Poznan, Poland, Sep 18, 2018 / 06:00 pm (CNA).- Increasing the role of women in screening and training priests is among the steps that should be taken to prevent future sex abuse, said Cardinal Marc Ouellet, prefect of the Congregation for Bishops.
“We would need participation of more women in (training) of priests,” the Canadian cardinal told AFP reporters at a recent meeting of the Presidents of the Bishops’ Conferences of Europe, a four-day assembly in Poznan, Poland.
He said bishops need to be chosen more carefully and that women should have more involvement in the selection of potential priests by assessing candidates’ suitability.
“We are facing a crisis in the life of the Church,” he said. “This is a very serious matter that has to be dealt with in a spiritual way, not only in a political way.”
Ouellet’s comments come amid a string of revelations regarding allegations of sexual abuse and cover-up by clergy in several regions of the world.
In late July, Pope Francis accepted the resignation of retired Washington, D.C. Archbishop Theodore McCarrick from the College of Cardinals, and suspended him from the exercise of any public ministry, amid allegations of sexual abuse and coercion.
Last month, a Pennsylvania grand jury report found more than 1,000 allegations of abuse at the hands of some 300 clergy members in six dioceses in the state. It also found a pattern of cover-up by senior Church officials.
Recent reports of clerical abuse and cover-up have also rocked Germany, the Netherlands, Chile, and Australia in recent months.
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Father David Waller will become the first bishop Ordinary of the Ordinariate. / Credit: Courtesy photo / Bishop’s Conference of England and Wales
National Catholic Register, Apr 29, 2024 / 18:45 pm (CNA).
The Vatican has announced a new leader of the ordinariate in Great Britain.
Father David Waller, 62, a parish priest and vicar general of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, will replace Monsignor Keith Newton, 72, who is retiring after serving over 13 years as the ordinary of the ecclesiastical structure for former Anglicans.
In a statement, Newton called the Vatican’s April 29 announcement “momentous” given that Waller, who is a celibate, will become the first bishop ordinary of the ordinariate.
As someone who was already married as an Anglican clergyman before entering the Church through the ordinariate, Newton was not allowed episcopal consecration.
Established by Pope Benedict XVI in 2011 through his 2009 apostolic constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus, the ordinariate is an ecclesiastical structure for Anglicans wishing to enter into full communion with the Catholic Church while retaining their distinctive Anglican patrimony.
With today’s announcement, the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham becomes the first of three in the world — the others being in the U.S./Canada and Australia — to have had an influence in choosing its leader.
In keeping with the Anglican emphasis on consultation and in accordance with the Anglicanorum Coetibus, members of the ordinariate’s governing council, made up of ordinariate priests, were able to choose Waller as one of three names they recommended to the Holy See.
Monsignor Keith Newton, 72, is retiring after serving over 13 years as the ordinary of the ecclesiastical structure for former Anglicans. Credit: Edward Pentin
Newton said he believed allowing this faculty, one that is usually left to the apostolic nuncio, “showed the Holy See’s confidence in the ordinariate in the U.K.”
A former Anglican vicar who served as a pastor, part-time hospital chaplain, and a member of the governing body of the Church of England, Waller was among the first Anglican clergy to be received into the Church following the establishment of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham in 2011.
He was then ordained to the diaconate and the priesthood, has served in two parishes, and was elected chairman of the ordinariate’s governing council. For the past four years he has worked with Newton as vicar general.
In a statement, Waller said it was “both humbling and a great honor” to have been appointed ordinary. “The past 13 years have been a time of grace and blessing as small and vulnerable communities have grown in confidence, rejoicing to be a full yet distinct part of the Catholic Church,” he added.
Already well known to members of the ordinariate, he said he was looking forward to serving them in his new role, adding that experience over these past years has taught him “there is nothing to be feared in responding to the Lord and that Jesus does great things with us despite our inadequacies.”
Newton said in a statement that he was “delighted” with Waller’s appointment, adding that he has been “unwaveringly loyal” to the ordinariate and a “great support” to him as vicar general.
Waller has been “totally been involved in life of the ordinariate and understands it all, and is a good administrator,” Newton told the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner.
No coercion to step down
Newton stressed that he had chosen to retire while he is still active.
