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RICHARD PURCELL – UBI NUNC – WHERE TO NOW?

A QUESTION FROM A BLOG READER:

Should Purcell be given a Priory for life to conduct independent ministry from, and if so would you welcome him to work in communion with you?


Basically my challenge today is; follow through on your blog and tell us where you believe the Abbot and Bishop should minister?

The answer to this question depends on two other questions:

1. What does Richard Purcell want to do himself?

2. What do the Cistercians want him to do?

Richard has to decide whether or not he wants to remain a priest and whether or not he wants to continue as a Cistercian monk

He says she has resigned for “personal reasons”.

I imagine those”personal reasons” will play an important roll in his decision on a way to go forward.

The allegations against him is that Richard Purcell has been a sexually active gay man.

You cannot be a Cistercian monk and Abbot and at the same time be sexually active.

Indeed you cannot be a Roman Catholic diocesan or religious priest and be sexually active – although we know that many are – and are thereby living a contradictory and hypocritical life – leading to scandal after scandal.

Richard Purcell can only continue as a monk and priest if he recommits to chastity and celibacy.

Can he do that?

Does he want to do that?

And therein lies his first hurdle.

THE CISTERCIANS

And then there is the question of the attitude of the Cistercians on this matter.

The Abbot General, Eamon Fitzgerald and his council have handled this matter terribly. They have let it drag on for two years and grow into a bigger problem and scandal.

Surely the monks, nuns, abbots and abbesses of the 160 communities in the order are very concerned by all of this?

The basic fact is that this is a matter primarily for Richard Purcell himself.

As a lay man his personal life is his own business.

As a priest and a monk it is the business of all in the church.

If Richard decides to return to civvy Street and the world of music, then we must give him his personal space.

112 replies on “RICHARD PURCELL – UBI NUNC – WHERE TO NOW?”

I honestly think a bonking monk is business as usual and the only thing that has influenced this is the veneer being scraped away. Assuming it is usual, the monks and nuns won’t be bothered, or will make the usual excuses.
Yes it has been dealt with badly but the norm seems to be doing nothing.

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Pat, aren’t you being very arrogant and hypocritical yourself in your attitude? Considering the personal struggles you had in your life on so many fronts which brought much pain and ignominy which I needn’t name, surely a little mercy at this stage is vital from you. The man has resigned. He will have an inner struggle in making necessary decisions. His conscience must be troubled. While you have definitively condemned him spiritually and morally, God must now be allowed to urge Fr. Purcell to think, reflect and pray. You or I or anybody else has no right to chart a direction for him for the rest of his life. This fallen man does not deserve to be hunted. I say this because this is what you may now be unintentionally encouraging. I acknowledge your role in seeking the truth and that’s admirable. Yet, I believe that at some point in these narratives, we must allow the individual or individuals the space to make further honest decisions. All who have been spoken about in this prolonged drama cannot but be disturbed and challenged. I would hate to place myself in judgment of any person’s moral failings in the arrogant belief that my own life is a shining piece of virtue. Can we write people off as utterly useless or of no value because of moral failings? Maybe so but as a Christian I do not share this view about Fr. Purcell. Sometimes after crushing events we reflect a little deeper and perhaps a human kindness needs to surface.

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Pat, you are forgetting the married former Protestant and Anglican priest who can be sexually active. It’s important to remember that what you refer to is not absolute.

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The difference between + Pat and Purcell is that Pat has resolved whatever inconsistencies there were in his life and is honest, transparent and upfront. Purcell is still in the dark shadows, trying to fool himself and everybody else. Purcell had no intention of resigning. He was intent on toughing it out and continuing in his hypocritical ways. Maybe now, the shock of this, will make him rethink. And convert. Or take another direction. But, let him not for a moment think that he can continue to have his cake and eat it and try to mislead everybody by his lies and his duplicity. Enough is enough.

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Good blog.
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Consider this though. What if the Cistercians decided to forgive him, while also holding him to the stability of the monastery. By this I mean, bind him to remain on site (only leaving for medical reasons) in the same fashion as Cistercian monks have generally lived. I was amazed to see he has sufficient freedom to visit inner city Dublin.
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Such would be a private matter known only within the Cistercians. It may be sufficient to the order, and it may be that his choice is to live a chaste life going forward.
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If he so choses, and if he is successful, you would never know – but you appear willing to blog in a manner that would chain him to his past transgressions. In doing so you are placing yourself in God’s seat of judgement and running the risk of presenting yourself as the Usurper.
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I urge caution and reflection, but I urge it for your sake. Please pray on your current thoughts. It is right to seek justice as you do, but justice has its limits and things are getting a little fuzzy here.

