This guy may just be getting a little bit too much comfort from his rod and staff. In the middle of Mass, no less.

[source]

From the New Jersey Star-Ledger:

A public school teacher in Newark has agreed to the revocation of his teaching certificates over allegations that he repeatedly groped teenage boys in the 1970s and 1980s, when he was engaged in active ministry as a Roman Catholic priest.

The Rev. John Capparelli reached a settlement with the State Board of Examiners, the body that regulates teachers, ahead of a scheduled hearing before an administrative law judge earlier this month. The revocation takes effect today.

(image by Robert Sciarrino via the Star Ledger)

This story was hard to write. Hard to type, even. I had to unclench my fists a few times.

Twenty years ago, shock washed over Ireland. After the Catholic Church sold a parcel of a North Dublin convent’s grounds to a commercial developer, and the construction dig began, 155 bodies were discovered in unmarked graves. The place had been a Magdalene asylum for “wayward girls.” Apparently, inmates who met an early end had been buried in secret — many without a death certificate, without notification of parents or other family, and all without the dignity of even the simplest grave marker.

Initially conceived as rehabilitation centers for prostitutes, the Magdalene asylums — also known as the Magdalene Laundries for the “women’s work” slave labor expected of the residents — eventually grew into houses of horror. The girls, some not even teens, were forced to work seven days a week without pay. The short-term treatment intended by the founders eventually gave way to long-term incarceration. Though conditions varied from one asylum to the next, a strict code of silence was in place for most of the day throughout the Magdalene system. Long prayer sessions were mandatory.

Worse, for over a hundred years, beatings and sexual abuse are thought to have been endemic.

Continue reading my piece over at the Friendly Atheist.

Classy!

When Clyde and Lesley Bevan were told the $6500 gold and diamond bracelet they had lost months ago had been found, they were delighted and grateful to the person who picked it up in a carpark.

Their happiness turned into incredulity when the finder told them he now owned the jewellery under a law that allows finders to keep unclaimed lost property after two months.

He said he would give Mr and Mrs Bevan the bracelet but only if they made a claim under their insurance policy and gave him half the payout.

The couple were surprised when they discovered the finder was a clergyman, the Rev. Terry McAuliffe, of St Paul’s Anglican Church in City Beach.

The Rev. McAuliffe, who said he was a former lawyer, explained he was simply offering to share his windfall with the Bevans.

“It would be nice to keep it but I felt it would be best to get it back to them,” he said. “They can get it back for 50 per cent.”

Ultimately, McAuliffe was overruled by his higher-ups, who made him give the bracelet back to the couple. They have apologized on his behalf.

[photo via the West Australian]