Updated December 5, 2012
Read our latest article: Sacrament of Confession protects criminals and persecutes their victims http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/11/sacrament-of-confession-protects.html

Updated November 18, 2012

1) By George Pell, Vatican Catholics still don’t get it. Australia’s painful awakening and discovery of JP2 ARMY-John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army… 10 years after the USA. See news updates below with our yellow highlights.

2) The Hague must watch this movie: “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God”

3) Sistine Chapel celebrates its 500th year… but 50 years of that… was the Reign of Vatican Deceits by John Paul II the Great and Benedict XVI who together covered-up the most heinous crimes against children committed by the JP2-John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army for over half of the 20^th Century

4) Benedict XVI canonizes a 332-years-old-dead Indian woman to “heal” victims of JP2 Army! Benedict XVI the greatest magician and faith-healer on earth!

Really, children’s last hope for true justice is The Hague to call upon Benedict XVI-Ratzinger to trial and bring final (one-and-only) justice to the hundreds of thousands of children sexually abused by thousands of perpetual pedophile priests of the 20^th century whom he covered-up as Josef Ratzinger the powerful Prefect of the CDF at the Vatican (sweet title for a poisonous youth-Nazi). The Hague must not “be silent like Christ” which Filipino Bishop Tagle propounded on behalf of the Synod of Bishops in order to make Catholic as slaves by “imitating the humility and the silence of Christ”, see our article updates below for October 28, 2012. Catholics must either voluntarily be silent - or they are forced to be silent - like Benedict XVI silenced the Liberation Theologians and now he silenced the Irish priests, read about them here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/04/hypocrite-benedict-silenced-outspoken.html The Filipino hero Jose Rizal said that “There can be no tyrants where there are no slaves” and he wrote and revealed how the Vatican Catholic Church was always there alongside the Spanish colonizers who made Filipinos their slaves by forcing them to imitate the humility and the silence of Christ. The Vatican branded him as anti-Catholic and he was executed by Vatican cohorts, the colonizers and the government. Vatican Catholics should realize that the Vatican dominates Christ as its Holy Slave, and the Pope and his cohorts use Christ for their narcissistic self-glory like John Paul II the Great did for his own fame and fortune that he even removed Christ from the arms of his mother and imposed his fat ugly body over the Mother of Christ, see his statues here http://stella0maris.blogspot.ca/ . Today all Catholic churches and Sunday homilies must cite either John Paul II or Benedict XVI writings and very little about Christ’s words. It's the Popes words that count, not Christ's anymore...how pathetic that Christ should be crucified and silenced again and again...

Catholics are blind and they should open their eyes and see that is what Christ is all about in the Eucharist, Christ is silent and those perpetual pedophile priests can continue to reincarnate him -- no matter how many years they have been sexually abusing children – Christ is at the mercy of their priestly words (what a stupid God) see news updates below about children’s stories who were abused by the JP2 Army-John Paul II Army in Australia and they were covered-up by their Bishops and Cardinals. Catholics continue to revere those priests even if they are serial pedophiles, have mistresses and sons, and even if they sexually abuse their own sons just like Fr. Marcial Maciel continued to be the apple of the eye of John Paul II the Great until his death, read more here http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2011/05/heil-satanas-jp2-patron-saint-of.html . Criminal Cardinal Bernard Law and other criminal Cardinals like Mahony, and Bishops, and criminal Pope Benedict XVI - whose Crimes against Humanity is awaiting in The Hague - continue to reincarnate Christ in the Eucharist because Christ is silent and Christ is their Vatican Catholic Slave. All these heads of states have been brought to trial and found guilty – Italy’s Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Egypt’s President Mubarak, Liberia’s President, Charles Taylor, convicted of war crimes by Special Court for Sierra Leone in The Hague - it is now the Vatican’s Benedict XVI turn to be brought to trial at The Hague for his most heinous crimes against children, crimes very unique from other world leaders. The Hague is our last and one-and-only-hope. Let’s hope Obama will not visit the Vatican and have his wife and daughters wear those “women’s uniforms to see the Holy Pope”, in black and with black veils, what hypocrisy!

The Eucharist is the most intoxicating Magic on earth and if the new magic of Harry Potter in a few years span has made its author a billionaire and earned it a temple in Disney World where people are willing to pay $50 for a magic wand, how much more billions of dollars has the Magic Brand Name of Jesus amassed for the Vatican Bank and make Vatican Catholics continue to revere criminal-Popes centuries after centuries as the “Representative of Christ” and now at our generation we witness the fastest tracking saint John Paul II the Great who had the longest papacy but covered-up the most heinous crimes against children committed by the JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army named aptly after him http://jp2army.blogspot.ca/ The Eucharist is the greatest Magic Show on Earth because Vatican Catholics (no longer Roman Catholics) will defend their evil Popes and evil Cardinals and evil Bishops with their hard-earned dollars and with their life because they are overpowered by the Magic of the Eucharist. Yes, the Sacraments of the Eucharist and Confession are tools of evil and injustice that the Devil couldn’t be happier with these Vatican invented Magic since he deceived Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden with the Apple of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The Eucharist and Confession are far greater than that Apple…or they are the greatest fruits of that Apple of the Garden of Eden. The Sacrament of Confession magically wipes away crimes without court trail and jail time for criminals, makes them say a sweet Hail Mary or Glory Be, and then happily feeds them with the reincarnated flesh and wine-blood of God in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. Vatican Catholics are so intoxicated that they feel-good no matter how heinous the crimes Popes and Cardinals and Bishops cover-up and they simply “Pray, Pay, and Obey” …and keep “silence” like the three monkeys who see, say and hear nothing.

The Jesuits are the worst example of and promoters of the Magic of the Eucharist. When Ignatius went with his 7 recruits of Masters Graduates to present themselves to be of service to the Pope, he knew Church history that the Popes were immoral bastards who had mistresses and sons whom they appointed as Cardinals and that Popes were murderers and thieves in association with European kings and Queens. But Ignatius had the royal background to “pray, pay, obey” the monarch of Spain (just like the narcissistic Opus Dei founder Escriva was obsessed with royal titles http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2010/05/spiritual-healing-eucharist-and-rosary.html ). Ignatius and the Jesuits were faithful to the Pope – because he is the Spouse of Christ – which makes the Vatican Catholic Chruch GAYS because the head (and hierarchy) of the Church is only-male – and they believe that the authority of Christ rest on the Pope alone no matter how evil and how heinous the crimes he commits. Cardinal Dolan proudly reminded people of the TV series of the murderer, thief and adulterer Pope, The Borgias and if Vatican Catholics still believe that the Pope is the Spouse of Christ even if he is a Borgia or head of the JP2 Army, then they should not be pitied when the Vatican will sink into a deep hole as predicted by the Third Secret of Fatima, because they will no longer have the largest palace for their criminal popes. The Jesuits are the main leaders of the parallel Church, read two articles below.

No wonder there is only place for a photo left at the Vatican because John Paul II and Benedict XVI have brought the deserving demise upon the great Vatican with the most heinous crimes against children in the 20^th century. There is only one commandment of Christ wherein he condemned men with a millstone and he cursed them to the depths of the sea with a millstone, and that is now the John Paul II Millstone read more here http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/ It had to take the greatest pope JP2 to fulfill Christ’s words in the Gospel.

Benedict canonizes 332-years-old dead Indian to “heal” victims of JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army

Benedict XVI used the Synod of Bishops as the backdrop for his Eucharist Magic Show and to canonize a 332-year old dead Indian saint called Kateri “to heal” the victims of the 20^th century JP2 Army –John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army and was immediately seconded the motion by a famous American Opus Dei priest with a book about “healing sexual abuse through the saint”, see news updates below. Is that why John Paul II the Great kept on canonizing and beatifying more than 1,500 dead people because these saint automatically “heal” the victims of the crimes he covered-up? And now Benedict XVI is hastily canonizing John Paul II so he too can heal the very children he offended and ignored because -- not once -- did he speak up against priest pedophilia right under his watch that he deserves to be called John Paul II Saint of Pedophiles, Pederasts and Rapists, read the prayer here http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2011/04/prayer-to-john-paul-ii-saint-of.html In fact John Paul II has two evil Achilles Heels which is why he can never be a saint no matter what Magic miracles he performs, read more here http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2011/05/heil-satanas-jp2-patron-saint-of.html .

Benedict XVI should meet this mother because Kateri or Opus Dei saints cannot cure her children abused by JP2 Pedophile Priests

So much heartbreak, so much pain, it's about time

AUSTRALIA

Brisbane Times
November 17, 2012
Chrissie Foster

I COULD never stand to live in a world without justice and truth: at last there will be a platform for both. Prime Minister Julia Gillard's announcement of a royal commission on child sexual abuse has brought to an end the cries from victims and victim supporters. Of course, there have been many tears this week. More will be shed. But the royal commission is a cause for celebration.

For my family, the struggle to achieve this breakthrough began 16 years ago, on March 26, 1996. This was the day my daughter Emma, after almost a year of starving her 13-year-old body to an emaciated 41 kilograms, numerous self-harming horrors and attempts to take her own life, disclosed that our parish priest had sexually assaulted her. Not once, but on many occasions over her primary school years.
Fifteen months later more horror and heartbreak surfaced through a half-finished suicide note from our second daughter, Katie. She had hidden the note in a shoebox. It was written in her very neatest handwriting. Katie had been another victim of our parish priest.

There was no cure for my much-loved daughters. The pain never leaves. After years of subsequent torment, Emma took her own life at the age of 26. Katie, while drunk after binge drinking, was hit by a car in 1999 (she was 15) and still receives 24-hour care as a result of her injuries.

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

Sistine Chapel 500th year and 50 years of that was the JP2 Army - John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army

The most colorful Chamber of Papal Power of the Vatican, the Sistine Chapel, celebrates its 500th year today… but 50 years out of that 500 years was the half-century crimes of the Vatican against children which it admitted and which Amnesty International Report Vatican “Torture, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment” on tens of thousands of children sexually abused by priests http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2011/09/amnesty-international-report-vatican.html. The Sistine Chapel has been the place where criminal popes are elected decades after decades, centuries after centuries, ah, the power of Vatican Deceit via art indeed… the art of Michelangelo has always cast a spell and blinded Catholics to worship the Popes as demi-gods especially John Paul II as the biggest Opus Dei Golden Cow chanting to him blindly, “Blessed John Paul II, we love you”. What is there to love with JP2 John Paul II who neither had compassion nor compunction for the hundreds of thousands of victims of his perpetual JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army exemplified by his evil Achilles Heels criminal Cardinal Bernard Law and criminal Father Marcial Maciel? Read our related article Heil Satanas JP2 http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/911-victims-5000-jp2-army-100000s-may.html

Out of the 500 years of the Sistine Chapel, the latter most part half of the 20th century marked the Vatican’s most heinous crimes against children committed by the JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army covered-up by the longest reigning pope John Paul II together with Cardinal Josef Ratzinger. Nice way to celebrate half a millennium, Sistine Chapel!

Michelangelo spent much of four years on his back painting the chapel's ceiling frescoes

Now the Sistine Chapel is a victim of its own fame and it too is sinking with the Vatican Titanic Ship. But Michelangelo was not blind, he saw the Vatican Evils of his days and he placed the face of popes among those falling into hell. Pope Sixtus was an unjust pope because he did pay the wage of the artist and he let Michelangelo live and die poor. From Pope Sixtus to John Paul II who silenced the Liberation Theology priests, the Vatican has cleverly used the Pope as the main oppressor of the poor of this world because the powerful Pope connives with despots and hoards their moneys in SECRET Vatican SWISS Banks or in Michelangelo’s times with the Medicis and the European nobilities.

Lest we forget, the Vatican was built on the poor’s money through the sale of indulgences for ove a century that prompted Martin Luther to openly criticise the sale of indulgences and cost him his excommunication.

How ironic that the Synod of Bishops come out with a prescription of following the “humility of Christ” while the Proud Pope Benedict XVI deviously claims to represent the poor Christ while he lives in the lap of luxury and wears red shoes and the Emperor Pope White Clothes and he does contrary to everything Christ did. Christ had nowhere to lay his head while the Vatican amass Billions in his name.

There is a daily long queue for tickets to enter the Sistine Chapel. At 15 Euro and 5 million visitors annually, that is guaranteed revenue of 75 million Euros for the Vatican and to maintain the lifestyle of the rich and famous misogynist Pope, see news updates below.

Vatican guidelines on sex abuse http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2011/05/save.html

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

Amnesty International Report Vatican “Torture, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment” on tens of thousands of children sexually abused by priests in Ireland http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2011/09/amnesty-international-report-vatican.html

Escriva stage-managed impostor Sr. Lucia & Fatima Third Message . Lucia was listed as deceased in 1948… http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2011/11/escriva-stage-managed-impostor-sr-lucia.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

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

Heil Satanas JP2 Patron Saint of Pedophiles, Pederasts Rapists-Priests! John Paul II is the same yesterday and today-- he cannot protect children http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/05/heil-satanas-jp2-patron-saint-of.html

Opus Dei + Walesa = 'Catholic Communism' in Poland. Behind The Media Hype of Walesa and Pope John Paul II http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2011/11/opus-dei-walesa-catholic-communism-in.html

Updated October 28, 2012

It is time that The Hague brings Benedict XVI into trial for his crimes against humanity before he dies, read about them here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/09/hague-is-asked-to-investigate-vatican.html as his secular counterpart, former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, following a six-year trial by a secular Italian court in Milan, was found guilty and sentenced to four years in jail, see news updates below. Meanwhile the Synod of Bishops has come out with a brilliant New Marketing of Old Vatican Deceits in the words of Filipino Bishop Tagle, an Opus Dei puppet, drums roll, "humility and the power of silence”. Those 262 Bishops are saying that the world must simply “follow Jesus’ example of humility and shut-up their mouth…and not think or criticise and speak the truth about the Pope and his cohorts of criminals at the Vatican.

The Jesus brand name is the most powerful tool of marketing and the Vatican Bank has used it well for 2,000 years. But the Vatican Titanic is sinking in moral bankruptcy as John Paul II is beatified in haste and worshipped as the Opus Dei Golden Cow, see his statues his http://stella0maris.blogspot.ca/ Christ is no longer a stupid God who will simply “obey” pedophile priests’ words and reincarnate in their evils hands. Cardinal Dolan is making entertainment of papal crimes as entertaining as the TV series The Borgias, see news updates below.

Tagle said that for the church to be a place where people meet God, it needs to learn three things from the example of Jesus: humility, respect for others, and "the power of silence." Tagle said, "Confronted with the sorrows, doubts and uncertainties of people, she cannot pretend to give easy solutions. In Jesus, silence becomes the way of attentive listening, compassion and prayer. It is the way to truth."

Jesus is a brand and puppet of the Vatican and we must beware of how those cunning 262 Bishops in The Vatican (not in Rome) are now cooking him up to suit their GREED for POWER.

This "silent Jesus" is the opposite of the Jesus the Liberator and the Jesus of the Irish priests whom Benedict XVI want to silence , read more here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/04/hypocrite-benedict-silenced-outspoken.html

Jesus was NEVER SILENT-- he criticised the Pharisees who prayed regularly (like the Opus Dei) and he condemned the Temple of Solomon to the ground -- just like the Third Secret of Fatima condemned the Vatican Temple to the ground. So the Vatican prefers to reveal and stage Vatileaks -- rather reveal the Third Secret of Fatima . Catholics should learn Occupy The Vatican... like Occupy Wall Street http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/10/ows-otv-occupy-wall-street-occupy.html

Benedict XVI in the Sacrament of Penance may forgive his billionaire pal Berlusconi’s sins, he may even grant him a Plenary Indulgence, but they all mean nothing because his papal religious forgiveness has no merits whatsoever in Italian court. That is why it is time all Vatican Pied Pipers stop referring to the Vatican and Catholics as “Roman Catholics” because the Pope has no say whatsoever in Rome or in Italy. The Sacrament of Confession is a Catholic tool and opium of Injustice http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2010/03/forgiveness-is-gizmo-of-injustice-to.html “Sins” is a Roman Catholic Church's word and theological concept while “crimes” is a secular word and society's reality.http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2010/05/sins-and-crimes-are-not-synonymous.html. As the Vatican “country” shrinks into its ancient walls, Benedict XVI is gasping for fame as he canonizes 7 saints, one of them an aboriginal Indian saint, Kateri Tekawitha, who is more than 300 years old dead and she is supposed to heal the 20^th century victims of the JP2 Army - John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army, see news updates below. Some native Indians of the Catholic residential schools sex abuse victims went to attend the canonization and the Vatican is using them to salvage the crimes against humanity of Benedict XVI (and John Paul II) who covered-up thousands of perpetual pedophile priests.

Silvio Berlusconi owns the Italian media empire and cinemas and so it isn’t a surprise why the Oscar award winning director Alex Gibney’s movie “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” wasn’t allowed to be shown in Italy because the Vatican is also a shareholder of Berlusconi Media Empire, see news updates below. The movie was banned by the Venice and Rome film festivals this year, films festivals that show garbage movies but they refuse to show what is the truth about the Vatican Evils and Pope Crimes of the 20^th century. “The direct connection of the Vatican to this sheds light on the way they’ve shoved this stuff under the carpet,” says Gibney, who discovered a similar scandal involving deaf students in Verona, Italy, while making the film.

Meanwhile foremost Vatican Pied Piper John L. Allen Jr entertains 1.2 billion Catholics and makes them feel-good about the Vatican Evils and Pope Crimes; he is throwing speculations about the next Pope so that the world will lose concentration on Benedict XVI’s Crimes against Humanity waiting at The Hague. There is really something fishy about Vatileaks, read our articles here

Read our related articles

Penance is not justice; penitence is inequality to the lifetime suffering of victims of the John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2010/04/penance-is-not-justice-penitence-is.html

Spiritual healing, the Eucharist and the Rosary bring NEITHER JUSTICE NOR SAFETY FOR CHILDREN, the preys of the John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2010/05/spiritual-healing-eucharist-and-rosary.html

NCAA & Penn State more moral than Vatican. Sports is more moral than John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Vatican Titanic sinking in moral bankruptcy

http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/

Catholic Church’s popularity at all-time low...churches closing by the dozens http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/08/catholic-churchs-popularity-at-all-time.html

Updated October 25, 2012

1) VCC Vatican Catholic Church … not RCC Roman Catholic Church

2) Cardinal Dolan’s Vatican Deceit strategy: Entertainment Hollywood Hype

3) Australian Jesuit blames “Original Sin” for phenomenal JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army in Australia slammed by Police and Government Inquiry

4) Benedict XVI canonizes centuries old dead saints while condoning current alive criminals Bishop Finn and Monsignor Lynn

5) Pope appoints new Cardinals while keeping old criminals Cardinal Bernard Law and Cardinal Roger Mahony

VCC Vatican Catholic Church … not RCC Roman Catholic Church

The 1.2 billion Catholics must now be called “Vatican Catholics” who belong to the VCC “Vatican Catholic Church” of the smallest country of the Vatican Theocracy where “it is not a democracy” because the Pope is its one-and-only autocratic ruler with his only-homosexual-males Bishops.

Catholics must now stop being called “Roman Catholics” because its old title RCC “Roman Catholic Church” no longer exists because now Rome is a secular city within the secular democratic state of Italy.

The Vatican and the Pope have no jurisdiction, no political voice, and no authority whatsoever in Rome therefore the Catholic Church is not Roman at all.

The Vatican is not Rome … and Rome is not the Vatican.

The Vatican is not equal Rome…and Rome does not equal the Vatican.

The Vatican and Rome are not identical geographically, politically and spiritually.

The Vatican must stop identifying itself with Rome in any shape or form. The Vatican does not own Rome as a colony nor is Rome part of its Vatican Imperialism.

It is a disgraceful pathological lie if the Vatican continues to claim the city of Rome as its own – even claiming it by name - because the reality now is - Vatican buildings and properties in Rome are now obliged to pay secular taxes to the secular government of Italy (see news update below).

The secular city of Rome has 2.8 million, 2,761,477 men and women and children population and Italy in total has 60.6 million, 60,626,442 – in 2011 Source: National Institute of Statistics.

The Vatican country has 8 hundred people, 800 homosexual male-only population, according to Vatican website, www.vaticanstate.va/EN/State_and_Government/.../Population.htm - “The population of Vatican City is about 800 people, of whom over 450 have Vatican citizenship, while the rest have permission to reside there, either temporarily ...”

Below are persons authorized to live as residents

Persons Authorized as Residents

Name	Abbr.	Adm.	A (hect)	E 2001-12-31 r	E 2002-12-31 r	E 2004-12-31 r	E 2005-12-31 r
Holders of Vatican Citizenship	VC		...	532	555	561	557
Cardinals		VC	...	59	57	62	58
Clergy of the Pontifical Representations		VC	...	272	293	291	293
Other Clery		VC	...	58	57	59	62
Swiss Guard		VC	...	94	104	101	101
Other Lay Persons		VC	...	49	44	48	43
Persons without the Vatican Citizenship	NVC		...	269	255	248	246
Vatican City	VAT		44	801	810	809	803

This proves that the Vatican is the worst liar on the planet because it claims to be a country when it does not even meet the qualification of population criteria by the United Nations , read more here

Beside the core Vatican City, further buildings and plots of land (like Castel Gandolfo) are exterritorial properties of the Holy See; they do not belong to the territory of the Vatican City. About 3,100 people reside in these buildings. (www.vatican.va) http://pope-ratz.blogspot.ca/2011/05/amnesty-international-names-vatican-in.html

Benedict XVI and his Vatican Curia members and his Cardinals and Bishops who carry Vatican passports cannot vote nor run for office in Rome. Benedict XVI has no papal authority in Rome or in Italy. Even the young Italian students of (former pontifical university) La Sapienza University rejected his papal visit (he had to cancel) and they refused to hear the voice or speech of Pope Benedict XVI at their convocation because of his “mistake in the past”, read more here http://pope-ratz.blogspot.ca/2008/01/benedict-xvi-rejected-by-romes-sapienza.html.

Benedict XVI keeps declaring that his number one enemy is “secularism” so he should be the first one to smell and see that Rome is a secular city and Italy is a secular country and therefore the Catholic Church must now be called the VCC “Vatican Catholic Church” and cease forever being called RCC “Roman Catholic Church”.

Benedict XVI commits geographical plagiarism and likewise his Vatican Pied Pipers commits geographical plagiarism if they continually refer to Catholics as “Roman Catholics” because they are deceiving the world that the Vatican and Rome are identical places when in reality they are not one and not the same geographically, politically or spiritually.

Zenit.org (founded by Fr. Maciel the favorite serial pedophile priest of John Paul II) that reports about the daily life of the Pope must stop calling itself as “The World seen from Rome” but it should call itself, “The World seen from the Vatican”. John L. Allen Jr. used to call his column “The Word from Rome” because he lived there and had unlimited access to the Vatican which he bragged about here http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2010/11/premier-vaticanista-john-l-allen-jr.html while none of the Italian victims of the JP2 Army were allowed to peek inside the door of the Vatican after their long walk across Italy to go and meet with Benedict XVI http://pope-ratz.blogspot.ca/. No surprise there because Benedict XVI meets only with royalties and millionnaires investors of the Vatican Swiss Banks and he is not really the Holy Father that Feed My Sheep but rather he has become the Thief of My Sheep, read the Vatican Billions here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011_03_01_archive.html

Almost everyone lives inside the walls of Vatican. Citizenship is granted mainly to clergy, including high dignitaries, priests, nuns, and famous Swiss Guards, a voluntary military force. There are about three thousand workers laymen who make up the majority of the workforce, but they reside outside the Vatican. The official language is Latin, the lingua franca of the Roman Empire, which remained in use by the Catholic Church. Italian and – to a lesser extent – other languages are used in general conversation, publications and broadcasts. German is the official language of the Swiss Guard. There is a separate Vatican citizenship that empowers officials to travel with Vatican passport and give them diplomatic status in the countries in which they are accredited. In late 2003, 552 persons who had citizenship of the Vatican cardinals 61, 346 other clergy, 101 members of the Pontifical Swiss Guard and 44 other lay persons (Opus Dei “lay” members). http://www.metrolic.com/vatican-the-smallest-sovereign-state-in-the-world-156250/

The Pope maybe the Bishop of Rome but there is also the Opus Dei Bishop of Rome who alone was

authorized to preside a mass in St. Peter’s Square aside from the Pope. So there are two Bishops of Rome, the Pope and the Opus Dei Bishop to whom the Pope really kowtow to – because the face of the Opus Dei is the Pope and the Phantom of the Opus Dei is the false saint Josemaria Escriva, read more here

2) Cardinal Dolan’s Vatican Deceit strategy: Entertainment Hollywood Hype

The main strategy of Vatican Deceits is to use entertainment Hollywood hype to make Catholics and the world feel-good so that no matter what crimes the popes commit like The Borgias in the recent TV series they can perpetuate and cover-up Vatican Evils. John Paul II masterfully employed this Hollywood Hype when he was a good actor as the Pope Superstar as he travelled around the world and roused millions of Catholics to chant blindly to him “JP2, we love you” http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/john-paul-ii-patron-of-pederasts-and.html

Below are updated articles that show how deceitful the Vatican and the Cardinals are in their manipulation of truth in the media. Cardinal Dolan said that “The Church is not afraid to admit its mistakes” but he refers not to current mistakes, but rather to the mistakes of 400 years ago of the Borgias recently portrayed in the entertaining TV series. Cardinal Dolan is entertaining Catholics and the world via the TV series of the Borgias produced in secret by the Opus Dei who also produced the anti-Semitic The Passion of the Christ. And the Opus Dei used the same actor (who played the good Jesuit in The Mission movie) to portray the bad Pope Borgia, just to spite at the Jesuits whom they are so resentful and covetous about.

Cardinal Dolan is a clone of JP2 because that is what John Paul II did in order to cover-up his thousands of perpetual pedophile priests during his longest papacy – he “entertained” hundreds of millions of Catholics with canonizations after canonization in papal feel-good deceitful spectacles in St. Peter’s Square -- just like Benedict XVI did last Sunday when he canonized centuries old saints like the autochtone Kateri Tekawitha of the 17^th century. It’s true that the Catholic Church is more than 200 years old outdated as the late Cardinal Martini said, see news updates below. John Paul II and Benedict XVI have a penchant for reincarnating not only the flesh of Christ but of reincarnating centuries old dead people as saints. Catholic Zombies for Halloween, anyone? And those criminal perpetual pedophile priests continue to be wizards of Christ just like criminal Bishop Finn. The Sacrament of the Eucharist is a tool of injustice in the world because none of these Vatican criminals are rotting in jail like Sandusky, read http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/07/ncaa-penn-state-more-moral-than-vatican.html.

Like Heil Satanas JP2 http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2009_12_01_archive.html Cardinal Dolan does not speak about the current mistakes of the VCC Vatican Catholic Church but rather he segues and focus to centuries old mistakes of the Borgias just like Benedict also blamed the Devil for the most heinous crimes of the JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army. Cardinal Dolan also does not speak about New York’s Catholic Diocese manipulation of New York government laws to not extend the statute of limitation so that his diocese will not pay millions of dollars of compensation to perpetual pedophile priests’ victims http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/06/new-yorks-short-statute-of-limitation.html. To imitate and inject Hollywood-hype into Vatican Catholicism, Cardinal Dolan teamed up with entertainer Stephen Colbert at Fordham University.

Like Cardinal Dolan, the high paying job of Vatican Pied Pipers especially John L. Allen Jr. and Catholic League Bill Donohue is to make Catholics and the world feel-good (like the TV series of the Borgias) about current VCC Vatican Catholic Church crimes. And now the Synod of Bishops are in the Vatican manipulating Vatican Deceits and repackaging them to deceive Catholics and the world in the 21^st century by using current jargons and media entertainment (like the Borgias).

SEE news updates below about Cardinal Dolan

Cardinal Dolan and other New York bishops are spending an estimated $100,000 a year to well over $1 million, sources say, on lobbying the state assembly to prevent an extension of the statute of limitations on sexual abuse, which would result in more lawsuits and more dioceses declaring bankruptcy. Read more here http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/

Criminal Bishop Finn is vehement in hanging onto his princely job and none of his Bishops colleagues now in the Bishops Synod are asking him to resign asap and disappear from the face of the earth with Fr. Ratigan whom he shielded, read our related article http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/11/bishop-finn-makes-devils-bowels-smell.html.

Even Vatileaks is a sham and an entertainment farce (vis-à-vis serious Wikileaks), how on earth can a butler steal "hundreds of thousands of documents" if not with the Vatican's own truck? read our related article here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/06/vatileaks-compilation-secrets-of.html

3) Australia Jesuit blames “Original Sin” for phenomenal JP2 Army – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army slammed by Police and Inquiry in Australia

Fr. Andrew Hamilton used to be a good critic of the Pope but now he has become another Opus Dei janitor like the Jesuit janitor Fr. Lombardi in the Vatican. Fr. Hamilton is the consulting editor of famous Australian Eureka and he now follows the strategy of the two most famous Benedict’s, Benedict XVI and Fr. Benedict Groeschel who blamed the Devil and the victims respectively ====== Read Fr. Andrew Hamilton’s full article below that imitates John Allen Jr.’s feel-good tactic to make Catholics feel-good and not disgust for Vatican Evils.

To soften and segue the Australian Police and the government inquiry on their discovery of the most heinous crimes against children in Australia – that “CATHOLIC clergy commit six times as much abuse as those in the rest of the churches combined”, Hamilton is deflating anger and disgust against the church by entertaining them with Hollywood Hype, with a nice photo of the apple with a bite in his article as he blames “Original Sin” and myths and all kinds of religious trash to counter the truthful and harsh statements by the Police and the government’s discoveries that “AT LEAST one in 20 Catholic priests in Melbourne is a child sex abuser, although the real figure is probably one in 15” and that the Church is "a holy and unholy mess”. See news updates below

Jesuit Andrew Hamilton makes the Australian clergy abuse like a “musing” entertainment like John Allen who compared the child abuse like “fashion” . Fr. Andrew says “But it prompts musing about the ways in which evil actions work out in a group…” Only “musing”? That delicious red apple in his article complements Benedict XVI’s blaming the Devil in the Garden of Eden here, see his full article below with our emphasis highlighted.

