January 28,2010

A nationwide support group for victims of sexual abuse is reaching out in local Catholic parishes where an alleged predator priest was previously assigned.

Bob Schwiderski, regional director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, held a press conference Tuesday outside St. Agatha’s Church in Hope.

Schwiderski says several victims from North Dakota have come forward with allegations that Father Gregory Patejko sexually abused them, among them a Zeeland, ND man who settled a claim with the Fargo Diocese after alleging Patejko sexually abused him in 1976.

Patejko was a pastor in Hope, Page and Aneta from 1979 to 1981 and his assignment to the local parishes came directly after his time in the Zeeland/Ashley area. He later served at several churches in Texas before relocating back to Poland. He is now believed to be deceased.

“They picked him up and they dropped him here is what they did,” Schwiderski said. “If there are victims here we urge them to get help.”

Schwiderski says that since his organization was first informed of the Fargo Diocese 1994 settlement with Richard Jangula of Zeeland, three more victims have come forward with stories of sexual abuse during Patejko’s time in North Dakota.

One of these victims also claims to have a “confidential agreement” with the Fargo Diocese. In it, the victims say they received an undisclosed amount of money and agreed not to sue the diocese in the future.

With this information, Schwiderski says he believes there are more victims who have not yet come forward. He also had harsh criticism for the Fargo Diocese, which he says should be open with local parishes about Patejko’s past.

The Diocese of Fargo’s statement of policy regarding sexual misconduct states that in the event of a report of sexual misconduct, “the Diocese is committed to communicating openly and fully with the affected parish or community.”

To the best knowledge of SNAP, Schwiderski says, there has been no communication from the Fargo Diocese to the Hope, Page or Aneta parishes directly referencing Patejko.

“They’re trying to change the subject and pass it off on victim confidentiality,” Schwiderski said. “That’s fine, but come back to your policy and be open with the parishes.”

SNAP vs. Fargo Diocese
The SNAP organization has challenged the Diocese of Fargo publically several times within the past year, claiming it has not aggressively sought to identify and assist victims of sexual abuse.

The group sent out a formal letter in December that was directed at Bishop Samuel Aquila for what the group perceives as a lack of response to allegations against Patejko.

“We’re worried essentially that three church officials allegedly knew of these credible allegations against a predator priest and, at best, stayed silent and, at worst, helped conceal them,” said David Clohessy, SNAP national director.

That letter states that since the allegations were made, “to the best of our knowledge, there has been no personal visit by top church staff to Patejko’s former parishes to urge victims to come forward and get help; no public announcements on the diocesan Web site, in the diocesan newspaper, in parish bulletins, or news releases to the media and public about Patejko’s wrongdoing…”

Bishop Aquila responded to the letter last month in the form of a letter to the editor that was printed in the Fargo Forum on Dec. 22, 2009.

“The most important message”

While the SNAP organization continues to criticize the Fargo Diocese, Schwiderski said the group’s main mission is to offer support and resources for victims. He, too, was abused by a Catholic priest as a boy in Hector, MN, Schwiderski said.

“You are not alone. Thousands of people in SNAP lived through the same burden and we’re here to help,” he added. “We’re not against the church. The issue is that people have been harmed and they need help.”

More on SNAP
SNAP, established in 1989, is a support group for women and men abused by religious authority figures in the United States. SNAP is an independent, 501(c) 3 non-profit organization with no connections with any churches. The group claims to have more than 4,500 members in 55 active chapters.

Reach SNAP at www.SNAPnetwork.org or at 1-877-762-7432.

The coalition said it was dismayed that a spiritual leader would resort to a letter read to parishioners at Sunday liturgies on a matter as significant as this and wonderment that any bishop who declares he is concerned about the issues of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Youth still does not feel compelled to be with his people as their spiritual leader in a time of crisis.

Words are poor subsitutes for presence in any crisis, the coalition said.

Bishop DiMarzio, the coalition noted, had no hesitation when he entered into people’s homes via robocalls in the recent election in praise of Assemblyman Vito Lopez who worked against statute of limitation reform for victims of sexual abuse. As direct a contact as he could get with all registered voters of the Assemblyman’s district seemed a good idea to the bishop.

Maybe the bishop could at least have robocalled the parishioners who were dealing with such a heavy blow.

His announcement of the removal of the pastor quotes him as saying to his people, “You are undoubtedly aware of the deep suffering and hurt that surround any mater of child abuse, especially when the allegations involve a member of the clergy. It can damage, often irreparably the innocence, trust and reputations of all who are who are in any way affected by it.”

The people of the parish, the coalition said, are “undoubtedly aware” we just wonder if Bishop DiMarzio is since actions undoubtedly speak louder than words.

Bishop DiMarzio’s statement says ,“The steps we have taken are essential to maintaining our commitment to the bishops’ Charter and Norms.”

Wouldn’t be wonderful if Bishop DiMarzio had a full court press, flat out, no holds barred committement to the protection of children instead of to a document that has proven its weakness over and over again since 2002.

We suggest the people of the parish withhold their money until they see their bishop in their parish.

Perhaps, that particular kind of absence will make the bishop’s heart grow fonder.

Link to Bishop DiMarzio’s statement:http://dioceseofbrooklyn.org/default_article.aspx?id=4534

National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) expressed its regret that the United States Supreme Court banned televising the Proposition 8 trial either by delayed posting on YouTube or live broadcast because of a technicality.

The court ruled that the Ninth District court had not allowed enough time for comments on whether the trial should be televised and therefore the US Supreme Court would not allow the delayed posting or live broadcast.

NSAC reiterated its call for as wide a distribution of the trial proceedings as possible.

The coalition said televising the trial would provide an avenue of knowledge for Catholics about the use of Catholic money by bishops to support or defeat legislation.

Exit polls showed that 64% of Catholics voted yes on Proposition 8 to ban same sex marriage. Catholic bishops in California led by San Francisco Archbishop George Neiderbauer, former bishop of Salt Lake City, formed an alliance with Mormons to support the proposition.

Citing Roman Catholic bishops’ direct involvement in the Proposition 8 issue and the “bitter lessons” learned about these same bishops and secrecy in the clergy sexual abuse scandal that has rocked the Roman Catholic Church, the coalition said it opts for openness in the search for truth.

The Catholic Church, an opponent of Proposition 8, should applaud and support any efforts that open the avenues of access to justice through a transparent process, the coalition said.

