Is the Pope Doing Almost Nothing to Halt Predator Priests?

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We regularly see members of the Catholic Church hierarchy feigning contrition over the worldwide sex abuse scandal that was added and abetted by the Church hierarchy for many decades if not centuries.  Despite the rivers of crocodile tears, sex abuse suits continue to be filed, the Church continues to oppose compensating victims tooth and claw, and judgments are entered every passing month against dioceses that closed their eyes to abuse and mere shuffled predator priest off to new, unsuspecting parishes. Meanwhile, of course, Pope Francis and the rest of the upper Church hierarchy continues a jihad against normal, non-predator gays and same sex marriage.  Italian journalist Emiliano Fittipaldi, who has written past exposes of the Church, in a new book accuses Pope Francis of doing “close to nothing” to stop clerical sexual abuse in Italy and around the world despite his protestations that he has zero tolerance for sexual abuse of children and youths.  The Guardian looks at Fittipaldi's charges against Pope Francis.  Here are excerpts:

The last time Italian journalist Emiliano Fittipaldi wrote an exposé about corruption at the heart of the Roman Catholic Church, it landed him in a Vatican court facing a possible jail sentence on charges that he had illegally obtained confidential church papers in the course of his reporting.

Now, six months after the 42-year-old reporter was cleared of all charges, Fittipaldi is taking on the church again. This time in a new book that accuses Pope Francis of doing “close to nothing” to stop clerical sexual abuse in Italy and around the world, despite the Argentinean pope’s frequent assertions that he has zero tolerance for the abuse of children or those who protect abusers.

In Lussuria (Lust), which will be released in Italian by publisher Feltrinelli on Thursday, Fittipaldi methodically pores over court documents and cites interviews with priests and judicial officials to paint a damning picture of the first three years of Francis’s papacy. Fittipaldi claims that 1,200 plausible complaints of molestation against boys and girls from around the world have been brought to the Vatican’s attention in that period. In some of the twenty cases of alleged sexual abuse by priests in Italy in 2016, Fittipaldi writes, priests have been convicted of abuse without the church taking any canonical action against them.

Fittipaldi also devotes attention to the case of Australian cardinal George Pell, who was appointed by Francis to reform church finances and has remained in that senior position despite questions over whether Pell protected serial abusers in his archdiocese in Australia decades ago.

Francis, who did not accept Pell’s resignation in June when the Australian cardinal reached retirement age, has declined to pass judgement on him. When he was asked by reporters about a separate abuse investigation into Pell by Victoria state police the pope said “justice has to take its course”. Last November, Francis did however decide not to renew Pell’s membership in a Vatican office that handles the church’s liturgical practice. He was one of several traditionalists whose membership was not renewed.

“The principle message of the book – the problem – is that the phenomenon of paedophilia is not being fought with sufficient force. Across the world, the church continues to protect the privacy of the paedophiles and also the cardinals [who protect them],” Fittipaldi said in an interview with the Guardian.

“Francis is not directly defending the paedophiles, but he did close to nothing to contrast the phenomenon of paedophilia,” he added.

The Vatican did not respond to a request for comment on the book or the assertion that Francis has not done enough to tackle abuse.

Fittipaldi alleges that under Francis’s watch, priests who practice omertà – a term that refers to a code of silence, usually by the mafia – have been favoured by the church.

Among other incidents, Lussuria delves into the case of Mauro Inzoli, a priest who was nicknamed “Don Mercedes” for his rich taste. Inzoli was found guilty of molesting children in 2012 by the church body that examines such cases and was defrocked by Francis’s predecessor, Pope Benedict. But in 2014, under Francis, Inzoli’s punishment was softened and he was able to return to the clergy under limited conditions, and to enjoy a life of “humility and prayer”. In the meantime, civil authorities in Italy prosecuted him and last year he was convicted of abuse. At the time of his conviction, a judge criticised the Holy See for not turning over evidence in the case.

Fittipaldi was working on Lussuria during his trial for illegally obtaining secret documents. Speaking to the Guardian, he recalled:“It was ironic to be there, during the trial. I was thinking that many priests and bishops and cardinal were involved in sexual abuse and the Vatican does nothing. They preferred going after journalists.” 

In short, since the Boston Globe first exposed the rampant sexual abuse by priests in 2002, the reality is that very little has changed.  Would that the media and politicians would wake up to this fact.

