Corruption in the Vatican beyond belief!!!

[Belle]

If correct, this is staggering and almost beyond comprehension. Sodom and Gomorrah!!

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/02/ ... posed.html

And this:

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/08/ ... -sins.html

[david johnson]

Speaking as a non-Catholic, the news I see reports the current Pope as working to solve some of this. I think he should do so. Officials 'on the payroll' who betray their charge to uphold the moral principles of their position are best removed.

[John F]

All too easy to believe, and not really surprising given the many revelations of sexual abuse by high-ranking Catholic prelates over quite a few years now.

[Belle]

Beyond dreadful, not just for victims of abuse but the culture of active homosexuality and rank hypocrisy in the church and its impact upon the trusting parishioners. When I infrequently attend a church service these days it's the Anglicans and always for the music - at our local cathedral.

When we lived on our farm, in the last years, an infamous pedophile was our local parish priest. I never went to mass and my children had all, by then, moved beyond the local catholic primary school attached to that church. However, one of my eldest son's classmates had been serially abused by that man (who died in jail in 2006, just a few years after incarceration). This occurred when the student was an altar boy and it left my son feeling very angry and outraged about his mate's multiple suicide attempts and tragic life. None of my children were religious and not regular church-goers, but many of their friends were. They, all of them, now hate the institution of the church - but not its teachings or good works.

The priest, James Fletcher, had been shunted from parish to parish by the Catholic church because of his behaviour - instead of being reported to police. He was there about 5 years, from memory. I had little to do with him but do remember meeting him once at the presbytery on 'an ecumenical matter'. He was odd, to say the least; cold, dismissive, completely disengaged with what I had to say, humorless and vague. When we found out about the charges being brought against him we had just left the area but my character assessment of him suddenly found a horrible explanation. Our closest friends, who remain very staunch Catholics, were on the church committee in that parish and remain very defensive about the whole issue of Father Fletcher on the few occasions he comes up in conversation. This article is about him and my son's classmate, whom he abused. The dates are wrong; he was not charged until about the early 2000's.

https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/sou ... d2b46f7003

I had a lot to do with the local archdiocese parents' association when my children were going through the Catholic school system (a very good one) and this afforded me the opportunity to get to know quite a few priests and observe them working together on our committee. At one stage I attended a couple of conferences with school principles, priests and teaching staff. Many of them were fine individuals whom I very much respected and liked and a couple of the local district priests would, over the years, visit me at our farm to discuss national politics and classical music!! These were great talks, accompanied by freshly baked (you call them) biscuits. They gravitated into my orbit once they realized I wasn't interested in discussing religion or parish trivia.

But I have a singular recollection, to this day, of priests behaving in a particular way when grouped together and commenting on this at the time to my husband; a kind of childlike banter, naivete and giggling which was all, at the time, slightly disturbing to me. I suggested to my husband it had all the hallmarks of sexual naivete, crypto-intimacy and insularity; something I found more than disturbing in seemingly intelligent men!!

[david johnson]

Belle, in the type church I attend, the following is the typical response to those caught in such behaviors: he is fired and 'blackballed', the wife usually leaves him, law enforcement does their thing when needed, help is offered where needed. If guilt is established, he is to confess publicly and repent. If not, the culprit is 'disfellowshipped'. Whatever happens, his ministerial career is over.

[jserraglio]

EXCERPT

National Catholic Reporter

Editor's Note: We are running an excerpt from the new book In the Closet of the Vatican: Power, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy by Frédéric Martel. The book, to be released Feb. 21, will be much talked about. The author claims to have done exhaustive interviewing and research both personally and with a large team of interviewers and translators. We’ll soon have a review and other commentary available.

https://www.ncronline.org/news/accounta ... et-vatican

[jserraglio]

As promised, NCR has published a review, mostly laudatory, by novelist and sociologist Donald Cozzens, a Cleveland, Ohio native and diocesan priest, whom I have run into a couple of times.

Almost twenty years ago, Fr. Cozzens published a remarkable book (The Changing Face of the Priesthood) that anticipated some of what Frederic Martel reports about clericalism in this new book, notably how it had become in Martel's words "sociologically homosexual".

https://www.ncronline.org/news/opinion/ ... loset-book

[jserraglio]

NCR also published a review by Michael Sean Winters that took Martel's book to the woodshed.

https://www.ncronline.org/news/opinion/ ... stakes-not