St. Daniel Church

The attorney general of Wisconsin has published an update on the state’s clergy abuse probe as it enters its fourth year.

Attorney General Josh Kaul said that his department has received 274 abuse reports, 66 of which were previously unreported, and 76 of which were previously reported only to a religious authority.

Kaul pledged to issue a final report, though he said that the timing of its release is uncertain.

Pope Francis received Emomali Rahmon, Tajikistan’s president since 1994, in an April 26 audience.

Rahmon also met with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, and Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, the Secretary for Relations with States and International Organizations. The parties discussed “the good relations between the Holy See and Tajikistan,” “some aspects of the country’s political and socio-economic situation,” and “the importance of dialogue and mutual understanding between peoples and cultures for the promotion of peace and stability,” according to a Vatican statement.

The Central Asian nation of 9.3 million (map) is 98% Muslim, but is known for its repression of all public religiosity.

A chemistry professor in California has urged the University of Washington to revoke a Ph.D. degree earned in 1978 by Patrick O’Donnell, a onetime Spokane priest (now laicized) who has been accused of abusing over 65 boys.

The chemistry professor, Dan O’Leary, said he almost became one of O’Donnell’s victims as an altar boy and that O’Donnell’s dissertation, “Evoking Trustworthy Behavior of Children and Adults in A Prisoner’s Dilemma Game,” might have involved “sexually abusive behavior under the pretext of conducting doctoral research.”

The University of Washington said that O’Donnell’s actions were “heinous and reprehensible,” but that the university was “unable to obtain evidence that in the course of his graduate work, Mr. O’Donnell met the standard for degree revocation.”

Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso, the chairman of the US bishops’ Committee on Migration, urged members of Congress to increase funding for migration-related government programs.

Bishop Seitz presented members of Congress with detailed requests for funding for nearly 20 different programs. For example, he requested $150 million for the Executive Office for Immigration Review’s Legal Representation Grant Program, and $432,161,000 for United States Citizenship and Immigration Services operations and support.

“We strongly hold that the protection of unborn lives cannot be separated from any work that aims at ensuring justice and flourishing for every human being,” he added. “The USCCB will oppose any bill that expands taxpayer funding of abortion, including any appropriations bill.”

Bishop Seitz’s April 25 letter followed a similar letter calling for increased spending on foreign-aid programs.

Pope Francis described the concluding October 2024 session of the synod on synodality as the synod’s “prophetic” stage and its “most challenging and important” stage.

“Now it is a matter of translating the work of the previous stages into choices that will give impetus and new life to the mission of the Church in our time,” he said. “The most important thing of this synod is synodality, the subjects and topics are there to advance this expression of the Church that is synodality.”

“For this, there is a need for people forged in the Spirit, for ‘pilgrims of hope’ ... men and women capable of charting and walking new and challenging paths,” the Pope added.

The Pontiff made his remarks about the synod at the conclusion of an address to members of Italian Catholic Action. During the address, he proposed a “culture of embrace” to the members of the lay apostolate.

Archbishop Gabriele Caccia, apostolic nuncio and Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, said that a “significant shift in the approach to debt is necessary to promote integral human development, social inclusion, and equity.”

FfD4, an upcoming forum on global finance, is “an opportune moment to implement new forms of solidarity in the actions to reverse growing economic imbalances,” Archbishop Caccia said at an April 24 UN meeting. “Through debt forgiveness and debt restructuring, developing countries are released from unsustainable debt, enabling them to make critical investments in healthcare, education, job creation, and social protection.”

Citing the 2024 Global Report on Food Crises, the Vatican newspaper reported that over 281 million people in 59 countries suffered from high levels of acute food insecurity in 2023—up from 105 million people in 48 countries in 2016.

“In addition to the dramatic situation in Gaza, where 81% of families do not have access to safe and clean water, Sudan has also suffered the greatest deterioration in its condition” because of the civil war there, L’Osservatore Romano reported. “Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Syria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Yemen also suffer from food crises.”

Pope Francis received pilgrims from Hungary in Paul VI Audience Hall on April 25, a year after his apostolic journey there.

In his address, the Pope recalled the different events of his three-day visit there. He concluded by thanking the pilgrims for their “fidelity to Christ, manifested in the testimony of faith and in lived ecumenism, in relationships with your neighbors, in welcoming charity even for those who are different, in respect for every human life and in responsible care for the environment.”

The Pontiff also received Hungarian President Tamás Sulyok in a private audience.

State police in Louisiana have obtained a warrant to search for documents in the files of the New Orleans archdiocese pertaining to the handling of sex-abuse complaints.

A police spokesman said that the search is part of an investigation begun in 2022, prompted by “numerous complaints of child sexual abuse.”

The archdiocese is cooperating with the search, the police spokesman said.

In a truly bizarre incident during an Easter Vigil ceremony, an Episcopalian bishop ripped the clerical collar off a female priest who had evidently forgotten her part in the liturgy.

Bishop Alan Gates of Boston has apologized for taking the collar from Rev. Tamra Tucker; she has not issued any public comment on the incident, which caused a shocked silence from the congregation.

The confrontation occurred during what a spokesman for the Episcopal diocese described as a “non-traditional” ceremony that included other Protestant communities and made a special point of welcoming homosexuals.