“I’ve not been forced out in any way, and nobody has told me to retire; it’s totally my own decision,” he said. “It’s a time to pass it on to new hands,” he continued, adding that he and his wife, Gill, “want to enjoy a bit of retirement together.”
Other prominent priests of the ordinariate also welcomed the news of Waller’s appointment. Father Ed Tomlinson, priest in charge of St. Anselm’s Ordinariate Parish Church in Pembury, Tunbridge Wells, told the Register he was “delighted the ordinariate will have a bishop” and that he wished “Father David the best.”
Father Benedict Kiely, an ordinariate priest of the same parish who also runs the charity Nasarean.org for persecuted Christians, said: “I will always remain grateful to Msgr. Keith for making the defense of persecuted Christians an important part of the ordinariate, and I’m sure Bishop David will continue that support.”
Newton said the date and place of Waller’s episcopal ordination have yet to be confirmed but that he expected it to take place “towards the end of June.”
This story was first published by the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, and is reprinted here on CNA with permission.
Lancaster, England, Jun 8, 2017 / 02:58 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Bishop of Lancaster issued last week liturgical norms for the Neocatechumenal Way, which apply to all in the diocese, in the interest of “fostering clarity” around the celebration of the Eucharist.
“The Neocatechumenal Way has been active in our Diocese for many years and has been a blessing to many people,” Bishop Michael Campbell, OSA, wrote in a May 28 statement issuing the norms.
“Recent years have seen a growing sense of unease about the multiplication of small community Masses in some of our already quite small parishes and about some of the differences in the way the Mass is celebrated among the communities of the Neocatechumenal Way,” he added.
The movement must celebrate Mass at a consecrated altar and members of the congregation who receive the Blessed Sacrament must consume it as soon as they receive it, Bishop Campell directed.
The Neocatechumenal Way is an ecclesial movement that focuses on post-baptismal adult formation in small parish-based groups. It was founded in 1963 by Spanish painter Kiko Arguello. Today it is estimated that the movement has about 1 million members, in some 40,000 parish-based communities around the world.
Bishop Campbell cited the Second Vatican Council’s constitution on the liturgy and the Neocatechumenal Way’s statutes, and then noted that “every Eucharistic celebration is an action of the one Christ together with His one Church and its therefore essentially open to all who belong to His Church.”
“Here, I exercise my authority to establish norms regarding the regulation of the liturgy, as a way of fostering clarity concerning the celebration of the Eucharist,” the bishop wrote.
In the statement, five liturgical norms were reiterated for the Lancaster diocese.
The first stated that all Masses said on Saturday evenings “must be celebrated at a consecrated altar,” for “If we cannot find find unity among ourselves at the one Altar of Sacrifice, where else will we find it?”
The second norm stipulated that if the Neocatechumenal Way’s Mass is one of a parish’s regularly scheduled Masses, its special character be noted in the bulletin; if the Mass is in addition to a regularly scheduled Mass on Saturday evening, a portion of its collection should go to the parish.
The third norm stated that the pastor has the authority to direct how many additional Masses may be said.
In order to allow for the time it may take to rearrage Mass schedules such that all are said at a consecrated altar, the fourth norm said this condition takes effect on July 1.
The fifth norm concerned the reception of Communion. Bishop Campbell directed that, in accord with the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, the celebrant of a Mass must consume the Body and Blood of Christ prior to distributing Communion, and that communicants are to consume the Body and Blood as soon as they receive the host or chalice. “There is to be no delay,” the bishop emphasized.
Neocatechumenal Way Masses typically direct that communicants hold the Eucharist in their hand and consume the Body of Christ only after everyone has been given a Host.
In a follow-up, clarifying statement issued June 6, the Diocese of Lancaster recalled that the “modest liturgical norms” were issued “by way of reminder” and that they “apply to all in the Diocese of Lancaster – not just to the Neocatechumenal Way.”
It added that the liturgy “belongs to the whole Church” and that even though the Neocatechumenal Way has its own statutes “these do not replace the principles given in the General Instruction of the Roman Missal or the role of Universal or Particular (liturgical) Law of the Church.”
The diocese added that “in no way should these norms be seen as punitive or issued for any other motive than simply reminding all of the liturgical norms of the Church and ensuring that the Liturgy of the Church in the Diocese of Lancaster is governed by the Diocesan Bishop.”
