Bill Gates has said he “regrets” ever knowing Jeffrey Epstein, as his former wife, Melinda French Gates, alluded to “muck” in their marriage, and insisted the Microsoft founder has questions to answer over his relationship with the deceased child sex offender.

Allegations that Gates hid a sexually transmitted disease from his wife after contact with “Russian girls” surfaced in the latest release of the Epstein files, which have provided remarkable insight into the disgraced financier’s multiple celebrity connections and activities.

His office immediately issued a statement denouncing the “absolutely absurd and completely false” assertion, but until now, Gates, 70, has remained silent.

He finally spoke on Wednesday on the Australian television channel 9News to deny the claim as “false”, and suggested that Epstein was trying to extort or defame him by writing an email in 2013 that further alleged he subsequently tried to give antibiotics to Melinda surreptitiously in case she also became infected.

“Apparently, Jeffrey wrote an email to himself. That email was never sent. The email is false,” Gates said.

“I don’t know what his thinking was there. Was he trying to attack me in some way? Every minute I spent with him, I regret, and I apologize that I did that.”

His interview followed comments made by his ex-wife to NPR on Tuesday, in which she made clear her disapproval of his friendship with Epstein.

“For me, it’s personally hard whenever those details come up, right? Because it brings back memories of some very, very painful times in my marriage,” French Gates told the radio network’s Wild Card podcast.

“Whatever questions remain there of what – I can’t even begin to know all of it – those questions are for those people and for even my ex-husband. They need to answer to those things, not me.”

The public airing of some of the lowest points in the Gateses’ 27-year marriage, which ended in a 2021 divorce, epitomises the fallout still being felt from the Epstein scandal, more than six years after his August 2019 death by suicide in New York’s Metropolitan correctional center as he awaited trial on sexual abuse trafficking charges.

Gates told 9News he met Epstein in 2011 and had dinner with him on several occasions to discuss investing in proposed scientific ventures. He insisted he never went to Epstein’s private Caribbean island, where countless girls and young women are alleged to have been abused, and did not have any relations with any women.

“The focus was always, he knew a lot of very rich people, and he was saying he could get them to give money to global health. In retrospect, that was a dead end,” Gates said.

“I was foolish to spend time with him. I was one of many people who regret ever knowing him. The more that comes out, the clearer it will be that, although the time was a mistake, it has nothing to do with that kind of behaviour.”

The interview with Gates French, meanwhile, will be released in full by NPR on Thursday. The network released snippets, and a three-minute video clip, on Wednesday, in which the 61-year-old spoke of the Epstein files’ release and scrutiny as a “reckoning as a society”.

Talking about Epstein’s numerous victims, she said: “No girl should ever be put in the situation they were put in by Epstein and whatever was going on with all of the various people around him. It’s beyond heartbreaking.

“I remember being those ages the girls were, I remember my daughters being those ages.”

She said she had “moved on” from a marriage she said she had to get away from, and was now “in a really unexpected, beautiful place in my life. I’m so happy to be away from all the muck that was there.”

Asked about her emotions at learning of the claims against her ex-husband, particularly that he tried to secretly procure her antibiotics, she said she felt “just unbelievable sadness”.

She added: “I’m able to take my own sadness and look at those young girls and say, ‘My God, how did that happen to those girls?’ I hope there’s some justice for those now women. What they went through is unimaginable.”

On Wednesday, the Republican South Carolina congresswoman Nancy Mace, said she supported French Gates’s position that her husband had questions to answer, and had written to James Comer, chair of the House oversight committee that is investigating Epstein’s activities.

“Last night, I watched Melinda Gates interview. I immediately asked the chairman of oversight, James Comer, to subpoena, Bill Gates. I have questions for Bill Gates about Epstein,” Mace wrote in a post on X.

On Monday, Bill and Hillary Clinton, whose names also feature in the Epstein files, said they had agreed to testify to the committee, days before the chamber was expected to vote to hold them in contempt for originally refusing to do so.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/04/bill-gates-epstein-relationship-melinda

January 28, 2026

By Peggy Fletcher Stack

Salt Lake City diocese confirms it conducted an investigation but says only that it “has taken steps to address its findings.”

William Hambleton alleged last year that he was abused as a teen by a priest in Utah, an assertion the Diocese of Salt Lake City later deemed “credible.”

Now Hambleton contends that the diocese has confirmed to him a wider issue: A powerful cleric occasionally destroyed documents in personnel files of priests.

Monsignor J. Terrence Fitzgerald , the diocese’s longtime vicar general, told multiple priests about his purges of “information that could cast clergy in a poor light,” according to Robert Moriarty, a former priest in the diocese.

“I came to assume that this practice was common knowledge,” Moriarty, a friend of Hambleton, wrote in a letter provided last summer to the diocese’s internal review board during its investigation.

In a meeting earlier this month, Hambleton said, Bishop Oscar Solis told him that the diocese found “credible” the allegation that Fitzgerald had destroyed documents — but that its conclusions would never be made public.

“Such secrecy perpetuates harm rather than healing,” Hambleton said in a statement, “it denies justice and transparency, deepens the wounds borne by survivors of clergy sexual abuse, and further undermines the moral credibility of the church.”

