For Those Who Like Stories Of The KGB And The Vatican

A visitor sent me a link to a blog called Jonah in the Heart of Nineveh, which seems to center on Nazi-Vatican conspiracies, with the KGB sometimes thrown in. This 2015 post reviews Unholy Trinity: The Vatican, The Nazis, and The Swiss Banks:

Written in riveting fashion by the coauthors of The Secret War Against the Jews, Unholy Trinity tells one of the darkest tales of World War II. After the war had ended, fearing a surge of Soviet growth, the Papacy entered into an espionage alliance with British and American intelligence agents. Subsuming justice to the nascent Cold War ideology, these three powers ferreted Nazi criminals out of Europe so that they could be used in the supposedly greater fight against Communism. The Vatican's Nazi smuggling network was penetrated by Prince Anton Turkul, the great Soviet double agent who turned the operations into a sting for his masters in the Kremlin. Unholy Trinity exposes Turkul's "Red Nazi" operation for the first time and shows how Kim Philby, the infamous British-Soviet double agent, and his network were nearly sacrificed to preserve Turkul's Vatican operation.

Other historical treatments, of course, show that Pius XII took his traditional papal role as protector of Rome's Jews seriously and did all he could to prevent their persecution and deportation. Yet others have him involved in plots to assassinate Hitler. But as Cardinal Pacelli, he had a wide diplomatic background and presumably played global politics to the Vatican's advantage as much as he could.

We must assume that Stalin took him seriously, no matter how many divisions he had -- as apparently his successors took John Paul II. Theories of Moscow's involvement in John Paul's assassination attempt via East Germany and Bulgaria persist, and it's significant that there is still no clear historical picture.

This post at the Jonah in he Heart of Nineveh blog references the same James Grein interview that Michael Voris cites in his report from Rome and comments,

This latest interview brings in two important additional elements: 1. St. Gallen is in a German region of Switzerland that quietly received many Nazi fugitives after Germany's defeat. That would connect it to the Nazi flight capital that was covertly deposited in Switzerland at the end of the war. 2. The McCarrick network engaged in Masonic/Luciferian practices, connecting it to the occult aristocracy of Europe and America. That elite had a locus at my college during my time at university in Toronto. It becomes understandable that Grein is fearful of provoking the jackals and will not disclose his full story at this time.

We've seen that conspiracy theories about elite occultism and pedophilia, most recently in Pizzagate, have at best been overblown and not well followed up. On the other hand, wealthy pedophile rings do exist, such as the one connected to Frank Sheldon, a wealthy Michicanite, and Jerry Richards, a teacher in a Catholic school.

Given how little we know about this, and how many puzzling leads and unanswered questions keep popping up over Vatican conspiracies of all sorts, I can't rule anything out. It sounds as though fallout from the current summit may excite more interest. Maybe I need to put this Jonah in Nineveh blog on my notifications.

Is McCarrick A Guy Burgess?

Michael Voris raised an intriguing issue in this report from the Vatican sex summit:

Through a back channel, Church Militant has obtained information from former Communist personnel who were instrumental in setting up a secret network of indoctrination and training centers throughout Europe in the aftermath of World War II, and their information directly implicates the involvement of Theodore McCarrick.

, , , According to Church Militant's sources, one of those European centers was St. Gallen, Switzerland, where Theodore McCarrick had resided right about 1950. McCarrick was a poor kid whose father had died when he was very young and whose mother slaved away doing menial work to make ends meet.

In a 2001 New York Times profile, McCarrick spoke briefly about his time in Europe immediately following high school in New York City, a hotbed of the Communist Party USA at that time.

Admitting he didn't have any plans for his life at the time, he says "a friend" invited him to Switzerland where he stayed for a year. He gave no details about how a poor kid from New York with no money happened to travel to Europe and remain here for a year with no visible means of support.

I ran this by a visitor with some intelligence knowledge, the same one who made a good case for Cardinal Law's father being an intelligence operative in Latin America and the Caribbean. He said,

Voris' talk of Vatican and Church infiltration by communists with a master plan has been a constant with the 'Fatima crusade' and to me always sounded like UFO sightings material.

On one hand, I would say that it isn't necessary to explain the state of the Church by referring to Stalinist conspiracies. Whether it's heretics, or the gays who've always been present, or Protestants, or Freemasons, or plain old corruption, the problems have always been there. On the other hand, as I understand exorcism, it's important to get the demon to give his name.

I assume the files are available now for investigation in the Kremlin. We have Venona material that's validated the status of figures like Alger Hiss. I don't have the impression that the history of KGB infiltration in the Church has been investigated at the level of scholarly detail that's been applied, say, to the Cambridge spy ring, so I would say at this point it can't be definitively confirmed or denied.

