Month: Aug 2019

Can significant structural reform in the Catholic church happen?

William M Shea – Patheos

Most would argue that it cannot on the grounds that the ministerial structure is determined by divine intention (see Lumen gentium, #18-29). The hierarchical structure and the distinction between clergy and laity are in effect dogmas. You cannot be a Catholic when you deny a dogma. Those who oppose the ordination of women to the priesthood (John Paul II) and even to the diaconate would argue so. Some would even include required celibacy in the divine aura though the Greeks, Catholic and Orthodox, seem to have missed that point. To be realistic about the political possibilities, structural reform is unlikely ever to happen.
Can the Catholic Church undergo a significant reformation? I doubt it. It had the opportunity to do so in the sixteenth century and refused. However, I don’t at all doubt that the church will change in response to the current mess… and perhaps for the better (at least for a while, at least here and there). My impossible dream is that the College of Cardinals will sooner or later elect to the papacy a monarch who doesn’t believe in monarchy, and who wants genuine and lasting reform. Perhaps Pope Francis is that man, at least in good part. The bishops need to have their feet held to the fire with charity and persistence by the laity, by religious orders, and by women religious until they summon up the courage to abandon papolatry and their own self-referential office. They are desperately stuck in a tar pit of their own making, apparently loving it, and they need to be pulled out of it by their sisters and brothers who love them and the church enough to put their backs to the wheel of history, to reverse the wheel.

Neither the bishops nor the pope, I fear, are capable of transforming a Church they themselves have made. The church must reform The Church. The Church doesn’t have a strong enough motive for self-reform but the laity and the lower clergy do. The hierarchical Church has run into a dead-end. On the rest of us the responsibility falls.
Historical-theological supposition: In the face of their immorality I am driven to the conclusion that the papacy and the episcopacy are a natural, not a supernatural, development of leadership, and have nothing whatsoever to do with Christ’s institution or the positive will of God – at least no more or less than the development of the Mormon apostles and president or the board of trustees of the Southern Baptist Convention.
That it is divine will that the churches be governed I do not doubt. That they be governed by a sacred hierarchy I do doubt.
I reach this conclusion on the basis of a moral judgment of the bishops and the Vatican’s behavior over the past thirty years (and doubtless more) of betrayal of children and parents. No one could possibly be God’s will for the church who behaves like this. You might as well argue that kings rule by divine right and will no matter what they do. The divine aura that the hierarchy exudes must be the result of human hubris, self-promotion and slight of hand, not of divine providence. Papal and episcopal pretensions are exposed as the action and inaction of a corrupt class and by the never ending list of their victims. “By their fruits shall you know them,” said the Lord. (Mt. 7:16-20) Jesus had something else to say about this situation: “You know how among the gentiles those who seem to exercise authority lord it over them; their great ones make their importance felt. It cannot be that way with you.” (Mark 10:41f) Well, dear Lord, it is that way with us now and my case is proven.

I am tempted to work under a simple and, for me, new rule: never believe what anyone says about their own importance and power, especially so when they drag God and Christ into it. Such men cannot possibly have been anointed by the Holy Spirit. No decent pagan would have acted and not acted as they have and claim divine sponsorship. When they define themselves as the Successors to the Twelve they are wailing for the perpetuation of their own office and their own spiritual superiority. But they have surrendered the latter and should lose the former. Jesus named their predecessors “whitened sepulchers” and the description fits them. Remember: Judas was an apostle and a bishop according to their own interpretation of the Johannine account of the Last Supper as the first ordination and consecration. Judas’ spirit lives on, and none of this is new. It has been going on for ages in various forms exposed by the particular shape of papal power in each age. Nevertheless, let’s begin the struggle to clean up the mess by refusing our trust except where they prove themselves worthy of it. There is no authority where authority is not recognized.
Let us not abandon the church but let us abandon its corrupt leadership. Remember: they have and will abandon our children to the perverts rather than create a ripple on the Tiber.[1]

[1] The bishops did not turn the Jesus movement of the first three centuries into a church monarchy. Taking Ireneaus of Lyons as a prime example, they in fact saved the churches from dissolution in the second and third centuries by preserving a version of the apostolic tradition of teaching about Jesus opposed to Gnostic and other esoteric traditions of teaching. Their success kicked off the idea that they in fact were the “successors of the Apostles,” a bit of a stretch for a disparate crowd of administrators who gradually crowded out the other prominent (charismatic?) ministries in the second and third century churches. See the Didache for a picture of a Christian community at the turn of the first century when the Jesus movement was still a movement and not the Catholic, much less the “Roman” Catholic Church, and Clement’s First Letter to the Corinthians for the still deflated episcopal/presbyteral roles. Apostolic Succession as a doctrine is as “meaningful” in our age as the medieval claims that the bread of the Eucharist bleeds. And it is of a piece with papal jurisdiction and infallibility, and makes no more sense than either of them.

PAT SAYS

The Roman Catholic institution is NOT the church/community Jesus Christ founded.

In fact that institution is an organisation has has abandoned Christ and built itself up as an international Golden Calf for blind men and women to worship it and its hierarchy and clergy.

Jesus’s church is the good men and women of the world who believe in the God revealed by Jesus and who do daily good in that God’s name.

In the past 33 years since being out of that institution I have experienced the freedom of a son of God.