Grand Jury: Altoona Diocese Concealed Sex Abuse of Hundreds of Children

A grand jury in Pennsylvania has found that the Diocese of Altoona covered up the sexual abuse of hundreds of children by priests of the diocese.  The story seemingly never changes, only the location. Sex abuse of children and youths was - and likely still is - systemic in the Roman Catholic Church. And as noted before on this blog, no senior member of the Church hierarchy has been thrown out and stripped of their retirement and luxurious perks.  Pope Francis is all talk and crocodile tears, but no action.  The Pittsburgh Post- Gazette has a copy of the grand jury report and details on this latest revelation of the moral bankruptcy and criminal conspiracy that permeates the Church hierarchy.  Here are excerpts:

ALTOONA — After the tolling of the noon hour Tuesday at the magnificent domed Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament, whose towering perch above this historic railroad town reflects the Catholic Church’s long powerful presence in central Pennsylvania, the Rev. Dennis Kurdziel left little doubt for whom the bell tolled.

“Pray for the victims,” said Father Kurdziel in a somber noontime Mass, held less than two hours after the release of a state grand jury report finding that hundreds of children were abused by at least 50 priests and others associated with the church in the Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown across nearly half a century.

Across town at the Blair County Convention Center, authorities were releasing a catalog of horrors in a 147-page report by the 37th Statewide Investigating Grand jury, which spent nearly two years delving into the case.

Hundreds of children were molested, raped and destined to lasting psychological trauma by clerics whose abuses were covered up by their bishops, other superiors and even compliant law-enforcement officials in Blair and Cambria counties, the report said.

The conspiracy amounted to “soul murder,” the report said, with abuse happening everywhere from camps and homes to the historic cathedral itself. That description echoes that of similar grand jury probes into the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in 2005 and 2011 that found cardinals and other clerics shifted numerous known abusers from one unsuspecting parish to another. 

These findings are both staggering and sobering,” said the grand jury report. “Over many years hundreds of children have fallen victim to child predators wrapped in the authority and integrity of an honorable faith. As wolves disguised as the shepherds themselves — these men stole the innocence of children by sexually preying upon the most innocent and vulnerable .... ”

The two previous bishops leading the diocese — James Hogan, who served from 1966 to 1986 and died in 2005, and Joseph Adamec, who served from 1987 to 2011 and is now retired — “took actions that further endangered children as they placed their desire to avoid public scandal over the well-being of innocent children,” the report said. “Priests were returned to ministry with full knowledge they were child predators.”

The grand jury said there was an apparent reason for this deference — that the diocese had political boss-like powers in central Pennsylvania. Monsignor Saylor said a mayor of Johnstown sent candidates for police and fire chief to him for interviews, and he would tell the mayor whom to pick. “That happened in Johnstown and Altoona,” he said.

The grand jury report quoted former Altoona police Chief Peter Starr as crediting his own appointment to such arrangements and saying that the “politicians of Blair County were afraid of Monsignor Saylor,” who was editor of the diocesan newspaper.

With such influence, “Hogan saw no obligation of faith or law to the children of his parishioners,” the grand jury report said.

The report added that even a diocesan review board, impaneled amid growing public outrage over sexual abuse by priests, often turned into a travesty, with investigations focusing not on the accused but on those reporting abuse by priests. In one case, the review board sought gynecological records of a survivor, the report said. . . . . the grand jury report noted that as late as 2005, the Altoona-Johnstown diocese was hiring private investigators to look for ways to undercut the credibility of an alleged accuser.

Again I ask, how can decent, moral people continue to belong to and financially support such a morally bankrupt institution.  Is thinking for one's self that frightening of a prospect?  As for the social aspects of church membership, why not join a club of fraternal organization that doesn't condone and cover up the raping of children?   

Catholic Church Spent Millions on Predatory Priests

I try not to do more that one post per day on a particular subject, but some days it is just too difficult to do.  Today, in follow to the abuse scandal involving former Pope Benedict's brother, The Age, Melbourne, Australia's largest newspaper, has a piece that spotlights the misplaced priorities of the Church hierarchy, which has fought tooth and claw to avoid paying victims of sexual abuse, yet spent millions on pensions and benefits for the very priests that molested children and youth.  Here are article highlights:

The Catholic Church has spent millions of dollars providing pensions, housing, and private medical insurance to convicted paedophile priests despite branding them "evil" and having most defrocked.

The Melbourne archdiocese alone is still financially supporting six former priests who have been convicted for committing sex crimes against children.

Parishioners have unwittingly been partly funding the assistance through their donations into church collection plates, which they believed went towards the local church or  fundraising for retired priests.