The case

Hambleton first alleged in a December 2024 letter to Solis, leader of Utah’s 300,000 Catholics, that the Rev. Heriberto Castrellion Mejia molested him when he was 16 years old. After a seven-month independent investigation and the publication of an exclusive Salt Lake Tribune story last summer, the diocese determined that Hambleton’s allegations against Mejia were “credible” and publicly apologized for the priest’s actions.

Hambleton, a former principal of The Madeleine Choir School who had dreamed of becoming a priest, was “grateful” for the diocese’s decision, he said back then. But he remained “deeply disappointed” that those priests he believed helped conceal the alleged abuse were not mentioned.

The 52-year-old educator pointed specifically to retired Monsignor Robert Bussen, who served as vicar general at the time, and Fitzgerald, who later took over that role.

Hambleton noted that Bussen and Fitzgerald together held the office of vicar general, essentially a deputy to the bishop, for 30 years. “Their moral and administrative failures contributed to a culture of sexual abuse and misconduct,” Hambleton wrote at the time. “Revoking their priestly faculties would represent a necessary step toward … transparency and accountability.”

But the diocese told him it wanted to investigate further.

Fast-forward to this year. Hambleton said he was invited to meet in person on Jan. 10 with Solis todiscuss the diocese’s findings about the two priests.

The bishop informed him in that meeting, according to Hambleton, that it had finished its investigation. The former seminarian had alleged that Bussen had “knowledge of” Mejia’s misconduct and “failed to act during his tenure as vicar general.”

Hambleton said in his response this month that Solis determined the assertion about Bussen was “unsubstantiated.”

The former parishioner said the bishop did conclude that Fitzgerald had “tampered with and destroyed official church documents during his tenure as vicar general.”

That claim was further buoyed by the letter from Moriarty.

Fitzgerald “first told me that he would destroy files after I returned from a leave of absence in 2000. As part of my return, I had undergone a psychological evaluation, and I was concerned that it remain confidential,” Moriarty wrote to the diocese’s review board. “He told me not to worry and that he had made sure there was nothing in my personnel file apart from basic biographical information. He went on to say that he would occasionally purge priest personnel files.”

Through the years, Fitzgerald mentioned to Moriarty “at least four more times that he engaged in this practice,” wrote Moriarty, who went on to become a Salt Lake City attorney . “Because I found it odd, I remember talking with four other priests (all of whom are now deceased) about what Msgr. Fitzgerald had told me regarding shredding files. All four of them said he had told them the same thing.”

Diocese responds

In response to questions from The Tribune about this month’s meeting between the bishop and Hambleton, the diocese reiterated in a statement that it found allegations about Mejia “credible and believable,” and repeated Solis’ earlier apology.

The statement said the diocese conducted an “internal canonical investigation” about the allegation that Fitzgerald, who died Jan. 14 at age 89, had destroyed documents.

“This internal investigation is complete,” the statement said, “and the diocese has taken steps to address its findings.”

The diocese did not detail any of those findings or if Fitzgerald or anyone else had disposed of records.

According to Hambleton, Solis told him in their meeting that Fitzgerald “would retain his status as a retired priest in good standing within the diocese.”

Among Hambleton’s other allegations was that Fitzgerald had “disparaged victims of sex abuse.” That was the reason, Hambleton said, why he never told Fitzgerald or any other clergy about Mejia at the time.

When Fitzgerald retired as vicar general in 2011, a Tribune profile quoted a leader in the diocese saying that “Fitzgerald met with every victim of abuse.” Fitzgerald himself said in that article that the diocese“ never had leadership that covered up abuse or transferred priests with problems.”

Yet “behind closed doors,” Hambleton insists in his statement, the vicar general “demeaned and insulted some of the very same victims who may have met with him in good faith.”

Hambleton said in his statement that Solis told him in their recent meeting that this accusation was “credible.”

The diocese’s statement made no mention of that.

“Bishop Solis informed me that he does not intend to remove Msgr. Fitzgerald’s faculties,” Hambleton said in his statement. “Instead, minimal penalties were imposed — amounting to little more than a private reprimand. Among them, Msgr. Fitzgerald must privately admit his misconduct and apologize to Bishop Solis. The bishop told me that he does not intend to disclose Msgr. Fitzgerald’s misconduct to the faithful, and that he will not issue a press release.”

By not alerting Utah Catholics of substantiated misconduct by a senior diocesan official, Hambleton said, Solis “has chosen a course that prioritizes secrecy over accountability. Having investigated an entrenched culture of concealment that enables abuse within the church, he has now reaffirmed it through his own decision.”

Hambleton also said that “canon law rightly considers the destruction of church records to be a grave offense — so serious that it permits a bishop to remove priestly faculties from the offender.”

The diocese did not make Solis available for an interview.

In 2018, the Salt Lake City diocese released the names of 19 clerics facing “credible allegations” of sexual misconduct with minors. Meija, who had lost his priestly faculties in fall 1992, was not on that tally.

A year later, the diocese published an independent review that included Mejia on a list of 23 clergymen facing abuse allegations within its parishes.

Appealing to higher-ups

After meeting with Solis, Hambleton said he wrote to Archbishop George Leo Thomas , leader of the Las Vegas archdiocese, asking for “assistance and pastoral intervention.”

According to Hambleton, Solis had told him that he had consulted with Thomas and “the archbishop advised him to respond the way he did.”