It also referred to a report that a representative of the Neocatechumenal Way, Paul Hayward, had said, according to the Catholic Herald, that “he had asked Bishop Campbell to hold off implementing the new norms until representatives of the Way had had a chance to meet him.”
The Lancaster diocese stated that while a meeting had been requested, “there was no mention at all of any desired-discussion of the norms in this request nor any mention of a request to delay these norms until such a meeting had taken place.”
Since the Neocatechumenal Way was founded, the group has sometimes been cautioned by the Vatican for inserting various novel practices into the Masses it organizes. These include practices such as lay preaching, the reception of Holy Communion while sitting, and the passing of the Most Precious Blood from person to person.
Sister Bernardita de la Inmaculada Sesso, who died Dec. 12, 2001. / Hermanas Pobres Bonaerenses de San José
Rome, Italy, Feb 10, 2022 / 14:43 pm (CNA).
The Argentine bishops’ representative for the causes of saints, Bishop Santiago Olivera of t… […]
5 Comments
He seems to be assuming that women are without sin, too. Women can and are often also predators. And this problem obviously isn’t just to the Church, even though that’s the long-standing association in secular minds. This abuse happens EVERYWHERE when there is someone in a position of power and someone in a position of learning and submission. Teachers, coaches, pastors.
The big problem that I see is that because the Church is so vast and the problem has been covered up so much for so long then it’s never going to stop until something fundamental is changed in the law of the Church itself. I’m not saying that priests should be allowed to marry or something like that, where would they find the time, but I am saying that there must be some type of more rigorous screening that can be done to find these predators before they are put in a position of power over a child or vulnerable person. Background checks do NOTHING since these crimes often go unreported.
Anyone other than the vetters of the last five decades…women, state troopers, retired fbi and cia, retired lawyers…all could do better than the past wisemen. I was rejected for jury duty in four Federal cases by defense lawyers because I made a citizen’s arrest. That was some trial. His defense lawyer accused me of strangling him….to which I retorted, “ In the words of a future Pope, ‘ I will not say a single word about that ‘ “.
Is this guy kidding? This is an open invitation for some woman either to scoop up a seminarian as a play thing, or make an unfounded accusation. Its interesting how the vatican manages to promote to it’s highest levels the nuttiest of nut bars in the priesthood.(This Canadian most know some German bishops, for sure.) How about, instead of promoting the politically connected, they push for promotion the priest who the people LOVE , knows his theology and has a good heart?
He seems to be assuming that women are without sin, too. Women can and are often also predators. And this problem obviously isn’t just to the Church, even though that’s the long-standing association in secular minds. This abuse happens EVERYWHERE when there is someone in a position of power and someone in a position of learning and submission. Teachers, coaches, pastors.
The big problem that I see is that because the Church is so vast and the problem has been covered up so much for so long then it’s never going to stop until something fundamental is changed in the law of the Church itself. I’m not saying that priests should be allowed to marry or something like that, where would they find the time, but I am saying that there must be some type of more rigorous screening that can be done to find these predators before they are put in a position of power over a child or vulnerable person. Background checks do NOTHING since these crimes often go unreported.
Anyone other than the vetters of the last five decades…women, state troopers, retired fbi and cia, retired lawyers…all could do better than the past wisemen. I was rejected for jury duty in four Federal cases by defense lawyers because I made a citizen’s arrest. That was some trial. His defense lawyer accused me of strangling him….to which I retorted, “ In the words of a future Pope, ‘ I will not say a single word about that ‘ “.
“women, state troopers, retired fbi and cia, retired lawyers…all could do better than the past wisemen.”
That’s not exactly saying much – a brain-damaged gopher could do better, judging by what we’ve read.
It hurts me that the innocent – good priests, good bishops – are having their reputations tarnished by this.
The abuse scandal within the church is predominately a male on male abuse, so Cardinal Marc Ouellet comments just confuses the issue.
Is this guy kidding? This is an open invitation for some woman either to scoop up a seminarian as a play thing, or make an unfounded accusation. Its interesting how the vatican manages to promote to it’s highest levels the nuttiest of nut bars in the priesthood.(This Canadian most know some German bishops, for sure.) How about, instead of promoting the politically connected, they push for promotion the priest who the people LOVE , knows his theology and has a good heart?