Month: Jan 2020

RICK ROSS, GUARDIAN JOURNALIST HAS WRITTEN THAT THE THREE SIGNS OF A CULT ARE AS FOLLOWS:

1. charismatic leader, who increasingly becomes an object of worship as the general principles that may have originally sustained the

group lose power. That is a living leader, who has no meaningful accountability and becomes the single most defining element of the group and its source of power and authority

The culmination of this process can be seen by members of the group often doing things that are not in their own best interest, but consistently in the best interest of the group and its leader.

2. A process of indoctrination or education is in use that can be seen as coercive persuasion or thought reform, commonly called “braineashing”.

3. Economic, sexual, and other exploitation of group members by the leader and the ruling coterie.

1

In the RCC this charismatic leader is the pope and to a smaller extent, cardinals and archbishops.

The pope has and us, often an object of veneration and worship.

Look at the millions who go to Rome and bring back the image of the Pope on pens, tea towels, tee shirts, cups, etc etc.

One pope some popes ago was issuing crucifixes with himself on it instead of Jesus.

The pope is accountable to no one and the semi divine papacy is a central defining element of RCC – ism.

“Many members of the group doing things in their own interests but in the interests of the leaders and group”.

Examples:

Leaving the RCC all your property and money instead of leaving it to family and friends.

Not wearing condoms because of RCC teaching and leaving yourself open to unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases- AN ESPECIAL PROBLEM IN AFRICA.

Rejecting LGBT family and friends as “disordered”.

Living your life by ideas and beliefs not grounded in reality and science.

All of us as Catholics have been brainwashed by the RCC. I was. I cant believe now how I fell for all the brainwashing.

2

A PROCESS OF INDOCTRINATION

Well, on this one the RCC is certainly cult like with its insistence on having it’s own denominational schools and colleges.

Father Denis Faul often said that there was a Catholic way ot teaching everything – maths, history, geography, science etc.

And the Jesuits said: “Give me a boy of seven and he’s mine for life”.

Like many others I had RCC doctrine beaten into me by violent and sadistic “Christian” Brothers, priests and nuns.

Today in Northern Ireland RC education is run by the CCMS – a body I have seen to be cruel and unjust to teachers and kids.

The poor masses around the globe were, and are still being brainwashed by the RCC.

The RCC has always been into thought control and reform.

Phonsie in Waterford would be a thought control and reform man – even on the subject of women’s bodies!

And if you disagree with them they expel and shun you.

Do people know that there are two kinds of excommunicated persons- the “tolerati” and “vitandus” – those who can be socially tolerated and those who must be shunned absolutely.

3

Economic, sexual, and other exploitation of group members by the leader and the ruling coterie.

Here we really go!

Catholics handing their money over to priests and remembering them in their will?

The corrupt Vatican bank.

Bishops spending millions on their houses.

Bishops and priests:

Sexually abusing children!

Sexually abusing men!

Sexually abusing women.

Sexually abusing seminarians.

Sexually abusing nuns!

Vatican as gay mafia!

Priesthood as gay profession.

Seminaries as gay hunting grounds.

Priests and seminarians having sex on altars.

Benedict, without meaning to, has undermined the papacy. In that, he has done us all a favour without intending to.

There is no proof that Peter was ever in Rome.

And even if he was, there is no proof that he was the “bishop” of Rome.

The Apostles, were not bishops in the sense we mean today.

They were not for ONE particular church. They were missionaries to the WHOLE church.

Bishops, on the other hand, while not been there in the beginning, eventually emerged from the “elders” or as they were called overseers.

In the early church these overseers were not

“bosses” but community servants.

How that has changed!

Later all bishops became monarchical and the bishop of Rome became an “emperor.

And that meant the church were from being a servant church to being an hierarchical empire.

Benedict retired as pope because of the sexual corruption in the church. He may have himself being involved in sexual misbehaviour and corruption?

And instead of properly retiring and shagging back to Germany invented a new title for himself and renovated a massive building in the Vatican for this new fangled “pope emeeitus” title where he lives with his boyfriend George.

Benedict should have returned to being a cardinal with the title bishop, emeritus of Rome.

But by inventing a title for himself that has NEVER existed in the 2000 year history of the RCC he has demistifed the papacy more.