Secrecy breeds corrosion and it is an enemy of the truth, NSAC said.

The Catholic Church, an opponent of Proposition 8, the coalition continued, should applaud and support any efforts that open the avenues of access to justice through a transparent process.

The coalition also noted the Supreme Court plans to take up the issue of televised court proceedings later in the term and urged the court to rule in favor of wide distribution of trial proceedings.

Contact:

Jim Jenkins, NSAC – California, 510-559-5173

Kristine Ward, NSAC, Chair, 937-272-0308

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National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) expressed its regret that the United States Supreme Court banned televising the Proposition 8 trial either by delayed posting on YouTube or live broadcast because of a technicality.

The court ruled that the Ninth District court had not allowed enough time for comments on whether the trial should be televised and therefore the US Supreme Court would not allow the delayed posting or live broadcast.

NSAC reiterated its call for as wide a distribution of the trial proceedings as possible.

The coalition said televising the trial would provide an avenue of knowledge for Catholics about the use of Catholic money by bishops to support or defeat legislation.

Exit polls showed that 64% of Catholics voted yes on Proposition 8 to ban same sex marriage. Catholic bishops in California led by San Francisco Archbishop George Neiderbauer, former bishop of Salt Lake City, formed an alliance with Mormons to support the proposition.

Citing Roman Catholic bishops’ direct involvement in the Proposition 8 issue and the “bitter lessons” learned about these same bishops and secrecy in the clergy sexual abuse scandal that has rocked the Roman Catholic Church, the coalition said it opts for openness in the search for truth.

The Catholic Church, an opponent of Proposition 8, should applaud and support any efforts that open the avenues of access to justice through a transparent process, the coalition said.

Secrecy breeds corrosion and it is an enemy of the truth, NSAC said.

The Catholic Church, an opponent of Proposition 8, the coalition continued, should applaud and support any efforts that open the avenues of access to justice through a transparent process.

The coalition also noted the Supreme Court plans to take up the issue of televised court proceedings later in the term and urged the court to rule in favor of wide distribution of trial proceedings.

Contact:

Jim Jenkins, NSAC – California, 510-559-5173

Kristine Ward, NSAC, Chair, 937-272-0308

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 National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) Urges Judge’s Approval for Broadcasts of Proposition 8 Trial in California

Trial Would Open An Avenue for Catholics to Know How Bishops Spend Their Money To Support or Defeat Legislation

Coalition Cites “Bitter Lessons” Learned from “Secrets” of Abuse Scandal

 
 For Immediate Release

 The National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) urged Ninth Circuit District Court Judge Alex Kosinki to approve the decision of Northern California District Judge Vaughan Walter to allow a delayed daily broadcast of the Proposition 8 trial on YouTube from the outset of the trial on Monday. 

The coalition, a United States based organization that was founded to support victims of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic clergy and religious women, also urged both federal judges to allow live television in the courtroom during the trial.

Citing Roman Catholic bishops’ direct involvement in this issue and the “bitter lessons” learned about these same bishops; secrecy in the clergy sexual abuse scandal that has rocked the Roman Catholic Church, the coalition called upon the judges to act in the interest of openness and transparency in the search for truth.

Catholics, the coalition, said, should know not only how their money is being spent but how much is being spent  to support or defeat legislation. An open trial provides an avenue for this knowledge, the coalition argued.

The Catholic Church, an opponent of Proposition 8, should applaud and support any efforts that open the avenues of access to justice through a transparent process, the coalition said.

“Secrecy breeds corrosion,“ the coalition said, “and it is an enemy of the truth.’

Exit polls showed that 64% of Catholics voted yes on Proposition 8 to ban same sex marriage. Catholic bishops in California led by San Francisco Archbishop George Neiderbauer, former bishop of Salt Lake City, formed an alliance with Mormons to support the proposition.

Pointing out that it has been difficult if not impossible for Catholics to find out the cost of lawyer fees in the Church’s against victims of clergy sexual abuse and legislative statute of limitation battles in a number of states, the coalition hailed the potential broadcast of the trial as a possible avenue for knowledge of the where, why and how much Catholic money is spent on legislative initiatives. 

Historically, Catholic bishops have depended on the deference shown them by government officials, police, the news media and the courts in order to keep their secrets.  Much harm has been done.

“Knowledge,“ the coalition declared, “ is indeed power.”

Text of letter to the Judge

Dear Judge Kozinki:

We support openness in court proceedings and their wide accessibility in the pursuit of truth and thus we urge you to approve the decision of Judge Vaughan Walter to permit an upload to YouTube of the daily proceedings of the Proposition 8 trial beginning on Monday.

Indeed we urge you to go further and allow the proceedings of the Proposition 8 trial to be broadcast live.

We have learned bitter lessons from the secrecy that has surrounded the handling of clergy sexual abuse cases by bishops and it has been a catalyst for our push for transparency. Historically, such secrecy was enabled by deference shown the bishops by law enforcement, the media, the government and the courts.

Secrecy breeds corrosion and it is the enemy of the truth. Knowledge is indeed power.

Citizens should literally see for themselves the proceedings of judicial activity particularly in regard to as major an issue as the one involved in Proposition 8.  All citizens should be able to see for themselves how this process unfolds, who the key players are, how they are funded and what their end-game maybe.

While declaring our interest in the possible knowledge that may be gained regarding the activities and financial decisions of Catholic bishops in California concerning the spending of Catholic money, we make this request of you to allow the widest possible access to these proceedings based on our conviction that secrecy is corrosive and justice is better served if easy access to legal proceedings is available.

The Church, a supporter of Proposition 8, should, we believe, applaud and support any efforts for openness and transparency in this trial. Openness and transparency are stated hallmarks of the bishops following revelations of the clergy sexual abuse crisis, built into the Bishops’ Dallas Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People.

The public discourse is enhanced, we believe, when supporters and opponents of issues such as Proposition 8 have wide arenas of communication for the exposition and argument of their respective positions.

In the interest of justice, we urge you to approve the broadcast of the court proceedings of the Proposition 8 trial. We respectfully request that you work with Judge Walter to seek the highest and best avenues to provide access to the trial proceedings to the largest possible number of citizens.

