Catholic News Service

Catholic News Service

VATICAN – The abuse crisis in the Catholic Church is a call for bishops to unmask the deep-seated clericalism that placed protection of the institution of the church above the sufferings of victims, said the head of the council of Latin American bishops. 
VATICAN – Catholics need to know that their leaders "mean business" when it comes to protecting minors from abuse, the Vatican's top abuse investigator told representatives of the world's bishops and religious orders.
VATICAN – "Every time I refused to have sex with him, he would beat me," an abuse survivor from Africa told Pope Francis and bishops attending the Vatican summit on child protection and the abuse crisis.
VATICAN – Opening the Vatican summit on child protection and the clerical sexual abuse crisis, Pope Francis said, "The holy people of God are watching and are awaiting from us not simple, predictable condemnations, but concrete and effective measures" to stop abuse.
WASHINGTON – The Catholic high school student at the center of an encounter with a Native American tribal leader in Washington filed a $250 million defamation lawsuit Feb. 19 against The Washington Post claiming the newspaper's coverage of the incident was biased.
VATICAN – Abuse survivors and support groups were very clear about what they want the world's bishops, religious superiors, the pope and the Vatican to do to protect children and end clerical sexual abuse.
DUBLIN – Ahead of a major Vatican summit on the protection of minors, Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh, Northern Ireland, has criticized Catholics who use the issue of clerical abuse to score points against people they disagree with in the church.
VATICAN – Catholics should speak up when things go wrong in the church, but theirs must be constructive criticism delivered with love, Pope Francis said, otherwise the devil is at work.
VATICAN – When speaking to God as a father, Christians experience a love that goes beyond human love and affection, which can be unpredictable and mired by selfishness, Pope Francis said.
OAKLAND, Calif. – The Diocese of Oakland, which serves two California counties in the East Bay area, published Feb. 18 a list of priests, deacons and religious brothers who have worked in the diocese and been credibly accused of abuse, dating back to the diocese's founding in 1962.