Category Archive for : ‘General’

Rev. James Smith, a pastor at St. Kevin’s Church in Flushing since 1989, has been stripped of his pastoral duties amid allegations of sexual misconduct with three children two decades ago.  He was asked to step down and was placed on administrative leave.  Michael Dowd, an attorney representing one of the alleged victims, said last night that Smith is accused of sexual misconduct toward three boys between 10 and 13 years old from 1970 to 1973.  At the time, Smith was assigned to Holy Trinity Church in Whitestone.  The alleged

Cardinal Desmond Connell, the leader of Ireland’s 4 million Catholics, apologized yesterday for the unspeakable harm inflicted by pedophile clergymen as alleged victims picketed outside, demanding his resignation.  He also sought God’s forgiveness and healing at a Mass honoring the man who founded the Christian Brothers religious order, which is embroiled in the unfolding sex-abuse scandal in the predominantly Catholic country.  Among those attending yesterday’s ceremony was Bishop Eamonn Walsh, appointed by the Vatican on Saturday to run Ireland’s southeast diocese of Ferns after its popular bishop, Brendan Comiskey, resigned

The late Rev. Joseph Birmingham, whose nickname was Father B, is accused of sexual abuse by a growing list of boys, including 13 who on Thursday joined in a lawsuit against the Boston archdiocese and church officials, including Cardinal Bernard Law.  The suit charges the church with covering up Birmingham’s sex crimes, shuffling him among six parishes and ignoring parents who told church officials about the abuse.  Birmingham started in Our Lady of Fatima Parish in Sudbury, Mass., in 1961 before moving to Salem, Lowell and then Boston.  He passed

Sullivan County District Attorney Stephen F. Lungen says the Archdiocese of New York deliberately made it difficult for his office to track down an accused pedophile priest who fled to Canada to avoid prosecution.  Lungen said yesterday the recent sex scandal rekindled memories of a case from 1991, when the late John Cardinal O’Connor headed the Archdiocese of New York.  The case involved Rev. Juan Bazalar, then 43, who was charged with sodomizing a 14 year old altar boy in upstate Monticello, fled while on bail.  The priest was busted

The survivors of abuse by priests know how to spot potential child molesting priests.  The names are listed in the Official Catholic Directory and they see their names next to harmless phrases like Absent on Leave, or Released from Diocesan Assignment.  There are 63 priests listed that way in the 2000 version of the book by the Brooklyn Diocese.  They all may not be abusers, but Bishop Thomas Daily, who has been reluctant to fully disclose the names and whereabouts of priests in his diocese accused of abusing children, should

With Edward Cardinal Egan’s move to give prosecutors the names of priests accused of molesting kids, some district attorneys yesterday accused him of creating a smoke screen, saying the files he turned over don’t cover all the likely cases in the New York Archdiocese.  The DAs also expressed concern over Egan’s new sex-abuse policy that requires victims to put their allegations in writing, a practice seasoned investigators say could hamper prosecution.  The files don’t cover priests who work in the archdiocese but are employed by religious orders.

(New York)