Guilty! The boy of St Vincent said. "Guilty, your honour," Lahey said.

4th May 2011

A Roman Catholic bishop has been found guilty of importing child pornography in a case that has sent shockwaves through Canada and the Church.
Bishop Raymond Lahey was stopped at Ottawa Airport after border guards found 588 images and dozens of videos of naked boys as young as eight on his computer and phone.
He was also carrying a bag of personal sex toys. He was found guilty on the charge today.

...


...
Twenty years ago, Earle and his brother Shane Earle testified at Newfoundland and Labrador’s Hughes inquiry into the Mount Cashel orphanage, where they suffered abuse as children.

Shane Earle says he told police back then that Lahey befriended him when Lahey was a priest in Mount Pearl, but the friendship ended when Earle and another boy found pornographic videos and photos in Lahey’s home.
Billy and Shane Earle said the news that Lahey is facing child pornography charges now has turned their minds back to that horrible time and that they’ve been talking and reliving their experiences with Lahey.

In an email sent to his brother Billy, Shane Earle says he told police 20 years ago the pornography he saw at Lahey’s home was child pornography.

“During the investigation in 1989 I did reveal to police that during a visit to Father Raymond Lahey’s house in Mount Pearl, I found catalogues of child pornography addressed to Ray Lahey. The pictures were of teen boys sexually aroused,” wrote Shane Earle, in an email that Billy Earle showed to CBC News.

Possession of child pornography only became a crime in the 1990s.

Shane Earle’s allegations to a St. John’s newspaper in the 1980s launched the investigation into what happened at Mount Cashel.

Lahey will be test of church's new rules Faces defrocking over child porn

A huge folder on Raymond Lahey’s personal computer contained sexually charged images, including one of a boy who appears as young as nine touching himself while wearing nothing but rosary beads, police say. ...

Disgraced Catholic Bishop Raymond Lahey will be the first test of new church rules dealing with clerics involved with child pornography.

It is possible that Lahey, who is expected to be sentenced today after pleading guilty to possessing violent child pornography, will be defrocked by the Catholic Church.

"It is extremely rare for a bishop to be removed from the clerical state because typically bishops haven't committed these types of crimes," said Chad Glendinning, a canon law professor at Ottawa's Saint Paul University. "But he has admitted his guilt so it makes it a little easier for the Holy See. They need not hold a full hearing to determine his guilt so could send the matter directly to the Pope and he could make the decision to dismiss him. But this isn't automatic. It's a possibility but not an inevitability."

In May 2010, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith approved new rules to deal with clerics who use child pornography and made it a crime under canon law to possess child pornography. The Lahey case is the first to be dealt with under those new rules, so the Catholic Church will enter new ground in when it decides his fate.

There are other options besides defrocking, Glendinning said. Other sanctions open to the Pope include prohibiting Lahey from publicly celebrating the liturgy or assigning him to a life of prayer and penance.

"It all has a similar effect as dismissing him from the clerical state (defrocking)," he said.

Michael Swan, associate editor of The Catholic Register, described Lahey as being in canon law limbo.

"In terms of the application of canon law to bishops on this, it is sort of unprecedented" Swan said. "So, like any legal system, it is going to create precedents."

Lahey was arrested at Ottawa Airport in September 2009 after authorities found nearly 600 pornographic images on his laptop computer. Some showed young boys engaged in bondage and torture. In some images, the boys were wearing crucifixes and rosary beads.

Lahey pleaded guilty in May 2011 and voluntarily entered jail to begin serving his sentence.

Shortly after his arrest, Lahey resigned his post, becoming officially known as "The Former Bishop of Antigonish."

Within the Catholic Church, he is and always will remain a bishop.

Raymond Lahey graphic images

25-6-2008
"The Diocese of Antigonish acknowledges that sexual abuse did occur with certain priests, some of whom have already been criminally convicted and punished for such horrific crimes," said Raymond Lahey, Bishop of Antigonish, in a statement issued June 25.

