Catholic Church News

Pope Begs For Forgiveness From Abuse Victims

9:01 am EST June 11th, 2010 | Religion | 19 Comments

pope benedict Of course, at the same time the church has done their damndest to avoid actual responsibility.

Pope Benedict XVI publicly begged for forgiveness from clerical abuse victims today, pledging to ‘do everything possible’ to ensure that children are never again raped or mistreated by Catholic priests.

The pontiff has issued similar apologies and promises in a letter to Irish Catholics in March and in recent private meetings with abuse victims. During one meeting in Malta in April, the Vatican reported that Benedict had ‘tears in his eyes’ as he heard the stories of men who had been molested as children.

Today’s call for clemency, though, was made at a highly symbolic public event: a mass in St Peter’s Square marking the end of the Vatican’s Year for Priests. The yearlong celebration of the clergy has been tarnished by seemingly endless revelations of pedophile priests, cover-ups by bishops and Church authorities and the gross failure of the Vatican to forcefully remove influential officials involved in the scandals.

Topic: Catholic Church

The Vatican’s Sex Abuse Defense

5:12 pm EST May 16th, 2010 | Religion | 7 Comments

Hilariously sad.

In a motion to dismiss a lawsuit on jurisdictional grounds, the Holy See is expected to argue that a key Vatican document calling for secrecy in church trials for sex abuse cases was not, as victims’ lawyers say, proof of a Vatican-orchestrated cover up. The Vatican’s U.S. attorney, Jeffrey Lena, said Sunday there was no evidence the document was even known to the archdiocese in question — much less used.

In addition, the Holy See is expected to assert that bishops aren’t Vatican employees because they aren’t paid by Rome, don’t act on Rome’s behalf and aren’t controlled day-to-day by the pope — factors courts use to determine whether employers are liable for the actions of their workers, Lena told the AP.

Topic: Catholic Church

Pope Finally Admits Abuse Scandal Is Problem From Within

9:05 am EST May 11th, 2010 | Religion | 1 Comment

This is a little better.

The clerical abuse scandal represents the greatest threat to the Roman Catholic Church and the crisis was ‘born from sins within the church’ not outside, Pope Benedict XVI said Tuesday on a trip to Portugal.

He called for profound purification and penance within the church as well as pardon and justice.

In some of his strongest comments to date, Benedict said the Catholic church had always suffered from internal problems but that ‘today we see it in a truly terrifying way.’

‘The greatest persecution of the church doesn’t come from enemies on the outside but is born from the sin within the church,’ the pontiff said. ‘The church needs to profoundly relearn penitence, accept purification, learn forgiveness but also justice.’”

Topic: Catholic Church, Pope Benedict

1985 Document Shows Pope Resisting Pleas To Defrock Pedophile Priest

12:28 am EST April 10th, 2010 | Religion | 116 Comments

Yet another smoking gun.

The future Pope Benedict XVI resisted pleas to defrock a California priest with a record of sexually molesting children, citing concerns including ‘the good of the universal church,’ according to a 1985 letter bearing his signature.

The correspondence, obtained by The Associated Press, is the strongest challenge yet to the Vatican’s insistence that Benedict played no role in blocking the removal of pedophile priests during his years as head of the Catholic Church’s doctrinal watchdog office.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime, Pope Benedict

Senior Vatican Priest Compares Scrutiny Over Abuse Scandal To Jewish Persecution

5:05 pm EST April 2nd, 2010 | Religion | 42 Comments

Just when you thought the church couldn’t go too far or debase itself further.

A senior Vatican priest speaking at a Good Friday service compared the uproar over sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church — which have included reports about Pope Benedict XVI’s oversight role in two cases — to the persecution of the Jews, sharply raising the volume in the Vatican’s counterattack.

The remarks, on the day Christians mark the crucifixion, underscored how much the Catholic Church has felt under attack from recent news reports and criticism over how it has handled charges of child molestation against priests in the past, and sought to focus attention on the church as the central victim.

Even worse when you consider what the church did during the holocaust.

Pope Pius XII’s (1876-1958) actions during the Holocaust remain controversial. For much of the war, he maintained a public front of indifference and remained silent while German atrocities were committed. He refused pleas for help on the grounds of neutrality, while making statements condemning injustices in general. Privately, he sheltered a small number of Jews and spoke to a few select officials, encouraging them to help the Jews.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime

Pope Ready To Claim Head Of State Immunity Over Abuse Scandal

6:24 am EST March 31st, 2010 | Religion | 50 Comments

Well then clearly they didn’t do anything wrong, right?

Court documents obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press show that Vatican lawyers plan to argue that the pope has immunity as head of state, that American bishops who oversaw abusive priests weren’t employees of the Vatican, and that a 1962 document is not the ‘smoking gun’ that provides proof of a cover-up.

It says right there in the bible: when accused of a crime, don’t admit guilt but look for international immunity from criminal prosecution.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime

Maureen Dowd On The Catholic Church’s Child Molestation Spin

11:37 pm EST March 30th, 2010 | Religion | 3 Comments

I am not a fan of Maureen Dowd, but she totally shreds the Catholic Church (and their US-based apologists, Bill Donohue’s right-wing “Catholic League”) in a most righteous fashion.

Complete with crown-of-thorns imagery, the church has started an Easter public relations blitz defending a pope who went along with the perverse culture of protecting molesters and the church’s reputation rather than abused — and sometimes disabled and disadvantaged — children.

The church gave up its credibility for Lent. Holy Thursday and Good Friday are now becoming Cover-Up Thursday and Blame-Others Friday.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime

In Response To Systematic Child Abuse Scandal, Vatican Attacks… The Media

4:49 pm EST March 25th, 2010 | Religion | 35 Comments

The very definition of not getting it.

The editorial in a Vatican newspaper came on a day abuse victims protested near St Peter’s Square to demand the pope open files on pedophile clerics and defrock ‘predator priests,’ and a cardinal spoke of a ‘conspiracy’ against the church.

‘The prevalent tendency in the media is to ignore the facts and stretch interpretations with the aim of spreading the picture of the Catholic Church as the only one responsible for sexual abuse, something which does not correspond to reality,’ the Vatican newspaper said.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime

VIDEO: Daughter Of Sex Abuse Victim: “The Pope Knew About This”

12:44 pm EST March 25th, 2010 | Religion | 7 Comments

Criminal.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime

Internal Church Documents Show Catholic Church – Including Pope Benedict Let Priest Molest As Many As 200 Boys

9:51 pm EST March 24th, 2010 | Religion | 47 Comments

Sick, sick, sick, sick filth.

Top Vatican officials — including the future Pope Benedict XVI — did not defrock a priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys, even though several American bishops repeatedly warned them that failure to act on the matter could embarrass the church, according to church files newly unearthed as part of a lawsuit.

The internal correspondence from bishops in Wisconsin directly to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future pope, shows that while church officials tussled over whether the priest should be dismissed, their highest priority was protecting the church from scandal.

Topic: Catholic Church, Crime