And then Francis comes along with a dark and murky past in Argentina and goes about the Vatican losing his temper and slapping hysterical women.

One of the Reformers once said:

“What Jesus announced was a kingdom. What we ended up with was a church”.

The current RCC bears no resemblance to the early New Testament church.

Nor does it reflect the teachings of The Nazarene.

My own journey, which I never planned or foresaw, has been a journey away from the church and back to the Kingdom.

These days I wonder how I never saw how rotten the whole thing was much earlier in life.

Of course I have been free of it now for 34 years.

As a result I feel the FREEDOM of a son of God.

When I have a decision to make I dont have to consult the corrupt canon law or any dictator bishop.

I simply have to ask myself: “What would Jesus do”?

And the only book I am have to consult is The Bible.

Of course I am a sinner with a myriad of faults and failings. I have got many thing wrong. I have gotten myself into situations I should not have gotten into.

But my heart is in the right place and I sincerely want to do right by God and people in need.

Even this week I have been in the presence of people who have been and still are being, deeply hurt by the RCC and powerful individuals within it.

This hurt is evil and evil does not come from a good place.

Some people say there some rotten apples in the RCC barrel.

Not true!

THE RCC barrel is rotten to the core and miraculously the odd apple is not rotten.

This is by God’s grace.

A number of years ago a friend asked me a question that stunned me. He asked:

“What if the Antichrist is not an individual but an institution”?

I now know which institution is the Antichrist!

—————–
BUT DONT WORRY.

BIG AMY IS PRAYING FOR US ALL IN LIMA

The Church’s Enduring Legacy of Abuse

Marcial Maciel’s crimes should have ended his organization.

By LEÓN KRAUZE
JAN 15, 20204:09 PM

Pope John Paul II blesses Marcial Maciel in Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican on Nov. 30, 2004.

Reuters/Tony Gentile

In Fernando Meirelles’ film The Two Popes, former Pope Benedict XVI, played by Anthony Hopkins, confesses his sins to Argentinian Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, now Pope Francis. It is a crucial scene, in which Benedict aims to convince Bergoglio, played by Jonathan Pryce, of the reasons for his resignation as head of the church.
As Bergoglio listens, Benedict mentions Mexican priest Marcial Maciel, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, an influential, ultraconservative organization present in more than 20 countries, where it operates more than a dozen colleges and almost 150 schools while maintaining close ties to the upper echelons of political power. Maciel, an infamous pedophile who victimized dozens of children in over six decades in the priesthood, enjoyed the active protection of the church for years, especially during John Paul II’s papacy, in which Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger—later Benedict XVI—was prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the church’s authority on policy and discipline. Although Meirelles precludes the audience from listening to Benedict’s full confession on Maciel, the inference is clear: Benedict’s inaction on Maciel and others like him burden him to the point of spiritual exhaustion.

It is impossible to know if the real 92-year-old pope emeritus, who was back in the news this week after demanding his name be removed as co-author from a controversial book defending celibacy, is really so profoundly troubled by the church’s unforgivable passivity during Maciel’s long reign of terror. But while Benedict’s conscience remains inscrutable, the full extent of Maciel’s crimes and the Vatican’s role in his impunity does not. Brazilian Cardinal João Braz de Aviz, head of the church’s Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, which oversees organizations and orders like Maciel’s Legionaries, recently admitted that the Vatican had evidence of Maciel’s crimes dating back to 1943. “We’ve been covering this for over 70 years, and it has been a tremendous mistake,” Braz de Aviz said.

COMPLETELY & UTTERLY FREE TO PLAY

The last four decades of Maciel’s life—during which he consolidated enormous influence, especially in his native Mexico—were particularly shocking. Despite mounting evidence, John Paul II turned a blind eye on his history of abuse, emboldening his followers. (Some even advocated for Maciel’s canonization.) For years, Joseph Ratzinger also refused to act against Maciel. As the prefect responsible for enforcing church doctrine, he choseto handle the church’s sexual abuse scandals through secrecy rather than transparency. For almost a quarter century, Ratzinger failed to push for the detachment of Marcial Maciel from the position of privilege he enjoyed for so long. He finally did so in 2006, when, as pope, he found the courage to remove Maciel from the priesthood and send him to Mexico to supposedly focus on a “discreet life of penance and prayer.” If Maciel followed Benedict’s spiritual marching orders, it certainly did not lead to atonement. He never admitted any wrongdoing, much less showed remorse. He died in 2008 without ever asking for forgiveness.

