dangerous and should be removed from the ministry.
The letter is among documentation used in litigation by lawyers for California clergy abuse victims. It has been analyzed this week as questions surrounding how much the Vatican knew about child sex abuse and how much it may have helped cover it up increase.
The Paracletes eventually became known as "Club Ped," or as one lawyer termed it, "a dumping ground for toxic ecclesiastical waste."
........
Fitzgerald, who died in 1969, never expected to deal with the serious issues presented by the pedophile priests who began arriving at the Jemez Springs order in the late 1940s, said the Rev. Liam Hoare, vicar general of the Servants of the Paraclete. He runs what is left of the order in the United States, a small retreat for troubled priests in Dittmer, Mo.
"They came on Greyhound buses, by trains, often sent by bishops who never told the Paracletes what their real problems were," Hoare said in a telephone interview with AOL News. "Back in the '40s nobody talked about this. You can't look at it through 2010 lenses."
Fitzgerald became so alarmed by the gravity of pedophiliac priests' disorders that he wrote letters for years to U.S. bishops and met with Pope Paul VI in Rome warning that such priests were "devils" and should be defrocked.
"These men, Your Excellency, are devils and the wrath of God is upon them and if I were a bishop I would tremble when I failed to report them to Rome for involuntary layization," Fitzgerald wrote in a 1957 letter to an unnamed archbishop.
Nor did he want them at his retreat, Hoare said. Fitzgerald even tried to buy a Caribbean island where they could be treated in isolation without fear they could harm children.
"It is for this class of rattlesnake I have always wished the island retreat -- but even an island is too good for these vipers of whom the Gentle Master said it were better they had not been born -- this is an indirect way of saying damned, is it not?" Fitzgerald wrote in the same letter.
.....................
Feedback on new translation positive
REPORT: FEEDBACK ON NEW TRANSLATION IS POSITIVE
Elegance, Dignity, Cadence Called a Great Improvement
From the world as seen from Rome:
LONDON, AUG. 30, 2011 (Zenit.org).- In countries where parts of the new English translation of the Roman Missal are already in use, the feedback has been very positive.
This is the report from Monsignor Andrew Wadsworth, executive director of the Secretariat of the International Commission on English in the Liturgy (ICEL), in a podcast from the Catholic Communications Network of England and Wales.
The new translation of the Order of Mass is already in use in South Africa, New Zealand and Australia. Other places, such as England and Wales, have already begun using the new musical arrangements.
Full implementation of the translation has generally been set for the first Sunday of Advent.
"There has been a lot of feedback from the countries that are already using elements of the translation," Monsignor Wadsworth said. "Generally the feedback has been very positive. People find the elegance of the language, its dignity, the sort of cadence of the language -- which particularly lends itself to the sung parts of the liturgy -- they find all of that to be a great improvement."
The monsignor explained that the altar edition of the new missal "has the largest amount of music of any missal the Church has ever produced in any language." This music is Gregorian chant, which "takes us back to the Church of the first millennium and the earliest centuries. That's the music which is in the Latin Missal, of which our English Missal is a translation," he explained.
Unpacking
Monsignor Wadsworth highlighted that the vocabulary of the new translation will require and give opportunity for catechesis, with terms that "need unpacking."
This implies a "catechetical process," he observed. But one of the great opportunities of the new translation, the priest suggested, is the opportunity for "more delving into the riches of the liturgy."
"It's right that we prepare for this by catechesis," Monsignor Wadsworth said, "and it's right that we revisit things that are perhaps very familiar to us to try to deepen our knowledge and understanding of them."
Elegance, Dignity, Cadence Called a Great Improvement
From the world as seen from Rome:
LONDON, AUG. 30, 2011 (Zenit.org).- In countries where parts of the new English translation of the Roman Missal are already in use, the feedback has been very positive.
This is the report from Monsignor Andrew Wadsworth, executive director of the Secretariat of the International Commission on English in the Liturgy (ICEL), in a podcast from the Catholic Communications Network of England and Wales.
The new translation of the Order of Mass is already in use in South Africa, New Zealand and Australia. Other places, such as England and Wales, have already begun using the new musical arrangements.
Full implementation of the translation has generally been set for the first Sunday of Advent.
"There has been a lot of feedback from the countries that are already using elements of the translation," Monsignor Wadsworth said. "Generally the feedback has been very positive. People find the elegance of the language, its dignity, the sort of cadence of the language -- which particularly lends itself to the sung parts of the liturgy -- they find all of that to be a great improvement."
The monsignor explained that the altar edition of the new missal "has the largest amount of music of any missal the Church has ever produced in any language." This music is Gregorian chant, which "takes us back to the Church of the first millennium and the earliest centuries. That's the music which is in the Latin Missal, of which our English Missal is a translation," he explained.
Unpacking
Monsignor Wadsworth highlighted that the vocabulary of the new translation will require and give opportunity for catechesis, with terms that "need unpacking."
This implies a "catechetical process," he observed. But one of the great opportunities of the new translation, the priest suggested, is the opportunity for "more delving into the riches of the liturgy."
"It's right that we prepare for this by catechesis," Monsignor Wadsworth said, "and it's right that we revisit things that are perhaps very familiar to us to try to deepen our knowledge and understanding of them."
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Open clergy rebellion in Austria
By Michael Frank
SUDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG/Worldcrunch
Aug. 26, 2011
VIENNA - There is open rebellion among the clergy of Austria’s Catholic Church. One highly placed man of the cloth has even warned about the risk of a coming schism, as significant numbers of priests are refusing obedience to the Pope and bishops for the first time in memory.
The 300-plus supporters of the “Priests’ Initiative” have had enough of what they call the Church’s “delaying” tactics, and they are advocating pushing ahead with policies that openly defy current practices. These include letting non-ordained people lead religious services and deliver sermons; making communion available to divorced people who have remarried; allowing women to become priests and to take on important positions in the hierarchy; and letting priests carry out pastoral functions even if, in defiance of Church rules, they have a wife and family.
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Vienna’s Archbishop and head of the Austrian Bishops’ Conference, has threatened the rebels with excommunication. Those involved in the initiative are not, incidentally, only low-profile members of the clergy. Indeed, it is being led by Helmut Schüller -- who was for many years Vicar General of the Archdiocese of Vienna and director of Caritas -- and the cathedral pastor in the Carinthian diocese of Gurk.
The issues that supporters of the initiative want addressed may be revolutionary, but they are by no means new: they constitute basic questions that have been around for a long time but have never been addressed by Church officials.
Initiative supporters are demanding that parishes openly expose all things forbidden by the Church hierarchy, thus putting a stop to hypocrisy and allowing authenticity of belief and community life to emerge. The appeal for “more honesty“ made to the world’s youth by Pope Benedict XVI in Madrid last week left a sour taste in many mouths in Austria, where some say that honesty is a quality the Church hierarchy has more of a tendency to punish than reward.
Open pressure and disobedience
Particularly affected are some 700 members of an association called "Priester ohne Amt" – loosely, priests without a job – who have a wife and children that they stand by, but wish in vain to practice their ministry. Priests who break ties with loved ones, on the other hand, are allowed to continue working.
According to initiative founder Schüller, only openly disobedient priests and joint pressure from priests and laity alike can force the hierarchy to budge. Although the problems have been out there for decades, he says, the Church keeps putting off doing anything about them. Cardinal Schönborn stated that the critics would have to “give some thought to their path in the Church” or face unavoidable consequences. On the other hand, Anton Zulehner, a priest who is one of the most respected pastoral theologians in Austria, believes that this time the Church is not going to get away with diversionary tactics.
