LITTLE ROCK — Court: Prelate was
Romania informant
BUCHAREST, Romania - Romania’s highest court has upheld the conviction of a top Orthodox cleric for secretly serving as an informant for the country’s communist-era Securitate police.
The 83-year-old Archbishop Pimen was found guilty by a government council of serving as an informant sent by the church and the Securitate to spy on fellow clergy and members of Romania’s expatriate community in the United States in the 1970s.
The dominant Romanian Orthodox Church has opposed opening the secret police files, which detail church officials’ efforts to bolster the old regime.
- The Associated PressArchdiocese halts
plan to build school
LANSDALE, Pa. - The Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia is abandoning a plan for a new 68-acre high school campus in suburban Philadelphia because it can’t afford to build the facility.
The archdiocese had already closed churches and more than two dozen schools as it grappled with a $17 million budget deficit, The New York Times reported in June. Also jettisoned - the diocese’s 13,000-square-foot mansion and its beach house.
The church faces millions of dollars in legal fees and numerous lawsuits from those sexually abused by priests.
A 2005 Philadelphia grand jury accused the diocesan leadership of a “continuous, concerted campaign” to cover up the crimes. The diocese’s “callous, calculating” response to the scandal was “at least as immoral as the abuse itself ...,” the report found.
- The Associated Press
Tennessee restricts church child-care
NASHVILLE, Tenn. - State officials say church-sponsored child-care programs such as parents’ day out must either obtain licenses or limit their programs to no more than two days a week.
The Tennessean reports that the programs have been given until next summer to comply with the rules.
Parents’ day out programs fill a niche for people who don’t need full-time child-care, such as parents who work part time or stay at home but need a break.
DHS said in a statement that it would work with child-care providers over the next year to explore any possible compromise. Some providers are already lobbying to change the law.
- The Associated Press
Vatican postpones mission to Syria
VATICAN CITY - The Vatican is postponing the departure of a Catholic church delegation to Syria, citing the “gravity of the situation” in the country wracked by civil war.
The church delegates are to express the pope’s solidarity with the people of Syria and his “spiritual closeness” with the Christian community.
The Vatican’s No. 2 official, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, said Tuesday that the delegation, which had been expected to depart for Damascus earlier this week, will leave at a date still to be decided. He said the composition of the group will also be changed, but gave no details.
Originally the group was to consist of seven church officials, including New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan.
Religion, Pages 12 on 10/27/2012