Under the Vatican’s tutelage, Maciel’s organization has tried to purge itself of its founder. In 2009, the order began a revision of its practices that five years later led to a new “constitutional text,” approved by the Vatican, to “preserve the charism of the congregation and help it thrive.” Maciel’s closest associates continually declared themselves aghast over the accusations and never admitted being privy to any wrongdoing. The organization is no longer allowed to refer to Maciel as “our father” or promote his works. The process of getting rid of Maciel’s legacy of abuse has been a whole different matter. This week, the organization announced Fernando Martínez would leave the priesthood after facing accusations of abuse from at least eight girls in schools run by the organization in Mexico during the early 1990s. The Legionaries stopped short of expelling Martínez, though.

One possible explanation? Martínez himself wasone of Maciel’s many victims of abuse when they crossed paths in a seminary in Ontaneda, Spain, as well as in Rome. The year was 1954. Martínez was 15.
This should come as no surprise. Recent reports have shown that the cycle of abuse within the Legionaries of Christ spanned generations of priests closely tied to both Maciel and the Legion’s origins. According to Spanish newspaper El País, child molestation within the order “was not the result of the perversion of a few priests, but part of a foundational dynamic” within the whole organization. Like Martínez, a considerable number of Maciel’s victims grew up to be abusers themselves, their impunity guaranteed in exchange for their silence about their original ordeal.

Many were rewarded with positions of power and influence. (It is no coincidence that Martínez was given an important role in two of the organization’s academic institutions in Mexico). “It’s part of the Legion’s methods,” Erick Escobar, an ex-member recently said. “Prepare you for the abuse, abuse you, and then turn you into an accomplice.” A recent study published by the order itself admits as much. According to the Legionaries own findings, more than 60 percent of those abused—111 children, by the organization’s own probably count—were either violated by Maciel himself, one of his victims or by a third generation of victims. “These were chains of abuse,” the report acknowledges.
After Maciel, the Legion has tried to get back to business, focusing not on the sins of the founder but on the group’s supposed atonement. So far, the strategy seems to be working, at least up to a point: In the decade since Maciel’s death, active membership has grown 3 percent. According to some estimates, over 170,000 students attend the organization’s schools.

As for the Vatican, Pope Francis seems resolute to leave Maciel in the past. Five years ago, in an interview, the legion’s new leader, Mexican priest Eduardo Robles Gil, told El País that Francis had given his blessing for the organization to renew its efforts. “Pope Francis told me ‘go forward, you have my support,’ ” Robles Gil said. But, as cases like Martinez’s prove, it is hard to turn the page on Marcial Maciel when he was the whole book. Maciel’s organization, tainted by heinous crimes that spanned generations, should have been laid to rest along with its founder.

PAT SAYS

The Maciel case alone shows the utter financial and sexual corruption of the RCC.

And John Pole was up to his eyes in it.

He should never had been made a saint.

His canonization makes canonization look very tacky indeed.

by Michael Sainsbury, Catholic News Service

YANGON, MYANMAR — The president of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference is the latest of the country’s senior clerics to push back against legislation to lift the seal of confession for child sexual abuse.

Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane made a submission to the Queensland state government opposing draft legislation that would see priests face up to three years in jail for failing to report confessions of child sexual abuse to the police; the penalty would be five years for “failure to protect.”

In his submission, Coleridge said a confession is between the penitent and God, and the priest’s task is to enable that dialogue.

“The proposed legislation would make the priest at this vital point less a servant of God than an agent of the state,” said Coleridge. “The mechanism within this legislation which deals with the confessional seal quite simply will not make a difference to the safety of our young people.”

Many priests have said they have never heard a confession from a child abuser, and some have noted that the psychopathy of many offenders is such that they do not believe they have done anything wrong.

In February 2019, Coleridge gave the homily at the closing Mass of the Vatican summit on child protection. He said the Catholic Church needs a true conversion that places survivors, and not the institution, as the focus of its concern as it enacts measures to combat the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable people.
Still, the prelate’s insistence that the confessional should trump the state’s laws has drawn a storm of protest on social media by Catholics and other Australians, concerned that the church is still prioritizing traditions over child safety.