Twenty years ago, Austria, nominally at least, was 85% Catholic. Today, in the city of Vienna, Catholics account for less than half the population, and rural parishes are melting away. Various scandals have rocked the Church in Austria, among them child abuse charges against former Vienna Archbishop Hans-Hermann Groer, and the nomination of a series of reactionary priests to the rank of bishop.
SUDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG/Worldcrunch
Aug. 26, 2011
VIENNA - There is open rebellion among the clergy of Austria’s Catholic Church. One highly placed man of the cloth has even warned about the risk of a coming schism, as significant numbers of priests are refusing obedience to the Pope and bishops for the first time in memory.
The 300-plus supporters of the “Priests’ Initiative” have had enough of what they call the Church’s “delaying” tactics, and they are advocating pushing ahead with policies that openly defy current practices. These include letting non-ordained people lead religious services and deliver sermons; making communion available to divorced people who have remarried; allowing women to become priests and to take on important positions in the hierarchy; and letting priests carry out pastoral functions even if, in defiance of Church rules, they have a wife and family.
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Vienna’s Archbishop and head of the Austrian Bishops’ Conference, has threatened the rebels with excommunication. Those involved in the initiative are not, incidentally, only low-profile members of the clergy. Indeed, it is being led by Helmut Schüller -- who was for many years Vicar General of the Archdiocese of Vienna and director of Caritas -- and the cathedral pastor in the Carinthian diocese of Gurk.
The issues that supporters of the initiative want addressed may be revolutionary, but they are by no means new: they constitute basic questions that have been around for a long time but have never been addressed by Church officials.
Initiative supporters are demanding that parishes openly expose all things forbidden by the Church hierarchy, thus putting a stop to hypocrisy and allowing authenticity of belief and community life to emerge. The appeal for “more honesty“ made to the world’s youth by Pope Benedict XVI in Madrid last week left a sour taste in many mouths in Austria, where some say that honesty is a quality the Church hierarchy has more of a tendency to punish than reward.
Open pressure and disobedience
Particularly affected are some 700 members of an association called "Priester ohne Amt" – loosely, priests without a job – who have a wife and children that they stand by, but wish in vain to practice their ministry. Priests who break ties with loved ones, on the other hand, are allowed to continue working.
According to initiative founder Schüller, only openly disobedient priests and joint pressure from priests and laity alike can force the hierarchy to budge. Although the problems have been out there for decades, he says, the Church keeps putting off doing anything about them. Cardinal Schönborn stated that the critics would have to “give some thought to their path in the Church” or face unavoidable consequences. On the other hand, Anton Zulehner, a priest who is one of the most respected pastoral theologians in Austria, believes that this time the Church is not going to get away with diversionary tactics.
Twenty years ago, Austria, nominally at least, was 85% Catholic. Today, in the city of Vienna, Catholics account for less than half the population, and rural parishes are melting away. Various scandals have rocked the Church in Austria, among them child abuse charges against former Vienna Archbishop Hans-Hermann Groer, and the nomination of a series of reactionary priests to the rank of bishop.
Monday, August 29, 2011
Kansas City pastor homily on clarifying thought
by Thomas C. Fox on Jun. 07, 2011 NCR Today
The pastor of Holy Family parish in the Kansas City - St. Joseph diocese, Fr. Matthew Brumleve, spoke the following words last Sunday, Ascension Sunday, about Jim McConnell, a member of his parish who stepped away from the permanent diaconate program, saying he could not kneel before Bishop Robert Finn and offer his unqualified obedience. This is an excerpt from his homily:
Another way ... to clarify one’s thinking on what is valuable and
important in life – is to make a difficult decision – as Jim McConnell had to
do within the last week. Jim and his wife Cindy prayed about and struggled
with his ordination to the diaconate – in light of all that has come out about
what Bishop Finn did, and failed to do, in the recent sexual abuse case
concerning Father Shawn Ratigan.
Jim decided that he could not just go through the motions of the ordination rite in which he would have to kneel before the Bishop and promise to respect and obey a person he no longer had respect for. And I say better that this faith community has lost a deacon than to just have one more person lose their integrity. Someone better than I once said that evil exists in the world because good people stand idly by and say and do nothing. So I say to Jim, and
I hope it is with the backing of this community, thanks, Jim, for leading the way in not standing idly by. Jim from the very beginning, and Cindy, almost from the very beginning, have been members of Holy Family. And so it is with a bit of pride that I hope in some small way it is due to the fact that Sunday after Sunday they were nurtured and formed by the Word of God in this place and were constantly being comforted and challenged by us – and this is what
gave Jim the strength and conviction to do what he did. So standing among the poor, losing someone you love, and making a tough decision are all ways that we can tell if we stand for the things Jesus stood for: compassion, understanding, integrity, acceptance, forgiveness and mercy.
Every day, each of us has to be able to say and do the things that allow us to sleep peacefully at night. In preaching this homily, I will sleep peacefully tonight. In standing against the exploitation and harm of children, Jim will sleep peacefully tonight. I hope that all of us can have a peaceful sleep tonight because we have been effective witnesses of the risen and ascended Christ this day. That today, in large and small ways, we have stood for the things Jesus challenges and expects us to stand for. AMEN!
The pastor of Holy Family parish in the Kansas City - St. Joseph diocese, Fr. Matthew Brumleve, spoke the following words last Sunday, Ascension Sunday, about Jim McConnell, a member of his parish who stepped away from the permanent diaconate program, saying he could not kneel before Bishop Robert Finn and offer his unqualified obedience. This is an excerpt from his homily:
Another way ... to clarify one’s thinking on what is valuable and
important in life – is to make a difficult decision – as Jim McConnell had to
do within the last week. Jim and his wife Cindy prayed about and struggled
with his ordination to the diaconate – in light of all that has come out about
what Bishop Finn did, and failed to do, in the recent sexual abuse case
concerning Father Shawn Ratigan.
Jim decided that he could not just go through the motions of the ordination rite in which he would have to kneel before the Bishop and promise to respect and obey a person he no longer had respect for. And I say better that this faith community has lost a deacon than to just have one more person lose their integrity. Someone better than I once said that evil exists in the world because good people stand idly by and say and do nothing. So I say to Jim, and
I hope it is with the backing of this community, thanks, Jim, for leading the way in not standing idly by. Jim from the very beginning, and Cindy, almost from the very beginning, have been members of Holy Family. And so it is with a bit of pride that I hope in some small way it is due to the fact that Sunday after Sunday they were nurtured and formed by the Word of God in this place and were constantly being comforted and challenged by us – and this is what
gave Jim the strength and conviction to do what he did. So standing among the poor, losing someone you love, and making a tough decision are all ways that we can tell if we stand for the things Jesus stood for: compassion, understanding, integrity, acceptance, forgiveness and mercy.
Every day, each of us has to be able to say and do the things that allow us to sleep peacefully at night. In preaching this homily, I will sleep peacefully tonight. In standing against the exploitation and harm of children, Jim will sleep peacefully tonight. I hope that all of us can have a peaceful sleep tonight because we have been effective witnesses of the risen and ascended Christ this day. That today, in large and small ways, we have stood for the things Jesus challenges and expects us to stand for. AMEN!
Vatican pressures theology journal
Now Rome is racheting up its attack on Catholic theologians by attacking the most basic standards of intellectual life - peer review (not to mention independence)
Aug. 29, 2011
In a move some theologians say undermines the credibility of the leading English-language Catholic theological journal, the Vatican has pressured it to publish a scholarly essay on marriage, unedited and without undergoing normal peer review.
The essay, which appeared in the June 2011 issue of the quarterly Theological Studies, published in Milwaukee under the auspices of the Jesuits, upholds the indissolubility of marriage. It was a reply to a September 2004 article in which two theologians argued for a change in church teachings on divorce and remarriage.