After outlining the case, the allegations and the diocese’s findings in his letter to Thomas, Hambleton asked the archbishop “to consider the gravity of this situation and the dangerous precedent it sets … and to advise Bishop Solis to share the findings of his investigation with the faithful of the Diocese of Salt Lake City.”

Thomas replied that he had “consistently applied the principles of transparency and full disclosure when addressing claims of sexual abuse in these dioceses,” according to a copy of the letter provided by Hambleton. “At the same time, it is important to note that during the 1970s through the 1990s, bishops frequently received reports from treatment facilities after sending clergy to these centers for evaluation. During those decades, it was commonplace for treatment facilities to send their aftercare reports with a bold heading marked ‘READ AND DESTROY.’”

When reached this week, the Las Vegas archdiocese declined to comment further.

At a Jan. 20 funeral Mass for Fitzgerald, who had battled cancer and heart failure in his final years, Solis said the priest felt sorrow for any pain he caused others.

“He was grateful, had genuine sorrow for any hurt he had caused, asked for forgiveness with humility, and sought reconciliation and peace with God and with others,” said the bishop, according to the Intermountain Catholic.
“He personally expressed this to me when I last visited him in the hospital a few days before he died. He died in peace, confident of the mercy of God, and asked forgiveness of the church he loved and of the people he might have hurt.”

Going forward, Hambleton said, “the full extent of [the vicar general’s] destruction [of files] can never be known. Nor can it be known how many crimes may have been concealed, or how many victims of clergy sexual abuse may have been silenced or further harmed as a result.”

That, he said, “is the irreversible nature of document destruction.”

https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2026/01/27/catholic-abuse-powerful-utah/

The Church of England has scrambled to defend the incoming Archbishop of Canterbury’s safeguarding record amid ongoing complaints from an “abuse” victim.

The Rt Rev Dame Sarah Mullally is the Bishop of London and is set to legally become the 106th – and first female – Archbishop of Canterbury at a ceremony at St Paul’s Cathedral on Wednesday.

She has faced accusations of mishandling a complaint from an alleged abuse victim, known as Survivor N, who claims that he was groped and asked to perform a sex act by a priest.

The priest also allegedly invited Survivor N to his flat and proceeded to change clothes, which involved stripping down to his underpants, before talking about his sex life and suggesting there was a “sexual attraction” between himself and his guest.

Survivor N claims Dame Sarah mishandled his complaint against the priest and failed him by claiming that his complaint had been “fully dealt with”, and also by sending a confidential email about the allegations directly to the priest accused of the sexual assault. The allegations threaten to pile pressure on her ahead of her imminent installation as Archbishop.

The Church of England has come to Dame Sarah’s defence, claiming she addresses safeguarding concerns with “care and rigour”.

The Rt Rev Dr Joanne Grenfell, the lead bishop on safeguarding, published a statement saying she has seen Dame Sarah’s “full commitment to safeguarding – strengthening systems and processes, and improving the culture across a large, complex organisation”.

As a result, Survivor N criticised the “galling betrayal” of abuse victims and dismissed the praise as “a slap in the face” and “a cruel untruth”.

Survivor N said Bishop Grenfell’s defence of Dame Sarah epitomised “the very worst of the Church of England’s double-speak – talking out of both sides of your mouth – around safeguarding”.

He added: “For Joanne Grenfell to praise Sarah Mullally’s record of dealing with clergy abuse while there are live and active safeguarding complaints against her, which are currently being investigated by the Bishop of Winchester, feels like a galling betrayal of both Survivor O and myself.

Last week The Telegraph revealed that, as well as Survivor N, a second victim was allegedly targeted by the priest in question. The alleged second victim, a Church of England clergy member whom The Telegraph is referring to as Survivor O, claims that the priest confronted them, while fully naked, and sexually propositioned them.

Although Dame Sarah had no involvement in Survivor O’s case and no complaint was ever made, because Survivor O felt “intimidated”, the latest allegation has put renewed pressure on her.

Dame Sarah’s predecessor, Justin Welby, was forced to resign in a separate scandal over his mishandling of abuse claims.

Bishop Grenfell said: “[Dame Sarah] gets it, she cares about it and she prioritises it.”

In a statement released this weekend, she added: “In areas where poor practice had gone unchallenged in the past, she didn’t look away. She tackled issues with clarity and principle and made sure concerns were followed through with care and rigour.”

She added that Dame Sarah “has taken care to listen, resource and act, and ensure complaints are handled properly… She is committed to taking the next steps towards greater independence in safeguarding across the Church – as Synod has voted for – with external scrutiny underpinned by legislation, survivor engagement embedded and practice kept robust and accountable at every level”.

Documents seen by The Telegraph show that the Church’s own officials are currently looking into Survivor N’s case, which, he suggests, shows that six years after making his complaint, it is neither resolved nor “fully dealt with” as Dame Sarah claimed in a statement published last month.

As a result, Survivor N filed an official complaint, known as a Clergy Discipline Measure (CDM), against Dame Sarah. The CDM remains outstanding and is being looked at by the Bishop of Winchester, the Rt Rev Philip Mounstephen.

Archbishop of York dismissed Survivor N’s claims

Furthermore, earlier this month, a previous CDM made by Survivor N against Dame Sarah over her handling of his complaint against the priest was dismissed by her closest ranking colleague, the Archbishop of York, the Most Rev Stephen Cottrell.

