Vatican Sex Abuse

Walking The (Catholic) Plank

Sarah O'Leary | Posted 04.27.2012

Sarah O'Leary

Why doesn't my Catholic Church get its own house in order first? Get the plank/log/boulder/semi truck/elephant out of its own eye before it tries to remove a speck from another's eye?

Radical Disobedience: Why Roman Catholics Won't Heed The Pontiff's Call For 'Radical Obedience'

Michele Somerville | Posted 04.16.2012

Michele Somerville

There's not a thing Joseph Ratzinger can do to stop Roman Catholic women from becoming Roman Catholic priests. Alleluia. Alleluia.

Prominent Sex Abuse Attorney Drops Case Against Vatican

Posted 02.13.2012

By Alessandro Speciale Religion News Service VATICAN CITY (RNS) A prominent sex abuse lawyer has dropped a high-stakes lawsuit that sought to hold...

WATCH: Vatican Holds Global Summit On Sexual Abuse

Posted 02.08.2012

Feb. 6 marked the beginning of "Towards Healing And Renewal," a four-day Vatican global summit on sexual abuse. The purpose of the summit is aimed at ...

Vatican To Host Global Summit On Sexual Abuse

Posted 02.04.2012

By Alessandro Speciale Religion News Service VATICAN CITY (RNS) Ten years after the clergy sexual abuse scandal erupted in the United States, Cath...

Vatican Investigates Sex Abuse Claims In London

AP | By JILL LAWLESS | Posted 12.25.2011

LONDON -- The Vatican has ordered an inquiry into decades of sexual abuse by clerics at a Benedictine abbey in London, whose former head monk has disa...

Belgian Bishop Says Abuse Of Nephew Was A 'Game'

Posted 06.16.2011

By Francis X. Rocca Religion News Service VATICAN CITY (RNS) Belgium's Catholic bishops declared themselves "extremely shocked" on Friday (Apr. 15...

Christian Sacrifice And The Unholy Crusade To Defrock Roy Bourgeois

Michele Somerville | Posted 06.05.2011

Michele Somerville

What is Father Bourgeois' transgression? Did he travel the world with a pet altar boy in tow? No. He committed a truly grave sin. One the Vatican deems intolerable.

Vatican Plays Damage Control On Irish Sex Abuse Letter

Posted 05.25.2011

By Francis X. Rocca Religion News Service VATICAN CITY -- The Vatican on Wednesday (Jan. 19) tried to tamp down allegations a controversial 1997 lett...

US: Vatican Relations Strong Despite Cable Leak

AP | VICTOR L. SIMPSON | Posted 05.25.2011

ROME — Washington's relationship with the Holy See is too strong to be undermined by WikiLeaks revelations, the U.S. ambassador to the Vatican s...

Vatican Tried To Keep Notorious Child Rapist A Priest

AP | SHAWN POGATCHNIK | Posted 05.25.2011

DUBLIN — The Vatican tried to stop Dublin church leaders from defrocking a particularly dangerous pedophile priest and relented only after he ra...

Vatican Defends Pope's Record On Sexual Abuse

Posted 05.25.2011

By Francis X. Rocca Religion News Service VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope Benedict XVI, while still a cardinal, sought in vain to expedite the process for de...

Facing Protests, Vatican Seeks To Be 'Ally' With Victims On Abuse

Posted 05.25.2011

By Francis X. Rocca Religion News Service VATICAN CITY (RNS) The Vatican's top spokesman appealed to victims of pedophile priests who demonstrated...

ENOUGH: First Protest At Vatican Over Catholic Sex Scandal

Posted 05.25.2011

Italian police blocked victims of Catholic priest sexual abuse from protesting near the Vatican on Sunday, the AP is reporting. The demonstration was ...

Vatican Sex Abuse Prosecutor Calls For Death Penalty, Hell For Guilty Priests

AP | FRANCES D'EMILIO | Posted 05.25.2011

VATICAN CITY — The Vatican prosecutor of clerical sex abuse warned perpetrators on Saturday that they would suffer damnation in hell that would be w...

Catholic Church Violated by Karmic Thrust

Scott Janssen | Posted 05.25.2011

Scott Janssen

The frustration and embarrassment of the sexual abuse scandal that has plagued the Catholic Church added another chapter recently, this time in Belgiu...

The Long Scandal: A History of Abuse

Alex Wilhelm | Posted 05.25.2011

Alex Wilhelm

The Catholic Church is in trouble today, but they should be prosecuted in the public mind for millennia of wrongdoings against children. It is a long scandal, a heartbreaking history of abuse.

'Blame the Gays' and Other Children's Stories

Rev. Meg Riley | Posted 05.25.2011

Rev. Meg Riley

The latest development in the unfolding Catholic story gave me a new angle from which to talk to my daughter about the trustworthiness of adults.

Pope, Breaking Silence, Says Church Must 'Do Penance'

Religion News Service | Francis X. Rocca | Posted 05.25.2011

VATICAN CITY (RNS) Breaking his silence as an international clergy sex abuse scandal has roiled the Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI on Thursday (Ap...

Vatican Backtracks On Linking Abuse Scandal To Gays

Religion News Service | Francis X. Rocca | Posted 05.25.2011

VATICAN CITY (RNS) A day after the Vatican's No. 2 official suggested a link between pedophilia and homosexuality, the pope's top spokesman issued a c...

Why Arresting the Pope Is a Great Idea

Derek Beres | Posted 05.25.2011

Derek Beres

Leave it to Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, the totems of the British Atheist movement, to once again point out common sense, noting that the Pope's political sidestep is not recognized by the UN.

Pope's Ivory Tower Past Adds to His Detachment

AP | VANESSA GERA | Posted 05.25.2011

VATICAN CITY — Long before entering Vatican life, Pope Benedict XVI won renown as a theologian and a German university professor, penning more t...

The New Yorker: Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church

newyorker.com | Hendrik Hertzberg | Posted 05.25.2011

It is not "anti-Catholic" to hypothesize that these things may have something to do with the Church's extraordinary difficulty in coming to terms with...

Vatican Denies Pope Covered Up Abuse

AP | GILLIAN FLACCUS and BROOKE DONALD | Posted 05.25.2011

OAKLAND, Calif. — Even in his seminary days in the early 1970s, there were questions about California priest Stephen Kiesle: Colleagues said he ...

The Catholic Church's Approach To Communications: Cloister

Heidi Sinclair | Posted 05.25.2011

Heidi Sinclair

The Catholic Church has chosen the comfortable approach to its communications during this ongoing sex abuse scandal: to cloister itself. Systematically, it has closed down any venue or platform for discussion.