The Vatican has been pressuring the editors at Theological Studies since not long after the publication of the 2004 essay, according to theologians not connected to the journal or to the Jesuit order. The Vatican aim is to weed out dissenting voices and force the journal to stick more closely to official church teachings.
The theological sources, who asked not to be identified lest they come under pressure from the Vatican, say the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith pressured policy changes at Theological Studies. The journal’s editor in chief, Fr. David G. Schultenover, announced the changes, following the words “A clarification” printed in bold letters in his editor’s column in the December 2010 issue.
He then wrote for his subscribers, mostly Catholic theologians who carefully read each issue for scholarly purposes, an explanation for some editorial policy shifts in the journal. Schultenover began by making a reference to a controversial essay published in the journal’s September 2006 issue. That essay, sources have told NCR, further raised tension levels between the Vatican and Theological Studies’ editors.
Wrote Schultenover: “Even with the best professional protocols and sincerest intentions to offer a journal of service to the church, an article might appear in our pages that some judge could mislead some readers. This seems to have been the case with ‘Catholic Sexual Ethics: Complementarity and the Truly Human,’ by Todd Salzman and Michael Lawler (September 2006). Some readers might have formed an opinion that because this article appeared in our pages, the journal favors and even promotes its thesis, one that does not in all aspects conform to current, authoritative church teaching. For all such readers, I wish to clarify that this article, insofar as it does not adhere to the church’s authoritative teaching, does not represent the views of the editors and sponsors of Theological Studies. While the journal, heeding the mandates of recent popes to do theology ‘on the frontiers,’ promotes professional theology for professional theologians, it does not promote theses that contravene official church teaching, even if -- though very rarely -- such theses find a place in our pages. If and when they do, our policy will be to alert readers and clearly state the current authoritative church teaching on the particular issue treated.”
.........
“It’s a terrible precedent,” Coriden said, referring both to the publication of the “as is” article and the new editorial policy that singles out theology not in keeping with official church teachings. Coriden is the recipient of the 2011 Catholic Theological Society of America’s John Courtney Murray Award, the highest honor bestowed by the society to a theologian.
John Thiel, president of the Catholic Theological Society of America, said he regrets the Vatican interventions, calling them “misguided” on several fronts.
“First, it wrongly assumes that the journal’s readership of professional theologians is incapable of making its own professional judgments about theological positions. Second, it seems to conflate theology and doctrine, wrongly thinking that theology’s task is the repetition of doctrine. Theology’s long history of playing a role in the process of doctrinal development shows this not to be true. Third, the publication of an article by a fiat in violation of the editorial process calls into question the integrity of the article so published, placing its authors in an unfortunate position.”
Fr. Charles Curran, professor of theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said the Vatican action “is the most serious attack possible on U.S. Catholic theology because Theological Studies is our most prestigious scholarly journal.”
...........
Full article at National Catholic Reporter
Aug. 29, 2011
In a move some theologians say undermines the credibility of the leading English-language Catholic theological journal, the Vatican has pressured it to publish a scholarly essay on marriage, unedited and without undergoing normal peer review.
The essay, which appeared in the June 2011 issue of the quarterly Theological Studies, published in Milwaukee under the auspices of the Jesuits, upholds the indissolubility of marriage. It was a reply to a September 2004 article in which two theologians argued for a change in church teachings on divorce and remarriage.
The Vatican has been pressuring the editors at Theological Studies since not long after the publication of the 2004 essay, according to theologians not connected to the journal or to the Jesuit order. The Vatican aim is to weed out dissenting voices and force the journal to stick more closely to official church teachings.
The theological sources, who asked not to be identified lest they come under pressure from the Vatican, say the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith pressured policy changes at Theological Studies. The journal’s editor in chief, Fr. David G. Schultenover, announced the changes, following the words “A clarification” printed in bold letters in his editor’s column in the December 2010 issue.
He then wrote for his subscribers, mostly Catholic theologians who carefully read each issue for scholarly purposes, an explanation for some editorial policy shifts in the journal. Schultenover began by making a reference to a controversial essay published in the journal’s September 2006 issue. That essay, sources have told NCR, further raised tension levels between the Vatican and Theological Studies’ editors.
Wrote Schultenover: “Even with the best professional protocols and sincerest intentions to offer a journal of service to the church, an article might appear in our pages that some judge could mislead some readers. This seems to have been the case with ‘Catholic Sexual Ethics: Complementarity and the Truly Human,’ by Todd Salzman and Michael Lawler (September 2006). Some readers might have formed an opinion that because this article appeared in our pages, the journal favors and even promotes its thesis, one that does not in all aspects conform to current, authoritative church teaching. For all such readers, I wish to clarify that this article, insofar as it does not adhere to the church’s authoritative teaching, does not represent the views of the editors and sponsors of Theological Studies. While the journal, heeding the mandates of recent popes to do theology ‘on the frontiers,’ promotes professional theology for professional theologians, it does not promote theses that contravene official church teaching, even if -- though very rarely -- such theses find a place in our pages. If and when they do, our policy will be to alert readers and clearly state the current authoritative church teaching on the particular issue treated.”
.........
“It’s a terrible precedent,” Coriden said, referring both to the publication of the “as is” article and the new editorial policy that singles out theology not in keeping with official church teachings. Coriden is the recipient of the 2011 Catholic Theological Society of America’s John Courtney Murray Award, the highest honor bestowed by the society to a theologian.
John Thiel, president of the Catholic Theological Society of America, said he regrets the Vatican interventions, calling them “misguided” on several fronts.
“First, it wrongly assumes that the journal’s readership of professional theologians is incapable of making its own professional judgments about theological positions. Second, it seems to conflate theology and doctrine, wrongly thinking that theology’s task is the repetition of doctrine. Theology’s long history of playing a role in the process of doctrinal development shows this not to be true. Third, the publication of an article by a fiat in violation of the editorial process calls into question the integrity of the article so published, placing its authors in an unfortunate position.”
Fr. Charles Curran, professor of theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said the Vatican action “is the most serious attack possible on U.S. Catholic theology because Theological Studies is our most prestigious scholarly journal.”
...........
Full article at National Catholic Reporter
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Bishop Finn ties vote to salvation
From a Nov. 2008 radio program in Kansas City:
Stigall: "There are Catholics listening to me right now who are thinking strongly or are convinced that they will vote for Barack Obama. What would you say to them?"
Bishop Finn: "I would say, give consideration to your eternal salvation."
Stigall: "There are Catholics listening to me right now who are thinking strongly or are convinced that they will vote for Barack Obama. What would you say to them?"
Bishop Finn: "I would say, give consideration to your eternal salvation."
After long valient fight, St Mary church is closing
Below is an excerpt from a long article from the Buffalo area about parish closings of vibrant parishes and the plea for relief.
Aug. 28, 2011
Monica Pullano was thankful to be part of St. Mary Parish even if it was for just one more day, after parishioners heard the stunning announcement on Oct. 13, 2007, that the church would soon be closed.
As it turned out, members of St. Mary spent almost four additional years in their beloved Catholic church on a bank of the Erie Canal in downtown Lockport.
But the extra time is now winding down. After exhausting all options with the Vatican to stay open longer, the 152- year-old parish is gathering today for a final Sunday Mass.
“I’ll be bringing plenty of Kleenex, I know that,” said Pullano, a Lockport resident.
The congregation on Thursday will merge with All Saints in Lockport, and St. Mary will be converted to oratory status, which means parish activities and regular Sunday worship won’t be held there any longer.
“We’re at the end of the road on this,” said Jean Skop, also of Lockport. “It’s hard to see something so good end.”
More than any other Catholic parish in the Diocese of Buffalo, the people of St. Mary fought the closure tooth and nail.
