MONTREAL -- Since May 5, 2021, the phone has been ringing at least once a day at the home of Marie Christine Kirouack, the Montreal lawyer to whom Archbishop Christian Lépine has entrusted the responsibility of receiving all complaints of abuse and inappropriate behavior committed by priests, staff members and volunteers of the Archdiocese of Montreal.

Ever since the world learned about priests and brothers abusing orphan boys at Mount Cashel, for 40 years Canada’s Catholics have lived with a public image of their Church as hypocritical and defensive.  As more abuse scandals rumbled across headlines and through the courts, public contempt for the Catholic Church became commonplace. Add onto this mountain of shame all that we’ve learned lately about Indian residential schools.

WASHINGTON -- Former Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick pleaded not guilty Sept. 3 in a Massachusetts court, where he is facing three counts of sexually assaulting a teenager in the 1970s.

Quebec’s Brothers of the Sacred Heart agreed to pay $60 million to settle two class-action lawsuits on clerical sexual abuse.

VATICAN CITY -- While acknowledging Vatican-mandated reforms in the handling of clerical sexual abuse, four U.N. special rapporteurs urged the Vatican to make it mandatory that church officials everywhere report abuse allegations to civil authorities.

Jane Doe never attended Mount Cashel Orphanage, but she knows the second-hand impact all too well. 

COLOGNE, Germany -- The second expert report commissioned to investigate abuse in the Archdiocese of Cologne also incriminates church officials who are still alive and accuses them of mistakes in dealing with cases of sexualized violence, according to its author, Björn Gercke.

OTTAWA -- Archbishop Peter Hundt says “sacrifices” will have to be made, but the Archdiocese of St. John’s has to move forward with compassion and understanding after a “dark chapter” of abuse in the Newfoundland archdiocese’s history.

A victim of former priest and notorious sexual abuser Charles Sylvestre can reopen her civil suit against the Diocese of London, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled Feb. 11.

DODGE CITY, Kan. -- Denying any wrongdoing, Bishop John B. Brungardt of Dodge City has stepped away from his duties and pledged to cooperate with authorities investigating an allegation of abuse of a minor made against him.

In the midst of the Christmas season, Dan Cere sees signs of Easter in the Archdiocese of Montreal.

VATICAN CITY -- A French criminal court found an Italian archbishop who was once the Vatican's ambassordor to Canada guilty of sexual assault against four men and handed him, in absentia, an eight-month suspended prison sentence.

VANCOUVER -- The Archdiocese of Vancouver has released the names of three priests involved in settlements related to sexual abuse and confirmed 13 more people have come forward with abuse allegations.

The Boucher Report, released on Nov. 25 by the Archdiocese of Montreal, makes for distressing reading. The tale told therein also illustrates how failures in Canada may have contributed to the significant reforms made by Pope Francis last year aimed at changing the culture of episcopal governance.

In the weeks since the Vatican released its report regarding disgraced former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, the blame game has been in full swing.