News Story of the Day
New Jersey can have a grand jury investigate clergy sex abuse allegations, state high court rules
The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Camden, N.J., Wednesday, April 20, 2022. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)
AP News
June 16, 2025
By Mike Catalini
TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey can have a grand jury examine allegations of clergy sexually abusing children, the state’s Supreme Court ruled Monday, after a Catholic diocese that had tried for years to block such proceedings recently reversed course.
The Diocese of Camden previously had argued that a court rule prevents the state attorney general from impaneling a grand jury to issue findings in the state’s investigation into decades of allegations against church officials. But the diocese notified the court in early May that it would no longer oppose that. Camden Bishop Joseph Williams, who took over the diocese in March, said he’d met with stakeholders in the diocese and there was unanimous consent to end the church’s opposition to the grand jury.
The seven-member Supreme Court concluded such a grand jury inquiry is allowed.
Alleged child sexual abuse victim Cindy Clemishire, father file suit against Robert Morris, his wife and Gateway Church
CBS Texas
June 12, 2025
By S.E. Jenkins
Cindy Clemishire, the woman at the center of the child sex abuse case involving Gateway Church founder Robert Morris, and her father have filed a lawsuit against the church founder, his wife and several current and former church leaders.
The suit alleges the defendants knew about Robert Morris' deceit, hid it and made millions of dollars from his "moral failures and rape of Plaintiff, Cindy Clemishire."
The lawsuit names Gateway Church, Robert Morris, Robert Morris' wife Deborah Morris, Thomas H. Miller, Jr., John D. Willbanks III, Kevin Grove, Jeremy Carrasco, Kenneth W. Fambro II, Gayland Lawshe, Dane Minor, Lawrence Swicegood, Steve Dulin and the Robert Morris Evangelistic Association Inc.
Miller, Willbanks, Grove, Carrasco, Fambro, Lawshe, Minor and Dulin are identified as Gateway Church elders and Swicegood as the former Executive Director of Media and Communications for Gateway. Deborah Morris, Robert Morris' wife, is listed a former leader of the women's ministry at Gateway.
CSWR and Special Collections releases first portion of Archdiocese of Santa Fe Institutional Abuse Collection
University of New Mexico News
June 7, 2025
The Center for Southwest Research and Special Collections (CSWR), part of the University Libraries, has announced the public release of the first portion of the Archdiocese of Santa Fe Institutional Abuse Collection. This important digital archive provides public access to previously sealed legal documents related to clergy sexual abuse cases in New Mexico.
The collection was established as a part of the settlement between the Archdiocese of Santa Fe and victims of sexual abuse perpetrated by its clergy members. This first batch of documents consists of deposition transcripts related to lawsuits against the Archdiocese in the 1900s, 2000s, and 2010s. Overall the collection includes depositions, personnel files, church administrative records, and other legal documents from the settlement. These documents, now available in digital format, serve as a crucial resource for survivors, researchers, journalists, and community members seeking greater transparency and accountability in institutional abuse cases.
"New Mexico was an epicenter of Catholic sexual abuse in the US; the state gained the reputation of a “dumping ground” because priests who abused young people landed frequently here. But in a remarkable development, the Archdiocese of Santa Fe handed over its “abuse files” to UNM as part of its bankruptcy settlement. Now UNM is the first university in the US to hold a Catholic sexual abuse archive,” said Kathleen Holscher, associate professor of Religious Studies and American Studies. Holscher also holds the endowed chair of the Roman Catholic Studies at UNM.
Catholic bishops sue Washington state over law requiring clergy to report child abuse
The Trump administration has launched an investigation into the law, calling it "anti-Catholic." The bishops say it would force them to break their oaths.
MSNBC
June 3, 2025
By
Catholic leaders in Washington have sued the state over a new law requiring clergy to report suspected child abuse, including details potentially revealed during confession.