Survivor N has indicated that he will appeal the dismissal of this CDM. This would mean that there would be two live CDMs against Dame Sarah as she becomes the Church of England’s top bishop.

LANSING (MI)
Native News Online [Grand Rapids, MI]

December 19, 2025

By Levi Rickert

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel on Thursday announced the launch of a statewide criminal investigation into Indian boarding schools and related institutions that once operated in Michigan.

The Department of Attorney General will work to identify, document and investigate potential criminal conduct at the schools and pursue prosecutions when warranted.

The department is asking survivors, witnesses and others with firsthand knowledge to come forward with information that could assist the investigation.

“This investigation seeks to bring truth and accountability to a painful chapter in our state’s history,” Nessel said. “My office is committed to ensuring that survivors’ voices are heard and that any criminal acts uncovered are thoroughly investigated and, when possible, prosecuted.”

The Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition (NABS) reports that eight Indian boarding schools operated in Michigan. The two largest were the Holy Childhood of Jesus School, which operated in Harbor Springs from 1829 to 1983, and the Michigan Indian Industrial Boarding School, which operated in Mount Pleasant from 1893 to 1934.

On Aug. 13, 2022, then–Interior Secretary Deb Haaland (Laguna Pueblo) and Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan Newland (Bay Mills Indian Community) held a listening session during the second stop of “The Road to Healing” tour at Pellston High School’s gymnasium. Throughout the day, dozens of Indian boarding school survivors and their descendants gave testimony, sharing stories of physical, emotional and sexual abuse that occurred at the schools.

“I am pleased with Attorney General Nessel for taking steps to hold accountable any individuals, institutions, or systems that abused Native American children during the Indian Mission and Boarding School era, which lasted until 1984,” Sault Ste. Marie Tribal Councillor Aaron Payment said to Native News Online. “During Secretary Haaland’s Road to Healing tour, one by one, victims stood in solidarity and testified, often weeping and naming their perpetrator as Sister X or Father Y. Case by case, such physical assault and corporate punishment could be excused away, but collectively, you see a clear pattern of systemic racism and abuse that was allowed to happen. These schools operated by states with federal funds under the guise of civilizing and educating the “savages.”

“The true intention was to decimate the very fabric and social systems of American Indian life that have had lasting impacts called historical and intergenerational trauma,” Payment continued.

Anyone with information related to the investigation may contact the Department of Attorney General by email or by phone at 517-897-7391. Tips may be submitted anonymously. Additional information is available on the department’s Native Boarding School Investigation webpage.

https://nativenewsonline.net/currents/michigan-attorney-general-opens-criminal-investigation-into-indian-boarding-schools

NEWARK (NJ)
NorthJersey.com [Woodland Park, NJ]

December 30, 2025

By Amanda Wallace

A judge has denied the Delbarton School’s request for a new trial, months after a jury unanimously awarded $5 million to a former student who sued the all-boys Catholic school, alleging sexual assault by one of its monks nearly five decades earlier.

In a decision filed Dec. 29, state Superior Court Judge Louis Sceusi denied a motion brought by the Morris County school, ruling that the record fails to establish “clear and convincing evidence” of any miscarriage of justice that would require a legal do-over.

The jury arrived at a “fair and well-reasoned verdict” after its five-week trial this fall, Sceusi wrote.

The unanimous Oct. 8 verdict was a milestone, hailed by clergy abuse victims and advocates. It was the first civil sex abuse lawsuit against the Catholic Church to go to a jury in New Jersey since the state extended its statute of limitations in 2019. It was also the first of dozens of clergy abuse claims against Delbarton to reach a trial, though the school has settled others.

During the trial, the 65-year-old plaintiff, identified only as “T.M.” to protect his privacy, alleged that the Rev. Richard Lott abused him on New Year’s Day in 1976, when he was attending the Morris Township school.

Lott, 89, denied the accusations, stating in his testimony that he was not on campus on the date of the alleged assault and was instead serving as a parish priest in Lakewood. He said he had never had sex with anyone.

The six-person jury at the Morris County Courthouse ultimately ruled that the abuse had occurred and that both Lott and Delbarton were liable for T.M.’s suffering. Jurors spared Delbarton a further financial hit, however, when they decided not to award punitive damages on top of their $5 million compensatory award.

The case for retrial

In an Oct. 28 state court filing, Delbarton and the Order of St. Benedict of New Jersey, which operates the school, complained of a “litany of errors” from “start to finish” at the trial, requesting a retrial.

The defendants applied for a mistrial six times but were denied by Sceusi each time, the motion noted.

In the filing, the Morris County school and the Order of St. Benedict argued that terminology used by the plaintiff’s attorney at the trial was “intentional and inflammatory” and “irreparably tainted the jury’s perception of the case.”

The filing also cited the exclusion of the order’s medical expert from testifying, allegedly improper statements by T.M.’s attorney, and misconduct by a juror that led to his removal. A new trial is “required to preserve the integrity of the judicial process,” it added.

More: Can Delbarton recover from $5M sex assault verdict? ‘Stakes are high’ as jury reconvenes

On top of that, James Barletti, a lawyer for Delbarton and the Order of St. Benedict, deemed the $5 million award “excessive.” The school was found 65% liable for the award, with Lott responsible for the rest.