"We are committed to providing compassion, compensation and counseling to these victims‚ and we hope to structure a service of reconciliation and healing," said Lahey.

August 7, 2009

Good Morning Ladies and Gentlemen. Thank you for your presence here today.

I am Bishop Raymond Lahey of the Diocese of Antigonish.

Before I say anything else here today, as Bishop of Antigonish, I want to formally apologize to every victim and to their families for the sexual abuse that was inflicted upon those who were entitled instead to the trust and protection of priests of the Church.

I want them to know how terribly sorry we are; how wrong this abuse was, and how we are now attempting to right those wrongs. Money can never compensate fully, but we are trying throughout this process to be fair, responsible, respectful, and most of all, compassionate. Above all, we want to do the right thing.

bron

bishops fingers; Where is Bishop Raymond Lahey? Polanski the Sequel.

For the information of the Press and any other inquirers.

Bishop Raymond Lahey is not in residence here. The press seems to have anticipated something that may have been discussed in the court proceedings but was not definitively decided upon. Ultimately some other arrangement has been made for Bishop Lahey's residence. We are not expecting him coming to reside here.
The Crown Prosecution Service never formally requested my consent to Bishop Lahey's coming here, and I am not expecting them to do so.

Bede Stockill
Abbot
Sunday 4 October 2009 AM.

"Nobody wants him here, he'd have to have brothers or sisters or family that he could go stay with; I'm pretty sure they've got room in the Vatican in Rome," said (burgemeester) LeBlanc.

Stockill said RCMP officers have visited the monastery to check in on Lahey but haven't been back since.

He said if Lahey were to turn up he would be welcomed into the sanctuary.

"Yes we will, but I'm not expecting him to (turn up)," said Stockell.

Bishop Raymond Lahey en z'n kinderporno

OTTAWA — A sentencing hearing for a Catholic bishop who possessed child pornography has been delayed until August.
Raymond Lahey was scheduled to be in court on Friday for a daylong hearing for submissions on the length of his sentence.

On Tuesday, the hearing was pushed back to Aug. 4 and 5 because the Crown had yet to receive Lahey’s clinical file from Dr. John Bradford, the psychiatrist who examined Lahey at the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre.

Prosecutors want time to examine the clinical records to properly cross-examine Bradford about his findings in a sexual behaviours assessment.

Lahey, who voluntarily went to jail after pleading guilty in May to possessing child pornography for the purpose of importation, faces a one-year mandatory minimum sentence.
The 71-year-old was bishop of Antigonish in Nova Scotia when he was caught with child pornography on his laptop computer when he was passing through the Ottawa airport in summer 2009 after a trip abroad.

He retains his rank in the Catholic Church until a canonical disciplinary process concludes.
Lahey had been a central figure in settling a lawsuit against his diocese over the sexual abuse of children by priests in Nova Scotia. The diocese agreed to pay $15 million.

The material he was caught with in Ottawa, about five weeks later, included photographs and stories featuring the humiliation and degradation of young boys.

did Lehay make a deal with the Canadian court system, Was Lehay rewarded for deals with government officials, Catholic hierarchies cover up?

Let's make a deal -- let's finally protect children instead of dysfunctional sex freaks

October 3,
Pittsburgh Independent Examiner
Mike Ference

My last examiner article was not meant to be prophetic. I guess after almost 20 years of investigating dysfunctional sex freaks like Raymond Lahey, a 69-year-old Roman Catholic Bishop who was recently released on $9,000 bail, charged with possessing and importing child pornography, maybe it just comes with the territory.

I thought some would view my ranting and raving about how law enforcement and elected officials must choose to look the other way, rather than confront pious and pathetic Catholic Church leaders when clerics are caught or suspected of heinous crimes against innocent children. In the case of Bishop Lahey, maybe his lust for child pornography was hidden with similar skills displayed on the game show “Let’s Make A Deal,” where contestants could bargain and negotiate their way through a series of propositions hoping to win a grand prize behind door number one, two or three.