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12.12: An excellent and timely comnent. It is honest, asserts the truth of what has happened but is also a humane, kind and necessary comment, probably the most Christ-like. I also believe, as I’ve expressed recently, that we cannot forever condemn any person as to imprison them in their past. Jesus did not do this and though we like to rejoice at the public humiliation of others, at this juncture of this narrative, we should act more charitably. The judgment has been made, people have resigned and undoubtedly there will be much soul searching taking place behind closed doors and before GOD in truthful conscience. I pray for everyone in this drama.

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Dear Pat ,
Respectfully , I think you fail to answer the heart of the question .Let me put it to you then in two ways .Because it was a good question from another reader of the blog .
Part A – If Richard Purcell left the institutional church to continue a Priest in an Independent Ministry , and in those circumstances petitioned you a Presiding Bishop of the
Oratory Society to minister in communion with you what would you say ? ” Yes ” or ” No .”
Part B – If the above were to happen what would the reasons be for the answer you would give to Richard Purcell ?

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Surely a discerning answer to a petition isn’t unqualified but consists of things like “continue considering such and such”. Pat and any applicant can continue making examination of the individual in private and not paint themselves into blogosphere corners about personal matters.

Just about the most obvious point however is cut and dried: affiliation to the Vatican City State (VCS). Pat’s public don’t need to make the split but in tying oneself to Pat’s institution one does. Some people would prefer to continue in affiliation to the VCS as lay person. This is why the best answer to these “good questions” is better questions. Above all any petitioner has to decide for himself what questions he himself is going to formulate.

Monkship or priestship aren’t entitlements; to listen to some seminarians they make out like it would be better for them (probably because they had their wealth stolen from them by “laics”). To be an ordinary bod is surely the greatest gift and freedom but, if one does happen to be ordained, to be independent of the VCS behemoth is surely next in rank.

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Withrespect, Bishop, and with no desire to become involved in the Latin Mass controversy, shouldn’t that UBI NUNC be QUO NUNC?
Regards, Old Joe Lollard (O-level Latin, 1956)

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they]”) is a rhetorical question taken from the Latin Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt?, meaning “Where are those who were before us?” Ubi nunc…? (“Where now?”) is a common variant. Sometimes interpreted to indicate nostalgia, the ubi sunt motif is actually a meditation on mortality and life’s transience.

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I think the problem is the Latin doesn’t mean what your translation says.
Taken cold you would supply est to make sense of the sentence – ubi nunc est – Where is he now?
To get your translation you would use quo.

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“Where has this left a person” versus “where ought a person to be off to next”, my Latin O level is far more up to date than yours! 🥳

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Only honesty is courageous. Does he want to abolish the institutional sacramental system? Or are the Romans merely picking on waverers as usual?

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“Richard Purcell can only continue as a monk and priest if he recommits to chastity and celibacy.” You are absolutely right, + Pat. The issue at stake here is whether the Church and clergy take seriously and live a life of chastity and celibacy which they have promised to live before God and the faithful. God and the faithful can therefore reasonably expect them to keep that promise. The reality is that bishops, clergy and faithful all know that this is lived as much in the breach than in the promise, and worse still that it has become something that is almost expected and tolerated. That leads to clergy essentially living a lie for much of their ministry, fooling themselves perhaps, but not fooling God or the faithful. Such hypocrisy and lying has a corrosive effect on the life the Church, on trust, and on the ability of the faithful to believe the clergy who are supposed to be encouraging them to live good and Christian lives. There is a whiff of arrogance about clergy who believe that they can straddle parallel lives and continue to fool God and the faithful. Well, with the forensic focus that people like you, + Pat, are bringing to this matter, these clergy are beginning to realise that they cannot get away with it scot free anymore, and will have to make a decision. People like Purcell, at long last. It’s the arrogance and plain lying that really sticks in my craw. I can understand weakness of the human person, but I cannot understand and will not accept systemic duplicity and lying. I think many young men have realised the dysfunctional clerical culture and lifestyle they will find themselves in if they come forward for ministry as priests. Hence a dearth of vocations. I would have no problem with the Church revisiting and reviewing its teaching about sexuality, celibacy and gender, which perhaps would lead to a healthier, more integrated, whole clerical culture and way of living and ministering, as well as the benefits such would bring to the Chruch generally. Until it does that, and continues to insist on the sexual morality and mandatory celibacy that it currently demands of its clergy, then I insist that is respected and lived by clergy. Where it is not, I am with you, + Pat, to name it and shame it for what it is – dishonesty, hypocrisy and lying.

