Tuesday, June 28, 2011

French woman sues Opus Dei, claims brainwashing

Updated September 27, 2011



A French woman is suing Opus Dei, founded by St Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer, a statue of whom is shown at the Vatican

Read our related article

Why John Paul II is Opus Dei's Patron Saint: analysis of conference at Holy Cross Pontifical University in Rome

http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/why-john-paul-ii-is-opus-deis-patron.html

2 Opus Dei Followers On Trial In France

by The Associated Press

PARIS September 22, 2011, 03:37 pm ET

PARIS (AP) — Two Opus Dei followers and an association closely linked to the conservative Roman Catholic group went on trial Thursday, accused of forcing a disciple to work for more than a decade with little or no pay.

Defense lawyers portrayed it as a case about labor law, while an Opus Dei spokeswoman says the plaintiff in a Paris court chose of her own free will to follow the group.

But the trial is expected to shine a spotlight on the secretive group's practices. Dan Brown's bestseller "The Da Vinci Code" painted Opus Dei as a murderous, power-hungry sect, a portrayal the group vigorously protested.

Opus Dei's founder, Spanish priest Jose Maria Escriva de Balaguer, was made a saint by Pope John Paul II.

The trial came after a legal complaint by Catherine Tissier, who was 14 when she joined the Donson hotel school in eastern France, where the religious sacraments were led by Opus Dei.

Under the guidance of a "spiritual director," she gradually chose to follow Opus Dei's spiritual path and began working as a "numerary assistant."

"I was working from seven o'clock in the morning to ten o'clock in the evening every day, seven days a week. The three weeks of holidays we had were spent with Opus Dei, where they thought us theology and pursued in-depth studies on the spirit of the (Opus Dei) founder," Tissier told The Associated Press.

She said she got paycheck each month, but was asked to sign blank checks by her employers and never saw the money.

She described being encouraged to keep her parents at bay, and being diagnosed with depression. A doctor, whom she said was an Opus Dei follower, put her on medication.

"I wasn't able to eat by myself, I couldn't even wash by myself, my head was hard to keep straight. Regardless of that, I still had the same workload in the Donson school," she said.

At age 29, she weighed just 39 kilograms (86 pounds). During a weekend visit to her parents' home, they took her to see their family doctor, who said she shouldn't go back.

"I started to live when I was 30. I started going out, I had never been to the movies," Tissier says.

She first filed a lawsuit in 2001 accusing Opus Dei of "mental manipulation." Those charges were later dismissed.

After a decade of investigation, two Opus Dei followers and the association that employed her are going on trial on charges of "clandestine work" and "remuneration contrary to dignity."

"This isn't a crusade against Opus Dei, that's not what's at stake," her lawyer Rodolphe Bosselut said. His client wants compensation and for Opus Dei to "review the status of the numerary assistant," a job he called "dysfunctional."

Thierry Laugier, a lawyer for ACUTE, the association that employed Tissier at the hotel, said the case revolves solely around an alleged breach of labor law.

Beatrice de la Coste, spokeswoman for Opus Dei in France, said, "Catherine Tessier was an employee at the hotel school, she was of course in contact with Opus Dei and she chose that spiritual path."

As of 2005, Opus Dei had 4,000 numerary assistants, all women, whose full-time, paid jobs are to care for the Opus centers, doing laundry, cleaning and cooking for the numeraries and priests who live there, according to the book "Opus Dei: Secrets and Power Inside the Catholic Church," by John Allen.

Allen cites critics of the numerary assistants, who say they are recruited from poorer classes to do long hours of manual labor and are told it's a vocation from God to give up marrying or having children in order to serve Opus Dei.

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Nicole Winfield in Rome contributed to this report.

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French woman sues Opus Dei, claims brainwashing

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gw-2sL0vkuPdy5rPQg7mnSPJob1Q?docId=CNG.901f10405411aeeb8554b48d4d3a7341.2e1

By Dorothee Moisan (AFP) – Jun 28, 2011

PARIS — A French woman claiming to have been brainwashed by the secretive Catholic society Opus Dei is suing it for allegedly keeping her illegally as a domestic servant, she told AFP Tuesday.

Catherine T., who asked not to be identified by her family name, said she joined a hoteliers' school in northeastern France in 1985, aged 14, which she later discovered was run by associates of Opus Dei.

She said she was forced to take vows and made to work as a domestic servant for virtually no pay.

Opus Dei responded in a statement that it was "not involved in the charges being brought" and had "nothing to be guilty about."

It will be the first ever trial targeting the organisation, branded a sect by some, which came to wide attention after featuring in the blockbuster novel and film "The Da Vinci Code".

"They assigned me a 'tutor' who was actually a kind of conscience instructor," Catherine told AFP. "I entered into the system.... You were forbidden to talk about it to your parents."

She said the group compelled her to take vows of obedience, poverty and chastity and for the following 13 years gave her jobs with organisations that her lawyer Rodolphe Bosselut said were linked to Opus Dei.

She said she was made to work 14-hour days, seven days a week, cleaning and serving. Staff paid her a salary and then reclaimed money from her by making her sign blank cheques, supposedly to pay her room and board, she alleged.

She added that staff accompanied her wherever she went, including on visits to the doctor. On these occasions she was taken to see an Opus Dei doctor who prescribed tranquilisers that left her "senseless".

Catherine weighed only 39 kilogrammes (86 pounds) in 2001 when her parents rescued her from the group. Lawyers first took legal action that year alleging "mental manipulation" among other charges. A nine-year investigation followed.

Two Opus Dei leaders are now summoned to appear in a Paris criminal court on September 22 and 23 on labour law charges of undignified punishment and not declaring her as an employee, lawyers said.

The lawsuit also targets the University and Technical Culture Association (ACUT) which ran the school. It said it had nothing more than a "cultural link" with Opus Dei.

"There is nothing to this case," said the ACUT's lawyer, Thierry Laugier, insisting that Catherine T. "was paid according to the work she did."

========

For more information about the lawsuit:

Agence France-Presse (AFP) "French woman sues Opus Dei, claims brainwashing" By Dorothee Moisan – Jun 28, 2011
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gw-2sL0vkuPdy5rPQg7mnSPJob1Q?docId=CNG.901f10405411aeeb8554b48d4d3a7341.2e1

CatholicCulture.org "French woman files involuntary-labor charges against Opus Dei" - June 29, 2011
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=10842


Family claims Opus Dei holding daughter

A family from Kenya has turned to the courts in an effort to stop Opus Dei from sending their 25-year old daughter away to another country. The daughter, Sophie Naliaka, was recruited into Opus Dei as a numerary while attending Kenya High School, according to a report in the Nairobi Star. Her parents, Dr. Charles Ngome and his wife Hellen Kibanani have instituted a suit at the High Court in Nairobi. Naliaka has been ordered to be produced in court on July 15, 2011.

The parents have reported that their daughter has suffered from delusional disorder as a result of her association with Opus Dei. Naliaka was hospitalized on May 9 for treatment of mental illness and discharged on May 24. Opus Dei members were involved as Naliaka left her parent’s home in Bungoma on June 18.

This story is yet another indicator of Opus Dei questionable practices, including highly manipulative recruitment techniques, including the recruitment of minors without the knowledge or consent of parents, mental illness abuses, secrecy, manipulation and deception, occurring in different cultures, countries and even continents wherever Opus Dei operates.

To read the entire article:

http://www.nairobistar.com/national/national/31016-family-claims-opus-dei-holding-daughter-



Opus Dei Tries to Influence Public Opinion with Film

There Be Dragons, a movie produced by Roland Joffe, Guy J. Louthan and Opus Dei members Ignacio G. Sancha and Ignacio Núñez, opened in U.S. theaters on May 6. The story portrays Opus Dei founder Josemaria Escriva during the early years of Opus Dei's founding, which took place in Spain during the Spanish Civil War.

Despite downplaying its role in the production of the film, Opus Dei has again employed its usual tactic of manipulating circumstances in the background while presenting a picture that seems entirely spontaneous and without guile. Keen observers of Opus Dei recognize that the film project has indeed been Opus Dei driven and financed, despite allegations to the contrary.

In a New York times article published last June, the author writes of the movie:

"The financing of about $30 million came from about 100 investors, and raising it was a struggle, said Ignacio G. Sancha, the lead producer, a Spanish financier and lawyer who is also a member of Opus Dei." (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/22/movies/22opus.html?_r=1)
The early Times article stated that "the project was initiated by a member of Opus Dei, is partly produced and financed by the group’s members and has enlisted an Opus Dei priest to consult on the set."

Contrast this information with a recent quote from an Opus Dei website saying that "at the request of the film’s producers, the communications office of the Prelature of Opus Dei provided historical information and other audiovisual materials regarding Saint Josemaria, as it does in response to similar requests for news stories, books and documentaries," as if Opus Dei had nothing at all to do with the planning and production of the film.

In addition, the Opus Dei site states "while news of a film dealing with Saint Josemaria by a director of Mr. Joffe’s caliber generates considerable interest and expectations, this movie is not a project of the Prelature of Opus Dei, and the few members of Opus Dei involved in it are acting in an entirely personal capacity." (http://www.josemariaescriva.info/article/roland-joffe-film-there-be-dragons ) Those who have experienced Opus Dei's manipulation and deception firsthand know better.

For further information on "There Be Dragons":

Wikipedia - gives some good information but needs to be read with caution as sources are not always identified or confirmed:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_Be_Dragons

Hollywood Reporter Film Review
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/be-dragons-film-review-171212

Variety Film Review
http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117944888/

Opus Dei's spin on the movie:
http://www.josemariaescriva.info/article/roland-joffe-film-there-be-dragons



For Testimonies about Opus Dei click on the following: Testimonies and Other Writings


New Book about Opus Dei Available on Kindle

OPUS DEI

THE FALSE WORK OF GOD


A GUIDE TO FAMILIES

ALL OVER THE WORLD


http://www.amazon.com/Opus-Dei-false-Families-ebook/dp/B004RZIC68

BOOK REVIEW
by the author, Betty Silberstein

This book was born from the effort of a common person to be acquainted with an organism which has in the secrecy one of its most outstanding characteristics: the Opus Dei, or The Work. This work presents itself as a valuable instrument for the understanding of this phenomenon embedded in the Catholic Church.

Knowledge is certainly the most efficient instrument in the combat of indoctrination. And, as the title announces, the goal of this book is to alert families about the insidious way Opus Dei filters through them, in order to take their children away afterwards.

The reading of this book is extremely useful not only for Catholic families, because this organization can attack anyone, Catholic or not. Once it gets close to people who they want to co-opt, the members do not even explain their true objectives or their actual practices. Therefore, the publication of Opus Dei addresses, companies, schools and entities linked to it, is something of very high value, since parents have now the possibility to know that the place their children are attending is not only a “kids’ club”, or a simple catechism class, or free tutoring classes, but, mostly, a recruitment center for young persons from an extremely reactionary Catholic entity.

BETTY SILBERSTEIN

Betty is a former teacher. Nowadays she is a writer, translator and reviser. She took part in several Anthologies, in Brazil and abroad (France and the US). She has received many awards for her work, among them the Médaille d´Argent, from the Académie de Arts Sciences et Lettres de Paris.