It’s very possible that Canadian police may have been aware of Lahey’s interest in child pornography as early as 1989 – albeit, in 1989 child pornography was not a crime in Canada.

CBS News reported that a former resident of the infamous Mount Cashel orphanage told police 20 years ago that he had seen child pornography in Lahey’s home, in the St. John’s suburb of Mount Pearl. Two brothers Billy and Shane Earle testified at Newfoundland and Labrador’s Hughes inquiry into the Mount Cashel orphanage, where the two boys had suffered abuse.

CBS News quoted from an email Earle had sent to his brother Billy: “During the investigation in 1989 I did reveal to police that during a visit to Father Raymond Lahey’s house in Mount Pearl, I found catalogs of child pornography addressed to Ray Lehay. The pictures were of teen boys sexually aroused.”

If the report is accurate, did Lehay play let’s make a deal with the Canadian court system to keep the information hushed up? Was Lehay rewarded with a bishop post because of his skills in parleying deals with government officials to cover up sex abuse crimes against innocent children? Did Lehay help Catholic hierarchy cover-up other clergy abuse crimes? If so, how many other victims went without help? How many resorted to drugs or alcohol? How many victims committed suicide?

We have to ask these questions. Catholic church hierarchy have had decades – if not centuries – to fess up to dysfunctional sex freaks parading around as priests, bishops, cardinals – and yes, even popes. Instead, God’s most precious commodity – innocent children – are nothing more than bargaining chips for whatever prizes the Catholic church doles out to protect dysfunctional sex freaks. Contestants can win cash and other prizes; scholarships to Catholic universities and colleges for sons and daughters; lucrative distribution contracts with Catholic institutions; career advancement and job placement with corrupt political cronies; the list goes on and on. And so do the crimes and the cover-ups

The struggle continues as the “congregation” of victims continues to grow.

Snotneusies met rode, blauwe, groene en gele t-shirtjes

[...] The conferences inspires teens in their Catholic faith through talks, music, prayer, the Mass, fellowship and praise and worship. The theme for the weekend, Above All, was taken from 1 Chronicles 29:11 — “Yours, O Lord, are the greatness, the power, the glory, the victory, and the majesty; for all that is in the heavens and on the earth is yours; yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and you are exalted as head above all.”

Bishop Raymond Lahey gave the homily at the weekend’s closing Mass.
He spoke about the friendship of Christ and placing Him above all.
“Let him be the Lord of your life. You will have peace and strength.
“If Jesus Christ is Lord of our lives, if he is above all, if we love Jesus, we will want to live in obedience to his commands,” Bishop Lahey said.
He encouraged the youth to turn to the Holy Spirit in times of need.
[...]

Halifax — Globe and Mail Update
Oliver Moore Friday, Oct. 16, 2009
A huge folder on Raymond Lahey’s personal computer contained sexually charged images, including one of a boy who appears as young as nine touching himself while wearing nothing but rosary beads, police say. ...

...
The documents allege that Lahey used MSN to chat with people he meets online and that the conversations were often sexual in nature, but he thought the people involved were adults.

One document also says the RCMP officer seeking the search warrant interviewed Shane Earle, a Newfoundland man who alleges he saw a catalogue of child pornographic images in Lahey's bedroom when he was a priest in St. John's in the mid-1980s.

In the search warrant, it is alleged Earle told the officer last week that "the images were of boys not older than 13 years old and that in some of the images the boys were sexually aroused."

Earle has said in an interview that he told police in Newfoundland about the incident a few years after it is alleged to have occurred. His claims prompted police there to review their files, but they say they have not found any record of it.

In 1989, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. John's commissioned an inquiry into the sexual abuse of boys by members of the clergy and Christian Brothers. Headed by former Lieutenant-Governor Gordon Winter, an Anglican, the commission strongly criticized the Archdiocesan administration for its handling of child abuse allegations, writing that it adopted a "minimal response policy" (138) which often amounted to no more than sending the offenders out of the province.

