Canadian Lutheran Leader Deals with Child Abuse the Right Way - Tells Police

"He spoke as a guest speaker about problems with cohabitation at the 2011 Getting Real About Sexuality conference at the Concordia University College of Alberta."

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/Edmonton+Lutheran+pastor+faces+child+pornography+charges/10298927/story.html

EDMONTON - An Edmonton pastor has been charged with possessing child pornography following an investigation that began with a complaint to a church official.  

Richard John Docekal, 58, was pastor of All Saints Lutheran Church — located at 13850 119A St. — in early September, when an individual brought allegations of child pornography to Don Schiemann, a regional president of the Lutheran Church-Canada. 

Schiemann passed the complaint on to police the next day. The Internet child exploitation unit of the Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams (ALERT) opened a month-long investigation.   

Docekal was arrested on Oct. 9 and charged with possession and distribution of child pornography. ALERT’s forensic teams are currently analyzing a significant number of electronic devices seized from Docekal’s home. 

Police seized dozens of manual drawings depicting sexual assaults against children, said Sgt. Mike Lokken. There is no evidence that any sexual contact was made with any children.

“They were depicting some pretty horrific stuff in these images,” Lokken said. “Anybody that’s attracted to this material, it’s disturbing.”

According to a biography on an archived version of his former church’s website, Docekal had been pastor at the Carlisle neighbourhood church since 2007. The American-born pastor graduated from a Lutheran seminary in Fort Wayne, Ind., in 1994 and pastored in Oklahoma and Ohio before coming to Edmonton in 2001, gaining Canadian citizenship in 2007. Initially, he was a regional vacancy and supply pastor for the Lutheran Church-Canada. 

According to his denomination’s website, he also served as chaplain of Faith Lutheran School in northeast Edmonton.

The Winnipeg-based Lutheran denomination released a statement Friday. Docekal officially resigned from the church and denomination on Oct. 2, a day after a meeting with Schiemann about non-criminal activities that were part of the complaint, which were “of concern regarding his role as a pastor.” 

The denomination is co-operating with the authorities and Schiemann will provide pastoral care to Docekal’s former church. 

“Because the matter is now before the courts, Lutheran Church-Canada is unable to make further comments at this time, other than to pray for God’s guidance and mercy in what is a difficult time for many,” the statement said. 

Docekal also worked with the Lutheran Women’s Missionary League, the Lutheran Layman’s League and the Good Samaritan Society. He spoke as a guest speaker about problems with cohabitation at the 2011 Getting Real About Sexuality conference at the Concordia University College of Alberta.

bwittmeier@edmontonjournal.com

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© Copyright (c) The Edmonton Journal

Burke's Law - Conservative Cleric Removed by Leftist Jesuit Pope Frank

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/conservative-us-cardinal-demoted-by-pope-he-tells-buzzfeed/ar-BB9OCXz

Cardinal Raymond Burke, the conservative American who holds the top position in the Vatican’s justice system, on Friday told BuzzFeed he was being demoted.

Burke, a former archbishop of St Louis, has publicly challenged Pope Francis on issues including abortion and homosexuality.

A preliminary report from the church’s extraordinary synod on the family, released on Monday, signalled a readiness to adopt a more conciliatory attitude towards homosexuality, divorce and other “irregular” family situations.

More than 200 bishops contributed to the report, which said: “Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a fraternal space in our communities?”

A day later, Burke expressed concern, and said a great number of synod fathers had objected to the contents of the report. He told the Catholic World Herald Francis was “long overdue” in making a definitive statement about suspected changes in the Catholic church.

“The pope, more than anyone else as the pastor of the universal church, is bound to serve the truth,” Burke told Buzzfeed. “The pope is not free to change the church’s teachings with regard to the immorality of homosexual acts or the insolubility of marriage or any other doctrine of the faith.”

Burke told Buzzfeed he was being transferred from his position as prefect of the supreme tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura to be patron of the sovereign military order of Malta, though he said he had not received a formal order. He assumed his role as chief guardian of canon law in June 2008, having been appointed by Pope Benedict XVI.

Benedict also appointed Burke to the Congregation for Bishops in 2009. Four years later, Francis removed Burke and 13 other bishops from the 18-man group. Days after he was removed from that post, in December 2013, Burke criticised Francis in an interview with the Catholic broadcaster EWTN.

“One gets the impression, or it’s interpreted this way in the media, that he thinks we’re talking too much about abortion, too much about the integrity of marriage as between one man and one woman,” Burke said. “But we can never talk enough about that.”

When National Catholic Reporter asked Burke who told him that he was being removed from the Vatican’s justice system, he replied: “Who do you think?”

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GJ - Related - the big Catholic meeting is turning into a major rebellion against the pope. Stay tuned.

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