I have simply followed my conscience guided by the Spirit of Jesus.

No more man made rules. No more despotic bishops and clergy to deal with. No more dogmas and canon law.

Just WWJD – What Would JesusDo?

Forget the corrupt and revolting men.

Simply follow the God man of Galilee.

IN MY OPINION NOEL TREANOR, THE BISHOP OF DOWN AND CONNOR, HAS SHOWN UNBELIEVABLE IRRESPONSIBILITY BY APPOINTING THE DISGRACED CIARAN DALLAT AS THE PP OF LOUGHGINISLAND IN COUNTY DOWN.

At the time he made a parishioner pregnant he also went out for dinner with friends and allowed the poor woman to miscarry their baby on the bathroom floor!

Treanor had hidden Dallat in Maghaberry Prison since the scandal as a chaplain.

Now he has brought Dallat back and made him the PP of Loughinisland!

The parishioners there will have to keep a close watch on their wives and daughters.

THE OTHER DOWN AND CONNOR CHANGES 2019

FATHER FRANCIS O’BRIEN PP Ballymoney to be PP Larne.

FATHER AIDAN KERR PP Larne to be PE Glengormley.

FATHER RAYMOND FULTON to retire and be PE Ballycastle.

FATHER GABRIEL LYONS PP Glenravel to be PP St Theresa’s Belfast.

FATHER BRENDAN HICKLAND PP St Theresa’s To be PP Holy Rosary, Belfast.

FATHER BRIAN MC CANN TO BE Adm Derrighy as well as PP Twinbrook.

FATHER MICHAEL SPENCE to be CC St Bernadette’s and Holy Rosary, Belfast.

FATHER GERARD McGEE Chaplain Queen’s University to return to the Cistercians.

FATHER KIERAN WHITEFORD PP Loughinisland to be PP Cushendal and Cushendun.

FATHER LUKE McWILLIAMS PP Cushendun / Cushendal to be PP Rasharkin.

FATHER DARREN BRENNAN CC Ballymena to be PP Dunloy.

FATHER DAMIAN McCAUGHAN to be PP Ballymoney.

FATHER CONOR McGRATH CC Drumbo to be PP Glenravel.

FATHER SEAN ROGAN to be PE Drumbo.

FATHER PADDY McKENNA to be PE Ballymena.

FATHER BRIAN WATERS to be CC St. Mary’s Belfast as well as CC St Peter’s Cathedral.

FATHER TIMOTHY BARTLETT to be Administrator St. Mary’s Belfast.

FATHER DOMINIC MC GRATTAN TO BE CHAPLAIN QUEENS UNIVERSITY AND ASSIST IN ST BRIGID’S BELFAST

FATHER PAUL ARMSTRONG to be PE St. Mary’s Belfast.

FATHER JAMES MADDEN O Praem to assist at St. Mary”s Belfast.

FATHER Aloysius Lumala (Uganda) CC St Theresa’s to be CC Ballymena.

FATHER WLODZIMIERZ DZIDUCH to be chaplain to Polish community and live in St. Malachy’s Belfast.

• This is the first time in over 25 years that Tim Bartlett has done pastoral work in a parish.

Posted by Betty Clermont

open tabernacle.wordpress.com

These men claim to be religious leaders, spiritual guides, moral authorities. They are addressed as “His Eminence.” The man who appoints and promotes them is addressed as “Holy Father” and his government is the “Holy See.”
Theodore McCarrick, Donald Wuerl and Kevin Farrell were among the officials who received thousands of dollars from West Virginia Bishop Michael J. Bransfield. Bransfield was seeking to “purchase influence” with “those whose opinions carry weight with the Vatican” according to a recent Washington Post investigation.
In September 2018, one of Bransfield’s closest aides “came forward with an incendiary inside account of years of sexual [with priests] and financial misconduct.” The Post provided evidence that “senior Catholic leaders in the United States and the Vatican began receiving warnings about Bransfield as far back as 2012 [but] his conduct went unchecked.”
Church law requires bishops to turn in their resignation to the pope when they turn 75; the pope has the option of accepting or rejecting it. Pope Francis accepted Bransfield’s resignation when he turned 75 in September 2018.
“Bransfield spent $2.4 million on travel, often flying in private jets, as well as $4.6 million in all to renovate his residence” using diocesan funds in one of the poorest states in the country.
As head of the Wheeling-Charleston diocese, “Bransfield maintained a prominent public profile” noted The Post. “He regularly traveled to the Vatican while serving as treasurer of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and as [an official] on the board of trustees for the Papal Foundation.”

The Papal Foundation’s response to a request by Pope Francis for a $25 million donation to a crime-ridden Vatican-owned hospital is only part of a narrative that shows – when it comes to bribes, cover-ups, sexual and financial misconduct – Bransfield is only the tip of an iceberg.