BRON

"Church officials aligned themselves with the accused;" the commission wrote, "their response to victims was thus inappropriate and un-Christian and this compounded the victims' initial sense of betrayal by the Church" (139). Archbishop Alphonsus Penney resigned as a result of the commission's findings.

bron

A TALE OF TWO BISHOPS

and 

the saga of Raymond Lahey

by

Richard Sipe  2012

CBC KLIK

5-10-2009 
The Telegram

The Canadian Press

Former archbishop Alphonsus Penney had been made aware
of child porn allegations 20 years ago: Archdiocese says

...

During a public inquiry into abuse at Mount Cashel in October 1989, Shane Earle - a former resident of the orphanage - testified he saw something in Lahey's home as a teenager that disturbed him and caused his hospitalization for depression.

The inquiry heard that the incident happened in 1985 at Lahey's home. Earle said he lost control after spotting something in the house, but at that point inquiry lawyer Clayton Powell quickly warned him not to mention what he had seen.
Police in Newfoundland and Labrador are reviewing the allegation including audio and video records of interviews with "victims and offenders" from the investigation of sex abuse allegations at the Mount Cashel orphanage.


Today the Archdiocese of St. John's said last Thursday it became aware of Earle's testimony.

According to a news release, it states that since hearing the media reports, Archbishop Martin Currie asked for a review of what officials in the Archdiocese might have known at the time.

In the Hughes Inquiry Report, it is written: "He (Shane Earle) went to Portugal Cove and spoke to Father Kevin Molloy, telling him stories of Mount Cashel that upset the priest who promised to make inquiries."

Based on this information, Currie contacted Molloy and was informed by Molloy that he had met with Earle and that the conversation between them included reference to Lahey. 
Molloy said he passed on the information he learned from Earle to then Archbishop Penney.

klik

The latest scandal has hit the Catholic Church hard.

Lahey's laptop and other media devices were seized by border guards when he was returning to Canada at the Ottawa airport on Sept. 15. Ottawa police charged him with possession and importing child pornography on Sept. 25 after a forensic investigation found images that police say were of "concern."

In his testimony to the public inquiry, Earle said senior officials of the Christian Brothers at Mount Cashel - including Lahey while he was still a priest - were told about sex involving boys and brothers at the orphanage.

Earle said he told Lahey that he had seen a brother having sex with several boys and the priest told him he had recommended to a member of the order's executive council in Toronto that the brother be removed from the orphanage, which was run by the Roman Catholic lay order for decades.

Weeks after his conversation with Lahey, the brother left the orphanage, said Earle, whose allegations sparked the inquiry into Mount Cashel by retired Ontario judge Samuel Hughes.

Polanski the Sequel Is It Going to Happen again? Yeah, of course. Priests will sin.

Veroordeelde pedofiel mag niet meer in Eindhoven wonen
Elsevier dinsdag 6 oktober 2009

PvdA-burgemeester Rob van Gijzel van Eindhoven wil niet dat een veroordeelde pedofiel terugkeert in de stad. Van Gijzel weert de pedo op basis van de Gemeentewet. De pedoseksueel is woedend en stapt naar de rechter: 'Ik heb het recht om terug te keren.'

Pedofiel in Eindhoven wordt de stad uitgezet
Dat meldt de Volkskrant. Het is voor het eerst dat een pedofiel na zijn vrijlating niet mag terugkeren in zijn woonplaats.
Van Gijzel handelt op grond van artikel 172 in de Gemeentewet, waarin staat dat hij de bevoegdheid heeft verstoring van de openbare orde te voorkomen.