She is a Member and Counselor for REBRA (Brazilian Women Writers Net), where her homepage may be accessed.

http://www.rebra.org/escritora/escritora_ptbr.php?id=1315

Her e-mail is: bettyescritora@silber.com.br


Opus Dei Awareness Network, Inc. (ODAN™)
PO Box 4333, Pittsfield, MA 01202-4333,
Tel: (413) 499-7168; Fax: (413) 499-7860
Web: www.odan.org, e-mail: odan@odan.org

December 2010 Funding Letter

Dear Friends of ODAN,

On April 9, 2010, the Catholic News Service announced the appointment of Opus Dei member Archbishop Jose H. Gomez to be the coadjutor archbishop of Los Angeles, one of the largest Catholic dioceses in the world. In this CNS story it stated, “Archbishop Gomez is one of 24 Opus Dei Bishops around the world, although like any priest, once a member becomes a bishop, he answers directly to the pope and no longer to his bishop or religious superior.”[1] The important question being asked is how much influence will Opus Dei have with Gomez in this powerful position? “Will he be accountable to Los Angeles first and to Opus Dei second?” Archbishop Gomez says he is no longer a member of Opus Dei but are his loyalties going to cease to an organization that he has been associated with since his college days? “Anyone who has read the governing documents or is familiar with Opus Dei, knows that his loyalties are going to be with Opus Dei. He will be required to have a spiritual director, who is going to be a member of Opus Dei, and he will have an obligation of obedience to his spiritual director, with all of the fine shades of meaning that would accompany his official statements about his loyalty.[2]

ODAN was the first to post the Opus Dei Constitution and its Statutes to its website in English. Without these translations, who would know many of the inconsistencies that exist between what Opus Dei says is its Church-approved mode of operation and what it actually does in practice? When ODAN released those secret documents to the public, it forced Opus Dei to reveal more of itself than it had ever done before. For years, the Opus Dei Constitution/Statutes were only written in Church Latin, a hard translation to accomplish.

Recently a former member of Opus Dei told of how the Constitutions of Opus Dei (10 S1) say the priests will not accept stipends for saying Mass, but when the former member’s mother, some years ago, offered a priest of the Work a stipend to say a Mass for the Dead, he said the price had gone up. It leads to having secret documents that tell the Church their priesthood is doing something more noble than is required of priests, but then it is not lived in practice.

Another important and troubling discrepancy is Opus Dei’s “contract” or ‘agreement’ pertaining to its membership. What is the nature of membership in Opus Dei? Why is it not defined? It seems as if the cart came before the horse. Dennis Dubro, former numerary member of Opus Dei, writes:

The same old tricks

Opus Dei continues to put forward its same old message of being fully approved by the Church without any secrecy. In the leaked 1982 Statutes on ODAN's website the closing paragraphs say that "All of the members are bound by the same obligations and conserve the same rights which they had in the preceding juridical government (secret 1950 Constitutions), unless the prescriptions of this Code expressly establish something else." That says quite explicitly that the 1950 Constitutions remain in effect except for the changes approved in the 1982 Statutes. Members continually try to deny this, saying the Statutes replace the Constitutions. This is not even logical since Constitutions establish the basic operating rules for an organization and then Statutes are the laws that are made, based upon those Constitutions. The Constitutions of Opus Dei explicitly foresee and make way for any future Statutes that may be approved in Paragraph 89.

In John Allen's book on Opus Dei (Opus Dei: An Objective Look Behind the Myths and Reality of the Most Controversial Force in the Catholic Church), John asked Opus Dei why the governing documents were kept secret. The answer, quoting his book on Page 153, is "The deeper logic, according to Opus Dei insiders, is that some essential terminological questions have not yet been settled in canon law. For example, is the relation between a member and Opus Dei best described in terms of a 'contract' or an 'agreement'? ... and many canonists feel it's inappropriate for describing the nature of a bond in the Church". This raises a clear question how the Vatican can have approved an organization when such critical things as membership are not acceptably defined in the Law of the Church?



Anyone familiar with the operation of Opus Dei knows that Opus Dei says everyone is free to leave at any time. Yet Paragraphs 102 and 103 of the Constitutions say that anyone who leaves his assigned Center can be declared a fugitive and an apostate. Why would anyone incur such penalties if they were truly free to leave?



If you have donated to ODAN in the past and continue to do so, thank you for your years of support. If you have donated in the past, but not recently, please consider supporting ODAN again this year. If you have never donated to ODAN before, please consider a donation this year. ODAN runs solely on your generosity. Since the economic crisis, ODAN, like all non-profits, has experienced a downturn in our donations. This year your donation is critically important to continue our important work. There is no other source in the United States where a person can find factual, truthful commentary about Opus Dei’s questionable practices.



Opus Dei Awareness Network, Inc. (ODAN) is a 501(c)3 tax exempt organization and all donations may be taken as a charitable deduction. Please keep ODAN in your prayers and consider a generous donation to keep the ODAN website online and functioning. Go to the ODAN website to keep informed!

Sincerely yours,

Dianne R. DiNicola

Executive Director

[1] Catholic News Service, http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/100142`.htm Apr-9-2010
[2] Dennis Dubro, former numerary Opus Dei member Dec-10-2010

To make a donation to ODAN, please click on the following link:
Support Us

Thank you!


Opus Dei Bishop Appointed Head of Los Angeles Diocese

Archbishop Jose H. Gomez was announced coadjutor and future archbishop of the Los Angeles diocese on April 6, 2010. Ordained as an Opus Dei priest in 1978, Gomez is the first Latino archbishop in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles diocese is the largest diocese in the United States and one of the largest in the world. Gomez will succeed Cardinal Roger M. Mahony in February 2011 when Manony turns 75, the age when bishops must submit their resignation to the Pope.

Born in Monterrey, Mexico in 1951, Gomez joined Opus Dei when in college. He has degrees in business and philosophy from the National University of New Mexico (1975) and a doctorate in theology from the Opus Dei-run University of Navarre. Previous to his appointment in Los Angeles, Gomez was archbishop in San Antonio, Texas since 2005. Gomez became a US citizen in 1995.

News reports predict that it is likely Gomez will be appointed a cardinal in the years ahead. In an article written by John Allen Jr., Gomez is quoted as saying that "he is not a "member" of Opus Dei, but rather that he was ordained a priest in Opus Dei and that his spirituality reflects that background. If he's a "member" of anything now, he says, it's the diocese he leads."

For more information:
"Four Points to Make about Gomez and LA" by John Allen Jr., April 9, 2010
http://ncronline.org/blogs/all-things-catholic/four-points-make-about-gomez-and-la
Catholic News Service, http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/100142`.htm Apr-9-2010

Testimonies about Opus Dei:

"Opus Dei Recruits Minors and Deceives Church Officials"
"Opus Dei Superiors Lied to Church Officials"
"Government, Direction and Control in Opus Dei"
"Fathers, don't let your sons grow up to be Opus Dei recruits"

Included with these testimonies are the guidelines issued by the now deceased Cardinal Basil Hume in 1981 in England (Cardinal Hume Guidelines) directing Opus Dei to comply with a number of criteria, including not allowing minors to make any commitments to Opus Dei; requiring that minors discuss the matter with their parents or guardians before making any commitments; allowing Opus Dei members to choose their own spiritual directors(in Opus Dei or not) and enter or leave the organization without undue pressure.

The testimonies show clearly that Opus Dei before, during and after that time period, has clearly violated all those guidelines while making false statements to church officials. While several of the authors have chosen to remain anonymous for various reasons, including fear of repercussions from Opus Dei, ODAN has verified that they are true accounts written by sincere
individuals who contacted ODAN with the desire that their stories be known. It is ODAN's hope that by posting this information for public perusal it will lead to a change in Opus Dei's deceptive and unethical practices.

The testimonies can be found under Testimonies and Other Writings.


Opus Dei's Forbidden Book List

Opus Dei's "Index of Forbidden Books" which they continue to deny using, has been updated
thanks to the Spanish sister group Opus Libros. The new list which is believed to be current as of 2003, can be accessed as an Excel spreadsheet at the following link:
Index of Forbidden Books New


About ODAN


The Opus Dei Awareness Network, Inc. (ODAN) was founded in 1991 to meet the growing demand for accurate information about Opus Dei and to provide education, outreach and support to people who have been adversely affected by Opus Dei. ODAN challenges many of Opus Dei's Questionable Practices because of the way they affect an individual's personal freedom, choices and family life.

Since 1991, ODAN has been in contact with countless individuals, families, the secular and religious press, clergy, religious, cult awareness organizations, campus ministers, home-schooling parents and more.

ODAN is a worldwide community of people who have had painful experiences as a result of their association with Opus Dei.

Contact Us

ODAN is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization. Donations are tax-deductible.

http://www.odan.org/

===============

"I encountered perhaps one example of this difficulty in the course of my research. Early on, I asked Bill Schmitt for a copy of Opus Dei’s constitutions. I thought that by reading them I could better understand Opus Dei and lay to rest some misconceptions. He gave me a copy of the 1982 statutes. But they were in Latin, and a technical “church” Latin at that. Could I have a copy of the English translation? There was none, he said. Why not? First he said that Opus Dei had not had sufficient time to translate them. I replied that this seemed odd, given that the statutes had been around for 12 years and that The Way had already been translated into 38 languages."

"Nevertheless, it still seemed odd, so I asked Mr. Schmitt again. I received the same answer: “The document belongs to the Holy See and the Holy See does not want it translated. I’m sure there’s a reason.”

"I asked three experts in canon law what that reason might be. One canon lawyer said, “Property of the Holy See? I’ve never heard of such a thing.” Another, John Martin, S.J., professor of canon law at Regis College in Toronto, noted that religious orders and lay associations as a matter of course publish their statutes in local languages, and as far as he knew, “there is no general ecclesiastic prohibition against the translation of documents of religious orders.” Or of personal prelatures, for that matter. Richard Hill, S.J., of the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, Calif., agreed, saying “there is no canonical reason” why Opus Dei should not be allowed to translate their own statutes. So it appears to be Opus Dei, not the Holy See, that is keeping the statutes from being translated."

"Ann Schweninger is a 24-year-old former Opus Dei member now living in Columbus, Ohio, where she works with the Diocese of Columbus. She was not surprised when I told her of my difficulty in making sense of all this. “Opus Dei plays by its own rules,” she said. “If they don’t want to have something out in the open, they won’t make it accessible.” Referring to her own time in Opus Dei, she said: “The statutes were never shown to me nor were they available. They are mentioned but not discussed.” According to Ms. Schweninger, the only official document available is the catechism of Opus Dei, which even members can read only with the permission of the house director. “It’s kept under lock and key.” She also mentioned that during classes on the catechism, she was encouraged to take notes “in code” in case non-members should read them."

"Critics contend that numerary life is anything but lay, particularly in what they see as its replication of religious life, with emphasis on “commitments” (Opus Dei does not use the term “vows”), life in common, a daily order and, at least for some of the men, eventual ordination. Many of those in authority are clerics—the director of their national headquarters in New Rochelle, N.Y., is a monsignor; their prelate was recently ordained a bishop. “If this is
a lay organization, I’d hate to see a clerical one,” said one of the priests from Princeton."