The Papal Foundation

The Papal Foundation was co-founded in 1988 by then-Archbishop of Newark Theodore McCarrick. Since 1990, the Philadelphia-based foundation has given over $100 million to support “programs and projects” that are particularly significant to the pope.
The Foundation is supported by donors known as stewards. “In order to be considered a steward, one must commit $1 million to be paid in no more than ten years, at least $100,000 a year.”
A Board of Trustees administers Foundation funds. American cardinals are the controlling members of the board. Archbishops, bishops and elected laity serve as trustees.
Istituto Dermopatico dell’Immacolata, a Vatican-owned hospital
The Istituto Dermopatico dell’Immacolata (IDI) was founded by the Italian Province of the Congregation of the Sons of the Immaculate Conception (Picfic). “The Vatican’s involvement began in 1925 when the Holy See sponsored the expansion of the health care project,” explained Claire Giangravé.
“A 2012 financial inquiry found that [money was being funneled out of the hospital to tax havens around the world and even to fund oil extraction projects in Africa,” according to Giangravé.
At that time, “the Vatican refused to provide any financial assistance and a Rome court certified the hospital as insolvent,” the Guardian reported. Pope Francis was elected in March 2013.
On April 4, 2013, Italian police put three IDI executives under house arrest including Fr. Franco Decaminada, a Picfic priest. 40 others were indicted “on 144 counts of bankruptcy fraud, money laundering and embezzlement.” reported ANSA. Picfic, the religious order, “declared bankruptcy and went into receivership in May 2013.”
A Vatican official, Cardinal Giuseppe Versaldi, asked the Vatican Bank to loan $50 million to the IDI. The bank president declined telling Versaldi the loan would be imprudent, Giangravé reported. So Versaldi borrowed the $50 million from the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See (APSA). APSA manages the lion’s share of Vatican investments.
A partnership of Picfic and the Vatican purchased the IDI on April 14, 2015, reported Kevin Jones. It operates the hospital through the Luigi Maria Monti Foundation, “which is nothing other than [Picfic] under a different name.” But “IDI’s troubles were far from over,” Giangravé wrote.
In March 2016, Decaminada and other hospital officials were indicted for “repeated plundering behaviors” of the IDI, tax evasion and embezzlement.
“The consensus among the lawyers, economist, accountants and prelates” Giangravé consulted is that “the hospital is likely to remain a financial hole … as long as the current management and the Vatican is involved.”
“Many wondered why the Vatican is so committed to the survival of the [IDI] and questioned its ties with the ‘chameleon congregation,’” noted Giangravé.

McCARRICK

In June 2017, Pope Francis asked Cardinal Donald Wuerl for $25 million to help save the IDI from collapse. As chairman of the Papal Foundation’s Board of Cardinals, Wuerl asked them to make a grant – initially for only $8 million.
Wuerl “moved to take up the matter outside of the Foundation’s normal grant cycle. He convened an executive session of the cardinals’ board, including Cardinal McCarrick, who also lobbied for making the grant,” reported Michael O’Brien.
Meanwhile, in May 2017 just weeks before Wuerl received the request from Pope Francis, the Archdiocese of New York was notified by a victim that he had been sexually abused by McCarrick when he was a boy. “Before the archdiocese could investigate the charges, it had to receive authorization,” noted O’Brien. Accusations of sex abuse of a minor by a bishop are investigated by the Congregation for Bishops. But only the pope can approve an investigation of a cardinal.
“McCarrick stood to benefit personally if [by helping to secure the $25 million requested by Pope Francis], he could win leniency in how he handled his sex abuse case,” noted O’Brien.

Maciel

Bransfield and McCarrick had ample reason to believe that favorable outcomes from the Vatican could be secured with money. “Money paved way for Fr. Marcial Maciel’s influence,” wrote Jason Berry, co-author of Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II.
In January 2019, the trusted Vatican reporter Edward Pentin “revealed that the Vatican knew about sexual abuse allegations against the founder of the Legionaries of Christ, Marcial Maciel, since at least 1943. Maciel founded the religious order of priests based in Mexico in 1941. This means that from the very beginning, Maciel was engaged in horrifying predation …. He not only abused seminarians for decades, but fathered children with various women – and then raped those children, too,” Steve Skojec wrote.
“Maciel ingratiated himself with Vatican officials, including some of those in charge of offices that should have investigated him, as he dispensed thousands of dollars in cash,” Berry noted. “The trail of money he reportedly gave cardinals raises profound ethical questions about how money circulates in the Vatican,” Berry concluded.
In 2006, Pope Benedict XVI ordered Maciel into an unenforceable, and therefore voluntary, retirement from active ministry two years before his death at age 87.
In addition to Maciel, there were two others “who always showed up at the Vatican with lots of money,” according to Rod Dreher. One was the notorious pedophile-protector Cardinal Bernard Law, given a cushy Vatican appointment after he was forced to resign in 2002 as archbishop of Boston. The other was McCarrick.

The Papal Foundation Pays

In August 2017, the Papal Foundation sent $8 million to the Vatican without assurances as to how the money would be tracked and spent, noted O’Brien.
It wasn’t until their annual meeting on December 12, 2017, that Wuerl asked “the Foundation’s entire tiered board – cardinals, bishops, and laymen – to approve the full $25 million (including the already-sent $8 million),” O’Brien reported.
Both Giangravé and O’Brien agree that the votes in favor of granting the full $25 million were split – generally the prelates in favor and the laymen against. “The former chairman of the Foundation’s audit committee, businessman James Longon, called the grant an ‘irresponsible and immoral stewardship of funds.’”
Both Giangravé and O’Brien reported that the full $25 million has not yet reached the IDI. The matter “remains shrouded in mystery,” according to Giangravé.