Sincerely,

Kristine Ward,NSAC Chair

James Jenkins, Ph.D,NSAC – California

The resignation of the Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin, Ireland, James Moriarity, former auxiliary bishop of Dublin and one of five
bishops named in the Murphy Report, came wrapped in a statement that said, “with the benefit of hindsight, I accept that from the time I became an auxiliary bishop I should have challenged the prevailing culture.”

The National Survivor Advocates Coalition expresses its incredulity that any religious leader at any time could think that the abuse of children and the protection of priests who abused them could be considered acceptable and only in “hindsight” could right could be discerned from wrong.

We hope that the gift of foresight will be forthcoming upon the Irish hierarchy this Christmas season so that not one more child will suffer the bitter myrrh of sexual abuse.

While acknowleding that two resignations of bishops in Ireland is a 100% better result that the public knowledge of clergy sexual abuse in the United States produced, the coalition called for the resignations of the three additional bishops named in the Murphy Report.

December 17, 2009

The National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) sees in the resignation of Bishop Donal Murray, Bishop of Limerick, Ireland the failure of a Church unwilling to hear the cries of the innocent until forced into a corner by a civil government.

For 15 years, survivors in Ireland pursued the government’s investigation after they got no serious response let alone compassion or understanding or action to protect other children from the hierarchy that claimed to be part of a moral voice on the planet.

What is admirable today is not the passing of a bishop from his realm but the courage of those whose childhoods were taken from them, whose souls and spirits were deeply scarred yet who nobly rose to advance the cause of truth.

The resignation of one bishop does not end this scandal or even begin to heal its wounds.

Wholesale change, deep and meaningful must come to a hierarchy and a Church that allowed children to be abused and unflinchingly covered up crimes.

If the acceptance of this resignation is Pope Benedict’s “outrage” and “deep distress” for the Church in Ireland, it is an oxymoron.

Contact: National Survivor Advocates Coalition 937-272-0308

“Closing of the Purses” In Ireland

Cites US Experience of Bishops Fighting Victims

For Immediate Release – 12/15/09

The National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) calls on our Irish cousins to close their purses until they receive a satisfactory response from their local bishops and the pope for the rape and sodomy of innocent Irish children.

The pope and bishops are quick to use words such as “shamed,” “shocked,” or “horrified” and will make hollow apologies and promises of improved programs to protect children. All of this is done to placate the initial distaste of the average Catholic in the pew.

In reality they will quickly tell you the abuse crisis is “history” as did the current President of the Unites States Conference of Catholic Bishops. They will fight victims and survivors at every step of their search for justice. They will write their own policies and they will offer to police themselves. They will roll out “independent audits” using surveys and checklists designed by none other than the bishops themselves.

Not one bishop will resign or be fired for his inaction in protecting children or for his own involvement in transferring abusive priests, thereby aiding and abetting sexual predators. They will destroy documents or ignore court directives to release files on abusive priests. They will provide zero pastoral care to these children (now adults) who served the priests at the altar or were their students in theology class.

Now is the time to take the only action the bishops and pope understand.

Withdraw the cash these bishops will use to fight survivors, to hire expensive lawyers and public relations firms. Stop the cash flowing to the pope who personally developed some of the existing Church polices when he was Prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Sadly, this is the legacy of Benedict XVI and the Roman Catholic bishops of America.

Contact: NSAC 937-272-0308

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Get Answers Before Giving to Christmas Collection

Give to Charities That Have Proven Track Record for Helping Not Hurting Children

The Catholics of Bridgeport Connecticut deserve better than they are getting from Bishop William Lori.

First, their money is spent to fight for a serious and hefty fight to the United States Supreme Court to keep documents about sexual abuse by priests secret.

Now, today’s Hartford Courant reports, that Bishop William Lori paid $40,000 in Catholic money to victims of two priests who remain in ministry in the diocese.

One of the priests, Father Frank Wissel, a pastor and founder of a home for underprivileged says he never knew any payments were paid and he was told an investigation decided the charges were false.

Monsignor William Genuario, the other priest in today’s report, was a vicar general of the diocese, currently a judge on the marriage tribunal court, and has been part of the diocese’s administration since 1956.

The diocesan faithful who contribute to the coffers that pay settlements and legal fees have to be understandably confused: why pay if allegations are false? or if allegations are true why keep priests in ministry when you have a policy of removing them as Bishop Lori says he does?

We urged Catholics in Bridgeport to follow the money and get clear answers from their Bishop before they turn over any more of the their hard earned money in the Christmas and Sunday collections.

The coalition is not advoacting that Catholics in Bridgeport withhold their money from good causes, particularly those that help children. We do urge them to give their money and to dig deep and give generously to any group that has clearly demonstrated that the money is used to help children, not to fight legal battles and obscure the truth.

Contact: Kristine Ward, Chair

937-272-0308

NSAC Calls for Removals of Bishops, Recall of Nuncio

For Immediate Release

The National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) based in the United States, today called Pope Benedict’s response to the Irish sexual abuse scandal as “woefully inadequate.”

Pope Benedict said today after meeting with Irish bishops at the Vatican that he was “deeply dissturbed and distressed” and would write a pastoral letter to the people of Ireland outling future changes in dealing with abuse.

The coalition said in a statement., the Pope should:

· immediately remove the Bishops who protected sexual abusers in the Irish clergy

· remove any person in Ireland and in the Vatican hierarchy complicit in protecting abusers

recall the papal nuncio

The Pope now has the report, he has spoken with the Irish bishops. Now is the time for action. It has been too long delayed.

The Pontiff has the authority to remove bishops. To leave them in positions of authority sends the message that no wrong was done, no strong action is not needed and all that’s necessary in the face of these horrific revelations is a bit of tinkering on how things will be done in the future.

These horrific crimes cry out for justice. In the name of the Christ Child, the Pope should act.

The Catholic Church is suffering from laryngitis in its moral voice. Today, the Pope offered no medicine that will advance the cure.

One must ask,: How long, O Lord, how long?”

How long, how many meetings, how many letters until there is clear, decisive, real action to own up to the crimes committed against children, the vulnerable and innocent by persons in authority in the Catholic Church?

Contact: Kristine Ward, National Survivor Advocates Coalition

937-272-0308

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Reply to sender | Reply to group

For Immediate Release

The National Survivors Advocates Coalition (NSAC) calls upon Catholics in the Diocese of Bridgeport, CT and throughout the country to be actively vigilant regarding the release of documents that the diocese fought up to and including a request for an appeal hearing from the United States Supreme Court.