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‘I think many young men have realised the dysfunctional clerical culture and lifestyle they will find themselves in if they come forward for ministry as priests. Hence a dearth of vocations.’
This is so true, but I wonder whether the church is still blaming this on society, as they do with clerical child abuse.

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9.56
Not a very nuanced view of reality. It is not true to claim the church blames society for clerical abuse. Nowhere will you find evidence that this position expresses what the church holds.

What you will find interested commentators doing is to dituate clerical sexual abuse into societal sexual abuse. Placing something in its context is an indispensable prerequisite for understanding it.

Worlds apart from your scenario.

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10:46
What the church teaches and what it says and thinks are two different things – haven’t you noticed? Have a read of Elsie’s comments on abuse if you have so far ignored the evidence.

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It is said that clergy have the same attitude to Paul VI’s encyclical on celibacy as married Catholics have to his encyclical on birth control (which Peter de Rosa called ‘the celibate’s revenge.’ It’s not clear if there are any married contributors to this blog or any women. But if their were one could demonise them in the same way as sexually active clergy are demonised. Here goes:

“Ms Jones can only continue as a Catholic if she recommits to chastity and stops using contraceptives.” The issue at stake here is whether the Church and its laity take seriously and live a life of chastity in which each marital act is open to the transmission of life which they have promised basically in their baptismal promises. The world reasonably expects Catholics to believe what their Church teaches and at last to make a serious atttempt to live up to that teaching. The reality is that bishops, clergy and faithful all know that this is lived as much in the breach as in the observance, and worse still that it has become something that is almost expected and tolerated. That leads to married Catholics essentially living a lie for much of their married lives, fooling themselves perhaps, but not fooling God or the world at large. Such hypocrisy and lying has a corrosive effect on the life the Church, on trust, and on the ability of the world to believe in a Church which is supposed to be teaching and encouraging them to live good and upright lives. There is a whiff of arrogance about Catholics who believe that they can straddle parallel lives and continue to fool God and the faithful. Well, with the forensic focus that people like you, + Pat, are bringing to this matter, these married folk are beginning to realise that they cannot get away with it scot free anymore, and will have to make a decision. People like Ms Jones, at long last. It’s the arrogance and plain lying that really sticks in my craw. I can understand weakness of the human person, but I cannot understand and will not accept systemic duplicity and lying. I think many young men have realised the dysfunctional double think of contracepting Catholics, a culture and lifestyle they will find themselves in if they come forward for marriage in church. I would have no problem with the Church revisiting and reviewing its teaching about sexuality, celibacy and gender, and conraception, which perhaps would lead to a healthier, more integrated, Catholic culture and way of living, as well as the benefits such would bring to the Church generally. Until it does that, and continues to insist on the sexual morality that it currently demands of its married members, then I insist that this is respected and lived by marrried couples. Where it is not, I am with you, + Pat, to name it and shame it for what it is – dishonesty, hypocrisy and lying.’

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10:51
A truly brilliant comment and shows exactly the hypocrisy. In fact you could extend this to adolescent boys and masturbation.
By the way I’m a woman brought up a Catholic and now a Druid, but no longer needing contraception!

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10:51,
A brilliant comment. The important point though is that monks make a vow of chastity and clergy make a vow of celebacy. It is hypocritical to make these vows and then live a contradictory lifestyle.
A bishop will give an abbatial blessing to a wayward monk but will he give a blessing of love to an LGBT couple who are truly in a committed, respectful and loving relationship?
Married men of good standing cannot join the priesthood but wayward seminarians and clergy living lives of moral hypocrisy can carry with the status of clerical state.
There has to be understanding that people fall and people fail. The Pope said himself that a lapse of the vow can be forgiven. If someone is not mending their ways, they must have the integrity to return to lay state.
The Church baptises children born out of wedlock and marry couples who already has children. It is an act of understanding by the church of humanity.
Pax.