This is the crux of Andrew Hamilton’s article invoking (and abusing) Christ’s name so that the Police and government inquiry in Australia becomes as delicious as eating a red apple. We underline his key words as Opus Dei janitor sweetly wiping away the most heinous crimes of the JP2 Army in Australia.

But in its Christian context the universality of original sin is a cause for optimism because we are healed from it by Christ. Neither individuals nor groups are doomed by fate. We are never helpless victims or collaborators of groups tainted by the evil that has been done by them. The evil that's been done can be repented of, apologised for, its causes addressed and reconciliation sought by attending justly and compassionately to its victims.¸

Jesuit Andrew Hamilton is a pathological Vatican Pied Piper when he says that “original sin is a cause for optimism because we are healed from it by Christ”. All prisons in the world would be empty today if all victims are simply healed by Christ and that criminals can simply repent and apologise and do not need to go to jail to pay for their crimes. This confirms our article a few years ago that Catholic “Forgiveness is a tool of injustice and that “Sin and crimes are not synonymous=. The Sacrament of Confession is a hoax that priests can forgive sins and criminals can go scot-free. The Sacrament of Eucharist is also a hoax because finite mortal men cannot reincarnate anyone and not especially the Infinite Creator. Vatican Evils are perpetuated by Vatican Deceits of the Sacraments administered by deceitful priests like Andrew Hamilton and propagated by Vatican Pied Pipers like John L. Allen. Jr. and Goliath-bully Bill Donohue.

This shows the main difference with Vatican Evils and secular justice. Sandusky could not simply say to his victims that they are “not helpless” and that they are “healed by Christ” and that his crimes “been done can be repented and apologised for” and therefore he does not need to spend time in jail.

Jesuit Andrew Hamilton proves us right and our article right that -

NCAA & Penn State more moral than Vatican. Sports is more moral than John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Vatican Titanic sinking in moral bankruptcy http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/

Updated October 21, 2012

The Vatican and Rome are not one and the same. The Vatican and Rome are no longer synonymous. The Vatican is the smallest theocratic, autocracy, ‘it is not a democracy’ country while Rome is the secular city of the democratic state of Italy. Vatican Pied Pipers must stop writing that the “Pope summons bishops, nuncios to Rome”. The correct way is “Pope summons bishops, nuncios to the Vatican”. The last time that “All roads lead to Rome” was during the longest papacy (27 years) of John Paul II when he was obsessed with building his legacy as “JP2 the Great” (to match King Herod the Great) and when he glorified in Rome his favorite criminals Cardinal Bernard Law and Fr. Marcial Maciel (his two evil Achilles Heels) and when he with Cardinal Josef Ratzinger together covered-up thousands of perpetual pedophile priests of his JP2 Army - John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army through his Latin addiction Crimen Sollicitationis http://pope-ratz.blogspot.ca/2007_05_01_archive.html

Vatican Pied Pipers must also stop referring to the "Roman Curia" because the papal administration is now limited to the little "Vatican Curia". Italy has declared property taxes on all Vatican properties in Rome ...therefore Roman Curia is a thing of the past...at last, the glory that was Rome for the Tsar Pope Emperor is of another day long gone by...

Today the Vatican is shrinking to its own palpable walls as Italy has stripped the Vatican Titanic of “an historic tax exemption from 2013 after the government upheld a divisive decree under close scrutiny from EU watchdogs” (see news updates below for October 21, 2012). “In February, the government had amended Italy's property tax law to end the Church's privileges amid rising calls for the Vatican to share in debt crisis sacrifices and in the face of intense scrutiny from the European Commission”. Money talks, indeed. The 1.2 billion Catholics should learn from Italy’s government and Italy’s La Sapienza University students read about it here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/04/hypocrite-benedict-silenced-outspoken.html and stop sending their hard earned American dollars to support the narcissistic lifestyle of the misogynist Pope and his Mammon-worshipping Cardinals and autocratic Opus Dei power-hungry cronies… who are obsessed with canonizing John Paul II the Great, Heil Satanas
http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/04/satanas-jp2-blood-worshipped-in.html

Read about the Vatican billions here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011_03_01_archive.html

Today, as the Vatican Titanic is sinking in moral bankruptcy, the Last Tsar of the Vatican, Benedict XVI, is imposing his fading pathetic misogynist papal voice for the last time against Irish priests and American nuns and he is using his Opus Dei microphones Goliath bully Donohue and Vatican foremost Pied Piper John Allen. http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/03/john-l-allen-jr-devils-twin-21st.html

The Vatican Titanic is sinking in moral bankruptcy for gone are the days when leaders of countries kowtowed to the Pope and blindly obeyed his theocratic whims as in the 100 years or one century of Jesuit Suppression when at the stroke of a papal pen, all countries expelled all Jesuits into sea letting them die there, and the Vatican confiscated all Jesuit schools and properties. Thank God for the atheist queen of Russia who took in some Jesuits and asked them to educate her children and royal members, or else the Jesuits would be extinct today. Anyone who has not seen the movie The Mission should watch it and see how the Pope and Cardinals strategically planned the massacre of an entire tribe and Jesuit missionaries .Watch the trailer here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/10/sacred-evil-vatican-benedict-xvi-hall.html

We sin by putting our faith in princes or in the sons of men. We sin by making the True God an idol or a shield or a pillow to suit our own fancy. (See news updates below) The 1.2 billion Catholics are sinning by making John Paul II the Great as their pillow at night making novenas to the Opus Dei Golden Cow Blessed John Paul II the Great, see his worldwide golden cow statues here http://stella0maris.blogspot.ca/

SECULAR POLICE of Australia versus Catholic Church:

"Catholic clergy the worst abusers", CATHOLIC clergy commit six times as much abuse as those in the rest of the churches combined...Police slam Catholic Chruch over abuse"..his focus is firmly on the Catholic Church, which, from his description, is in a type of exclusion zone...Australia inquiry told, see news updates below.

The New Evangelization is a repackaging of Vatican deceits and Vatican evils in the 21st century with Vatican Pied Pipers Bill Donohue of Catholic League and John L. Allen as their Catholic main messengers. The hundreds of Bishops are in the Vatican to discuss on which Vatican deceits still sell to Catholics and what no longer sell and from there to form strategies on how to best deceive the 1.2 billion Catholics and the whole world before the final demise of the Vatican to a big black hole in the ground...as predicted by the Third Secret of Fatima. We will post more articles in the days to come.

The Pope has also summoned all NUNCIOS to the Vatican because they have to find a new strategy on how to use their diplomatic immunities to transfer ill-gotten wealth of despots into SECRET Vatican SWISS BANKS. We will post more articles in days to come, stay tuned.

http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2011/04/top-worst-sins-and-crimes-of-popes-in.html Vatican Crimes Exposed: Top 10 Most Evil Popes in History

Read our latest article

NCAA & Penn State more moral than Vatican. Sports is more moral than John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Vatican Titanic sinking in moral bankruptcy

http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/

Updated September 1, 2012

The Vatican is one of the last autocratic country that rules by fear, read below "The Vatican rules the Roman Catholic Church through indoctrination, control, and fear, rather than through nurturing love, service, and freedom". It is time that the last roman Catholic Tsar is dethroned by the United Nations removing the statute of the Vatican as a "country".

Secular Governments oppose Vatican dogmas and laws. Germany bans circumcision. See news updates below.

Updated July 15, 2012

The smallest country of the Vatican does not allow women and children to live within its walls but it controls the sex and the conscience of 1.2 billion Catholics and it condemns the use of contraception as grave sin . Religions haves always controlled their followers through sex, i.e. the Catholic Church forbids masturbation and the use of contraception and sex must be performed only for the purpose of having babies. To the homosexual few hundred men within the Vatican, women have no rights whatsoever over their bodies except to “obey their husbands” and that sex must be performed only for the procreation of children. The Vatican bans contraception and preaches that sex is only for procreation. But Melinda Gates has come forward as “women’s voice” worldwide in the free use and distribution of contraception against the will of the Vatican and the Pope’s doctrines and Catholics sex laws. Dare the Pope ban Melinda Gates who is practising Catholic from receiving communion now? The United Nations will do humanity a great favour by removing the Vatican as a “country” because it is only one building occupied only by a few hundred homosexual GAY male. Microsoft has more followers and users worldwide than 1.2 billion Catholics, so should Microsoft be also considered as a “country”? Read our related article,

Melinda Gates versus Benedict XVI: who’s more “like Christ”? Melinda Gates saves lives of 200 million women while Benedict XVI sits in out-of-touch-with-reality Vatican Throne

http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2012/07/vatican-titanic-hit-by-melinda-gates.html

The secular state and totalitarian religious regimes obviously contradict each other. The secular country of Germany has recently banned religious circumcision on the grounds it causes bodily harm to babies thus ending the ancient 6,000 year old Old Testament Abrahamic practise that even Jesus Christ subjected himself to but which St. Paul later denounced. This has sparked anger among Muslim and Jewish citizens who cited their religious freedom. Since the ruling in Cologne, Germany; the Jewish Hospital in Berlin has stopped all ritual circumcisions, see news article below.

Read articles on news out of Germany below defying religious laws of 6,000 years..

Read our related article on Vatileaks where a German magazine, Titanic, put on its cover Benedict XVI who has just taken a leak over his white papal robe. http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/06/vatileaks-compilation-secrets-of.html

July 14, 2012

The size of the Vatican is half that of the Washington Mall in Washington, D.C., and its population is half that of a USA High School. Only a few hundred only-male homosexual GAYS live within the Vatican walls and women and children are forbidden to enter and live inside this “smallest country” see aerial image here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/05/is-vatican-state-or-country-it-is-only.html Is the Vatican a “country” or is it the biggest farce within the United Nations and the loudest papal fart on the face of the earth in the 21^st century? http://pope-ratz.blogspot.ca/2011/05/amnesty-international-names-vatican-in.html The United Nations was formed to fight the fascists Nazis and it is time it lived up to its ideals and revokes the Vatican country formed by the fascists Hitler and Mussolini. An Indian priest recently wrote that the Vatican “emerged unscathed from the second world war thanks to the notorious neutrality it maintained with the two horrendous dictators: Hitler and Mussolini. In fact, few remember today that the papal state of Vatican City was granted to the Church by Mussolini in return for its acceptance of fascist authority”, see his article below. He writes that the Vatican “is an inflexible iron-frame with a cold sense of history that can rebuff its enemies with a bizarre patience. At the same time, it is also a highly malleable—almost amoebic—system that bends to the times with strategies so subtle that they remain invisible for centuries. It is the canniest self-perpetuating bureaucracy of the world. That is how it has withstood the turbulent forces of history ever since Emperor Constantine transformed it into the master of the Roman Empire in AD 313 through the Edict of Milan. One signature made the underdog top dog. The Church has never looked back…. The point is, the Church is a tough nut to crack.” But the United Nations can crack that Vatican nut because the United Nations can end the status of the “country” of the Vatican and The Hague can bring Benedict XVI to face his crimes against humanity http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2011/05/full-text-of-criminal-charges-against.html and http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/09/hague-is-asked-to-investigate-vatican.html

No babies are born within the country of the Vatican and therefore it is not a “country” - why can’t those immense nations of millions of people like USA, China and Russia in the United Nations not comprehend this that the Vatican is only a few hundred Opus Dei all-boys club and not a viable country? When a nun in India becomes pregnant by a priest, she is asked by the church to abort the baby, as she wrote in her autobiography “A child is not born in the church…” (see articles below), and look now, there is hypocrite Pope Benedict XVI suppressing American women who are not fighting enough “against abortion” in the USA, read our compilation here

Vatican attacks American nuns: A compilation. USA nuns live Gospel, serve the poor and sick...while Benedict XVI lives in luxury out-of-touch-with-reality in Vatican Bank Tower

http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/04/vatican-attacks-american-nuns.html The Indian nun wrote that “ There is no new life in the church”, and she’s right that there’s no new life within the church nor in the Vatican Church and therefore the Vatican is not a “country”.

We are in the 21^st century and it’s time we recognize the facts of 2,000 years of crimes committed by the popes and the Vatican Evils and it’s time we get rid of their papal farts once and for all especially the papal farts of Benedict XVI who committed crimes against humanity now pending at The Hague http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2011/02/nazis-of-hitler-and-roman-catholic.html

and it’s time the world smelled the biggest papal farts of John Paul II the Great who elevated criminal Cardinal Bernard Law to Rome after he resigned in disgrace as Archbishop of Boston for confessing in public that he transferred 80 pedophile priests from one parish to another and who will soon be the biggest Opus Dei Golden Cow in the world scattering his papal farts and papal dung everywhere http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/04/hypocrite-benedict-silenced-outspoken.html.

Read about the Vatican billions here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011_03_01_archive.html

The London Famuily Planning population control conference just started in England and Melinda Gates has spearheaded birth control raising awareness and distributing contraceptives for free to hundreds of millions of women, and contraceptives are what the Vatican condemns? read articles below. The Vatican is only one ancient medieval building for an exclusive misogynist Opus Dei boys-club praying Pharisaic Latin medieval prayers and reinforcing medieval doctrines and dogmas that condemn people into the fires of Hell worse than Hitler’s gas chambers for the Jews during the Holocaust . The Nazis of Hitler and the Roman Catholic Church of Benedict XVI are similar: They both burn human beings in Auschwitz and in Hell http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2011/02/nazis-of-hitler-and-roman-catholic.html

How can the United Nations allow the Vatican to be a “country” and allow it to use and abuse its “diplomatic immunity” to hoard despot’s ill-gotten wealth in SECRET Vatican Swiss Banks and allow the Vatican as the last totalitarian Regime to send billions of non-baptised people in the fires of Hell? Read article below by an Indian priest, Peter’s House Is Broken, below.

The Vatican has beatified John Paul II and is about to make him as the fastest tracking saint or biggest Opus Dei Golden Cow to the whole world… therefore it is time the world stops worshipping false saints in the 21^st century, especially false saint John Paul II. So what if John Paul II “healed” that Polish nun (she’s ready to join her spouse the Christ anyway, what’s the big deal). The fact remains that John Paul II cannot heal any of the 100,000s of thousands of victims of his own JP2 Amy – John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army. All his writings are heartless towards children and his Theology of the Body is useless for children, read more here http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/04/why-john-paul-ii-is-opus-deis-patron.html

John Paul II is the biggest Opus Dei Golden Cow and those Opus Dei controllers are sneering at the world as they also laugh on their way to the Vatican Swiss Banks where they hoard despots’ ill-gotten wealth hence, Opus Dei who controls the Vatican and the papacy, oppress poor people, poor women and perpetuates poor countries. Opus Dei is the worst Catholic caste system and it is time that the United Nations ends the Vatican as a “country” so that Opus Dei will not wield their stupid caste system all over the world either.

Pope Benedict XVI Josef Ratzinger is a criminal pope, let us pray that The Hague will try him now - before he dies, and the voice of the Vatican Evil Empire must be silenced once and for all by the United Nations. If the “Pray, Pay, Obey” Catholics want to evangelize the papal farts of the Vatican, let them do it at their own expense, they are wealthy enough to pay for a taste of the Prime Meat of Christ in the Eucharist each week. If each Catholic gave a $ dollar each week, that is 52 weeks times 1.2 billion Catholics, that is a guaranteed income of the Vatican of $62.4 billion dollars…going where exactly? To feed the Opus Dei Golden Cow Pope and his Opus Dei cronies living the lifestyle of the rich and famous at the Vatican?

May 1 & September 11 anniversaries for SNAP and JP2 Army victims. SNAP ad in New York Times should be framed and permanently exhibited in all churches, schools and children venues: U.S. Catholic Bishops and Child Sex Crimes http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/07/may-1-september-11-anniversaries-for.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

Read our related article 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

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/why-john-paul-ii-is-opus-deis-patron.html

==========

THE ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST

Council of Elvira 306 AD

71. Those who sexually abuse boys may not commune even when death approaches.

1700 years of Tradition!

ANOTHER CHRIST

"As an alter Christus, the priest is profoundly united to the Word of the Father who, in becoming incarnate took the form of a servant, he became a servant (Phil 2: 5-11). The priest is a servant of Christ, in the sense that his existence, configured to Christ ontologically, acquires an essentially relational character: he is in Christ, for Christ and with Christ, at the service of humankind. Because he belongs to Christ, the priest is radically at the service of all people: he is the minister of their salvation, their happiness and their authentic liberation, developing, in this gradual assumption of Christ's will, in prayer, in "being heart to heart" with him. Therefore this is the indispensable condition for every proclamation, which entails participation in the sacramental offering of the Eucharist and docile obedience to the Church." - Pope Benedict XVI 24 June 2009

QUESTION:

What did the Roman Catholic priest say to the altar boy as he pushed his penis up the boy’s anus?

ANSWER:

“Body of Christ”!

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

Must-read articles for July 14, 2012

Peter’s House Is Broken

INDIA
Outlook India

The meek shall inherit the earth? Not if the Church has its way.

Paul Zacharia

The Catholic church is an ancient monolith and has been in the game of power, wealth, cadre- and institution-building for so long that nothing can change it except its own perceptions of survival. It is an inflexible iron-frame with a cold sense of history that can rebuff its enemies with a bizarre patience. At the same time, it is also a highly malleable—almost amoebic—system that bends to the times with strategies so subtle that they remain invisible for centuries. It is the canniest self-perpetuating bureaucracy of the world. That is how it has withstood the turbulent forces of history ever since Emperor Constantine transformed it into the master of the Roman Empire in AD 313 through the Edict of Milan. One signature made the underdog top dog. The Church has never looked back.

It survived the tempestuous challenge of Martin Luther and the Reformation. Its expertise in conducting immense and long-standing wars is simply mind-boggling. The Crusades are just one example. It emerged unscathed from the second world war thanks to the notorious neutrality it maintained with the two horrendous dictators: Hitler and Mussolini. In fact, few remember today that the papal state of Vatican City was granted to the Church by Mussolini in return for its acceptance of fascist authority.The point is, the Church is a tough nut to crack. It remains doubtful if it can be reformed even if the Pope were inclined to try. Because, its empire is today flung far across continents, nations, cultures and civilisations, and there are the machinations of countless vested interests at work. The Pope might be able to ensure that the cardinal principles of faith remain uniform and sacrosanct. But even that is not easy. For instance, saints deposed by the Vatican years ago are still venerated in Kerala. The Kerala church finds them useful. As for celibacy, if a priest gives it up, what can the Church do? Next to nothing.

Like all religious hierarchies that have gained influence in the modern world, the Catholic church too, by and large, keeps word and deed apart. By word, I mean the word of Jesus, which is the bedrock of the Church. Perhaps it isn’t possible at all to make the two one if you wish to obtain and retain great power and great wealth. For who can live today the beggarly life that Jesus lived and expect to be taken seriously by presidents and prime ministers?

Read more here http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/07/vatican-titanic-hit-by-melinda-gates.html

The Church is as worldly an institution as—a comparison to aid clarity—the United States of America, holding monopoly over an unbeatable brandname: Jesus. The J-brand, sedulously built up over 2,000 years, is so powerful that the blatant aberrations of the Church go unnoticed under its overpowering spiritual glamour. Without its charisma, the Church would collapse like a house of cards. Therefore, the last thing the Church wants is to let people find the real Jesus: a poor, wandering dreamer and revolutionary who just lost out.

But somewhere in the glitzy interior of this behemoth, Jesus’s civilising messages—love and mercy, for example—continue to survive in their many guises. That is how the Church continues to be able to legitimise its materialistic goals. It’s a simple question: if you are poor, can you help others? The answer is, no. You need to be wealthy to be charitable, to build educational institutions, hospitals, orphanages, old people’s homes. Not to mention, the churches, seminaries, convents, pilgrim-centres and so on.

But there comes a point, as with the church in Kerala, when the goal of profit-making overrides all else, as happens with any heartless business empire. And the spiritual message becomes just a gaudy, conspicuous robe to cover the currency bundles. But luck is with the Church. Because the faithful don’t see this as a problem. The more the glitter and the pomp, the better. For them, the church is more status symbol than spiritual center. Without the splendour of the rituals and ceremonies, their weddings and funerals will turn into shabby, boring affairs. The Church for them is a grand event-producer.

The Church can be reformed only from the inside because it is a closed and closely guarded system—and afforded further protection by its minority status under the Indian Constitution. The Church’s most consistent critic in Kerala, Joseph Pulikunnel, calls for all church assets—thought to be worth a few billions—to be transferred to the laity. But his is a utopian dream. For, the laity are no saints. They are, on the other hand, congenital sinners! And they have more use for money than the priests!

“When The Priests Drink, What Spews Out Is Absolute Filth”

INDIA
Outlook India

Sixty-seven-year-old Sister Mary Chandy walked out of the Congregation of the Daughters of Presentation of Mary in Chevayur, Kozhikode, 14 years ago. She wrote her autobiography, Nanma Niranjavale Swasthi (Peace to the One Filled with Grace), in April 2012. Excerpts from an interview:

What did you do after you left the convent?

I only had the clothes that I was wearing. I did not have any money. I remember envying men for they can sleep at night under a tree but a woman cannot do that. I would visit houses and ask for donations. My dream was to open an orphanage and look after unwanted children.

Is there one incident that made you quit the order?

There are so many incidents that hurt me. After I left the convent, I went through many trials and tribulations. It has been a long journey outside.

You have said that the priests drink during festive occasions?

Yes, both the priests and nuns drink wine and foreign liquor. When the priests drink, what spews from their mouths is absolute filth.

Sins Of Our Fathers

INDIA
Outlook India

Do nuns and priests have civil rights? The canon law and the Catholic Church say the professed people have no right to sue the Church. It took six brave sisters of Little Flower Convent, Narakkal, in Ernakulam district, to prove it otherwise. They created history of sorts when they sued a Syro-Malabar bishop of the Ernakulam diocese and the priest of St Mary’s Church for criminal intimidation and forgery.

In the normal course, the sisters would have had to take up their problems with the ecclesiastical forums and, under the precept of obedience, listen to them. What made the sisters take this drastic step? The sisters run two schools and a poor home on three acres of land in Narakkal. From the late 1930s, successive parish priests of St Mary’s church had been helping them to manage the school. The sisters knew the priests collected money illegally as donations but they kept quiet for awhile. In 1971, unknown to the sisters, the priest of St Mary’s church forged documents and transferred the management of the Little Flower School to the church. Then, after over 30 years, in 2007, the sisters were asked to shift their second school, St Joseph’s, to another location.

To Cast The First Stone

INDIA
Outlook India

“Later, I’m taken to the priest’s room for coffee. While I’m having coffee sitting on the cot, the only place in the room to sit, he comes and embraces me hard, almost suffocating me. When I struggle to escape from his clutches, he squeezes my breasts and asks me to show them to him. ‘Have you seen a man?’ Stunned, I shake my head ‘no’. In no time, he undresses himself.”

Sister Jesme in her book Amen: The Autobiography of a Nun

***
“The convents and nunneries are being converted into brothels. The priests have sex with the nuns at night in these convents. Because of these acts, the chastity of the priests and nuns has come under suspicion. Their love for God has shrunk...some of the clergy protect their chastity by watching pornography and reading pornographic material. They lose themselves in this habit. These books and DVDs are kept in secret places and can’t be found easily.”

Father Shibu Kalamparambil in his memoir Oru Vaidikante Hrudayamitha (The Heart of a Priest)

***
“The cry of a baby came from the bathroom of one of the inner rooms along with the sobs of a woman. We used our might to force open the bathroom door and what we saw would break anyone’s heart. A nun who had given birth to a child was pushing the head of the baby into the closet. The bathroom was filled with blood. The legs of the child, which were sticking out of the closet, were kicking for life.”

Sister Mary Chandy in her autobiography Nanma Niranjavale Swasthi (Peace to the One filled with Grace)

“A Life Is Not Born In The Church. The Nun Is Forced To Abort...”

INDIA
Outlook India

The priest, whose memoirs were published in 2010, on the sexual misconduct of priests and financial irregularities

Outlook Interviews Father Shibu Kalamparambil

Father Shibu Kalamparambil, 40, was defrocked from the Vicentian Congregation after 12 years as a priest. His memoir Oru Vaidikante Hrudayamitha (The Heart of a Priest) was published in 2010.

Why did you decide to write the book?

I had aired my views about the sexual misconduct of priests and financial irregularities many times but they were not willing to correct themselves. So I wrote this book and for four years I showed it to near and dear ones and to those inside the Church. They advised me not to publish it, they said it would be catastrophic. They kept saying that things will be corrected but they never were so I published my book.

What is the Church establishment’s response when a priest makes a complaint?

The complaints are dealt with by the bishops and they influence the laity. If a woman among the laity becomes pregnant because of a priest or a bishop, they build houses or give money to them and hush it up.

What happens when a nun gets pregnant?

A life is not born in the church. When it comes to the nuns, they either make her abort the child or she is sent out of the church. If the nun tries to take it up, then she is ostracised by society.

MELINDA GATES war against Vatican contraception !

Melinda Gates takes aim at the Catholic Church in her fight to improve access to contraception worldwide. Photo: Reuters

BILLIONAIRE Melinda Gates has thrown down the gauntlet to the Vatican with a vow to dedicate the rest of her life to improving access to contraception around the globe.

READ our related article Vatican Titanic hit by Melinda Gates iceberg! Melinda Gates saves millions of women while Benedict XVI wallows in luxury. Vatican sinking in moral bankruptcy. http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/07/vatican-titanic-hit-by-melinda-gates.html

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Gates, who was a speaker at the London Summit on Family Planning organised by her foundation in conjunction with the UK government and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), said that since she announced her new direction a few weeks ago she had been inundated with messages of support from Catholic women, including nuns.

"A church is made up of its members, and one of the things this campaign might do is help women speak out. I've had thousands of women come on to websites and say" 'I'm a Catholic, but I believe in contraception.' It's going to be women voting with their feet."

Gates said that in the west the bishops said one thing, but ordinary Catholics did another. "In my country 82% of Catholics say contraception is morally acceptable. So let the women in Africa decide.

The choice is up to them."

She admitted, though, that she had agonised over whether to speak out in defiance of the church hierarchy. "Of course I wrestled with this. As a Catholic I believe in this religion, there are amazing things about this religion, amazing moral teachings that I do believe in, but I also have to think about how we keep women alive. I believe in not letting women die, I believe in not letting babies die, and to me that's more important than arguing about what method of contraception [is right]."

Being a woman and a mother were at the heart of her decision to focus on family planning, said Gates, who has three children aged 16, 13 and 10. "It would have been nice to stay as a private citizen but part of the reason why I'm so public is that it does take a woman to speak out about these issues.

"Why have women not been at the heart of the global health agenda? It's because we've not had enough women speaking out. We need to give a voice to women all over the planet.

"This will be my life's work."

Wednesday's conference, which brings together 250 delegates from around the world including Jakaya Kikwete, the president of Tanzania, Chantal Compaoré, first lady of Burkina Faso, and the Bangladeshi minister of health, AFM Ruhal Haque, is the launch of what the Gates Foundation is billing "a groundbreaking effort to make affordable, lifesaving contraceptive, information, services and supplies available to an additional 120 million girls and women in the world's poorest countries by 2020". Gates announced on Wednesday that her foundation was pouring $560m over the next eight years into improving access to birth control. The UK government is pledging to double its efforts on family planning, up from its current £90m a year to £180m a year.

Vatican Titanic hit by Melinda Gates iceberg! Melinda Gates saves millions of women while Benedict XVI wallows in luxury. Vatican sinking in moral bankruptcy. http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/07/vatican-titanic-hit-by-melinda-gates.html

-=====================

St. Paul was against circumcision

St. Paul more explicitly denounced the practice, rejecting and condemning those who promoted circumcision to Gentile Christians. Paul warned that the advocates of circumcision were "false brothers".(Gal 2:4) He accused Galatian Christians who advocated circumcision of turning from the Spirit to the flesh: "Are you so foolish, that, whereas you began in the Spirit, you would now be made perfect by the flesh?" (Gal 3:3) He accused advocates of circumcision of wanting to make a good showing in the flesh (Gal 6:12) and of glorying or boasting of the flesh (Gal 3:13). Some believe Paul wrote the entire Epistle to the Galatians attacking circumcision and any requirement for the keeping of Jewish law by Christians, saying in chapter five: "Mark my words! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all." (Galatians 5:2). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circumcision_controversy_in_early_Christianity

German Jews and Muslims blast circumcision ban

The German government has stepped in to try to settle a controversy in the country over the right of some religious groups to practise ritual circumcision.

Earlier this month, a lower court banned the practice on the grounds it causes bodily harm to babies, sparking anger among Muslim and Jewish citizens who cited their religious freedom.

The government has pledged to find a way around the ban "as a matter of urgency," but people such as Mimi Lipsis and her husband, Leo, remain concerned about the situation.

Their young boys have been circumcised in keeping with their Jewish faith, but if she gives birth to another, she might not be able to have him circumcised in Germany.

The controversy stems from a recent decision in a regional court in Cologne that made the circumcision of boys a criminal act, saying it causes bodily harm. The ruling, which does not apply on a national level, has left the Jewish community shocked and outraged.

"I don't think there's any bodily harm," Mimi Lipsis told CBC News. "I think in Judaism, when the child is seven days old, it's not a physical harm.… It puts a very sad light on Germans and on Germany."

The decision in Cologne to criminalize circumcision — in which the foreskin of the penis is removed with a scalpel — was finalized after a doctor carried out the procedure on a four-year-old Muslim boy in a way that led to medical complications, prompting an investigation and charges against the doctor. He was acquitted.

Martin Boese, a University of Bonn law professor, said the court based its decision on whether the need for the procedure justifies the surgery.

"The difference between circumcision and surgery is that there is a reason to do a surgery — it's for the health of the child," Boese said. "In this case, the court says religious reasons are not enough to justify this kind of surgery."

Boese said the ruling also raised questions about the religious rights of the child. "I think this is the first case where this question comes up: Are the parents entitled to give their consent or not?"