Randy Engel has thoughtful remarks on the role of homosexuality in such conspiracies in The Rite of Sodomy:

The personality profile of a homosexual closely fits Westerfields’ personality profile of a traitor—he is immature, neurotic, and narcissistic. The active homosexual is an artful seducer, a natural recruiter and a proselytizer for “the cause.” He is a predator skilled in evaluating the vulnerability of his prey. He is conditioned to acts of duplicity and split loyalties. He lives a compartmentalized life with contacts to the criminal underworld via illicit drugs, pornography, prostitution, and possible blackmail and violence. The homosexual is a gatherer of “injustices” and Marxism offers him “the attraction of a secret shrine of individual rebellion.” It is this desire to strike back against a society that has rejected him, rather than the threat of blackmail that lures the homosexual into the enemy’s espionage net. The homosexual believes himself to be an “outsider,” who like the spy, wants to come in from the cold, but feels he cannot. (p 298)

Another Take On Bp Barron

The visitor who sent the link to Wednesday's post to California Catholic Daily tells me, "Bp Barron is often a bone of contention here. Some fear he is angling for metro DC as Wuerl's replacement." I wasn't familiar with the site, but on hearing that, I've got to say, "Of course." The best anyone not in the loop can speculate is that Cardinal Tobin had been in line for the post when Wuerl was eased out, but the Italian actor bunkmate made that too much of a stretch, so now they need some sort of fresh air type without the gay baggage but not a crazy like, say, Bp Daly of Spokane, who seems to have his head screwed on a little too straight.

Thus we have the willingness of Bp Barron to wag his finger at the racists among the Catholic faithful, a majority of whom voted for Trump in 2016. No matter that, as Catholics, they saw Trump's public policy positions on life issues as far better than those of any prominent Democrat. The puzzle for me is why Barron and apparently many other US bishops don't recognize this, except that the "seamless garment" school of theology seems to take the position that the perfect must be the enemy of the good -- if Trump is somehow a "racist", then any support for life issues must be cynical, no matter that current public policy on abortion, based overtly on eugenics, results in proportionally more minority babies aborted than white ones.

Plus, if Catholic teaching on life issues makes us uncomfortable or less popular, we can say it's all a seamless garment, and if somehow this or that public policy on immigration or whatever is "racist", we can disregard the rest of the whole structure unless it's perfect. So let's get on with it and be less "homophobic".

Up to now, I'd thought Michael Voris was a little too hard on Bp Barron, but if the bishop is signing on to this, I'm not so sure. As I say, I was seated not far from him at a concert last year, and my impression was that he seemed open and unpretentious, which I counted in his favor. However, I'm certain that if I e-mailed him with my concerns, it would never reach him, nor would he want it to. So my mind is open.

Certainly for him to move from auxiliary in a more rural part of the Los Angeles archdiocese to a major post in the US Church would be a phenomenal rise, but I think it would also be an indication that he could be manipulated by powerful figures already in place.

Better Bishops

A visitor very kindly forwarded a link to yesterday's post to California Catholic Daily, which ran it there as "Question for L.A.’s Bishop Barron". So far, there have been no comments at that site, my traffic hasn't spiked over it, and I have no idea if Bp Barron will even see it. On the other hand, the piece goes with the unrelated image at right from Barron's Twitter feed, which suggests to me that other Catholics have begun to be skeptical as well. I'm very sorry for that.

It occurred to me that I heard the opinion several weeks ago in the wake of the original Covington pile on that the bishops were in fact guilty of rash judgment, a specific sin, rather than a vague "racism" somehow implicit in wearing MAGA hats (the boys were too young even to vote for Trump, although I believe the Church endorses their right to do so when they come of age). I would certainly welcome the chance to address this in some forum with Bp Barron, though I'm sure it won't happen.

Another visitor made this comment over yesterday's post:

When I read the line about better bishops, it reminds me of the sentiment that is part and parcel of the problem of Our Lady Of The Atonement. Because it is true that we need better bishops, and have for some time. With the freedom available in the Anglican Use, it was possible to work around the Bishop. This freedom was taken advantage of, and the result was continuous problems - and most went unreported, with parishioners departing. I think the possibility of working around the Bishop, who is often lukewarm, is why there is a link between the Anglican Use - and now Ordinariate, and those who want orthodoxy. It also explains why most members of OLOTA are not Anglican converts.

I think this also goes to the idea of the Anglican special rites as what my regular correspondent calls a "gated community" that's somehow not subject to the ordinary problems in the rest of the Church. Yeah, no gay clergy in the North American ordinariate, huh? But the idea of a special dispensation for a snooty elect, whether Anglican wannabes or other traddy separatists, sets these people up to fall for phonies in clerical collars, whether that be Fr Phillips, Fr Treco, Fr Reese, Fr Kenyon, the Frs B, or of course Dcn Orr.