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Well done and indirectly exposing the non-recognised contrast between free belief (including disbelief in sacraments, if she is clever enough) versus obligation to church order, crucial parts of the latter being found as nonsensical as trammelings placed on the former.
Church authorities aren’t honest enough to teach Mrs Jones to disbelieve in sacraments for everybody, therefore she is not to blame to want in as JP II insisted.

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12:38
That’s strange, when people criticise the church’s teaching here you always get some priest coming on here going, I have never taught that.
I think you’ll find Mr Nichols is actually the church – if the church is something different then you’re in bigger trouble than even I thought. Oh, and since you’re obviously a troll – anything, including you, which makes it clear to the world that the RC junta is iniquitous, is fine by me. So carry on, ‘father’.

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3.42
Even Pope Francis would not claim to be the church. You are on to a loser here. Vous pensez du roi Louis XIV, lui qui disait ‘L’état, c’est moi.’

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He has resigned and is publicly humiliated. I think it’s time to give him space now. Perhaps focus your efforts on Oscott College as that place has secrets that need to see the light of day.

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I agree with your observation that the Abbot General, Dom Eamon Fitzgerald and his council have handled the allegations made against Purcell in the most disastrous fashion. They displayed a lack of leadership, insight, and ignorance that is stupefying. Remember, Fitzgerald appointed a convicted paedophile to be novice master at Mount Melleray Abbey. Think about that for a moment.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/monk-jailed-for-indecent-assaults-on-schoolgirls-1.25359

I am hopeful that when the reality of the situation is properly understood by the Cistercians they will be appalled. And, when they come to elect Fitzgerald’s successor in the early part of next year they will elect somebody who will bring about much-needed improvements to the governance of the Order.

Richard Purcell is not the first abbot or indeed monk who has had this problem. He will also not be the last. A monastery is not the place for somebody who is incapable of being chaste. Purcell is a monk in solemn vows. He could exercise his right to remain as a monk of Mount Melleray Abbey. He could seek to return to the house of his monastic profession in Roscrea, but he probably would not be welcome due to the negative impact it would have on the reputation of the school. He would be subordinate to Dom Malachy. #awkward

And it is unlikely he would be welcomed in the other Irish houses. He is now damaged goods as a result of his own stupidity and recklessness.

Purcell has brought the church and monastic life into serious disrepute. His contemptible behaviour displayed an arrogance and hubris that has no place in monastic life. There is a strong argument to be made that he should be immediately laicised, because this kind of stupidity needs to be punished. The church loves a scapegoat regardless of the prerogative mother of mercy.

There is also the possibility that laicisation could be forced upon him because there are people who have sufficient influence will be sufficiently appalled at his behaviour to get this in front of the Prefect of the Congregation for Religious and a Decree could be issued without his consent. Purcell is now on thin ice. He could, however, also petition for a dispensation of his monastic vows and a request to be dispensed from the obligations of the clerical state that is probably the most likely outcome.

In the extremely unlikely event that Purcell wishes to remain a monk he could do well to emulate the example of Dom Hennessy one of his predecessors at Mount Melleray Abbey.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/a-humble-unconventional-abbot-who-chose-exile-in-africa-1.1147646

It would appear that Purcell is a very talented man. It is a shame that his stupidity has brought about his own downfall. It could be a moment of grace where he begins again to embrace his original vocation with humility and renewed fervour. That would be the best outcome, but this needs to be carefully managed, because Purcell is indicative of something that is negatively systemic within the Cistercians, and it needs to be extirpated, because individuals like Purcell bring about the ruination of monastic houses.

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Thank you for the fascinating link about Dom Hennessy – an interesting contrast with the subject of today’s blog. Of course there is a huge difference between a community being able to accommodate people with unconventional CVs and turning a blind eye to promiscuity but the article makes you wonder what happened between the seventies and now to allow that change. Dom Hennessy was very obviously a character and some religious communities definitely wouldn’t be willing or able to contain him.

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Actually the other article you link has an incredible line:
‘Judge Burgess said an additional impact was that the faith of the three victims in their church had been undermined, but he appealed to them to embrace their church.’
Ireland in a nutshell.

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“.. has brought the church and monastic life into serious disrepute.”
He most definitely has brought the monastic community into serious disrepute.
“… as a result of his own stupidity and recklessness.”
His behaviour in the scullery was reckless. Going to the Boiler house then was a premeditated action. Talk about being an altar angel and boiler house devil! There was no excuse for that. It was stupid. It was reckless. Once that became known, a visitation should have been ordered swiftly resulting in his resignation at that time.
Pax.