In their ruling, the Cologne judges concluded circumcision went "against the interests of a child to decide later for himself what religion he wishes to belong to."

Serdar Yazar, a spokesman with an organization that represents Turkish migrants in Germany, said the ruling is a slap in the face for Muslims.

"The perception is that it's a kind of Islamophobia," he said, "and it's a sign Islam is not part of Germany — that Muslims don't belong to German society."

'Religious freedom'

For the Lipsis family, the issue transcends both religions.
"Germany can't afford this level of Islamophobia, either," Mimi Lipsis said. "It's not about Judaism or about Islam in particular. It's about religious freedom in a broader sense."

Since the ruling, the Jewish Hospital in Berlin has stopped all ritual circumcisions.

A surgeon at the hospital told CBC News he has had to cancel five circumcisions since the ruling in Cologne, for fear that he would face a similar charge.

"On one hand, you have freedom of religion and parental rights. On the other, you have criminal law that says you can only perform this procedure if it's for the well-being of the child," Martin Mueller said.

"But the question is, what is actually good for the child: preventing bodily harm or providing religious freedom?"

=========
POPE JOHN PAUL II & POPE BENEDICT XVI SAY TALMUDIC JEWS ARE THEIR BROTHERS:

The Talmud is Judaism's holiest book (actually a collection of books).

Its authority takes precedence over the Old Testament in Judaism.

Evidence of this may be found in the Talmud itself, Erubin 21b (Soncino edition): "My son, be more careful in the observance of the words of the Scribes than in the words of the Torah (Old Testament)."

Jewish scholar Hyam Maccoby, in "Judaism on Trial," quotes Rabbi Yehiel ben Joseph:

"Further, without the Talmud, we would not be able to understand passages in the Bible ... God has handed this authority to the sages and tradition is a necessity as well as scripture. The Sages also made enactments of their own ... anyone who does not study the Talmud cannot understand Scripture."

Second century Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai, one of Judaism’s very greatest rabbis and a creator of Kabbalah, sanctioned pedophilia—permitting molestation of baby girls even younger than three! He proclaimed,

“A proselyte who is under the age of three years and a day is permitted to marry a priest.” 1

Yebamoth 60b,

Subsequent rabbis refer to ben Yohai’s endorsement of pedophilia as "halakah," or binding Jewish law. 2 Yebamoth 60b

Has Rabbi ben Yohai, child rape advocate, been disowned by modern Jews? Hardly. Today, in ben Yohai’s hometown of Meron, Israel, tens of thousands of orthodox and ultra-orthodox Jews gather annually for days and nights of singing and dancing in his memory.
References to pedophilia abound in the Talmud. They occupy considerable sections of Treatises Kethuboth and Yebamoth and are enthusiastically endorsed by the Talmud’s definitive legal work, Treatise Sanhedrin.

The Pharisees Endorsed Child Sex

The rabbis of the Talmud are notorious for their legal hairsplitting, and quibbling debates. But they share rare agreement about their right to molest three year old girls. In contrast to many hotly debated issues, hardly a hint of dissent rises against the prevailing opinion (expressed in many clear passages) that pedophilia is not only normal but scriptural as well! It’s as if the rabbis have found an exalted truth whose majesty silences debate.

Because the Talmudic authorities who sanction pedophilia are so renowned, and because pedophilia as “halakah” is so explicitly emphasized, not even the translators of the Soncino edition of the Talmud (1936) dared insert a footnote suggesting the slightest criticism.

They only comment: “Marriage, of course, was then at a far earlier age than now.” 3

In fact, footnote 5 to Sanhedrin 60b rejects the right of a Talmudic rabbi to disagree with ben Yohai's endorsement of pedophilia:
"How could they [the rabbis], contrary to the opinion of R. Simeon ben Yohai, which has scriptural support, forbid the marriage of the young proselyte?" 4

1 Yebamoth 60b, p. 402.
2 Yebamoth 60b, p. 403.
3 Sanhedrin 76a.
4 In Yebamoth 60b, p. 404, Rabbi Zera disagrees that sex with girls under three years and one day should be endorsed as halakah.

=========

FREUD & PSYCHOLOGY ARE BIRTHED FROM TALMUDIC JUDAISM

A Fascination with Sex

Perusing the Talmud, one is overwhelmed with the recurrent preoccupation with sex, especially by the most eminent rabbis. Dozens of illustrations could be presented to illustrate the delight of the Pharisees to discuss sex and quibble over its minutest details.

The rabbis endorsing child sex undoubtedly practiced what they preached. Yet to this hour, their words are revered. Simeon ben Yohai is honored by Orthodox Jews as one of the very greatest sages and spiritual lights the world has ever known. A member of the earliest "Tannaim," rabbis most influential in creating the Talmud, he carries more authority to observant Jews than Moses.

Today, the Talmud’s outspoken pedophiles and child-rape advocates would doubtlessly spend hard time in prison for child molestation.

The Oedipus complex was the invention of Sigmund Freud! Freud originally discovered, in the treatments partially conducted under hypnosis, that all his patients, both male and female, had been abused children and recounted their histories in the language of symptoms. After reporting his discovery in psychiatric circles, he found himself completely shunned because none of his fellow psychiatrists was prepared to share the findings with him. Freud could not bear the isolation for long. A few months later, in 1897, he described his patients’ reports on sexual abuse as sheer fantasies attributable to their instinctual wishes.

Freud’s father was a paedophile! In a letter to his friend Wilhelm Fliess, he wrote:

“Unfortunately, my own father was one of these perverts and is responsible for the hysteria of my brother (all of whose symptoms are identifications) and those of several younger sisters. The frequency of this circumstance often makes me wonder.”

Fliess’s son, Robert Fliess exposed his own father as being another paedophile, who had sexually abused him when he was a child.

=====

THE FOUNTAIN OF PERVERSION

No Rights for Child Victims

The Pharisees were hardly ignorant of the trauma felt by molested children. To complicate redress, the Talmud says a rape victim must wait until she was of age before there would be any possibility of restitution. She must prove that she lived and would live as a devoted Jewess, and she must protest the loss of her virginity on the very hour she comes of age. “As soon as she was of age one hour and did not protest she cannot protest any more.” 10

The Talmud defends these strict measures as necessary to forestall the possibility of a Gentile child bride rebelling against Judaism and spending the damages awarded to her as a heathen - an unthinkable blasphemy! But the rights of the little girl were really of no great consequence, for,

"When a grown-up man has intercourse with a little girl it is nothing, for when the girl is less than this (three years and a day) it is as if one put the finger into the eye." The footnote says that as “tears come to the eye again and again, so does virginity come back to the little girl under three years.” Kethuboth 11b.

In most cases, the Talmud affirms the innocence of male and female victims of pedophilia. Defenders of the Talmud claim this proves the Talmud's amazing moral advancement and benevolence toward children; they say it contrasts favorably with "primitive" societies where the child would have been stoned along with the adult perpetrator.

Actually, the rabbis, from self-protection, were intent on proving the innocence of both parties involved in pedophilia: the child, but more importantly, the pedophile. They stripped a little boy of his right to "throw guilt" on his assailant and demanded complicity in sex from a little girl. By thus providing no significant moral or legal recourse for the child, the Talmud clearly reveals whose side it is on: the raping rabbi.

Pedophilia Widespread

Child rape was practiced in the highest circles of Judaism. This is illustrated from Yebamoth. 60b:

There was a certain town in the land of Israel the legitimacy of whose inhabitants was disputed, and Rabbi sent R. Romanos who conducted an inquiry and found in it the daughter of a proselyte who was under the age of three years and one day, and Rabbi declared her eligible to live with a priest.

The footnote says that she was “married to a priest” and the rabbi simply permitted her to live with her husband, thus upholding “halakah” as well as the dictum of Simeon ben Yohai,

“A proselyte who is under the age of three years and one day is permitted to marry a priest.” 12

These child brides were expected to submit willingly to sex. Yebamoth. 12b confirms that under eleven years and one day a little girl is not permitted to use a contraceptive but “must carry on her marital intercourse in the usual manner.”

In Sanhedrin 76b a blessing is given to the man who marries off his children before they reach the age of puberty, with a contrasting curse on anyone who waits longer. In fact, failure to have married off one’s daughter by the time she is 12-1/2, the Talmud says, is as bad as one who “returns a lost article to a Cuthean” (Gentile) - a deed for which “the Lord will not spare him.” 13 This passage says:

“… it is meritorious to marry off one’s children whilst minors.”

The mind reels at the damage to the untold numbers of girls who were sexually abused within Judaism during the heyday of pedophilia. Such child abuse, definitely practiced in the second century, continued, at least in Babylon, for another 900 years.

10 Kethuboth 11a.
11 Kethuboth 11b.
12 Yebamoth 60b.
13 Sanhedrin 76b.

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

Vatican Titanic is no longer the Barque of St. Peter. Vatican Ending

UNITED STATES
Pope Crimes & Vatican Evils...
Paris Arrow
Updated July 8, 2012
The Vatican Pied Piper, Sandro Magister, has recycled his article of 30 June 2006 entitled The Victorious Barque of Peter, Buffeted in Vain by Satan: In his homily for the feast of Saints Peter and Paul, Benedict XVI describes a Church “buffeted by the wind of ideologies,” but unsinkable…. This year, on July 6, 2012, Magister calls it, “The Mutineers of the Barque of Peter but added a pathological lie that Benedict XVI had something to do with the Arab Spring: The memorable lecture in Regensburg was the first demonstration of this. Benedict XVI… invoked for Muslims the revolution of the Enlightenment that Christianity has already experienced. Years later, the springtime of freedom that sprouted and immediately withered in the city squares of the Arab world confirmed that he had seen correctly…

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

SPIRITUAL LIFE: Author says Vatican rules through indoctrination, control, and fear

UNITED STATES
The Patriot Ledger
By Suzette Martinez Standring
For The Patriot Ledger

Posted Sep 01, 2012
The Vatican rules the Roman Catholic Church through indoctrination, control, and fear, rather than through nurturing love, service, and freedom, according to Father Emmett Coyne, a Roman Catholic priest. His new book, “The Theology of Fear,” exposes how far the highest church authorities have strayed from the gospel of Jesus Christ (CreateSpace, $12.25, 325 pages, July 2012). The book is available on Amazon and on www.emmettcoyne.net

“I’m on the last lap of life and eternity is facing me. It’s my last chance to speak up and speak out,” said Father Coyne, who was ordained in 1966 and is retired at age 73.

For 46 years, the Rev. Coyne’s ministry has focused on serving those in need. He was a parish priest at several New Hampshire parishes, and later traveled to more than 1,000 parishes nationally to raise awareness and money to help the poor. His conscience is disturbed at how the gospel of Jesus that teaches service on behalf of the least ones is subverted in favor of church power.

“Theology of Fear” is a well-written and easy-to-read history of the systems put into place that created the Roman Catholic Church as the only religious political entity in the world through the establishment of the Vatican city state. “I think the gospel is compromised when it is processed through a political consideration,” said the Rev. Coyne who lives in Exeter, N.H.

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

Updates for October 21, 2012

Catholic Church slammed by Vic police

AUSTRALIA
Big Pond News
Friday, October 19, 2012
Victoria Police has attacked the Catholic Church for allegedly destroying evidence of sexual abuse by clergy and being more concerned with its reputation than the welfare of abuse victims.
Deputy police commissioner Graham Ashton has told Victoria's parliamentary inquiry into abuse by religious organisations that the church places its image first and victims second.
Mr Ashton said of the 620 cases of abuse the church says it has internally upheld since 1956, none have been reported to police.
In giving evidence to the inquiry, he accused the church of 'wrapping a special process' around a member of the clergy accused of sexual abuse.

Catholic clergy the worst abusers, inquiry told

AUSTRALIA
The Age
October 19, 2012
Barney Zwartz and Jane Lee

CATHOLIC clergy commit six times as much abuse as those in the rest of the churches combined, ''and that's a conservative figure'', a child protection expert says.

Patrick Parkinson, a Sydney University law professor, told the state inquiry into how the churches handle sex abuse yesterday that the figures for the Catholic Church were strikingly out of proportion.

He proposed a 12-month amnesty from charges of perverting the course of justice if the church opened all its files on offenders alive and dead, but said those involved in cover-ups would have to resign.

Earlier, Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Graham Ashton set the inquiry's opening day alight with more broadsides against the Catholic Church's systemic obstruction of police inquiries over five decades.

Police slam Catholic Church over abuse

AUSTRALIA
Courier Mail
By Paul Mulvey
From: AAP
October 19, 2012

THE Catholic Church has put its own reputation ahead of the welfare of victims by destroying evidence of sexual abuse and failing to report accusations against the clergy, Victoria Police says.

Victoria's deputy police commissioner Graham Ashton says the church has hindered justice and not reported any case of abuse in more than 50 years, while a legal expert claims cover-ups went to the "highest level".
In damning evidence to a parliamentary inquiry on Friday, Mr Ashton said that of the 620 cases of abuse the church has internally upheld in Victoria since 1956, none had been reported to police.

He said in those 56 years, police had investigated 2110 offences committed by clergy and church workers against 519 victims, of which 370 were committed by Catholic priests or brothers. He said 87 per cent of the victims were boys aged 11 or 12.

Vic Police says Catholic Church more worried about PR than sex abuse victims

AUSTRALIA
ABC - PM
[with audio]

One of Victoria's top police officers says the Catholic Church is more interested in protecting its reputation than helping victims of sexual abuse. Deputy Police Commissioner Graham Ashton has told a Victorian parliamentary inquiry he won't believe that the church's priorities have changed until it starts reporting sex abuse cases to authorities.
Simon Lauder
Transcript

BRENDAN TREMBATH: One of Victoria's top police officers has accused the Catholic Church of being more concerned about its reputation than the interests of sexual abuse victims.
The Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Graham Ashton told a State Parliament inquiry the church's lack of cooperation and its internal system for dealing with abuse claims is hindering police investigations and helping to hide the problem.

He says until the church starts reporting abuse allegations to police he doesn't have any faith that it's serious about tackling the problem.

Simon Lauder reports from Melbourne.

SIMON LAUDER: Opening the inquiry into abuse within religious organisations, committee chair Georgie Crozier promised the inquiry is not intent on singling out any institution.

One of the first witnesses to give evidence, Deputy Police Commissioner Graham Ashton, made it clear that his focus is firmly on the Catholic Church, which, from his description, is in a type of exclusion zone.

A Song of Sinfulness

UNITED STATES
Waiting for Godot to Leave

A friend of mine has just relayed to me in depth the story of how he and his family were abused by the Church. It's not a tale of sexual abuse, but it is a horror story nonetheless - an unimaginable assault by power hungry clergy and laity, complete with cover up by bishops and filled with a kind of spiritual darkness that makes you feel sick. It has taken this family several years to begin to heal. He has asked me not to spread his story around - at least not in the written form in which he has expressed it, but I can say this much - it rings quite true. It is both rather funny and also the kind of thing that would make the pit of your stomach drop and your faith dry up.

And the villains in the piece are not the liberals. The villains are the meticulous OCD sado-masochistic "conservatives", the Latin Mass crowd, who, God bless them, will probably end up in a lower pit of hell than the Stanford Nutting-type libs, who at least have the humanity left to enjoy their sins.

And it's all about sin.

I knew a young woman who was psychologically knocked about by a similar "Super-Catholic", who practically left her at the altar without a pang of compunction. I know a certain blogger who dared to question the sanctity of a Catholic TV host and who soon learned that the Faith is far less important to most "Devout Catholics" than their politics and their own self-interest.

And I myself have seen what happens when you invest your love and your work and your care and concern into Church related organizations and people who end up turning on you. It's bad "stewardship of love" on the victim's part, certainly - but it's worse than that glib phrase indicates. It's a heart-breaking-soul-crushing experience that can sink you.

And sexual abuse is that much worse.

But there's a salvation here. It's something that dawned on me only yesterday when reading Macbeth. And that is this ...

It's just sin.

It's just our sin and theirs.

This is why we have a Church to begin with and this is why we have so much need of Jesus Christ.

We sin by putting our faith in princes or in the sons of men. We sin by making the True God an idol or a shield or a pillow to suit our own fancy. We sin when we turn against each other, when we deny the essence of love. We sin all the time.

It hurts, but it's just sin.

The Pattern

UNITED STATES
Waiting for Godot to Leave

You know, the sex scandal was typical. I don't mean that priests typically molest kids and bishops typically let them get away with it. What I mean is, the way the Church handled the sex scandal is the way they handle everything.

For example: below are all things I can vouch for in my twelve short years as a Catholic, though the names have been changed to protect the guilty - if any names are used. Some of these events I was involved in; others happened to friends.

A teacher at a Catholic grade school handles a situation very poorly in class. Mom and Dad complain to the principal. The principal responds by circling the wagons, threatening the parents, and bullying them behind closed doors. The parents complain to the pastor. The pastor responds, "I have full confidence in Principal Raw-Knuckle. This matter is entirely hers to handle as she sees fit." The problem recurs and is not fixed.

The parents move their kids to another Catholic grade school,which is run by a principal who is even worse, and by a pastor who is even more hands off. Eventually, the parents remove their children from the Catholic grade school system entirely (to save their faith, for one thing. The best indicator of adult apostasy - twelve years of Catholic education). A problem arises with a teacher at the public grade school (she was telling the kids in class to tell their parents to vote yes in the next election to allow embryonic stem cell research in our state). The parents complain to the public school principal, who sincerely apologizes and promises that he will handle the situation with the teacher, and that the issue will not arise again. "She should not be campaigning in class," he simply and plainly admits. The parents are treated professionally and courteously.

No threats, no circling the wagons, no bullying. The problem does not recur.

We're losing our faith faster than most countries as only 47pc say they are religious

IRELAND
Irish Independent
By Breda Heffernan and Colm Kelpie
Wednesday August 08 2012
THE scale of the crisis facing the church in Ireland is laid bare today in a stark survey which reveals that religious faith is plummeting.
Irish people are abandoning religion faster than almost every other country worldwide, the massive global survey on faith reveals.
Only Vietnam has seen a bigger drop in people declaring themselves to be religious over the past seven years, a period when the Catholic Church in Ireland has been rocked by sex-abuse scandals and a crisis of leadership.
Red C interviewed more than 51,000 people worldwide, including just over 1,000 people in Ireland.

Medieval Clerics Resisted Celibacy, Historians Say

UNITED KINGDOM
Science Daily
ScienceDaily (Aug. 6, 2012) — Medieval clerics did not relish the prospect of giving up sex when the Papacy tried to introduce the principle of celibacy. Resistance was widespread, it was revealed at an academic conference at the University of Huddersfield where two historians are playing a key role in developing the burgeoning study area of medieval masculinity.
Dr Pat Cullum an Dr Katherine Lewis organised the conference, entitled 'Religious Men in the Middle Ages'. It was attended by 50 delegates from 14 countries.

Now Dr Cullum and Dr Lewis -- in tandem with Dr Philippa Hoskin and Dr Joanna Huntington of the University of Lincoln -- have announced the formation of a network named 'The Bishop's Eye'.

Dr Lewis explained: "This network will foster new research into the lives, experiences and representation of medieval religious men, both those following a professional vocation -- bishops, monks and priests for example -- and laymen.

„60 procent Poolse priesters houdt celibaat niet”

POLEN
Reformatorisch Dagblad (Nederland)
WARSCHAU – Uit een sociologisch onderzoek blijkt dat meer dan 60 procent van de priesters in Polen het celibaat met de voeten treedt door het hebben van een relatie. Ongeveer 10 tot 15 procent heeft kinderen en is daar ook (financieel) verantwoordelijk voor.
Dat maakte de Poolse uitgave van het weekblad Newsweek onlangs bekend. Godsdienstsocioloog Jozef Baniak van de Universiteit van Poznan bracht de cijfers naar buiten. Een paar geleden schatte Baniak het aantal priesters met een relatie op ongeveer 15 procent.

Salvation, Righteousness, Surrender and Spirituality

UNITED STATES
Patrick J. Wall
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so — Mark Twain

Experience tells me that Twain’s words are wise. Heed his warning to reconsider and reevaluate your core assumptions and beliefs.

Most people in the United States were born into one of the monotheistic religions. The three most common are Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. I emphasize being born into a religion because our belief systems are planted into our core from birth — almost akin to a reptilian response.

Religion vs. Spirituality

Judaism, if boiled down, is about Righteousness; Christianity is about Salvation; and Islam is about Surrender. All three are core elements of western spirituality. Each share different “holy buildings”: Temples, Churches and Mosques. Each religion has a Holy Book or books interpreted with authority by Rabbis, Priests/Ministers and Mulah’s. They have different initiation rites, liturgies, languages and cemeteries. And each proposes to teach their youngest followers what to think and how to live a religious life.

But the spiritual life is very different. The spiritual life, in complete constrast from religion, demands that we question our basic beliefs, ditch the bad habits we have picked up over the years and consider that sometimes we have to go into exile in order to find our way home. Can Science Spot a Pedophile? Research Zeroes In On Brain Abnormalities

UNITED STATES
The Daily Beast
As the Catholic Church, college football, and now the Boy Scouts reel from sex-abuse scandals, new studies suggest the urge to prey on children may come from how a brain is wired.
New research suggests that pedophiles can be identified before the mental illness turns into a crime, potentially keeping many children out of harm’s way. The analysis comes at a crucial moment, amid a wave of pedophilia cases dominating headlines, from Jerry Sandusky’s sentencing to allegations of sexual abuse within the Boy Scouts and the British Broadcasting Corporation.
Identifying pedophilia through MRIs and IQ studies may seem like quack science, but many experts say it is a mental illness and, just like clinical depression or bipolar disorder, can be treated—and maybe one day cured.
At least five studies conducted in the past two years have dealt with various abnormalities detected in pedophiles’ brains. Research has varied, from discerning irregularities in the frontal lobe to observing brain activity as pedophiles viewed images of naked children.

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Italian church to be stripped of tax exemption from 2013

ITALY
The Telegraph (United Kingdom)

The Italian Catholic Church will be stripped of an historic tax exemption from 2013 after the government upheld a divisive decree under close scrutiny from EU watchdogs.

The Church currently pays tax on several properties it owns that are commercial enterprises but is exempt if at least some of the activities on the property are "non-commercial" - for example a chapel in a hotel.

"The regulatory framework will be definite by January 1, 2013 - the start of the fiscal year - and will fully respect the (European) Community law," Prime Minister Mario Monti's government said in a statement late Tuesday.

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Garry O’Sullivan: The biggest problem facing 'medieval' Vatican is itself

VATICAN CITY
Irish Independent

Tuesday October 09 2012

WITH the Pope's butler now convicted of theft and under Vatican house arrest awaiting a probable pardon from Pope Benedict XVI, the Vatican will be hoping that the Vatileaks scandal can be put behind it. Yet it is not clear that it can.

Even the most conservative of Catholics living here in Rome yearn for transparency and real reform, their initial scepticism of corruption in the Vatican beaten down by years of evidence to the contrary.

The Pope's spokesman, Federico Lombardi, believes that the media goes too far and presents the normal human frailties in the Vatican's government as fights, divisions and interest group struggles, which he says goes well beyond reality.

Yet it is precisely the efforts at transparency that seem to cause the Vatican to shoot itself in the foot on a regular basis. ...

Transparency around the long-awaited clean-up of how the Vatican dealt with child abuse came in the form of Monsignor Charles Scicluna, who for over a decade took a tough line on abusive priests, many of whom were Irish. Msgnr Scicluna once criticised the "deadly culture of silence" or "omerta" in the church which, he said, "is in itself wrong and unjust".

Yet now Msgnr Scicluna is being sent back to Malta and no successor has been named.

None of the Above: The Rise of the Religiously Unaffiliated

UNITED STATES
Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly

WASHINGTON DC (October 9, 2012) — Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly, the national PBS television program produced by Thirteen/WNET, is launching a three-part mini-series, “None of the Above: The Rise of the Religiously Unaffiliated,” based largely on a new survey about the views of the 46 million Americans who say they are not affiliated with any particular religion.

According to the Pew Research Center, one in five American adults — nearly 20 percent of the US population — now describe themselves as religiously unaffiliated, the highest percentage ever in Pew’s polling. Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly partnered with the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life in a survey to delve more deeply into the theological, social and political views of these Americans, who are often called “the nones.”

“We’re getting a growing group, as much as one-fifth of the adult population, that do not identify with some kind of organized religion, and that has a lot of implications for religion, for politics, for society,” Prof. John Green, director of the Bliss Institute at the University of Akron, told Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly. “It represents a very significant change.”

The emerging social, political force: 'Nones'

UNITED STATES
USA Today

9:30AM EST October 9. 2012 - Rebecca Cardone, 21, who grew up Methodist in Texas, is president of the student body at California Lutheran University.

But don't call her Protestant or even Christian. Cardone is one of the new "Nones" -- atheists, agnostics and folks like her who believe "nothing in particular."

"I like the ambiguity" of going without a label," she says. "I prefer to stress the importance of acting with compassion rather than choosing a predetermined system of beliefs."

The big news about people with no religious identity, the Nones, isn't that they're No. 2 now in the USA, 19.6% and climbing.

HOMOSEXUALITY & CATHOLIC CULTURE

UNITED STATES
Richard Sipe
by A.W. Richard Sipe
September 13, 2012
Isn’t it time for the Catholic Church to have an intelligent and informed dialogue about homosexuality? Headlines about same-sex marriage, widespread sexual abuse of minor boys by clergy, hate crimes and continuing condemnations by the Vatican—even to the point of questioning the validity of ordinations of gay oriented men—make homosexuality and related issues more confused and urgent than ever.
In 1969 I was on a flight from Baltimore to Chicago to participate in an American Medical Association committee meeting to develop a handbook on Human Sexuality (eventually published in 1972). I had in hand the current issue of Time Magazine that featured a cover story on the Stonewall riot in Greenwich Village where the clients of the gay bar rose in protest against police harassment.

Over 400 people attend ACP meeting in Galway

IRELAND
The Association of Catholic Priests
The Association of Catholic Priests held a meeting entitled ‘Towards and Assembly for the West’ in the Clayton Hotel Galway on Saturday 6th Oct.
Four hundred people attended. The energy and enthusiasm of the gathering was equal to what we experienced at the Regency Hotel last May.
The speakers, both from the platform and the floor, spoke about their commitment to their faith and to the Church, but stressed over and over again that it is our Church; they want to belong, to be involved, and to be regarded as equals in the Church, as was envisioned by the Second Vatican Council.
Considerable disappointment was expressed at the absence of any bishop, even though all the bishops of the west had been invited. It was the strong feeling of the meeting that the bishops be asked to engage actively with the energy and enthusiasm that is being unleashed in the Church as a result of the regional gatherings being organised by the ACP, and the emergence of the Association of Catholics of Ireland (A

Church is 200 years out of date, top cleric claims

IRELAND
Irish Independent
By Cormac McQuinn
Monday October 01 2012
A SENIOR figure in the Association of Catholic Priests (ACPS) has said he agrees with a distinguished Italian cardinal who has said that the church is 200 years out of date.
Co Mayo priest Fr Brendan Hoban, one of the leaders of the organisation, has spoken of how the church needs to face its current crises such as the series of child sex abuse scandals and the fall in vocations.
And speaking ahead of two conferences aimed at increasing the participation of lay Catholics, he said bishops and priests can't solve the church's problems on their own, that it needs the help of ordinary Catholics.
Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini died at the end of August but in an interview given two weeks before his death, he said the Catholic Church is "200 years behind the times".

Study: Almost one in five Americans has no religious affiliation

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

by Tom Roberts | Oct. 9, 2012

Bethesda, Md. --
Alexis de Tocqueville's 19th-century observation that "the Christian religion" had a greater influence on America than any other country in the world might still be true, but if he were visiting today, he'd find Americans dropping their formal religious affiliations in unprecedented numbers.

In the last five years, the number of people who claim no religious affiliation has increased from slightly more than 15 percent to just under 20 percent of all U.S. adults, according to a new study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, one of seven projects that make up the Pew Research Center. The study was done in partnership with the PBS program "Religion & Ethics Newsweekly."

According to the report, titled " 'Nones' on the Rise," the almost 20 percent (33 million people) who are unaffiliated include 13 million self-described atheists and agnostics, or almost 6 percent of the U.S. population. ...

How long denominations will be around to provide such benefits is the question. In fact, the only religious groups to remain relatively unchanged are Black Protestant (8 percent), other minority Protestant (6 percent), Orthodox (1 percent), Mormon (2 percent) and Catholic (23 percent). The stability in the Catholic population has largely to do with the influx of Latin American immigrants, previous Pew studies have documented.

Church tax decree bodes ill for German Catholicism

GERMANY
National Catholic Reporter

by Moya St. Leger | Oct. 11, 2012

Viewpoint --
The German bishops' recent decree refusing sacraments to Catholics who stop paying a church membership tax has been greeted with incredulity and opprobrium around the world.

Global media coverage of the decree, which was authorized by Rome, has brought into sharp focus a situation of which most were unaware: German Catholics and members of other denominations pay a "church tax" amounting to 8-9 percent of their income tax.

The state has collected the church tax since the secularization of Germany in the 19th century and channels the money to the churches for a small fee. It is widely assumed that the German Catholic church uses the income to fund a broad range of Catholic organizations and bodies — schools, hospitals, study centers, youth centers and kindergartens — whose indisputably excellent work would have to be taken over by the state if church tax ceased.

Carsten Frerk, an expert in church finance, disputes this assumption in Caritas und Diakonie in Deutschland. For example, he writes, estimates reveal that the state's contribution to denominational kindergartens amounts to approximately 75 percent of the operating costs

The Catholic Church: an organisation damned

AUSTRALIA
3AW

Posted by: Neil Mitchell | 11 October, 2012

Today the Catholic Church is in disgrace.

Not for what it did years ago, but for what it is doing now. Today, and as recently as three years ago.

Today it is alleged by Victoria Police that the Church is presiding over a culture of secrecy and institutional dishonesty that is frustrating and side stepping the law, and aggravating the pain of victims abused by priests.

The Church itself is worsening the abuse, and there is more to come.

