Pope Francis: ‘Come out of the tomb of fear’

Vatican City, Feb 23, 2017 / 07:33 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Thursday Pope Francis welcomed longtime friend and Rabbi Abraham Skorka to the Vatican for the presentation of a new version of the Torah, which he said is a sign of the love God shows to man i… […]

Vatican City, Mar 6, 2020 / 05:10 am (CNA).- The Vatican announced Friday that Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Cardinal Philippe Barbarin as archbishop of Lyon after his recent acquittal at the conclusion of his appeal of a 2019 conviction of failing to report abuse.

Jan. 30 the French cardinal was acquitted of last March’s conviction of failing to report the sexual abuse of a minor by a diocesan priest. He had received a six-month suspended prison sentence.

Barbarin, 69, had submitted his letter of resignation to Pope Francis after his initial conviction in March 2019, but it was not accepted, pending his appeal.

The Vatican stated at the time that Pope Francis preferred to leave “Cardinal Barbarin free to make the best decision for the diocese.”

Barbarin elected to step back from the governance of the diocese, leaving the day-to-day management to his vicar general, Fr. Yves Baumgarten.

Archbishop of Lyon since 2002, Barbarin was accused of not reporting instances of abuse to judicial authorities between July 2014 and June 2015, in a case involving Fr. Bernard Preynat, who has been accused of abusing dozens of minors in the 1980s and early 90s.

At the time of his conviction in March last year, five other archdiocesan officials on trial with Barbarin were acquitted. Barbarin’s conviction was widely expected to be overturned after the prosecutor in the case argued there was no proof of the cardinal’s legal wrongdoing and therefore no grounds for conviction.

In 2017, the cardinal told Le Monde that he did not conceal allegations against Preynat, but said that his response to the allegations had been “inadequate.” He said he opened an investigation against Preynat after becoming aware of the allegations against him and removed him from ministry in 2015.

Barbarin’s trial also made headlines when, in October 2018, the French court issued a summons to Cardinal Luis Francisco Ladaria Ferrer, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, to testify in the case. The Vatican invoked diplomatic immunity, saying that as a minister of Vatican City State, Lardaria is protected under international law.

The court summons had involved a letter Ladaria sent to Barbarin, advising him to take disciplinary action against Preynat, “while avoiding public scandal.”

The plaintiffs’ lawyers wanted Ladaria to testify as to whether the direction to prevent scandal was intended as an injunction to avoid going to court, in which case, they said, the CDF prefect would have been complicit in failing to report the allegedly abusive priest to authorities.

Allegations against Preynat became public in 2015. Prosecutors dropped the case the following year after an initial investigation, but a victims’ group with more than 80 members who say they were abused by Preynat led to a reopening of the case. He now faces up to ten years in prison in a trial which is still ongoing.

At the time of his conviction, Barbarin said “after the decision of the court, regardless of my personal fate, I want to reiterate first of all compassion for the victims and the whole place that they and their families have in my prayers.”

Barbarin was born in 1950 in Rabat, Morocco, at the time under French protectorate. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Creteil, France in 1977.

He was bishop of Moulins from 1998 until his appointment as archbishop of Lyon in 2002. He was created cardinal in October 2003.

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Columbus, Ohio, Mar 10, 2021 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- Several pro-abortion protesters who disrupted a pro-life Mass in Columbus, Ohio in January have been charged with misdemeanors and arraigned, with pretrial hearings scheduled for the coming months.

On Jan. 22, more than a half-dozen pro-abortion protesters disrupted the Respect Life Mass at St. Joseph’s Cathedral in downtown Columbus, where Bishop Robert Brennan was presiding at an event marking the 48th anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

Those involved, masked and holding hand-made signs, chanted slogans such as “Two, four, six, eight, this church teaches hate.” “Fund abortion, not cops,” said one of their signs. “Abortion on Demand. End Hyde Now,” said another, referring to the Hyde Amendment, which bans most federal funding for abortion.

Police and church officials escorted the protesters outside, where some protesters appeared to make obscene gestures at them. The protesters continued to chant at slogans outside the church.

Three of the protesters— two women and one man— were later charged with disorderly conduct and criminal trespass, both misdemeanors.

A fourth person, a woman, faces those same misdemeanor charges in addition to a criminal damage charge; she is set to be arraigned March 19.

All three protesters arraigned March 5 pleaded not guilty, and are scheduled for pretrial hearings in March and April, the Columbus Dispatch reported.

No arrests were made on the day of the protest, but the city attorney’s office filed the charges Feb. 18.

“We are…thankful for the proactive concern shown by our city’s leaders in supporting people of faith and their right to worship in peace and free of disruption,” Bishop Brennan said in a statement Monday.

Pro-life groups active in the state also praised law enforcement for taking action against the protesters.

“Even our pro-choice city attorney recognized that the rule of law must always apply and our churches are sacred institutions,” said Mike Gonidakis, president of Ohio Right to Life, in a statement.

“Menacing others and yelling vulgarities at a church service at which young children were present is both unlawful and unconscionable…Such displays of irreverence towards women and children practicing their faith is tragic and uncalled for.”.

The charges drew ire from several pro-abortion organizations, who say the protesters’ actions— despite taking place inside the church and taking the form of occasionally vulgar slogans and gestures— were justified.

Several of the pro-abortion organizations likened the disruptive protest that took place in the cathedral to the pro-life witness of religious people outside abortion clinics.

A group called the Ohio Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice— a group aligned with the dissident group Catholics for Choice— said in a statement that they “stand firm in our continued support of the pro-abortion activists” who engaged in what they called “a brief peaceful protest.”

“No church can claim to be an inviolable sacred space when it abuses its power and authority to promote a political agenda and demean those seeking abortion care,” the group claimed, implying that the protest at the cathedral was, in part, retaliation for pro-lifers’ “organized sidewalk harassment at clinics throughout Ohio.”

Pro-abortion groups Women Have Options Ohio, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Ohio, NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, and Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity all released similar statements of support for the protesters.

Several of the pro-abortion groups cited a 2019 incident during which a rock was thrown through a window of Toledo’s only abortion clinic as evidence that pro-lifers “attack” women seeking abortions and abortion providers, despite no evidence that the rock was thrown by a pro-life protester.

“After a pattern and practice of spewing vile and hateful insults at patients, following patients to cars, and throwing rocks at a Toledo clinic these extremists claim protesting a public event is harassment,” Women Have Options Ohio said.

Peter Range, Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Toledo’s Director of the Office for Life and Justice, disavowed any violence against the abortion clinic and its patients when the rock-throwing incident took place.

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