They spent about $50,000 on canon lawyers to press their case in Vatican courts. They organized letter-writing campaigns to Bishop Edward U. Kmiec. In 2008, they rented a large billboard space just a few blocks from the diocese’s chancery offices on Main Street, for a sign that
read, “Why Should St. Marys, Lockport CLOSE? Over 1,000 Families Want To Know.”
............
For many members, the closing of St. Mary has raised larger issues about the future of Catholicism.
A growing shortage of priests was one of the impetuses behind the diocesan restructuring— although St. Mary parishioners maintained that their pastor, the Rev. Gary Kibler, had agreed to stay until his planned retirement in 2015.
Kibler, who has been appointed senior parochial vicar at St. Mary Church in Swormville, effective Sept. 1, did not return calls to comment.
Nonetheless, the diocese is now down to about 185 active priests, and another wave of retirements is forecast that will bring that number closer to 140 within the next four years, while only a handful of seminarians are in training to be ordained.
“I guess the church should look at alternate priesthood. You don’t close a viable community,” Pullano said. “If the shortage of priests is the issue, then let’s look at that issue.”
The Vatican might need to re-examine its restrictions against ordaining women and married men, Pullano said.
...........
“We’ll all go forward. Our faith is strong. But for a lot of us, our religion is faltering,” said Skop.
Several dozen people have indicated they would be part of a new group called St. Mary Renaissance that will meet for prayer, meditation and music initially on Sept. 10 in a Protestant church.
Full article at Buffalo News
Aug. 28, 2011
Monica Pullano was thankful to be part of St. Mary Parish even if it was for just one more day, after parishioners heard the stunning announcement on Oct. 13, 2007, that the church would soon be closed.
As it turned out, members of St. Mary spent almost four additional years in their beloved Catholic church on a bank of the Erie Canal in downtown Lockport.
But the extra time is now winding down. After exhausting all options with the Vatican to stay open longer, the 152- year-old parish is gathering today for a final Sunday Mass.
“I’ll be bringing plenty of Kleenex, I know that,” said Pullano, a Lockport resident.
The congregation on Thursday will merge with All Saints in Lockport, and St. Mary will be converted to oratory status, which means parish activities and regular Sunday worship won’t be held there any longer.
“We’re at the end of the road on this,” said Jean Skop, also of Lockport. “It’s hard to see something so good end.”
More than any other Catholic parish in the Diocese of Buffalo, the people of St. Mary fought the closure tooth and nail.
They spent about $50,000 on canon lawyers to press their case in Vatican courts. They organized letter-writing campaigns to Bishop Edward U. Kmiec. In 2008, they rented a large billboard space just a few blocks from the diocese’s chancery offices on Main Street, for a sign that
read, “Why Should St. Marys, Lockport CLOSE? Over 1,000 Families Want To Know.”
............
For many members, the closing of St. Mary has raised larger issues about the future of Catholicism.
A growing shortage of priests was one of the impetuses behind the diocesan restructuring— although St. Mary parishioners maintained that their pastor, the Rev. Gary Kibler, had agreed to stay until his planned retirement in 2015.
Kibler, who has been appointed senior parochial vicar at St. Mary Church in Swormville, effective Sept. 1, did not return calls to comment.
Nonetheless, the diocese is now down to about 185 active priests, and another wave of retirements is forecast that will bring that number closer to 140 within the next four years, while only a handful of seminarians are in training to be ordained.
“I guess the church should look at alternate priesthood. You don’t close a viable community,” Pullano said. “If the shortage of priests is the issue, then let’s look at that issue.”
The Vatican might need to re-examine its restrictions against ordaining women and married men, Pullano said.
...........
“We’ll all go forward. Our faith is strong. But for a lot of us, our religion is faltering,” said Skop.
Several dozen people have indicated they would be part of a new group called St. Mary Renaissance that will meet for prayer, meditation and music initially on Sept. 10 in a Protestant church.
Full article at Buffalo News
Belleville diocese considers church closings
BELLEVILLE, Ill. (AP) Aug. 28, 2011 — The Catholic Diocese of Belleville is considering closing up to 20 of its 121 parishes because of the loss of population in some areas and the advanced age of some priests.
Bishop Edward Braxton said in a recent letter on the diocese's website that parishes will be asked to evaluate their viability. Town hall meetings will also be held to gather input. The diocese covers 28 southern Illinois counties.
The Belleville News-Democrat (http://bit.ly/oEkQYN ) reports that decisions will be made sometime after February 2013.
The Rev. John Myler is pastor at St. Peter's Cathedral in Belleville and a spokesman for the diocese.
He said plans to close some churches are not related to the recent $6.33 million settlement of a sexual abuse case against a priest.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Former priest and notorious child molester may be committed rather than released
Once of the worst sexual abusers in Los Angeles was Fr. Michael Baker. He is about to be released and the Los Angeles District Attorney is trying to get him committed to the Coalinga Mental Hospital as a dangerous sexual predator.
Aug. 26, 2011
Prosecutors are trying to commit a former priest notorious for child molestion to a mental hospital.
The former man of the cloth is Michael Baker of the Los Angeles archdiocese. Baker avoided prosecution on all but two of a dozen sexual abuse allegations. If prosecutors are successful he could face an indefinite time in custody. His earlier sentence had him scheduled to leave prison after serving half od a 10-year sentence.
The district attorney's office, acting under a provision known as Jessica's Law, hopes to block his release.
In a petition filed in Superior Court, prosecutors said Baker is a sexually violent predator who would be likely to commit further crimes if released.
full story here
The following from a year ago tells how about Baker and Cardinal Mahoney's coverup
April 2010
An NPR investigation reveals that Cardinal Roger Mahony, the archbishop of Los Angeles, failed to act when presented with pedophile priests, and in particular, the case of one of the most notorious abusers, the Rev. Michael Baker.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles is still reeling from a major sex abuse scandal that broke eight years ago. A federal grand jury is investigating the church for how it handled sex abuse allegations, and the church is still fielding lawsuits even though it has already paid out $660 million to more than 500 victims.
An NPR investigation reveals that Cardinal Roger Mahony, his top officials or even his review board failed to act when presented with pedophile priests -- and in particular, the case of one of the most notorious abusers, the Rev. Michael Baker.
In 1986, Cardinal Mahony, the archbishop of Los Angeles, found out that Baker had been abusing boys from an impeccable source: the priest himself. Baker told Mahony that he had molested two boys, beginning in 1978. According to Tod Tamberg, a spokesman for the archdiocese, Mahony responded the way everyone did back then.
"Cardinal Mahony decided to handle it pastorally," says Tamberg, "and thought the thing to do would be to make sure that Michael Baker got the kind of treatment he needed and the help he needed so that he could make himself whole again."
After six months of treatment, Baker was put in restricted ministry. Tamberg says Baker did only administrative work. He was supposed to have no contact with children and was theoretically monitored by other priests. But over the next 14 years, Baker was moved to nine different parishes, several of which had elementary schools adjacent to the rectory.
..........
Cardinal Mahony did set up stronger policies to stop abuse. For example, he created the Sexual Abuse Advisory Board in 1994. The four priests and four Catholic laypersons on the board were supposed to be advocates for victims, to help the archdiocese root out sexual abuse.
Richard Byrne, a retired judge on the Los Angeles Superior Court, has served on the board since the beginning. He says about eight times a year, the vicar for clergy, who oversaw all the priests in the archdiocese, would call a meeting. There he would present each case as a hypothetical, with no names of victims or suspected priests.
"And then we would discuss that," he says. "This was purely advisory to the vicar. We assumed that the vicar then spoke to the cardinal."
Byrne says the board did not have authority to make recommendations, nor could it conduct investigations. Those were done by the archdiocese.
"It was in-house, so to speak," he says, conceding that the board relied on the priest for all its information.
.......