Many, many more cases and many more victims are yet to come forward. And they are recent – not 80-year-old men and women – recent abuse.

Pope warns lapsed Catholics of "spiritual desertification"

VATICAN CITY
Reuters

By Philip Pullella

VATICAN CITY | Thu Oct 11, 2012

(Reuters) - Pope Benedict urged lapsed and lukewarm Roman Catholics on Thursday to rediscover their Church and stop the advance of "spiritual desertification".

The pope made his comments in the homily of a Mass before tens of thousands in St Peter's Square on the 50th anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council, a far-reaching event in the Church's 2,000-year history.

"Recent decades have seen the advance of a spiritual desertification," he said, opening a worldwide "Year of Faith". "We see it all around us ... the void has spread." ...

The Church is suffering desertions from its practicing flock in former strongholds in Europe, North America and Latin America due to sex abuse scandals, increasing secularism, rival faiths and open dissent against Church teachings on homosexuality and its ban on a female priesthood.

Talking about talking about church

VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
by Phyllis Zagano | Oct. 10, 2012
Just Catholic
I think it was the late Jeane Kirkpatrick, a former UN ambassador and sharp-tongued conservative, who said it. True quote or not, the thought remains: "There's no shortage of people willing to spend a week in Paris talking about poverty."

Now 262 bishops and 94 hand-picked others are spending three weeks in Rome talking about evangelization.

Pasta, anyone?

The 13th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops on "The New Evangelization for the Transmission of the Christian Faith" will cost who-knows-what and give the various attendees an opportunity to talk about talking about church. Seven of the bishops and 10 experts and auditors are from the United States. The entire crowd presents all the outlooks in the church from right to far right.

Opening the Church to the World

UNITED STATES
The New York Times
By JOHN W. O’MALLEY

Published: October 10, 2012
VATICAN II, which has been rightly described as the most important religious event of the 20th century, began 50 years ago today in St. Peter’s Basilica. Over three years, from 1962 to 1965, some 2,800 bishops from 116 countries produced 16 documents that set the Roman Catholic Church’s course for the future. Its proceedings were closely followed in the media, bringing the church into the homes of hundreds of millions of ordinary Catholics on nearly a daily basis.

An increasingly popular view, at least among critics, is that the Second Vatican Council failed to put the church’s house in order. Its most radical inward move was not to democratize the church (though it has often been described that way) but to reinstate an older, more collegial style in church governance. Under the council’s version of this teaching, known as collegiality, the papacy had the final word, but others in the church, from the bishops to the priests and the laity, had a voice, too.

The bishops at Vatican II felt that more than a century of centralization needed to be tempered. But in their euphoria, they failed to reckon sufficiently with the resistance of entrenched bureaucracies — jealous of their authority and fearful of disorder — to change. A more participatory mode of church life took hold for 15 years or so after the council, but from on high it began to be more and more restricted, to the point that central control is now tighter than ever.

Former president Mary McAleese 'not troubled' by gay marriage

IRELAND
RTE News

Former president Mary McAleese has said she is not troubled by the idea of gay marriage.

She has also revealed that when Cardinal Bernard Law accused her of being “a very poor Catholic president” in front of dignitaries she told him it was none of his business to tell her whether she was or not.

Mrs McAleese made her comments in a pre-recorded television interview with Gay Byrne.

On The Meaning of Life programme, to be broadcast tonight, she reaffirmed her strong support for marriage and the family.

Self-serving strategy leaves credibility in tatters

AUSTRALIA
The Age

October 11, 2012

Barney Zwartz

THIS IS the worst nightmare made real for the Catholic Church, its careful defences of its handling of clergy sexual abuse reduced to ruins by Victoria Police.

The police submission to the parliamentary inquiry explodes the careful strategy the church has run for years that, yes, it had made terrible mistakes, but these have been corrected by new protocols since 1996, and they can be trusted.

But the police say that even after 1996 the church hindered police investigations, protected paedophile priests and never reported a single complaint to police.

Despite constant church claims that all victims are encouraged to go to police, the police submission suggests that in fact, many are dissuaded from doing so and that the church's independent commissioner, Peter O'Callaghan QC, has a conflict of interest. Where the church says abuse has almost disappeared - only 13 of the 618 confirmed cases the church admitted to in its submission to the inquiry occurred after 1990 - the police suspect the victims have merely been slow to come forward, in the usual pattern.

Police slam Catholic Church

AUSTRALIA
The Age

October 11, 2012

Jane Lee

VICTORIA Police has launched a scathing attack on the Catholic Church, accusing it of deliberately impeding its investigations into child abuse.

In a submission to the parliamentary inquiry into the handling of child abuse by churches, signed by Chief Commissioner Ken Lay, police recommend that some of the church's actions to hinder investigations be criminalised.

The submission lists a number of ways in which the church has hindered the criminal justice process, including dissuading victims of sexual crimes from reporting them to police, failing to engage with police and alerting suspects of allegations against them, ''which may have resulted in loss of evidence''.

It says the church moved or protected known or suspected sexual offenders. While the submission notes the church has recently improved co-operation with police, in some cases it has been reluctant to provide information even when a warrant was issued.

We believed predators over victims: Catholic Church

AUSTRALIA
The Australian

Stuart Rintoul
From:The Australian
October 11, 201212:00AM

THE Catholic Church says it is committed to facing up to a shameful history of child abuse by priests, and has admitted it was slow to respond, slow to believe victims and wrongly believed the denials of "predators".

But Victoria Police has accused the church of hindering investigations in its submission to the Victorian government inquiry into the handling of child abuse by religious and other non-government organisations.

VicPol says it had "serious concerns" about the church's internal inquiry process, which had resulted in a number of ex gratia payments to victims, but not a single referral to police.

Recurring issues included the church appearing to dissuade victims from reporting allegations to police, alerting suspects of allegations and the movement or protection of known or suspected offenders.

Audit of Safeguarding Arrangements in the Catholic Church in Ireland

IRELAND
Health Service Executive

Volume 1 Dioceses Report

FOREWORD

The sexual abuse of a child by a trusted adult is a traumatic event for the child and can have catastrophic effects on the life experiences and life chances of the child as he or she progresses into adulthood. This is now widely understood and accepted.

What is less clearly understood is the impact that the disclosure of abuse has on the organisation to which the adult belongs. In many cases there is shock and disbelief; an unwillingness to accept the facts, leading in turn to inertia of action and subsequent mismanagement of the situation. It was concerns in relation to possible mismanagement of disclosures of abuse that led to the Government asking the Health Service Executive to conduct an audit of the arrangements for safeguarding children in the Catholic Church in Ireland. The Audit process has been protracted and a number of obstacles, which are detailed within this report, had to be overcome a comprehensive report on the overall state of safeguarding children within theChurch Dioceses could be produced.

The delay has not been without its benefits in that in making assessment of the safeguarding arrangements we can now the Standards and Guidance Document for the Catholic Church in Ireland issued by the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church in February 2009. This document is now the first and key point of reference for all those with responsibility for implementing the Church’s safeguarding policy and procedures. The document enables everyone in the Church to reach a uniform standard of best practice in safeguarding.

In this report, the achievement of each diocese in the application of the standards up to November 2011 is analysed as is the information on allegations and information about accused priests as supplied by dioceses in response to audit questionnaires. It is clear that dioceses are at different stages of development but are progressing positively. The analysis of the position in each diocese will facilitate the further development that is needed to achieve the goal that is set out in the Safeguarding document issued by the National Board. It is to this area of activity that any available
resources should be targeted.

Pope summons all Nuncios to Rome

10/17/2012

Cardinal Bertone

A meeting with all papal representatives across the world is to be held next June in Rome

vatican insider staff
Rome

The Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone announced this during his speech at the Synod on the new evangelisation that is currently taking place in the Vatican. The cardinal explained that the meeting is one of the initiatives planned for the Year of Faith and was inspired by a similar gathering held in the year 2000 on the occasion of the Jubilee.

Year of faith or Year of fallacies and more Vatican deceits

In agreement with the Episcopates, the Holy See uses “instruments of diplomatic dialogue with civil authorities,” to ensure that its action “is not aimed at guaranteeing anachronistic privileges but guaranteeing the Church as much freedom in internal government and in the exercise of its mission, to which it lays legitimate claim as possible. When this freedom exists, it also benefits members of other religious faiths and fosters social harmony,” Bertone told Synod Fathers.

Hogwash – it benefits also members of other religious faith – when “Outside the church there is no salvation – it is guaranteed damnation in Hell – and more so on earth

Apostolic Nuncios are above all Catholic bishops, the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, recalled this in his speech at the Synod. The Apostolic Nuncios who represent the Holy See in 179 countries that have diplomatic relations with the Vatican, but also those who represent it at the European Union, in the Palestinian National Authority, the Order of Mata, at the UN (in New York and Geneva), the OSCE, UNESCO, FAO and other international or regional organisations, such as the Arab League and the African Union, “are aware of the direct responsibility they have as members of the College of Bishops and in announcing the Gospel and promoting the New Evangelisation.”

The New Evangelisation is a repackaging of Vatican deceits and Vatican evils in the 21st century with Vatican Pied Pipers like Bill Donohue of Catholic League and John L. Allen as their Catholic main messengers.

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It’s a Puzzlement

UNITED STATES
National Survivor Advocates Coalition

There has been a growing number of news stories in recent days about the Vatican naming a coadjutor bishop for the Diocese of Armagh in the Republic of Ireland –a bella figura approach to packing the Primate of All Ireland Cardinal Sean Brady off into retirement for his role in the sexual abuse scandal.

Here’s a link to one of those stories: Read the story here.

There have been no news stories about the possibility of the Vatican removing Robert Finn, the criminally convicted Bishop of the Diocese of Kansas City – St. Joseph, Missouri.

It’s a puzzlement.

There was news last week that Pope Benedict accepted the resignation of a bishop in Chile, Marco Antonio Ordenes Fernandez of Iquique, following the allegation that the bishop had sexually abused a minor.

There were no news stories last week that Bishop Finn had tendered a resignation for the Vatican to accept.

It’s a puzzlement.

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

NEWS UPDATES FOR OCTOBER 25, 2012

AUSTRALIAN JESUIT blames "Original Sin" for JP2 Amry John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army in Australia. How convenient. Sandusky and other secular criminals do not have this Catholic Faith luxury to keep them out of jail.

Original sin and clergy sex abuse

ANDREW HAMILTON October 24, 2012

http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=33802

Being a Catholic priest during public enquiries into sexual abuse within the Church is a bracing experience. Infinitely less hurtful than being the victim of abuse, of course. But it prompts musing about the ways in which evil actions work out in a group and affect the individual members of the group and its perception by others.

In many cultures these questions run so deep they can be caught only through symbol. In Greek myths and tragedies they are explored through what happens in a family, or house, in which monstrous deeds are fated.

They taint the house and work their way destructively through later generations. In the stories connected with Oedipus, for example, the consequences are fated and individuals are passive before them. Their best efforts to escape only create the circumstances of the doom that awaits them and those associated with them.

The proper response to such events when embodied in drama is one of terror and pity. This is how we would respond to a natural disaster when allowed to enter the human experience of those caught in it.
The Christian teaching about original sin can helpfully be seen through the lens of this myth. It understands the whole of humanity to be affected by a taint which goes back to Adam's sin. Its consequences are death. The curse that in the Greek tragedies affected particular families or groups is now universal. (Jesuit Hamilton is using entertainment Hollywood Hype of Greek mythology to make the world of Catholic JP2 Army-John Paul II Perpetual Pedophile Priests Army)

This view of the world also appears to be quite pessimistic in assuming that the disastrous human condition cannot be remedied by human activity. Indeed it is more pessimistic than the earlier myths, because the doom does not attach only to particular groups but to the whole human race. All human beings and the groups to which they belong are equally flawed.

But in its Christian context the universality of original sin is a cause for optimism because we are healed from it by Christ. Neither individuals nor groups are doomed by fate. We are never helpless victims or collaborators of groups tainted by the evil that has been done by them. The evil that's been done can be repented of, apologised for, its causes addressed and reconciliation sought by attending justly and compassionately to its victims. (Jesuit Andrew Hamilton is hypnotizing the Australian Police and government inquiry who are newly discovering the most heinous crimes committed by Catholic pedophile priests against Australian children)

Within the Christian framework those watching this drama can respond with outrage at what has been done, encouragement for what is being done to address it, and analysis of what needs to be done. They are not passive spectators. But neither can they separate themselves from the group. They are aware of their own shared flaw and their shared good fortune at being rescued from original sin.

As a Christian understanding of the human condition this account has its limitations. And in any case it no longer has a strong claim on the public imagination. What has replaced it in public attitudes to the ways in which wrongdoing and guilt affect groups is also unhelpful in many ways.

When the canopy of universal sin and forgiveness is taken down, wrongdoing is commonly seen as marking a person for life. The proper response is harsh punishment and subsequent ostracism. Similarly, groups in which wrongdoing has occurred, like the Catholic Church, are seen to be corrupt. Apologies are not heartfelt; tears shed for the victims of abuse are crocodile tears; steps to ensure accountability of ministers or the protection of children are window dressing. Those associated with the Church are automatically and lastingly suspect. They can wash away their taint only by renouncing their membership.

At one level attitudes like this do not matter. Indeed at a personal level they can be salutary. In Christian tradition to be regarded as rubbish and to be beaten up are a privileged way of following Christ, not to mention a way of sharing some of what victims have suffered in the Catholic Church.

The real loss from such attitudes is incurred by society. The groups and individuals that are seen in this way will find it harder, not easier, to make up for what they have been part of and to contribute to healing in society. They risk being distracted from what really matters in all this - the welfare of the victims of abuse. Making boxers punch drunk in training is no way to prepare them for the big fight.

Andrew Hamilton is consulting editor of Eureka Street.

Surprise cardinal appointments spark Pope health concerns

VATICAN CITY
Straits Times
VATICAN CITY (AFP) - Six non-European Catholic prelates will join the Vatican's College of Cardinals in a move which may influence the election of the future pope, amid uncertainty over Pope Benedict XVI's health.

The 85-year-old Benedict, who has been looking increasingly tired and worn, said on Wednesday he will appoint cardinals from Colombia, India, Lebanon, Nigeria, the Philippines and the United States in a surprise consistory in November.

The college, the elite body that advises the pontiff and elects his successor upon his death, is currently heavily weighted in favour of Europe. Religious watchers had not expected there to be another consistory until next year and the surprise announcement sparked concern among Vatican watchers that the elderly pontiff's health may be worse than thought.

Religious observers note that the pope appears to have been particularly hard hit by the child abuse scandals rocking the Church and the betrayal of his personal butler, who was found guilty this month of stealing private memos.

Billboard calls for convicted KC bishop to resign

KANSAS CITY (MO)
Southeast Missourian
Wednesday, October 24, 2012

The Associated Press

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- An electronic billboard in Kansas City calls for the resignation of the highest-ranking U.S. church official to be convicted of a crime related to the child sexual abuse scandal.
The Kansas City Star reports that the sign, located along Interstate 35, directs passers-by to an online petition that urges Bishop Robert Finn to step down. So far, more than 100,000 people have added their names.

Large letters read: "For the good of the people Bishop Finn must RESIGN!"

Pope nominates six new cardinals

VATICAN CITY
Rome Reports
[with video]
October 24, 2012. (Romereports.com) (-ONLY VIDEO-) During the general audience in St. Peter's Square, the Pope announced that he will hold a consistory on November 24th to appoint six new cardinals. READ TEXT:
“And now, with great pleasure, I announce that on November 24th, I will hold a Consistory in which I will appoint six new members of the College of Cardinals. The Cardinals have the task of helping the Successor of Peter in the performance of his ministry of confirming the brethren in the faith, and the principle and foundation of unity and communion of the Church.
Here are the names of the new cardinals:
Msgr. JAMES MICHAEL HARVEY, Prefect of the Prefecture of the Papal Household.
Beatitude BÉCHARA BOUTROS RAÏ, Maronite Patriarch, (Lebanon).
Beatitude BASELIOS CLEEMIS THOTTUNKAL, major Archbishop of the Trivandrum of the Siro-Malankaresi in India.
Msgr. JOHN OLORUNFEMI ONAIYEKAN, Archbishop of di Abuj (Nigeria)
Msgr. RUBÉN SALAZAR GÓMEZ, Archbishop of Bogotá (Colombia)
Msgr. LUIS ANTONIO TAGLE, Archbishop of Manila (Philippines).

Legion of Christ founder son arrested

MEXICO
Sky News (Australia)
A Mexico state judicial official says the alleged son of the late Reverend Marcial Maciel, founder of the Catholic order Legions of Christ, is in custody on attempted extortion charges.
The official says Jose Raul Gonzalez Lara was detained on Tuesday.
Legion spokesman Javier Bravo confirmed that the order had filed a criminal complaint against Gonzalez.
A Mexican woman divulged in 2010 that Maciel, a Catholic priest, had fathered two of her children, including Gonzalez, and accused him of molesting both.

Media groups want Legion of Christ papers unsealed

PROVIDENCE (RI)
Associated Press
By DAVID KLEPPER, Associated Press
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The Associated Press and three other news organizations Tuesday filed legal papers asking a Rhode Island judge to unseal documents in a lawsuit contesting the will of an elderly widow who gave some $60 million to the Legion of Christ, a disgraced Roman Catholic religious order.
The New York Times, The Providence Journal and the National Catholic Reporter joined the AP in submitting a legal filing arguing that the public has a right to access the documents and rejecting the Legion's argument that press coverage of them could taint prospective jurors. Pope Benedict XVI took over the Legion in 2010 after a Vatican investigation determined its founder, the late Rev. Marcial Maciel, had sexually molested seminarians and fathered three children by two women.
The woman's niece, Mary Lou Dauray, had sought to challenge Gabrielle Mee's will, saying her aunt had been defrauded by the order into leaving it her fortune. Mee died in 2008. Rhode Island Superior Court Judge Michael Silverstein last month threw out the challenge because he determined the niece lacked standing. However, in his decision Silverstein noted that Maciel gave Mee financial advice and another priest helped her with estate planning.
"The transfer of millions of dollars worth of assets — through will, trust and gifts — from a steadfastly spiritual elderly woman to her trusted but clandestinely dubious religious leaders raises a red flag to this court," Silverstein wrote.

A new saint for sufferers of childhood trauma

UNITED STATES
Feast of Eden
October 22, 2012 By Dawn Eden
Pope Benedict’s canonization of Kateri Tekakwitha yesterday gave the Church a new patroness for those who have suffered physical, emotional, or sexual abuse in childhood— particularly those whose abuse was perpetrated by family members or family friends.

Born in 1656 to a Mohawk father and a Christian Algonquin mother in present-day New York, St. Kateri lost her parents to smallpox when she was four. The disease also struck Kateri herself, leaving her with disfiguring scars and poor vision.

Kateri was raised by her aunt and uncle, who expected to set her up in an arranged marriage. But by the time she reached her late teens, she had decided to dedicate her life to Christ, receiving instruction in the Catholic faith from Jesuit missionaries. Her Christian faith, her modesty, and her decision to remain a virgin caused her entire extended family to turn against her, looking upon her as an embarrassment. According to one of her early biographers, her family would refuse to let her have any food on Sundays because she would not work on the Lord’s day. When she went to the chapel, they would send boys out to throw rocks at her and taunt her (their favorite taunt was “Christian,” which they shouted with disgust, as if it were “dog”).

The uncle particularly resented Kateri’s decision to preserve her virginity, because he was a tribal chief and could benefit politically if he were able to marry her off. So, in a particularly heinous attempt to humiliate his niece, he encouraged his drunken, violent friends to pursue her around the village, attempting to molest her.

Des Cahill tells state inquiry ...

AUSTRALIA
The Telegraph
Des Cahill tells state inquiry into child abuse that Catholic Church had created a "holy and unholy mess"
Grant McArthur
Herald Sun
October 23, 2012
MORE than one in 20 Victorian Catholic priests became a child abuser and the church's senior leaders may have to go to jail for covering up the crimes, a former priest and academic has told a state inquiry.
On the second day of public hearings into churches' handling of child abuse, RMIT intercultural studies professor Des Cahill said the Catholic Church had created a "holy and unholy mess" it was incapable of taking action to resolve.
A former priest who, when resigning in 1976, accused the Catholic Church of being unable to face up to its problems, Prof Cahill warned the inquiry the State Government needed to intervene.
"It is an unfortunate reality that as a result of this inquiry some senior religious people may end up in jail for dereliction of duty, and they must be treated with compassion and understanding," Prof Cahill said.

One in 20 priests an abuser, inquiry told

AUSTRALIA
The Age
October 22, 2012
Barney Zwartz

AT LEAST one in 20 Catholic priests in Melbourne is a child sex abuser, although the real figure is probably one in 15, the state inquiry into the churches' handling of sex abuse was told this afternoon.

RMIT professor Des Cahill said his figures, based on analysing conviction rates of priests ordained from Melbourne's Corpus Christi College, closely matched a much larger American analysis of 105,000 priests which found that 4362 were child sex offenders.

The intercultural studies professor also told the inquiry that the Catholic Church was incapable of reforming itself because of its internal culture. He said the Church's Melbourne Response abuse protocol had to go, and the state would have to intervene to achieve it.
In other key testimony, Professor Cahill:
•Called for married priests, as are being allowed now in the Anglican ordinariate within the Catholic Church, as a "circuit-breaker" that would reduce child sex abuse. The state should remove the Equal Opportunity Act exemption letting the church discriminate on grounds of marital status, he said.
•Described the Church as "a holy and unholy mess, except where religious sisters or laypeople are in charge, for example schools and welfare agencies".
•Called for an "eminent Catholic task force" of lay people to work with the Church on reform and transparency.
================

Cardinal Dolan makes Popes Crimes as entertaining feel-good TV series as the Borgias

Dolan: “The Church is not afraid to admit to its own mistakes” (LIAR! LIAR!)

The Archbishop of New York, Timothy Dolan

The Archbishop of New York’s comments at the Synod of Bishops: humility is not a strategy but the right attitude. A video on the rise of Islam presented by Cardinal Turkson has triggered a dispute

http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/the-vatican/detail/articolo/18950/

alessandro speciale
vatican city

The Church is not afraid to admit to its own mistakes. This was the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Timothy Dolan’s message to journalists this morning, during the Synod of Bishops on the New Evangelization. Exuberant as always, Dolan mentioned a television debate he recently took part in, speaking about the reaction to the paedophilia scandal in the Catholic Church and about other mistakes the Church has committed in the past.

One believer, referring to the television series The Borgias - which paints a gloomy picture of the intrigues of the Curia and the Roman nobility during the Renaissance period - asked Dolan: “How do we defend the Church with stories such as that involving Pope Alexander VI who had a lover?” Dolan’s reply was: “No, he did not just have one lover, he had many! The Church – he added – is not afraid to admit to its own mistakes.”

For the American cardinal “being humble isn’t just a pastoral strategy. It’s an evangelical demand” to ensure the Church fulfils its mission. “The new evangelisation - he added - is to do with conversion of heart and interior renewal.” Returning to the paedophilia scandal, Dolan spoke about Cardinal Marc Ouellet’s “mea culpa” for the sexual abuse committed by priests against minors, pronounced at the shrine of Lough Derg, on the occasion of the Eucharistic Congress which took place in Ireland last year.

Cardinal Ouellet’s gesture had “an amazing credibility. He did it genuinely,” said Dolan, who was chosen by Benedict XVI to join the team of apostolic visitors to guide the Irish Church out of the crisis.

According to the Archbishop of New York, despite recent statistics which reveal a growth in the numbers of non-believers in the country, “America at its core is still very spiritual and very religious.” During the briefing some self-criticisms were made on issues such as homilies in U.S. churches (“Everybody agrees they’re too long and they’re boring”) and the abandonment of the sacrament of penance (“I’m afraid that on so many levels we just gave up”).

The projection of a short film on Islam, by the President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Cardinal Peter Turkson, caused a stir at the Synod of Bishops. The YouTube video shows alarming statistics about the growth of the Muslim population in the world, reminding Christians that “the world is changing” and that they need to “announce the Gospel.”

But some of the bishops who watched the video presentation last Saturday criticised the data shown and the forecasts given as they said these did not take into account factors such as the drop in fertility in Middle Eastern countries. According to the Synod’s English speaking spokesman, Fr. Thomas Rosica, the video sparked a heated debate which continued today.

Jesuits Explain Child Sex Abuse: “Stress” Makes Them Do It

UNITED STATES
What They Knew
The Society of Jesus has long been regarded for the intellectual prowess of its priests and educators. In the marketplace of ideas Jesuits have made significant contributions to both the physical and social sciences. But there is evidence that this is starting to slip. Recent cases in California and elsewhere have begged the question, “What has happened to the Jesuit Order? Can they still wave their intellectual wands and make sexual abuse a defensible act?”

We stumbled upon this bit of Jesuit produced research (link to Santa Clara Univ. article) into why Jesuits abuse. Written by Gerdenio Sonny Manuel, S. J., a member of the California Province Sensitive Incidents Team, entitled Living Chastity: Psychosexual Well Being in Jesuit Life An Essay for Studies in Jesuit Spirituality.

The thrust of his intellectual question, with regards to being a Jesuit is “How in the world could you do that to yourself?” Basically sex abuse by Jesuits boils down to lack of self-understanding, loneliness and stress. From the article:
“In addition to coping with the stress related to our lifestyle and ministry, there are the usual varieties of ordinary life events that can burden us: personal illness or misfortune, interpersonal conflicts, family struggles, aging, the death of loved ones. From time to time, friends, family, or the Society will inevitably disappoint and even hurt us. And so, independently or cumulatively we can be stressed by our lifestyle, ministry, and ordinary life traumas and find ourselves in pain and searching for solace. During these times of distress, we need to be especially vigilant that we do not use sex as a way of altering mood or as an escape. Along with other forms of gratification or socially isolating activities like extended television viewing, engaging in sexual fantasies, various forms of internet pornography, and sexually acting out can be ways of coping with sadness by medicating our pain and suffering.”

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

Austria and Belgium JP2 Army - John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army

Translated from Google

Allegations against priest-abuse initiative to AustriaKleine ZeitungThe pastor's initiative with allegations of the platform "Affected ecclesiastical violence" faced. According to these are also "known abuser" member of the reformist group, it was told APA. Helmut Schüller spokesman confirmed this to the APA, we will advise the Board how they would proceed in the two cases.
Belgium: 403 applications for compensation for sexual MissbrauchsBELGIENkathweb25.10.2012Brussels, 25/10/2012 (KAP) in Belgium so far 403 applications for compensation have been submitted for sexual abuse in the church. About 80 percent of the applicants were men, the newspaper "Le Soir" (Thursday) reported, citing a report of the neutral arbitration committee, which was set up in late 2011, on a proposal of a special committee of the Belgian House of Representatives. The majority of the victims was born between 1940 and 1970, about 5 percent are reported to have more than 80 years old. About two-thirds of the applicants were Flemish, Walloons third.The arbitration court sitting Month to date, have been able to achieve seven settlements, the newspaper reports. "To the victims, it is important first of all to be heard and acknowledged," said the chairman of the Special Parliamentary Committee, Karine Lalieux, according to the report. Applications may still be submitted until the end of October. The process should provide compensation in particular those victims whose cases are barred by law.

October 25, 2012

Missbrauch: Pfarrer-Initiative will Umgang mit Mitgliedern beraten

OSTERREICH
Der Standard
Plattform Betroffener kirchlicher Gewalt kritisiert Zugehörigkeit zweier mutmaßlicher Täter - Schüller verweist auf nächste Vorstandssitzung
Wien - Die Pfarrer-Initiative ist mit Vorwürfen der Plattform "Betroffener kirchlicher Gewalt" konfrontiert. Laut dieser sind auch "bekannte Missbrauchstäter" Mitglied der Reformgruppe, hieß es am Donnerstag gegenüber der APA. Sprecher Helmut Schüller bestätigte dies gegenüber der APA, man werde im Vorstand beraten, wie man in den beiden Fällen vorgehen werde.

Vorwürfe gegen Pfarrer-Initiative zu Missbrauch

OSTERREICH
Kleine Zeitung
Die Pfarrer-Initiative ist mit Vorwürfen der Plattform "Betroffener kirchlicher Gewalt" konfrontiert. Laut dieser sind auch "bekannte Missbrauchstäter" Mitglied der Reformgruppe, hieß es gegenüber der APA. Sprecher Helmut Schüller bestätigte dies gegenüber der APA, man werde im Vorstand beraten, wie man in den beiden Fällen vorgehen werde.

Belgien: 403 Entschädigungsanträge wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs

BELGIEN
kathweb
25.10.2012
Brüssel, 25.10.2012 (KAP) In Belgien sind bislang 403 Entschädigungsanträge wegen sexuellen Missbrauchs im kirchlichen Bereich gestellt worden. Rund 80 Prozent der Antragsteller seien Männer, meldet die Tageszeitung "Le Soir" (Donnerstag) unter Berufung auf einen Bericht der neutralen Schiedskommission, die Ende 2011 auf Vorschlag eines Sonderausschusses des belgischen Abgeordnetenhauses eingesetzt wurde. Der Großteil der Opfer sei zwischen 1940 und 1970 geboren; etwa 5 Prozent sind den Angaben zufolge über 80 Jahre alt. Etwa zwei Drittel der Antragsteller seien Flamen, ein Drittel Wallonen.
Das Schiedsgericht, das seit Monatsbeginn tagt, habe bisher sieben Einigungen erzielen können, berichtet die Zeitung. "Den Opfern ist es in erster Linie wichtig, gehört und anerkannt zu werden", betonte die Vorsitzende des parlamentarischen Sonderausschusses, Karine Lalieux, dem Bericht zufolge. Anträge könnten noch bis Ende Oktober eingereicht werden. Das Verfahren soll insbesondere jenen Opfern Entschädigung gewähren, deren Fälle strafrechtlich verjährt sind.

Updates October 27, 2012

Former Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi sentenced to jail for tax fraud

Controversial former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, 76, has been sentenced to prison and banned from holding political office after being found guilty of tax fraud.