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Dom Richard certainly showed facility with his organ given his deliberate journey to the Boiler House.
Sorry.
If he was accept a live of a simple monk, using his musical talents for the liturgy of that house, I think he would gain great graces from it. Dom Richard patently wasn’t living as a proper monk for a long time. If he never did, perhaps some parish will have a talented organist.
https://bishoppatbuckley.blog/2020/09/11/dom-richard-purcell-could-he-be-the-next-archbishop-of-dublin/
It should also be remarked that this is possibly another time Dublin dodged a bullet. Michéal Ledwith was strongly considered for Dublin after all. Hopefully it was just a thought in the head of Patsy McGarry. The archdiocese cannot keep dodging these bullets. Even if Abp Farrell were to prove unsuccessful or mediocre, at least its priests and faithful are not facing another more dreadful challenge. Bishops with sexual issues they cannot keep inside themselves or out of the news, seem to choose people like them, or three monkey sycophants.

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@ 3:42 pm
You have got me all wrong. Please don’t call me “Father,” I neither own nor deserve that nomenclature, but I will allow you to revel in your fantasy land if it keeps you happy. The Church is bigger than any one individual, and how often have we heard a prelate pronounce on something and we have thought “they don’t speak for me”? Vincent Nichols was not speaking for me on the occasion/s you were considering. As 7:42 pm has rightly said, even the Pope doesn’t doesn’t claim to be the Church.
Try not to mistake the messenger for the message.

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“Basically my challenge today is; follow through on your blog and tell us where you believe the Abbot and Bishop should minister?”
Good question by your blog reader.
The wayward monk must decide whether or not he wants to remain a priest and whether or not he wants to continue as a Cistercian monk.
You cannot be a Cistercian monk, Roman Catholic diocesan or religious priest and be sexually active. Those who are, are living a contradictory and hypocritical life. They must reflect on their positions and have the good moral integrity to to the honourable thing.
This is a matter primarily for the monk himself but the Cistercians have questions to answer on why such a person was made abbot. The Abbot General has removed himself from the position of explaining. The incoming Abbot General will have to explain. The Cistercians reputation is in tatters. The departed Abbot General had to take responsibility for bringing this embarrassment on the Cistercian community. It was allowed to happen on his watch.
Pax.

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Seamus, absolutely.
Generally speaking once a religious institute has appointed a convicted paedophile novice master, elected as general the Abbot who made that appointment, then elected as abbot a man who isn’t living the life, the only way is down.

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Dom Hennessy was a great man in many ways. He was full of good zeal, but perhaps, he did not appreciate that not everyone at the abbey was infused with the same zeal. He mellowed with the passing of time.

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Church history shows there is rarely a surgically clean break between one dispensation and another. More frequently, change occurs as a matter of assimilation. The bigger picture tells us linking celibacy to priesthood as an obligation is not working, if it ever did. This consideration is more significant than individual clerics having a sexual life.

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There are lots of good comments today but some are hyper merciless. Perhaps being merciless brought the truth to the light. That is a great outcome. I’m never happy when we continue being merciless long after the expected outcome, which we have with the resignation of two key men in the Cistercian Order. The Order will be troubled in conscience by these events. We cannot guess the follow-up within the Cistercians, but we can be certain that many questions will be asked. Today’s word of God for the 2nd Sunday of Advent invites us to help people to imagine a better future for themselves. From Baruch to St. Paul to John the Baptist the calling is to prepare a way in our hearts for the Lord, a preparation that must be accompanied by true repentance for all wrong doing. Herein lies the challenge not just for the former Abbots, but for all of us. I contend that it is very un-Christ-like to permanently lock any person into a past. While it is imperative to name all wrong doing and criminal behaviour we must resist the temptation of continual judgment.

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“Blessed are the merciful”. Maybe many who post on here and the blog’s author may adopt this as their prayer during Advent.

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11:33 and 1:04,
Satan loves to quote Scripture too, for perverse ends.
In your case, “merciful” means, apparently, turning a blind eye to corrupt and abusive individuals who are devastating God’s vineyard.
“If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy” (1 Cor 3:16)

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3.36
You enunciate a caution in your first sentence, and in your last, you illustrate it.

