By Peter Finney Jr.
NEW ORLEANS (CNS) – Retired Archbishop Alfred C. Hughes of New Orleans will turn 90 in December, but the bike rack on his car at Notre Dame Seminary proclaims, in a fittingly understated way, that God isn’t finished with him yet.

He still cycles to Audubon Park in New Orleans every Sunday – “That’s the safest day to ride in the city!” – swims daily during the summer in the Notre Dame Seminary pool, provides ongoing spiritual direction for seminarians, priests and religious – “I’ve had to cap it at 30” – and spends every Friday afternoon sitting and praying with the residents of Project Lazarus, the archdiocesan shelter and ministry to homeless men and women with AIDS.

He just finished another book – “Priests in Love with God and Eager to Witness to the Gospel” – and lives out another chapter each day with his cheerful witness.

He’s known as the Katrina archbishop for shepherding the archdiocese during Hurricane Katrina 17 years ago.

Archbishop Hughes recalls being inside the adoration chapel at Our Lady of Mercy Parish in Baton Rouge. It finally had become apparent that the floodwalls of the 17th Street Canal had collapsed and Lake Pontchartrain was angry and winning.
“I was just overwhelmed and didn’t know where to begin or what to say or do,” Archbishop Hughes said. “I was putting this all on the Lord, and, of course, the Lord was remaining silent.”

And then, at the end of the hour he said it struck me that the Lord was not saying anything, “but he’s present, and he’s expressing through his presence – support.”
“So, what I say or what I do may be secondary to being God’s presence to the people. That brought inner peace to me,” he told the Clarion Herald, archdiocesan newspaper of New Orleans.

In his life as a priest, spiritual director, seminary rector and bishop, Archbishop Hughes has been masterful in helping others calm the troubled waters churning within themselves. The pitched-fork battles that characterize our social interactions these days – as a nation and as a church – cry out for healing.
Those neuralgic divisions over social policy and the obvious lack of fair play in public discourse are not going to be solved overnight. In his years of spiritual mentorship, Archbishop Hughes says healing must start with a personal commitment to examine our own lives.

“The No. 1 step that’s very helpful to take is to be faithful to some space and time each day of quiet to be present to God,” Archbishop Hughes said. “If we don’t step back from the swirl of messages and emotions going on around us, we’re not going to get sufficient distance to see reality more objectively and sort out truth from falsehood or half-truth. And, we’re not going to experience the peace in ourselves that the world needs so much to receive from us.

“If we’re going to be able to make some positive contribution, we first have to be faithful to a regular time of placing ourselves before God and asking him for the grace to see ourselves, to see other people, to see the world and all that’s going on, and even to see the demonic, as they are and, with his eyes, learn what it is he wants me personally to try to do that reverses, in some small way, and counters evil with good.”

(Finney is executive editor/general manager of the Clarion Herald, newspaper of the Archdiocese of New Orleans.)

By Kurt Jensen
WASHINGTON (CNS) – When the Supreme Court ruled June 24 that there is no constitutional right to abortion, the historic decision came a day before what would have been the 98th birthday of Nellie Gray, founder of the March for Life.

The march – which Gray, a Texas-born government lawyer, founded in 1974 to mark the first anniversary of the court’s Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion nationwide – is a fixture of Catholic pro-life activism and bus pilgrimages to the nation’s capital.

So the ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, and Gray’s mission accomplished, has led to speculation as to the future of the national march.

Will it continue?

Yes, said Jeanne Mancini, who became March for Life president in 2013, a year after Gray’s death.
But there’s a new emphasis on growing statewide marches, an effort that began a few years ago.
“We will still be having our federal legislative battles,” Mancini said on a June 29 webcast, “Life Beyond Roe,” sponsored by a consortium of pro-life groups.

But “I would say the voices will have more impact at the state level” as state legislatures that have not already enacted abortion bans begin to debate legislation, she said. “So it’s like less is more.”

March for Life has held state marches in Connecticut, Virginia and California, with ones planned for Pennsylvania in September and Ohio in October.

Next year, Mancini said the plans are to double the number, and over the next six years, to have marches in all 50 state capitals.

As for the Dobbs decision, “I can’t think of a better birthday gift for Nellie,” she added. In a June 25 statement, Mancini promised, “We will continue to march until abortion is unthinkable.”

In January 1974, the first March for Life was organized in Gray’s living room at her Capitol Hill home and drew about 10,000 participants.