Others are concerned that the Catholic Church in Australia remains on probation after the damning finding of the Royal Commission Into Institutional Child Abuse and that the pushback from Coleridge and others will be seen as evidence that the church remains clericalist at heart and is not doing enough to change.

The Queensland government is the latest of Australia’s six states and two territories to propose such legislation, which comes in direct response to the recommendations of the Royal Commission. From 2013 to 2017, the commission heard evidence that Catholic-run institutions were among the biggest offenders in scandals that reached back decades.

Last November, similar legislation was introduced in Victoria the state, home to the dioceses of Ballarat and Melbourne, which were at the epicenter of multiple child abuse scandals. Other states and territories have all signaled intentions to introduce legislation to remove the legal shield from the confessional for child sexual offenses.

Coleridge’s public opposition to laws tearing down any legal protection from the confessional follows similar statements made by Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher and Melbourne Archbishop Peter Comensoli.

The seal of confession has been an issue in other countries, too. For instance, in November, Cardinal Vincent Nichols of Westminster told the Independent Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse that Catholic priests would die rather than break the seal of confession to report child abusers to the police.

“The history of the Catholic Church has a number of people who’ve been put to death in defense of the seal of confession,” he said. “It might come to that.”

PAT SAYS

The RCC, especially in places like Ireland, has become far too used to expecting state laws and constitutions, to make special provisions for them and their canon law.

Australia is run according to Australian civil law.

No private body, like a Christian denomination, is above civil law.

The RCC might contain a large number of adherents but it is still only a private body and a denomination. In fact, as the world is discovering, it is a dangerous cult.

The RCC needs to be taken to task by Australia and by all civil authorities.

The Seal of Confession is a a theological concept I happen to agree with.

BUT it cannot be forced on civil society!

LETTER FROM ST THERESA’S PARISHIONER

LETTER FROM ST THERESA’S PARISHIONER

FATHER CON CUNNINGHAM WAS ALLOWED BY THE BISHOP OF RAPHOE TO REMAIN IN MINISTRY FOR 16 YEARS AFTER IT BECAME KNOWN HE WAS A SEX ABUSER!

IRISH TIMES

Con Cunningham (83), a former priest, has been sentenced to nine months in jail for indecent assault of a child, at Donegal Town Circuit Court. Photograph: Joe Boland/North West Newspix

An ex-county Donegal priest who was held in “highest esteem”, who had “simulated sex” with a young girl in his car, was jailed for nine months at Donegal Town Circuit Court, yesterday.

In jailing 83-year-old Con Cunningham, Glen Road, Carrick, Judge John Aylmer said he did not accept that the offences were at the “lower end of the scale”.

The judge said while no penetration had taken place the ex- priest had simulated oral sex and had pushed the child’s face into his crotch until he had satisfied himself.

He had left the child to experience smells and stains and bruising to her genital area from “similar simulated sex”.

The judge said the defendant had climbed on top of the girl and a “significant level of both force and violence” was used.

He accepted that no alcohol was involved which would be an aggravating factor.

The judge said that given the defendant’s position of authority as a priest and accepted by the family, this was “a grievous breach of trust against the young girl and her family”.

And the effect on the victim was on-going after 43 years and the offences were on the higher end of the scale.

Mitigating factors were his plea albeit it late, his age and the fact that prison would be “onerous” on him, although he was a “fit” person.

The defendant had been of previous good character and had no previous or subsequent matters.

The ex-priest was now on the Sex Offenders Register and had a significant “fall from grace”.

Indecent assault

Cunningham, of Glen Road, Carrick had pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent assault against the female on dates between January 1st, 1976 and December 31st, 1976 at a location in Donegal.

The defendant also pleading guilty to a similar third count that occurred at an unknown location between Donegal and Dublin on dates between January 1st, 1976 and June 30th, 1977.

At an earlier sitting Patricia McLaughlin, for the Director of Public Prosecutions, said Cunningham had begun the abuse, when the girl was less than 10 years old, by sitting her on his knee and tickling her in front of her mother who was happy with the attention the girl was getting. It later progressed to rubbing her breasts and getting on top of her in his car while both were clothed while making grunting noises and it was clear he was satisfying himself, the victim said.