An Italian court delivered the sentences of Berlusconi and 10 others on Friday following a six-year trial.

Prosecutors claimed the defendants purchased television rights for US movies through a series of offshore companies.

They then falsely declared the payments to avoid taxes.

Prosecutors had demanded a sentence of three years and eight months for Berlusconi and four years for the chairman of his Mediaset conglomerate Fedele Confalonieri.

As well as an initial four-year prison sentence, later cut to just one, Berlusconi has been barred from holding political office for three years.

The high-profile trial began in July 2006, but was put on hold due to a now-scrapped immunity law.

The complex structure to Italian law means cases must pass two levels of appeal before the verdicts are final and Berlusconi's legal team confirmed on Friday they will appeal the ruling.

If the 76-year-old is eventually jailed, he will only serve one year behind bars as a result of a 2006 amnesty law aimed at reducing over-crowding in prisons.

Berlusconi has been tried numerous times in the past for his business dealings.

He has always been cleared, acquitted or seen the statute of limitations time-out.

The media mogul was not in the courtroom for today's verdict.

It comes days after Berlusconi announced he will not run for the premiership in upcoming elections.

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/world/916137-former-italian-pm-silvio-berlusconi-sentenced-to-jail-for-tax-fraud#ixzz2Acur8Yf4

Silvio Berlusconi watched as strippers dressed as nuns performed at party

Disgraced former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi watched in delight as strippers dressed as nuns at his infamous bunga bunga parties, a court heard.

Moroccan-born model Imane Fadil, 27, was paid €2,000 (£1,650) to attend dinner parties in the basement of Berlusconi’s Milanese villa.
She was astounded when two women dressed like characters in the hit film Sister Act.

Miss Fadil told a Milan court about the bash in February 2010: ‘At one dinner, I saw Nicole Minetti and Barbara Fagioli (two guests) dressed in black tunics, they were wearing white head caps and a crucifix, it was like something out of Sister Act and then they stripped off.

‘I was completely unprepared for their double act. They took off the nun’s habits and were left just in their underwear.’

She told the court the girls ‘touched themselves’ and also allowed Berlusconi, 75, to touch their intimate parts while they did the same to him, leaving her shocked and embarrassed.

She also described how other strippers wore AC Milan football kits and masks with famous players’ faces on them. One came as Ronaldinho.

Berlusconi denies a charge of having sex with dancer Karima El Mahroug, nicknamed Ruby The Heart Stealer, when she was under age.

Sex-abuse doc blames Vatican

UNITED STATES
New York Post

Alex Gibney — the Oscar-winning documentarian who has trained his lens on Eliot Spitzer, Lance Armstrong, Julian Assange and Enron — has found his most controversial topic yet with the Oscar-buzzed exposé “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” which traces a sex-abuse scandal from a Milwaukee Catholic church to the Vatican.

The movie was banned by the Venice and Rome film festivals this year, and Gibney says of its rejection: “I was disappointed. The Vatican exerts a very strong influence in Italy. There is a palpable sense of fear there. This film takes on the Vatican’s complicity [in covering it up].”

The HBO film, in theaters Nov. 16, follows the story of Father Lawrence Murphy at the St. John’s School for the Deaf in Wisconsin, who molested 200 of the school’s pupils for 24 years until 1974. He was never disciplined, even after his actions were brought to the attention of the Vatican. Instead, he was moved to other schools.

“The direct connection of the Vatican to this sheds light on the way they’ve shoved this stuff under the carpet,” says Gibney, who discovered a similar scandal involving deaf students in Verona, Italy, while making the film.

Vatican says it cannot posthumously remove Jimmy Savile's papal honor; condemns sexual abuses

VATICAN CITY
Fox News

Published October 27, 2012

Associated Press

LONDON – The Vatican says it cannot rescind the papal knighthood awarded to television star Jimmy Savile, who emerged as an alleged child sex predator after his death.

The Catholic Church of England said it has contacted the Holy See to ask it to posthumously revoke Savile's honor in recognition of the "deep distress" of the victims allegedly abused by Savile, a well-known BBC children's television host who died last year at the age of 84.

But the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, told The Associated Press on Saturday that the names of people who receive the knighthood don't appear in its yearbook and that the honor dies with the individual.

The BBC's real crime over Jimmy Savile was to act like the Catholic church

UNITED KINGDOM
The Guardian

Jonathan Freedland
The Guardian, Friday 26 October 2012

There is a tide in the affairs of men and this one has gone in and out and back in again. The first wave brought horror at the alleged crimes of Jimmy Savile, revulsion at a deception that had been perpetrated on the British public over four decades: hoodwinked by visible good deeds, so that we wouldn't see the darkness beneath.

The next wave saw that fury turned on Savile's longtime employer, the BBC, for failing to reveal the truth about him when it had a clear chance, by binning a Newsnight investigation a year ago – a decision the programme's editor made, we now discover, a day after the corporation had published its Christmas schedule, a lineup that included not one but two fawning tributes to the presenter. That BBC-focused rage reached a peak at the start of the week, when Panorama tore into its sister programme as George Entwistle prepared to take a pasting from a House of Commons select committee.

Since then the tide has headed in the reverse direction, with both commentators and politicians insisting it is wrong to obsess over BBC management practices when the real issue is the sexual abuse of children. "The voices of the victims seem to have been completely ignored," the Tory MP Claire Perry told Question Time, because "the BBC is doing too much navel-gazing".

Friday, October 26, 2012

Gerald T. Slevin...

Gerald T. Slevin: After Elections, Who Will Prosecute More Predatory Priests? Constitutional Lawyer Obama Or The Three R's---Romney, Ryan & Ratzinger? And Why Does It Matter?

UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

Another hard-hitting and exhaustively researched essay by the Harvard-trained former Wall Street lawyer Jerry Slevin today. Jerry looks at the two U.S. presidential candidates in light of their records in dealing with issues of child abuse and of church and state, and challenges Catholics to inform our consciences as we select a candidate by thinking carefully about why the Vatican and U.S. bishops appear to be playing very overt partisan politics in this election cycle--to assure that the candidate (Romney) more likely to be lenient to Catholic officials prosecuted for criminal activity with child abuse cases is elected. What follows is Jerry's essay:

Is Anyone Above American Law For Misdeeds Committed In U.S.?

The U. S. Founders in the American Revolution risked their fortunes and even their lives to establish a basic legal principle, namely, that sovereigns, whether kings, clerics or presidents, must be subject, as all other citizens are, to the rule of law, in particular, under laws that are democratically enacted, transparently applied and impartially enforced. In 1776, European absolute monarchs and clerics were in practice very often "above" the law. This had been a major grievance of many of the Founders, who were wisely and understandably appalled at the unaccountable monarchs and clerics of the Old World. Consequently, the Founders made sure in the U.S. Constitution that no one was to be above the law.

President Nixon with Watergate, and President Clinton with "Monicagate," learned painfully that the Founders really meant what they said about the supremacy of the rule of law, as these two powerful U.S. Presidents were humiliated in public Constitutional proceedings for their misdeeds. My Harvard Law mentor, Constitutional scholar and Watergate prosecutor, Archibald Cox, made this very clear to Nixon.

Will This Essential Legal Principle Still Apply After the Elections?

Ominously, it now appears that this fundamental legal principle, that all persons, including politically powerful ones, are subject to American law for their U.S. misdeeds, may be seriously at risk following the current U.S. elections, at least as it may relate to the U.S. misdeeds of the pope and his U.S. bishops. Religious liberty for all, under the rule of law, appears to be in danger of becoming clerical privilege for some, depending possibly on whether Mitt Romney or Barack Obama is elected.

All American voters, but especially Catholics, have to include this serious consideration conscientiously in their voting calculus. Catholics cannot let themselves by manipulated by a cynical Catholic hierarchy that appears to be attempting to exploit election-year wedge issues like contraception and gay marriage to further the Catholic hierarchy's narrow self-interest and possibly even to protect themselves from possible criminal prosecution.

Barack Obama's U.S. Justice Department prosecutors recently took very aggressive legal action in a criminal case of a priest child pornographer directly related to the subsequent conviction of the first U.S. Catholic bishop, Bishop Finn of Kansas City, for a child endangerment related crime. Obama also, following the Penn State Sandusky revelations, condemned strongly child sexual abuse, and his Federal prosecutors are actively presently pursuing Penn State cover-up investigations. Obama could have pursued a less aggressive approach to child sexual abuse to accommodate the Catholic hierarchy's anxieties, but he did the right thing for defenseless children instead.

By contrast, when Boston's politically powerful Cardinal Law initially refused to resign after the Boston Globe's explosive and extensive revelations of the cover-up of pervasive priest rape of children by local Catholic priests, then Massachusetts Governor candidate Romney's spokesman and currently prime "etch a sketcher," Eric Fehrnstrom, told the Globe: "It is not Mitt's place to say whether he should continue to lead. This is a matter for Cardinal Law's own conscience...." What? Cardinal Law subsequently resigned and then skipped town for an indefinite Roman holiday, while Governor Romney and his state attorney general apparently just stood by.

Romney's evidently significant current political debt to the pope and U.S. Catholic bishops, as well as Romney's expected "hands off church/state" approach reflected in his long personal experience, including as a former "de facto bishop" in Boston in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), raises very troubling questions about the future Federal approach to prosecuting priest child rapists and the Catholic bishops that protect them, as well as to questions about legal and affordable access of all American women to sensible family planning.

Romney's anticipated tax breaks for the top 0.1%, including many U.S. papal donors who are members of the Knights of Malta, the Papal Foundation, LEGATUS, FADICA, the Leadership Conference on Church Management and top executives of the Knights of Columbus, who may share their additional U. S. tax savings with the pope if Romney is elected, may be one of the reasons for the pope's support of Romney, but is it the main reason, even as the Vatican is understandably very concerned about the escalation in the number of diocesan bankruptcies?

Is the pope expecting Mitt Romney, as U.S. "prosecutor-in-chief" and U.S. Supreme Court "nominee selector," to go easy on the Catholic hierarchy and predatory priests on child sexual abuse crimes and to appoint more "anti-contraception" papal pawns to the U.S. Supreme Court if he were to be elected U.S. president, in return for the unprecedented support the Catholic hierarchy have been giving Romney and his fellow Republicans in the current political campaign? As discussed below, the current (and also the much earlier) Romney position on abortion hardly seems sufficiently different from Obama's to justify the unprecedented election campaign support the pope is giving Romney. So the pope likely has other objectives in mind. What are they?

This question matters greatly. Firstly, children need to be protected from priest rapists. The Catholic hierarchy has failed for decades and continues to fail to do so adequately. In our Constitutional system of law, all criminals, even politically powerful ones, must be prosecuted and punished to deter future crimes and to give crime victims some minimal justice.

Moreover, I have been a lifelong practicing Catholic with 16 years of Catholic schooling. It is very clear to me that the current all-male Catholic hierarchy is in a losing worldwide battle to preserve their monarchical structure by foolishly and futilely attempting to hide their child abuse sins and by demonizing women, even nuns, and gay persons in their desperate effort to protect the Catholic hierarchy's political power and considerable wealth. This is a shameful fools' errand, really. As a grandparent and retired lawyer, I will do whatever I can to accelerate the hierarchy's defeat.

Worldwide, hundreds of millions of people, mostly children including many American children, presently live in misery often because their births were unplanned as a result of their poor parents' inability to access affordable contraception, due mainly to lobbying undertaken by the Catholic hierarchy against government assistance with contraception. And contraception usually removes any need to consider an abortion.

As is made very clear in the classic book by award winning journalist and Catholic scholar, Robert Blair Kaiser, entitled The Politics of Sex and Religion, the original papal condemnation of contraception in 1930 was largely politically motivated to try to stem the post-World War I decline in the Western European birth rate in the face of the expansion of the Soviet Communist threat. This excellent book is now available to all for free as an e-book at Robert Blair Kaiser's website.

More importantly, Kaiser's book shows convincingly that the 1968 second papal condemnation of contraception, including the "pill," against and in spite of the overwhelming recommendation of the pope's own widely regarded birth control commission, was made principally to preserve the then pope's weak claim to the "mystical" power of purported "infallibility" that would be undercut substantially if the pope in 1968 reversed the 1930 papal condemnation.

It now seems clear that the current pope wants to continue the papal contraception condemnation as a "loyalty oath," in order both to preserve even his currently weaker claim to "infallibility" power, and also to offset by more Catholic births worldwide the flight of millions of disgusted Catholics who are fleeing the Catholic Church's corrupt leadership, as well as to enable the Vatican to compete population-wise with the increase in the worldwide Islamic birthrate. Complete geopolitical nonsense, to say the least.

The papal contraception ban is mainly about power, and not morality or theology! Neither U.S. presidential candidate should be cooperating in any way with this mystical megalomania, no matter what election support is being offered by the Vatican. Moreover, Catholic voters should completely disregard the Catholic hierarchy's voting directives and recognize them for what they are, crass political power plays by understandably frightened hierarchs.

Are Popes Ever Above the Law?

Popes and their hierarchy clearly are "above and beyond" the law at present in Vatican City, and appear often to act as if they are above all earthly laws. The pope claims he is "immune as a head of state" from other countries' laws, as well, because the Italian dictator, Mussolini, to gain in 1929 needed papal political support, granted the then pope, Pius XI, a "separate country" in Rome, Vatican City, consisting of 100+ acres with a population of under 1,000 persons, smaller than almost all college campuses. The pope, as the last post-Constantinian absolute monarch in the Old World, controls completely the Vatican's laws, judges, prosecutors and police, as Roman Emperor Constantine comparably and dictatorially did in the Fourth Century.

This week, after a quick Vatican "show" trial of the pope's whistle-blowing butler that lacked some fundamental due process protections, a papal court declared that, although the butler did not benefit financially from leaking copies of papal documents, the butler had "...violated...the secrecy of actions owed to a sovereign..." and may have "...profited intellectually and morally...." For this purported "crime" of violating "sovereign secrecy" for alleged personal intellectual and moral profit (?), the butler has been sentenced to serve a year and a half, apparently out of the reach of the media, in a Vatican makeshift prison as reported HERE and as also reported HERE.

The U.S. Founders surely would have had some serious problems with this clear judicial abuse of this courageous and tragic butler at the behest of an unaccountable and harsh absolute monarch, his papal boss.

When popes want prompt Vatican legal action, they get it as was clearly the case with this butler's extremely rapid criminal prosecution. When popes want to avoid taking Vatican legal action, they also can avoid, and have often avoided, taking it. Serial child sex abuser Fr. Marcial Maciel bribed Vatican officials broadly and often to string out over a half century the corrupt Vatican bureaucracy's investigations of him, and this long saga of clerical corruption is still yet continuing at present as reported HERE. Famously, the current pope as then angry Cardinal Ratzinger a few years ago took a soft swipe at an ABC-TV reporter who dared merely to ask him about the stalled case of Maciel, a clear favorite of Pope John Paul II, as shown HERE.

In another notoriously stalled Vatican criminal case, Milwaukee predator priest, Fr. Lawrence Murphy, was accused credibly of sexually abusing over 200 young deaf children, yet was never really brought to justice, after decades of Catholic hierarchical inaction, including by this pope, Cardinal Bertone and others, as vividly reported in the new award-winning and hard-hitting HBO documentary, "Mea Maxima Culpa," discussed HERE and viewable as a movie trailer HERE.

Many other examples have been widely reported of the Vatican's utter avoidance of the transparent rule of law, especially with respect to the hierarchy's alleged cover-up of worldwide priest rape of children, including the widely reported instances of cover-ups relating to, among many others, Cardinals Law, Bevilacqua, Rigali, Brady, Groer, et al., and Bishop Mueller (Norway) and Bishop Vanglehuwe (Belgium), none of whom have ever really been called to account by the Vatican, while the pope's butler gets clobbered for unauthorized distributions of photocopies.

The pope's own reported personal failures, including his failures (1) to address publicly his actions in Munich that enabled a known pedophile priest to continue abusing more children for years and (2) to act on the longstanding abuses at his brother's Regensberg choir school, just underscore the pope's clear strategy to try to bury hierarchical cover-ups of abuse with silence, PR stunts and/or mystical smokescreens.

This shameful Vatican impunity may change soon when the mother, who was promoted recently to chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, which has enforcible jurisdiction over the pope, completes her review of the massive criminal complaint charging the pope and Vatican Cardinals Bertone, Sodano and Levada with "crimes against humanity" for their alleged roles in the worldwide cover-up of sexual abuse by priests of many thousands of defenseless Catholic children as reported HERE.

Of course, the U.S. President has significant influence with international organizations and foreign member nations. Spain backed off investigating George W. Bush administration officials for possible Iraq war crimes in light of U.S. diplomatic pressure. Former Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Sodano personally complained to the then U.S. Secretary of State Condelezza Rice about the efforts to reach the pope then being made by American lawyers for priest child sex abuse survivors. Sodano's efforts seem to have had some impact. Clearly, the Vatican fully understands the value of having influence in the White House to protect the Catholic hierarchy from the long arm of the law. Apparently, the pope has put his money on Romney as the one most likely to help shield the Catholic hierarchy.

What is the Pope's Current Situation Generally?

The formative youthful experiences of Joseph Ratzinger, the current pope, including his participation, purportedly involuntarily, in the Hitler Youth movement and in Hitler's Third Reich Army, seem relevant here. Since then, the pope's experience has mainly been limited, after some early academic efforts, to climbing ambitiously up the hierarchical ladder in a corrupt Vatican bureaucracy that has been marked too often by secretive, ruthless, corrupt and unaccountable actions. The pope's three decades in Rome have witnessed repeated failures, in dealing with issues ranging from child abuse, priest shortages, Curial reform, the Vatican Bank, the SSPX schism to ecumenism; and yet at 85 years old he still refuses to call it quits. What utter hubris!.

Not too surprisingly, the pope's long time friend and oldest living academic colleague, going back at least to their service together in the early 1960's at the Second Vatican Council, Fr. Hans Küng, sadly recently compared HERE the Vatican's current dictatorial procedures under this pope to that of Hitler's Nazi regime.

Fr. Küng has also called upon all Catholics to revolt from the Vatican hierarchy's yoke, a call being heard worldwide, including in Ireland as reported HERE and also HERE.

And importantly, last week Fr. Küng, and over 50 other prominent lay and clerical, female and male Catholic theologians from many countries, issued an online Declaration on Authority in the Catholic Church, for eventual signing by numerous Catholics worldwide. The Declaration, which serves as an excellent roadmap for the world's Cardinals and bishops, sets forth a specific and detailed agenda for making the Catholic hierarchy accountable and for renewing the Church as indicated HERE.

Given (1) the recent media reports that the 85-year old pope's health may now be declining considerably under the stress of the abuse scandal, Vatileaks and numerous other scandals, (2) the new appointments of Cardinals with no Italians among them, and (3) the announcement of a meeting in Rome to be held in a few months of all worldwide papal diplomats, the potential that very soon a papal resignation and election of a new pope may occur only heightens the importance of this major independent reform initiative.

The reported Vatileaks revelations about the widespread corruption and incompetence of the usually secretive Vatican Cardinals have made it very clear, presumably even to fearful but prudent Cardinals worldwide, that the world's Cardinals must elect a new reform pope who will rule collegially and transparently, otherwise all Cardinals risk being sucked down the priest child abuse sewer, and possibly even prosecuted, along with some corrupt and feuding Vatican Cardinals who have dismally failed for decades to clean up the child abuse mess. If the Gospels cannot move the world's Cardinals to act, perhaps the prospect of doing some prison time may finally get them to pay attention and act. If they don't think this could happen, they should talk to Cardinal Rigali, whom the pope removed from Philly last year, about his recently criminally convicted former subordinates, Bishop Finn and Monsignor Lynn! One must wonder whether Rigali is sleeping peacefully these days.

Are the Pope and U.S. Bishops Subject to U. S. Law At Present?

While this rapidly escalating international Catholic reform effort and the Intenational Criminal Court investigation relentlessly move forward, the application of the rule of law to the Catholic hierarchy has also advanced significantly in the United States, especially in recent months. The pope at present, of course, still appears to control completely his U.S. Catholic hierarchy, as recently reported HERE. Members of the U.S. hierarchy, however, have recently been increasingly subjected to American civil, criminal and bankruptcy laws, especially concerning criminal actions and civil liability related to hierarchical cover-ups of priest sexual abuse of defenseless children.

To date, also, more than a half dozen U.S. dioceses have filed for protection under Federal bankruptcy laws mainly due to the adverse financial impact of the abuse scandal, and many more are likely to follow, including possibly the major and venerable Archdiocese of Philadelphia (Philly), which had protected a pervasive pedophile priests' paradise for decades. U.S. bishops have already spent billions of dollars directly related to priest sex abuse claims and lost billions more in discontinued contributions from the 30 million+ U.S. Catholics who have left the "official Church," often out of disgust over the shameful priest child sex abuse cover up. At current trends, the pope, who saw his fatherland fall in 1945, must know it is only a matter of time, it appears, before the entire U.S. Catholic Church faces bankruptcy, depopulation and an end to the availability of priests. This bleak reality surely must have animated, if not motivated, this aging and pathetic pope to spend so much effort on the current U.S. presidential elections. Is it any wonder his health may be declining?

The pope's long-time colleague in the Vatican bureaucracy, Philly's shameful Cardinal Rigali, appears to be a central figure in these U.S. developments as reported HERE. Kansas City's Bishop Finn, the first U.S. bishop criminally convicted of a child endangerment related crime in connection with his cover-up of his priest, Fr. Shawn Ratigan's repeated child pornography activities, served under Rigali in St. Louis. Also, Monsignor Lynn, former Philly priest personnel chief, recently sentenced to six years in prison for failing to curtail activities of a Philly pedophile priest, had served for almost a decade until just last year as a top aide and pastor under Rigali.

Rigali himself, along with his successor, Archbishop Chaput, have just been sued for their alleged roles in covering-up for predatory Philly priests as reported HERE, while the cases of over a half dozen Philly priests identified by Rigali over 18 months ago as suspected child sexual predators still remain unresolved under Archbishop Chaput, with the suspects yet generally unsupervised. Meanwhile, Chaput and many of his fellow U. S. Catholic bishops rant regularly and predictably about the pope's U.S. election year preferred wedge issues, contraception and gay marriage, while suspected priest predators remain at large.

The head of the U.S. bishops, New York's Cardinal Dolan, the so-called "American Pope," is also a St. Louis protege of Rigali's. Dolan appears to be actively campaigning in Rome to be elected the next pope, presumably with Rigali's backing. Dolan just appeared prominently with Romney and Obama at NY's Al Smith Dinner.

It is no surprise then that Rigali, Dolan, Chaput, et al. joined in 2009 with right-wing Republican ideologues at ManhattanDeclaration.org to make common cause apparently to dump Obama by using contraception and gay marriage as wedge issues to bring out docile and conservative Catholic voters. The Catholic hierarchy appears to understand fully the need to influence the top American political leaders, who select U.S. Supreme Court nominees, control legislative child protection agendas, oversee Federal prosecutors and direct U.S. diplomats. Cardinal Dolan has also had extensive and longtime contacts with Paul Ryan, whom Dolan described as a "friend" HERE.

The detailed evidence relating to Monsignor Lynn's Philly conviction, now readily available to all at BishopAccountability.org, shows a decades-long pattern of extensive cover-ups by Cardinals Krol, Bevilacqua and Rigali of Philly predatory priests, often apparently with the acquiesence, if not at times possible collusion, of the Philly criminal justice system, at least until fairly recently.

The Kansas City prosecution of Bishop Finn also shows some stepped-up recent efforts of other local prosecutors, prodded apparently by the aggressive Federal prosecution by Obama's Justice Department of Fr. Ratigan under Federal child pornography laws. At present, the Catholic hierachy are clearly increasingly feeling heat from American prosecutors.

These prosecutions present a major challenge for the Vatican in its current bleak legal and financial environment incompetently managed by octogenerian and/or corrupt Vatican bureaucrats. It also makes it much more important for the Catholic hierarchy to secure maximum presidential political influence during the next four years to try to neutralize some of the anticipated legal and financial onslaughts likely facing the pope and the U.S. bishops.

As someone who for three decades as a Wall Street lawyer had counseled many senior executives at multinational corporations and organizations, I have little doubt that the recent criminal convictions of Bishop Finn and Monsignor Lynn have generated much fear, if not some panic, among Vatican bureaucrats and American bishops. Tellingly, the Catholic hierarchy has publicly said very little about these two convictions.

In my legal experience, there is nothing that gets the undivided attention of senior management faster than the criminal conviction of one of their own!

It also really puzzles me greatly that the worldwide bishops, especially voting Cardinals, seem so content to let their personal legal fates be controlled by corrupt and incompetent octogenerian Vatican bureaucats who may think they are too old to be prosecuted. They may practically be too old, but not all Cardinals and bishops worldwide are over 80 years of age!

What Is the Pope's Strategy in the Current U. S. Election?

In the deteriorating legal and financial situation facing the pope and his bishops, the Vatican appears to have had only three options to try to protect itself:

(1) Ecclesiatically, to reform the hierarchy and priesthood by accepting transparency, accountability, collegiality and a larger priest candidate pool;

(2) Legally, to defend criminal prosecutions of members of the hierarchy vigorously by all available legal maneuvers regardless of expense; and/or

(3) Politically, by lobbying to block legislation that is aimed at predatory priests and their bishop protectors or that helps abuse survivors establish financial claims, and by supporting political candidates who may be willing to forestall prosecutions of predatory priests and their bishop protectors.

Ecclesiastically, the current pope, as well as his immediate predecessor, John Paul II, and their corrupt Vatican bureaucracy, evidentally decided decades ago against pursuing authentic and effective reforms. Collegiality and power sharing with the worldwide bishops has been virtually eliminated as the current seemingly pointless Synod makes abundantly clear. Bishops today behave like papal puppets mostly and are selected mainly for their demonstrated capacity for blind obedience to the Vatican.

Requiring mandatory reporting by bishops of all priest child abuse claims to the police and requiring comprehensive mandatory, transparent and independent audits of all worldwide bishops' priest personnel files have both been flatly rejected by the Vatican. Hence, the sexual abuse of innocent children by predatory priests protected by their bishops continues to be an ongoing and unending major problem for the Vatican.

Even taking steps to reduce the pressure on bishops to accept and retain suspected predatory priests has been rejected by the Vatican by the papal refusal to consider adding married and women candidates to the potential priest pool.

Efforts to "buy" and transfer more foreign priests to deal with the priest shortages in many countries have also generally failed. Among other shortcomings, over 50 foreign Catholic priests that were assigned to the U.S. have fled to other countries to avoid potential prosecution for sexual abuse related crimes.

Streamlined canonical procedures to root out promptly "bad" priests are still mainly nonexistent as the documentary "Mea Maxima Culpa" so vividly but sadly shows. The recent exiling to Malta of the relatively effective, but woefully understaffed, Vatican prosecutor, Monsignor Scicluna, has just underscored this failure.

Instead of attempting to adopt real ecclesiastical reforms, the Vatican for several decades has concentrated almost exclusively on pursuing its legal and political options by hiring more lawyers and public relations firms, and lobbying powerful and pliable political leaders, who can be expected (1) to support laws that protect bishops and predatory priests from civil and criminal liability, and (2) to give more predatory priests and pedophile protecting bishops a prosecutorial pass. This strategy clearly appears to underlie the pope's current U.S. election efforts.

Where Do the U.S. Presidential Candidates Fit Into the Pope's Strategy?:

Barack Obama: It is clear Obama doesn't fit into the pope's strategy. Obama has already shown in Kansas City and at Penn State that he is getting more aggressive with sexual predators who abuse children. Given the pope's ploys in the current U.S. presidential campaign to "resurrect" the 1968 papal condemnation of contraception and to incite anti-gay predjudice as part of a campaign to try to dump Obama, it is likely Obama in a second term will expand even more his efforts to combat child sexual abuse, including by priests and their bishop abettors.

Mitt Romney: Romney's hands-off position with respect to Boston's Cardinal Law was discussed above.

As has been widely reported, Romney is a major financial contributor to the Mormon church and served for some years in a position in the Mormon church in Boston comparable in some respects to that of a Catholic bishop as reported HERE.

The U.S. Mormon church has had its own major and ongoing child sex abuse scandal as reported by a prominent abuse survivors' lawyer, Kelly Clark HERE. The Mormon church has also been implicated in the recent Boy Scouts sex abuse scandals as reported HERE.

Kelly Clark has been extensively involved as an attorney for years in pursuing child sex abuse claims against the Catholic Church, the Mormon church and the Boy Scouts. While he has some favorable comments about some recent Mormon efforts to curtail child sex abuse, he also notes the long-term suspicions of many Mormons of government intervention in their religious practices, as Mitt Romney's grandparents and many other Mormons faced in the past. He notes some parallels between Catholic and Mormon church leaders' preference for secrecy and for trying to avoid publicity relating to child abuse scandals that could embarass the Mormon church.

An interesting recent example of this is the involvement of the Mormon Utah Lieutenant Governor who recently appears to have gone to some efforts to neutralize the records of an audit related to a Mormon friend's family child abuse case as reported HERE.

While it is impossible to project with certainty how Romney will handle Catholic Church priest abuse issues, it is likely he has some experience with the issues both from his Massachusetts and Boston experiences and his overall ongoing significant role in the Mormon church that seems much more amenable to the Catholic hierarchy's approach than to Obama's approach. Apparently, the pope and U.S. bishops are more willing to take their chances with Romney than with Obama, which in itself may be telling.

Conclusion: The pope and U.S. bishops appear clearly to be supporting Romney as part of their desperate survival strategy amidst a bleak and deteriorating Vatican legal and financial situation. The Catholic hierarchy and their opportunistic "right to life" partners seem to care little about Romney's clear record of support for abortion as reported HERE and also HERE.

Catholic voters will have to decide between Obama and Romney based on their records, not on their rhetoric or positions du jour, and certainly not on their records on women's reproductive rights, neither of which conforms to the pope's position. What seems abundantly clear is that Catholic voters should pay little, if any, attention to their hierachy's voting directives, since the hierarchy appear more concerned with promoting their own self interest than with promoting the common good.