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3:36 You’ve got the ecclesiastical cover up merchants thoroughly rattled, presumably at the thought if their own little secrets appear here they won’t be miraculously forgotten overnight.
A classic example of a mistake which they wouldn’t mercifully deal with is a woman who gets pregnant by mistake, in circumstances where the baby will compromise her economic and perhaps physical well being. They would be quite happy for her to be relentlessly reminded of her mistake for the rest of her life, and it’s noteworthy that they only spout that mercy tripe on here when it’s about a priest who’s been caught out.
The sex scandal is very far from over.

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If:
1. Seminaries/religious communities didn’t admit unsuitable candidates;
2. Formators didn’t pass unsuitable candidates as OK for ordination;
3. Priests/religious took seriously their vows/promises;
4. Priests/religious sought help when their lives were going off the rails;
5. Bishops/superiors offered real help to priests/religious in need of support
There would be no risk of appearing on Pat’s blog. Pat does the governance, leadership and discipline that the RCC authorities refuse to do.

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@12.28, There is a difference between discipline and crucifying.
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However you make a point by listing what is wrong with the church. I am going to challenge that list because I think you missed the golden nugget.
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Catholic formators typically need to study the formation course run in the USA. It supposedly teaches a universal method of forming priests which is then applied globally. The trouble is that the training if offers is flawed. It teaches priests a psychological process known as ‘Gaslighting’. Young candidates for ordination end up with so much self doubt that they seek acceptance in all the wrong places – typically in a sexual manner as they will have had their sanity reduced to survival instincts – which ultimately ignites the sex drive for preservation of the species. With 75% of seminarians being homosexual this is why we end up with “strange goings on”.

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Holy Goat you’re bang on with this (as is 12:28 just with the exception that gaslighting is not best called a psychological process because it suggests it’s a technique in psychology rather than being an invalidating response.
As used by formators it usually means they think they want seminarians to face themselves as they are, but do not have the knowledge or safeguards that actual psychologists have to know how to do this. As a result they prod people for stuff that isn’t there and I can’t fault your description of the survival response this elicits.
One of the most difficult things in psychology is helping people to be aware of things they do that they’re not currently aware of and it is always best done gently, in an atmosphere of trust. If the accounts here are anything to go by, seminaries are not noticeably places of trust!

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@3.36
Thank you. You are correct in the fact that the formation process ought to help people to become more self-reflective, and that this is a difficult psychological process.
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However, I intentionally used the word gaslighting. I firmly believe that the formation process as it stands, is psychologically abusive. This does not mean I infer intention to abuse on any formator. Yet the effects of the abuse are appearing everywhere at this stage.

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THG you are back on form! In an “itinerary (garden path) of deformation” I once knew of, we were told God must think we deserved this sort of maltreatment, for melodrama’s sake. A lifelong orphaned old lady copied the “president’s” salacious talk, then a young married man copied hers. Total depravity and limited atonement Calvinism = Jansenism = Jesuitry. It is scary what they got my friend’s friend, who has a disability, to do, as part of his “vocation”.

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Actually, for the classic example of clerical gaslighting see the comments just below 👇
It’s almost as if they don’t listen.

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The Church should change the teaching or enforce the teaching and stop clerics laughing at the laity by having a “cake and eat it” lifestyle and switching from bed linen to altar linen and back again.

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3.36: Complete nonsense and a deliberate misreading of my comment at 11.33. Conveniently you ignore the TRUE READING of the word of God – if you read it at all – and you twist my words. I merely referenced the challenge of the word of God for this 2nd Sunday of Advent. I also said it is IMPERATIVE to name wrong doing and abuse. Being MERCIFUL does not mean ignoring the sinfulness or moral failings of others but being merciless is to imprison people in their part. Jesus condemned the sin and wrongdoing (corruption, dishonesty, abuse, arrogance) but not the sinner. I somehow prefer Jesus’s model of mercy and justice, not that of the lynch mobsters on this blog. Elucidate for me where vengeance and vindictiveness ever initiates real change or renewal in any person? St. John the Baptists’s words of today’s gospel needs to be heard by you – “Prepare a way for the Lord.. “!! How about trying that…

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@7.35 – comment is in the wrong place. There is another 3.36pm a little higher but I think 6.34 might have been a little angry after vespers.

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There is a 3.36 in reply to 1.04. It was the Cistercian establishment in close concert with dioceses and Benedictines worldwide, that imprisoned RP. The non-lynch non-mob I have seen here described the fact of those establishments’ strategy and tactic. Pat’s main comment above, like his previous comments (in his understated style), and everyone who agrees with him, have consistently called for him to stand up to them and seize thinking room and peace.
It does indeed seem to start like you say, a few “slips”, and then the authorities tell him “you’re all right for promotion”. RP has begun to twig that there is something going on here !!! Are we supposed to actually be heard thinking for ourselves? All those deranged authorities actually wanted him to “have something” on them. The RCC started picking on him in his 20s.