In a 2010 interview with Catholic News Service, Gray said the impetus came from the Knights of Columbus. “I didn’t even know who they were, but they explained their stance against abortion and needed a place to meet to discuss plans for a march.”

Since Mancini took over, the march has grown from a relatively modest event that went from the West Front of the Capitol to the Supreme Court sidewalk to an immense rally on the National Mall with marchers from across the country, including members of Congress and the occasional show business celebrity.

The 2020 event is considered to be the largest one in the march’s history. With President Donald Trump as the main rally speaker, it drew more than 100,000 participants.

The smallest one came just a year later during the COVID-19 pandemic. Only an invited group of 80, joined by more than 100 others midway in their route, marched from the Museum of the Bible to the Supreme Court.

It was the first outdoor event in Washington since the Jan. 6, 2021, violence at the Capitol; both the Capitol and Supreme Court were surrounded by high fences.

Counterprotesters over the years have been few in number. This past January, the march was briefly delayed when members of Patriot Front, a neo-Nazi group, attempted to lead the march on Constitution Avenue.

But they had announced their plans in advance on social media, so police who were expecting them quickly escorted them away to a nearby Metro subway station.

By Dennis Sadowski
WASHINGTON (CNS) – When Mike Hoffman decided to contact Archdiocese of Chicago officials in 2006 about how he was sexually abused by a priest for four years while a teenage altar server, he wasn’t sure how his story would be received.

“I wrote one letter and got an immediate letter back and we set a date (to talk),” Hoffman, now 57, told Catholic News Service. “In telling my story, I was not met with confrontation or difficulty. Although I felt anxious, my anxiety was that they would question me and question my character.”

“I was met with compassion, decency and professionalism,” he said.
For that response, Hoffman credits the procedures set up by the archdiocese under the “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People.”

The landmark document, adopted 20 years ago during a widely watched U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops assembly in Dallas, established minimum standards for dioceses and eparchies to follow in response to the clergy sexual abuse scandal that exploded in 2002.

“My experience was modeled after and by and through and within the charter,” Hoffman said.

Hoffman’s encounter with the archdiocese continues nearly 16 years after he revealed his story. He said that while he no longer undergoes therapy paid for by the archdiocese, he continues to receive support from its victim assistance ministry. He chairs the archdiocese’s Hope and Healing Committee, participates in special Masses for survivors, and works with parish-based “peace circles,” discussion groups open to anyone wanting to respond to abuse.

“I still need connection with our local church,” he said, “and they’re doing that, I can faithfully say.”
The archdiocese’s efforts to respond and educate about clerical sexual abuse have touched Hoffman’s family as well. As active members of their Chicago-area parish, he and his wife have undergone safe environment training. His now adult children received age-appropriate training throughout their time in Catholic schools.

The charter – and the accompanying norms approved by the Vatican that govern its provisions under canon law – has been mandated for use by dioceses and eparchies throughout the U.S. It encompasses 17 articles that prescribe specific actions in response to abuse allegations.

The document promotes healing and reconciliation with survivors abused as a minor; identifies procedures for responding to an abuse allegation; sets standards for ministerial behavior and appropriate boundaries; mandates transparency in communicating with the public; requires the permanent removal from ministry of any priest or deacon when an abuse allegation has been substantiated; and establishes of safe environment programs. The charter also launched the bishops’ Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People to coordinate the response to clerical sexual abuse.

In addition, the bishops established the Secretariat for Child and Youth Protection and arranged for an annual audit to be conducted to measure diocesan and eparchial compliance with the charter.
Journalist Jason Berry, whose investigative work into clerical abuse in Louisiana began in 1985 and continued for more than two decades, described the charter as an important step for the church.

He credited those bishops who have “been sensitized to the plight of survivors” and took extraordinary action to meet “with people they would have not met with before” after the scandal widened.
Despite such positive outcomes, Berry noted that the charter failed to cover bishops, who under canon law come under the purview of the pope when it comes to disciplinary measures for wrongdoing.

It took Pope Francis’ 2019 “motu proprio” “Vos Estis Lux Mundi” – which established procedures for reporting allegations of sexual abuse and for holding accountable bishops, eparchs and religious superiors who protect abusers – to prompt steps toward broader accountability on sexual abuse.