Mayor wants bishop removed from town as police review old homosexual child-porn allegation October 05, 2009
CatholicCulture.org

bron: CBC News 4-10-2009

As police review a decades-old allegation of child pornography against Bishop Raymond Lahey-- an allegation that involved the possession of pornographic pictures of teenage boys-- the mayor of the town in which the prelate has been ordered to reside is encouraging residents to complain so that the bishop will be sent elsewhere

Diocese won't pay Lahey's legal bills
The archbishop of Halifax says the diocese of Antigonish will not pay the legal bills of a Nova Scotia bishop facing child pornography charges.

In a statement released Monday, Halifax Archbishop Anthony Mancini, who is overseeing the Antigonish diocese, said Bishop Raymond Lahey has not asked for any financial help.

"If that request were made, it would be declined by the diocese," he said.

Marilyn Sweet, a spokeswoman for the Halifax archdiocese, said the decision was made Monday after church officials met with diocese lawyers. She said each diocese has its own protocols for dealing with legal matters.

Lahey's case has raised questions among parishioners, with some saying he should have to fight the charges on his own

kopvellen

Charles Lewis Oct 14, 2011

When Sister Nuala Kenny addresses a conference this weekend, which is meeting at McGill University to explore the sexual-abuse crisis in the Catholic Church, her message will be stark and even a bit frightening.

No matter what has been done so far to deal with the crisis, no matter how many new protocols are now in place, it is still not enough, she will tell those in attendance. The fundamental question of how a systemic breakdown came to pass throughout the worldwide Church, she said, has not been answered, let alone properly asked.

“What kind of people are we? How could bishops, priests and lay people allow it to go on as long as we did: the denial, the minimization, the secrecy and even the ostracization of whistle-blowers?

“For a people called to goodness and holiness, with a particular call in the Christian understanding of the protection of the marginalized and vulnerable, how could we have responded the way we did?”

In September 2009 Sr. Kenny was driving to her convent in Nova Scotia when a news flash came on the radio about Raymond Lahey, then the Bishop of Antigonish.

Bishop Lahey had been in the news in the months previously because of a historic and compassionate settlement he had reached with victims of clerical abuse in his diocese. For a short time he was considered an enlightened hero — someone who practised justice instead of deflection.

Sr. Kenny was so stunned by the radio report that she pulled over to the side of the road: Bishop Lahey had been charged with the possession and importation of child pornography.

“I’m a pretty tough cookie,” said Sr. Kenny, who at the time had just retired as head of the department of bioethics at Dalhousie University in Halifax.

“I’m a pediatrician as well as a nun and I’ve done a lot of end-of-life care for children. I’ve been there with a little four-year-old dying in your arms. That’s very tough stuff. But this news about Lahey made me ill.”

Nearly 22 years before, Sr. Kenny was a member of the Winter Commission, the group appointed by the St. Johns diocese to investigate the abuse that had taken place at Mount Cashel orphanage. It was one of the first major reports on the clerical abuse of minors and was considered to be the first step in trying to extinguish a cancer in the Church.

But she said hearing about Bishop Lahey made her realize that for all the analysis that was done, and all the similar reports that later followed in such places as Ireland, Louisiana, Boston and California, the Church was missing the point.

“You need to understand that this is not just an academic exercise for me. I’ve given my life to the Church. My ministry was caring for children. When you bring it all together this is as tough as it can get for me.”

Sr. Kenny said the Church has done excellent work in attempting to solve the myriad issues that came together to create the crisis. The Church has improved the education of priests and the laity about abuse, adopted stringent protocols for reporting allegations to civil authorities and made clear that there is zero tolerance for the abuse of children.

“We didn’t believe children who told us they were being abused. And this was not just the fault of priests and bishops, but of the laity who were also complicit.

“I’m so frustrated by those Catholics who say, ‘Oh my God, Nuala, you’re not talking about that again.’ But by not talking about it from start to finish is part of why the problem went on as long as it did. How can anyone be tired talking crimes committed against our young people?

“Whatever the protocols and policies focus on, if we don’t get to the underlying systemic issues the problem will once again rear its ugly little head in another form.”