McCarrick Exposed

On June 20, 2018, New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan announced that the Archdiocesan Review Board found the allegation of sex abuse of a minor by McCarrick was “credible and substantiated.” Earlier the same day, McCarrick made a statement to the press that “some months ago” Dolan had informed him of the allegation, thereby confirming he had known he was under a papal investigation.
After the June 2018 announcement:
“McCarrick’s former staff members told [the independent] Catholic News Agency about McCarrick’s habit of visiting Rome and distributing cash or personal checks to senior officials,” stated Ed Condon.
“The cardinal is reportedly planning to appeal the finding to Rome,” Rocco Palmo reported.
“The Papal Foundation was a huge point of leverage for McCarrick in terms of going to Rome,” Steve Schneck, head of the Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies at Catholic University, told The Post.
Additional sex abuse by McCarrick
After Dolan’s June 2018 announcement, at least two other accusations of abuse of minors by McCarrick were reported. One was the child of McCarrick’s friends who said he was sexually abused for years beginning when he was 11 years old. “The Vatican also received accusations of sexual abuse of a boy who was 13 when it began and from a number of seminarians,” according to Condon.
It was agreed that, among Church insiders, “everyone knew” about McCarrick’s sexual predation of young priests and seminarians. An excerpt from an “open letter” to Pope Benedict XVI, written in 2008 by the sociologist Richard Sipe who specialized in studying clerical celibacy, stated: ‘It has been widely known for several decades that Bishop/Archbishop now Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick took seminarians and young priests to a shore home in New Jersey, sites in New York, and other places and slept with some of them.’”
Pope Benedict XVI accepted McCarrick’s resignation as Archbishop of Washington D.C. in May 2006. He had turned 75 in July 2005. But the cardinal remained very active and influential in the Vatican and U.S. In 2008, Pope Benedict imposed restrictions on McCarrick’s travel and ordered him “to resign from all rolls at the Vatican and within the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops” because of his sexual misconduct with seminarians and priests. Gradually, the restrictions were ignored.
Pope Francis accepted McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals in July 2018. In February 2019, a week before his much-publicized Vatican “summit” on child sex abuse, Pope Francis made headlines by laicizing (defrocking) the 89-year-old McCarrick.
McCarrick’s misuse of a charitable fund
“The former cardinal’s reputation for [distributing cash] has come under renewed scrutiny following recent revelations concerning former Wheeling-Charleston Bishop Michael Bransfield.” While head of the Washington D.C. archdiocese, “McCarrick used his position as a board member on various grant-making foundations to assign regular five-figure grants to the Archbishop’s Fund, with two such foundations alone registering donations totaling $500,000,” Ed Condon wrote. The Fund is archdiocesan money meant for “charitable purposes” or “miscellaneous expenses.”
“McCarrick funnelled hundreds of thousands of dollars through the Archbishop’s Fund and reportedly made gifts to senior Vatican officials,” reported Condon.

WUERL

Recall that when Pope Francis wanted $25 million for the IDI, he turned to Wuerl for help. Wuerl had done the Vatican’s bidding before. Seattle Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen “embodied the ideals of the reformist Second Vatican Council” during the 1980’s. Then-Cardinal (later pope) Joseph Ratzinger “stripped Hunthausen of pastoral authority in five key areas. The authority was given over to Donald Wuerl, an auxiliary bishop, trained in Rome and marked for advancement.” From there, Wuerl was promoted to Bishop of Pittsburgh until 2006 when he was named as McCarrick’s successor.
Wuerl is known as “the pope’s man in Washington.” Because he is close to Pope Francis, Wuerl is “seen as the consummate insider” noted Michael Warren Davis. Members of the Bishops’ Synods held in Rome are usually elected by their fellow bishops. Pope Francis appointed Wuerl as a member of both the 2014 and 2015 synods.
After the sex abuse allegations against McCarrick were widely reported, questions were raised about Wuerl’s knowledge of his predecessor’s actions. Wuerl repeatedly denied that he knew anything about it.
However, one of McCarrick’s ex-aides gave Crux News the cardinal’s emails and private letters over the period 2008-2017. In reference to the restrictions imposed by Pope Benedict, “McCarrick claims that Cardinal Donald Wuerl, then the Archbishop of Washington, was aware of them and involved in conversations about their implementation …. The correspondence obtained by Crux also illustrates attempts by McCarrick to exercise influence on Pope Francis.” Which may have happened considering McCarrick’s “travels accelerated with the election of Pope Francis.”
In July 2018, “a Pennsylvania grand jury report detailed allegations of widespread predatory behavior by more than 300 priests against more than 1,000 children. The report is critical of Wuerl who served as the bishop of Pittsburgh for 18 years and describes him as one of the bishops who helped cover up abusive behavior.”
“Wuerl said in a statement that the report ‘confirms that I acted with diligence, with concern for the victims and to prevent future acts of abuse.’ Josh Shapiro, the Pennsylvania attorney general, said in a statement to CNN, ‘Cardinal Wuerl is not telling the truth. Many of his statements in response to the Grand Jury Report are directly contradicted by the Church’s own documents. Offering misleading statements now only furthers the cover up.’”
“Wuerl travelled to Rome to consult Pope Francis …. He asked the Holy Father’s permission to retire from the episcopacy. [Wuerl is 78 years old.] On October 12, it was granted,” Michael Warren Davis reported.
“In his letter accepting Wuerl’s resignation, the Holy Father praised Wuerl effusively.” The pope implied that Wuerl’s accusers were like Satan “trying to hurt the shepherd.” Pope Francis “depicted his retirement as an act of Christlike self-sacrifice. It was Wuerl’s ‘nobility’ that compelled him to step down, for which the pope says ‘I am proud and thank you.’” Wuerl’s influence on Pope Francis is “unlikely to weaken,” Davis concluded. “It’s hard to call this retirement at all.”
“Wuerl is now able to retire seemingly with no consequences for his actions,” Attorney General Shapiro told NBC News.
John Delaney, a survivor of clergy sexual abuse, said he sat and cried after reading that the pope had called Wuerl a “noble man.” “That’s such a huge slap in the face to victims,” said Delaney.
Pope Francis left Wuerl as administrator of the Archdiocese of Washington until a replacement could be named seven months later. Wuerl retains his positions in the influential Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith “which not only oversees doctrinal disputes but, since 2001, has also been the lead department in the fight against clerical sexual abuse” and the Congregation for Bishops, “which recommends new bishops around the world.”
Wuerl also remains a supervising cardinal of APSA, the department that gave $50 million to the IDI.
Wuerl’s replacement
Given Wuerl’s closeness to Pope Francis, it is reasonable to assume that he had influence in naming his successor. Atlanta Archbishop Wilton Gregory, who is also on the Papal Foundation’s board of trustees, was installed on May 21, 2019 as head of the Washington archdiocese.
“Gregory has a less than stellar history with child sexual abuse cases.” In 2004, he refused a court order to turn over the secret records of a priest who abused at least five kids, impregnating one of them, recalled the Survivor’s Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP).
As head of the Atlanta archdiocese, “he refused to post predator priests’ names on Church websites. He’s made deceptive claims about his dealings with pedophiles,” SNAP reported.
Had it not been for a March 23, 2014, front-page article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Gregory would have been living in a $2.2 million home he built for himself in Atlanta’s wealthiest neighborhood using money that had been donated “for charitable causes.” Within a month, “the Archdiocese of Atlanta issued a news release that the mansion would be sold after Gregory moves out next month.”
Gregory is now head of the archdiocese refusing to release those records naming the individuals, including bishops and senior Vatican figures, “to whom McCarrick made payments from the Archbishop’s Fund;” also “the sources, sums, and uses of the money,” Condon reported.