One of the cases that went before the board involved a new allegation against Baker. In 1994, Baker had befriended a 14-year-old boy named Luis, who served as an altar boy at St. Columbkille parish in Los Angeles. According to Luis' attorney, John Manly, the sexual molestation began immediately after the two met. One day in 1996, the Rev. Timothy Dyer, who was supposed to be monitoring Baker, spotted the boy in the rectory.
"Father Dyer came home to St. Columbkille and found Luis upstairs in the living area coming out of Baker's room," Manly says. "Father Dyer had an obligation to report. He didn't report."
Archdiocese spokesman Tamberg says the church wasn't legally obligated to call the police because priests were not mandated reporters until a year later. The church notified neither the police nor the parish. The archdiocese did conduct an investigation. There's a dispute about whether they talked to Luis -- but in the end, both the archdiocese and the review board concluded that no abuse occurred. And how did they know that?
"Baker was asked about it," Tamberg says. "He explained it away, and our mistake at the time was accepting his explanation at face value."
For four years, the church heard no further complaints about Baker. Then in 2000, two brothers walked into the office of attorney Cadigan. They were the two boys from Tucson. They detailed trips and visits that Baker had taken with them over 15 years. They described the sex and showed her his love letters. Cadigan quickly sent a 14-page letter to Baker, and four days later, Baker called her up.
"It was shocking," Cadigan says. "I had never had a priest confess to me."
Cadigan says Baker spoke of the many children he had had sex with, in the United States, Mexico, Thailand and Nepal. He said Cardinal Mahony knew about the abuse, but not the extent. She wrote the archdiocese threatening to sue. Within two months she had a check for $1.3 million.
There was one main condition: The settlement would be secret.
"It was obvious they wanted to sweep everything under the rug immediately," Cadigan says. "I had never seen such quick action to cover up and conceal sex abuse."
A Dramatic Deposition
After the settlement, Richard Loomis, the vicar for clergy, felt something had to be done about Baker. In a 2009 deposition obtained by NPR, Loomis told Luis' attorney that he suggested the police be called.
"Did they do that?" Manly asked.
"No," Loomis responded.
"Who did you suggest that to?"
"To the cardinal," Loomis said.
Describing the deposition to NPR later, Manly said that Loomis "flipped" right in the middle of the deposition.
"You know, how you used to see on Perry Mason or A Few Good Men, when someone actually flips on the stand? It just doesn't happen. And here it did," Manly said.
Later in the deposition, Loomis said he suggested that the archdiocese should alert all the parishes about Baker's activities, in case there were other victims. Again, the cardinal declined.
"I was upset because I felt we should have made the announcements," he said. "It was the right thing to do."
Loomis says he considered resigning, and suddenly, an increasingly agitated lawyer for the archdiocese, Donald Woods, stood up and grabbed Loomis in an angry bear hug, physically restraining him from talking.
"Wait, wait, woah, woah! What are you doing?" Manly asked.
"I'm instructing my client," Woods replied, as he jostled the priest and whispered in his ear.
"You're trying to shut him up!" Manly replied. "You're trying to get him to be quiet, because you don't like his answers."
Shortly after the deposition, Loomis got a new attorney. He was no longer represented by the archdiocese.
.......
And Mahony himself has said he was "misled" by Baker and other priests.
Attorney Manly doesn't buy it.
"Was he misled when he decided not to notify parishes in 2000?" Manley asks. "And was he misled in 2000 to force a confidentiality agreement on the two boys who did come forward? And was he misled in 2000 when he decided not to call the police? He wasn't misled. It was intentional, and it was hardhearted."
Earlier this year, the archdiocese settled the lawsuit with Manly's client, Luis, for $2.2 million. The archdiocese says that 23 people have accused Baker of molesting them.
Baker is now serving a 10-year sentence for sexually abusing three boys. And a federal grand jury is investigating whether the Archdiocese of Los Angeles committed fraud by allegedly covering up sexual abuse. Copyright 2010 National Public Radio.
Full article here
Aug. 26, 2011
Prosecutors are trying to commit a former priest notorious for child molestion to a mental hospital.
The former man of the cloth is Michael Baker of the Los Angeles archdiocese. Baker avoided prosecution on all but two of a dozen sexual abuse allegations. If prosecutors are successful he could face an indefinite time in custody. His earlier sentence had him scheduled to leave prison after serving half od a 10-year sentence.
The district attorney's office, acting under a provision known as Jessica's Law, hopes to block his release.
In a petition filed in Superior Court, prosecutors said Baker is a sexually violent predator who would be likely to commit further crimes if released.
full story here
The following from a year ago tells how about Baker and Cardinal Mahoney's coverup
April 2010
An NPR investigation reveals that Cardinal Roger Mahony, the archbishop of Los Angeles, failed to act when presented with pedophile priests, and in particular, the case of one of the most notorious abusers, the Rev. Michael Baker.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles is still reeling from a major sex abuse scandal that broke eight years ago. A federal grand jury is investigating the church for how it handled sex abuse allegations, and the church is still fielding lawsuits even though it has already paid out $660 million to more than 500 victims.
An NPR investigation reveals that Cardinal Roger Mahony, his top officials or even his review board failed to act when presented with pedophile priests -- and in particular, the case of one of the most notorious abusers, the Rev. Michael Baker.
In 1986, Cardinal Mahony, the archbishop of Los Angeles, found out that Baker had been abusing boys from an impeccable source: the priest himself. Baker told Mahony that he had molested two boys, beginning in 1978. According to Tod Tamberg, a spokesman for the archdiocese, Mahony responded the way everyone did back then.
"Cardinal Mahony decided to handle it pastorally," says Tamberg, "and thought the thing to do would be to make sure that Michael Baker got the kind of treatment he needed and the help he needed so that he could make himself whole again."
After six months of treatment, Baker was put in restricted ministry. Tamberg says Baker did only administrative work. He was supposed to have no contact with children and was theoretically monitored by other priests. But over the next 14 years, Baker was moved to nine different parishes, several of which had elementary schools adjacent to the rectory.
..........
Cardinal Mahony did set up stronger policies to stop abuse. For example, he created the Sexual Abuse Advisory Board in 1994. The four priests and four Catholic laypersons on the board were supposed to be advocates for victims, to help the archdiocese root out sexual abuse.
Richard Byrne, a retired judge on the Los Angeles Superior Court, has served on the board since the beginning. He says about eight times a year, the vicar for clergy, who oversaw all the priests in the archdiocese, would call a meeting. There he would present each case as a hypothetical, with no names of victims or suspected priests.
"And then we would discuss that," he says. "This was purely advisory to the vicar. We assumed that the vicar then spoke to the cardinal."
Byrne says the board did not have authority to make recommendations, nor could it conduct investigations. Those were done by the archdiocese.
"It was in-house, so to speak," he says, conceding that the board relied on the priest for all its information.
.......
One of the cases that went before the board involved a new allegation against Baker. In 1994, Baker had befriended a 14-year-old boy named Luis, who served as an altar boy at St. Columbkille parish in Los Angeles. According to Luis' attorney, John Manly, the sexual molestation began immediately after the two met. One day in 1996, the Rev. Timothy Dyer, who was supposed to be monitoring Baker, spotted the boy in the rectory.
"Father Dyer came home to St. Columbkille and found Luis upstairs in the living area coming out of Baker's room," Manly says. "Father Dyer had an obligation to report. He didn't report."
Archdiocese spokesman Tamberg says the church wasn't legally obligated to call the police because priests were not mandated reporters until a year later. The church notified neither the police nor the parish. The archdiocese did conduct an investigation. There's a dispute about whether they talked to Luis -- but in the end, both the archdiocese and the review board concluded that no abuse occurred. And how did they know that?