The lawsuit, filed last week on behalf of the bishops, alleges Senate Bill 5375, which was signed into law on May 2, violates the First Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. The law “puts Roman Catholic priests to an impossible choice: violate 2,000 years of Church teaching and incur automatic excommunication, or refuse to comply with Washington law and be subject to imprisonment, fine, and civil liability,” the lawsuit states.
The law’s text doesn’t target Catholics specifically. In fact, it upholds the mandatory reporting requirement for ministers, priests, rabbis, imams, elders or a “spiritual leader of any church, religious denomination, religious body, spiritual community or sect," adding to a list that includes school employees and health care workers. The bill’s sponsor, Democratic state Sen. Noel Frame, said she was motivated to create this bill following reports that Jehovah’s Witnesses covered up child sexual abuse for years.
We took the fight global - now we need you to help us keep going
Dear SNAP Community,
What began as a small group of survivors of clergy sexual abuse meeting for the first time at a Holiday Inn in Chicago has grown into a global movement. Under the fearless leadership of our founder, Barbara Blaine, our movement reached a historic milestone in 2010 when we brought a case against the Vatican to the International Criminal Court at The Hague. We stood up then, and we are still standing strong now for survivors of abuse in all faith-based institutions.
Seton Hall defies cardinal’s order in sexual abuse investigation
Cardinal Joseph Tobin promised “full cooperation” from the Catholic university in New Jersey, but the school is pushing back.
Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark promised a thorough investigation into clergy abuse at Seton Hall University, but the school blocked a key witness from participating. | Gregorio Borgia)/AP
Politico
May 23, 2025
By Dustin Racioppi
Cardinal Joseph Tobin of New Jersey left for Vatican City earlier this month to help select the next pope — a rare moment on the global stage for one of the most powerful Catholic leaders in the United States.
Back home, Seton Hall University — the oldest Catholic diocesan university in America, where Tobin personally oversees both governing boards — was preparing to defy him.
A day after the new pontiff was chosen on May 8, attorneys for the university blocked a key witness from participating in a clergy abuse investigation Tobin had ordered, according to a court filing. That inquiry centers on whether Seton Hall’s new president, Monsignor Joseph Reilly, was installed despite past mishandling of abuse allegations.
Now Tobin’s own archdiocese is trying to regain control.
The moves expose a conflict at the highest levels of Catholic education — pitting Tobin against the university he oversees — and threatens to unravel his public promises of transparency with the school’s “full cooperation.”
Gospel of Denial: How Churches Continue to Fail Clergy Abuse Survivors
International Policy Digest
May 22, 2025
By Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Today, I’m joined by Katherine Archer, Father Bojan Jovanović, Dr. Hermina Nedelescu, and Dorothy Small for a wide-ranging discussion on clergy abuse—its psychological toll, institutional roots, and pathways to reform.
Katherine Archer is the co-founder of Prosopon Healing and a graduate student in Theological Studies. She will begin a Master’s in Counseling Psychology in the fall. Her work focuses on clergy abuse within the Eastern Orthodox Church, blending academic research with nonprofit advocacy. Archer champions policy reform addressing adult clergy exploitation, advancing a vision of healing grounded in justice, accountability, and survivor support.
Father Bojan Jovanović, a Serbian Orthodox priest and Secretary of the Union of Christians of Croatia is known for his searing critiques of institutional failings within the Church. His book Confession: How We Killed God and his work with the Alliance of Christians of Croatia underscore a commitment to ethical reform and moral reckoning. Jovanović advocates for transparency and internal dialogue as essential steps toward restoring trust in religious life.
Dr. Hermina Nedelescu is a neuroscientist at Scripps Research in San Diego whose research probes the neurobiological underpinnings of human behavior, particularly in the context of substance use and trauma. Her current work explores how trauma, including sexual abuse, is encoded in the brain’s circuitry and how community-based interventions can address PTSD and addiction in survivors of clergy abuse.