FARRELL

Kevin Farrell was ordained as a Legionary of Christ in 1978. He was chaplain at the Catholic University of Monterrey in Mexico. Monterrey was the center of Maciel’s activities, wrote Carlos Ramirez. Maciel’s “close ties with the elite are most evident in Monterrey,” according to a Reuters report.
Farrell also “acted as general administrator of the Legionaries of Christ with responsibilities for seminaries and schools in Italy, Spain and Ireland,” noted Patsy McGarry.
Yet, when asked what he knew about Maciel being a sexual predator, Cardinal Farrell said, “Maybe I would have met Maciel once or twice, but I never suspected anything.”
Farrell left the Legionaries and became a parish priest in the Washington D.C. archdiocese. When McCarrick became the archbishop, he appointed Farrell as Vicar General in 2001. The same year, Farrell also was appointed as McCarrick’s auxiliary bishop.
Although Farrell had lived with McCarrick in the same residence and had been his second-highest official, he told the AP, “Never once did I even suspect” McCarrick of sexual abuse. Farrell held the same positions under Wuerl until he was appointed Bishop of Dallas in 2007.
In a lawsuit filed against the Diocese of Dallas, “John Doe” alleged that Fr. Timothy J. Heines, “sexually, emotionally, and physically abused” him beginning when he was 12 years old. In 2015, the plaintiff reported Heines to the diocese and Bishop Farrell removed the priest from ministry. But “it’s a big problem that Farrell made the decision to not report that abuse to the police,” said Turley Most, Doe’s attorney.
On May 15, 2019, Dallas police raided three locations of the Dallas Diocese. Detective David Clark said that “Church officials had ‘thwarted’ his investigations into allegations of sexual abuse by priests.” He wrote in a search warrant affidavit that the diocese hid records from the police.
“At the center of the affidavit is Edmundo Paredes, the longtime pastor at St. Cecilia, who had been credibly accused of molesting three teenage boys. Police said the allegations against Paredes had been known by Church officials since at least 2006.” Dallas police issued an arrest warrant for Paredes after a new accuser emerged. Unfortunately, “officials believe that Paredes had fled to his native country, the Philippines.”
Like Bransfield, Farrell also served the U.S. Bishops’ Conference as treasurer and was a trustee of the Papal Foundation. In August 2016, Pope Francis appointed Farrell as Prefect of the Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life, one of the new “super-dicasteries” created by the pope, Cardinals McCarrick, Wuerl, and Farrell: A Web of Sex Abuse, Bribes, Financial Misconduct and Cover-ups

Michael Warren Davis reported.
“In his letter accepting Wuerl’s resignation, the Holy Father praised Wuerl effusively.” The pope implied that Wuerl’s accusers were like Satan “trying to hurt the shepherd.” Pope Francis “depicted his retirement as an act of Christlike self-sacrifice. It was Wuerl’s ‘nobility’ that compelled him to step down, for which the pope says ‘I am proud and thank you.’” Wuerl’s influence on Pope Francis is “unlikely to weaken,” Davis concluded. “It’s hard to call this retirement at all.”
“Wuerl is now able to retire seemingly with no consequences for his actions,” Attorney General Shapiro told NBC News.
John Delaney, a survivor of clergy sexual abuse, said he sat and cried after reading that the pope had called Wuerl a “noble man.” “That’s such a huge slap in the face to victims,” said Delaney.
Pope Francis left Wuerl as administrator of the Archdiocese of Washington until a replacement could be named seven months later. Wuerl retains his positions in the influential Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith “which not only oversees doctrinal disputes but, since 2001, has also been the lead department in the fight against clerical sexual abuse” and the Congregation for Bishops, “which recommends new bishops around the world.”