The Coalition joined two other national groups, Survivors Network for Those Abused by Priests (SNAP) and BishopAccountability.org, calling for continued and sustained efforts by the attorneys for the four newspapers that brought the court case for release of documents.

” 1,488 secret documents were withheld recently by the Bridgeport Diocese, “the coalition said. BishopAccountability.org estimates that 12% of the records.

“It’s clear the courts have said the documents should be released. The courts did not say that all documents except for 12% of them should be released,” the coalition said.

“Catholics should be seekers of the truth, the whole truth not 12% shy of the truth,” the coalition said.

” Holding back on 12% of the records on top of a lengthy court fight to keep all of the records secret only reinforces the questions:

What is the Bridgeport Diocese trying to hide?
Whom is the diocese trying to protect?
How much Catholic money is Bridgeport’s secret hiding costing that could be spent on feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, liberating the oppressed and educating the next generation of Catholics?”

The coalition asked Catholics to remember that the Archdiocese of Los Angeles settlement and the Diocese of San Diego settlement in 2007 included provisions for the release of documents. These releases have yet to be fulfilled.

“We urgently ask our fellow Catholics to make it a priority that all of the Diocese of Bridgeport’s sexual abuse records requested by the four newspapers be released, “the coalition said, “Let us not go the way of Los Angeles where promises become vapors.”

The coalition said, “In the same way that we cannot be complacent about the hierarchy, we cannot take for granted that because Bridgeport Diocese has said it comply with the court ordered release of records that in fact the release of all documents that there will be an unobstructed path to the release of documents.”

“The roots and values of our faith unite us, “ the coalition added, “and we can do no less than heed our call to conscience to be vigilantly engaged in this process.”

Catholics in Bridgeport were asked by the coalition to:

Contact Bishop William Lori in person, by letter or through comments on his blog (www.bridgeportdiocese.com Bishop Lori’s blog) and inform him they are actively vigilant and expect deterrents to the release of documents to cease
bring up the matter with their parish priests this weekend and ask them to bring up the matter in any meeting with the Bishop and at meetings of priest councils
keep the document issue alive through conversations with fellow Catholics
contact the judge handling the release of documents
write letters to the editor the expressing their opinions about the process of the release of documents
seriously consider withholding financial support to the diocese and their parishes if they documents are not released with all deliberate speed

Contact:

Kristine Ward, Chair, National Survivor Advocates Coalition 937-272-0308
Full Text of the National Survivor Advocates Coalition Statement

Rev. Robert M. Hoatson, Founder and President
Rev. Kenneth Lasch, Co-founder
Road to Recovery, Inc. (serving clergy abuse survivors)
P.O. Box 279
Livingston, NJ 07039

Road to Recovery, Inc., a New Jersey-based international organization whose mission is to provide compassionate counseling to victims of sexual abuse by clergy and others, lauds the report from the Irish government about the soul murder of thousands of children, teenagers, and vulnerable adults by clergy persons in the Archdiocese of Dublin.  Road to Recovery has helped over 1,000 victims of clergy sexual abuse in the United States and internationally, including Ireland.

The “Dublin Archdiocese Report” confirms what victims and their families have known for decades:  the Catholic Church conspired with itself, the Vatican, local law enforcement, and the national government to keep secret thousands of cases of abuse of innocent children.  All those involved must be held accountable.  Not only that, the bishops and civil authorities of the United States and all other nations who acted similarly and continue to act similarly, must be held accountable.

We call on the United Nations Human Rights Division to commence an investigation of the Roman Catholic Church (The Vatican) and national government officials worldwide for their pre-meditated, calculated, and arrogant malfeasance in the handling of child protection worldwide.  No organization or country that treats its children in this manner deserves the title “nation-state” or “nation.”  Rather, we urge the UN Human Rights Commission to suspend all rights to Vatican City and complicit governments until they puts into place policies, procedures, and leaders who will act legally, justly, and rightly toward the young and innocent.

For more information, phone 862-368-2800. 
November 26, 2009

He takes legal action to hold child molesting cleric accountable

New child sex abuse and fraud case is filed against church organization

It charges that Christian Brothers deceived parents & let children be abused

WHAT
At a news conference, a Minnesota school superintendent who was molested as a boy by a cleric will

 Speak publicly for the first time about the crimes he suffered as a youngster,
 Announce and discuss the new clergy sex abuse and cover up lawsuit he’s filing,
 Ask why Christian Brother officials are now endangering kids by letting a known predator live near them &
 Urge anyone who may have seen suspected or suffered his crimes to call police and get help.

WHEN
Monday, November 16, 11:30 AM

WHERE
At the law offices of Jeff Anderson & Associates PA, 366 Jackson Street (corner of 5th) in St. Paul, MN

WHO
The victim (now a school district superintendent), his attorneys, and the Minnesota director of a support group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org).

DETAILS
In the 1960s, Brother Charles Anthony “Raimond” Rose repeatedly molested a then 16 year old boy at DeLaSalle High School in Minneapolis, MN. Church and school officials let Rose work there, despite earlier reports, made to another teacher/cleric, that Rose sexually abused at least one other child at the school. Upon discovery of this abuse, the officials took no further steps to investigate the misconduct or prevent further sexual abuse by Rose.

Roughly ten years later, Rose sexually assaulted the victim in this new suit. The crimes took place at the Dunrovin Christian Brothers Retreat Center at Marine on St. Croix, MN when the boy was 14-15 years old.

The new lawsuit charges two Catholic institutions (the Christian Brothers of the Midwest, The Christian Brothers of Minnesota) with fraud because they represented to victim and his family that Rose was safe when they knew he had sexually abused at least one boy earlier.

The suit is being filed in Ramsey County District Court. The Christian Brothers’ regional headquarters is in Chicago. Their Minnesota headquarters is at 1883 Laurel Avenue in St. Paul.

Rose has never been held accountable for his crimes and has worked for the Christian Brothers for at least five decades. He is believed to be living in Chicago in a church facility located next to a Christian Brothers high school called the De La Salle Institute.

CONTACT
Attorney Patrick W. Noaker of St. Paul MN, (651) 227 9990, (612) 961 1307 cell
Attorney Jeff Anderson of St. Paul MN, (651) 227 9990
Bob Schwiderski of Wayzata, MN SNAP Director, (952) 471 3422 (h), (612) 840 7290 cell

This letter was addressed to the public editor at the NY Times regarding the article in the Opinion section entitled, “The Archbishop’s Blog.”