Personally, if all other things were equal, I would vote against Romney solely because the pope is backing him for reasons I suggest above. But all other things are not equal. Obama now has four years of presidential experience. He has pulled the country out of a ditch left by Republicans, many of whom are Romney's current collaborators. Obama has the economy once again moving forward. It is not a good time to change horses.

Based on my three decades' experience on Wall Street, I expect Romney, if elected, would look out mainly for himself and the top 0.1%. His failure to release his tax returns is ominous. His failure to provide basic details of his tax plan is ominous. His constant flip-flopping is ominous. His views on women's economic and health issues and on gay marriage are ominous. He is, in my opinion, ominous.

On the specific issue of protecting children from priest rapists and their bishop abettors, I am certainly betting on Obama over Romney.

Fr. Emmett Coyne, The Theology of Fear: When Religion Takes Leave of Spirituality

Usually, when I discuss or recommend a book on this blog, I've already read it. In fact, I can't think of an instance in which a book I've recommended here hasn't been one I've yet read.

Today, I want, however, to tell readers about a book I haven't yet read, but am planning to read. And I want, as well, to explain why I think this book will be very useful to me--asking, as I do so, whether any readers of this blog may already have read the book in question and if we might talk together about it as a dialogic community on this blog.

The book I'm intending to read is Fr. Emmett Coyne's Theology of Fear. As this Amazon link to the book indicates, Fr. Coyne published the book this past May in conjunction with Amazon's CreateSpace self-publishing program. As Fr. Coyne's website also notes, profits from the sale of Theology of Fear are going to Partners in Health, to provide healthcare to those on the margins of society.

The website's summary of the book notes that Fr. Coyne wrote it to foster "a dialogue of change in our understanding of doctrine, morality, and how the Roman Church ought to 'seek first the Kingdom of God' by reading the signs of the times." It is, in other words, a direct reflection on the theology of Vatican II, which accentuated the concept derived from the theology of Cardinal Newman that doctrine develops, and that in the process of doctrinal development, the voice of the laity, our sensus fidelium, is critically important.

It's critically important because, as Newman maintained, the "reception" or lack of reception of a doctrinal or moral teaching of the magisterium is part and parcel of the truth claims made by that teaching. The relationship between the truth of church teaching and the laity who receive or don't receive a teaching is not static, in the sense that a commodity full of truth is offered to customers for sale, and customers either decide or don't decide to buy the commodity.

The relationship between the truth of church teaching and the laity's reception of that teaching is, instead, dynamic, in that the truth of the teaching isn't even there in a complete and meaningful way until and unless the people of God "receive" the truth of church teaching. There is an ongoing, dynamic, continually progressing and developing connection between the people of God's discernment of the truth claims of a church teaching, and whether those claims are even present at all in the "product" being offered for sale by church officials.

And so one reason I want to read Fr. Coyne's book is to remind myself of what is central to the theology of Vatican II as we commemorate the calling of that council by Pope John XXIII in 1962. Another reason--and it's inherently connected to the first--is that, as Fr. Coyne also notes on his website, rather than relying on the dialogic process Vatican II (and Newman) envisaged for the verification of the doctrinal and moral teachings of the magisterium, the leaders of the Catholic church have chosen increasingly in the period following Vatican II to rely on fear, threats, coercion, and punishment to enforce the truth claims of their teachings.

And this is having serious and radical effects on the ability of the church to communicate those claims both to its own members and the culture at large, even as the papacy and bishops step up their truth claims through overt attempts to coerce the faithful and society at large to accept Catholic teachings in the political sphere. Fr. Coyne's website says that he came to write the book because

[i]n its current incarnation, the Roman Church reflects more of Caesar than Christ - imposing fear, power, and control rather than cultivating love, service, and freedom. Its language remains Latin, its vocabulary ancient nomenclature, its clerical vestments vestiges of "the glory that was Rome." It is the only religion demanding to be treated as a political entity, mediating the Kingdom’s message through political considerations. Jesus would be aghast.

The Amazon site for Theology of Fear contains a review/synopsis of the book by the noted Dominican priest Fr. Tom Doyle, who has done such outstanding and courageous service on behalf of survivors of clerical sexual abuse--and who has paid a steep price with Catholic officials for his willingness to speak out on behalf of survivors. Fr. Doyle's review develops further the thesis that Fr. Coyne states in the preceding paragraph I've cited from his website:

Religion and spirituality are two radically different concepts. Religion can and often does pose an almost insurmountable barrier to a true spiritual experience of a Higher Power. This incredible book is about the toxic effects of Roman Catholicism as a religion and not as a source of spiritual growth. The title is spot on in describing the predominant theological force that permeates most of the elements of institutional Catholicism. This book is a "must read" for anyone who has been traumatized and harmed by the oppressive theology of fear that has permeated institutional Catholicism for ages. Emmett Coyne is more than qualified to write this book. He has been a priest for nearly half a century and has lived through the exhilaration of Vatican II and the increasing repression of the restorationist papacies of John Paul II and Beneduct XVI. It would be easy for brainwashed Catholics to dismiss Coyne as angry or insulting to church personages but to do so proves his point. The Church is not about those who control it nor is it about sustaining a power and money-hungry monarchy. The monarchical system has created a toxic dependence between its laws, structures, rituals and customs and the millions of believers. They have become emotionally dependent on this theology of fear and must find radical liberation to have a true experience of Christianity. Coyne's book should be the opening of the door to spiritual freedom for the many who have been controlled by the Church-driven yet totally inauthentic visions of an angry, vengeful and fear-filled God. The author's countless examples of this theology of fear, where it comes from, how it retains power and how it devours the souls of good people are all solidly grounded in history and theology. This is not an emotional rant. It is a solid, factual description of what is, in the hope that by seeing what is will lead to freedom from fear and an experience of the Church as it should be and as it is described in the life of Christ found in the gospels. The book is a must for anyone who has suffered religious abuse from the toxicity of Catholic oppression. It is a must for any cleric who has the courage to want to serve Christ first and the monarchy second.

This line (among several others) catches my eye: "This book is a 'must read' for anyone who has been traumatized and harmed by the oppressive theology of fear that has permeated institutional Catholicism for ages." Yes. I can see myself among those who have been "traumatized and harmed by the oppressive theology of fear" permeating institutional Catholicism, particularly as the Vatican and bishops step up their claims about their authority to intrude in and even direct the political lives of secular pluralistic democracies.

I blogged recently about how toxic I'm finding (all over again!) some of the conversations on Catholic blog sites lately, as Catholics battle Catholics re: how to assess moral issues like racism with the elections nearing in the U.S. In a National Catholic Reporter thread that developed in the last several days in response to a good article about same-sex marriage by Pat Perriello, I've been told by a reader I presume is a Catholic, "We don't like you."

This in response to questions I asked this person's friend when the friend, someone who uses the name William Glenn in this and other threads, maintained that legalizing same-sex marriage is tantamount to legalizing incest. Glenn had maintained a day or so prior to this in another thread that fewer than 5% of same-sex relationships last more than a few days.

In both instances, I asked Mr. Glenn to provide substantiation of his claims. In both instances, he has, up to now, simply ignored my questions. Mr. Glenn's friend, Botch, who tells me that he and his group--"we"--don't "like" me, wonders why he or anyone else should even talk to me at all, since, as he or she maintains, I approach church teaching and the hierarchy with "vitriol" and a "closed mind." And so there's no need to talk to someone who has a vitriolic and closed mind!

I have to conclude that people who think in this convoluted wayhave experienced some kind of cognitive impairment as a result of what church authority figures have done to their heads. How else can a refusal to talk to others who try to create dialogue about significant moral questions become a charge that the other person is vitriolic and "closed" in his mind? When refusing to talk to others while issuing childish taunts about how "we don't like you" becomes an example of non-vitriolic and open rather than closed discussion, up has become down and red has become green.

People can get to this strange space, I suspect, only when the kind of abuse doled out by religious authority figures has been so constant and brutal that their heads have been tampered with--so that they no longer know how to think, talk carefully about serious moral and doctrinal moral issues, or respectfully entertain the views of fellow believers that diverge from their own views.

When we as an institution get to this space--when this becomes normative for more and more of us who hang on as true believers--our religious institution has been sunk spiritually. It no longer serves spiritual ends and no longer deserves to be taken seriously as it tells us to vote against the gays because they are, after all, promiscuous people who can't hold onto real relationships and letting them marry will be opening the door to letting a brother marry his sister.

I find what has happened to my church under its current pastoral leaders, and as the William Glenns and Botches of the church proliferate and inform everyone else that we don't deserve to be treated with respect as fellow human beings and fellow Catholics, dispiriting in the extreme. And this is why I'd like to read Fr. Coyne's book and begin to understand better how we've come to such a sorry state.

Is the Catholic Church behind the BBC's Child Sexual Abuse Scandal?

UNITED KINGDOM
The Catholic World Reort

October 24, 2012

By Mark Brumley

You might expect such a headline, given the seemingly disportionate attention the Catholic Church has received for clergy sexual abuse. Mind you, CWR covered clergy sexual abuse from the outset and criticized folks high and low. It's not exactly as if we simply wanted to change the subject. At the same time, it seems that other institutions involved with cover ups of child sexual abuse have often gotten, if not a pass, at least disproportionately less attention.

That situation is starting to change. A recent case in point: the BBC. Yes, you read correctly. The BBC is being accused of sexual abuse and cover up. According to an AP story:

"A sexual abuse scandal shaking the BBC broadened Tuesday, with the broadcaster saying that it is investigating claims of sexual abuse and harassment against nine staff members and contributors, in addition to the late disgraced children's TV host Jimmy Savile.

Americans United Says Taxpayers Have Right To Challenge Church Control Of Federal Program

UNITED STATES
Americans United for Separation of Church and State

[Click here to read the story]

Oct 24, 2012

When the federal government lets a church group impose religious doctrine on a publicly funded program, taxpayers have the right to take the matter to court.

That’s the viewpoint put forward by Americans United for Separation of Church and State in a friend-of-the-court brief filed with the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals today.

The appeals court is considering a case in which the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in 2006 gave the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops control over a program that helps sex-trafficking victims. The bishops’ conference then denied funding to other social service agencies unless they promised not to use the public dollars for abortion or contraceptive services.

The American Civil Liberties Union challenged the arrangement, saying it violated church-state separation and denied essential services to trafficking victims.

A federal district court ruled in the ACLU’s favor, but now the bishops’ conference and HHS are claiming that the case should be thrown out because taxpayers have no “standing” to bring matters like this into court.

Said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United executive director, “It is an outrage that the federal government allowed a church group to deny essential public services to hurting people on religious grounds. It would compound that outrage if concerned citizens were not allowed to bring this violation into court.”

“Win Win” director Tom McCarthy takes on Catholic Church sexual abuse crisis in new movie

BOSTON (MA)
Irish Central

By
MICHELLE K SMITH
IrishCentral Intern

Published Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Actor and director Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer, one of the writers for “The West Wing,” have joined forces on an untitled drama which will follow the footsteps of the Boston Globe journalists who uncovered the sex abuse coverup in the Catholic Church in that area.

McCarthy has been working on the project for over a year, but has kept his work secret due to the sensitive nature of the film. The project was initially announced in April 2010 and is said to have similarities to “All the President’s Men.”

McCarthy told Boston.com about the film. He said, “This is a story that feels like it has to be told.”

McCarthy, who is a graduate of Boston College and grew up in a large Irish American family, said he felt drawn to the story because of his own connections.

He added, “It’s such a great reminder of how essential investigative journalism is.”

A global crop of cardinals; Syria; Vatileaks; and possible popes

ROME
National Catholic Reporter

by John L. Allen Jr. | Oct. 26, 2012 All Things Catholic

One could argue that in its strong focus on Western secularism, the papacy of Benedict XVI has been somewhat Eurocentric. When that case is made, however, the consistory of Nov. 24 will have to be recorded as a counter-example.

This will be Benedict's fifth crop of new cardinals, and for the first time, there's not a single European in the bunch. Granted, there are only six total, but most observers still expected a couple of guys from the old continent -- for instance, German Archbishop Gerhard Müller, the new prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, or Rino Fisichella, an Italian and president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization.

Instead, Benedict announced he would hold a consistory one month hence that includes only one Westerner: Archbishop James Harvey, a Milwaukee native, following 14 years as prefect of the Papal Household. The pope said he plans to name Harvey as archpriest of the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls.

The other five come from the developing world: one each from the Middle East, Latin America and Africa, and two from Asia. In that sense, November's consistory reflects the rise of a "world church" in which leadership will increasingly come from the southern hemisphere.

Immediately, the consistory would seem to elevate two figures into the ranks of the papabili, meaning candidates to be pope:
• Luis Antonio Tagle, 55, of Manila in the Philippines
• John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan, 68, of Abuja in Nigeria

Punishment, penance should come via a royal commission

AUSTRALIA

The Age

Michael Short
Journalist

ONE of the most fundamental responsibilities of government is to protect the community's most vulnerable citizens. Children are achingly vulnerable. They have a right to be able to trust adults who exercise direct institutional power over them. Schools and the church are two of the most powerful institutions. Children are at their mercy.

There is abundant, tragic evidence that many thousands of children have suffered sex crimes by Catholic priests in schools and dioceses. These perverted men of God have shown the children no mercy. Their putrid crimes have destroyed lives and caused untold misery, not only for their direct victims, but for the people who love them. There is no greater love than that felt by a parent for their child. Think how you would feel to discover a priest had raped your child.

These crimes have caused many to commit suicide. They have caused crippling anguish and mental health problems. They have caused drug and alcohol problems. They have caused relationship problems.

The Catholic Church has spent millions protecting paedophile priests. It has withheld evidence from police that would be likely to lead to the prosecution and jailing of an unknown number of perpetrators. These are criminals who, to add hypocrisy to horror, claim to speak for Jesus Christ, a figure revered by many for his love and compassion and who, one would think, would condemn child abuse above all else.

Austrian bishops call for church unity to bust stalemate

AUSTRIA
National Catholic Reporter

[link to Austrian Bishops' Conference and to the pastoral letter]

by Christa Pongratz-Lippitt | Oct. 26, 2012

Vienna Austria --
In a 15-page pastoral letter, which Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna admitted was the "outcome of intensive dialogue with Rome," the Austrian bishops insist that renewal of faith in full communion with the pope and the church's magisterium, and with special emphasis on church unity, is the only way out of the stalemate between the bishops and the Austrian Priests' Initiative, which demands far-reaching structural church reforms.

The pastoral letter, titled Jahr des Glaubens or "Year of Faith," has a special chapter on the ongoing deadlock in the Austrian church since the Austrian Priests' Initiative, which has more than 400 members, published its "Appeal to Disobedience" in June 2011. The initiative, which has the support of a large number of Austrian lay Catholics, calls for radical church reforms, including the ordination of married men and women.

Schönborn, president of the Austrian bishops' conference, presented the pastoral letter at a news conference in Vienna in the first week of October, before he headed to Rome for the 2012 Synod of Bishops, which has the theme "the new evangelization" or reviving Christian faith in increasingly secular societies. The synod coincides with the opening of a special "Year of Faith," which runs from Oct. 11, 2012, to Nov. 24, 2013, which also has focus on "the new evangelization."

Update for November 4, 2012

Is it safer for kids to fly or go to church?

MASSACHUSETTS
Patrick J. Wall
Patrick Doyle wrote an intriguing piece in the Boston Daily after interviewing a number of seminarians. After reading it, I now am more afraid than ever for the future safety of children in the Church.
The formators (priests in charge of seminarian formation) in the Roman Catholic Church in Boston are analogizing millennia-old child sexual abuse crimes to the airline industry. I do not think the folks at Boston Logan, Delta airlines or Boeing would concur.
From the article:
“As Father Chris O’Connor, the Vice-Rector at Saint John Seminary (Boston) is fond of saying, Priests are like airplanes. Most of them take off and land, take off and land, and everything is fine. You only hear about the ones who crash.”
It’s delusion at its highest form.
So let’s look at the numbers. If you compare and contrast what the National Transportatio Safety Board (NTSB) reports with the Roman Catholic Church National Review Board (NRB) here is what you find:
NTSB NRB
www.ntsb.gov www.usccb.org/news/2012/
crash rate is eight million to one crash rate is 4-10%
62 major crashes since 1950 6,115 priests since 1950
910,000 licensed US pilots 39,718 active US priests.
accident data base available accident data base is secret

Is it safer for a child to fly on an airplane in the United States or to attend the Roman Catholic Church? You do the math.

November 3, 2012

Gerald T. Slevin: Is Pope Leading a New "Children's Crusade" to Help Romney Win?

UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage

Another outstanding piece this morning by Jerry Slevin. In this essay, Jerry sketches the historical and political background to the intervention of the Vatican and the U.S. Catholic hierarchy in the 2012 elections, noting the connection of papal politics (and the politicking of the USCCB) to the sex abuse scandal in the Catholic church. Jerry's essay follows:

Of the many stories generated by the medieval wars, or Crusades, against Islamic rulers that were frequently supported actively by various popes, few are more fascinating than the ones about the so-called 13th Century "Children's Crusade." The stories, which relate to the exploits of a large numbers of itinerants, including many docile and idealistic youth, suggest a uniquely organized effort to rescue the Holy Land. As with most wars, including the Crusades, what seems fairly clear is that children were frequently disproportionately among the casualties, directly or indirectly, including these youthful Crusaders. Then as now, the welfare of children seemed to be a low priority for a generally celibate clerical caste, notwithstanding Jesus' clear Gospel mandate to protect children.

As the U.S. elections soon arrive, the pope is desperately leading another crusade that disproportionately negatively affects children. The pope is flexing his U.S. election year muscles to rally and bring out conservative Catholic voters in critical swing districts by opposing contraception health insurance, as well as the other "hot" wedge issue, gay marriage, that the pope claims, without real evidence and without addressing contrary evidence, hurts families, including children.

The pope's longstanding worldwide effort against government support of effective and voluntary birth control family planning for the poor, in particular, has contributed clearly and unnecessarily to hundreds of millions of "unplanned" children worldwide, including many in the U.S., who are often consigned to lives of miserable poverty.

What is the pope's goal with this heartless anti-contraception crusade? Firstly, the pope's power is apparently thought to be directly related to his efforts to maximize the size of the Catholic population worldwide, especially when compared to the higher birth rates in many non-Catholic countries in Asia, Africa and the Middle East, as well as the increasing Islamic populations in Western countries. Reproducing more Catholics seems to be a clear papal objective, especially since in many countries, including in the West, the pope is also facing currently a growing Catholic exodus over major papal failures, including the pope's inability and/or unwillingness to adopt effective measures to curtail the worldwide epidemic of priest sexual abuse of innocent children. ...

The challenge apparently for the pope was to find a novel way to use these weapons against Obama, who had recently been showing signs of getting increasingly aggressive against the U.S. bishops for their ongoing cover-up of priest sexual predators.

The new papal attack was launched against Obama's proposed rules requiring making available free contraceptive insurance for all employees of Church-controlled institutions, such as universities, but not for direct employees of the Church.

==========

Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel frescoes turn 500 years old

As the Sistine Chapel celebrates its 500th anniversary, the Vatican said Wednesday it may have to limit the huge numbers of visitors because pollution is damaging Michelangelo's frescoes, one of the artistic wonders of the world.

The scenes, including the moment in which God reaches out and gives life to Adam with the touch of his finger, are being damaged by the breath, sweat and heat of the 10,000 to 30,000 tourists who walk through the chapel every day.

The Vatican had an air-conditioning system fitted during restorations in the chapel in the 1990s, but critics have warned that it is no longer sufficient to deal with the amount of dust and dirt being dragged in by today's visitors.

Museums director Antonio Paolucci said a specialist company has been asked to design a new air-purifying system - but that if a solution is not found by next year the Vatican will be forced to begin reducing the number of tourists.

Michelangelo spent much of four years on his back painting the chapel's ceiling frescoes, which Paolucci said most tourists could not bear to miss on a tour of Rome, describing them as a "fatal attraction, an object of desire".

The chapel was commissioned by Pope Julius II, who said an evening vespers service on October 31, 1512, to inaugurate the room, and current Pope Benedict XVI will say his own vespers there later on Wednesday to mark the 500th anniversary.

The chapel - which is used by cardinals when they meet to elect a new pope - is one of the most visited sites in the world and guards struggle to enforce an atmosphere of prayer among the hordes of photograph-snapping tourists.

Tourists and pilgrims often queue for hours for a chance to see first hand the 2,500 square metres (27,000 square feet) of colourful frescoes which Michelangelo began in 1508 after designing scaffolding to allow him to reach the curved ceiling.

The Vatican had previously ruled out the idea of timed visits because the chapel is a place of prayer, but the issue flared up again in September, when one of Italy's leading literary critics publicly denounced the situation.

In a protest letter to leading newspaper Corriere della Sera, Pietro Citati said the chapel was an "unimaginable disaster" where tourists behave like "drunken herds" and "any form of contemplation was impossible... in the universal confusion."

"The church needs money for its various activities, but these monstrous conditions are impossible," said Citati.

Paolucci retorted that "the days when only Russian grand dukes and English lords... could gain access to the great masterpieces are definitely over," but on Wednesday admitted the Vatican may not have any choice in the long term.

Source: AFP

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Updates for November 18, 2012

By George Pell, Vatican Catholics still don’t get it. Cardinal uses tricks of Vatican blame game http://jp2m.blogspot.ca/2011/05/vatican-blame-game-its-them-not-us-john.html

Australia

’s painful awakening and discovery of JP2 ARMY-John Paul II Pedophile Priests Army… 10 years after the USA

Rules are one for all and all for one

AUSTRALIA

Sydney Morning Herald
November 18, 2012
Peter FitzSimons

Amid all Cardinal George Pell's bluster about the forthcoming royal commission, it is clear he does not have the first clue as to what is happening here.

Allow me, Cardinal, to spell it out. While you are free to worship whatever god you choose, it is now clear that generations of Australian children have been interfered with by your sex-maddened priests and, just as is happening all over the world, your church is now going to be called to account for both these actions and its appalling cover-ups.

As to those who, outrageously, support Cardinal Pell in his statement that ''the seal of the Confessional is inviolable'' - as in all Australians should obey the laws requiring the reporting of sexual abuse, except the very group identified as being most responsible for that abuse - give yourselves an uppercut.

To be intellectually consistent on this, you would have to also support the imposition of the even more appalling sharia for those who worship Allah.

From the moment you make exceptions for religions because of the dictates of imaginary friends, you attack the very essence of one law for all Australians and it is unsustainable. This royal commission must drag all religious institutions, kicking and screaming if necessary, into the 21st century.

…Pigs did not fly and the sky did not fall. Which brings me to how we can most easily become a republic. At the moment, to choose our titular head, the system is that the Prime Minister picks a Governor-General and the Queen gives her assent.

I propose the smallest possible change: The Prime Minister picks a Governor-General and then the Parliament gives its assent. Nothing else need change! We don't even change the title of ''Governor-General'', avoiding all the baggage that goes with the word ''President''.

Then we all get on with our lives, freed from the international embarrassment of still being linked with the English monarchy, more than 100 years after Federation.

Priest robbed a child's innocence

AUSTRALIA

The West Australian
Gary Adshead, The West Australian
Updated November 17, 2012
Reverend Michael Painter didn't stay long after laying 13-year-old David Dossett to rest during a small but gut-wrenching funeral service at Karrakatta in 1976.
The boy's mother Margaret assumed the family priest, who she says had taken David on youth group trips, found it too upsetting.
Almost two decades later she learnt the real reason Painter disappeared early on that terrible day. He was a shame- ridden paedophile who robbed David of his innocence and drove him to suicide.
Mrs Dossett's memory of the circumstances surrounding David's death was vivid.
She knew the names of the constables who were at the bush site in Thornlie where David was found at 4.50pm on August 12, 1976, having been lying unconscious and out of sight all day.

Galling defiance amid the shame

AUSTRALIA

Brisbane Times
November 17, 2012
Mike Carlton
Grave of mien, choosing each word with studied care, every inch a prince of Rome, Cardinal George Pell defied the accusers.

The sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests had been exaggerated, he told a news conference in Sydney on Tuesday. There was a "press campaign" against the church, with "general smears that we are covering up and moving people around''.

"We object to being described as the only cab on the rank … because there is a persistent press campaign focused largely on us, that does not mean we are largely the principal culprits.''

With those few sentences, Australia's most senior Catholic churchman flung aside any lingering shred of moral authority attached either to his person or his office as the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney. There were one or two perfunctory remarks about "shame" delivered in that familiar treacly baritone, but that was it. Strip away the apostolic airs and he could have been a flack for James Hardie assuring the world that the dangers of the company's asbestos products had been rather overblown.

Archbishop: I won't breach confession

AUSTRALIA

The West Australian
Andrew Tillett Canberra, The West Australian
The head of the Catholic Church in Perth warns that forcing priests to report sex offenders could be counterproductive and still put children at risk.
Archbishop Timothy Costelloe told _The Weekend West _ yesterday that the confidentiality of the confession box may be the only way of getting predators to admit and deal with their crimes.
In the wake of Julia Gillard announcing a national royal commission this week into child sex abuse, a raft of politicians - including the Prime Minister, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and Premier Colin Barnett - said priests had a responsibility to pass on claims of child sex abuse to the authorities.
In WA, priests are not bound by the same mandatory reporting requirements as teachers, doctors, nurses and police.

Priest calls for rally against abuse

AUSTRALIA

Geelong Advertiser
Mandy Squires | November 17th, 2012
GEELONG priest Kevin Dillon says a public rally against the handling of Catholic Church abuse claims could help send a message to the church's leaders.

Ordinary Catholics should consider letting the "blind and deaf" church hierarchy know they do not agree with the way abuse claims have been handled and want a new way forward, Father Dillon of St Mary's Basilica said.
A rally would also show support to abuse victims, he said.
"Maybe what we need is a march up Bourke St like we had for Jill Meagher a few weeks ago, to say to church leaders we want a different approach," Father Dillon said.
"We want people who have been violated and had their lives ruined to be looked after and we're sick and tired of this business of being told how good it (the Catholic Church's own system for handling abuse claims) is, when it hasn't been able to produce one victim to actually say that."

A step into the crucible

AUSTRALIA

The Australian
PETER CRAVEN
From:The Australian
November 17, 2012
IT'S fortunate that when Julia Gillard announced on Monday that she would hold a royal commission into child abuse, she emphasised it would not confine itself to any one religious institution, or to religious institutions at all: government childcare, non-profit private bodies such as the Scouts - all would be scrutinised.
If the process was going to take years, then fair enough, in the Prime Minister's view - there could (and should) be no shortcuts in this business.
It was an appropriate way to announce a royal commission, because the immediate provocation for one was that there had been more reports of abuse involving the Catholic Church.

They were hellish reports: of Catholic brothers committing pack rapes of children in orphanages, of offending priests being posted to new parishes where they offended again.
Premier Ted Baillieu in Victoria has an investigation under way and his NSW counterpart Barry O'Farrell has announced one too. Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser, independent senator Nick Xenophon and independent federal MP Tony Windsor had all called for a royal commission.

Ex-priest committed to stand trial

AUSTRALIA

The Standard
By Mark Russell
Nov. 16, 2012
A former Catholic priest has today been committed to stand trial on child sex abuse charges.
Magistrate Greg McNamara late this afternoon found there was sufficient evidence to convict David Rapson, 59, and ordered him to stand trial in the County Court.
Rapson, who told the magistrate he was "not guilty" of all the charges against him, was released on bail to appear in the County Court on December 11 for a directions hearing. His trial will be held in August next year.
Rapson is charged with one count of rape, five counts of indecent assault, four counts of indecently assaulting a child under 16, and one count of gross indecency from 1973 to 1990.

Abuse victims from orphanages and foster care to seek compensation through Royal Commission

AUSTRALIA

ABC - PM
TONY EASTLEY: The Federal Government's Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse may have been sparked by incidents within the Catholic Church but it's not the only organisation that will be subject to scrutiny.
Many people who were abused in foster care or at boys' and girls' homes also hope the Royal Commission will bring some recognition of what they went through.
The Care Leavers Australia Network hopes that compensation will be considered.
A warning: Timothy McDonald's report contains material that some listeners might find distressing.
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: Jeffrey Myers says he suffered horrific abuse as a child at the Royalston Boys Home in Glebe in inner Sydney.
He's in his 70s now and the abuse happened decades ago, but he still has a hard time talking about it.
JEFFREY MYERS: Well I will go as far as saying that there was penetration by objects in my body. That's about as far as I'll go mate, as far as the torture side of it was concerned. And I did black out.

Pell and Abbott to end up targets

AUSTRALIA

Canberra Times
November 17, 2012
Jack Waterford
Julia Gillard's decision to go for a royal commission into institutional sex abuse of children may have involved a calculation that it had more capacity to hurt the other side of politics than her own. That might be summarised with the observations that Australia's most visible Catholic, George Cardinal Pell, is a close friend, mentor and counsellor of the Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott, and no one can remember Pell wittingly doing Labor a favour - at least since 1955 - or missing an opportunity to benefit the Coalition.

Pell is not, of course, a sexual abuser of children, nor any sort of apologist for it. Nor is Abbott. But Pell's embattled, defensive and sometimes angry reaction to criticism of the church's response to the epidemic of child abuse - including his suggestion this week that the media were beating up on the church - could hardly have better symbolised a common suspicion that the leadership of the church was slow to act once it realised it had a big problem, failed to reach out properly to victims, and in certain respects still fails to ''get it''. Pell, when on the front foot on this subject, as opposed to Catholic issues he would prefer to be talking about, is a public relations disaster for the church.

And, some tacticians might think, the well-known reluctance of Pell to take a backward step or a back seat when under attack might accentuate the disaster at times in the political cycle when it matters. The Catholic Church may have a lot of adherents, even generally loyal ones, but it has only limited moral capital in the bank, and expending it on defending the indefensible is pretty dumb.

Church holds sex dossiers

AUSTRALIA

WA Today
November 17, 2012
Richard Baker, Nick McKenzie
THE Australian Catholic Church holds thousands of pages of documents containing the psycho-sexual profiles of dozens of clergy accused of sexually abusing children and vulnerable adults.