Church records show two of the paedophiles, priests Wilfred Baker and David Daniel, received hundreds of thousands of dollars alone in annual pensions and entitlements.  Their victims received one-off payments of $31,000 to $37,000 under the church's Melbourne Response redress scheme.

The decision to continue financially supporting disgraced priests was made by senior church figures in Melbourne and the top advisory council at the Vatican, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, according to documents tendered to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Nine other priests have received pensions, housing stipends or private health insurance after their convictions and until their deaths. Many of them had also been defrocked.

Among those who received lifetime assistance was Father Wilfred "Bill" Baker, who molested at least 21 children.  The church had received complaints about him as early as 1978. He pleaded guilty to to 16 counts of indecent assault and 1 count of gross indecency in 1999.

The year before, Baker had been allowed to "retire",  a euphemism the church regularly used for priests who were stood down over sex abuse allegations.

In contrast, Baker's victims received an average one-off compensation payment of just $31,000 under the Melbourne Response.

Father Desmond Gannon was convicted of sex crimes on five separate occasions over the past two decades – in 1995, 1997, 2000, 2003 and 2009 – and the church cared for him up until his death.[C]utting them off completely was never considered an option.

"It's horrific to think they offered Emma only $50,000 as way to move forward over the rest of her life, yet the church was willing to support a priest they knew was convicted and deserved nothing else than to have to go out into society and fend for himself once he was out of prison," Mr Foster told The Sunday Age.

The church has declined to comment on the total cost of supporting the 15 priests that have been convicted of child sex crimes or 15 other priests who have been identified as abusers but were never convicted in a criminal court.

The figure is likely to be at least several million dollars in total based on known payments to a number of the priests.

As I have noted before, the moral bankruptcy of the Church hierarchy is complete.  Decent, honest, parishioners need to cease financial support to the Church immediately until the hierarchy it priorities in order.

Bishop of Syracuse, New York: Victims Of Predatory Priests Are "Culpable"

Syracuse Bishop Robert Cunningham - Mr. blame the victim

I grew up through high school in the Diocese of Syracuse, New York, and was an altar boy for 10 years and on a number of occasions served at mass and other services with the then Bishop of Syracuse.  At that point in time, priests were afforded god like deference and very dew adults much less minors would dare challenge the word of a priest or a bishop.  Now, the current occupant of the bishopric of Syracuse, Robert Cunningham, has testified under oath that the victims of predator priest shared in culpability with the predatory priests who sexually molested them.  The mindset is akin to that of those who are only too ready to blame female rape victims of "having asked for it."  It's disgusting and one cannot help but wonder where is Pope Francis when it comes to disciplining  this foul douche bag.  The New Civil Rights Movement looks at these despicable statements.  Here are highlights:

Pope Francis is coming to Philadelphia next week, and a group of survivors who were abused by Catholic priests plan to present him with a petition to remove Syracuse Bishop Robert Cunningham from his position, after it came to light that the bishop testified in an abuse case that, in the eyes of the Church, the boys who were molested are also at fault. 

Bishop Cunningham made the statement under oath, during a 2011 deposition during a federal lawsuit brought by a man who accused a priest in Bishop Cunningham's diocese of sexually abusing him as a child.

The lawyer representing the victim asked Bishop Cunningham whether, in the eyes of the church, a child molested by a priest has committed a sin. Bishop Cunningham answered:

"The boy is culpable." 

Charles Bailey and Kevin Braney, survivors of priest sexual abuse, are planning an online petition which they will present to Pope Francis, asking to have Bishop Cunningham removed. Mr. Bailey told Syracuse.com that he was not surprised by Bishop Cunningham's testimony:

"(Bishop) Moynihan said that right to my face – 'The age of reason is 7, so if you're at least 7 you're culpable for your actions.' That kind of floored me."

Bishop Cunningham has been desperately trying to walk back his testimony ever since it became public earlier this month - quite inopportune timing with the Pope on the way. 

Patrick Wall, who has testified as an expert witness in the criminal trials of Catholic priests accused of sexual abuse, called Bishop Cunningham's testimony "preposterous."

"There's no way, either in law or in moral theology or in canon law which Bishop Cunningham is trained in," said Mr. Wall, "that a child can consent to that crime."

Along with his own words from the 2011 deposition, the survivors plan to complain to Pope Francis about Bishop Cunningham's refusal to publicly release the names of the priests against whom the diocese has found credible allegations of child molestation. The survivors say they will also present evidence that priests from other dioceses with child-molestation allegations against them have been sent to a retirement home for priests in Syracuse.

