Experts argue the constitutionality of the school reform movement's most controversial proposal.
A California diocese recovers from a sex-abuse scandal, and finds that healing comes through facing the truth. The unprecedented agreement, worked out by victims' lawyers in cooperation with diocese financial officer Monsignor John Brenkle, is the most substantive sign of change yet in a diocese rocked by an escalating series of sexual and financial scandals. On Friday, a former diocesan priest and youth ministry leader was charged with rape and committing lewd acts against minors in a series of complaints dating back several decades. The situation reached a climax in June when Bishop George Patrick Ziemann, the diocese's charismatic prelate, resigned amid charges of sexual harassment and coercion brought by a priest, Father Jorge Hume Salas, who had himself been dismissed after being accused of stealing from church collections. Ziemann, who resigned July 21 after Hume Salas filed a lawsuit against him, at first denied the sexual relationship.