Rayna Kessler, an attorney for T.M., dismissed the motion as “nothing more than Delbarton and OSBNJ’s continued refusal to accept accountability.” The $5 million award was not excessive, she told NorthJersey.com.

Judge denies Delbarton’s request for new trial

In his ruling Monday, Sceusi wrote that he found no evidence that the plaintiff’s counsel’s remarks “irreparably influenced the jury” and said the exclusion of the medical expert’s testimony was justified.

The court also found that the issue of juror misconduct was handled as required by law, according to the ruling.

“In review of the entire record the court sees no substantial prejudice or injustice to either party. The proceedings as a whole were even handed and fair,” reads the decision. “The court acted appropriately, under the circumstances, and the jury’s verdict represents a sound reasonable evaluation of the evidence.”

The judge also determined that the $5 million award is “neither excessive nor unsupported by the evidence.”

“The court has spoken, and the jury’s voice has been upheld,” Kessler said in an emailed statement Tuesday afternoon. “This case was the first of many to go to a jury under the 2019 law, and this ruling ensures that the precedent set by this jury stands firm.”

She continued, “After nine years of contentious litigation, it is time for Delbarton to stop fighting the truth and start accepting accountability. True healing for its many victims cannot occur until the school finally reconciles with its past failures.”

Barletti did not respond to a request for comment on the judge’s decision. Delbarton spokesperson Jessica Fiddes declined to comment, citing the school’s policy against speaking on active litigation.

By Amanda Wallace

 

Chicago Tribune, Evy Lewis, December 18, 2025

Pope Leo XIV made his most important U.S. appointment to date Thursday, naming a fellow south suburbanite as the next archbishop of New York to lead one of the biggest archdioceses as it navigates relations with the Trump administration and its immigration crackdown.

Joliet Bishop Ronald Hicks will replace the retiring Cardinal Timothy Dolan, a prominent conservative figure in the U.S. Catholic hierarchy.

During a news conference in New York Thursday morning, Hicks noted he grew up in South Holland, which is right next to Dolton in the south suburbs.

“South Holland and Dolton might not mean anything to you, but Dolton is where our holy father, Pope Leo XIV, grew up and is from, and our houses are literally 14 blocks away from each other,” Hicks said.

Hicks will be installed as archbishop Feb. 6 at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, according to the Joliet Diocese. Until then, he will continue serving as bishop of Joliet, where he has been since 2020.

“The past five years in Joliet have been a true blessing for me,” Hicks wrote in a statement. “The relationships we have built, the faith we have shared, and the journey we have walked together are treasures I will carry with me to New York.”

Hicks takes over after Dolan last week finalized a plan to establish a $300 million fund to compensate victims of sexual abuse who had sued the archdiocese.

Dolan submitted his resignation in February, as required when he turned 75. But the Vatican often waits to make important leadership changes in dioceses if there is lingering abuse litigation or other governance matters that need to be resolved by the outgoing bishop.

Hicks thanked Dolan for his backing during Thursday’s news conference.

“He said to me, ‘Ron, I want you to do well here, and you have all my support,’” Hicks said.

A call for solidarity with immigrants

Like Leo, who spent 20 years as a missionary in Peru, Hicks worked for five years in El Salvador heading a church-run orphanage program that operated in nine Latin American and Caribbean countries.

“Taking a new position as archbishop of New York is an enormous responsibility, but I can honestly say that Bishop Hicks is up to the task,” said the Rev. Eusebius Martis, who has known Hicks since the mid-1980s and worked with him at Mundelein Seminary, the Chicago archdiocesan seminary.

He said New York was lucky to have him.

“He is a wonderful man, always thoughtful and attentive to the needs of seminarians,” Martis, professor of sacramental theology at the Pontifical Liturgical Institute of Sant’Anselmo, the Benedictine University in Rome, said in an email.

In November, Hicks endorsed a special message from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops condemning the Trump administration’s immigration raids, which have targeted Chicago in particular.

In a statement then urging Catholics to share the message, Hicks said it “affirms our solidarity with all our brothers and sisters as it expresses our concerns, opposition, and hopes with clarity and conviction. It is grounded in the church’s enduring commitment to the Catholic social teaching of human dignity and a call for meaningful immigration reform.”

Hicks reiterated his call Thursday for solidarity by invoking New York City’s history as a point of arrival for millions of immigrants, referencing Emma Lazarus’ famous poem about the Statue of Liberty, which concludes: “I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

“I feel the hope that so many to our shores had that came through this very harbor here in New York, including my own family,” Hicks said. “I am committed to working with the great variety and diversity of faith leaders and civic leaders to keep that hope alive, and to make real the promise of the golden door.”

Neighboring hometowns

Though they both hail from the south suburbs, Hicks only met the future pope in 2024, when then-Cardinal Robert Prevost visited one of Hicks’ parishes in New Lenox and took part in a question-and-answer conversation for the public.

Hicks, who sat in the front pew, said he learned that day what sort of future pope Leo would be and said he liked what he saw both in his public remarks and in their private conversation.

“His talk was very clear and concise,” Hicks said Thursday. “Afterward he said, ‘Can I just get get five minutes with you?’ And that five minutes turned into about 20 minutes.”

Hicks said that he relates strongly to the pope, having grown up nearby.

“We would have played baseball in the same parks, gone swimming in the same public pool and we even share a famous pizza place that’s our favorite,” Hicks said.