"That’s totally wrong,” said Ann Schweninger when she heard that last statement. “I had no choice. When in Opus Dei you’re asked, you’re being told.” According to Ms. Schweninger, it is “bad spirit” to refuse. Women are told that it is important to have a love for things of the home and domestic duties. “And since that’s part of the spirit of Opus Dei, to refuse to do that when you’re asked is bad spirit. So nobody refuses.”

For numeraries living in the centers, mail—incoming and outgoing—is read by the director. But for most numeraries this is not a problem. “If you’re in an organization and part of the group, where you go to the priest in confession and tell him everything that’s on your mind, what could you possibly receive in a letter that would matter?” said one. But he also admitted that he wasn’t sure if his friends knew their mail was being read. “But they never say anything that couldn’t be read by other people.”

One man who attended Columbia University in the early 1980’s, who asked not to be named, described the process of being recruited by Opus Dei. “They had someone become my friend,” he said bluntly. After Mass one day he was approached by another student, with whom he soon became good friends. Eventually he was invited to the Riverside Study Center near Columbia’s campus. He was not certain exactly what it was. “I thought it was a group of students that were a think tank or something.” After dinner a priest gave a short talk. He was later invited to join a “circle,” which he described as a sort of an informal prayer group. Soon afterwards Opus Dei suggested that he take one of the priests at the center as his spiritual director.

After becoming more involved—at this point meeting with the group frequently—he decided to investigate on his own. He spoke with a few priests and professors at Columbia and was surprised at how little he really knew: “I didn’t know anything about the secrecy, the numeraries, supernumeraries, any of that. And I didn’t know there were people taking vows of celibacy. I felt kind of upset that I didn’t know much about them. I didn’t think they were honest or straightforward about who they were. I felt very indignant.”

At the next circle meeting he raised some questions about issues that troubled him—for example, women and minority presence in Opus Dei. “They really didn’t have any answers and asked me not to return.” And more disturbing for him: “I never heard from my friend again. I was totally cut off.”

http://www.americamagazine.org/content/articles/martin-opusdei.cfm

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Testimonies and Other Writings

The following is the work of the individual author and does not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the Opus Dei Awareness Network, Inc.

My Nightmarish Experience in Opus Dei
(This story was translated into Spanish by an ODAN supporter and posted onto the www.opuslibros.com website. To read the story in Spanish, click on "Mi Pesadilla en el Opus Dei.")

by Sharon Clasen, Former Numerary

Send us your storiesAfter I left Opus Dei, I had nightmares almost every night for ten years. Opus Dei, a lay organization approved by the Catholic Church, claims to do the work of God, but their methods compare to those described in Steve Hassan's Combatting Cult Mind Control. Hassan breaks mind control down into four components: behavior, information, thought and emotional control. After I describe how I gradually got lured into Opus Dei, I will show from my personal experiences how they used these techniques to control my life.

My involvement with Opus Dei began innocently with the recommendation of a friend that I look into Bayridge Residence as a housing solution. I was a naive and idealistic freshman at Boston College when I applied to live at Bayridge. All I knew about Opus Dei was that they ran the spiritual activities at the residence. After I moved in, I started to have doubts about being able to afford living there. The director of Bayridge admissions, who was a numerary (celibate member), and whom I will call Maria, assured me that God would provide the necessary means for me to live at Bayridge. Upon her recommendation, and for the first time in my life, I prayed over this decision, and when I did find a part-time job, I was led to believe that my moving into Bayridge was providential. Soon after moving in, Maria offered to give me Catechism classes toward the goal of my converting to Catholicism, and we started meeting on a weekly basis for this reason. She talked to me about God, the existence of guardian angels, and informed me that French kissing was a mortal sin. She paid a lot of attention to me; for example, from time to time, she would even leave little chocolates for me on my pillow. Another resident, whom I'll call Anna, who had graduated from The Willows Academy, a college-prep school, whose overall religious education is entrusted to Opus Dei, befriended me and also took me under her wing. Anna would invite me to go to mass with her during the week, and taught me the necessary prayers and gestures to follow along. She also invited me to attend my first meditation, and my first retreat, where I learned all about hell. With much encouragement from Maria, Anna and many other residents, I prepared to receive my First Communion. On this day, I was showered with gifts, cards and congratulations saying how I had been specially chosen by God to receive his graces.

This special treatment culminated with an invitation to travel to Rome during Holy Week as part of an Opus Dei-sponsored group UNIV. I did not realize that this trip was designed specifically for recruiting members to Opus Dei. Both Maria and Anna accompanied me to Rome. I was one of a select few in our group who received a special ticket to attend an Easter Vigil celebrated by the Pope. Maria tried talking to me about joining Opus Dei while visiting the crypt of the founder of Opus Dei, but I delayed my decision because of the pressure I felt during this week. However, she did not give up on me that easily. In May, Maria and the director of Bayridge, also a numerary, invited me and some of my other Bayridge friends to a weekend getaway at a cottage in New Hampshire in order to live "the spirit of Opus Dei." We did not have to worry about any of the preparations. The administration even packed all of our nice groceries. I remember wearing a white suit on Sunday, the same one I had worn to the Easter vigil in Rome. During a private chat with the director, she complimented me on how pretty I looked in the suit. She told me that when she joined Opus Dei as a numerary, she cried and cried because she had wanted to have a baby, but now God had rewarded her because she felt as if I were a daughter to her. Soon after, I joined as a supernumerary, a member who can get married and have a family. They told me not to become a numerary right away, not until I had more spiritual formation.

As a supernumerary, I started to feel the control Opus Dei was having in my life. When I started to date as a sophomore, the director asked me what my boyfriend and I talked about, and told me not to discuss religion or Opus Dei with him. She advised me to have him contact someone in the men's branch. Since I was still in the honeymoon stage of my new vocation, I did not understand why I should have to suppress talking about my life in Opus Dei, but I blindly obeyed. While I was spending my junior year abroad at the University of Navarre in Pamplona, Spain, which is openly run by Opus Dei, my spiritual director recommended that I try to befriend English-speaking students who were not familiar with Opus Dei, and invite them to the English mass on Sundays at one of the university chapels. I felt torn about this because I was trying to learn Spanish and wanted to make friends with the Spaniards in my classes.

After returning home from Spain for my senior year, Maria was influencing me to become a numerary. In her talks, she discussed the higher calling of a numerary. Her message was clear -- supernumeraries were necessary, but unless you were a numerary, you were not giving everything you could to God. In my fraternal chats with her, she told me repeatedly that I should make myself available to the will of God. Wanting to do His will, I finally gave in to the pressure and became a numerary in May 1985. The directors told me not to tell my family that I had joined since "they would not understand." In the fall, I moved back into Bayridge. Several days after joining, the director took me aside and handed me a small blue-flowered hand-sewn bag filled with a cilice, a spiked chain worn around the thigh for two hours a day. The bag also contained a small whip called the disciplines used to whip the back or buttocks. Up until this point, mention of these instruments of self-inflicted torture had been downplayed, and now reality was starting to set in.

But it was not until I moved into Brimfield, the Opus Dei Center of Studies for numerary women in Newton, Massachusetts, that I started to feel that my freedoms were being openly restricted. According to Hassan, the first component of mind control is behavior control, which "is the regulation of an individual's physical reality. It includes the control of his environment - where he lives, what clothing he wears, what food he eats, how much sleep he gets - as well as of the jobs, rituals and other actions he performs." The atmosphere at Brimfield, where I began the two-year course comparable to a seminary (we had classes in theology, philosophy, Latin and Spanish, and Opus Dei) was strikingly different from that of Bayridge. Now, I had to ask permission to meet with my sister, with whom I was very close and was often met with discouragement, and my whole schedule was regulated. The director told me I would have to wean myself from my family because Opus Dei was my family now.

Opus Dei does not reveal all of the lifestyle changes numeraries make before they join. On the day I moved in, I found out that we were supposed to get rid of old family photographs and that we slept on a slab of plywood placed on top of our mattress. We were also supposed to sleep without a pillow one night/week as well. Every night at 6:00 pm, we sat down to dinner, and were expected to eat what was on our plate. On several occasions I asked my spiritual director if I could skip dessert as some of my clothes were tightening to the point where the director bluntly told me that I needed to start wearing a girdle. She told me to choose some other corporal mortification instead so I felt forced to eat the dessert. After gaining weight - I'm not sure how much since there was no scale in the house - the director sent me out shopping with the assistant director. She picked out skirts for me which were two sizes larger than my old ones. When I was a member, female numeraries were not allowed to wear pants, except while exercising. Soon after moving in, I was told that Opus Dei would like for me to leave my job at Boston University and work full-time for Bayridge Residence as their public relations coordinator. The directors always talked about the founder's need to have more members in the field of communications.

The second component of mind control is control of information. Hassan says, "information is the fuel we use to keep our minds working properly. Deny a person the information he requires to make sound judgments, and he will be incapable of doing so." At Brimfield, we had to check all books, articles, newspapers, and magazines with the director, who kept the Index of Forbidden Books under lock and key in her office. In his book of spiritual advice, The Way, the founder says in point 339, "Books. Don't buy them without advice from a Catholic who has real knowledge and discernment. It's so easy to buy something useless or harmful. How often a man thinks he is carrying a book under his arm, and it turns out to be a load of trash." One of my housemates, who was in the Honors Program at Boston College, could not read most of the books on her lists. She said she prayed to the Holy Spirit for infused knowledge. She started developing nervous habits like pulling out her hair and eyelashes. We could not even watch television without a chaperone. For example, I became frustrated because I wanted to watch the local news to help with my job, but I was only allowed to watch the World News with Peter Jennings with the director sitting beside me. Some nights I would sneak upstairs to watch the 11:00 pm local news, but one night I got caught. Soon after, I was assigned to labor-intensive chapel duties, which included cutting and arranging flowers on the altar every night, and washing and ironing all of the priests' linen vestments and altar cloths, which took me most of Saturday to complete. While I was ironing in the basement, I felt like Cinderella, longing for my freedom.

The third component of mind control is thought control, which "includes indoctrinating members so thoroughly that they internalize the group doctrine, incorporate a new language system, and use thought-stopping techniques to keep their mind 'centered.'" In classes on Opus Dei, we were frequently reminded, "You are Opus Dei." Opus Dei refers to the indoctrination of their members as "formation." The means of formation in Opus Dei, which we were taught to embrace and be deeply appreciative of as "the way" to salvation, are divided into the following categories: those which occur on a daily basis (60 minutes of meditation, mass, recitation of the rosary and preces, 15 minutes of spiritual reading, examination of conscience at the end of the day), weekly basis (confession, fraternal chat with a director, circle or talk about a certain virtue), monthly basis (day of recollection), yearly basis (retreat and annual course) and some are considered "always," - like cheerfulness, obedience, and presence of God. For example, while we were commuting or walking, we were encouraged to say the rosary or other prayers. In addition to all of the above means of formation, we had classes every night of the week, so that we had absolutely no free time in order to think. Learning Spanish and Latin are very important in Opus Dei because all of the original documents from the founder are in Spanish, and many of the prayers, like the mass and the special Opus Dei prayer called "the preces" are recited in Latin. Quotes from the founder in The Way illustrate to what extent Opus Dei tries to control the thoughts of its members.