Raymond Lahey

In an emotional pastoral letter read to all the Catholic parishes in the Archdiocese of Halifax this weekend, Archbishop Anthony Mancini responded in the strongest possible language yet to the news that Bishop Raymond Lahey was arrested for the possession and importation of child pornography last week.

tekst bief pdf file

A sexual-abuse survivor told N.L. church officials in the 1980s that he had seen pornography at the home of Bishop Raymond Lahey, who's now facing child-porn charges, the Catholic archbishop of St. John's said Monday.

Archbishop Martin Currie said former Portugal Cove, N.L., priest Kevin Molloy contacted him last week to say that in 1989, Shane Earle told Molloy that he had seen pornography in Lahey's home.

At the time, Lahey was the bishop for St. George's diocese in western Newfoundland. In 2003 he moved to Nova Scotia to head the diocese of Antigonish.

"I asked him what he did with [that information], and Father Molloy mentioned that he had taken it to the appropriate authorities. In this case, it would have been Archbishop [Alphonsus] Penney," Currie said.

Gregorius Gregory van Buuren Novo Scotia New Glasgow Mabou Canada ; CBC As it happens: Dangerous import interview with Bishop Brian Dunn

Novo Scotia
Last month, Lahey announced the multimillion-dollar settlement and formally apologized to the victims and their families.
""Ron Martin and Bishop [Raymond] Lahey had the courage … "

graphic images Raymond Lahey

bron

Transparante Kerk; opdat onze leiders betrouwbaar zijn, wij bidden U verhoor ons.

- Appointed Bishop Jose Ignacio Munilla Aguirre of Palencia, Spain as bishop of San Sebastian (area 1,977, population 694,944, Catholics 641,515, priests 523, religious 2,136), Spain. He succeeds Bishop Juan Maria Uriarte Goiricelaya, whose resignation from the pastoral care of the same diocese the Holy Father accepted, upon having reached the age limit.


- Appointed Bishop Brian Joseph Dunn, auxiliary of Sault Sainte Marie, Canada, as bishop of Antigonish (area 18,800, population 226,000, Catholics 130,600, priests 124, permanent deacons 1, religious 279), Canada.

NER:RE:NA/.../... VIS 091123 (170)

Hij volgt Raymond Lahey op, die, op de vlucht, zijn direct door B XVI geaccepeerde ontslag indiende na door de douane te zijn aangehouden als kinderporno-smokkelaar.

Een vent die al tientallen jaren zijn gang bijkt te hebben kunnen gaan, gelovigen en vroegere slachtoffers van kerkelijk institutioneel seksueel misbruik hernieuwd misbruikte door zijn rol in een vergeldingsproces, en demonstreerde religiewaanzinnige geilheid te hebben.
en nu dus demonstreert hoe het Vaticaan aan het voor kinderen, samenleving en Kerk noodzakelijk inzicht en voorlichting inzake seksueel misbruik en de noodzakelijke bescherming geen enkele boodschap heeft.

Veiligheidsraad bijeen: Belgische Oblaten Blanden kopen NL helikopter, zal wegbezuinigd personeel HMS Tromp zich melden in het leger van de Heer?

En lachen daar in Ninavut als dat volk Eric DeJaeger even komen ophalen
Maar dat zou wel eens minder hard gebulder kunnen zijn als op een paar advocatenkantoren waar nu toasts, Kassa! uitgebracht kunnen worden gebracht op senator Torfs en de rechtszaken tegen het Vaticaan verder aangezwengeld kunnen worden.

Blijft het nog even afwachten wat Dan Brown zal onthullen over de nieuwe missie van Bernard Law indien de uitruil van Cor Schilder en Vangheluwe bij Roosendaal mislukt en Schotland , nee dank U wel , heeft gezegd op de Zuid Limburgse adviescommissie van de Eerwaarde Pastoor Caldelas.