Dorothy Small is a retired registered nurse and longtime survivor advocate with SNAP. A survivor of both childhood and adult clergy abuse, Small began speaking out long before the #MeToo movement gave such voices a broader platform. A cancer survivor and grandmother, she now writes about recovery, resilience, and personal freedom, amplifying the strength of survivors and the urgency of institutional accountability.
Survivors of clergy sexual abuse turn up calls for reforms from new pope’s American hometown
Pope Leo XIV appears at the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica for his first Sunday blessing after his election, in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican, May 11, 2025.(AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, File)
AP
May 21, 2025
By Sophia Tareen
CHICAGO (AP) — Survivors of clergy sexual abuse amplified calls Tuesday for a global zero-tolerance policy from the new pope’s American hometown and raised questions about Leo XIV’s history of dealing with accused priests from Chicago to Australia.
The Archdiocese of Chicago responded by defending Leo’s record and saying he had “consistently expressed his compassion for survivors of this crime and sin.”
The cases span Robert Prevost’s previous posts. They include leading a Catholic religious order, bishop and as head of the Vatican’s office for bishops, where he was made cardinal.
The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, called out alleged abuse by Chicago priests and other clergy in Peru, Colombia, Canada and Australia where it contended the new pope should have done more.
Along with a worldwide zero-tolerance law for accused priests, SNAP has called for a global truth commission, survivor reparations and church transparency measures.
“It is our hope that Pope Leo does the right thing,” Shaun Dougherty, SNAP president, told reporters in Chicago. “It is our gut, in our experience, that says that he will need the pressure.”
Associated Press requests for comment to the Vatican media office Tuesday and its diplomatic representative to the United States didn’t receive immediate replies.
New WA child abuse-reporting law is not ‘anti-Catholic’
All of us are mandated reporters when it comes to crimes against children, writes the author, Mary Dispenza, pictured speaking in front of St. James Cathedral in Seattle. (Catalina Gaitán / The Seattle Times, 2024)
The Seattle Times
May 16, 2025
By Mary Dispenza,
The U.S. Department of Justice has opened an inquiry into a new Washington law, signed by Gov. Bob Ferguson on May 2, that adds clergy to the list of professionals required to report child abuse or neglect to law enforcement. It does not protect what is said in Confession. “It is anti-Catholic,” the administration says.
I say the law is not anti-Catholic. Anti-Catholic behavior would be allowing actions that harm children. Reporting crimes against children is the best of Catholic behavior. The Catholic Church is not being singled out or persecuted — the law includes all faiths and spiritual institutions that argue they do not have a duty to report sexual abuse against children.
The fact that the DOJ is investigating the validity of our constitutional right to put forward a bill and pass it strikes me as ludicrous.
As a survivor of clergy abuse at age 7, who shared her abuse and the perpetrator’s name in the confessional at age 18, I know the fallout from such secrecy. Confession protected my abuser, the Rev. George Neville Rucker, who went on to rape and abuse dozens of girls over the next four decades. The seal of confession should not hold when we are talking about crimes against children. A priest’s calling is to intervene on behalf of the vulnerable, especially children, who are powerless.
It is important to remember that every time sexual assault against a child is confessed and kept secret, a perpetrator is free to abuse that child, and others, again and again. The Los Angeles archdiocese eventually agreed to pay $60 million to 44 of Rucker’s victims. He died in 2014.
Can an American pope do a better job addressing the clergy sex abuse crisis?
VATICAN CITY (VATICAN CITY)
Boston Globe
May 8, 2025
By Joan Vennochi
How much the experiences of the US Catholic Church will influence the new pope on this issue is unknown.
An American pope was considered a longshot to be selected as a successor to Pope Francis. But now that it has happened, Pope Leo XIV could be the best hope survivors and their advocates have when it comes to getting the Catholic Church to finally address the long-running clergy sexual abuse scandal in a meaningful way.