Clark Hoyte, Public Editor
NY Times

Mr. Hoyte:

Re The Archbishop’s Blog, The Public Editor, NYT Sunday Opinion, November 8, 2009:

Now you’ve done it! What were you thinking?

By exposing the thin-skinned New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan’s schemes to cow the NY Times you have only proven, in “clerical-world think,” how really anti-Catholic the NYT can be.

Don’t fret. When Dolan expresses criticism for Maureen Dowd’s “hyperbole” for defending American religious women and disdain for Laurie Goodstein’s reporting about the unbelievable hypocrisy and cluelessness of priest, Franciscan community and bishop abandoning a dying young man fathered by the very same priest in a bizarre illicit relationship, Dolan is just venting a bishop’s disgusted regret of ever having allowed Catholic nuns to teach women like Dowd to even read and write.

I wish I were joking.

Dolan, like any good politician, really is only following the Vatican’s public relations/media playbook when trying to mitigate damning media coverage of priests’ pedophilia and ephebophilia (i.e., exclusive sexual attraction to adolescents), by whining about how unfair it is that the Catholic Church is singled out for special scrutiny by the media as opposed to other religious groups or professions (in this case, reports of child sexual abuse in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn).

The thinly veiled attempt to deliver to American religious women a full measure of the Vatican’s special brand of persecution (“by apostolic visitation”) is deliciously Roman: under the guise of a smarmy, unctuous concern for the state of American religious women, I suspect the Vatican is only trying to get their grubby little fingers on what’s left of the sisters’ financial and property assets as they continue to age and die. (Cardinal Rode, who heads the investigation, is notorious for funneling money into Vatican coffers no matter how unsavory the source.)

The hierarchs’ other favorite companion tactic is to posture themselves as modern day victims of “nativist anti-Catholic caricature[s]” and prejudices of mid-19th century America. This argument only makes sense if you are the rankest narcissist.

For the hierarchs, I guess it is any harbor in a storm. [If you want some background for this view, run a Lexus search on Catholic Church officials responding to adverse media coverage of priestly child sexual abuse.)

Dolan also reverts to another favorite bishops’ stratagem for undermining their in-house Catholic critics by the not-so-subtle suggestion that if one has a beef like Dowd’s, “why don’t you just leave the church?”

How dismissive and condescending is that?

Why should any American Catholic just leave because they resent and expose the rank hypocrisy of these bishops? Most American Catholics have never abetted the sexual exploitation of children, or engaged in corrupted, twisted leadership, or fraudulently mismanaged millions of dollars like many, if not most, bishops.

The hierarchs are betting that the public with its notoriously short memory will eventually forget their moral equivocation and complicity in the rape and sodomy of thousands of children. After all, that is the Roman way: they figure they will still be standing when all their critics have given up the ghost.

From the Roman Catholic clerical point of view, I sense that Dolan’s real problem with Dowd and Goodstein’s critique is sourced, like most, if not all, bishops and clerics, in a primitive, most of the time unconscious, fear and loathing of women. It is something clerics are acculturated to from their earliest seminary training. Maybe it goes way back to their early familial relationships?

I learned first-hand about this artifact of the clerical psyche while I served as chair of the review board of the San Francisco Archdiocese (then headed by William Cardinal Levada, now prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation of Christian Doctrine – formerly the Holy Office of the Inquisition, a post previously held by none other than Joseph Ratzinger, now Benedict XVI). The review board’s charge was to investigate allegations of child sexual abuse by priests. I had a front row seat to clinically observe this special clerical brand of misogyny at close range.

Dolan and his Vatican masters have a lot to fear from Dowd’s opinions and Goodstein’s reporting. Here are two women who have a prominent and prestigious platform at the NY Times strategically placed to circumvent the vaunted media and imaging-making machine of the world’s longest standing all-male feudal oligarchy.

As any politician in an undemocratic institution like the Catholic Church, for all his personal affability and genuine “healer” tendencies, Dolan is only trying to further ingratiate himself with the dons at the Vatican, because most certainly one day he hopes to wear the red hat of the exclusive and elite College of Cardinals, and be addressed deferentially as, “Eminenza.”

Sadly, it’s all the hierarchs live for. Something they have groveled and clawed after for most of their clerical careers.

My sainted sixth-grade teacher, Sister Adelaide, always told us to never confuse the Church for the Christ. Sister Adelaide counseled that we should imitate Jesus by being more concerned about how well we live the Beatitudes, practice the corporal works of mercy, and a lot less concerned about what she called “Pharisees enthralled with their own fervor.”

If American Catholics, especially those who still care enough to even associate with the church, are to endure, we desperately need Maureen Dowd and Laurie Goodstein’s continuing critique.

We should celebrate their voice, not try to silence them.

Jim Jenkins, Ph.D.

Jim Jenkins is a psychologist in private practice and a member of Newman Hall community at the University of California, Berkeley.

James A. Jenkins, Ph.D.     PSY 17650   268 Arlington Avenue, Kensington, CA 94707

jjenkinsphd@earthlink.net      510.559.9963

TABLE OF CONTENTS
 
Click on the headline to read the whole story.
 