The pope is famously a fan of Aurelio’s Pizza in Homewood, which has embraced the connection with pride, with a “Poperoni” pizza and a Pope Leo XIV table.

But unlike Pope Leo, a devoted White Sox fan, Hicks shared in New York Thursday what he called his first “controversial statement.”

“I’m a Cubs fan, and I love deep-dish pizza,” Hicks said. “I am going to remain a loyal Cubs fan. However, I am going to start rooting for the New York sports teams.”

Hicks was a parish priest in Chicago and dean of training at Mundelein Seminary before Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich made him vicar general of the archdiocese in 2015. Three years later, Hicks was made an auxiliary bishop, and in 2020 Pope Francis named him bishop of Joliet, serving about 520,000 Catholics in seven counties.

“I was formed in Chicago in the Archdiocese of Chicago, under the care of Cardinal (Joseph) Bernardin, through the witness of Cardinal (Francis) George and by the mentorship of Cardinal Cupich,” Hicks said. “For all them, I’m deeply grateful.”

Cupich, seen as a progressive in the U.S. church, has been a close adviser to both Francis and Leo, and Hicks’ appointment to such a prominent job likely could not have come without Cupich’s endorsement.

“Archbishop Hicks is a holy man with a heart for Jesus and the People of God,” Cupich said in a statement. “He will embrace the diversity of his new archdiocese and be an adept administrator.”

The New York Archdiocese is among the largest in the nation, serving roughly 2.5 million Catholics in Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island in New York City, as well as seven counties to the north.

Overseeing abuse settlements

In one of his biggest initial tasks, Hicks will have to oversee the implementation of the abuse settlement fund that Dolan finalized, which is to be paid for by reducing the archdiocesan budget and selling off assets. The aim is to cover settlements for most, if not all of the roughly 1,300 outstanding abuse claims against the archdiocese.

“As a church, we can never rest in our efforts to prevent abuse, to protect children and to care for survivors,” Hicks said. “While this work is challenging, it’s difficult, it’s painful, I hope it will continue to help in the areas of accountability, transparency and healing.”

Hicks is no stranger to managing the fallout of the abuse scandal, after the Joliet Diocese under his predecessors and the rest of the Illinois church came under scathing criticism by the state’s attorney general in 2023.

A five-year investigation found that 451 Catholic clergy abused 1,997 children in Illinois between 1950 and 2019. Hicks had been appointed to lead the Joliet church in 2020. The attorney general’s report was generally positive in recognizing the diocese’s current child protection policies, but documented several cases where previous Joliet bishops moved known abusers around, disparaged victims and refused to accept responsibility for their role in enabling the abuse.

Following the publication of the 2023 report, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests criticized Hicks, saying he lacked transparency. The organization said he should have notified the public and parishes when the Joliet Diocese’s public list of priests credibly accused of sexual assault was added to, and called on him to add additional names of accused priests.

“Bishop Hicks is unfit to oversee the settlement of abuse claims in New York,” the survivors network said in a statement following Thursday’s announcement. “Survivors do not trust him, and for good reason. His record of stonewalling, secrecy, and betrayal is the kind of behavior that has kept the Catholic abuse crisis going for decades.”

Read story at the Chicago Tribune

by Sam Borcia

A leader at a church in Winthrop Harbor was arrested and gave a full admission that he repeatedly sexually assaulted a child, beginning when she was as young as six years old and spanning years.

Greg R. Douma, 58, of Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, was charged with one count of repeated sexual assault of a child, three counts of first-degree child sexual assault and one count of incest.

The Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin Police Department responded on November 23 to the 9100 block of 39th Avenue in Pleasant Prairie to meet with a DCFS worker for a report of a sexual abuse allegation at the residence.

Police learned the female victim was a patient at a mental health hospital where she told staff that she had been sexually abused by a relative, identified as Douma, according to a criminal complaint.

The child, who is under the age of 13, said that Douma was “doing things to her that make babies.”

The girl was transported to the child advocacy centre for an interview on December 3.

The victim told investigators that when she was six or seven years old, Douma asked her if she wanted to watch something on a phone, the complaint said.

The girl said she was obsessed with watching kitchen videos at the time. She laid on the bed on her stomach watching the videos on the phone, and Douma sexually assaulted her, the complaint said.

The victim explained to investigators in detail how it occurred and said that it continued to happen because she “got to watch videos, and he got to do his… You know when men and women put private to private, and it makes them feel good.”

The complaint said Douma told the girl that he should not do that and that it was illegal, while saying to the girl that if she told anyone, then his wife would divorce him.

The assaults continued for years until she was approximately 12 years old.

The child told investigators that she called Douma this month and he asked her not to tell anyone, but she told him she was not going to lie anymore, to which he responded, “Okay,” according to the complaint said.

Detectives interviewed Douma on Friday at the Pleasant Prairie Police Department, and he confessed, on video, that everything the girl had claimed about sexual assault was true, the complaint said.

Douma said the assaults occurred on and off over the years, and he did not know how many times in total,l but that it happened most frequently over the past two years, the complaint said. He added that it “happened an awful lot over the years.”

Douma was an elder at The Point in Winthrop Harbor where he served with the church’s AIM children’s ministry doing security. The church has since removed Douma from its website and YouTube channel.

