skip to main content
skip to newscasts

Thursday, February 27, 2025

Public News Service Logo
facebook instagram linkedin reddit youtube twitter
view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Chief Justice John Roberts pauses order for Trump admin to pay $2 billion in foreign aid by midnight; NM Legislature advances appropriations bill with funding for wildlife corridors; Group warns livestock manure making MI Great Lakes not so great; Volunteer lobbyists to press Colorado lawmakers on homelessness.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

The House has passed a budget outline. Elon Musk attends first Trump cabinet meeting. And federal workers leave jobs despite litigation allowing them to stay.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

The federal funding freeze has left U.S. farmers in limbo about their future farm projects, tourists could find public lands in disarray when visiting this summer, while money to fight rural wildfires is in jeopardy.

Pope's Historic Visit Reignites Church Sex Scandal Debate

play audio
Play

Friday, September 25, 2015   

NEW YORK - The historic U.S. visit of Pope Francis has refocused attention on the Catholic Church's sex-abuse scandal. Although the pontiff has vowed to root out child sex predators from the Church, which has cost billions in legal expenses, victims of clergy sexual abuse want the pope to do more.

In New York, Michael Mack, 58, who says he was abused by a priest when he was 11, hopes to bring more attention to the issue this week. He has written a one-man play, "Conversations with My Molester."

"I truly believe that his intention is to heal around this process," Mack said. "And since this play of mine really is all about healing - about my own personal healing journey, but also the journeys that it reflects for so many survivors - that it seemed like the timing was a natural."

Mack, who began practicing Catholicism again about seven years ago, said reform efforts such as a Truth and Reconciliation Commission would give church sexual-abuse victims a true chance to heal. Mack's play opened in New York City on Thursday, the same day Pope Francis arrived in the city.

Some have noted that the pope's strong stance on this issue contrasts sharply with efforts by some Catholic bishops, who are fighting legislation in New York and other states that would give child sex-abuse victims more time to sue their abusers. Marci Hamilton, a professor at the Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University, said she thinks bishops and their lobbying groups are standing in the way of justice.

"They are not only blocking the cases involving their own victims, but they're also blocking the incest cases and the school cases," she said. "So that, I think, is something that the pope needs to address."

The Church argues that extending the statute of limitations on these cases would allow other cases based on weak evidence to further drain its finances. Up to 100,000 U.S. children may have been victims, according to insurance experts named in a paper presented to the Vatican in 2012.

More info about the statute-of-limitations cases is online at sol-reform.com.


get more stories like this via email

more stories
National parks such as Yosemite are bracing for the busy season even as they lose staff in the Trump administration's plan to reduce the federal workforce. (Greg Pickens/Adobe Stock)

Social Issues

play sound

A lawsuit to halt the firing of probationary federal workers gets a hearing before a district court judge in San Francisco this afternoon, even as …


Environment

play sound

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has approved a permit to expand Ridge Breeze Dairy in Salem despite hundreds of local objections…

Social Issues

play sound

Environmental projects are restarting as advocates praise Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro for suing the Trump administration, leading to the release …


Social Issues

play sound

Coloradans who want to help move the needle on homelessness can still sign up for a lobbying day next Tuesday at the State Capitol. Cathy Alderman…

The 34 accredited tribal colleges and universities served by the American Indian College Fund have a combined enrollment of nearly 22,000 students across 13 states. (Adobe Stock)

play sound

A new report says North Dakota's five tribal colleges contribute nearly $170 million to the state's economy. But any positive news is overshadowed by …

Social Issues

play sound

More than 14,000 incarcerated people in Washington are not able to vote and two bills in Olympia aim to change it. One bill would make voting more …

play sound

Environmental advocates are waiting for results from legislation passed last year, regulating the use of industrial sludge from flowing into …

 

Phone: 303.448.9105 Toll Free: 888.891.9416 Fax: 208.247.1830 Your trusted member- and audience-supported news source since 1996 Copyright © 2021