Newspaper Page Text
6A Sunday, November 11,2018
The Times, Gainesville, Georgia | gainesvilletimes.com
NATION
Sex abuse crisis tops agenda as
US Catholic bishops convene
A demonstrator holds up protest signs Wednesday Oct. 24, at the Capitol in Harrisburg, Pa. as over
100 people conducted a rally at the state Capitol Wednesday following the Senate’s GOP majority’s
decision the previous week to leave Harrisburg without voting on a bill that would give victims a
two-year window to file lawsuits that would otherwise be outdated.
BY DAVID CRARY
Associated Press
As U.S. Catholic bishops
gather for their national
assembly next week, the clergy
sex abuse crisis dominates
their agenda amid calls from
critics that church leaders
finally bring about meaningful
reforms to root out misbehav
ing priests.
The three-day assembly that
starts Monday in Baltimore
comes after a series of abuse
scandals this year that have
been stunning in their magni
tude and number.
Bishops have several reforms
under consideration to craft a
stronger response to the scan
dals, but some Catholic activists
are demanding further steps,
including releasing the names
of all clergy accused of abuse
and giving a greater voice to
abuse victims. One coalition of
concerned Catholics, the 5 The
ses movement, plans to post its
proposals for reform on church
doors in Baltimore and else
where on Sunday.
The abuse crisis is foremost
among several challenges con
fronting Catholic leaders, who
face conflicting pressures on
the role of women and LGBT
people in the church. And even
though the Catholic population
in the U.S. has been growing,
most Catholics attend Mass
rarely, and the number of
active priests and nuns contin
ues to decline.
Setting the tone for the
national assembly, the presi
dent of the bishops’ confer
ence, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo
of Galveston-Houston, asked
his fellow bishops to spend
the preceding seven days in
“intensified” prayer, fasting
and reparation.
The bishops will consider
new steps to police their own
ranks during abuse cases, and
will likely approve an investi
gation by lay law enforcement
experts of the handling of the
scandal surrounding the former
cardinal in Washington, D.C.
“Bishops are under intense
scrutiny and pressure to
deliver on both of these
items,” said the Rev. Thomas
Berg, admissions director at St.
Joseph’s Seminary in Yonkers,
New York.
In July, Pope Francis
removed U.S. church leader
Theodore McCarrick as a car
dinal after church investiga
tors said an allegation that he
groped a teenage altar boy in
the 1970s was credible. Subse
quently, several former semi
narians and priests reported
that they had been abused
or harassed by McCarrick as
adults, triggering debate over
who might have known and
covered up his misconduct.
In August, a grand jury
report in Pennsylvania
detailed decades of abuse and
cover-up in six dioceses, alleg
ing that more than 1,000 chil
dren had been abused over
the years by about 300 priests.
Since then, a federal prosecu
tor in Philadelphia has begun
working on a federal criminal
case centered on child exploi
tation, and attorneys general
in several other states have
launched investigations.
In Baltimore, the bishops
will consider several propos
als approved by a committee
in September. They include
developing a code of conduct
for bishops regarding sexual
abuse and harassment, and
establishing a confidential
hotline — to be run by a third
party — to receive allega
tions of sexual misconduct
by bishops and relay them to
appropriate church and civil
authorities.
The committee also
endorsed a “full investigation”
into the McCarrick case that
would give a role to lay law
enforcement experts.
Critics have urged the bish
ops to go further by allow
ing outside investigators full
access to church sex-abuse
records and by supporting
changes to statute-of-limitation
laws so that more cases of
long-ago sex abuse could be
JACQUELINE LARMAI Associated Press
addressed in court.
Another recommendation
came from a sex abuse task
force at Villanova University
in Philadelphia, one of the
country’s top Catholic schools.
It said the bishops’ conference
should require all bishops to
become mandatory reporters
of suspected sexual abuse —
in the same category as school
teachers, social workers and
others who work with children.
The step has been avoided
thus far despite “the nefari
ous actions of certain bishops
surreptitiously transferring
sexually abusive priests from
parish to parish, and in some
cases from diocese to diocese,
without notifying civil authori
ties of the suspected abuse,”
the task force said. “American
bishops should never have the
option of looking the other way
and remaining silent again.”
Most states include clergy
among mandatory reporters,
but some do not.
AROUND THE NATION
IOWA
Small plane crashes,
killing all 4 on board
GUTHRIE CENTER — A small plane
crashed, killing all four people on board, after
the pilot apparently had a heart attack and a
student pilot was going to attempt an emer
gency landing, authorities said Saturday.
The plane dropped off radar Friday night
about 4 miles from Guthrie Center airport, the
Guthrie County Sheriff’s Office said in a news
release. Searchers found the wreckage Sat
urday morning in a cow pasture southwest of
Guthrie Center, which is about 115 miles south
west of Le Mars, where the plane had taken off.
The sheriff’s office identified those killed
as the pilot, 49-year-old Edward Ralph Ander
son, 36-year-old Patrick Kellen and 15-year-old
Samantha Clark, all of Le Mars, and 28-year-old
Tyler Douvia, of Merrill, which is next to Le
Mars in northwestern Iowa.