The profiles, often sent to bishops, were created as part of the church's little-known 1997-2008 rehabilitation program for those it described as ''sexual boundary violators''.

It is understood none of the clergy treated under the multimillion-dollar Encompass Australasia program run from Sydney's Wesley Private Hospital was referred to police.

This was despite senior church figures being aware of serious abuse allegations - or in some cases, admissions - that led to clergy being sent for treatment.

Cracking the vows of silence

AUSTRALIA

Canberra Times
[Church funding paedophiles' legal defence]
November 17, 2012
Rick Feneley, Paul Bibby, Barney Zwartz, Jane Lee, Daniel Lane
Members of the small parish were furious. Word had gone around that money from the Christmas collection had been used to help pay the legal costs of a local priest accused of repeatedly raping an altar boy. It was December 2004. Father James Patrick Fletcher, 64, had just been found guilty of multiple counts of anal and oral penetration of ''Desmond'', who was 13 when the attacks had started in 1990 in the Maitland-Newcastle diocese. Fletcher would die one year into his 10-year maximum jail sentence.

But The Newcastle Herald soon began to question how his defence had been financed. According to the victim support group Broken Rites, legal experts had estimated his costs for the 11-day trial, including for the services of a prominent QC, exceeded $200,000. The Bishop of Maitland-Newcastle, the Most Reverend Michael Malone, said Fletcher had made use of a ''loan facility''. He also admitted that one local priest had ''donated'' part of the parish's Christmas collection to help pay Fletcher's lawyers. Not that this priest had told his parishioners or sought their permission. It was the secrecy that really angered the faithful.

As Fairfax Media revealed on Friday, at least two Catholic orders - the Christian Brothers and Marist Fathers - have continued to fund the legal defences of clergy as they went to trial for the second, third and even fourth times for the sexual abuse of children. It is the perception that churches have shielded their own - and that even police have turned a blind eye - that largely motivated the Prime Minister this week to announce the biggest inquiry into child abuse in Australia's history.

Only on Tuesday, the Archbishop of Sydney, George Pell, stressed that his archdiocese did not pay for the defence of clergy accused of child abuse. But as Pell also made clear, he is not the boss of the Catholic Church in Australia. He is the nation's only cardinal, making him Australia's most influential Catholic. It gives him moral authority to speak out. But different orders have their own authority.

M'boro priest would break silence to out child sex abusers

AUSTRALIA
Fraser Coast Chronicle
MARYBOROUGH priest Paul Kelly says he would break the sacred "seal of silence" and report child sex abusers who confessed to him, despite the threat of excommunication from the Catholic Church for doing so.

Father Kelly's comments come after the Federal Government announced a royal commission into child sex abuse cases, a move which has unearthed concerns about the church directive that priests keep secret all information given in confession.

For a priest to break this code is considered a mortal sin and would see them excommunicated from the Catholic Church.

But Father Kelly, who has also campaigned against the gay panic defence, said he agreed with suggestions the "seal of silence" privilege could be seen to protect child sex offenders.

Church respects the law of the land, and the act of Confession

AUSTRALIA

Brisbane Times
November 17, 2012
Cardinal George Pell
To the surprise of some, the Catholic bishops of Australia welcomed the Prime Minister's announcement of a royal commission into child sexual abuse.

Australians believe in justice and there is a strong feeling that justice has been denied to victims of sexual abuse. Justice is also owed to the individuals and institutions working to prevent sexual abuse and helping victims and their families.

I welcome the royal commission because it will help victims and help to clear the air. Victims have an absolute right to justice and I am pleased that they have welcomed the royal commission.

It might be helpful to clarify some important points from last week.
Some proposed an inquiry into only the Catholic Church. I opposed this for the simple reason that there is no evidence to suggest abuse is confined to the Catholic Church. I welcome the fact that the commission will consider the problem more broadly across all Australian institutions. If we are serious about tackling this scourge in our society, this is the right thing to do.

A rare show of unity to shine light on evil

AUSTRALIA

Canberra Times
November 17, 2012
Ross Peake
George Pell now has the unlikely mantle of The Great Uniter.

He has unexpectedly drawn federal politicians from all parties together for a meeting of minds, in revulsion and disgust against his views.

The nation's leading atheist Julia Gillard is joined by the conservative Catholic Opposition Leader in opposing the cardinal as he clings to the notion that the law of the Vatican overrides the law of this land. Why should a priest who is told of sex abuse not be required to report this to police?

And many Australians would just see Pell as an embarrassment, noting his quick dismissal of the row over child sex abuse as a media ''beat-up''.

Sarah Joseph: Clash of rights in confession move

AUSTRALIA

New Zealand

Herald
By Sarah Joseph
Friday Nov 16, 2012

In response to the cascade of accusations and evidence of systemic and decades-long child abuse, the Australian Government finally announced a royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse on Monday.

One possible recommendation is being mooted, that priests be obliged to report any knowledge of child sex abuse to police.

Such an obligation would undoubtedly enhance protection of the rights of children. It would also interfere with the freedom of religion of priests if they are compelled to reveal information conveyed during formal "confessions". In this clash of rights, which should prevail?

Long struggle to expose evil abuse of children in the Illawarra

AUSTRALIA

Illawarra Mercury
By PETER NEWELL
Nov. 17, 2012
When the sun's first rays creep over the horizon this morning and gently kiss, warm and illuminate the Illawarra coastline, they may be on a special mission.
First, they will touch the Pacific Ocean, and then its foaming surf and the beaches on to which it cascades.
Seconds later they will make landfall, bringing the birth of another day to all, and to two places in particular - the Bulli and Lakeside Kanahooka cemeteries. There lie at rest two special souls and, after political events this week, their headstones deserve to be bathed in sunshine.
Indeed, I wouldn't be surprised at all if both these grave sites seem to have a particular sparkle about them today - a sort of celestial salute to good men, if you like.
Bulli is the resting place of the earthly remains of Peter Hugh Cullen, former Illawarra Mercury editor and, I'm proud to say, my mate. At Kanahooka rests Father Maurie Crocker, a man of great courage who saw evil flourishing and felt it his duty to do something about it while others turned a blind eye.
Although no longer here, years ago each played his own particular role in this week's announcement by Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard of a wide-ranging royal commission into paedophilia across the country. It has been a long time coming, but I am sure each of them would cheer its arrival with gusto.
Peter and Maurie tackled this evil abuse of children in the Illawarra, and its cover-up, when it was not fashionable in some circles to expose such matters - back in 1993. I was the Mercury's general manager at the time, having been its editor previously with Peter as my deputy, so our relationship was close.

It's time to break the seal of confession

AUSTRALIA

NEWS.com.au

•Tory Maguire
•From: News Limited Network
•November 14, 2012

I’ve only ever been to confession twice, both times when I was a young child. The first time I couldn’t think of anything to confess to so I made up some sins and was rewarded with penance of two Hail Marys.

In hindsight the Hail Marys were probably for lying to God. Our parish priest was a good man who would have known when an 8-year-old was talking it up.

But even then it felt very weird to me that children would be expected to enter a dark little box on their own and open up the conversation with: “Forgive me Father for I have sinned”.

Even stranger was that if you’d done something wrong that was the end of it, the priest wouldn’t even tell your Mum.

I won't take confession at all in case a pedophile walks in, says Father Chris Riley

AUSTRALIA

NEWS.com.au

CHILD sex abuse is not a secret priests should keep, prominent Catholics say.

Sydney priest Father Chris Riley, founder of Youth Off The Streets, says he refuses to take confessions because he could not listen to a child sex abuser without reporting them to police.

Melbourne priest and radio host Father Bob Maguire says if a pedophile confessed his sins he'd tell him he would report him. And controversial NSW married priest Father Kevin Lee says he would convince an offender to seek outside help.

Australia

's most powerful Catholic, Cardinal George Pell, is looking increasingly at odds with the Catholic community with his strident defence of the seal of Confession, which means that child sex abusers can confess their sins to a priest and not be reported to police.

Seal of confessional no excuse - Gillard

AUSTRALIA

Sky News

Prime Minister Julia Gillard says using the seal of the Catholic confessional to cover up child abuse is a 'sin of omission' because all adults have a duty of care towards children.

Ms Gillard says the terms of reference for the federal royal commission announced on Monday haven't been set, and nor has the way evidence will be gathered and witnesses questioned.

'That is going to be a matter for the royal commissioners we appoint,' she told reporters in Brisbane.

She said all parties including institutions and victims would be consulted carefully on the terms of reference.

When asked if the commission should examine the Catholic Church's seal of the confessional, the prime minister agreed that it wasn't good enough that some adults had been 'averting their eyes' from the problem of child abuse.

Church Uses Facebook for Sacramental Scrutiny at its Peril

UNITED STATES
Religion Dispatches
By Elizabeth Drescher
For all Il Papa’s social media encouragement the last few years, the Roman Catholic Church continues to struggle with digital ministry practice, particularly where new media intersects the church’s medieval sacramental structure.

In 2011, a new smartphone app aimed to support preparation for and the practice of confession ended up generating more confusion than contrition when a not particularly social design invited people to conclude that absolution was granted by way of the Confession app itself rather than, according to Catholic teaching, through the mediation of the priest.

No wonder Pope Benedict XVI’s Message for World Communications Day earlier this year highlighted silence and listening—the heart of Christian practices of contemplation—by way of encouraging the development of “a kind of ‘eco-system’ that maintains a just equilibrium between silence, words, images and sounds.” And, we might add, actions.

Blog a bit, tweet a bit, share your favorite liturgical recipes on Facebook if you like, the Holy Father seemed to be saying to the Catholic faithful, but once in a while, for the love of God, zip it.

All in all, not a bad idea, but I suspect the silence His Holiness had in mind had nothing to do with the kind of creepy, panoptical Facebook surveillance that led the Rev. Gary LaMoine of Assumption Church in Barnesville, Minnesota to prevent 17-year-old Lennon Cihak from receiving the sacrament of confirmation, a rite of passage usually administered to Catholic teenagers to “perfect the work of baptism” (the first of the sacraments, in Roman Catholic teaching) and mark their maturity as Catholic Christians. Likewise, the boy’s family members have been prevented from receiving the sacrament of Holy Communion at the church.

Catholic priest allegedly drugged then raped 12-year-old boy

AUSTRALIA

The Age
November 16, 2012
Mark Russell
A WITNESS has told a court how he was playing computer games in former Catholic priest David Rapson's office at Salesian College Rupertswood in Sunbury when he was given a glass of lemonade and passed out.

He claimed he woke up to find Rapson raping him.

He was 12 years old.

And as he ran from Rapson's office, the priest allegedly called out for him to come back ''in a voice like the devil''.

Church funding paedophiles' legal defence

AUSTRALIA

Brisbane Times
November 16, 2012

Paul Bibby
Court Reporter
THE Catholic Church has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal fees to defend priests and brothers who have already been tried and convicted of serious sexual assaults against children in their care.

A Fairfax Media investigation has revealed that at least two Catholic orders have continued to fund the legal defences of some of their religious members as they went to trial for the second, third and even fourth time for the sexual abuse of children.

This includes the funding of multiple appeals, hiring top barristers who charge thousands of dollars a day, and hiring private investigators.

In some cases the result has been that criminal prosecutions and the victims of abuse are dragged through the courts for many years.

'Few take confession or reveal sex crimes'

AUSTRALIA

The Australian
Jill Rowbotham
From:The Australian
November 16, 2012
WHETHER priests respect the sanctity of the confessional is likely to be irrelevant to the royal commission into child sexual abuse because few people attend and those who do don't reveal such matters.
If push came to shove, legal evidence expert Ian Freckelton SC said, there was not much room to refuse to testify, for priests or anyone else. However, while royal commissions did not afford the protections of a court, Dr Freckelton added: "I can't imagine a royal commission attempting to coerce a priest to disclose what was said in the confines of the confessional."
While politicians including Tony Abbott and NSW Premier Barry O'Farrell, who are both Catholic, have distanced themselves from Cardinal George Pell's defence of the confessional, senior churchmen queried whether it would ever become relevant.
Catholic historian Paul Collins, a former priest, said: "The vast majority of Catholics don't go to confession now. Priests could sit in confessionals for hours on end and wouldn't meet a soul.

Confessional also has protection of the law

AUSTRALIA

The Australian
Rocco Mimmo
From:The Australian
November 16, 201212:00AM
THE announcement by Julia Gillard that we are to have a royal commission into child sex abuse is universally welcomed.
However, in some quarters of the media it has unleashed a hysteria of salivating opportunism for vengeful attacks on religion, in particular the Catholic Church.
How unfortunate, as it moves the focus from the primary aim of healing the victims and bringing to trial those accused of abuse.
It is a fair bet that whatever acknowledgement is made and apologies offered to victims of clergy abuse this will never satisfy the anti-religious group as they zero in on the confessional.
The important point in all of this is to keep in mind what was said by Broken Rites, the organisation campaigning for the victims of the clergy's sex abuse: ". . . confession was a non-issue. The real issue is when victims or their families complain about abuse, the church authorities fail to arrange an interview between the victim and police."
Wednesday's editorial in this newspaper put it nicely: " . . . those conducting the commission and those reporting on it will need to guard against turning this into an inverted Spanish Inquisition -- a chance to desecrate the Catholic Church."

It's essential we think outside the confessional box

AUSTRALIA

Sydney Morning Herald
November 16, 2012
Waleed Aly
Who says politicians can't sing in unison? This week we've seen the full array of politicians - Green, Labor, Liberal and independent - lining up to dismantle the Catholic Church's institution of sealed confession. The idea that a priest could hear another priest's confession of child sex abuse, and fail to report it to the authorities is, says the Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, "really abhorrent". The NSW Premier, Barry O'Farrell, "just can't fathom" it. The independent MP Nick Xenophon just slams it as "a medieval law that needs to change in the 21st century".

No freedom of religion argument can succeed against this. The secular liberalism that defines our public culture simply won't accept it for one simple reason: religious freedom ends where harm to other people begins. And it's a rare kind of harm that is more horrific than children being raped. The church can argue all it likes that the confessional seal is "inviolable". But what obligation does the secular state have to canon law? What interest does the state have in ensuring people can receive absolution? The church simply has no answer to this. Hence the spectacle of practising Catholics like Tony Abbott and Christopher Pyne jumping on the anti-confessional bandwagon. There's just no politically viable alternative.

But here's the problem: the whole issue of the confessional seal is a monstrous red herring. This becomes clear once you pay attention to the way politicians are talking about it. Xenophon recounts the story of a 10-year-old boy who told his story of being abused to a priest at a confessional, only to be told that he's the sinner and he needs to repent. If that's the full story, then Xenophon's right to call it "sickening", but it simply has nothing to do with the confessional seal. There's no confession from the abuser to reveal. The child is perfectly entitled to take his story to the police and the priest is perfectly entitled to help him do it. This case isn't about confidentiality. It's about a priest with a septic morality. I'd want that priest fired. I'd want the church to apologise, help prosecute the abuser, compensate the victim and make sure it never happens again. And breaking the seal of confession doesn't help any of that.

Open season on Catholicism (A Typical Vatican Catholic defending the Catholic Church)

UNITED STATES
Catholic Culture
By Phil Lawler
It’s open season on Catholicism. In Ireland and in Australia, public opinion is being whipped into frenzy in crusades against Church teachings. In both cases the arguments are thoroughly irrational.
•In Ireland, Savita Halappanavar died a horrible, painful, needless death. But rather than mourning her death, and demanding a full accounting of where the doctors went wrong, pundits are blaming the tragedy on teachings of the Catholic Church. We really don’t know, at this point, what caused her death. But one thing is quite clear already: it was not due to Catholic teaching, nor to Catholic influence on Ireland's laws.
•In Australia, there are angry demands for Catholic priests to break the confessional seal. This campaign is fueled by the notion that the seal has protected perpetrators of sexual abuse. There is zero evidence—zero—to support that notion. And there is ample evidence that the campaign against the Catholic Church is tinged by political motives

Pell blames media 'smear'

AUSTRALIA

The Age

[with poll]

November 14, 2012

Barney Zwartz

A DEFIANT Cardinal George Pell has blamed a smear campaign against the Catholic Church for public pressure that led to a royal commission into child sex abuse.

The Archbishop of Sydney said a commission into the Catholic Church was not needed, but he welcomed the broader inquiry announced by Prime Minister Julia Gillard on Monday night as ''an opportunity to clear the air, to separate fact from fiction''.

He attacked a ''persistent press campaign'' and ''general smears that we are covering up and moving people around'', and suggested that abuse by Catholic priests had been singled out and exaggerated.

He also suggested that cynicism about the church's handling of abuse was confined to the press, and the public understood that the church was serious about tackling the problem.

''We are not interested in denying the extent of misdoing in the Catholic Church. We object to it being exaggerated. We object to being described as the only cab on the rank,'' Cardinal Pell told a press conference in Sydney.

What George doesn't understand

AUSTRALIA

Sydney Morning Herald

The Religious Write
Barney Zwartz is religion editor of The Age

George Pell has been a beacon for criticism over the years and even more so this week. Much of it is richly deserved. But some of it is, frankly, silly and shows a culpable ignorance (at least, if you want to be a commentator) of the Catholic Church.

George Pell is Australia's only active cardinal, but he is not Australia's chief Catholic. No one is. If there were such a position it would belong to the cardinal's close friend and colleague, Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart, as the chairman of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference.

Each bishop of Australia's 30-odd Catholic dioceses is theoretically autonomous, answerable to the Pope, not Pell. So to say he should have done this in Newcastle or that in Ballarat is to miss the point: he has no authority there; he is the Archbishop of Sydney.

But that doesn't let him off the hook when it comes to talking about the Catholic Church in Australia. As he said in Tuesday's press conference in Sydney, he has considerable moral influence, which he uses to comfort some and discomfort others.

Deaf, Dumb and Blind

AUSTRALIA

National Survivor Advocates Coalition

A star is rising in the East.

That would be Australia where Prime Minister Julie Gillard announced this week a royal commission would investigate sexual abuse and the institutional response to it.

She said the royal commission, the highest level of investigation in Australia, was not targeting any one church but you’d have to be deaf, dumb, blind and dead not to realize the trigger for this monumental action was the series of revelations regarding pedophile priests in the Catholic Church.

In making the announcement, the prime minister, Ms Gillard said: “There have been too many revelations of adults who have averted their eyes from this evil. I believe in these circumstances that it is appropriate for there to be a national response through a royal commission.”

Senior Police Office Peter Fox said in a letter to the New South Wales state Premier Barry O’Farrell, “I can testify from my own experience that the church covers up, silences victims, hinders police investigations, alerts offenders, destroys evidence and moves priests to protect the good name of the Church.”

Why the Church should thank the media

AUSTRALIA
Eureka Street

Michael McVeigh November 14, 2012

The Royal Commission into child sexual abuse can only be a good thing for the Catholic Church. It is a chance to account for the betrayal and crimes of priests and other church representatives who committed acts of abuse against the vulnerable, and for the careless, even callous way in which many church officials responded to complaints against their own. This will be a long overdue first step in moving forward.

However, while victims have been calling for a Royal Commission for a long time, and while the bishops have welcomed it, the fact that it has taken government intervention for a proper account of the crisis to take place represents in part a failure of the Church's response.

The Church's defenders point to the policies and procedures put in place to protect children, the establishment of the National Committee for Professional Standards, and the Towards Healing processes for providing compensation and support for victims unwilling to make complaints against abusers through the legal system.

Most abuse cases today are from more than 20 years ago, indicating a change in Church practice and in cultural attitudes, providing better protection for young people. The Church's current procedures are part of a laudable move towards a response centred on the needs of victims, and a greater awareness of the problem in general.

Archbishop George Pell says air should be cleared and the truth revealed

AUSTRALIA

The Australian

Dan Box, Justine Ferrari
From:The Australian
November 13, 2012

CATHOLIC archbishops last night supported the decision to set up a royal commission into institutional child abuse, but denied the existence of systemic sexual abuse within their church.

"Sexual abuse is not confined to the Catholic Church. Tragically, it occurs in families, churches, community groups, schools and other organisations," said a statement agreed by the archbishops.

Archbishop Pell reacts to abuse inquiry

AUSTRALIA

ABC - 7.30

Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Broadcast: 13/11/2012
Reporter: Leigh Sales

Archbishop of Sydney George Pell says the media have campaigned against the Catholic Church but says the church will cooperate with the Government's Royal Commission into child abuse within institutions.

Transcript

LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: A day after the Government announced a royal commission into child sex abuse, the Catholic Archbishop George Pell has defended his institution's handling of such matters. Cardinal Pell believes there's a persistent press campaign against the Catholic Church and he objects to his organisation being singled out. He also says the Church's association with sex abuse is, at times, exaggerated. In a press conference today the Archbishop said he would fully cooperate with the Commonwealth investigation as a way to bring to an end decades of damage to the Church's reputation and to deliver justice to victims. Cardinal Pell has been dogged by this issue for much of his leadership in the Catholic Church.

The day after the Government called a royal commission, Cardinal Pell finally agreed to answer questions about what has led to it.

GEORGE PELL, CATHOLIC ARCHBISHOP OF SYDNEY: We object to it being exaggerated, we object to being described as the "only cab on the rank", we acknowledge - with shame - the extent of the problem. One of the reasons why we welcome the royal commission is that this commission will enable those claims to be validated... or found to be a significant exaggeration.

LEIGH SALES: George Pell's history with the child sex abuse issue goes back decades. In the early 90s, in the Victorian town of Ballarat, one of the Catholic Church's most infamous paedophile scandals was unfolding. The perpetrator, Father Gerald Ridsdale, abused as many as 200 children over 20 years, while his superiors did nothing to stop him.

Interview with Father Frank Brennan, Jesuit Priest and lawyer

AUSTRALIA

ABC - Lateline

Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Broadcast: 12/11/2012
Reporter: Emma Alberici

Father Frank Brennan, Jesuit priest, Professor of Law at the Australian Catholic University and Professorial Visiting Fellow at the University of New South Wales, discusses the fundamental challenges ahead for the church and the call for a royal commission.

Transcript

EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: Father Frank Brennan is a Jesuit priest and Professor of Law at the Australian Catholic University in Canberra.

He drove from the south coast of New South Wales to join us in our Sydney studio just a short time ago.

Father Brennan, thanks so much for coming in tonight.

FRANK BRENNAN, JESUIT PRIEST AND LAWYER: Good to be with you.

EMMA ALBERICI: Now you were opposed to a royal commission per se. What are your reservations?

FRANK BRENNAN: I was opposed to a national royal commission because I thought there were a number of state inquiries underway that could be useful. And my concern about a national commission - I would hope for the sake of victims nationwide that it will bear fruit.

Archbishop rejected call to move priest

AUSTRALIA

The West Australian

Luke Eliot, The West Australian
November 15, 2012,

A leaked document shows Emeritus Archbishop Barry Hickey rejected recommendations when he was Archbishop of Perth to move a priest accused of child sex abuse to a ministry without a school.

The West Australian has obtained a confidential document written by Archbishop Hickey, who retired this year. It referred to Father Richard Joseph Doyle, who is now retired.

The report was signed in June 2000 and was a response to an internal assessment regarding Father Doyle, who, it stated, was the subject of child sex abuse allegations.

The assessment found there was no evidence to support a claim that a "small boy" was abused in Bruce Rock but that "on the balance of probabilities there are grounds to the complaint in respect of the girls", relating to women who said Father Doyle dealt with them inappropriately when they were children.

Editorial: Extreme voices lead to politicized church

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter
by NCR Editorial Staff | Nov. 6, 2012
When the bishops of the United States gather later this month in Baltimore for their fall meeting, they ought to take some time to ponder a simple question: Were their words and actions during the recent election season the kind of discourse that informs and persuades or did they contribute to the partisan shrillness that we hope our teachers are educating youngsters to rise above as they mature into voting citizens?

We do not yet know the outcome of the national election, but the results for the church are already well-known -- no polls necessary here. The activity of the loudest and most extreme voices in the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have left us the most politicized and divided church in recent memory. They have not only done a disservice to the cause of unity, they haven't done much to advance the causes they so stridently champion. ...
The bishops are so beholden to the huge sums of money dumped on them by the Knights of Columbus (see story) that they can't imagine pushing back against the political agenda of an organization led by a longtime, high-level Republican operative.

Protection of Confession under heavy fire

AUSTRALIA

Newcastle Herald

By Phillip Coorey
Nov. 15, 2012

POLITICIANS of all persuasions, from Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott down, say Catholic priests must not be exempt from having to report child abuse to police should they hear it in the confession of a colleague.

MPs said the royal commission into sexual abuse should examine the issue and recommend that, where necessary, state criminal codes be harmonised to mandate that priests go to the police in child sexual abuse matters.

The federal Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, who is charged with setting up the commission, agreed the seal of Confession should be looked at, but she cautioned against too much focus on the issue.

Ms Roxon said the commission's remit would be much broader than just the Catholic Church.

Hunt on for victims of priest

AUSTRALIA/NEW ZEALAND
Stuff

ALISTAIR BONE

A Waikato-based enquiry has been launched to find victims of a serial-paedophile priest who previously worked in the region.

Father Denis McAlinden is thought to have abused hundreds of girls aged between four and twelve in Australia and has at least one known victim in New Zealand.

But a researcher into sexual abuse by Catholic priests is certain the prolific Australian paedophile abused more than just one girl while he was working in the Hamilton Diocese in the 1980s.

Father McAlinden spent six months in the region in 1984, but only a single victim from his time here has so far come forward.

Baillieu earns some credit over the child sex scandal

AUSTRALIA

Sydney Morning Herald

November 15, 2012

Josh Gordon
State political editor for The Age.

It was the Victorian decision that finally got the ball rolling.

THE announcement of a sweeping royal commission on the sexual abuse of children must have come as a much-needed political gift for Ted Baillieu as he approaches the two-year anniversary of his election win.

After a bruising year, the Premier can now justifiably claim some credit for the historic decision: finally Australia will fling open the curtains and shine some light on decades of allegations of institutional sexual abuse and church cover-ups.

It was, after all, his government that got things rolling by setting up a parliamentary inquiry after the Cummins inquiry into child welfare.

Clerical error: look east for reason why celibacy vow should be axed

AUSTRALIA

WA Today

November 15, 2012

Joseph Wakim

The royal commission into ''institutional responses to child abuse'' will not have the authority to review one vexed issue: the mandatory vow of clergy celibacy.

While we should be careful not to confuse correlation with causation, one compelling question cannot be avoided - why do Eastern Catholics and other churches with married clergy rarely encounter claims of child sex abuse?

As a Maronite Catholic, with an uncle who was a married priest with four children, this choice of celibacy or marriage has been functional since the church's foundation.

Catholic churches in the East, the birthplace of Christianity, have always had married clergy.

Paedophile priest James Fletcher was buried with honours

AUSTRALIA

NEWS.com.au

Gemma Jones
The Daily Telegraph
November 15, 2012

THE Catholic church honoured a paedophile priest - who died in jail - with a marble headstone which listed his achievements.

One of James Patrick Fletcher's victims yesterday said the burial in the priests' section of Sandgate Cemetery near Newcastle was the "final insult".

A brass plaque records the deviant's career as a priest. In death he kept his title of Reverend Father.

A court found the 65-year-old had committed "a gross and inexcusable breach of trust" when he raped an altar boy, a crime for which he was sentenced to almost eight years prison, where he died in 2006.

Ireland inquiry exposed horrors

IRELAND

NEWS.com.au

IRELAND'S landmark inquiry into Catholic Church child sex abuse uncovered more than 100 cases of rape and assault involving at least 21 priests in only one small county diocese.

The 2005 Ferns Report found the church, police and government failed in their duties to protect children.

It said the church hierarchy considered rape and sexual assault a moral issue rather than a criminal matter.

Only two priests were convicted over the scandal in County Wexford. A third priest charged committed suicide in the late 1990s before his case went to court.

Almost half the accused priests had died by the completion of the report, one of four major child abuse inquiries in Ireland over the past decade including the Cloyne Report, the Murphy Report and the Ryan Report.

A time for open confession

AUSTRALIA

The Australian

FOR Catholics who wish to remain in a state of grace, the church offers the service of the confessional, whereby the priest conducts an audit of the soul on behalf of the Almighty. Since the penitent is considered to be confessing to God alone, in the presence of his servant, the information is protected under the seal of the confessional.

A priest who tried to withhold information gained in this way from a royal commission could be jailed for contempt. In practice, a wise royal commissioner would first explore every other avenue to establish the truth, knowing that the fabric of society is best preserved by avoiding pushing the theoretical conflict between church and state to the ultimate test. For its part, the church takes a pragmatic approach, in so far as its divine obligations will allow. Priests are adept at guiding penitents in the direction of the local police station when needed, quietly and without fanfare. George Pell has gone further, advising priests not to hear a confession when they suspect that criminal behaviour might be revealed.

Those who simply want to put a stop to child abuse will see this debate as entirely confected. It is unlikely to come to a head at the forthcoming royal commission, assuming goodwill on behalf of the commission and the church. Those who see an opportunity to discredit the Catholic Church, however, will milk it for all it is worth.