"Baker was asked about it," Tamberg says. "He explained it away, and our mistake at the time was accepting his explanation at face value."
For four years, the church heard no further complaints about Baker. Then in 2000, two brothers walked into the office of attorney Cadigan. They were the two boys from Tucson. They detailed trips and visits that Baker had taken with them over 15 years. They described the sex and showed her his love letters. Cadigan quickly sent a 14-page letter to Baker, and four days later, Baker called her up.
"It was shocking," Cadigan says. "I had never had a priest confess to me."
Cadigan says Baker spoke of the many children he had had sex with, in the United States, Mexico, Thailand and Nepal. He said Cardinal Mahony knew about the abuse, but not the extent. She wrote the archdiocese threatening to sue. Within two months she had a check for $1.3 million.
There was one main condition: The settlement would be secret.
"It was obvious they wanted to sweep everything under the rug immediately," Cadigan says. "I had never seen such quick action to cover up and conceal sex abuse."
A Dramatic Deposition
After the settlement, Richard Loomis, the vicar for clergy, felt something had to be done about Baker. In a 2009 deposition obtained by NPR, Loomis told Luis' attorney that he suggested the police be called.
"Did they do that?" Manly asked.
"No," Loomis responded.
"Who did you suggest that to?"
"To the cardinal," Loomis said.
Describing the deposition to NPR later, Manly said that Loomis "flipped" right in the middle of the deposition.
"You know, how you used to see on Perry Mason or A Few Good Men, when someone actually flips on the stand? It just doesn't happen. And here it did," Manly said.
Later in the deposition, Loomis said he suggested that the archdiocese should alert all the parishes about Baker's activities, in case there were other victims. Again, the cardinal declined.
"I was upset because I felt we should have made the announcements," he said. "It was the right thing to do."
Loomis says he considered resigning, and suddenly, an increasingly agitated lawyer for the archdiocese, Donald Woods, stood up and grabbed Loomis in an angry bear hug, physically restraining him from talking.
"Wait, wait, woah, woah! What are you doing?" Manly asked.
"I'm instructing my client," Woods replied, as he jostled the priest and whispered in his ear.
"You're trying to shut him up!" Manly replied. "You're trying to get him to be quiet, because you don't like his answers."
Shortly after the deposition, Loomis got a new attorney. He was no longer represented by the archdiocese.
.......
And Mahony himself has said he was "misled" by Baker and other priests.
Attorney Manly doesn't buy it.
"Was he misled when he decided not to notify parishes in 2000?" Manley asks. "And was he misled in 2000 to force a confidentiality agreement on the two boys who did come forward? And was he misled in 2000 when he decided not to call the police? He wasn't misled. It was intentional, and it was hardhearted."
Earlier this year, the archdiocese settled the lawsuit with Manly's client, Luis, for $2.2 million. The archdiocese says that 23 people have accused Baker of molesting them.
Baker is now serving a 10-year sentence for sexually abusing three boys. And a federal grand jury is investigating whether the Archdiocese of Los Angeles committed fraud by allegedly covering up sexual abuse. Copyright 2010 National Public Radio.
Full article here
Friday, August 26, 2011
Council and Continuity conference
from Rorate Caeli -
Is there actually an American diocese willing to look beyond the so-called "reform of the reform" to what should rightly been seen as rupture?
The Archdiocese of Phoenix is holding a Conference on the 1965 Rite. Bishops Olmsted, Cordeleone (of Oakland) and Elliot (Auxiliary in Melbourne Australia) will be there, along with some "conservative" liturgists.
It is not a Tridentine Conference but, according to a well-known traditional priest and friend of Rorate, it is his understanding that the underlying message of the conference is that the 1965 Rite was supposed to have been the end of the reform. In other words: a future New Rite was not intended by the bishops in 1965 and became, ultimately, a rupture with tradition.
Our priest source also believes this is not a "reform of the reform" conference either. The reform of the reform assumes that the Novus Ordo is the direction, but it just needs to reigned in a bit. This conference, he believes, is very quietly suggesting that the Novus Ordo should not have been.
If true, this could turn out to be a remarkable event, and we will grant any of our readers who attend the event the ability to post a report on this blog. Just send us your report at athanasiuscatholic@yahoo.com
Also interesting will be, if this gets enough pre-conference press, will it be shut down before it ever takes place ..
Is there actually an American diocese willing to look beyond the so-called "reform of the reform" to what should rightly been seen as rupture?
The Archdiocese of Phoenix is holding a Conference on the 1965 Rite. Bishops Olmsted, Cordeleone (of Oakland) and Elliot (Auxiliary in Melbourne Australia) will be there, along with some "conservative" liturgists.
It is not a Tridentine Conference but, according to a well-known traditional priest and friend of Rorate, it is his understanding that the underlying message of the conference is that the 1965 Rite was supposed to have been the end of the reform. In other words: a future New Rite was not intended by the bishops in 1965 and became, ultimately, a rupture with tradition.
Our priest source also believes this is not a "reform of the reform" conference either. The reform of the reform assumes that the Novus Ordo is the direction, but it just needs to reigned in a bit. This conference, he believes, is very quietly suggesting that the Novus Ordo should not have been.
If true, this could turn out to be a remarkable event, and we will grant any of our readers who attend the event the ability to post a report on this blog. Just send us your report at athanasiuscatholic@yahoo.com
Also interesting will be, if this gets enough pre-conference press, will it be shut down before it ever takes place ..
Priest's dream to help others became nightmare
Some of the anti-Vatican II conservatives claim the sexual abuse crisis was due to "laxity" and reduced moral values in seminaries following the Council. This is refuted by history, both ancient and modern. The following shows the church was covering up predator priests long before the council. Similar records have been uncovered in Europe.
Huffington Post (April 1, 2010) -- The story of the Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald, a pioneering priest whose name surfaced this week as one of the first clergymen to repeatedly warn the Vatican about pedophile priests, started off as heroically as a Bing Crosby movie.
The Boston-born Fitzgerald drove from Massachusetts to a deserted, picturesque canyon in New Mexico where he founded the Roman Catholic Church's first order for wayward priests in 1947, three years after Crosby starred as a young, idealistic priest in "Going My Way."
But in the end, things did not go the way Fitzgerald had planned for his Jemez Springs order, called the Servants of the Paraclete. He had envisioned a place for the healing and renewal of priests with alcohol problems and other emotional issues easily identifiable in the 1940s. He never expected that many of the priests who would come to his new retreat would be pedophiles.
Courtesy of Valles Caldera Trust / AP
The Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald headed the Servants of the Paraclete, which housed wayward priests. The Jemez Springs, N.M., facility is now used as a science and education center.
In an especially ironic twist, Fitzgerald's prescient warnings about pedophile priests came true in what happened to his own order after he was forced out in a power struggle around 1965. The battle revolved in part around his belief that pedophile priests were incurable. He suggested they be housed on an island for treatment.
Fitzgerald wrote a follow-up letter to Pope Paul VI in 1963 after he went to Rome to warn the pontiff that pedophile priests were dangerous and should be removed from the ministry.
The letter is among documentation used in litigation by lawyers for California clergy abuse victims. It has been analyzed this week as questions surrounding how much the Vatican knew about child sex abuse and how much it may have helped cover it up increase.
The Paracletes eventually became known as "Club Ped," or as one lawyer termed it, "a dumping ground for toxic ecclesiastical waste."
........
Fitzgerald, who died in 1969, never expected to deal with the serious issues presented by the pedophile priests who began arriving at the Jemez Springs order in the late 1940s, said the Rev. Liam Hoare, vicar general of the Servants of the Paraclete. He runs what is left of the order in the United States, a small retreat for troubled priests in Dittmer, Mo.