PAT SAYS

It is quite obvious from this that Francis, McCarrick, Wierl and Farrell are all first class gangsters.

The RC church is run by people worse than the mafia.

They are into sex, money power.

Religion is only a cover for their gangsterism.

Cork priest hits out at parents who choose nonbelievers as Godparents

Roisin Burke The Echo Cork.

“Barefaced lying in the face of God” should not be tolerated by the Catholic community according to a Cork priest.

Gurranabraher Parish Priest Fr Tomás Walsh has denounced parents who are selecting nonbelievers as Godparents to their children as well as couples who chose to get married in a church simply because it is a nice building.

The priest, who has served in the Gurranbraher community for the past three years, told The Echo that disrespect at these special catholic occasions such as Baptisms, funerals and marriages, was a “big problem.”

“It is becoming increasingly impossible to conduct Baptism ceremonies with children running wildly around the church – and adults, obviously only present for the celebrations afterwards, not caring about the disturbance they or their children are causing.

“This is happening in every church in the country but ‘political correctness’ forbids one from speaking out.”
Fr Walsh also spoke out about Godparents who had “no faith at all” and who have “no intention in overseeing the child’s faith formation” making a promise in the church and “lying in the face of God.”

“Even more outrageous is the presence of Godparents who believe nothing themselves and are permitted to make promises to God that they will oversee the faith formation of the God-child.”

The Gurranabraher priest said that he also has an issue with couples who come to him, looking to be married in the church, who had little faith themselves.

Fr Walsh said that he tried to assess couples when they first come to him in order to decide if they were God-fearing people, but said that too often, people give the right answers.
“There are a number of alternatives nowadays for getting married. A church is not the only option and I always stress this to anyone thinking of getting married in a church. It is a charade if you do not have faith themselves.”

Finally, Fr Walsh mentioned guests of funerals and weddings being disrespectful and disruptive to the ceremonies.

“People come because they are invited, they don’t even pretend to have faith, they are in and out of the ceremony, just waiting for it to end so they can party in the hotel after.”

Priest slams use of cigarettes and cans of booze as symbols of dead loved one’s life at funerals

By Ann Mooney The Echo

A PRIEST has hit out at funeral-goers who use symbols like fags and beer cans to commentate a dead loved one’s life.
Controversial priest Fr Tomas Walsh spoke out about gifts and long tributes in the Cork Northside Gurranabraher newsletter.

Fr Walsh reckons a can of beer should not be brought to altar during a funeral as an offertory gift
Writing about items being brought to the altar as offertory gift, he said: “Bringing things such as a can of beer, a packet of cigarettes, a remote control, a mobile phone, or a football jersey does not tell us anything uplifting about the person who has died.
“Surely items such as a flower, a family photograph, a prayer-book or rosary reveals far more about the person who has died — and the loss he/she is to the family who grieve.”

Fr Walsh also expressed frustration with eulogies that go on “for as long as the Mass itself.”
The cleric — who has previously been outspoken about couples choosing godparents for their children who lack faith — said a funeral Mass is simply about praying for the dead.
He said: “A Requiem Mass is essentially the coming together of the family along with the believing community to pray for the person who has died.

PAT SAYS

I think that Fr Walsh makes very good points.

If people do not believe it is not appropriate for them to promise to help to bring children up in that faith.

And to do so, for social reasons is not authentic.

Neither is it authentic for people who dont believe to get married in a church because it’s a cute building.

The reason to get married in church is to ask God’s blessing on your marriage.

I think that people should be true to their beliefs and principles.

If you are an atheist that is good – but get married somewhere secular and with the services of a humanist celebrant. They are everywhere now.

I also agree with Fr Walsh about inappropriate items in an offertory procession.

Using cigarettes and cans of beer are tacky to say the least.

That procession should represent a person’s life and good quality.

Who wants a send off as a boozer and smoker?

On a priest’s coffin they normally place a stole and a book of the gospels.

Hypocrisy and tackiness do not add to a ceremony. In fact they detract from it.

by Phyllis Zagano NCR

I think we owe a debt of gratitude to former West Virginia bishop Michael Bransfield, pilloried by The Washington Post for his reportedly lavish and lascivious ways. The Post wrote from an unredacted report written by lay investigators.

Bransfield’s creative accounting let us see exactly who benefited from his largess. His history of unchecked behavior demonstrates who knew what and when. Most importantly, his objectively sad story sheds light on ingrained episcopal practices around the world.

Plus, it saves us the trouble of reading medieval history.