* Point 13, "Get rid of those useless thoughts which are at best a waste of time."
* Point 945, "You are badly disposed if you listen to the word of God with a critical spirit."
* Point 261, "I forbid you to think any more about it. Instead, bless God, who has given life back to your soul."
* Point 856, "Spiritual childhood demands submission of the mind, which is harder than submission of the will. In order to subject our mind we need not only God's grace, but a continual exercise of our will as well, denying the intellect over and over again, just as it says 'no' to the flesh."

Emotional control, the fourth method of mind control used by cults, "attempts to manipulate and narrow the range of a person's feelings. Guilt and fear are necessary tools to keep people under control." Opus Dei discourages numeraries from spending too much time with their natural families because this takes away from the "needs of Opus Dei." During the year I spent at Brimfield, it became an effort for me to meet with my sister because I was so busy and because Newton was farther away from Boston. One night I came home after dinner because I had met my sister, and the director scolded me in front of everyone. I started to grow discontent. I started speaking about my unhappiness with the director. Playing upon my fear of hell, she told me that leaving Opus Dei was like getting a divorce and that I would be excommunicated from the Catholic Church, without which I could not be saved. Also aware of my doubts, another numerary, whom I will refer to as Theresa, told me that she had a dream about the end of the world and that I received a sentence of two years in purgatory.

But it was a personal family crisis that made me realize to what extremes Opus Dei would go to control the emotions of numeraries. One Saturday night, I got a phone call from my mother, who told me that my sister was in the hospital due to an unfortunate accident. I wanted to rush to her side. I ran to find the director and tell her of the crisis. Showing absolutely no emotion, she told me that I would have to wait for Maria to finish her dinner and then she would drive me there. We were not allowed to visit our families without a chaperone. I had to wait for her to finish her dinner and her social cup of coffee. I thought it was very strange that no one else shared my sense of urgency and emotion. I returned that night to Bayridge, and was required to attend an all-day retreat on Sunday. At 4:00 pm, I returned to the hospital, but once again slept at Bayridge. On Monday morning, my aunt called me while I was working. She was quite upset. In a stern voice, she told me that my mother needed me now, and that I had better come home. At that very moment on the telephone with my aunt, I "snapped" out of their mind control. I went upstairs to pack my suitcase and I knew that I would never return.

Even after I did walk out the door, that was not the end of my experience with Opus Dei and their attempts to control my life. After a couple of days, the director called me and asked when I would be returning. I said that I was not. She tried to convince me to return to the center, by saying "Opus Dei is your real family." For four months after I left, I was harassed by members of Opus Dei. Maria actually came to my place of work. When I told her I was busy and on my way to a business meeting, she followed me on the subway, all the while talking at me about how if I did not come back, I would go to hell. And Theresa kept calling to set up times when we could meet to make sure I was still living "the spirit of Opus Dei." Finally, they gave up on me.

Before reading Hassan's book, I focused on rebuilding a life for myself and had buried my cult-like experience in my subconscious. It was trying to come out in my dreams, but I was not ready to deal with it yet. Now that I understand how Opus Dei uses the same four methods of mind control used by cults, I no longer have nightmares about trying to escape.

References:

Combatting Cult Mind Control by Steve Hassan, Park Street Press, Rochester, Vermont, 1998

The Way by Josemaria Escriva, Scepter Publications

Sharon Clasen has also written How Opus Dei is Cult-like for the ODAN website.


Revised May 28, 2003

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Lawsuit versus John Paul II and Benedict XVI the pair of eyes that ruled the Holy See, the pair of hands that shepherded the Vatican

John Paul II and Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI) were the pair of eyes that ruled the Holy See and the pair of hands that shepherded the Vatican for over a quarter of a century of the 20th century. Cardinal Ratzinger ruled as Prefect, from 1981 to 2005, the CDF Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (or Inquisition), and he was as powerful as John Paul II. He silenced many theologians who dared criticise John Paul II and his doctrines, read the list in our related article Beware! Benedict XVI-Cardinal Ratzinger and his allies can be violent http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2010/03/benedict-xvi-cardinal-ratzinger-and-his.html

In 2001, Pope John Paul II ordered that all files of priests worldwide who were accused of sexually abusing children and minors be forwarded to the Vatican, to the office of the CDF (formerly known as the Vatican’s Inquisition) to be investigated personally by Cardinal Ratzinger. Ratzinger’s response to the most heinous crimes against children was -- the threat of excommunication from the Catholic Church -- to any witnesses who refused to maintain silence about those sexually abusive priests – and he re-imposed the 1962 Vatican document Crimen Sollicitationis (“The Crime of Solicitation”), watch explanation and video of Crimen Sollicitationis here http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2007/06/benedict-xvi-in-google-video-sex-crimes.html

In February 2002, priest pedophilia erupted in Boston. In July 2002, John Paul II went for his last WYD World Youth Day in Toronto, an hour’s flight from Boston. In that rally, Paris Arrow saw a vision of St. Michael the Archangel asking John Paul II to apologize to the world youths about the pedophile priests he covered-up. He refused and so St. Michael tied a giant millstone to John Paul II’s neck and his papal neck broke and was cast into a raging sea of fire, read more here in our sister weblog the John Paul II Millstone "9/11 victims 3,000. JP2 Army 100,000s. May Day: both Hitler and bin Laden Announced Dead on May 1 on John Paul II Beatification Day B-Day http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/911-victims-5000-jp2-army-100000s-may.html John Paul II refused to address the most heinous crimes against children in Christendom, the Priestly Sodomy of Biblical Proportions committed by his JP2 Army of Pedophiles Rapists-Priests named aptly after him because he had 27 years to do and say something to stop them but he didn’t, read the JP2 Army website here http://jp2army.blogspot.com/.

On November 30, 2002, in Murcia, Spain, when Cardinal Ratzinger was asked about the priest pedophilia erupting in Boston and in America, this was his reply, read more here John L. Allen Jr the Pied Piper of Benedict XVI toots “Will Ratzinger's past trump Benedict's present?” http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2010/04/john-allen-of-ncr-pied-piper-of.html :

In the church, priests are also sinners. But I am personally convinced that the constant presence in the press of the sins of Catholic priests, especially in the United States, is a planned campaign, as the percentage of these offenses among priests is not higher than in other categories, and perhaps it is even lower. In the United States, there is constant news on this topic, but less than one percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type. The constant presence of these news items does not correspond to the objectivity of the information or to the statistical objectivity of the facts. Therefore, one comes to the conclusion that it is intentional, manipulated, that there is a desire to discredit the church.

This “but less than one percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type” corroborates with the Vatican Blame Game and the John Jay College reasons for clergy sexual abuse of minors, read our related article here VATICAN BLAME GAME: John Jay College blame '60s & '70s. Benedict XVI blames the Devil so priests can reincarnate God-Jesus but they can't on dead cats http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/vatican-blame-game-its-them-not-us-john.html Ratzinger’s response in 2002 also corroborates with the reasons of the Opus Dei for the clergy sex abuse on minors in 2002, read about it here http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/why-john-paul-ii-is-opus-deis-patron.html and Opus Dei’s conference in Rome in 2011, read more here Why John Paul II is Opus Dei pope number 1 http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-paul-ii-saint-of-pedophiles-and.html

In December 13, 2002, Cardinal Bernard Law was forced to resign - by the laity and priests in Boston http://www.boston.com/globe/spotlight/abuse/law_resigns/ and 17 months later, on May 27, 2004, John Paul II named Cardinal Bernard Law, the "retired archbishop of Boston" (as Zenit puts it, they do not mention his disgraceful resignation), the new archpriest of the Basilica of St. Mary Major of Rome. John Paul II elevated the disgraced Cardinal Bernard Law who resigned as Cardinal of Boston for transferring 80 pedophile priest from one parish to another -- this proves John Paul II was cold hearted and callous towards children who were victims of pedophile priests. Imagine that Law could become the Archpriest of the St. Mary Major, the ‘mother of all basilicas in Rome’ only through the infallible papal powers of John Paul II the Great.

In the same year, in November 2004, only 4 months before he died John Paul II would also bless Father Marcial Maciel for the latter's 60th sacerdotal anniversary in Rome -- these are his 2 evil Achilles Heels, read our related article John Paul smelled Devil`s Bowels as roses for 27 years as he deified Father Marcial Maciel and deified Cardinal Bernard Law http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-paul-smelled-devils-bowels-as.htmland Oprah did more good than John Paul II for 25 years. Oprah gave truth and exposed evil while John Paul II hid them in his 2 evil papal Achilles Heels http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/oprah-did-more-good-than-john-paul-ii.html .


The Master of 2 Popes

But John Paul II and Cardinal Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI) were not acting on their own papal mindset or for their own ‘holy plans’ but were rather controlled like puppets from behind the papal scenes by the most powerful group that controls the Vatican today and also control all Cardinals and Bishops worldwide, the Opus Dei founded by St? Josemaria Escriva. The Opus Dei also control many governments of countries with their lawyers, court judges and politician secret members, that includes the Senate of the USA (anyone who watched the Memorial Day celebrations at Capitol Hill may have noticed the Latin Agnus Dei sung by an opera singer member ofOpus Dei memebr). The Opus Dei controlled the papacy of John Paul II mainly through the Opus Dei celibate (or religious brother), Dr. Joaquin Navarro-Valls, who was JP2’s secretary and his edict was – “No one goes to the Holy Father except through me and the Pope does nothing except through me.” Cardinal Ratzinger was awarded honorary doctorates in Opus Dei universities in Rome and Spain, read more here http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2011/04/opus-dei-pope-benedict-xvi-promoter-of.html.

After John Paul II died, Cardinal Ratzinger became Pope hence perpetuating the Opus Dei WORLD DOMINATION Agenda and control of the papacy. Benedict XVI hastily beatified his partner John Paul II (and will canonize him before he dies) because he want to make sure that they will go down in history as the pair of hands and the pair of eyes of the Holy See or the Vatican…and the two most “Holy Father” of Catholics. All roads lead to Rome and all pedophile priests also lead to Rome where both these popes covered-up the JP2 Army, the thousands of pedophiles, pederasts, rapists-priests named aptly after John Paul II because he proved during his longest reigning 27 years papacy that he had no moral conscience whatsoever and no heart as a “Holy Father” towards children who are suffering a “living Hell” as victims of the Priestly Sodomy of Biblical Proportions committed by his JP2 Army. John Paul II’s absence of conscience and cold heart are proven in his 2 evil papal Achilles Heels of Father Marcial Maciel and Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston.

The edict of Cardinal Ratzinger in Dominus Iesu that “Outside the Catholic Church, there is no salvation” does not apply to the Secular world and neither does it threaten secular people. Secularism means no God and no religion. Pope Benedict XVI has declared an open war against Secularism and he established a special office at the Vatican to counterattack secularism and he preaches constantly against secularism. If there is no God and no religion, then Benedict XVI and the Vatican are obsolete and irrelevant.