"They came on Greyhound buses, by trains, often sent by bishops who never told the Paracletes what their real problems were," Hoare said in a telephone interview with AOL News. "Back in the '40s nobody talked about this. You can't look at it through 2010 lenses."
Fitzgerald became so alarmed by the gravity of pedophiliac priests' disorders that he wrote letters for years to U.S. bishops and met with Pope Paul VI in Rome warning that such priests were "devils" and should be defrocked.
"These men, Your Excellency, are devils and the wrath of God is upon them and if I were a bishop I would tremble when I failed to report them to Rome for involuntary layization," Fitzgerald wrote in a 1957 letter to an unnamed archbishop.
Nor did he want them at his retreat, Hoare said. Fitzgerald even tried to buy a Caribbean island where they could be treated in isolation without fear they could harm children.
"It is for this class of rattlesnake I have always wished the island retreat -- but even an island is too good for these vipers of whom the Gentle Master said it were better they had not been born -- this is an indirect way of saying damned, is it not?" Fitzgerald wrote in the same letter.
.....................
Full article at Huffington Post
Huffington Post (April 1, 2010) -- The story of the Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald, a pioneering priest whose name surfaced this week as one of the first clergymen to repeatedly warn the Vatican about pedophile priests, started off as heroically as a Bing Crosby movie.
The Boston-born Fitzgerald drove from Massachusetts to a deserted, picturesque canyon in New Mexico where he founded the Roman Catholic Church's first order for wayward priests in 1947, three years after Crosby starred as a young, idealistic priest in "Going My Way."
But in the end, things did not go the way Fitzgerald had planned for his Jemez Springs order, called the Servants of the Paraclete. He had envisioned a place for the healing and renewal of priests with alcohol problems and other emotional issues easily identifiable in the 1940s. He never expected that many of the priests who would come to his new retreat would be pedophiles.
Courtesy of Valles Caldera Trust / AP
The Rev. Gerald Fitzgerald headed the Servants of the Paraclete, which housed wayward priests. The Jemez Springs, N.M., facility is now used as a science and education center.
In an especially ironic twist, Fitzgerald's prescient warnings about pedophile priests came true in what happened to his own order after he was forced out in a power struggle around 1965. The battle revolved in part around his belief that pedophile priests were incurable. He suggested they be housed on an island for treatment.
Fitzgerald wrote a follow-up letter to Pope Paul VI in 1963 after he went to Rome to warn the pontiff that pedophile priests were dangerous and should be removed from the ministry.
The letter is among documentation used in litigation by lawyers for California clergy abuse victims. It has been analyzed this week as questions surrounding how much the Vatican knew about child sex abuse and how much it may have helped cover it up increase.
The Paracletes eventually became known as "Club Ped," or as one lawyer termed it, "a dumping ground for toxic ecclesiastical waste."
........
Fitzgerald, who died in 1969, never expected to deal with the serious issues presented by the pedophile priests who began arriving at the Jemez Springs order in the late 1940s, said the Rev. Liam Hoare, vicar general of the Servants of the Paraclete. He runs what is left of the order in the United States, a small retreat for troubled priests in Dittmer, Mo.
"They came on Greyhound buses, by trains, often sent by bishops who never told the Paracletes what their real problems were," Hoare said in a telephone interview with AOL News. "Back in the '40s nobody talked about this. You can't look at it through 2010 lenses."
Fitzgerald became so alarmed by the gravity of pedophiliac priests' disorders that he wrote letters for years to U.S. bishops and met with Pope Paul VI in Rome warning that such priests were "devils" and should be defrocked.
"These men, Your Excellency, are devils and the wrath of God is upon them and if I were a bishop I would tremble when I failed to report them to Rome for involuntary layization," Fitzgerald wrote in a 1957 letter to an unnamed archbishop.
Nor did he want them at his retreat, Hoare said. Fitzgerald even tried to buy a Caribbean island where they could be treated in isolation without fear they could harm children.
"It is for this class of rattlesnake I have always wished the island retreat -- but even an island is too good for these vipers of whom the Gentle Master said it were better they had not been born -- this is an indirect way of saying damned, is it not?" Fitzgerald wrote in the same letter.
.....................
Full article at Huffington Post
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Growing number of Catholics push for return of Latin mass
Wisconsin State Journal
Aug 23, 2011
Ellie Arkin doesn't speak Latin, so upon entering Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in Madison on a recent Sunday, the 21-year-old UW-Madison student opened a Latin-to-English translation book provided by the church.
Aug 23, 2011
Ellie Arkin doesn't speak Latin, so upon entering Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in Madison on a recent Sunday, the 21-year-old UW-Madison student opened a Latin-to-English translation book provided by the church.
For the next hour, she and many of the other parishioners followed along in the book as the Mass unfolded mostly in Latin.
For centuries, this was the only way Catholics around the world experienced Mass. Reforms ushered in by Vatican II in the 1960s largely eliminated Latin Mass, but now, across the country and in the Madison Catholic Diocese, traditionalists are seeking its comeback.
Supporters say it offers a reverence and gravity lacking in today's more casual worship approach.
"There's this incredible sacredness you can feel and taste and see — it is not just a social gathering," said Jacek Cianciara, 67, of Madison, one of the parishioners helping to bring back Latin Mass locally.
Other Catholics find the older style needlessly difficult to follow and too passive.
"When it's in Latin, it's just rote — you're not reading the words for the real meaning," said Alice Jenson, 66, of Fitchburg. "I'm opposed to having this artificial barrier being put up."
Catholics now can attend a Mass in Latin somewhere in the 11-county diocese every day, although the vast majority of worship services remain in English. About 200 Catholics consistently attend a Latin Mass at least weekly, with others dropping in periodically, the diocese estimates.
That's a tiny slice of total church attendance — about 57,000 people attend Mass in the diocese each week — but it's a vocal and growing slice.
More than language
Latin Mass, also known as the Tridentine Mass, is distinguished by more than language. The priest faces the altar, which traditionally faced East, the direction from which Catholics believe Christ will return.
This means the priest has his back to the people, which traditionalists view as appropriate, like a general leading his troops.
The priest speaks in a low, quiet voice, rendering the Latin largely and intentionally inaudible to parishioners. That's because the priest should be praying to the Lord in their name, not proclaiming something to the people, said Monsignor Delbert Schmelzer, 81, one of the diocesan priests who leads Latin Masses.
"That emphasis is a world of difference," he said.
Gregorian chant is the required music, sometimes accompanied by an organ or singing. Female altar servers are not used because traditionalists believe the role should be reserved for boys, the only ones who can become priests.
Only the priest reads the Scriptures or distributes Communion.
A big shift
The 1962-65 Second Vatican Council introduced Masses in local languages, and reform-minded theologians followed with a host of other changes that loosened the structure of the worship service and increased roles for laypeople.
Girls were added as altar servers, and church members started assisting priests as Scripture readers and Communion distributors. The music expanded to include guitars, folk choirs and hymns such as "Amazing Grace."
Priests began facing the people instead of the altar.
"Vatican II shifted the emphasis to draw more on the talents and abilities of people who are not ordained — the idea that, ‘It's my church too,'" said the Rev. Steven Avella, a history professor at Marquette University in Milwaukee and a Catholic priest.
The same principle was behind the translation of the Mass into the native tongue, Avella said. "People could understand what was being said and respond in their own language," he said.
For traditionalists, the changes were unfortunate.
"Churches were full in the 1930s and 40s, but they're not full now because people don't even understand why they're there," Schmelzer said.
.........................
Avella said Latin Mass seems to have a particular appeal among people who are politically and socially conservative. Cianciara did not take issue with the characterization.
"These are people who base their lives on very strong moral principles," he said. "If you extend that to politics, they are more conservative. You will find they are against abortion, against euthanasia, against homosexual marriage."
.........................
