Church child protection chief caught with 4,000 child porn pictures

Full article here:

"A child protection official for the Catholic Church has been caught with 4,000 pictures of child porn.

Father-of-four Christopher Jarvis was arrested after uploading pictures of children being abused to a website.

Married Jarvis, 49, a former social worker, was employed by the church following sex scandals about pervert priests."

Must have more ecumenism!

Katholische Kirche: „Wir sind Kirche“ fordert mehr Ökumene - Vermischtes - FOCUS Online - Nachrichten

The "popular" (Cathcon- my ironic quotation marks) church movement "We Are Church" has criticized prior to the Pope's visit to Germany the "lack of readiness of the Catholic Church for ecumenism." They also take a position on the growing criticism that the cost of the Pope's visit are too high.

Ahead of the visit to Germany by Pope Benedict XVI on 22 to 25 September popular church movement "We Are Church" has criticised the "lack of readiness of the Catholic Church for ecumenism." "If the Pope's visit promotes dialogue within our church and there is progress in ecumenism with the Protestant church, then it is money well spent," said spokesman Christian Weisner to the "Rhein-Zeitung" (Friday edition). He has taken this position to the growing criticism that the costs for the visit of 25 to 30 million euros were too high. Yet his expectations are limited, Weisner said. "I hope that from the ecumenical meeting in Erfurt, which according to the programme only 35 minutes are provided, something can be really got moving." The question is whether this visit will only be a sermon trip, or also one which provides for listening to eachother.

Ecclesiastical and judicial incompetence in new abuse case in Germany

Missbrauchsfall Salzgitter: Priester ignorierte Kontaktverbot zu Jugendlichem - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten - Panorama

Priest ignored ban on contact with teenagers

A Catholic priest from Salzgitter has confessed to molesting three minors. For several years, he had been forbidden contact with a young person. But recently he had not paid attention to the direct order from his diocese.

Salzgitter - Shortly before his arrest on abuse allegations, a Catholic priest from the Salzgitter violated a contact ban imposed by the diocese. The 46-year-old had again approached a teenager whose family in 2006 had demanded more distance from the cleric. The diocese confirmed that on Wednesday.

The priest had clearly broken the 2006 ban on contact. Neither then nor now, was there question of sexual abuse, the diocese spokesman said. For five years, the cleric had acted on the clear instructions of the church.

There were indications that the cleric had stayed in a bed with a boy in 2006 - the family of the accused protested. When the same family again in 2010 reported the incident four years earlier, the diocese put the matter to the prosecutor's office for examination. The iffice did not find any criminal act and stopped the investigation. According to a spokeswoman for the prosecutor's office in Hildesheim, the diocese had reported the facts, without mentioning the name of the priest.

The 46-year-old was held last week arrested were - just before he was to leave with a youth group for a camp in France.

The man has since confessed to molesting three minors. A mother and her son had previously complained about him to the poluce. The police said he abused the boy several times and over several years, since 2004, when the child was ten years old.

Bishop Williamson back in court, ordinations in any case

Prozess gegen Williamson, trotzdem Priesterweihen

On Monday, the appeal takes place against the Court of the First Instance sentence of Holocaust denier Richard Williamson, Bishop of the Society of St. Pius X. Two days earlier the Society in Zaitzkofen, where Williamson denied the Holocaust in front of the camera, will ordain four priests - against the express wishes of the Vatican.

On 4 July at 9 clock the appeal will be heard in the District Court in the trial of the member of the Society of St Pius X, Bishop Richard Williamson. He was convicted in April 2010 by the Court of the First Instance of denying the Holocaust in the Zaitzkofen Seminary of the arch-conservative Society. But two days before the trial, the Society will again openly provoke the Vatican, despite the request of the pope to no longer for the moment ordain priests by holding ordinations on 2 July in Zaitzkofen.

The Bishop of Regensburg has already described the most recent ordination as a "provocation". Two days before the renewedcourt proceedings which have caused an international sensation, probably the criticism of Pope Benedict and his efforts to reintegrate the Society into the Catholic Church will flare up again.

Criminal allegations against Cardinal Schönborn

Strafanzeige gegen Kardinal Schönborn | Nachrichten.at

Criminal allegations have been made against Cardinal Christoph Schönborn by a 45-year-old to the Vienna public prosecutor. "Failure to prevent a crime" is the accusation.

It states that after informing the then Auxiliary Bishop in 1994 of a sexual assault, that Schönborn did not react for ten years. During World Youth Day with Pope John Paul II in Rome she had been abused as a 17-year-old by a Franciscan priest from Tyrol in his apartment, other incidents occurring in 1985 and 1997. The accused has now confessed to the ombudsman of the Diocese of Innsbruck. He was suspended from duty as a school counselor.

The Klasnic Commission had promised therapy to the 45-year-old as "recognized victims" in March 2011 and envisaged her financial compensation. The claim was not reimbursed because they had the impression that "this is not desired by the abused parties." The woman has now made allegations of sexual assault against the director of the Pontifical Mission Societies, Leo Maasburg . He rejects the allegations- the Klasnic Commission wants to examine the case.

The 45-year-old asked Christoph Schönborn in 1994 to contact Maasburg and take up the matter with him. A spokesman for the Cardinal rejected this yesterday. It had been merely a confession in which no serious allegations were never discussed.

Vatican guidelines for parish closings?

Or just a visitation of Cleveland Diocese?

Full article

Marco Tosatti of La Stampa writes that the Vatican plans an apostolic visitation of the Cleveland diocese, to examine the bishop’s decision to close 50 parishes in the face of severe budget problems. The parish closings have prompted an angry reaction from parishioners, who have appealed to the Vatican for help.

The Vatican has not announced plans for any investigation of Bishop Lennon’s decision. The Cleveland diocese has not yet responded to the Italian newspaper report.

Earlier this week the Vatican Insider reported that the Congregation for Clergy is preparing a new document on diocesan reorganization plans, setting forth guidelines for dioceses that plan to close or merge parishes. A Vatican official later denied that any such instruction is imminent. But the tensions created by parish-closing decisions in American dioceses—compounded, in several cases, by Vatican rulings that the affected churches should not be closed—have exposed the need for some new thinking on the subject.