I bear no ill will and wish no harm to Michael Bransfield. I am convinced he is a product of a system that corrupted him. One wonders if that system alone drove him to drink.

That system is the clericalism Pope Francis talks about. It is the system in which only priest clerics judge clerics, only priest clerics wield authority, and only priest clerics promote clerics to higher offices.

It is the system of priestly clericalism, seeded in the early church, nurtured by the Middle Ages, and full-blown by the 11th century.

It is the system that killed the diaconate.

Ever wonder whatever happened to deacons, once the stewards of the church’s money? For the longest time, deacons and archdeacons managed church funds, providing for needs of the people of God. In the third century, St. Lawrence the Deacon presented the poor to the Roman prefect who demanded the church’s treasures. He had it right.

Over the centuries, deacons grew very powerful. The cadre of priests did not like that at all, especially since bishops were often chosen from among the deacons.

Why choose a deacon as bishop? Deacons were the clerics whose jobs today are called diocesan vicar general, judicial vicar, and finance officer, among others. It made ultimate sense to elect the person who had already been running the diocese as its next overseer. Many popes were deacons and never priests.

And then there was Pope Gregory VII. Born the son of a blacksmith in Tuscany in 1015, he rose to become archdeacon and the cardinal deacon of Santa Maria in Domnica in Rome. Elected pope by acclamation in 1073, he insisted on being ordained a priest eight days before his consecration as bishop of Rome.

Gregory VII thereby solidified the “cursus honorum,” the “course of honor” that essentially restricted diaconal ordination only to men destined for priesthood.

The Gregorian Reform, so-called in his honor, changed other things. Gregory outlawed the practice of simony, especially the buying of church offices.

He also began in earnest the centralization of church power in Rome. One wonders if centralization helped cause more, not less, simony.

Detail of “Standing Bishop,” silver with silver gilt, by the German workshop of Hans von Reutlingen, circa 1510 (Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Which brings us back to clericalism, the hothouse for abuses of every description that shuts its doors to any outside views, even from other clerics, like deacons

Despite 16th-century decisions of the Council of Trent, it was not until the Second Vatican Council that the diaconate was renewed as a permanent office. Today, more than 50 years later, deacons the world over are still finding their places within the clerical system.
What deacons do not do is buy their way up the ladder, for there is none to climb. Deacons are ministers. Most do not get stole fees for administering sacraments. Unless they hold a diocesan or parochial job, deacons support themselves.

That is the difference. For the most part, diocesan priests are wholly dependent on their bishops, who may in turn be indebted to their metropolitan archbishops, who may in turn be indebted to the nuncio, and so it goes. The concurrent gauzy web of lateral relationships is not so apparent, but it is there, making the vaulted notion of “transparency” impossible.

Which brings us back to Michael Bransfield. I am saddened that he has been exposed and vilified, I really am. But his story pokes a hole in the clerical veil pulled over the eyes of so many other clerics (deacons, priests and bishops) and laypeople who want to see the church as a church for people, not as a corporation that enriches CEOs while giving pennies to its stockholders.

If we can respectfully continue to part that clerical veil, we might enjoy a church that does not corrupt its most talented and capable clerics.

[Phyllis Zagano is senior research associate-in-residence at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. She will speak Friday, Sept. 13, 2019, at the Bishop Keane Institute of Immaculate Conception Church in Hampton, Virginia and Tuesday, September 24, 2019 at the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston College. Her books include Women Deacons: Past, Present, Future, recently published in France and Canada as Des femmes diacres and in Portugal as Mulheres diáconos: Passado, presente, futuro. Study guides are available for free download at people.hofstra.edu/Phyllis_Zagano.]

LISTEN TO A CURRENT US BISHOP TELLING 6 ORDINANDS HOW VERY SPECIAL THEY WILL BE AS PRIESTS.

LAST WEEK THIS BLOG RECEIVED A NUMBER OF COMPLAINTS CONCERNING TWO SENIOR DUBLINB PRIESTS – THE ACTING CHANCELLOR FATHER PAUL COYLE AND THE PARISH PRIEST OF RUSH – FATHER KEVIN BARTLEY.

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I thought that the right and proper thing to do was to refer those complaints to the Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin.

I did so.

The archbishop replied to say that the complaints came as a surprise to him.

He said he would immediately begin “a formal investigation”.

He made the further point that pending the outcome of the investigation he would be giving the two priests the the presumption of innocence.

The archbishop is perfectly right to approach his formal investigation by giving the men the presumption of innocence.

That is completely in line with natural justice.

I will be asking the archbishop the outcome of his investigation.

Since then I have discovered that Father Kevin Bartley is highly regarded by his fellow priests in Dublin.

On the other hand, Father Paul Coyle is. for whatever reason, not held in high esteem by the same priests.

DAD TRIES TO TELL HIS SON THE FACTS OF LIFE

By Leonardo Blair ,Christian Post Reporter

The Rev. W. Thomas Faucher, a retired Idaho priest who once claimed to have urinated in communion wine at least once at his church, was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in prison without parole for what investigators said was the most disturbing child pornography case they had ever seen.

According to the Idaho Statesman, Faucher, 73, who pleaded guilty in September to five felony crimes stemming from amassing thousands of child porn images and videos on his home computer, will also have to register as a sex offender.

He apologized in the courtroom ahead of his sentencing at the Ada County Courthouse in Boise.

