IN THE same week that that Alexander Bede Walsh – a former Roman Catholic priest from Staffordshire – was warned that he faces jail after being convicted of 21 counts of child abuse, retired New York Cardinal Edward Egan caused outrage by retracting an apology he made in 2002 to victims of sexual abuse carried [...]
Continue reading about Catholic abuse scandal: one ex-priest faces jail; another insults victims
FIRST off, let me make it absolutely clear – to BarrieJohn in particular – that I did not choose to blog this sorry saga because a key player in it has a funny name: Dr Hazel Chowcat. Chowcat is a magistrate in Yorkshire, and according to this report, she accepted the defence of a 73-year-old [...]
Continue reading about Catholic boozehound in puppy club prang
A ROMAN Catholic monk was warned about his behaviour after molesting a 12-year-old boy at the school at which he was teaching – but instead of being reported to the police he was simply prevented from teaching younger children by the Benedictine abbot of the monastery to which the school was attached. This shocking fact [...]
AN online petition has been launched, calling on the Nigerian authorities to investigate a very public assault on a teenage girl by a self-styled “bishop”. The ‘bishop’ was caught on camera delivering the slap (click on pic to view the entire incident) During a “deliverance” service at Otta, in Ogun state, “Bishop” David Oyedepo, general [...]
FOLLOWING our report last month regarding the disappearance of Father Laurence Soper, 80, wanted by police in connection with abuse at St Benedict’s Catholic Independent School in Ealing, west London, comes the news that monks from the neighbouring Ealing Abbey are no longer to be involved in the running of the school A report, commissioned [...]
Continue reading about St Benedict’s School in west London escapes the clutches of Catholic monks
LAST night, in a desperate last-minute search for a Hallowe’en costume, I ducked into La Rosita, an enormous toy emporium in Benidorm which, this year, displayed the largest-ever collection of ghoulish accoutrement I have ever seen. What puzzled me, though, was that priestly garb featured largely among the werewolf, witch and vampire costumes, and, for [...]
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
