The Vatican will open an investigation into French Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard, the retired archbishop of Bordeaux, who admitted in a public letter that he had abused a 14-year-old girl 35 years ago.

In the past two months, courts gave the go-ahead for class-action lawsuits involving 100 plaintiffs alleging sexual abuse in the Archdiocese of Quebec and the Diocese of St. Hyacinthe near Montreal.

A Superior Court judge authorized the filing of a class action suit related to sex abuse cases against the Diocese of Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec.

Pope Francis asked his safeguarding commission to provide an annual audit of what the church is doing to protect minors and what needs to change, as well as to urge bishops' conferences to set up special "centers" where victims can be heard and find accompaniment toward "healing and justice."

As Archbishop Christian Lépine moved through the last days of Lent toward Easter 2022, he acknowledged the worst Cross to bear in his 10 years leading Montreal Roman Catholics has been the scandal of clerical sexual abuse.

VATICAN CITY -- Amending a written statement made to a panel investigating clerical sexual abuse in his former Archdiocese of Munich and Freising, retired Pope Benedict XVI said he was present at a 1980 meeting to discuss the transfer of a priest accused of misconduct.

MUNICH -- A law firm's report on how abuse cases were handled in the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising incriminated retired Pope Benedict XVI, with lawyers accusing him of misconduct in four cases during his tenure as Munich archbishop.

WARSAW, Poland -- A Polish diocese apologized after its lawyer suggested a former altar server could have enjoyed being sexually molested by a priest, as a spokesman for victims warned the church still had "a long way to go" in combating abuse.

MUNICH -- As Germans await publication of a report on how leaders of the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising handled cases of historic abuse, a canon lawyer casts doubt on accusations against retired Pope Benedict XVI over possible negligence.

The Archdiocese of Montreal has received 75 formal complaints, 46 of which relate to abuse, dating back to 1950, according to the second quarterly report compiled by an independent ombudsman.

LOURDES, France -- France's Catholic bishops have unveiled new measures to counter sexual abuse by clergy after an October report by an independent commission estimated more than 330,000 children had been abused since the 1950s.

A Canadian priest who served in three different Canadian dioceses from 2010 to 2013 has been convicted by a French court in the 2019 sexual assault of four teenage girls in France and Italy.

VATICAN CITY -- An adult survivor of abuse by a priest appealed to the world’s seminarians to become good priests and to make sure the “bitter truth” always prevails, not silence about scandals and their cover-up.

The 2023 Synod on Synodality can’t come fast enough for physician, ethicist and expert on sexual abuse by priests Sr. Nuala Kenny.

Just in case any of us thought the abuse crisis in the Church has moved from a boil to a simmer, the report from an independent commission on sexual abuse in France has turned up the heat yet again — as it should.