“I am deeply sorry that I was and have been connected to that in any way,” Faucher said while acknowledging that he now knows child porn is not a victimless crime. “I was one really sick puppy. I screwed up big time … I feel so much remorse and anger.”

Detective John Brumbaugh, who’s been on the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force for five years, testified Thursday that he received a cybertip about two images sent from wtfauch@aol.com that was linked to the St. Mary’s Catholic Church website.

Over several months, Brumbaugh said verified chats and emails showed Faucher was “actively seeking interests with gay men, satanic interests” as well as the rape and killing of minors.

The detective described the contents of the images police found on Faucher’s cellphone, computer and Dropbox account containing more than 2,500 files displaying child pornography described as violent, disturbing, torturous and included children crying.

“The volume of [images] was something I haven’t come across,” Brumbaugh said.

The disgraced priest also expressed a desire to have sex with boys, had “satanic desires,” an attraction to 6-year-old boys and expressed excitement at the “thought of killing someone” authorities said.

“The volume of [images] was something I haven’t come across,” Brumbaugh explained, noting that the case disturbed everyone who worked on it.

Brumbaugh said Faucher also had images of black slavery and discussed using racist language. Images of Faucher urinating on a cross and canon law book were also found.
Bishop Peter F. Christensen and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Boise said in a press statement that the shocking discovery of the evil Faucher harbored has forced them to start the process of defrocking him.

“The volumes of shocking information that the law enforcement investigation uncovered reveal the heinous nature of child pornography and the tragic impact upon its victims. While we cannot begin to fathom what brought Faucher to the point that he was able to enter into this evil and dark world, we are thankful for the efforts of the law enforcement community in doing what it can to protect our children from these crimes,” the diocese said. “Since his actions came to light in February, Faucher has been unable, and continues to be unable, to function as a priest in the Catholic Church.”

Christensen, said now that the criminal case is over, the church has started the process of turning the case over to authorities in Rome.
“We have already begun our preparations to turn this case over to Church authorities in Rome,” Christensen said. “Our response should send a clear message that we will not tolerate these sorts of behaviors from anyone who holds a leadership position in our diocese.”

PAT SAYS

This case is shocking in the extreme.

A priest involved in Satanic worship, gay sex, wanted to have sex with and kill little boys and downloading violent child porn.

AND urinating in the chalice before Mass AND urinating on a cross.

Is this man sick or evil, or both?

He deserves 25 years without parole.

He is a danger to the community and to children.

This case is rare but not the only of it’s kind.

A priest once told me about Satanic Masses in the Vatican with chalice containing blood, semen and urine.

It an extreme example of how bad things are in the Church of Rome.

YESTERDAY ON THIS BLOG I SAID THAT I WOULD BE PUBLISHING A BLOG TODAY ABOUT RORY COYLE AND HIS CURRENT LIFE IN LONDON.

I HAVE CHANGED MY MIND AND I AM NOT PUBLISHING THAT BLOG.

What has changed my mind?

I had a confidential telephone call and the caller asked me not to publish the blog I had planned.

At the beginning of the call the called ask for confidentiality and I promised. I cannot break that promise.

The main treason they gave me was that the staff and volunteers in the Irish Centre are all lay people and that it would be unfair of me to publish their pictures and drag those private people into controversy.

I must make it absolutely clear that:

1. I was not promised any benefit of any kind for not publishing the blog.
2. I was not threatened in any body by anybody if I did publish the blog.
3. The person who rang me is not an official at any level in the Roman Catholic Church.
4. No one got to me.

On this blog people see the strong, campaigning, challenging side of me.

But there is another me.

There is the listening, compassionate and caring side. And there is the pastoral me that feels for people in difficulty.

People may feel that there is a contradiction there. And there is. All of us are contradictions.

Someone once advised priests to be “Like a lion in the pulpit and like a lamb in the confessional”.

The Bible talks about the lion and the lamb lying down together.

There is a lion and a lamb inside me.

The lion comes from my father – a life long socialist and trade union official.

The lamb comes from my mother Jo, who incidentally was 13 years dead yesterday.

I have been believable told that Rory is in London, is a simle volunteer in the Irish Centre and is not conducting Mass or the Sacraments and working on his future.

People will find this blog today confusing and maybe inadequate.

I ask readers to trust my judgement.

I am expecting comments from people who will be very curious.

I am also expecting the usual attacks.

So be it!

I decided not to publish the planned blog for Christian and priestly reasons.

STATEMENT BY YOUNG MAN WHO TALKED WITH RORY ON GRINDR.

“I saw your blog post about Fr Rory Coyle.

I can probably tell you why he has vanished.

He spoke to me on Grindr a few times and kept wanting to come to my mum’s house for sex with me while she was at work.

He’s a dirty bastard; orgies in Dublin, gay beaches in Portugal, renting rooms by the hour in Soho in London for sex meets. He told me all about it. He told me a whole lot more about his exploits but I didn’t save it. He’s a total pervert.

He didn’t realise I knew him cos he used to be the school chaplain at XX XXXXX in XXXXXXXXX when I used to go there.

He’s just a hypocrite. Denouncing gay people from the pulpit and then shagging guys when no one is looking.

You can relax. I’m over 18 so at least he’s not a paedo. lol.

I’d love to know what actually happened if/when the diocese found out what he was up to.