 
1.  No decision on release of diocesan records on priest sex abuse – CONNECTICUT – Connecticut Post
 
2.  The ‘anti-Catholic!’ cry is a cheap, easy accusation – NEW YORK – National Catholic Reporter
 
3.  Louise Akers elevates women’s issues at CTA meeting – MILWAUKEE (WI) – National Catholic Reporter
 
4.  Jury selection completed in priest abuse trial – WILMINGTON (DE) – The News Journal
 
5.  God’s Other Banker – Forbes
 
6.  Human Sacrifices  – UNITED STATES – Breakpoint
 
7.  A Tribute to Pokrov – 10 Years of Courage and Commitment – UNITED STATES – Pokrov
 
8.  Burke’s influence is set to grow – VATICAN CITY – National Catholic Reporter
 

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No decision on release of diocesan records on priest sex abuse CONNECTICUT
Connecticut Post
By Daniel Tepfer
STAFF WRITER
WATERBURY — A Superior Court judge is expected to decide later this week how to release to the public hundreds of documents detailing allegations of sexual abuse by priests in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport.
During a hearing Monday at Waterbury Superior Court, lawyers for the diocese offered to go through the documents themselves and decide which ones should be made public.
“I believe we could do it in a day,” said Ralph Johnson, one of three lawyers representing the diocese during the hearing.
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The ‘anti-Catholic!’ cry is a cheap, easy accusationNEW YORK
National Catholic Reporter
by Tom Roberts on Nov. 09, 2009 NCR Today
It is unfortunate that Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York, new to the national stage and responsible for one of the most visible and potentially most influential sees in the nation, chose to play the tired anti-Catholic card so early in his tenure. His recent blog posting accused The New York Times and the wider culture of indulging in rampant anti-Catholic activity.
In doing so, he wastes the authority of his office by aligning it with such imprudent screamers as William Donohue and his Catholic League, which exists to raise money so it can continue to scream Fire! in the crowded theater of overcharged religionists.
The reality is, of course, that it is increasingly difficult to establish an anti-Catholic case of any substance or depth in the culture when so much — industry, politics, finance, academia, the Supreme Court itself — is in the hands of high-profile Catholics. …
Several members of the hierarchy, most notably Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver and now Archbishop Dolan, have attempted to distract our attention away from the severity of the sex abuse crisis in the church by pointing the finger at others — at teachers, Boy Scouts, the culture at large, the press — but it is an ineffective strategy. There are several principal reasons the church continues to come under scrutiny for its handling of crises and scandals related to sex, and none of them has to do with the press or an anti-Catholic culture.
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Louise Akers elevates women’s issues at CTA meetingMILWAUKEE (WI)
National Catholic Reporter
Nov. 09, 2009
By Thomas C. Fox

Charity Sr. Louise Akers, telling the story of how she was dismissed, after 40 years of teaching in the Cincinnati archdiocese, for not retracting her support for women’s ordination, held more than 2,000 Call to Action conference delegates spellbound here, and in the process united two women’s issues precious to many Catholics: the ban on women’s ordination and the Vatican’s secretive investigation of U.S. women religious.
Both, Akers explained, relegated women to lesser roles in the church, and are affronts to human dignity and grave injustices that all Catholic need to confront. …
The church, Akers said, needs to be more inclusive not just in outreach, but also within its internal structures. … A church that is universal in cultures and inclusive in gender would project a renewed presence. There is also a need for persistence in raising questions or objections to such abuses as the pedophile scandal. The lack of accountability is more and more evident and cries out for a new model of leadership.”
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Jury selection completed in priest abuse trialWILMINGTON (DE)
The News Journal
By SEAN O’SULLIVAN · The News Journal · November 9, 2009
WILMINGTON – Jury selection was completed today in the civil trial against the Oblates of St. Francis de Sales by former Salesianum student James Sheehan, who alleges that he was sexually abused by a now-deceased priest at the school in 1962.
The process to select 12 jurors and four alternates, before Superior Court Judge Calvin L. Scott Jr., began around 11 a.m. and was completed before 3 p.m.
Opening arguments in the case are set for 9:30 a.m. next Monday.
This case of alleged priest abuse is one of the few brought under the Delaware Child Victims Act of 2007 that was not affected by the Catholic Diocese of Wilmington filing for bankruptcy because the defendant is a religious order, which is separate from the diocese.
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God’s Other BankerForbes
Brian Wingfield
When Goldman Sachs boss Lloyd Blankfein told The Times of London recently that bankers are “doing God’s work,” the cautionary tale of another successful businessman with ties to finance, London and the Almighty came quickly to mind.
Back in the early 1980s, Roberto Calvi, head of Italy’s Banco Ambrosiano, was known as “God’s banker,” because of his business connections to the Vatican. In 1982, the bank went belly up in the wake of a massive fraud scandal dealing with offshore accounts.
As the investigation unfolded, a complicated picture began to emerge, involving Calvi, the Holy See, a secretive Masonic lodge, the Mafia and allegations of money laundering. That June, “God’s banker” vanished; his body was soon found hanging from the scaffolding beneath London’s Blackfriars Bridge.
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Human Sacrifices UNITED STATES
Breakpoint
[with audio]
By Mark Earley|
Published Date: November 05, 2009
It’s never easy for Christians to look at scandal within the Church. But for the sake of truth, healing, and the integrity of the faith, we must.
In the new documentary All God’s Children, there’s a lot of talk about sacrifice. Near the beginning of the film, Dr. Bob Fetherlin, vice president of International Ministries for the Christian and Missionary Alliance, says, “The advance of the Kingdom of God historically has always involved some suffering and hardship…We know that there will be sacrifice involved.”
Then we hear two more people, Beverly Shellrude Thompson and Rich Darr, talking about sacrifice. But their perspective is very different. Thompson, Darr, and others in the film say that they themselves were sacrificed when they were children. Sent to a Christian and Missionary Alliance boarding school while their parents served as missionaries in Africa, they claim they were physically, sexually, emotionally, and spiritually abused by their house parents and teachers.v
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A Tribute to Pokrov – 10 Years of Courage and CommitmentUNITED STATES
Pokrov
Author: Paul Cromidas
Date Published: 11/7/2009
Publication: Pokrov.org
It was the early 90’s when Melanie Jula Sakoda and Cappy Larson thought they had found a home in Orthodoxy at San Francisco’s Holy Trinity Cathedral, part of the OCA – The Orthodox Church in America.
Instead, they found a nightmare: a place where a layman went about the church wearing black clothes and a large cross, but was molesting children of the parish. This was taking place even though he had admitted to the pastor that he had a history of pedophilia. As many as 11 children were victimized, some were toddlers.
When parents sought redress and understanding from the church and its hierarchy their nightmare continued. The head of the OCA at the time, Metropolitan Theodosius Lazor, never replied directly to the parents. He did so through his chancellor, who would then direct the parents to deal with their bishop, Tikhon Fitzgerald. The bishop, now retired, at one point admonished parents to “get a life – get a life in Christ”.
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Burke’s influence is set to growVATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
Nov. 06, 2009
By John L Allen Jr
Archbishop Raymond Burke’s Oct. 17 appointment to the powerful Congregation for Bishops offers an illustration of how in the Vatican, even the ordinary can be extraordinary.
The appointment means that the 61-year-old Burke, a frequently polarizing figure during his 12-year run as a bishop in the United States, is now in a position to put his stamp on the next generation of Catholic bishops all over the world.
At one level, Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to tap Burke for the role was the dictionary definition of pro forma. Of the 33 members of the Congregation for Bishops at the beginning of 2009, 25 were current or former Vatican officials, including Burke’s predecessor as prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, the church’s highest court. (Burke was actually appointed on Oct. 17 along with another recently installed curial official, Spanish Cardinal Antonio Cañizares Llovera, who heads the Vatican’s liturgical office.)
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On this special day let us all remember those who have served in the Armed Forces of our country and who, as children or vulnerable adults, have been subjected to the horrors of sexual rape and molestation.