There is more, but the take away is that if Pope Francis is truly contrite for the world wide criminal conspiracy that allowed thousands and thousands of children and minors to be sexually abused, then action should be taken against Cunningham.   I continue to believe that those who see Francis as a wind of change are indulging in a fantasy.  I'd love to be proven wrong, but I doubt that I will be proven wrong.

  

Catholic Diocese Legal Defense: A priest Is Not a priest When He's Molesting Children

As more and more victims of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy are increasing demanding that Pope Francis take action against high clerics who covered up abuse and/or protected predator priests, the Diocese of Trenton has put forth an utterly absurd defense in a lawsuit which claims that the diocese has no liability for abuse because when a priest is molesting children, he is not "on duty."  This outrage gives even more merit to demands that Francis cease the mealy mouthed apologies and fire some individuals, and by fire, I mean defrock them and kick them to the curb pension less.  Nj.com looks at the batshitery coming out of the diocese of Trenton.  Here are highlights:

Chris Naples says something snapped inside him that January day.

The Burlington County man sat in the gallery of the Delaware Supreme Court, watching as a lawyer for the Diocese of Trenton told the justices that the Rev. Terence McAlinden was not "on duty" — or serving in his capacity as a priest — when he allegedly molested Naples on trips to Delaware in the 1980s.

McAlinden, who once headed the diocese’s youth group, had introduced himself to Naples at a church-sponsored leadership retreat in Keyport. He’d heard his confession, included him in private Masses and discussed matters of spirituality with him.

Yet McAlinden wasn’t officially a priest when he took a teenage Naples to Delaware, the lawyer argued.

[R]eplied the diocese lawyer, “you can determine a priest is not on duty when he is molesting a child, for example. ... A priest abusing a child is absolutely contrary to the pursuit of his master’s business, to the work of a diocese.”

"Any hope I had that the church was concerned about me as a victim or about the conduct of its priests was totally gone," Naples, now 42, said in a recent interview. "They were washing their hands of it. I was shattered. I just couldn’t believe that was one of their arguments."

He [McAlinden]  also admitted sleeping nude with "a number of" teen boys who were active in the diocese’s youth group. The overnights took place at Jeremiah House, the youth group’s headquarters in Keyport, and at the rectory of St. Theresa’s, he said. Other times, McAlinden said, teen boys bathed nude with him in a hot tub at his parents’ home in Toms River.

Meanwhile, a piece in The Independent looks at the growing demands that Pope Francis do more than give lip service to supposed remorse over the rape of children and youths by Catholic clergy.  Here are highlights:

As Pope Francis prepares to meet victims of sexual abuse by clergy, will he concede that the notion of abstinence has failed, and even more importantly, demand that priests facing accusations of sexual abuse be handed over to the law? 

During a flight from Jerusalem last week, Francis announced he would be meeting with sexual abuse victims at the Vatican and declared the act of priests’ molestation of children equivalent to “a satanic mass”.

Enough already! 

By now victims and whistle-blowers of the Roman Catholic’s sexual scandals – details of which have exploded in the last 15 years or so – could do with more action and less of the emotive descriptions of what are plain unlawful acts which ought to be handed to law enforcement for prosecution. 

Benedict and Francis conveniently forget that the church holds itself to a higher standard than that found in the broader society. 

It is the church which ordains its priests to act in the person of Christ the Head. But that aside, what has transpired in this regard since the declarations “to deal appropriately and transparently” with these sordid deeds? 

The Ryan Commission set up by the Irish Government to investigate the extent and effects of abuse on children in Irish institutions operated by Catholic Church orders found wide-ranging abuse including physical, emotional, sexual abuse and neglect. 

The Belfast Telegraph described the details of the commission’s report as “Ireland’s nightmare from hell” and “Ireland’s shameful holocaust”. 

The paper said the findings were “our Nuremberg trial, Irish style, with no names, prosecution and no court appearances”.

And what of the many bishops and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church who have stymied investigations into the accusations, and where priests who have been identified as wrong-doers have been shifted from parish to parish to obstruct and deny victims justice? 

Where are the offending priests? 

What of the men and women who have come forth on the side of the victims and spoken up but have now been chastised as a result of their actions?

 Will he [Pope Francis] now step up to the plate and decisively deal with the issue of the clergy’s sexual abuse and, while at it, put up for review the celibacy of Roman Catholic priests?