|
(Continued from page 26)
• As investigators Friday tried to find the gunman in a black Range Rover SUV who triggered the shocking chain of events, families and friends tried to grasp the blink-of-an-eye finality of it all.
• "Right now my heart is breaking," said Cherry's great aunt, Patricia Sims, of Oakland, Calif. "This has really been a tragedy. Kenny was just a delightful kid."
• ___
Pa. girl fights to keep playing Catholic league football; archbishop reviewing boys-only rule
• DOYLESTOWN, Pa. (AP) -- The Roman Catholic church in Philadelphia doesn't need another public relations headache after years of priest-abuse and school-closure headlines, but it's got one in the form of a pony-tailed 11-year-old athlete.
• Sixth-grader Caroline Pla is fighting the archdiocese for the right to keep playing church-sponsored youth football.
• The soft-spoken twin has been battling boys on the gridiron since she was 5. She's played the last two seasons in a Catholic Youth Organization league, where the 5-foot-3, 110-pound offensive tackle and defensive end made the all-star team.
• But the archdiocese may put the kibosh on her Catholic youth league career. While at least a few U.S. dioceses let girls play football, and about 1,600 girls play on U.S. high school teams, the Philadelphia league is open only to boys.
• "First they said it was a boys sport. Then they said it was a safety issue. Then they said it was inappropriate touching. I think they are just constantly looking for excuses to not change it," Caroline said Thursday at her home in Buckingham Township, Bucks County.
• ___
Ex-Legion priest testified he witnessed financial improprieties in disgraced religious order
• PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) -- A former priest for the disgraced Roman Catholic religious order the Legion of Christ said in sworn testimony recently made public that he witnessed financial improprieties at the order's operation in Rome.
• Father Stephen Fichter, who left the Legion in 2000, testified that the group's founder used large amounts of cash without any accounting and he believed the founder and then-second-in-command gave gifts to people at the Vatican to curry favor with them.
• But a spokesman for the Legion said the testimony concerned things that hap (Continued on page 28)
|
|