Benedict XVI’s biggest hypocrisy is him claiming to be the secular head of the secular state of the Vatican so that he can travel to other countries using secular taxpayers’ money to finance his tour and finance secular police security especially for his public sorcery of the re-incarnation of the Flesh and Blood of Jesus in the Eucharist or Mass, read about Benedict XVI versus Mary http://stella0maris.blogspot.com/2010/01/magisterium-benedict-versus-holy-mary.html

John Paul II and Benedict XVI-Cardinal Ratzinger are not “above” secular law neither are they “above” secular justice. Pedophile priests haven been convicted in the USA and Cardinals and Bishops have paid almost $3 billion dollars in settlements to almost 16,000 victims abused by 6,000 pedophile priests. So it is but fair and just that a new lawsuit against both John Paul II and Benedict XVI for enabling Fr. Daniel McCormack’s long pattern of child sex abuse was filed by Chicago attorney Jeff Anderson, read more news details and video below.

The Vatican is the most evil institution on Earth. The Vatican uses or abuses the “diplomatic immunity” of the Pope and Cardinals and Apostolic Nuncios, to carry the secret millions and billions of dollars of despots and dictators from poor countries and then transfer them to the secretive Swiss Banks. Ever wonder why there is the Swiss Guard Army, it’s because the Vatican owns Switzerland and the Swiss Banks. The Vatican’s worst crimes are the Vatican Swiss Banks that hoard despots’ ill-gotten wealth hence they perpetuate poor countries and poor peoples. It’s really time that the UNITED NATIONS must END the VATICAN as a country or “NATION” because it’s only 1 building for homosexual male GAYS (with population less than a USA High School). Women and children are forbidden to enter and live inside the Vatican therefore it is only one religious building for males only and homosexual gays. The Pope and Cardinals don not need “diplomatic immunity” to re-incarnate Jesus in the Eucharist + Mass = Sorcery. Read our related article Holy Heist! John Paul II WYD had no role with Arab youths who liberated Egypt from Mubarak who stole then deposited billions into Vatican Swiss Banks http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/02/holy-heist-john-paul-ii-wyd-had-no-role.html

Victims in USA - Attackers - Responsible Leaders

Pearl Harbor - 3,000 victims - 170 planes - Admiral Yamamoto

WTC & 9/11 attacks - 3,000 victims - 19 Muslims - Osama bin Laden

JP2 Army - 15,736 victims - 6,000 pedophile priests - John Paul II & Benedict XVI & Opus Dei, the new Vatican Trinity

Opus Dei controlled the 27 years papacy of John Paul II and is therefore the foremost guilty party who aided and abetted and covered-up the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. Opus Dei wrote most of John Paul II’s books and writings and to ensure their perpetuity as “All things Catholic”, they want JP2 to be beatified and canonized now by Benedict XVI so as not to take any chances on other future popes. The FACE of Opus Dei is John Paul II and the PHANTOM Spirit of Opus Dei is their founder St. Josemaria Escriva, read our related article John Paul II, Patron of Pederasts and Opus Dei – analysis of Joaquin Navarro-Valls’ reasons for JP2 beatification at Opus Dei conference in Rome http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-paul-ii-patron-of-pederasts-and.html

Read our related articles:

Fr. Murphy in the Evil Eyes of Benedict XVI On 'Today' Show: Religious Leader Tells Americans To 'Continue The Faith In Christ' http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/

John L.Allen Jr.Pied Piper of John Paul II deceives Catholics with his essay Fast-Track Saint in Newsweek -with Vatican lunacy & Satanic timeline http://jp2army.blogspot.com/

Excerpt
Contents
1. The Vatican Trinity
2. John L.Allen Jr the Pied Piper of the Vatican Swiss Banks
3. Core paragraph in Newsweek Magazine
4. The Nucleus: Blueprint of Vatican Beatification of JP2
5. The 2-lines most deceptive words of John Allen as reincarnation of Serpent of Eden
6. John Paul II’s old age is his best qualification as the Fast-Track Saint
7. John Allen corroborates with the Vatican Blame Game
8. Opus Dei the mastermind behind John L. Allen Jr.
9. Lunacy of John L. Allen Jr…and his Satanic timeline
10. “Holiness” the mark of Opus Dei and mark of Lucifer
11. Opus Dei replace Jesus Christ “’standing’ on the Cross”
12. The fast-track saint John Paul II fulfills Lucifer’s desires (Isaiah 14:12-24)
13. Analysis of the Entire Essay
14. The title
15. JP2 photo in Newsweek Magazine is a deception
http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2011/05/john-lallen-jrthe-pied-piper-of-john.html

Vatican guidelines on sex abuse are hogwash as long as Cardinal Bernard Law sits as High Priest in Rome - apply first to him &his 80 pedophile priests http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/save.html

================

Suit: 2 popes enabled Chicago pedophile priest

CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune
By Manya Brachear
Tribune reporter

Emboldened by a ruling in Portland, Ore. last month that ordered the Vatican to disclose its role in supervising a priest accused of child sex abuse, a Minneapolis attorney has sued the Vatican on behalf of a young man abused by former Roman Catholic priest Daniel McCormack.

Announcing the suit at a news conference in Chicago on Wednesday, attorney Jeff Anderson said he had sufficient evidence to hold Pope Benedict XVI and his predecessor Pope John Paul II accountable for enabling McCormack’s long pattern of child sex abuse.

‘This case isn’t really about what Daniel McCormack did but those at the top,” he said.

Anderson’s client already reached a civil settlement with the archdiocese and McCormack. This lawsuit would not change that settlement, he said.

Vatican Named in New Lawsuit
CHICAGO (IL)

NBC Chicago

[with video]

[the lawsuit]

By Charlie Wojciechowski

A lawsuit filed Wednesday in Federal court accuses the Vatican of directly covering up the accusations of sexual abuse by U.S. priests, including one here in Chicago.

Attorney Jeff Anderson said he is bringing the suit on behalf of a woman whose son was sexually abused by Fr. Daniel McCormack.

"All the problems of this kind lead to Rome and to the Vatican," Anderson said, alleging that the Holy See is engaging in a criminal conspiracy to conceal the abuse by McCormack.


Vatican sued over McCormack abuse
CHICAGO (IL)
WLS
[with video]
Jessica D'Onofrio

May 11, 2011 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- A lawsuit accuses the Vatican of looking the other way in the abuse case of Father Daniel McCormack, who is currently serving time after admitting to molesting boys as a Chicago priest.

Attorneys claim that all of the problems lead to Rome, and that unless there is change at the top, children worldwide will be in danger.

Attorneys announced the new lawsuit Wednesday against the Vatican. It's being brought on behalf of the mother of one of Father McCormack's victims. Attorneys are seeking to have McCormack jailed indefinitely as a sexually violent predator.

McCormack was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty in 2007 to charges he fondled five boys. In February, two more young men came forward claiming they were sexually abused when McCormack served as a pastor in the Lawndale community on the West Side.

Lawsuit against Vatican for covering up for pedophile priest

CHICAGO (IL)
WGN
[the lawsuit]
Judith Ruiz-Branch
WGN News

CHICAGO— A lawsuit is being brought against the Vatican claiming he covered up for a priest who was molesting children.

Daniel McCormack pleaded guilty to abusing five boys in July of 2007.
He served two and a half years in prison, but the state has kept him in custody as a sexually violent predator.

A lawsuit is being brought on behalf of the mother of one of the molested children.
The lawsuit says McCormack raised money for the Vatican even though church officials knew he was molesting children.

Vatican lawyer says no merit to lawsuit claiming cover-up of child sex abuse by Chicago priest

CHICAGO (IL)
The Republic
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

CHICAGO — A lawyer for the Vatican says there's no merit to a lawsuit claiming the Holy See helped cover up child sexual abuse by a Chicago priest.

Jeffrey Lena says the lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court "rehashes the same tired theories already rejected by U.S. courts."

The Vatican has argued it's shielded from lawsuits as a sovereign nation. The Chicago suit claims the priest was a "direct agent" of the Vatican.

Attorney Jeff Anderson says he's representing a woman whose son was sexually abused by Father Daniel McCormack. He pleaded guilty in 2007 to abusing five children and was sentenced to five years in prison.

GAY Popes: The Embarrassing Death of Paul II. The first GAY Pope....

We are posting a history of GAY Popes to prove how hypocritical Benedict XVI is - together with his pathetic Vatican Pied Pipers such as George Weigel - in their condemnation of GAYS. This compilation of GAY Popes is a prelude to our post on George Weigel bashing Maureen Dowd, the New York Times and Anglican Bishop Spong.

Benedict IX: The First (Primarily) Gay Pope
Lynne Yamaguchi Fletcher, in "First Gay Pope", called Benedict IX (r. 1033-1045; 1047-1048) “the first pope known to be primarily homosexual.” Benedict’s pontificate, which “turned the Vatican into a male brothel,” was so scandalous that he was deposed not once, but twice.

Benedict IX (1021--ca. 1052) was the son of the count of Tusculum. He imitated John XII in staging licentious orgies. These and other excesses caused such indignation that Benedict was deposed in 1045, but then reinstated, only to be deposed again. He disappeared into such deep obscurity that his actual date of death is unknown.

Matt & Andrej in their Biographies of LGBT people, quote this description (original source not stated):

At the death of John XIX, his brother Alberic decided to keep the papacy in the family by having his young son Theophylactus elected (October, 1032). Theophylactus, a young man probably about twenty years old, was a cleric. That was about his only qualification for the papacy. Unqualified by his youth, his bringing up, his depravity, Benedict IX became one of the very few really disreputable popes. He was known for homosexual orgies, at the Lateran Palace. The story of Benedict's pontificate is as unsatisfactory as his life. The Romans rose against him probably about 1036 and drove him from the city. Benedict proceeded to Cremona, where he met Emperor Conrad II and received a promise of protection. By imperial influence Benedict returned to Rome, only to be driven out again in 1044.

This time there was a fight, and Benedict's supporters grimly clung to a foothold in the Trastevere district. Inside the city, John, bishop of Sabina, was set up as Pope Sylvester III, but Benedict was not idle. He had fled for help to his family's base at Tusculum and within two months his tough Tusculans fought their way into the city, sent Sylvester III back to his diocese of Sabina, and restored Benedict IX.

Once restored, Benedict did not feel at ease on the papal throne. For some reason, in 1045 he decided to abdicate. As Desiderius, the abbot of Monte Cassino (later Pope Victor III), put it, "Devoted to pleasure, he preferred to live like Epicurus rather than like a pope." Consequently, he handed over the papacy to the worthy archpriest, John Gratian. Benedict did not go empty-handed. Gratian paid a large sum to get rid of this offensive character. The charms of retirement soon wore thin for Benedict, and a short time after his abdication he was once more claiming to be pope. With Sylvester III and Benedict IX fighting Gregory for the control of Rome, things were in a frightful muddle. This was ended by Henry III, who had succeeded his father Conrad II in 1039. Henry came down into Italy, cooperated with Gregory to get rid of the pretensions of Sylvester and Benedict, and then had a council demand and receive Gregory's abdication. Henry then put in a German pope--Clement II. Benedict made one more comeback. After the death of Clement II, he once again entered Rome and held sway at the Lateran, but only from November 8, 1047 to July 17, 1048. Henry III insisted on his removal and brusquely ordered Boniface, marquis of Tuscany, to expel Benedict.

