Monday’s roundup

It’s a stormy beginning to Holy Week for the Catholic Church, as it continues to deal with accusations that Pope Benedict XVI failed to punish pedophile priests, or at least remove them from ministry. Protesters took to the streets in London, an Austrian bishop announced an investigation into charges of rape and molestation by Catholic […]

It’s a stormy beginning to Holy Week for the Catholic Church, as it continues to deal with accusations that Pope Benedict XVI failed to punish pedophile priests, or at least remove them from ministry. Protesters took to the streets in London, an Austrian bishop announced an investigation into charges of rape and molestation by Catholic clergy, the Swiss president said their should be a registry of pedophile priests, and a prominent, but retired Cardinal said the church should rethink its celibacy requirement for priests.

Benedict didn’t mention the crisis during his Palm Sunday homily but did say, “From God comes the courage not to be intimidated by petty gossip,” which some abuse victims say trivializes their suffering. The Vatican says how it handles the crisis will be “crucial for its moral credibility.” On Italian TV three deaf men confronted a spokesman for the diocese where they were molested as children. A French Catholic journalist asked if people who stay in the church through all this are masochists.

The AP profiled Jeff Anderson, the Minnesota lawyer who has made a career out of crusading against Catholic hierarchs who covered up clergy sexual abuse. Archbishop Dolan of NY forcefully defended Benedict from the pulpit of St. Pat’s on Sunday, decrying that “certain sources seem almost frenzied to implicate the man.” One of the sex abuse victims who famously met with the pope during his 2008 U.S. visit says he now believes it was just a PR stunt.


In other news, President Obama will host a Passover Seder at the White House tonight amid tensions between Israel and the U.S. over new Israeli settlements in disputed territories.

Former Scientologists are looking for back pay for the hundred-hour weeks they labored through as church employees. The PCUSA is offering severance packages to 30 more employees as denominational resources continue to drop. Seven Christian militants were arrested in the Midwest.

It’s the fifth anniversary of Pope JPII’s death, and there are some doubts about the miracles that would help his cause for canonization. Two female suicide bombers believed by officials to be Islamic separatists from the Caucasus blew up a Moscow subway station, killing 37 people. Hundreds of Voodooists in Haiti prayed in public for the dead. Bestselling British author Philip Pullman has a new book coming out that will make Christians even more angry than his “Dark Materials” trilogy did.

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