Frontline – Catholic Church sex abuse story of Native Americans in Alaska

FRONTLINE reveals a little-known chapter of the Catholic Church sex abuse story: decades of abuse of Native Americans by priests and other church workers in Alaska. In The Silence, FRONTLINE producer Tom Curran and reporter Mark Trahant examine the legacy of abuse by a number of men who worked for the Catholic Church along Alaska’s far west coast in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They would leave behind a trail of hundreds of claims of abuse, making this one of the hardest hit regions in the country. video of show  is at: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/the-silence/

Frontline Investigates Church Sex Abuse in Alaska

The Silence – Tuesday, April 19, 2011, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS
FRONTLINE reveals a little-known chapter of the Catholic Church sex abuse story: decades of abuse of Native Americans by priests and other church workers in Alaska.

In The Silence, the first of two magazine segments airing Tuesday, April 19, 2011, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS, FRONTLINE producer Tom Curran and reporter Mark Trahant examine the legacy of abuse by a number of men who worked for the Catholic Church along Alaska’s far west coast in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They would leave behind a trail of hundreds of claims of abuse, making this one of the hardest hit regions in the country….

“This was 1970,” says Anchorage attorney Ken Roosa, who represented the Alaska victims in a class action law suit against the church. “It was absolutely unthinkable that the Catholic Church could be involved in the sexual abuse of children. There was nowhere for the kids to hide. There was no one they could talk to. The adults believed the abusers over their own children. It was a perfect storm for molestation.” As part of the church’s class action settlement with the victims, the bishop of Fairbanks, Donald Kettler, was asked to do something that no other bishop in the country had done on this scale: return to all of the villages where the abuse occurred and apologize to the victims in person.

In December 2010, FRONTLINE gained unique access to Bishop Kettler’s visit to the village of St. Michael — frequently referred to as “ground zero” for the abuse — where the bishop would come face-to-face with the reality of the abuse that the church had refused to acknowledge for years.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/the-silence/

Child sex abuse by US Catholic clergy, Hand of God – Frontline

Child sex abuse by US Catholic clergy down sharply: study Mar 23, 2010  WASHINGTON (AFP) – Pay-outs by the US Roman Catholic church for child abuse cases involving clergy members fell to a six-year low last year but remained in the nine-figure range, an annual US report tracking clergy sex abuse of minors said Tuesday. Nearly 400 new, credible allegations of clergy sex abuse were reported in 2009, said the report, which comes as the Roman Catholic church struggles to deal with thousands of alleged sex offenses by clerics against children in Europe and South America. In the United States, the Roman Catholic church paid out 104,439,629 dollars last year in costs related to sex abuse cases, more than half of the money – 55 million dollars – in settlements for victims, the report showed.

The 193 dioceses around the United States that provided data for the report said they received 398 new credible allegations last year of sexual abuse committed by priests and deacons against children. The vast majority dated from decades ago, but six involved children who were under the age of 18 in 2009. http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100323/ts_alt_afp/usreligioncatholiccrimesexchild_20100323183323

Hand of God – Frontline 1/6/07 In recent decades, more than 10,000 children were reportedly sexually abused by Catholic priests in the United States. In “Hand of God,” filmmaker Joe Cultrera explores just one of those cases, that of his own brother Paul. Paul Cultrera was molested in the 1960s by Father Joseph Birmingham, who allegedly abused nearly 100 other children. “Hand of God” tells the story of faith betrayed, and how Paul and the rest of the Cultrera family fought back against a scandal that continues to afflict scores of churches across the country. Contains frank descriptions of sexual conduct. Viewer discretion is advised.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/handofgod/view/?utm_campaign=viewpage&utm_medium=grid&utm_source=grid