What happened to Benedict after this is obscure. According to one report, which it may be hoped is true, Benedict retired to the abbey of Grottaferrata, resigned all claim to the papacy, and spent his last years as a penitent. Scandalous as Benedict had been, he carried on the routine business of the papacy. And like the few other bad men who were popes, Benedict taught nothing but the pure doctrine of Christ, though by so doing he condemned and did not excuse his own disordered life.


Gay Popes: The Embarrassing Death of Paul II

I've been reading Martin Duberman's anthology, "Hidden From History", and in particular James Saslow on Homosexuality in the Renaissance. One of Saslow's key points is that at this time, men who had sex with men were not exclusive - in modern terms, they w0uld more likely be described as "bisexual". In a passage about how the rich and powerful freely made sexual use of their subordinates, I came across this throwaway reference:

Similar patterns prevailed among the clergy and educated humanists. Charges against Paul II and Julius II centred around their seduction of much younger men; Cellini's autobiography records a beautiful and talented youth, Luigi Pulci, who made a career out of service to Roman bishops.

Now, I knew about Julius II - and for that matter, Julius III - but this was the first sexual gossip I have come across concerning Paul II, so I explored further. This is what I found: it seems he died while being sodomized by a page boy.


Paul II died, on July 26, 1471 of a stroke, allegedly whilst being sodomized by a page boy. After his death, one of his successors suggested that he should rather have been called Maria Pietissima, "Our Lady of Pity", because he was inclined to break into tears at times of crisis. Some historians have suggested the nickname was rather due either to Paul propensity to enjoy dressing up in sumptuous ecclesiastical finery, or his likely homosexuality.
Nor was he the only cleric who enjoyed some male company. Here's Saslow again:

The intimate living arrangements of the all-male clerical world and the opportunities that educational and religious duties afforded for privacy and empiotional intimacy, while not themselves "causes" of of homosexuality, may have contributed circumstantially to their expression. Priests in fifteenth century Venice and Stuart Sussex were convicted of sex with young parishioners, unpublished records of church trials in Loreto, Italy, in the 1570's detail the activities of a choirboy who slept successively with various older monks......
Remember, while Paul II was enjoying his adventures with co-operative pages, elsewhere in Italy and the rest of Europe, "sodomites" were being burned at the stake for their "sin".

Nor was it only Paul's interest in boys that got my attention. On his election as pope back 1464, the cardinals tried to rein in papal power (and thus to increase their own), by imposing s range of tight conditions, which:

•bound the future pope to continue the Turkish war;
•forbade him to journey outside Rome without the consent of the cardinals;
•limited the number of cardinals to a maximum of twenty-four,
•all creations of new cardinals were to be made only with the consent of the College of Cardinals.
•Upon taking office, Paul II was to convene an ecumenical council within three years.
Alas, for the best laid plans of mice and men......

Paul II simply ignored these requirements, declaring that election "capitulations", which cardinals had long been in the habit of affirming as rules of conduct for future popes, could affect a new pope only as counsels, not as binding obligations. He then created a whole slew of new cardinals from his own loyalists.

Now, a half a millenium and more later, why does all this sound so familiar?
(Among his "achievements", he was friendly to Christian scholars; he restored many ancient monuments; made a magnificent collection of antiquities and works of art; built the Palazzo di St. Marco, now the Palazzo di Venezia; and probably first introduced printing into Rome. Paul embellished the costume of the cardinals, and collected jewels for his own adornment.)

=======

Benedict IX: The First (Primarily) Gay Pope

Lynne Yamaguchi Fletcher, in "First Gay Pope", called Benedict IX (r. 1033-1045; 1047-1048) “the first pope known to be primarily homosexual.” Benedict’s pontificate, which “turned the Vatican into a male brothel,” was so scandalous that he was deposed not once, but twice.

Benedict IX (1021--ca. 1052) was the son of the count of Tusculum. He imitated John XII in staging licentious orgies. These and other excesses caused such indignation that Benedict was deposed in 1045, but then reinstated, only to be deposed again. He disappeared into such deep obscurity that his actual date of death is unknown.

Matt & Andrej in their Biographies of LGBT people, quote this description (original source not stated):

At the death of John XIX, his brother Alberic decided to keep the papacy in the family by having his young son Theophylactus elected (October, 1032). Theophylactus, a young man probably about twenty years old, was a cleric. That was about his only qualification for the papacy. Unqualified by his youth, his bringing up, his depravity, Benedict IX became one of the very few really disreputable popes. He was known for homosexual orgies, at the Lateran Palace. The story of Benedict's pontificate is as unsatisfactory as his life. The Romans rose against him probably about 1036 and drove him from the city. Benedict proceeded to Cremona, where he met Emperor Conrad II and received a promise of protection. By imperial influence Benedict returned to Rome, only to be driven out again in 1044.

This time there was a fight, and Benedict's supporters grimly clung to a foothold in the Trastevere district. Inside the city, John, bishop of Sabina, was set up as Pope Sylvester III, but Benedict was not idle. He had fled for help to his family's base at Tusculum and within two months his tough Tusculans fought their way into the city, sent Sylvester III back to his diocese of Sabina, and restored Benedict IX.

Once restored, Benedict did not feel at ease on the papal throne. For some reason, in 1045 he decided to abdicate. As Desiderius, the abbot of Monte Cassino (later Pope Victor III), put it, "Devoted to pleasure, he preferred to live like Epicurus rather than like a pope." Consequently, he handed over the papacy to the worthy archpriest, John Gratian. Benedict did not go empty-handed. Gratian paid a large sum to get rid of this offensive character. The charms of retirement soon wore thin for Benedict, and a short time after his abdication he was once more claiming to be pope. With Sylvester III and Benedict IX fighting Gregory for the control of Rome, things were in a frightful muddle. This was ended by Henry III, who had succeeded his father Conrad II in 1039. Henry came down into Italy, cooperated with Gregory to get rid of the pretensions of Sylvester and Benedict, and then had a council demand and receive Gregory's abdication. Henry then put in a German pope--Clement II. Benedict made one more comeback. After the death of Clement II, he once again entered Rome and held sway at the Lateran, but only from November 8, 1047 to July 17, 1048. Henry III insisted on his removal and brusquely ordered Boniface, marquis of Tuscany, to expel Benedict.

What happened to Benedict after this is obscure. According to one report, which it may be hoped is true, Benedict retired to the abbey of Grottaferrata, resigned all claim to the papacy, and spent his last years as a penitent. Scandalous as Benedict had been, he carried on the routine business of the papacy. And like the few other bad men who were popes, Benedict taught nothing but the pure doctrine of Christ, though by so doing he condemned and did not excuse his own disordered life.

===============

Sistine Chapel built by GAY Pope sodomite with his GAY nephew and GAY lovers

Benedict XVI condemns GAYS as "intrinsically evil" people and he was voted as "Person of the Year" by GAYS, read our related article here http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2006/10/pope-benedict-xvis-second-bite-gays.html

The Sistine Chapel where Popes are elected was founded by a GAY Pope and his GAY lovers. The Sistine Chapel was named after Pope Sixtus who built it while carrying on sexual relationships with his GAY lover nephew.



Pope Sixtus IV appoints Platina as Prefect of the Library, by Melozzo da Forlì

Read The Nazis and the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army were both an inherently evil all-male elite hierarchy born from the Devil's bowels http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2011/01/nazis-and-john-paul-ii-pedophiles.html

9/11 victims 3,000. JP2 Army 100,000s. May Day: both Hitler and bin Laden Announced Dead on May 1 on John Paul II Beatification Day B-Day http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/911-victims-5000-jp2-army-100000s-may.html

Sixtus IV (r. 1471-1484), born Francesco della Rovere, was notable enough to have the Sistine Chapel named after him. Like Julius III with Innocenzo, Sixtus made his lover Petro Riario - who was also his nephew - a cardinal. According to Crompton, this time writing in his monumental history Homosexuality and Civilization, Sixtus was labeled a “sodomite” in the dispatches of the Venetian ambassador and the diaries of Vatican insiders Stefano Infessura and Johann Burchard. Another nephew, Giuliano della Rovere, later achieved infamy as the “terrible pope” Julius II (1503-1513), Sixtus IV (1414-1482), is remembered for his art patronage, which included the erection and first decorations of the Sistine chapel. Among the artists most prominent in his reign was the Florentine homosexual Botticelli.This pope favored his scheming nephews, one of whom himself became pope under the name of Julius II. However, Sixtus was most devoted to another nephew, Raffaele Riario, whom he made papal chamberlain and bishop of Ostia. He elevated to the cardinalate a number of other handsome young men.

Both within Catholic and Protestant circles, there were widely spread rumors about the homosexual liaisons of Sixtus IV (Francesco Della Rovere, 1414-84; reigned 1471-84); many of these were recorded by the chronicler Stefano Infessura (c. 1440-1500). Among the young men whom Sixtus is supposed to have favored is Giovanni Sclafenato (d. 1497), whom he appointed Cardinal and bishop of Parma. The inscription on Sclafenato's tomb in Parma Cathedral--declaring that he was appointed Cardinal because of "his loyalty, industry, and other gifts of the spirit and the body"--lends support to allegations that his physical endowments helped to inspired the favors that the Pope extended to him.

Despite the scandalous rumors spread about his personal conduct, Sixtus was an effective leader, and he succeeded both in strengthening the temporal power of the Catholic Church and in halting temporarily the advances of Protestantism. He is responsible for establishing as dogma several fundamental aspects of Catholic belief, including the sanctity of Christ before the Resurrection.

Today, he is perhaps best remembered as an outstanding patron of the arts; he was responsible for initiating the physical rehabilitation of the city of Rome, which was continued by pontiffs in the early sixteenth century. He undertook the construction of the Sistine Chapel (1471-80) and the decoration of its walls (1481-2) with frescoes of biblical scenes by leading artists of the day, including Pietro Perugino, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio, and Cosimo Rosselli.

