EDGE Boston

A Catholic priest pleaded guilty Monday to sexually abusing a 12-year-old boy he invited for a sleepover when he was pastor of a church in a small city south of Portland.

The only scandal about the revelation that a gay sex scandal in the Vatican may have prompted Pope Benedict to resign is that anyone is shocked.

A jury on Wednesday convicted a priest and teacher in a pivotal church-abuse case that rocked the Philadelphia archdiocese and sent a church official to prison for child endangerment.

Documents from a clergy-abuse trial show Catholic church officials ignored complaints a Philadelphia priest had molested two boys until they heard he was also running a travel business - and competing with a big donor.

A former altar boy described how two priests serially made him strip, masturbate & abuse him & his consequent descent into drug use in the trial of a priest accused of enabling such abuse in Philadelphia.

In dramatic court testimony, a man accused the current bishop of West Virginia, Michael Bransfield, of repeatedly sexually abusing him and several others when they were boys. The church is trying to play down the trial in Philadelphia.

Court files show a priest who wrote x-rated letters about young boys was sent to a church-run treatment center for priests, where staff concluded he did not have "a pathological interest in children or adults."

Researchers commissioned by the nation’s Roman Catholic bishops to analyze the pattern of clergy sex abuse so dioceses could better identify offenders have concluded that homosexuality, celibacy and an all-male priesthood did not cause the scandal.

A federal judge in Oregon ruled Thursday that the Vatican must respond to certain requests for information from a man who says he was molested by a priest in the 1960s.

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia placed two retired priests on administrative leave Wednesday, bringing to 23 the number of priests suspended following a scathing grand jury report on allegations of child sex abuse.