St. Daniel Church

At Pope Francis’s invitation, Archbishop Paul Etienne of Seattle is one of 20 American delegates at the upcoming Synod of Bishops.

“I have spent the past several weeks renewing my prayer life, longing for greater receptivity to the voice of the Holy Spirit, to better discern in communion with the other synod delegates and our Holy Father, Francis, how best to carry out the mission of the Church today,” he writes.

Archbishop Etienne recently asked all the archdiocese’s pastors to resign and then rescinded his request. He lives in a $2.4-million home purchased for him by the archdiocese.

A leaked Vatican canonical investigation found that Bishop Christopher Saunders, now 73 years old, “likely sexually assaulted four youths while potentially grooming another 67.”

In 2016, Bishop Saunders told a royal commission that “I would agree that there has been a massive failure on behalf of the Church to respond appropriately to the issues and the matters and the allegations of sexual abuse throughout Australia.”

“We have all of us, I think – certainly myself, anyway – sat with victims of child abuse, and it strikes deeply into your heart to listen to the story of a person, somebody that you know, even somebody that you have just met,” the prelate added at the time.

Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was established in 2013 and issued its final report in 2017.

CUNY for Abortion Rights, a student group that advocates for free abortion, protested Brooklyn Bishop Robert Brennan’s appearance at Mass on the Queens College campus on September 11.

Queens College “recognizes and respects the right of the bishop and his staff to visit and perform services at the invitation of the Newman Center as well as the right of those who disagree with their views to peacefully protest,” a college spokesman said.

Three years after the release of the Vatican’s McCarrick Report, Professor Robert George of Princeton University has called for a new investigation into the disgraced former cardinal.

“Of course the report is deficient!” said George. “It’s deficient because it doesn’t provide the faithful with the information they are entitled to have: 1) how McCarrick acquired and maintained over decades the extraordinary influence he had — especially in respect to episcopal appointments and advancements; and 2) on whose behalf he brought that influence to bear, and why.”

“On top of that we need to know who in the hierarchy knew of McCarrick’s crimes and when they knew it,” George added. “How high up the chain was it known that Theodore McCarrick was a predator and a fraud?”

CWN editor Phil Lawler is among those who offered comments for the article.

At his regular weekly public audience on September 27, Pope Francis reported on his weekend visit to Marseille, which was highlighted by a conference on the Mediterranean.

The challenge that the conference faced, the Pope said, was “that the Mediterranean might recover its vocation,” and become “a laboratory of civilization and peace.”

The result of the conference, the Pope continued, was “an outlook on the Mediterranean that I would call simply human, not ideology, not politically correct or instrumental—no, human—that is, capable of referring everything to the primary value of the human person and his or her inviolable dignity.”

Cardinal Mario Grech, appointed Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops in 2020, said in 2009, “Whoever does not accept Christ’s teachings should be honest with themselves and excommunicate themselves from the Church.” At the time, he was bishop of Gozo (Malta).

“He had a very, very strong opinion and then he changed,” said Joseanne Peregin, a founder of the Drachma parents’ group, a Maltese organization described in the article as “a welcome space for LGBTQ+ Catholics.”

“And the reason for that change was meeting the people,” she added. “This synodal process, he lived it. He lives it. If I was the Pope, I would want exactly those kinds of people.”

Speaking to a UN conference on prospects for nuclear disarmament, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, the Secretary for Relations with States, said:

Achieving the total elimination of nuclear weapons requires a collective response based on mutual trust. The International community must continue to explore ways to enhance cooperative security toward that end.

Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors has issued a strongly worded statement decrying the “tragically harmful deficiencies” in the handling of sex-abuse complaints.

“Every day seems to bring forth new evidence of abuse, as well as cover up and mishandling by Church leadership around the world,” the commission said.

The September 27 statement from the commission, which was created by Pope Francis, comes as prominent figures in Rome question the handling of complaints against Father Marko Rupnik, and the Pope’s involvement in his case.

“We are long overdue in fixing the flaws in procedures that leave victims wounded and in the dark both during and after cases have been decided,” the papal commission protested.

In June, the leaders of the German bishops’ conference and the lay Central Committee of German Catholics sought a meeting with Pope Francis to discuss the resolutions approved during the nation’s Synodal Way. Three months later, the bishops’ conference has posted the letter on its website.

Bishop Johann Bonny of Antwerp, Belgium has complained about the Vatican’s failure to take disciplinary action against a retired bishop accused of sexual abuse.

Bishop Roger Vangheluwe of Bruges resigned in 2010, after admitting to “a little bit of intimacy” with two nephews. He has subsequently been the subject of other abuse complaints.

Bishop Bonny told a broadcast interviewer that the Belgian bishops have urged the Vatican to laicize Bishop Vangheluwe, but have not been given any response. “I want to honestly say that our conference of bishops has been asking Rome to do this for years,” he said.