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A little angry after vespers? He’s always on here ranting when people stand up to his clerical privilege and exceptionalism cloaked as fake forgiveness. Telling people they misunderstood his comments is another Hallmark – putting people right is another characteristic of clerical conversation displayed here on a daily basis.

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Purcell can join the Church of England and have a “fresh start” in Chichester. Otherwise, he can be laicised along with Kirby in Silverstream.

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12:39,
The former abbot of the Priory at least resigned swiftly enough unlike the more recent abbatial resignation.
The former abbot took up life in the monastery not as superior, but as an ordinary monk.
The diocese seem to believe that the he had been “imprudent,” and “lacked proper boundaries,” but that his behavior didn’t meet the level of sexual abuse.
One can fairly ask how why did the bishop of the diocese report allegations of misconduct to the Gardaí after confirming the accused in a leadership position? Will the Garda investigation determine if the former abbot can resume his role?
Can the Priory continue indefinitely with a superior who is not a priest?

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“ Can the Priory continue indefinitely with a superior who is not a priest?”

Furthermore, why doesn’t Deenihan ordain him?

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He may just follow the example of the disgraced former Dormition abbot, change his name and have some cosmetic surgery done before joining the Anglicans. It seems the most straightforward course of action.

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And make a big deal, as the Dormition one does, of being a wise, deep, quasi-mystic steeped in monastic wisdom.

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There are two teachers named Coffey on the teaching staff of Glenstal. Are they related to Abbot Coverup?

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Can there really be a calling to be a permanent Deacon? I can only think someone in their pious childhood thought about becoming a priest, grew out of it and then after marriage and work thought about it or was ‘invited’ to think about it. Why should the length of training be so short in comparison to the priesthood? Of course if you are a C of E Bishop you can become a Deacon in a month and a priest a week later, very renaissance

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Cistercian College Roscrea has a President and a Principal. What is the difference between the two positions and who is in charge? Similarly, Glenstal Abbey School has a Headmaster and a Principal. What’s that all about?

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Principal paid by State. President and or headmaster is where the actual power lies and is the person in charge

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@3:50 complete crap in that article spun by Hennessy. Real story is that not long after that article the monks announced closure of school as they were pumping too much money into it. It’s not about about money not prayer. Then parents intervened and fundraised to keep it open

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@1:44 Do you expect him to commute from Melleray because allegedly the foundation in Roscrea is packing up its troubles in its ole kit bag and getting ready to move to Waterford

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It’s sincerely to be hoped that Dom Richard’s successor will embrace the hidden, cloistered life of an enclosed order and not be running from pillar to post in Ireland and overseas. Richard’s restlessness and desire to see and be seen should have alarmed the AG.

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Bishop Pat, do you think Silverstream will be disbanded and if so, where do you think the monks will go? Why was the Monsignor involved in the three way visitation. Why not a Monsignor from Meath? Or Dublin? Or Armagh? Or Galway? Or Ferns? Or Down & Connor? Why that Monsignor?

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I would think by now Purcell is over qualified to be a Cardinal !
Perhaps he could replace Elsie and the Nun at Westminster ????

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You’re forgetting Purcell was a lay student in UCD for some years. Rome don’t like people who had lives before seminary or monastery. Most monks in UK go to Oxford which isn’t known as the best Theological place in the world so he’s really no different from most monks.

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7.41
Nonsense. There isn’t a single entity , ‘Rome’ which likes or doesn’t like xyz. You are displaying Jim S. symptoms. I’d recommend an antigen test pronto.

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7.41-8.04. “Romity” loves those with a pre-life as trophies whom they can make show of spurning.

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Bishop Pat, where do you suppose the Kitty Kirby “In Sinu Jesu” money goes? The book is sold now in several languages.

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The visitation conducted at Silverstream should be considered null and void now, Bp Pat, and completely rigged. Time to turn up the heat again there.

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A Padre on civvy street is a challenging place to be.W What is truth and how can we all learn and benefit from the knowledge

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Look more into the direct contact of Richard Purcell with Maynooth Seminarians. ‘weekend sleepovers ‘

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