From Wikipedia: Gay Popes: Sixtus IV (r. 1471-1484)

Sixtus IV has been accused of having had male lovers, the basis of this being the diary records of Stefano Infessura who recorded documented episodes, but also unsubstantiated rumours. He was accused of awarding benefices and bishoprics in return for sexual favours, and nominated a number of young men as cardinals, some of whom were celebrated for their looks. While it is indisputable that Sixtus favoured his relatives in the hope of having faithful executors of policy; there is less evidence of direct corruption or favouritism. The exception may perhaps be Giovanni Sclafenato, who was created a cardinal according to the papal epitaph on his tomb for "ingenuousness, loyalty and his others gifts of soul and body". The English theologian John Bale attributed to Sixtus "the authorisation to practice sodomy during periods of warm weather". However, such accusations by Protestant polemicists can be dismissed as attempts at anti-Catholic propaganda.
========

It is time to end the Vatican as a "state" or a nation as it is only ONE BUILDING of GAY Pope and GAY Cardinals and eunuchs who surround him, read our related article Fr. Murphy in the Evil Eyes of Benedict XVI On 'Today' Show: Religious Leader Tells Americans To 'Continue The Faith In Christ' http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/

Victims in USA - Attackers - Responsible Leaders

Pearl Harbor - 3,000 victims - 170 planes - Admiral Yamamoto

WTC & 9/11 attacks - 3,000 victims - 19 Muslims - Osama bin Laden

JP2 Army - 15,736 victims - 6,000 pedophile priests - John Paul II & Benedict XVI & Opus Dei, the new Vatican Trinity

Opus Dei controlled the 27 years papacy of John Paul II and is therefore the foremost guilty party who aided and abetted and covered-up the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. Opus Dei wrote most of John Paul II’s books and writings and to ensure their perpetuity as “All things Catholic”, they want JP2 to be beatified and canonized now by Benedict XVI so as not to take any chances on other future popes. The FACE of Opus Dei is John Paul II and the PHANTOM Spirit of Opus Dei is their founder St. Josemaria Escriva, read our related article John Paul II, Patron of Pederasts and Opus Dei – analysis of Joaquin Navarro-Valls’ reasons for JP2 beatification at Opus Dei conference in Rome http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-paul-ii-patron-of-pederasts-and.html

Friday, June 10, 2011

Vatican trail (theft) of Peter’s Pence Collection: “Render unto Rome: The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church”

Updated July 25, 2011

For those who are not aware of how the Vatican was built over the course of 100 years, watch the movie Luther (2003) see link below. The Vatican was selling indulgences to the poor and threatening them with the fires of Hell if they did not buy them. The Vatican was built from the moneys of poor peoples from all over Europe. Today, the Vatican has not change much in the way it operates -- by stealing moneys from poor peoples – through stealing from the Peter's Pence Collection meant for charities for the poor as this new book, Render Unto Rome, an investigation of the 2009 Peter's Pence Collection wherein $82 million was received but only $8.5 million were actually spent on works of charity.

To prove that the Vatican owns the Swiss Banks is like trying to prove that there are pedophile priests in the year 2002 when it first erupted in Boston. At that time it was almost unthinkable and impossible that such evil could exist in the Catholic Church because John Paul II was at his height and glory as the most "Holy Father" and holiest longest reigning pope for 24 years and he appeared as if he ruled with utmost holiness and greatness. But eventually almost 6,000 pedophile priests were brought forward in the USA and almost 3 billion dollars were paid by the Catholic church to almost 16,000 victims. So regarding the reality of the Vatican Swiss Banks we will be also proven right in due time as one revelation after another comes out from persons who write without fear and whose souls cannot be bought by the God-and-Mammon money of the Vatican Bank. Read our related articles in our sister weblogs:

The John Paul II Millstone http://jp2m.blogspot.com/

Fr. Marcial Maciel's Swiss Bank accounts: Angelo Sodano with Carlos Slim´s help has set his nephew up in business with a swiss registered company http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/fr-marcial-maciels-swiss-bank-accounts.html

JP2 Army John Paul II Pedophiles, Pederasts, Rapists-Priests Army http://jp2army.blogspot.com/

Vatican Swiss Banks $25 billion owned by ‏Legion and Fr. Marcial Maciel who went frequently to Thailand for 7 and 8 year old boys http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2011/05/vatican-swiss-banks-25-billion-owned-by.html

9/11 victims 3,000. JP2 Army 100,000s. May Day: both Hitler and bin Laden Announced Dead on May 1 on John Paul II Beatification Day B-Day http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/911-victims-5000-jp2-army-100000s-may.html

The narcissism and grandiosity of John Paul II, Cardinal Bernard Law, Benedict XVI, and Bishop Roger Vangheluwe are nauseating and despicable http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/narcissism-and-grandiosity-of-john-paul.html

John L.Allen Jr.Pied Piper of John Paul II deceives Catholics with his essay Fast-Track Saint in Newsweek -with Vatican lunacy & Satanic timeline http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2011/05/john-lallen-jrthe-pied-piper-of-john.html

Victims in USA - Attackers - Responsible Leaders

Pearl Harbor - 3,000 victims - 170 planes - Admiral Yamamoto

WTC & 9/11 attacks - 3,000 victims - 19 Muslims - Osama bin Laden

JP2 Army - 15,736 victims - 6,000 pedophile priests - John Paul II & Benedict XVI & Opus Dei, the new Vatican Trinity

Opus Dei controlled the 27 years papacy of John Paul II and is therefore the foremost guilty party who aided and abetted and covered-up the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. Opus Dei wrote most of John Paul II’s books and writings and to ensure their perpetuity as “All things Catholic”, they want JP2 to be beatified and canonized now by Benedict XVI so as not to take any chances on other future popes. The FACE of Opus Dei is John Paul II and the PHANTOM Spirit of Opus Dei is their founder St. Josemaria Escriva, read our related article John Paul II, Patron of Pederasts and Opus Dei – analysis of Joaquin Navarro-Valls’ reasons for JP2 beatification at Opus Dei conference in Rome http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-paul-ii-patron-of-pederasts-and.html

==========



Luther the movie 2003

Storyline
Biography of Martin Luther, the 16th-century priest who led the Christian Reformation and opened up new possibilities in exploration of faith. The film begins with his vow to become a monk, and continues through his struggles to reconcile his desire for sanctification with his increasing abhorrence of the corruption and hypocrisy pervading the Church's hierarchy. He is ultimately charged with heresy and must confront the ruling cardinals and princes, urging them to make the Scriptures available to the common believer and lead the Church toward faith through justice and righteousness.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0309820/

=================



http://www.amazon.com/Render-Unto-Rome-Secret-Catholic/dp/038553132X

Noted author James Berry to speak in St. Louis

ST. LOUIS (MO)
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

His new book is on Catholic Church finances

Three local organizations are sponsoring a reading and discussion in St. Louis on Tuesday of a nationally recognized writer who has a new book out about the largely secret finances of the Catholic Church.

Jason Berry has written “Render unto Rome: The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church;” the first real in-depth examination of the institution’s financial underpinnings and practices.

The Faithful of Southern Illinois (FOSIL), Voice of the Faithful (VOTF) and the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) are sponsoring Berry’s appearance.

Berry is the nation's most experienced reporter on clergy sexual abuse, having uncovered the first nationally publicized pedophile priest scandal in Louisiana in 1985.

His first book on the crisis, Lead Us Not Into Temptation, was published in 1992. He has written on the church scandal for the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Washington Post and worked as a consultant to ABC News. His 2004 book Vows of Silence (co-written with Gerald Renner), tracked the career of Marcial Maciel, one of the most powerful priests in Rome who was long shadowed by pedophilia accusations, and Pope John Paul II’s failure to remove him. With grant support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism, Berry later did a film about the Maciel scandal and the Vatican justice system.

==========

Rome, rendered

UNITED STATES
Spiritual Politics

By Mark Silk on June 9, 2011

Yesterday I went up to St. Eulalia's in Winchester, Mass. to hear Jason Berry talk about his important new book, Render Unto Rome, to 50 or 60 members of Voice of the Faithful. No one has done more to investigate the underside of the contemporary Roman Catholicism than Berry, from his bringing to light the problem of sexual abuse of minors by priests back in the 1980s, to his work on Marcial Maciel and the Legion of Christ a decade ago, to his current exploration of, as the subtitle puts it, the secret life of money in the Catholic Church. Naturally, the ecclesiastical powers-that-be look at him as a turd in their punchbowl.

Render Unto Rome is rich in revelations, from the $2.3 billion in losses resulting from collection plate embezzlement in the U.S. over the past half-century to the financial wheeler-dealing of Cardinal Angelo Sodano, dean of the College of Cardinals. But perhaps Berry's most egregious discovery concerns Peter's Pence, the annual sum collected in June from parishes around the world for relief of the poor.

According to the USCCB website:

The Peter's Pence Collection unites us in solidarity to the Holy See and its works of charity to those in need. Your generosity allows the Pope to respond to our suffering brothers and sisters with promptness, love, and compassion, so God's people will not feel alone in their time of misfortune.

However, of the $82 million received in 2009 (the last year for which figures are available) Berry was able to identify only $8.5 million that were actually spent on works of charity. His conclusion is that the remaining 79 percent went to plug the Vatican's operating budget.

It would be nice if the news media and Catholics themselves took up the cause and began peppering Rome with inquiries about where all that alleged poor relief went--not to mention why someone like Sodano continues to occupy so exalted a position. Meanwhile, the USCCB has never seen fit to issue guidelines for the handling of collection plate receipts--the Church's principal source of income. When they meet later this month, why not put that on their plate?

http://www.spiritual-politics.org/2011/06/rome_rendered.html

==============

Authority on sex abuse by priests to be in Toledo
TOLEDO (OH)
Toledo Blade

BY DAVID YONKE
BLADE RELIGION EDITOR



Jason Berry

Jason Berry, a journalist and author known for his meticulous reporting on sexual abuse by Catholic priests, is to be in Toledo today to discuss his latest book, Render Unto Rome: The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church.

Mr. Berry spent 2½ years following the money trail in the Roman Catholic Church, which with 1.2 billion members, is the largest organization in the world.

The financial story includes donations made (or withheld) by average Catholics in the pews, sales of multimillion-dollar properties, and settlements paid to victims of sexual abuse by priests.

Throughout his detailed research — the book contains nearly 40 pages of footnotes — Mr. Berry finds much of the church’s money unaccounted for.

He points out, for example, that Peter’s Pence, a global collection taken every June for the Pope’s use in helping people in dire need, raised $82.5 million in 2009, but the Vatican reported allocations of $8.65 million, only 10.5 percent of the total.

Looming over the church’s financial picture is the monetary impact of the clerical sexual abuse scandal.

In Portland, Ore., the diocese filed for federal bankruptcy protection in July, 2004, after a spate of lawsuits was filed alleging sexual abuse by priests, shortly after the diocese reached a $53 million settlement for 100 abuse claims, Mr. Berry writes.

At the same time that many U.S. dioceses faced increasing budget pressures, some — notably Boston and Cleveland — started closing parishes and selling valuable properties.

The debts from legal settlements, as well as from mismanagement, embezzlement, and declining revenue, are not directly linked to the sale of church property but are certainly “major factors,” Mr. Berry said in an interview with The Blade.

He called Cleveland’s closing of parishes, overseen by Bishop Richard Lennon, an “outrage” and “another sign of how downsizing, selling property, and the like become a mere instrument of diocesan finances.”

Mr. Berry’s book spotlights the case of the former St. James Parish in Kansas, Ohio, which was closed by Bishop Leonard Blair in 2005 during the Toledo diocese’s largest restructuring in its history.

The parishioners held a round-the-clock prayer vigil in the church, filed appeals with the Vatican under canon law guidelines, and pursued their cause in civil court, spending more than $100,000 on legal bills.

The diocese, meanwhile, used some of the funds acquired from St. James’ bank account after the parish closed to pay attorneys to fight the ex-parishioners’ legal suit.

Why did Mr. Berry include a small parish in rural Seneca County in a book with such a global view?