Court records show Douma appeared in Kenosha County Court on Monday and was ordered held in the Kenosha County Jail on a $50,000 cash bond.

Douma posted the bond and was released from jail with pre-trial conditions. He is scheduled to appear in court again on December 16 for a preliminary hearing.

Douma faces a potential combined prison sentence of 280 years if he is convicted of all charges, sentenced to the maximum for each, and each sentence runs consecutively.

New recordings of church officials spurred the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, to file an updated complaint with the Vatican.

Chicago Sun-Times, Violet Miller, December 4, 2025

Survivors of clergy abuse are calling for an investigation into Pope Leo XIV during his tenure as bishop of Chiclayo in Peru, alleging he played a role in covering up how priests and clerics accused of sexual assault were allowed to continue their roles in the Catholic Church.

Recordings of a meeting from in April between the Rev. Giampiero Gambaro with Ana María Quispe Díaz and others accusing Peruvian clerics of assault revealed the man they accused had confessed to church officials years ago, and in September was granted an “honorable discharge.”

The Chicago Sun-Times reviewed a translated version of the recordings made public by Conclave Watch.

The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests plans to file an updated vos estis lux mundi complaint, the church’s pathway for documenting accusations of abuse or mishandling of cases, in light of the newly surfaced recordings. The group said these cases were representative of “a system that allows bishops and cardinals to control and close cases that implicate themselves.”

“We cannot have another pope in this institutional system who has covered up child sex crimes,” said Peter Isely, a survivor of clerical sexual abuse from Wisconsin and SNAP founder, at a Thursday news conference in Chicago. “I’ve been at this 35 years, and the only way things change is when there are consequences and accountability. … We don’t want this to happen to another child.”

Vatican officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Díaz, of Chiclayo, Peru, alleges she was abused by a priest when she was 9 years old, and her two sisters were assaulted by the same priest. In April 2022, she said, the three of them brought their allegations to Pope Leo XIV, then known as Robert Prevost and serving as bishop of Chiclayo, though he never opened an investigation.

The Vatican ended its investigation into the alleged abuse in 2023 after civil authorities said the allegations were beyond the statute of limitations, according to The New York Times. The Vatican told the paper that Prevost had done more than was required in at least one of the cases.

The new evidence shows that church officials admitted the Rev. Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzáles, known as Father Lute, had confessed to removing his clothes, making sexually inappropriate comments and touching himself and the victims, according to SNAP.

Gambaro said Prevost’s “preliminary investigation was very poorly conducted” — describing it as a “joke” — and that “the church’s statute of limitations is clearly quite different.” He added that an unknown church official, believed by the victims to be Prevost, “signed a letter saying the [canonical] process should not be carried out.”

“This is the first time I’ve dealt with this type of situation where they invoke the statute of limitations under civil law in this way,” Gambaro says in the recording.

Lute and the Rev. Ricardo Yesquén Paiva, who Díaz says also assaulted her as a child, continued to be shown in Facebook photos serving in church roles despite Prevost’s claims they had been removed, according SNAP’s analysis of social media.

One Facebook photo shows Prevost standing with Paiva at his birthday party in 2023 — three years after the allegations surfaced — with both dressed in clerical garb.

The Oklahoman, Carla Hinton, November 16, 2025

A secular news outlet described an Oklahoma City archbishop as a “conservative culture warrior,” while a religious magazine said he is “far from an extremist.”

Reactions to the Most Rev. Paul S. Coakley’s election to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ presidency have come as onlookers seek to define what his rise to the top of the nation’s primary arm of the Roman Catholic Church says about the American Catholic hierarchy’s relationship with Pope Leo XIV, the first U.S-born pope.

Coakley, 70, is the first bishops’ conference president to be elected during Pope Leo’s papacy. And the hyper focus on the bishops’ choice of leadership is also undoubtedly tied to the fact that he is taking the organization’s helm as its first president elected during President Donald Trump’s second term.

On the political front, pundits and commentators have questioned whether Coakley, widely known as a staunch conservative, will, during his three-year term as its president, steer the bishops’ conference on the right-leaning path it has appeared to follow in the last several years.

The Associated Press called Coakley a “conservative culture warrior” chosen as the USCCB doubles down on its “conservative bent.” He is connected to the Napa Institute, a conservative Catholic organization, as its ecclesiastical adviser.

By contrast, The Catholic Herald said he was “far from an extremist,” and has dutifully fulfilled his duties as a Catholic bishop.

“In short, if one treats pro-life and pro-family teaching as ‘conservative,’ then one would hope all US bishops are conservatives,” the London-based Catholic monthly magazine said.

On another front, organizations that advocate for people sexually abused by religious clergy, and survivors of such abuse, said that choosing Coakley as their leader means that the nation’s Catholic bishops have no sense of justice or urgency about holding faith leaders who prey on others accountable.

Peter Isely, a longtime spokesperson and activist for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said Coakley’s election as president of the bishops’ group “only reinforces what we already know: survivors waiting for justice should not look to the USCCB.”

“Only public exposure and action on the part of civil society will force the U.S. bishops to remove offenders and disclose the vast amount of criminal evidence of rape and sexual assault in their possession,” Isely said in a statement.

Coakley called for an independent investigation on the archdiocese’s response to sexual abuse claims over a period of about 20 years. Under his leadership, the archdiocese hired the law firm McAfee & Taft to conduct an investigation and compile the report, which was released in 2019.