Some have come forward to seek justice and healing. Some are still, after many years, keeping their secrets in their hearts. Some are now silent forever.

All deserve to have their memory enshrined in our hearts, receive our thanks for their service to our country, and be kept in our thoughts and prayers, today and always.

Steve Sheehan, Publisher
NSAC News

Spurs On Bridgeport Catholics to Keep the Pressure On For Release of Diocesan Documents

                 For Immediate Release

The National Survivors Advocates Coalition (NSAC) calls upon Catholics in the Diocese of Bridgeport, CT and throughout the country to be actively vigilant regarding the release of documents that the diocese fought up to and including a request for an appeal hearing from the United States Supreme Court.

The coalition asked Catholics to remember that the Archdiocese of Los Angeles settlement in 2007 included a provision for the release of documents. This release has yet to be fulfilled. The same is true in the Diocese of San Diego where full disclosure of documents is still not complete.

“We urgently ask our fellow Catholics to make it a priority that the Diocese of Bridgeport’s records be released, “the coalition said, “Let us not go the way of Los Angeles and San Deigo where promises become vapors.”

The coalition said, “In the same way that we cannot be complacent about the hierarchy, we cannot take for granted that because the United States Supreme Court denied an appeal hearing to the Diocese of Bridgeport that the Monday, November 9 status conference in Superior Court in Waterbury, CT that there will be an unobstructed path to the release of documents.”

“The roots and values of our faith unite us, “ the coalition added, “and we can do no less than heed our call to conscience to be vigilantly engaged in this process.”

Catholics in Bridgeport were asked by the coalition to:
• Contact Bishop William Lori in person, by letter or through comments on his blog (www.bridgportdiocese.com Bishop Lori’s blog) and inform him they are actively vigilant and expect deterrents to the release of documents to cease
• bring up the matter with their parish priests this weekend and ask them to bring up the matter in any meeting with the Bishop and at meetings of priest councils
• keep the document issue alive through conversations with fellow Catholics
• contact the judge handling the release of documents
• write letters to the editor the expressing their opinions about the process of the release of documents
• seriously consider withholding financial support to the diocese and their parishes if they documents are not released with all deliberate speed

Contact:
Kristine Ward, Chair, National Survivor Advocates Coalition 937-272-0308

Full Text of the National Survivor Advocates Coalition Statement

The National Survivors Advocates Coalition (NSAC) calls upon Catholics in the Diocese of Bridgeport, CT and throughout the country to be actively vigilant regarding the release of documents that the diocese fought up to and including a request for a hearing from the United States Supreme Court.

Let us remember that the Archdiocese of Los Angeles settlement in 2007 included a provision for the release of documents. This release has yet to be fulfilled.
The same is true in the Diocese of San Diego where full disclosure of documents is still not complete.

Let us not go the way of Los Angeles and San Diego where promises become vapors.

We believed in years past that all as well with matters of our church resting solely in the hands of hierarchs. We have learned that children were raped and sodomized while the priest perpetrators of these heinous crimes were protected by the hierarchy and moved to unsuspecting parishes and their crimes were never reported to the police.

In the same way that we cannot be complacent about the hierarchy, we cannot take for granted that because the United States Supreme Court denied an appeal hearing to the Diocese of Bridgeport that the Monday, November 9 status conference in Superior Court in Waterbury, CT that there will be an unobstructed path to the release of documents.

The roots and values of our faith unite us and we can do no less than heed our call to conscience to be vigilantly engaged in this process.

We call upon our fellow Catholics to learn the hard lessons of the past and rise to the call of conscience of our faith.

We call upon the Catholics of Bridgeport to stand in the vanguard of letting the truth be told.

We call on the Catholics of Bridgeport to aid with full full and vigor the healing and support of victims of clergy sexual abuse. Let those who have been shunned be welcomed.

We urge Catholics in the Diocese of Bridgeport to:
• Contact Bishop William Lori in person, by letter or through comments on his blog (www.bridgportdiocese.com Bishop Lori’s blog) and inform him they are actively vigilant and expect deterrents to the release of documents to cease
• bring up the matter with their parish priests this weekend and ask them to bring up the matter in any meeting with the Bishop and at meetings of priest councils
• keep the document issue alive through conversations with fellow Catholics
• contact the judge handling the release of the documents
• write letters to the editor expressing their opinions about the process of the release of documents
• seriously consider withholding financial support to the diocese and their parishes if they documents are not released with all deliberate speed

 This section of NSAC News is designed to permit Survivor Advocates to express their opinions and ideas relevant to the subject matter of this newsletter. Your participation is invited and encouraged. Letters to the Editor addressing a particular article should be sent to the Editor of the publication. in which the article originally appeared.  This Op-Ed section provides a forum for our readers to express their independent views.

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A Fork in the Road

 James Jenkins, Ph.D.

 Wednesday, 21 October 2009, I learned from the NY Times of the announcement in Rome by William Cardinal Levada, the Vatican’s chief doctrinal watchdog, that the Roman Catholic Church was taking steps to ease the way, more likely grease the skids, for conservative, reactionary Anglican bishops and priests to be fully accepted into the Catholic communion.

 There are continuing reports out of the Vatican that there is a lot of “inside-Roman-baseball” that underlies much of this story.  Apparently, both Anglicans and Roman officials charged with shepherding “ecumenical dialogue” were caught off-guard and surprised by this audacious announcement emanating from Levada’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (formerly the Holy Office of the Inquisition).

 My own speculation is that this whole incident demonstrates the preference of Benedict XVI’s papacy for exercising his absolute power through his most favored bureaucracy, staffed and stacked with his most trusted operatives, which he fashioned to his own will over two decades as its leader before becoming pope.  We have to presume that Benedict is no fan of collegiality.