Zal nu het het afzetgebied in Z Amerika nog verder naar de bliksem wordt geholpen door Karadima cs. en de Jezuiten in wetenschappelijk onderzoek van Seatle hebben bewezen dat de Inuit inmiddels ook onbetaalbaar zijn geworden de kardinaal advies inwinnen bij de leken van Regnum Cristie of houdt hij het bij de post pensionaire Mahony? En heeft president Lugo in zijn memo zijn bemiddeling aangeboden bij de Chinezen die naar verwachting niet al te scheutig met hun gastvrijheid zullen zijn bij een benoeming van buitenaf.

Heeft Laurent voor hij naar Congo ging nog pekingeend gegeten met Danneels? Zal het aankomen op Diarmuid Martins herbenoeming bij de VN om de keuzevrijheid van Law tussen bikini en burka mogelijk te maken en zal de Belgische belastingbetaler dit wensen te financieren of zal de Blandense Oblaten verzocht worden dit te regelen met Raymond Lahey?

En zal het Dan Brown lukken dit alles in een stripboek te verwerken voor de WYD in Madrid nu ook de gelovigen in Asturië tot de verkiezingen van Onze Vader hun medewerking hebben opgeschort?

Mount Cashel. Not out of sight. Not out of mind! Raymond Lahey; Canada.

THANK YOU!

Child Dignity in the Digital World

Statement

By Terence McKiernan, President of BishopAccountability.org

October 5, 2017

KLIK

The Vatican conference on Child Dignity in the Digital World has just concluded its speeches and workshops. There will be a reception this evening, and then a papal audience tomorrow, during which the conference’s Final Declaration will be presented to Pope Francis.

During the conference, Msgr. Carlo Capella has been the elephant in the room. The Vatican diplomat is the subject of an international child pornography investigation, yet he is being harbored by the Vatican while the conference about child abuse images/child pornography and related problems proceeds.

To my knowledge, none of the participants has confronted the ironies of this situation, certainly not Cardinal Pietro Parolin. 

He dealt briefly with the “very painful” matter of Msgr. Capella before the conference, and then in his keynote address invoked the “tragic reality” and “extremely grave facts” of the Catholic abuse crisis, mentioning them as qualifications for the Vatican’s hosting the conference: “We want to share the experience we have acquired.”

Cardinal Parolin went on to cite the Holy See’s “adherence” to the Convention for the Rights of the Child. 

KLIK

Yet in its Concluding Observations (2014), the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child stated:

“The Committee is gravely concerned that the Holy See has not acknowledged the extent of the crimes committed, nor taken the necessary measures to address cases of child sexual abuse and to protect children, and has adopted policies and practices which have enabled the continuation of sexual abuse by clerics and impunity for the perpetrators.” (para. 43)

The concerns that the Committee on the Rights of the Child expressed are ongoing, and the case of Msgr. Carlo Capella is by no means unique. Many priests have been convicted of possessing and trading in child abuse images, and many clerical abusers have photographed their victims, partly to memorialize the abuse and share it – even profit from it – and partly to menace their victims.

The recent child pornography cases of Archbishop Józef Wesołowski, Bishop Raymond J. Lahey, and Bishop Robert W. Finn’s handling of Father Shawn F. Ratigan, all show that the Catholic church has ongoing and serious problems with the digitally enabled abuse of children.

It is astonishing that those problems were not only swept under the rug at this con
ference, but treated as qualifications for sponsoring the event. Much better if the conference had been devoted to examining honestly the Catholic church’s own “tragic experience” with child abuse images and the digital harming of children.

About BishopAccountability.org

Founded in 2003, BishopAccountability.org maintains the world’s largest archive of documents on the problem of clergy sexual abuse, outside the Holy See’s own archives. We conduct research on child abuse by priests and religious and on the management of those cases by bishops and their staffs, superiors of religious orders, and the Holy See. An independent non-profit based in Waltham, Massachusetts, USA, BishopAccountability.org is not a victims' advocacy group and is not affiliated with any church, reform, or victims' organization.

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a month-long committal hearing scheduled

 to take place from March 2018