“It was just the rank injustice of it,” he said in the interview. “These are hardworking people in the heartland of America who clearly wanted to do everything they could to maintain a vibrant faith community. If your measurement of a vibrant faith community is dollars and cents, then the whole question of a parish is up for grabs. And the idea that Bishop Blair could take the cash reserves to use it to pay his lawyer to beat them in court and use it to tear down the church seems vindictive — winner take all.

“I think we have a generation of bishops who just seem unable to sit down with lay people who have valid questions and to negotiate differences in a pastoral, forward-looking way.”

In response, the Diocese of Toledo issued a statement Saturday saying that it “agrees with the position of the Toledo Blade in its editorial published Oct. 14, 2008, which stated that the lawsuit initiated by the Kansas St. James parishioners was ‘without basis.’ The Blade wrote that they ‘should stop holding onto a past that doesn’t fit the present’ and ‘that the only winner in this contest, in which the former parishioners are challenging the authority of Bishop Leonard Blair over church property, is the Columbus law firm representing them to the tune of “well over $100,000” in legal fees.’

“The Diocese would also point out that parish assets that remained after closing were spent principally on care of the property, insurance, and taxes [after it ceased to be a church] and eventual demolition. These expenses were prolonged by the time period during which some former parishioners refused to vacate the property.”

Mr. Berry, a Catholic who graduated from Georgetown University in Washington, said his investigations of the church have not shaken his faith. “I am severely disappointed and still shocked by the incompetence and corruption in the government of the church,” he said in the interview. “But I don’t want bishops, some of whom act like moral thugs, to drive me out of the place where I practice my faith. And I think a lot of Catholics feel that way.”

Jason Berry will speak and sign books at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Needmor Foundation, 42 St. Clair St., in downtown Toledo. Admission is free. Information: 419-345-9291.

Contact David Yonke at: dyonke@theblade.com or 419-724-6154.

===============



===================

Scientologists, Catholics and More Money Than God

UNITED STATES
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/books/review/inside-scientology-and-render-unto-rome-book-review.html?_r=2&tntemail1=y&emc=tnt&pagewanted=all

INSIDE SCIENTOLOGY
The Story of America’s Most Secretive Religion
By Janet Reitman
444 pp. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. $28.

RENDER UNTO ROME
The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church
By Jason Berry
420 pp. Crown Publishers. $25.

By GARRY WILLS

Published: July 21, 2011

We do not need these books to tell us that money and religion make for a poisonous combination. But it is of some interest to see that ancient truth confirmed in both a church as relatively new as Scientology and one as ancient as Roman Catholicism. Even religious leaders develop a certain swagger when they know they are backed by bundles of cash. When a French court fined Scientology nearly a million dollars, one of its officials shrugged that off as “chump change.” And when the Vatican ran a deficit of nearly 2.4 million euros in 2007, an Italian journalist familiar with the church’s finances dismissed the debt as “chopped liver.” Chump change or chopped liver, both churches have bigger sums they can get to and use, and few outsiders are given a look at how they do it. These two books trace the cash source of theological confidence.

As Janet Reitman describes in “Inside Scientology,” Scientology did not begin as a religion, which its founder, L. Ron Hubbard came to consider his initial mistake. In 1950 Hubbard published his book “Dianetics,” which proposed a variant on the “mind cures” that have littered the American landscape through most of its history. He offered his followers a process of “auditing” that combined Freudian sessions with elements of his former career as a writer of science fiction. People being audited could relive their births, or test their future hopes on the E-meter, a kind of super lie detector that revealed “the anatomy of the human mind.” Mental health authorities, Reitman notes, were quick to condemn Hubbard’s claims as fraudulent. He did not, at this point, have the money to fight against such attacks, a situation he would spend the rest of his career correcting.

Hubbard’s failure to secure a strong financial base exposed him to a takeover of his concepts and properties. Barely two years after founding the movement, he lost Dianetics to a wealthy supporter named Don Purcell, who simply bought him out. To restart his project, he needed protection for it. He found that protection in religion. After all, one cannot buy out a religion. This “religion angle,” he wrote in 1953, is “a matter of practical business.” Being a church, Reitman writes, gave Scientology tax exemption, clerical status for his “ministers” (who wore Roman collars) and clerical exemption from the draft for these ministers. It also allowed him to rally even non-Scientologists to his defense against increasingly hostile government agencies, presenting any of his troubles as a persecution of religion, violating the separation of church and state. ...

The Catholic Church offers a very different picture, but one where money is even more important. Jason Berry, the reporter who broke several of the priest abuse scandals of recent times, finds the same pattern of deception, denial and subterfuge in the church’s handling of money as in its treatment of pedophiles. The Vatican comes to its high-handed way with money in an understandable fashion. In the Middle Ages, all authority was male and monarchical, so the pope became a king. His multiple realms had all the appurtenances of a medieval monarch — armies, prisons, spies, torturers, legal courts in papal service. The money flowed in from many sources — as conquest, as tribute from subordinate princes (secular and religious) or from the crops on farm lands held by the pope, who was not accountable to anyone for use of these funds. When normal sources did not satisfy papal ambition, clerical underlings invented new kinds of revenue — like the granting of time off in Purgatory for cash contributions during life (“indul­gences” for sale).

All that seemed to be ending in 1860 when Italy at last united its secular government and began taking away the pope’s realms. Pope Pius IX rejected the Italian government’s efforts at partial restitution, calling the secular regime illegitimate. He made himself a “prisoner of the Vatican,” never venturing out into Rome, or even addressing it from his balcony. Catholics in sympathy to Pio Nono’s “martyrdom” by the modern state increased their popular donations to the Vatican called Peter’s Pence. This donation arose in the seventh or eighth century, when the pope was still a monarch. It was set aside from the monies exacted from various parts of the papal empire, as something coming voluntarily from the people in the pews. The announced purpose was for the pope to have extra money for the charities he supported.

But after 1860 a surge of sympathy made Catholics every­where, but especially in America, pour large sums into the Vatican, originally conceived as giving the pope military assistance, but then turned over to him for any use. No longer were papal charities the rationale. In fact, the lay cardinal who was Pius’s secretary of state, Giacomo Antonelli, took all available Vatican sums for ambitious new financing schemes. Already in 1857 he had used Peter’s Pence funds as collateral for a new loan from the Rothschild banking firm. Antonelli made one of his brothers the head of the Pontifical Bank. Another Antonelli brother secured a monopoly on Rome’s grain imports (a key to power in Rome since classical times). Antonelli soon had papal investments in countries all over Europe. The pope’s distress was made the excuse for a new financial empire, with no accountability for the funds used.

That non-accountability continues. The Vatican issues statements of its assets — in 2007 the amount was 1.4 billion euros — but the Vatican Bank is off the books, as is a metric ton of gold, and other things not reported. On a list of papal assets, St. Peter’s Basilica and other historic sites are listed as worth one euro each. No wonder, as Berry says, “the Holy See’s true net worth is invisible.”

Having set this historical background, Berry begins his true project — the use of funds in the American church during its modern time of troubles. He grants there are excuses for the financial maneuvering of the Catholic bishops. “The Roman Catholic Church in America is undergoing the most massive downsizing in its history,” he writes. “Since 1995 the bishops have closed 1,373 churches — more than one parish per week for 15 years.” There are many reasons for this wrenching development — lower church attendance, which means fewer donations from the pews; the movement of parishioners from inner cities to the suburbs, stranding old ethnic structures; the loss of free labor in Catholic schools by the declining number of nuns. We can add to this the payment of damages to the victims of priest pedophiles — though many bishops claim they haven’t closed churches because of the sex scandals.

Berry says it is hard to verify this claim because the ordinary bishop is as loath to reveal his transactions as the pope is. A lay group begun in Boston, the Voice of the Faithful, asked that the financial arrangements of the diocese be exposed, and it was fiercely resisted by bishop after bishop. Church authorities in some cities banned the V.O.T.F. from meeting in any parish. The same bishops had earlier opposed revealing what sums were paid to victims of sexual abuse. Settlements forbade the victims from revealing this. Even when settlements were reported, other hidden costs were kept secret — for instance, how much had gone to expensive rehabilitation centers through which the pedophiles were endlessly and uselessly recycled, and to legal costs while the bishops were denying accusations.

Lay people were also kept out of the decision on which churches to close. Good faith attempts by lay people to cooperate in evaluating this procedure were rebuffed. While Cardinal Sean O’Malley was trying to remedy the harm done the Boston diocese by Cardinal Bernard Law’s recycling of pedophiles, his auxiliary bishop Richard Lennon was managing a professedly separate operation to close churches — he would finally shut down 62 in the Boston area. The opponents to Lennon’s plan alleged that he was selecting properties most likely to bring the highest price for resale, not taking into account community support, unconsidered resources or the possibility of merged work with nearby parishes. At eight condemned parishes, people devoted to their churches kept round-the-clock vigils, refusing to give them up. Appeals were taken to Rome, but the man responsible for parishes, Cardinal Castrillón Hoyos, refused them a hearing. Berry finds the Boston pattern repeated in other dioceses, like those of Cleveland and Los Angeles.

Then, returning to Rome, Berry shows the power of money to squelch evidence that the founder of the ultra-conservative Legionaries of Christ, Father Marcial Maciel Degollado, was a serial child molester and had illegitimate children in Mexico. I met Berry in 2002 at the bishops’ Dallas meeting on the sex scandals. He was just beginning his exposé on Maciel, and I followed his work after that, since he was up against vituperation from the Legionaries, criticism from people like William Bennett, and a cold shoulder in Rome, where he went with Maciel’s victims to plead their cause. Unfortunately, Maciel was a great favorite with Pope John Paul II and his secretary of state, Angelo Sodano. It helped that Maciel showered Rome’s cardinals with expensive gifts. Every Christmas Legionary brothers fanned out across Rome to deliver lavish Christmas baskets to the hierarchy, with fine wines, liqueurs and rare Spanish hams worth up to $1,000. He sent a million dollars in support of the pope’s visit to Poland. He gave large cash gifts to Sodano. He ordered a Mercedes-Benz for Cardinal Pio Laghi, though Laghi turned it down. Sodano and others were entertained in style at the Legionary headquarters.

Cardinal Ratzinger, who had taken charge of all sex claims reaching Rome, sat on the charges against Maciel, at the urging of Cardinal Sodano, who reminded him that Maciel was well liked by Pope John Paul. Ratzinger held off until John Paul was clearly dying; then he hurried to remove this incubus from the church. In December 2004 Ratzinger’s office ordered Maciel to step down, pending an investigation. Even then the Vatican Press Office, under pressure from Sodano, denied that there was any “canonical process” against Maciel. But once Ratzinger was Pope Benedict XVI, he consigned Maciel to a period of prayer and penitence and began a thorough re-evaluation of his order.

Whether Berry is considering sex scandals or money scandals, or the refusal of the hierarchy to be open with its own believers on many fronts, the thing that sours all relations is secrecy — as we can see from the conduct of our own government. Secrecy eats at the soul. Some are surprised that religion is so corruptible. They should not be. When secrecy is used to protect a higher order of knowledge, it can make the keepers of the secrets think of themselves as a higher order of humans. Corruptio optimi pessima, goes the old saying. Blight at the top is the deepest blight. It is the sin of taking God’s name in vain.