OHIO
Ohio State board to hear from
ex-students alleging sex abuse
COLUMBUS — Ohio State University’s trust
ees will hear directly from former students who
say they were sexually abused by a team doctor,
allegations that span the late physician’s two
decades at the school.
Alumnus Brian Garrett says he and other
accusers of Dr. Richard Strauss asked to speak
so they can share their stories, seek help and
request changes. He says they don’t want to dis
cuss their lawsuits against Ohio State.
The board says it’s setting aside 20 minutes to
hear students’ stories at next Friday’s trustees’
meeting
Strauss killed himself in 2005. His relatives
have said they’re shocked by the allegations
first raised in April.
A law firm investigating abuse claims has
heard from at least 145 ex-students who have
shared firsthand accounts of alleged miscon
duct by Strauss between 1979 and 1997.
OREGON
3 men arrested after cyclist
injured by booby trap on path
PORTLAND — Three men authorities say
set up a booby trap on a walking and bike path
in Portland, Oregon, that injured a female
cyclist have been taken into custody.
KOIN-TV reports that 23-year-old Justin J.
Jones, 27-year-old Antonio R. Tolman-Duran
and 21-year-old Dakota E. Murphy were
arrested Friday and face charges of assault and
reckless endangering.
Portland police say a woman cyclist at about
11p.m. ran into material strung across the path.
A responding police officer spotted woven
string across the path and other officers found
three men suspected of putting the material on
the path and arrested them.
It’s not clear if the three men have attorneys.
Associated Press
Border wall, immigration seen as hot
topics before Congress winds down
BY FRANCO ORDONEZ
McClatchy Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - The
White House is racing to
finish an immigration plan
focused on enforcement that
could be introduced before
Democrats take control of
the House. It would include
funding for the U.S.-Mexico
border wall, restrictions
on asylum and cuts to legal
immigration, according to
people familiar with the plan.
But the plan is being
resisted by some in the White
House, who are urging Presi
dent Donald Trump to agree
to a more moderate plan
that would limit cuts to legal
immigration and protect
immigrants who came to the
United States as children.
“There is a schism within
the White House over this
issue,” said Jessica Vaughn,
a former State Department
foreign service officer.
“There are some folks who
think it’s important to push
those provisions now under
the guise of merit-based
immigration reform. And
others who are opposed to
that. They want the emphasis
to be on enforcement.”
The proposal would par
tially be a permanent legisla
tive change to action Trump
took Thursday to confront
the caravan of migrants
nearing the United States by
invoking national security
powers used to implement
last year’s “travel ban” to
deny asylum to migrants who
enter the country illegally.
The two plans are set
ting up a new battle in the
Republican Party between
immigration hardliners, led
by White House adviser Ste
phen Miller, who wants to
rewrite the U.S. legal immi
gration system; and more
centrist Republicans and
business leaders who want
to protect the young immi
grants and provide more
access to foreign workers.
Democrats won control
of the House Tuesday. That
means Trump will work
with a divided Congress
come January. But any plan
would be difficult to pass,
especially one focused on
enforcement, when Con
gress is also trying to avoid a
government shutdown over
changes in a spending bill
and trying to push through
other difficult measures
such as a farm bill.
“I think the lame duck ses
sion of Congress is a great
opportunity to pass immi
gration reform so I may still
have some important work
to do when I get back,” said
Rep. Carlos Curbelo, R-Fla.,
after he conceded his re-elec
tion bid on Tuesday.
“I sure hope we have
a chance. This would
be the best time to do
it especially because
we can probably
expect more grid
lock or even worse
gridlock in the next
Congress.”
Congress will be
in session for 12 work days
before its holiday break. A
new Congress is sworn in in
January. In that time, it has
to pass a spending bill before
Dec. 7 or the government
will have to shut down with
no funding.
Earlier this year, Trump
warned that a “good shut
down” may be necessary to
force Democrats to agree
to spend more than $20 bil
lion on a border wall. But he
appeared to back away from
those threats this week after
seeing the election results.
Trump said at a news
conference Wednesday that
he’s “not necessarily” com
mitted to a shutdown and
indicated Democrats may
be willing to work with him.
“I speak to Democrats all
the time and they agree that
a wall is necessary,” Trump
said. “We want to build the
whole wall at one time, not
in chunks.”
Democrats are unlikely
to be in a negotiating mood
during the lame-duck ses
sion, given their pickup of 30
seats in Tuesday’s elections.
Trump seeks to decrease
numbers and
address thousands
of migrants travel
ing toward the U.S.
border. He used the
group as a final ral
lying cry as the mid
term campaigning
wound down, saying
the group included
criminals. The cara
van amounted to an “inva
sion” of the U.S, Trump said.
He sent troops to the border.
The White House and Con
gress have tried and failed to
agree on a plan that would
fund the wall and provide
protections for the young
immigrants who have been
able to work and remain in
the United States under the
Deferred Action for Child
hood Arrivals program.
A three-judge panel of
the 9th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals ruled Thursday
that Trump cannot end the
DACA program, which he
tried to do last year after
several states threatened to
sue to force an end to it.
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