In March 2020, the Catholic Bishops Abuse Reporting Service began. It allows for confidential sexual misconduct allegations against U.S. bishops and eparchs to be made through an online portal or via a toll-free telephone number.

The experience gained under the charter over the past two decades has allowed church leaders to better respond to abuse and the needs of survivors, said Deacon Bernie Nojadera, executive director of the USCCB secretariat.

The church has moved forward in collaborating more closely with survivors and their families and has integrated the expertise of “competent laypeople” in its response to sexual abuse, he said.

Deacon Nojadera described how under the charter, church ministers and employees have been empowered with skills and resources. “If there is an allegation that comes forward,” he told CNS, “it is the ongoing, consistent and competent training that will allow us a church to respond in a manner that is courageous, compassionate and trauma-informed.”

In the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, the charter’s provisions are seen as “minimal requirements” for any church entity to follow, said Susan Mulheron, chancellor of canonical affairs.
“We’ve really gone beyond the charter,” Mulheron said, explaining that the archdiocesan review board also hears allegations of clergy misconduct beyond sexual abuse. “There’s a lot of benefits that we’ve found to that practice.”

She added, “Our review board, they’re fantastic. They’re an essential tool for us in the archdiocese. They bring that diverse expertise. And it also helps us keep honest and accountable.”

Following the Dallas meeting, the bishops also introduced the lay-led National Review Board, which collaborates with them in their response to abuse. It continues to provide updates to the bishops on progress in addressing abuse and recommendations for charter improvements.

Francesco Cesareo, who is retiring June 30 as president of Assumption University in Worcester, Massachusetts, chaired the National Review Board from 2013 to 2020. His tenure was the longest of the eight laypeople who have held the post throughout its 20-year history.

He helped craft the most recent update of the charter in 2018, a process that took five years to complete because of a lengthy legal and canonical review.

The changes tightened requirements for all individuals working with children while clarifying language in several articles.

Cesareo credited the charter for setting standards for dioceses in their response to abuse allegations. NRB members, he said, wanted to partner with the bishops to ensure that the response to allegations was effective and consistent.

For all the good accomplished under the charter, the NRB continued to urge that language be made more prescriptive and less ambiguous in some areas, Cesareo said. The concern focused on how bishops could interpret some sections of the charter differently and have their dioceses still be found in compliance with it.

Cesareo pointed to the need for diocesan review boards to investigate all allegations rather than just those referred by a bishop and that such boards be required to meet regularly rather than only when a bishop forwarded an allegation. The NRB also wanted to introduce specific language pertaining to boundary violations and clarity on safe environment training, he said.

“The NRB was pushing the idea that the charter was a living document and just like a living document it needs to evolve based on the experience of the church and based on what the bishops were confronting because otherwise the charter was not going to address new realities,” Cesareo told CNS.

Another update of the charter has begun. The bishops’ voted during their fall general assembly in November to begin the process this year rather than wait until 2025.

Bishop James V. Johnston Jr. of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Missouri, chairman of the Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People, told the assembly that several factors necessitated the new timeline.

They include changes in the Code of Canon Law regarding penal sanctions in the church that took effect in December; Pope Francis’ “motu proprio”; and the case of former cardinal Theodore McCarrick.

Discussions began in May, Deacon Nojadera said.

Mulheron, the St. Paul and Minneapolis archdiocesan official, said that in talking with other diocesan chancellors and bishops, she has found they are taking the charter’s provisions seriously, are committed to compliance during annual audits and want to do what’s best for abuse survivors.

She said the check-the-box mentality seems to arise from frustrations in the audit process because of imprecise language in the charter, a point to which Cesareo, the past NRB chairman, agreed.

“It’s not fair to say dioceses are simply checking the box in terms of a commitment to a safe environment for children. I can’t conceive of a diocese that doesn’t believe in that and doesn’t take it seriously,” Mulheron said.

She called for the charter to “raise the bar” on how dioceses commit to supporting and engaging their review boards, based on her experience in St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Hoffman, the abuse survivor from Chicago, invited Catholics – leaders and people in the pews alike – to review the charter and examine what it means to the life of the church.

“Major anniversaries are an important time to retell a story and to revisit and renew the commitment,” Hoffman said.

“We literally do evolve as people and we do evolve as church. So I’d like our priests and all other staff and all of us to evolve together. … Twenty years later, we’re not the same people we were when this thing (the charter) was published,” he continued.

“To keep evolving is where we should focus.”