Steady advancement

Coakley, a Norfolk, Virginia, native, was ordained to the priesthood in 1983. He was appointed by Pope John Paul II to serve as bishop of the Diocese of Salina, Kansas, in 2004. Pope Benedict XVI appointed him archbishop of Oklahoma City in 2010, and he was installed in 2011, succeeding the Most Rev. Eusebius J. Beltran, who retired.

How did Coakley ascend to the apex of America’s Roman Catholic hierarchy?

He was in a key position to be considered for the role of USCCB president, and his style of leadership has become widely known among his fellow bishops due to his membership on several of the organization’s committees.

Most notably, Coakley was serving as the USCCB’s secretary, considered the bishop conference’s third most senior post, behind the president and vice president, when he was tapped to become the group’s president on Nov. 11.

And, he has served on 12 USCCB committees, three of which he served as chair. Coakley served on the USCCB’s Domestic Justice and Human Development Committee from 2019 to 2022. The archbishop has also served on the USCCB’s Committee on Priorities and Plans from 2022 to the present.

He served on Catholic Relief Services’ ‘board of directors from 2012 to 2019, serving as chair from 2014 to 2016. Catholic Relief Services is the USCCCB’s official international relief and development agency.

Leadership in Oklahoma

As others share their opinions on what Coakley will bring to his role as USCCB president, there’s no question that he has risen to prominence both in and outside Oklahoma due to his high profile stance on several issues. These include immigration, abortion and the death penalty.

Oklahomans, including those who have worked alongside Coakley and those who fall under his leadership, discussed how he has made the position of Oklahoma City archbishop his own since being appointed to the role. They said he has been willing to publicly weigh in on hot-button issues.

The Rev. Don Heath, co-pastor of Disciples Christian Church in Edmond, said the archbishop has spoken out numerous times over the years in opposition to the death penalty. Heath served as chairman of the Oklahoma Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty for eight years.

“Every time I gave a statement, Coakley gave one, too,” Heath said. “He’s been faithful to that. He’s also a fierce advocate for the immigrants, and I hope he will continue.”

The Rev. Tim Luschen, an Archdiocese of Oklahoma City priest serving as senior pastor of Little Flower Catholic Church in south Oklahoma City, offered similar comments. Luschen is also a member of Voices Organized in Civic Engagement, or VOICE, a coalition of congregations, nonprofits, worker associations and schools on a mission to help Oklahoma City metro-area families face a wide range of challenges.

Luschen said Coakley has been given an opportunity to weigh in on issues of vital importance from a national platform, and he thinks the role suits the archbishop.

“This election has really given him an opportunity to speak for all the bishops in the U.S. on issues like sanctity of life — from the womb to natural death,” Luschen said. “He’s going to be speaking out on different things that affect our families like immigration, but also also how people are going to afford health care and how they are going to put food on their table.”

Like Heath, Monsignor Don Wolf, pastor of Sacred Heart Church and rector of the Blessed Stanley Rother Shrine, said Coakley’s opposition to the death penalty has been well known in Oklahoma.

Wolf said he thinks Coakley will continue to weigh in about the need for the humane treatment of undocumented migrants, even as he voices his agreement with nations having sovereign borders.

“Everyone wants a good and well-ordered society, and you can do that in a way that’s more humane, in a way that respects human dignity, and I think that’s what the archbishop has talked about,” the priest said.

“He’s trying to thread the needle when it comes to that. I think the archbishop has been pretty careful about that. He makes an attempt to speak clearly and carefully, and I know he’ll bring that to the national stage. His desire to communicate is on point.”

The Rev. Shannon Fleck, executive director of Faithful America, a national nonprofit organization that mobilizes Christians to take action for social justice, racial equality and democracy, worked with Coakley in her former role as executive director of the Oklahoma Faith Network, an ecumenical coalition of more than 16 Christian denominations and individual churches that partner with other organizations, including those affiliated with other faith traditions.

In 2018, the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City had been a longtime member of the network, then called the Oklahoma Conference of Churches, when Coakley withdrew the faith organization from the statewide coalition, which continues to include the Episcopal Diocese of Oklahoma, the Oklahoma United Methodist Conference and several Black faith denominations, among others. In his statement regarding the matter, Coakley cited what he deemed as coalition leadership’s shift from ecumenism to secular politics as the reason for his decision.

Fleck, who continues to reside in Oklahoma, said she had only been on the job a few months, and she felt that Coakley had pre-judged her and her work when he withdrew the archdiocese from the faith coalition. She said she is hoping in his new role at the helm of the USSCB, Coakley will see the importance of working with people with who he disagrees, for the sake of the common good.

“It was disappointing that he walked away from a table that sought to bring diverse voices together in dialogue, and I would hope that as he chooses to lead in this capacity, he is intentional about being in spaces with people that do not agree with him because that makes us better leaders,” Fleck said.

Read story at The Oklahoman

by Sam Borcia

A deacon at a church in Round Lake has been suspended after the Archdiocese announced an investigation into him regarding the sexual abuse of children.

Archbishop of Chicago Cardinal Blase J. Cupich announced the news in a letter to members of St. Joseph Catholic Church, 114 North Lincoln Avenue in Round Lake, on Wednesday.