November 17, 2012

Gerald T. Slevin: Why President Obama Must Now Act to End Organized Child Abuse

UNITED STATES
Bilgrimage
Another extremely important essay by Harvard-trained former Wall Street lawyer Jerry Slevin. Jerry argues that "it is the right time for President Obama to act" to protect children from childhood sexual abuse, as the Catholic hierarchy clearly remains intent on stonewalling, diverting, and covering up. What follows is Jerry's essay:
This year, 2012, has been crucial in the horrible history of organized child sex abuse in the USA, especially in the Catholic Church. After over more than a quarter century of mainly Vatican diversions, distractions and/or deceptions, experts at a public Vatican abuse symposium in February estimated here that so far there have been over 100,000 young victims of priest child sex abuse in the USA alone, with no end in sight.
These abuse survivors and their families usually bear the painful psychological and other adverse effects of these sexual assaults for the remainder of their lives, often at great costs to society at large. Outrageously, most priest sexual predators and almost all predator-protecting bishops in the USA have so far escaped any accountability for their crimes, mainly as a result of the Catholic hierarchy's political and media clout, as well as the lack of fortitude of most US political leaders and media executives and reporters.
This pressing and worsening problem is a national one and cannot be resolved adequately at the local state, county or city level only, since the bishops' political clout has generally been very effective at controlling local lawmakers and prosecutors, as has been demonstrated repeatedly, most recently in Philadelphia, as noted here. While private lawyers for abuse survivors have caused some US bishops and their dioceses significant financial pain, the bishops often appear to settle the lawsuits before all of the stark details of the bishops' cover-up misconduct reach the public record.
Private civil lawyers' main objective in abuse cases generally is to get maximum payments for their abused clients, and not full disclosure for citizens of bishops' misconduct.
With only rare exceptions, most US media organizations lack the staff, budgets and "appetite" for covering priest child sexual abuse cases consistently and in the detail often required. Unfortunately, there does not yet exist any national organization of lay Catholics that comes even remotely close to presenting a credible challenge to the US bishops' political, financial and media clout.

In the shadow of evil

NEW ZEALAND

New Zealand

Herald
By Catherine Masters , Greg Ansley
5:30 AM Saturday Nov 17, 2012
Calls mount for New Zealand involvement in a top-level Australian inquiry into the widespread sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests and other authority figures. Greg Ansley and Catherine Masters report
Former priest Denis McAlinden was defrocked following sexual abuse allegations involving minors in Australia. He spent six months in Tokomaru Bay's church. Photo / Supplied

The Catholic church in Tokomaru Bay, Gisborne, is like many in small-town New Zealand - a picture of safety and innocence.

It's hard to imagine that the pretty little wooden chapel with the blue roof has been caught up in a top-level inquiry into the sexual abuse of children, which was launched in Australia but is likely to extend to this country.

Among the practices to be investigated is that instead of prosecuting paedophile priests, the Catholic church transferred them from diocese to diocese - sometimes shipping them across the Tasman to New Zealand and vice versa.

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

Vatican Catholics still don’t get it

The Parallel Catholic Church

UNITED STATES
dotCommonweal
November 16, 2012
Posted by Eric Bugyis
Over at The Dish, Andrew Sullivan praises a new HBO documentary, “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” by Alex Gibney (“Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room”) on the perpetration and cover-up of sex abuse in the Catholic Church that traces the corruption all the way to the Pope. None of this, I think, will be news to many of us who have been following this horrifying story for more than a decade, but Sullivan offers an interesting comment on how the loss of moral credibility among the hierarchy has created two parallel churches:
One feature of this last election was the complete failure of the Vatican hierarchs to dictate the vote to the flock. American Catholics voted for Obama over Romney. The docile fools in dresses – from Dolan to Chaput – were ignored as they now routinely are, and should be. They actually think they still have moral authority. But moral authority has to be earned with each generation, and the corruption in the Vatican is so deep and so rotten and so incapable of self-reflection it has effectively created two Catholic churches in America: those few in the pews who still listen to the bishops and those who exist almost in a parallel church, focused on their own parish, their own priest, and their own faith, which remains, for many of us, undimmed.

I have also found the idea of inhabiting a parallel Catholic Church to be one way of sustaining my own faith through the dark time of scandal, pastoral malfeasance, and political cynicism that continues to undermine the hierarchical Church. The wonderful community at my local parish and the excellent priests that serve us have kept me coming back every week in spite of the continual heartbreak that comes from seeing certain bishops and their friends take the public stage with a militant defensiveness, a hunger for power, and a litigiousness that seems to be the very antithesis of the Gospel’s message of self-sacrifice, humility, and love. Now more than ever, I find that spending Sunday mornings in prayer with my spouse and our friends a the Church of Loretto is essential to sustaining a spiritual life away from the daily silliness that has become the public witness of institutional Catholicism. (This is the effect of the Magic of the Eucharist just like Harry Potter addiction)

The Vatican's Dead End

UNITED STATES
The Daily Beast
[with video]
Andrew Sullivan
Earlier this week, I was privileged to attend a screening of Alex Gibney's latest piece of documentary brilliance, "Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God." It's released today. To be honest I want to see it one more time before writing a length about it. It's about the Catholic Church's sexual abuse crisis - and the criminal conspiracy reaching right to the current Pope that will one day surely bring the whole house of cards down, so that the church can be rebuilt amid the ruins created by deeply sick and psychologically crippled men at its core. No one is more implicated in covering up this institutionalization of sexual abuse and secrecy than the man who controlled and oversaw every single case of clerical sex abuse in the world from 2001 onwards: Pope Benedict XVI, who knows more than anyone else on the planet about the horrifying psycho-sexual truth beneath the ermined, bejewelled veneer.
One feature of this last election was the complete failure of the Vatican hierarchs to dictate the vote to the flock. American Catholics voted for Obama over Romney. The docile fools in dresses - from Dolan to Chaput - were ignored as they now routinely are, and should be. They actually think they still have moral authority. But moral authority has to be earned with each generation, and the corruption in the Vatican is so deep and so rotten and so incapable of self-reflection it has effectively created two Catholic churches in America: those few in the pews who still listen to the bishops and those who exist almost in a parallel church, focused on their own parish, their own priest, and their own faith, which remains, for many of us, undimmed.
But every now and again, that parallel church actually encounters - and cannot elide - the hierarchy. In Minnesota, where a third of the population is Catholic, the hierarchy insisted that the state amend its constitution to keep gay couples out of civil society and civil marriage. The hierarchy failed - as miserably as they failed in their trumped up "war on religion" nonsense. The Amendment didn't pass. You cannot be exposed as an institution that is responsible for covering up the rape and torture of thousands of children and have any moral authority when it comes to the constitutional equality of gay citizens or the contraceptives that 99 percent of Catholic American women use at some point.

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

Casting Announced for Reading of Vatican Falls

NEW YORK
Playbill

By Andrew Gans
16 Nov 2012

Theatre for the New City will present a reading of Frank J. Avella's Vatican Falls, a play "set against the backdrop of the Catholic sex abuse scandal," Dec. 3 at 7 PM.

Directed by Laura Caparrotti, the reading will feature the talents of Francesco Andolfi, Carlotta Brentan, Drew Bruck, Matthew Crooks, Joshua Dixon, Cali Gilman, Kalen J. Hall, Salvatore Infantino, Maggie LaMonica, Devon Talbott and Rob Ventre. Alexander Haynes will read the stage directions.

Based on factual material, Vatican Falls, according to press notes, "follows the life of one survivor who struggles with understanding how those closest to him could damage him the deepest. The multi-genre, non-linear play probes the conflicting feelings involved in most sexual abuse situations and dares to confront the truth about the ever-growing scandal and the Church’s complicity in it."

Bishops agree on need for better preaching, more penance

BALTIMORE (MD)
National Catholic Reporter
by Catholic News Service | Nov. 14, 2012
Baltimore --
During their annual fall general assembly Nov. 12-15 in Baltimore, the U.S. bishops voted down a document on the troubled U.S. economy, passed documents on penance and better preaching, approved a reorganization of their Communications Department and endorsed the sainthood cause of Dorothy Day.

Although the bishops discussed the economy, their document "The Hope of the Gospel in Difficult Times: A Pastoral Message on Work, Poverty and the Economy" did not gain the two-thirds vote required for passage Tuesday.

Some bishops criticized the document after it was introduced Monday for being too long to be practical and for failing to include a variety of points and historical references. ...
The bishops approved a reorganization of their Communications Department that would include hiring a director of public affairs who would work to unify messages on the activities and stances of the USCCB -- not individual dioceses or bishops -- and better carry out church campaigns related to new evangelization, according to New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, USCCB president. ...
The bishops also approved a 2013 budget of $220.4 million and agreed to add a national collection for the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services. The budget for 2013 represents a 1.3 percent increase from 2012.

The new collection for the military archdiocese would begin in 2013. Under the plan, it would be taken voluntarily in parishes every three years. Bishop Michael J. Bransfield of Wheeling-Charleston, W.Va., USCCB treasurer, said the 2013 budget includes a surplus totaling more than $749,000. He also told the bishops that there was a projected surplus of $250,000 for 2014, meaning there was no need to seek an increase in the annual diocesan assessment for USCCB operations.

The Cost of Exposing a Pedophile

BELIZE

The Guardian
Written by Shane D. William
Thursday, 15 November 2012
Last week, an eleven-year-old girl from Frank’s Eddy Village summoned the courage to tell her mother that she was being sexually abused by the pastor of their church, 46-year-old Julio Cesar Garcia. According to the mother, the child spoke of two occasions when Garcia pressured her into having sex. The first time was actually inside the church on October 28th. The second time was at the pastor’s home on November 1st. The mother was devastated by the news. She took the child to a doctor, who confirmed that the child was carnally known. The mother then reported the incident to police and Garcia was arrested and charged with two counts of unlawful carnal knowledge. He appeared in the Belmopan Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday, November 7th, where the charges were read against him. Due to the nature of the offense, bail was not granted, and he was remanded to the Belize Central Prison until his next court appearance on January 25th, 2013.
For the eleven-year-old, Garcia’s arrest should have been the start of the recovery process. Unfortunately, that is far from the case. Garcia’s arrest caused other victims to come forward. At least two other mothers claimed that their daughters reported sexual advancements by Garcia to them. The scandal made headlines on the local television stations and Garcia was exposed as a “Predator Amongst the Flock”. The church’s parent organization, the Baptist Association, issued a press release disassociating itself from Garcia, claiming that he had never been a Baptist pastor. Those familiar with the Baptist denomination explained that it is common practice to have church leaders, who are not ordained pastors, sothe association’s statement was in no way a disassociation. However, it did act as the final nail in the forearm of the crucified Garcia. He had been jailed, publicly humiliated and labeled as a predator. Some would say deservingly so. Undeservingly though, is that where Garcia’s suffering had come full circle the victim and her family’s suffering was just beginning.
The Guardian spoke to the victim’s mother on Monday, November 12th. She said that since the story was made public, life has been difficult for her family. She said, “I won’t say any names. Some people are just looking at me and some of them are mad saying that this is a lie. The God that I serve, he knows that I am not lying…” The mother said that her family has been receiving more cold shoulders than expressions of support or even sympathy. The incident was not enough to shake her faith in God, and she still attended church this past Sunday. She said that by the way they watched her, she knows they are upset. As hard as it has been for the mother, it is nothing compared to what the child experiences on a daily basis. “They tease her at school,” the mother said as her eyes fill and her voice cracked. She knows that life will never be the same for her daughter and family. They have become like lepers - outcasts in the tiny village they call home. And as the child continues to suffer from pain in her womb, it is the pain in her heart that is unbearable. She suffers greatly because instead of providing a healing environment, her community has chosen to ridicule and scratch the wounds. Instead of moving on from being abused twice, she now has to cope with abuse on a daily basis.

Bishop defends church conduct

AUSTRALIA
Latrobe Valley Express
By Louis Nelson
Nov. 15, 2012
The Catholic Church is investigating fresh allegations of sexual abuse by a priest within Gippsland; however, if current church protocols stand, the allegations may never be made public.
While Catholic diocese of Sale's Bishop Christopher Prowse would give no further details of the investigation into the priest, who was now deceased, he said he was confident the church could respond to the victim's claims appropriately.
In welcoming Prime Minister Julia Gillard's announcement of a royal commission into child sex abuse in an interview with The Express on Tuesday, Bishop Prowse defended the church's tradition of handling sexual abuse allegations in-house.
This comes amid growing calls for the Catholic Church to adopt mandatory reporting of abuse allegations to police, something Bishop Prowse said the church would oppose in the context of allegations being made within confession.

November 15, 2012

Boston cardinal reshuffles parishes to meet priest shortage

BOSTON (MA)
Washington Post

By G. Jeffrey Macdonald| Religion News Service,

Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley on Thursday (Nov. 15) launched an ambitious, five-year plan to consolidate local parish leadership and reinvigorate an archdiocese rocked by scandal, declining Mass attendance and a chronic shortage of priests.

Starting with a first phase in January, O’Malley’s “Disciples in Mission” initiative will reorganize the archdiocese’s 288 parishes into 135 “collaboratives,” or clusters of two or three parishes headed by a single pastor. Assistant pastors and other staff from local parishes will be reoriented to serve entire collaboratives. By 2016, every parish will be part of a collaborative.

The shift marks the latest major change for the 1.8 million Catholics in and around Boston, who grieved 69 parish closures in the wake of the clergy sexual abuse crisis. Clustering parishes under shared leadership is now crucial, organizers say, in order to carry out the “New Evangelization” encouraged by Pope Benedict XVI.

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

Interview: Alex Gibney ...

UNITED STATES
Hitfix
Interview: Alex Gibney on exposing the Catholic Church and giving voice to the deaf in 'Mea Maxima Culpa'
By Guy Lodge Friday, Nov 16, 2012
From misplaced questions to accidental transcription errors, interview fumbles are obviously to be avoided under any circumstances, but you particularly want to be on your game when the subject is one of America's preeminent documentarians – someone whose own profession is built on a level of journalistic expertise. So you can imagine my mortification when my iPhone recently took it upon itself to wipe its own memory clean – deleting, among other things, all aural evidence of my face-to-face conversation with Alex Gibney at last month's London Film Festival.

The prolific filmmaker, an Oscar-winner in 2007 for his devastating legalized-torture study “Taxi to the Dark Side,” was in town for the European premiere of his superb new film “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” which would win him the festival's Best Documentary award the very next day. The film, which hits US theaters today, is not the first to examine the horrific history of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, but it is arguably the most penetrating, methodically tracing a dense network of crime and cover-up all the way from Milwaukee to the Vatican itself. It could well earn Gibney a deserved third Oscar nod.

Speaking over the phone from his New York office earlier this week, Gibney casually waves off my apologies for having to restage the interview. “Trust me, I've been there,” he says with a light laugh, his crisp, deliberate voice sounding rather less exhausted than it did in the bar of London's Mayfair Hotel a month ago. It's hard to imagine interviews – or any information, for that matter – slipping through the director's fingers, so keen and diligent is his filmmaking style across a broad range of subjects, from the fall of Enron to the fizz of Hunter S. Thompson. “Mea Maxima Culpa” is among his most perspicacious works: weaving a profoundly moving story of human heroism through a tough-minded analysis of a global scandal, he carves out new angles in a story he admits initially fearing had already been adequately exposed.

Pick of the week: The case that unlocked the Catholic scandal

UNITED STATES
Salon
Pick of the week: Alex Gibney's "Mea Maxima Culpa" follows the scandal from one Wisconsin school to the pope's desk
By Andrew O'Hehir
You can’t argue that Alex Gibney’s “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God” is the definitive treatment of the Roman Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal. This problem goes so deep into church history, and its implications are so broad, that no single book or film or series of newspaper articles can encompass it all. But by beginning with one of the earliest and most infamous of documented cases in the United States — the abuse of perhaps 200 deaf boys at a Wisconsin boarding school by a priest named Lawrence Murphy — the Oscar-winning Gibney (director of “Taxi to the Dark Side,” “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” and several other films) is able to suggest answers to certain very big questions.
Ever since the clerical abuse scandal began to break open in the early 2000s, with wave after wave of disturbing revelations and a groundbreaking investigative series in the Boston Globe, certain issues have remained shrouded in mystery. How much did the Vatican hierarchy know about the widespread rape and sexual abuse of children by men who were designated as the earthly representatives of Jesus Christ, and what did they do about it? Was the scandal really limited to the United States and other “Anglo-Saxon” countries, as many Catholics outside North America maintained? Were there few documented cases prior to the 1960s because they did not exist, or because they had been successfully squelched? Of course it was tempting to assume or infer answers to those questions, especially when faced with the world’s largest, oldest and most secretive religious organization, but journalists are supposed to hew to a higher standard than guesswork.
It won’t surprise anyone who’s been following this story over the past decade or so to learn that the partial answers emerging from “Mea Maxima Culpa” pretty much amount to the worst-case scenario on all those questions. While it became Vatican policy early in the scandal to blame the American bishops for their inadequate response to the crisis (and many of them indeed behaved disgracefully), the best evidence now indicates that the hierarchy in Rome heard about virtually every case, and that from 2001 onward most if not all of them went straight to the desk of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who is now Pope Benedict XVI.

Sins of the fathers: Alex Gibney shines light on Church scandals in 'Mea Maxima Culpa'

UNITED STATES
Film Journal
Nov 15, 2012
-By Daniel Eagan
The details of the crime were appalling. For years, the students of St. John's School for the Deaf outside Milwaukee, Wisconsin, were systematically abused by the very person put in charge to protect them, Father Lawrence Murphy. The students appealed to teachers and eventually to the police for help, only to be turned away. As Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney shows in Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, this pattern of indifference and culpability leads from Milwaukee to the Vatican, the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church.
Raised a Catholic, Gibney reacted strongly to the issue of sexual abuse within the Church. "But a lot of people had done films about isolated tales of clerical abuse," he says during an interview from HBO offices in New York. "I wanted to make sure that if I was going to do it, I could make a new contribution."
Articles by New York Times national religion correspondent Laurie Goodstein about how deaf survivors took their story to the public brought national attention to the St. John's incident. Gibney was drawn to the story because it linked Church abuse for the first time to the Vatican, giving him a canvas that was both intimate and panoramic. "This was a story about everyday heroes," he adds. "Deaf survivors who had no voices, but still managed to make themselves be heard."
In the film, Gibney builds the case against the Vatican gradually, first working backwards to explain the conditions at St. John's. "We didn't want to make a dogmatic film," he explains. "We wanted to fan out from this case to something much bigger. Much as these survivors, who were just local kids from Milwaukee, suddenly got religion, so to speak, and started to try to raise their voices until they took their story all the way to the top. But honestly, the movie comes out of silence, and you have to learn to inhabit that world first, let it open up to you."

'Mea Maxima Culpa' review: Unholy orders

UNITED STATES
The Star-Ledger
By Stephen Whitty/The Star-Ledger
Alex Gibney's new film begins with dark shots of Gothic architecture, ominous figures moving through murky shadows and, in the background, faintly chanted Latin. It feels a bit like a monster movie.
It is, too.
Sadly, though, "Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God" is a documentary about real-life horrors - the sexual abuse (and coverups) that have tortured countless innocents, bedeviled the Catholic Church and caused many to question their faith.
The Summit-based documentarian, always a careful filmmaker, begins by focusing on a single, albeit monstrous case - a priest who, for decades, abused boys at a Wisconsin boarding school for the deaf.
But then, it slowly widens its gaze - to see similar horrors taking place in Ireland, in Italy, in Latin America. And to uncover a pattern of deceit that both denied the victims help and practically ensured their abusers could continue the assaults.

Filmmaker Alex Gibney Accuses Pope: 'Sexual-Abuse Scandal Goes to the Top of the Vatican' (Video)

UNITED STATES
The Wrap
By Sharon Waxman
Follow @sharonwaxman
Alex Gibney is ready to take on the Pope in his new documentary, "Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God," which opens this weekend.

Gibney, who has taken on hot topics from lobbyist Jack Abramoff to biking champion Lance Armstrong to Enron, digs into a new aspect of the sexual-abuse scandal in which deaf children in Catholic boarding schools were preyed upon by pedophile priests.

One of those children, now grown, has sued the Pope. The film raises the tantalizing question of whether private individuals can sue the Vatican, which is a sovereign country.

"So you can understand the magnitude of this scandal, it’s a concerted systematic cover-up of childhood sexual abuse that goes all the way to top of Vatican," he told me.

He said that the sins of the Wisconsin priest at the deaf school, Lawrence Murphy, "leads you on a journey, like the film 'Chinatown,' from Milwaukee to Ireland all the way up to the top of the Vatican, to the Pope himself."

A Silent Trail Leads Beyond a Cover-Up of Protracted Abuse

UNITED STATES
The New York Times
By A. O. SCOTT
Published: November 15, 2012
The Rev. Lawrence C. Murphy, a Roman Catholic priest in Wisconsin who died in 1998, appears in old photographs and home movies as an energetic, round-faced man with a warm, friendly, efficient manner. Even without the sinister music that shadows these glimpses of Father Murphy’s benign, banal public activities in the ’50s and ’60s, the viewer of “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” Alex Gibney’s new documentary, will suspect that there’s something terrible lurking under the surface.
There was a time, not long ago, when a priest’s devotion to children would elicit a smile of approval rather than a shudder of suspicion and dread. The revelation early in the movie that Father Murphy, who was for many years in charge of a boarding school for the deaf, systematically molested youngsters in his care — scores if not hundreds over the years — is sickening but not especially surprising. A decade of reporting and advocacy has made stories like his distressingly familiar.
“Mea Maxima Culpa” is not the first documentary to present the testimony of victims or to expose the failure of the Roman Catholic hierarchy in dealing with widespread sexual abuse by priests. Kirby Dick’s “Twist of Faith” (2004) and Amy Berg’s “Deliver Us From Evil” (2006) are both important predecessors that link intimate crimes with institutional failures. But the prolific Mr. Gibney, whose other films include “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room,” “Taxi to the Dark Side” and “Casino Jack and the United States of Money,” is something of a specialist in the corruptions of power. And he doggedly updates the larger story here, connecting dots that lead, in a trail of denial and cover-up, from the rural Midwest to the Vatican.

"Mea Maxima Culpa": New Doc Exposes Horror of Catholic Child Sex Abuser and Heroism of His Victims

UNITED STATES
Democracy Now

[with video]

"Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God," a new documentary by Oscar-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney, investigates how a charismatic priest in Milwaukee abused more than 200 deaf children in a Catholic boarding school under his control. The young students were molested again and again by Father Lawrence Murphy, who stalked them in their dorm rooms at night, on trips to his rural cabin, and even in the confessional booth. Gibney, whose past films include "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room" and the Academy Award-winning "Taxi to the Dark Side," joins us to discuss his new exposé, which opens this Friday in theaters in New York City and Los Angeles, and will debut on HBO in February 2013. [includes rush transcript]

Guest:
Alex Gibney, Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker. His latest film is called Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God. His past films include Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room and the Academy Award-winning Taxi to the Dark Side, which focuses on an innocent taxi driver in Afghanistan who was tortured and killed at Bagram Air Force Base in 2002. Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God opens this Friday in theaters in New York City and Los Angeles, and will debut on HBO in February 2013.

Ending The 'Silence' Around Priests' Sex Abuse

UNITED STATES
WSIU
By Mark Jenkins
Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God documents the claims made by four deaf men who accused a Catholic priest of sexual abuse — and in chronicling the response of the church, details the role the current pope played in such scandals earlier in his career.
By the time Father Lawrence Murphy died in 1998, it's alleged, he had sexually abused more than 200 children. Many of them must have seemed ideal victims: Students at St. John's School for the Deaf in Milwaukee between 1950 and 1974, they possessed limited ability to communicate with others. Commonly in that period, the boarding school's pupils had hearing parents who didn't know American Sign Language.
These boys, largely unable to speak, are more than metaphors for all of the voiceless children whose sexual assaults are chronicled in Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God. In 1972, three of them became the first known victims of a pederast priest to accuse their attacker publicly.
============================== Related news

Bishop's Annual Appeal letter doesn't have much appeal

KANSAS CITY (MO)
National Catholic Reporter
by Tom Roberts | Nov. 15, 2012
I arrived in Kansas City, Mo., today and wasn’t here more than three hours when someone handed me a recent letter headlined “Bishop’s Annual Appeal.” The bishop who is doing the appealing, of course, is Robert Finn, recently convicted in county court for failing to report suspected child abuse and spared a fine and jail time under an agreement worked out with prosecutors.

It was somewhat amusing, then, to see the line just under that heading:

“Honoring Bishop Emeritus, Raymond J. Boland – 25 Years As A Bishop.”

Boland was hardly a hero when it came to policing sex abuse crimes. He demonstrated the same lapses as was the case with many members of the hierarchical culture of his generation. But on other matters he was, in temperament, management style and pastoral approach, quite a different bishop from Finn, who within days of taking over undid by fiat virtually everything that had been put in place by Boland and several of his immediate predecessors. Generally speaking, Boland was respected; in the same degree, it might safely be said, Finn sets teeth on edge.

Whether or not Boland gave permission for his name to be used this way, it seems clear that Finn — having violated not only civil law but also church law in the form of the charter fashioned by the U.S. bishops themselves, and having made the diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph a source of embarrassment and derision nationwide — had to find some sympathetic figure on which to hang his fund raising ambitions.

MA - Sex abuse victims praise Globe editor who's moving on

UNITED STATES
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests

Posted by Barbara Blaine on November 13, 2012

Globe editor Martin Baron is moving on to the Washington Post. Every parent in the US should be grateful to him.

In an unprecedented and brave move, he gave the Globe's superb investigative team the green light to thoroughly investigate widespread clergy sex crimes and heinous cover ups, first in Boston, then across America. As a result of his courage and their incredible skill and determination, thousands of child molesting clerics and hundreds of corrupt Catholic officials have been publicly exposed. Some of the criminals have been prosecuted and many of them have been ousted from schools and parishes. Literally tens of thousands of girls and boys are safer because of Baron's bold and compassionate decision and the Globe's tenacious and solid reporting.

We wish Mr. Baron well at the Washington Post and will always be deeply grateful for his historic role in the on-going global movement to safeguard children from predator priests and complicit bishops.

COMMENTS: Salaries in Boston Diocese

BostonCatholicInsider. com for July 2010 gives the following salaries for the Archdiocese: chancellor (250,000) education director (300,000), general counsel (300,000), media direcvtor (250,000), assoc supt of schools (185,270). In light of the financial bailout for abuse, this is very imprudent. It gives an image of fiscal irresponsibility as well as an attempt to set up an alternative religious infrastructure in this country and to "phase out" priests and nuns. That is what O'Malley is really all about. He is the retiring head of the USCCB and is soft on sex abuse and supportive of gay rights. Timothy Dolan is bringing socialism to the Catholic schools in New York by creating "one giant parish". ..

Irish pull away from scandal-hit Catholic Church

IRELAND

WA Today (Australia)
November 18, 2012
What angers people most is the cover-up, writes Karen Kissane from Dublin.
MARIE Collins was 13 and in Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children when she was abused. It was the hospital chaplain, a Catholic priest. He went to jail for it, many years later, like so many of his colleagues in Ireland, but only after decades of misery for Ms Collins.

''I never connected his abuse with the church,'' she says. ''I thought it was somehow my fault and that I was a bad person who had brought it on myself. I had years of depression and agoraphobia that included nine admissions to psychiatric wards.''

As a young adult, anxious that other children not be hurt as she had, she told a priest in her parish. ''He told me it was probably my fault, that I must have led the poor man on, but that I was forgiven and I could go away and forget about it.''

Ms Collins did go away, into more years of silence and depression. The misery did not lift until after her attacker, Father Paul McGennis, was jailed in 1997 over offences involving her and another child he abused 18 years after Collins. He was later convicted of having raped a third girl, 24 years after he attacked Ms Collins.

Priest charged with 39 counts of sexual assault

IRELAND

Irish Independent
Friday November 16 2012
AN ELDERLY priest has been charged with sexually assaulting a teen over an eight-year period two decades ago.
Fr Vincent Mercer (66) of Black Abbey, Kilkenny, was remanded on bail after being charged before Cork District Court with a total of 39 counts of sexual assault.
Fr Mercer faces 39 charges of sexual assault against a juvenile at various locations in Cork and Limerick between January 1, 1986 and February 22, 1994.
The juvenile was aged between 11 and 17 over this period.

Man sues Legion of Christ over father's donation

PROVIDENCE (RI)
Seattle PI
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — A Connecticut man has sued the Legion of Christ, accusing the disgraced Roman Catholic order of using "predatory" means to persuade his father to donate his retirement savings.

The suit filed in federal court in Rhode Island seeks to recoup some $1 million of James Boa-Teh (bo-AH'-teh) Chu's savings and $10 million in damages. Chu was a Yale University professor who died in 2009.

Paul Chu's lawsuit says his father's health was declining when Legion representatives convinced him to donate his savings.

A Legion spokesman denies the claim.

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Synod of Bishops & New Evangelization...or New Marketing of Old Vatican Deceits. Why Vatican must end as a “country” . Christ the Vatican Slave! Australia JP2 Army!

Benedict XVI should meet this mother because Kateri or Opus Dei saints cannot cure her children abused by JP2 Pedophile Priests

NCAA & Penn State more moral than Vatican. Sports is more moral than John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Vatican Titanic sinking in moral bankruptcy

Catholic Church’s popularity at all-time low...churches closing by the dozens http://popecrimes.blogspot.ca/2011/08/catholic-churchs-popularity-at-all-time.html

Persons Authorized as Residents

NCAA & Penn State more moral than Vatican. Sports is more moral than John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Vatican Titanic sinking in moral bankruptcy

Melinda Gates versus Benedict XVI: who’s more “like Christ”? Melinda Gates saves lives of 200 million women while Benedict XVI sits in out-of-touch-with-reality Vatican Throne

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German Jews and Muslims blast circumcision ban

HOMOSEXUALITY & CATHOLIC CULTURE

Pope summons all Nuncios to Rome

Original sin and clergy sex abuse

Cardinal Dolan makes Popes Crimes as entertaining feel-good TV series as the Borgias

Dolan: “The Church is not afraid to admit to its own mistakes” (LIAR! LIAR!)

The Archbishop of New York’s comments at the Synod of Bishops: humility is not a strategy but the right attitude. A video on the rise of Islam presented by Cardinal Turkson has triggered a dispute

October 25, 2012

Friday, October 26, 2012

Gerald T. Slevin: After Elections, Who Will Prosecute More Predatory Priests? Constitutional Lawyer Obama Or The Three R's---Romney, Ryan & Ratzinger? And Why Does It Matter?

As the Sistine Chapel celebrates its 500th anniversary, the Vatican said Wednesday it may have to limit the huge numbers of visitors because pollution is damaging Michelangelo's frescoes, one of the artistic wonders of the world.

Updates for November 18, 2012

Open season on Catholicism (A Typical Vatican Catholic defending the Catholic Church)

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Vatican Catholics still don’t get it

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