 For me personally, this moment seems more like the reflection poet Robert Frost offers in his poem, “The Road Not Taken.”  Spiritually, religiously, and culturally, “Two roads diverged in a wood…”

 After years of revelations of the exploitation of children by sexually rapacious clerics, and the moral betrayal of supposed shepherd-bishops, shell-shocked Catholics are now treated to the spectacle of Vatican politicians, Benedict chief among them, of trying to cherry-pick the low hanging fruit off the Anglican branch of the vine.

 I can almost hear the Anglicans, and their fellow American Episcopalians, heaving a giant sigh of relief that finally someone is willing to take their embarrassing problems off their hands. 

 How politically opportunistic!  This is so rich, so Vatican!  The Vatican apparently hopes to cannibalize Anglican misogynistic and homophobic misfits in order to prop up their own dead-end ideology and failed pastoral leadership of the past forty years? Where is the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in that?

 Is this political ploy the fruit of Benedict’s chosen strategy to reclaim the spiritual heart of an alienated Western Europe and North America?  These democratic societies are the very ones the Vatican considers in the throes of “moral relativism” and, by the Vatican’s repeated words and actions over the years, have wished again and again consigned to the historical ash heap.

  This comes in the context of other Vatican shenanigans.  The Vatican is now in the midst of an “investigation” of American religious women, who after making decisive contributions to the cultural and economic development of Catholics in the United States, are now aging and dwindling in numbers.

 There are not a few of us Catholics who smell a clerical rat.  I suspect that the true motivation for this investigation of American Catholic sisters is not to fathom the decline of religious life in American society.  On the contrary, the Vatican seems to more likely to positioning themselves to pick the carcass of the sisters, who have limited but substantial financial and property holdings, in these days of diminishing and depleted church treasuries. 

 I’m sorry, but I can’t think of any other motive for the clerics but power and greed.  They want to be the beneficiaries when these American nuns are no longer able to offer any dissent, or cause trouble by educating the Catholic masses about their individual dignity and independent moral conscience – not highly valued principle by our Vatican clerical overlords.

 I digress.

Let those who want to cling to Roman ways and traditions, continue to do so.  I have to admit that I consider this choice a dead-end.  The signs of the times are all around us, and have been for a long time:  The clerical dominated Catholic Church is passing away.

 The child sexual abuse scandal ripped away any pretense of a healthy, vibrant community led by their celibate priests.  Laid bare was the morally bankrupt and corrupt leadership of bishops and priests complicit in the rape and sodomy of children.  The full scope of the clerics’ financial chicanery and fraud has been assiduously repressed and has yet to be fully disclosed.

 In a shocking reversal of the gospel, our shepherds now aided and abetted the wolves preying on the most vulnerable of the sheep, our children.  The betrayal, the shame, the humiliation will be with Catholics for many, many decades.

  Millions of Americans no longer are even willing to call themselves Catholic, let alone attend or even associate with the church. Priests, most of whom are our friends and confessors, are dying off with fewer and fewer quality replacements.  Parishes and schools are being sold off, many times to easy the financial hit from over $2 billion in settlements from the sex abuse scandal.

 The appropriate response of American Catholics, who seek a reformed and renewed Christian community, rooted in our own cultural and historical traditions, should be to declare our American Catholic Independence.

 We American Catholics should throw off “Old World,” Vatican religious and spiritual hegemony.  Like the ancient Eastern or Oriental rites of the church, we should establish our own American Catholic Rite and be done with it.

 The Roman rite can remain a home for those who still cling to that clerical worldview.  An all male celibate, hierarchical priesthood will most likely continue.  The church over the centuries has always managed to suffer on and endure.  The Vatican and pope could still function as a unifying force for Christianity maybe without the stifling need for absolute control.  But this time, just maybe, in a more humble manifestation.

 This new rite would reflect American democratic traditions and individual freedoms, our unique indigenous culture.  The new American rite could be a church where the PEOPLE DECIDE about our liturgy and prayer, how we manage and administer our resources, whom we ordain, how we designate our leadership.  Anything less, it shouldn’t survive.

 The American rite will only give expression to a distinct cultural identity and spiritual integrity.  It will be uniquely suited to pass on in the American cultural context the values of the gospel, the practice of the Beatitudes and corporal works of mercy, the singular vision of Jesus as the Prince of Peace.

 Taking a page out of the Vatican playbook, American Catholics should ask the Episcopalians for help and assistance in establishing and organizing our new rite.  Most American Catholics would be surprised to learn how much the Episcopalians, while not perfect, already model the church we seek.  We will need guidance in forming our governance, selecting men and women for our priesthood, and establishing a new pastoral identity.

 I am presuming that the Roman church will not be very generous in sharing the resources and infrastructure of the present American church with this new endeavor of a new American rite.  With some striking out to find their own way, the clerics most likely will be hurt and feel abandoned especially when so many indicators foretell a bleak future. 

 Yet, we will need places to meet for worship and prayer, places to educate and form our children.  American Catholics, if we are to survive let alone endure, will have to begin from scratch.

 Like the traveler in Frost’s poem, American Catholics have a decision which path to pursue: Do we stay with the Romans stuck in an alienating reality?  Or, do we strike out on our own fulfilling the best promise of Vatican II. 

 An inexorable evolution toward a Peoples’ Church has already begun.  The evidence has been with us for a very long time.  It may take us decades, whole lifetimes, but we must begin this journey now.  We must help this new Light burn brighter.  Frost’s ending stanza can only give us hope:

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

     Hopes It Frees Any Person with Information to Come Forward

It is our sincere hope that the United States Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the appeal of Father Gerald Robinson convicted of murdering Sister Margaret Pahl in Toledo, Ohio in 1980 will provide some sense of peace to the Pahl family.

Given the Vatican’s current investigation of US nuns, there seems no better time to wonder where the Vatican’s heft and moral leadership were when a no holds barred approach to finding the killer was needed when Sister Margaret was found slain in the hospital chapel on Holy Saturday 1980.

Instead officials of the Toledo Diocese, the same diocese now headed by Bishop Blair who is carrying out the Vatican’s investigation of nuns, block and blunted a true investigation of Father Robinson.

The Supreme Court has done what Catholic bishops have failed to do: provide justice to victims. This shameful stain cries out for Bishop Blair to seek out any and all victims of Father Robinson and all sexual abuse victims. We hope this decision is freeing for any person who may have any additional information regarding Father Robinson and it is an impetus to come forward to the Toledo police.

Contact:
- Kristine Ward, chair, National Survivor Advocates Coalition
  937-272-0308