Long after pope's abuse summit, victims still traumatized by the system meant to address their cases
CTV News, Associated Press - Feb. 20, 2024
VATICAN CITY -- One afternoon in mid-December, Pope Francis had a meeting that wasn’t on his official agenda or otherwise recorded, that underscored the utter dysfunction of the Catholic Church’s response to the global clergy sex abuse scandal.
In the main reception room of the Vatican hotel where he lives, Francis met for more than an hour with a Spaniard who as a young seminarian was molested by his spiritual director. The former seminarian was desperate.
Bishop Accountability - December 23, 2025 Brampton, ON - A Catholic priest in Brampton, Ont., has been charged with sexual offences and removed from the ministry, the Archdiocese of Toronto says. It says the man is accused of one count of sexual assault and one count of sexual interference, an offence that applies when the victim is under 16 years old. It says the decision to remove the man from the pastoral ministry was made in accordance with its protocols and procedures relating to allegations of misconduct.
Free Press - September 23, 2025 Somerset, MB - The Archdiocese of St. Boniface has denied a man’s claims he was sexually abused by one of its priests in rural Manitoba decades ago. The man, who’s in his late 60s, claimed in a lawsuit filed in the Court of King’s Bench earlier this year that he was sexually abused by now-deceased Catholic priest Rene Touchette in the village of Somerset, about 150 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg. In a statement of defence filed in late July, the archdiocese argued the lawsuit should be tossed out — and that the man has provided no proof of the alleged abuse.