News & Issues
|
|
News & Issues |
|
Home | Communications with the Archbishop
| Discussion Board
|
News | Articles & Essays
| Links | Officers | Meetings |
|
| There are 8077 News Items in 674 pages and you are on page number 24 |
| Optional Celibacy: So all can be at the table - Thursday, June 10, 2010 6-10-10FutureChurch is pleased to announce our new initiative: Optional Celibacy: So All Can Be At the Table. We are launching an international electronic and paper postcard campaign asking Cardinal Hummes at the Congregation for the Clergy in Rome to open discussion of optional celibacy at the highest levels of the Church. (full story) |
| Scandal gives new momentum to dissidents - Wednesday, June 09, 2010 6-8-10 The clerical sex abuse crisis is energizing Roman Catholic dissidents who want to open up the priesthood to women and ditch celibacy requirements. They marched on Rome Tuesday even as Pope Benedict XVI called on priests to converge on the Vatican to cap a yearlong celebration of the priesthood. And in a sign of the deepening crisis, the faithful in traditionally Catholic Austria are at the forefront of demands for change. In Rome, church reformers demanded changes in the male-dominated church structure they say is responsible for covering up priestly sex abuse for decades, pressing their case on the eve of a three-day rally of the world's priests summoned by Benedict. (full story) |
| Abbey issues apology - Wednesday, June 09, 2010 6-9-10 St. John's Abbey on Tuesday issued an apology and said it regretted "shortcomings" in its statement last month about the work history and whereabouts of an abbey monk after the monk was accused of sexual abuse. The apology was included in a letter to the editor submitted for publication in the St. Cloud Times. The letter also clarified the whereabouts of Fr. Francisco Schulte, who was named in a lawsuit last month alleging that the abbey, the Order of St. Benedict and St. John's Prep School covered up abuse by Schulte and others. The May 18 statement was in response to the lawsuit and contained errors about where Schulte was after 1992. (full story) |
| SNAP's criteria for papal address - Wednesday, June 09, 2010 6-9-10 Many Vatican observers believe that this week, during a large celebration in Rome, Pope Benedict will issue another apology for the crimes of pedophile priests. SNAP wants Benedict to squarely place responsibility where it belongs: on reckless, deceitful and callous church officials who have and continue to ignore and conceal child sex crimes. And the organization is urging the Pope to take proven steps to safeguard children now. Specifically, SNAP wants the Pope to 1) publicly list, on diocesan websites across the world, the names and whereabouts of all proven, admitted and credibly accused pedophile priests, and 2) toughen the US bishops’ sex abuse policy (especially to cover discipline and removal of corrupt bishops) and expand it worldwide. (full story) |
| SNAP tells Pope 'Start cleanup in your backyard' - Wednesday, June 09, 2010 6-9-10 In few nations do Catholic officials enjoy greater deference from secular authorities than in Italy. That’s one reason why SNAP is urging Pope Benedict to start effectively taking action on clergy sex crimes and cover ups by focusing first on Italy. The group is releasing a fact sheet with names and specifics about eight Catholic clerics who are or recently were in Italy and who face credible child sex abuse allegations. Most have been sent abroad from other nations. All have been publicly exposed before, some recently, through criminal or civil legal action and/or news accounts. (full story) |
| Boston's Caritas chain converts to for-profit - Wednesday, June 09, 2010 6-9-10 The majority of those who spoke backed the plan to convert the Boston-based Caritas chain of six nonprofit Catholic hospitals to for-profit businesses, citing the dire need for investment capital that will enable the hospitals to upgrade their facilities. The new ownership group has also pledged to retain their Catholic identities. (full story) |
| Danish nun's death to be investigated - Wednesday, June 09, 2010 6-7-10 Circumstances surrounding an elderly nun who died under suspicious circumstances at a convent in 1993 could lead to charges against Denmark’s Catholic bishop. Two former nuns went to the police last week about their late colleague, who suffered from dementia and who they say was regularly mistreated. After a petition from the Danish People’s Party, justice minister Lars Barfoed said his office would look into the case. (full story) |
| The Vatican's Ask and Tell Problem - Tuesday, June 08, 2010 6-7-10 In The New York Times, Paul Vitello reports on the new screening tests the church is implementing to weed out would-be seminarians who are gay or who are considered prone to pedophilia. Some may think it a matter of progress if the church is aware of danger coming from pedophiles in the ranks. But read what applicants to the seminaries are going to be asked, and apply the same tests to a would-be medical student, or law student, or science professional, and it will be clear what absurdity the church has backed itself into. (full story) |
| Mistrust, deep divisions await O'Malley - Tuesday, June 08, 2010 6-8-10 When Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley arrives in Ireland to investigate the handling of sex abuse cases in the Dublin Archdiocese, he is likely to encounter a divided clergy, skeptical victims, and a sense of betrayal that runs far deeper than what he encountered when he arrived in Boston seven years ago. (full story) |
| Candidate testified for Church - Tuesday, June 08, 2010 6-7-10 Last January, at the suggestion of a Green Bay Catholic official, Republican Senatorial hopeful Ron Johnson testified against the Child Victims Act before the Wisconsin Senate Judiciary Committee. Johnson, a Lutheran who served on the Catholic Diocese of Green Bay's finance council, feared that: "This bill could actually have the perverse effect of leading to additional victims of sexual abuse, if individuals, recognizing that their organizations are at risk, become less likely to report suspected abuse." Peter Isely, the Midwest director for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said the Catholic Church has been more likely to cover things up if it is not faced with court action."He's just wrong," said Isely, who was not aware that Johnson had testified. (full story) |
| SNAP at 'Year for Priests' event - Tuesday, June 08, 2010 6-8-10 The U.S.-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, held a news conference in Rome June 8 asking Pope Benedict XVI to make a public apology for clerical sex abuse during the closing ceremonies for the Year for Priests and to back it up with a pledge that any priest who abuses a minor anywhere in the world immediately will be removed from the priesthood. SNAP also asked Pope Benedict to explain how he personally dealt with accusations against priests when he was a bishop in Germany and later when he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. (full story) |
| SNAP responds to Irish probe of 'tradition' - Tuesday, June 08, 2010 6-7-10 An Irish newspaper reports that the upcoming Vatican "visitation" of Ireland's Catholic church will likely concentrate on increased evangelization," fighting "secularization," boosting confession and mass attendance and similar “measures” of how devout parishioners may or may not be. If this report is accurate, this is extremely disheartening. Clergy sex crimes and cover ups happen when church officials are “liberal” or “conservative,” and whether the flock is “devout” or “lax.” Even discussing such matters detract from the real task at hand: protecting the vulnerable, healing the wounded, exposing the truth, and deterring future recklessness, callousness and deceit. (full story) |
VOTF Atlanta
Voice of the Faithful, VOTF, "Keep the Faith, Change the Church,"
Voice of Compassion, VOTF logo(s), Parish Voice, and Prayerful Voice are
trademarks of Voice of the Faithful, Inc.