"Most U.S. Catholics still gravitate to their home parishes where the Mass is in English, the music is more diverse, and they can be active in various liturgical ministries," he said.
Schmelzer sees a gradual blending of the more-formal Latin Mass with the more-casual new Mass.
"They are the same Mass, just different styles," he said. "The Pope would like it to be a melding of the best parts of both for the future, and that may take a generation or two."
Full story at Wisconsin State Journal
Living with the missal
Editorial from the Tablet
(British Catholic Journal)
20 August 2011What kind of obedience do Catholics owe the Church, with reference to the new English translation of the Roman Missal? Even before its introduction this autumn, there has been a glimpse from Scotland of the way some parishes and their priests are reacting, not with open defiance, but with excuses and prevarication as to why their parish is not yet “ready” for the new Missal. Bishop Peter Moran, outgoing Bishop of Aberdeen, spoke recently of “a certain amount of resistance in the parishes”, which was a “challenge”.
Fr Kevin Kelly, Britain’s eminent moral theologian, has now published a letter to the Catholic bishops of England and Wales accusing them of using “doublespeak” by praising the new translation in public while expressing unhappiness with it in private. It is beyond argument that the new translation is a flawed product of a flawed process, an issue well rehearsed in the columns of The Tablet. That does not lead automatically to the conclusion that the only right response to it is resistance. In any case, that is not what Fr Kelly recommends. He wants the bishops to be frank. The bishops have obviously made a calculation that the new translation – which, in its final version, they have never themselves formally approved – is a done deal. Hence their duty of obedience requires them to make the best of it while keeping their doubts to themselves. The bishops have called for a catechetical exercise in the parishes to deepen people’s faith in the Eucharist. That is impossible to object to and may do much good. But it does not supply a convincing reason why, for instance, “and with your spirit” is a better reply to “the Lord be with you” than the present form, “and also with you”. In the absence of any explanation for that and similar linguistic infelicities, people will feel bemused and no doubt somewhat irritated.
The controversy was given an extra dimension when Cardinal Napier of Durban wrote to The Tablet to ask: “Whatever happened to religious faith and obedience in Europe …? Is there no room for humble submission?” Hitherto, obedience had not been the dominant issue, though it may become so if priests start to defy their bishops. Obedience in any case is a complex concept, which does not necessarily mean unthinking compliance with an order from above. It comes from the Latin word for “to hear”, audire, which leaves open the possibility of listening without complying. In the Catholic context, for instance, as articulated by Fr Timothy Radcliffe OP, obedience has been construed as meaning “deep attentiveness”. But what is it in this case that Catholics are beholden to attend to deeply? The need to revive collegiality in the decision-making processes of the Church? That seems to be the fundamental issue.
Nevertheless, there is in the parishes a deep instinct for unity in the Church, and a common-sense reluctance to make the good – or even the not-so-good – the enemy of the best. The Mass is the Mass, whatever the language. Ordinary people know very well that in practice the Church is far from perfect, and have learnt, by and large, to make the best of it. But there are problems with the “everything in the garden’s lovely” approach when people know differently. It could rapidly undermine trust and credibility.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Grand jury to meet on Ratigan case
In addition to the state and federal court cases involving Fr. Shawn Ratigan for producing and possessing child pornography, there is now a local grand jury investigation as reported by the Kansas City Star and a local tv station.
Grand jurors in Jackson County soon will hear evidence related to the Rev. Shawn Ratigan case, independent sources have told the newspaper.
Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/08/24/3096110/grand-jury-to-meet-on-ratigan.html#ixzz1W0eCmjIb
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- KMBC 9 News has learned that a Jackson County grand jury has subpoenaed Bishop Robert Finn in connection with the church's handling of child sex allegations against priests.
Michael Mahoney reported that while Finn has been subpoenaed, it is not known when or even if he will actually appear.He said Finn has been relieved of the subpoena, although attorneys asked about the case had differing opinions on what it could mean.The grand jury investigation could go in multiple directions, Mahoney said. He said the grand jurors could be looking into Shawn Ratigan's arrest on child pornography charges, although the case originated in Clay County. Mahoney said it could also be focusing on the church and its official response to the Ratigan case or even the state's child abuse reporting laws.Finn's counsel said only that "Bishop Finn, the Kansas City Diocese and its employees are cooperating with law enforcement in the Shawn Ratigan investigation."Barbara Dorris of the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests criticized Finn for not honoring a 2008 pledge to promptly report problems to state authorities."He has exhausted his good name," she said. "He only does what he has to do when pushed by the media or by the victims."The Jackson County Prosecutor's Office declined comment on the story, Mahoney said.
Read more: http://www.kmbc.com/news/28967071/detail.html#ixzz1W0djsh00
Grand jurors in Jackson County soon will hear evidence related to the Rev. Shawn Ratigan case, independent sources have told the newspaper.
A local grand jury is poised to explore the case of a priest already facing child pornography charges in state and federal courts, The Star has learned.
The sources asked that their names not be used because of their close relationships to numerous parties affiliated with the case.
The topic and target of the grand jury probe are unclear, however a similar panel in U.S. District Court has appeared to focus on Ratigan’s conduct. The Star’s sources suggested that authorities now are concerned with how the Catholic hierarchy handled Ratigan’s alleged misdeeds.
A spokesman for the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office declined to confirm or deny the possible existence of a grand jury exploring the Ratigan case.
Diocesan spokeswoman Rebecca Summers declined to comment on a television report that Bishop Robert Finn, who leads the Roman Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, had been subpoenaed. She also would not comment on the emergence of a new grand jury investigation.
“We’ve been cooperating with law enforcement since May 12, when Monsignor (Robert) Murphy picked up the phone and telephoned the Kansas City, Mo., Police Department to discuss this with them,” Summers said. “We’ve been cooperating with them since then and have fully allowed ourselves to be interviewed and made ourselves available to the detectives.”
In May, Ratigan was charged with three counts of possession of child pornography in Clay County. Federal grand jurors later charged him with 13 counts of production, attempted production and possession of child porn.
In May 2010, the principal of a Catholic school had complained to diocesan officials about Ratigan’s purportedly inappropriate behavior around children. Other than counseling Ratigan to moderate his conduct, his church superiors took little substantial action.
In December, diocesan authorities found what prosecutors later alleged was child pornography on Ratigan’s computer. The church relieved him of his duties as pastor of a Northland church and assigned him to live at an Independence mission house, where he allegedly attempted to take pornographic photos of a young girl.
Finn has apologized for his handling of the case.
Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/08/24/3096110/grand-jury-to-meet-on-ratigan.html#ixzz1W0eCmjIb
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- KMBC 9 News has learned that a Jackson County grand jury has subpoenaed Bishop Robert Finn in connection with the church's handling of child sex allegations against priests.
Michael Mahoney reported that while Finn has been subpoenaed, it is not known when or even if he will actually appear.He said Finn has been relieved of the subpoena, although attorneys asked about the case had differing opinions on what it could mean.The grand jury investigation could go in multiple directions, Mahoney said. He said the grand jurors could be looking into Shawn Ratigan's arrest on child pornography charges, although the case originated in Clay County. Mahoney said it could also be focusing on the church and its official response to the Ratigan case or even the state's child abuse reporting laws.Finn's counsel said only that "Bishop Finn, the Kansas City Diocese and its employees are cooperating with law enforcement in the Shawn Ratigan investigation."Barbara Dorris of the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests criticized Finn for not honoring a 2008 pledge to promptly report problems to state authorities."He has exhausted his good name," she said. "He only does what he has to do when pushed by the media or by the victims."The Jackson County Prosecutor's Office declined comment on the story, Mahoney said.
Read more: http://www.kmbc.com/news/28967071/detail.html#ixzz1W0djsh00
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