Judge John Aylmer initially imposed a sentence of 15 months but suspended the final six months and the ex-priest was bound to be of good behaviour and keep the peace on his own bond of €100 for a year.

Defence counsel Peter Nolan said “apart from this appalling matter he was held in very high esteem by his parishioners”.

He handed in a number of references and testimonials which showed “Fr Cunningham to be an exemplary priest”.

The ex- priest understood that what he did was “vile and wrong” and has “remorse for the fact that he ruined this girl’s life”.

It was a total and utter breach of trust taking advantage of a child and he full accepted that fact, the court heard”.

Donegal people were very disappointed with the statement of the current bishop Alan McGuckian which read:

“The bishop have an extensive interview with Greg Hughes on Highland Radio last Friday answering questions about Con Cunningham. There will be no further statement at this time”.

Parishioners of Carrick were very angry that for 16 years after allegations Con Cunningham was allowed to celebrate Mass, weddings and funerals.

The clergy and the Gardai were told he was still in ministry and did nothing about it.

Parishioners are angry with McGuckian for failing to apologise to the two Martin sisters who were Cunningham’s victims.

They are also angry that McGuckian has not shown his face in Fanad where the abuse occurred.

The PP Fr Pat McGarvey did apologise at Sunday Masses.

The late bishop, Hegarty, totally mishandled the Cunningham case – sending the priest for therapy but not informing the Gardai.

Bishop McGuckian made a fool of himself by saying that the duty to report to the Gardai did not crystallize until 2017.

The bishop after Hegarty, Boyce was also informed.

There is also criticism of the diocese buying a house for Cunningham in 2002 in close proximity to children

Cunningham also had a habit of hanging around the primary school gate at 2 and 3 pm.

In 2009 7 years after his removal for abuse a parent found Cunningham alone in their house with a 9 year old child offering the child sweets and chocolate!

Cunningham also started going to the underage girls football matches and hanging around the dressing rooms!

This case has mishandled and still being mishandled by three bishops, Hegarty Boyce and now McGuckian.

UNDERTAKER’S DEATH NOTICE:

The death has occurred of Fr. Michael Lomasney
Castlelyons, Cork

OVER THE PAST FEW DAYS PEOPLE HAVE BEEN REMINISCING OVER PAST ENGLISH CATHOLIC BISHOPS

One of the few past bishops I came across was Cyril Cowderoy of Southwark.
He used to visit St John’s Seminary in Waterford when I was there.

One the day I was ordained deacon in 1975 a fellow ordinand and I went for dinner in the Tower Hotel, Waterford.

There was suddenly a great flurry at the dining room door. We spotted a number of clerics and flashes of episcopal purple.

The head waiter brought the clerics to the next table to us and said to the most senior: “Would your grace like to see the wine list”?

A big voice boomed back: ‘His grace would like a pint of bass”.

It was Cowderoy and a gaggle of priests and monsignors.

I was later told that Cowderoy used to go out in the afternoon to post his own letters, dressed like a 19th century prelate.

DOES ANYONE ELSE FIND THE SINGING PRIEST RAY KELLY EMBARRASSING?

There is absolutely no doubt that he has a very good voice.

In fact I wrote to him when his singing first hit the news and congratulated him on his voice.

But has the attention gone to his head and is making him behave embarrassingly?

Those of us of a certain age, and not endowed with external beauty, need to conduct ourselves in a manner that suits our age, our appearance and our state in life.

And we all have to resist that narcissistic part that is in all of us that suggests to us that we are something that we are not.

So many priests nowadays present themselves as PERFORMERS when that is not what we are.

We priests, when it comes to Mass and the Sacraments are “celebrants” and “presiders”.

In the rest of our lives we are “pastors”.

Of course the Mass or Sacraments become more meaningful when the celebrant is warm and has the gifts of good preaching or even a good voice to lead the singing.

But our basic calling is to put Jesus Christ at the centre – and not ourselves.

Maybe priests, who are neither fathers or husbands are pushed towards narcissism because they live alone or do not have to negotiate their personal spaces to include a partner and children.

And on top of that goes the adulation priests gave traditionally received.

Pedestals are alright – but you run the risk of thinking you are better or different.

Father Kelly was apparently angry that he was not asked to sing for Pope Francis in Ireland?

I think he has lost his contract with his recording company too?

But he still has the best contract any priest could have – to be a parish priest.