What I find encouraging is that, although importuning errant bishops still isn't easy, faithful laity who pay attention and sincerely and prayerfully work on the problems do in fact make progress, and they've had an easier time than they had, for instance, when Cardinal Spellman and complicit Catholics in the media were able much more effectively to prevent references to Spellman's actively promiscuous homosexuality from reaching print. The decline of elite media and the rise of populist outlets like blogs and YouTube have contributed to this.

Confer the ability of laity to bypass received elite opinion over the Covington boys by overwhelming the phone capacity of their diocese and even the neighboring Archdiocese of Cincinnati, forcing Bp Foys first into making any public statement, which he'd resolved not to do, and then to issue a full apology for his own rash judgment, weeks before his own official investigation (which he'd originally meant to hide behind) was complete.

If people pay attention and are willing to make an effort, they can have an impact on their bad bishops. We'll have to see what follows the sex summit in Rome.

The Bishops And The Worldly Elites

I ran into this piece in City Journal by Heather MacDonald, one of the more thoughtful writers in the past two decades:

The Jussie Smollett case, in which a young black, gay actor has apparently concocted a tale of being attacked by two white men wearing MAGA hats and shouting anti-gay slurs, is just the latest example of how desperately media elites want to confirm their favored narrative about America: that the country is endemically and lethally racist, sexist, and homophobic, and that the election of Donald Trump both proves and reinforces such bigotry.

The truth: as instances of actual racism get harder and harder to find, the search to find such bigotry becomes increasingly frenzied and unmoored from reality.

This is simply a respectable restatement of the more irreverent YouTube opinions I cited yesterday: there are so few actual racists that Smollett and the complicit media had to outsource the role of white racists to Nigerian actors. MacDonald ties this, as many have, to the Covington hoax:

The Smollett case is a rerun of the Covington hoax, which mobilized an identical longing on the part of the media and political elites to confirm the narrative of American racism, now exacerbated in the era of Trump. Native American activist Nathan Phillips concocted an outright lie about his interaction with the Covington Catholic High School students, and he, too, became an instant, revered celebrity. Then as now, public figure after public figure announced that MAGA hats were the very symbol of white supremacy.

Separately, Nick Sandmann's family has sued the Washington Post for $250 million. Again, let's not forget that a number of Catholic bishops joined in the media pile on. Bishop of Lexington John Stowe hasn't retracted these remarks:

I am ashamed that the actions of Kentucky Catholic high school students have become a contradiction of the very reverence for human life that the march is supposed to manifest.

Er, they stood calmly waiting for their buses home while not responding to provocative actions from two groups of agitators? But Stowe gets to the real meat of his argument farther down:

This past November, the U.S. Catholic bishops issued their first pastoral letter on racism since 1979.

This letter speaks of the structural kind of racism that has worked itself into the fabric of our nation. It describes the unspeakable sins from the slave trade in which the Church was itself complicit as well as the sins of national policies that deprived Native Americans of their lands and livelihood. The pastoral letter describes racism as a “life” issue; that perspective needs to become part of our educational curriculum. Students must grapple with this history and ask themselves how they are going to live differently.

The problem I see here is that there's a respectable body of opinion, which MacDonald represents, that says there's an elite narrative that the US is "endemically and lethally racist, sexist, and homophobic, and that the election of Donald Trump both proves and reinforces such bigotry". Thus the grave moral defect Bp Stowe sees with schoolboys wearing MAGA hats that they lightheartedly bought from Washington street vendors on a field trip.

It's more and more apparent to me that Bp Barron, speaking on behalf of the USCCB in bringing up the same November 2018 letter, is aligning himself with Bp Stowe. But isn't Bp Barron an auxiliary in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, one of the most diverse anywhere? Wasn't his boss, Abp Gómez, born in Mexico? Does Bp Barron even look around in the nave when he visits his parishes?

Kentucky, of course, stayed out of the Confederacy during the US Civil War, which was fought over the "unspeakable sins" that Stowe mentions. What, precisely, should the Covington Catholic boys have done differently, other than possibly not wear MAGA hats? How, more precisely, would Bp Stowe urge the boys to "live differently" other than this? Are they attending segregated schools? Do they ride on segregated buses? Have they in fact bullied or harassed anyone on a racial basis? Have they gone to a lynching? Or is it just that they have to deal with some vague endemic racism, and maybe more to the point, "homophobia", which the gay movement that Stowe supprts seeks to link with racism?

Legally sanctioned racism, in the form of miscegnation laws, segregation in public facilities, and segregation in schools had disappeared by the 1960s, largely in fact during the Republican Eisenhower administration. "Racism" as now defined consists almost entirely of presumptive "dog whistles" and microaggressions. One anecdote that's come from the Smollett case is that the Nigerians, hired to wear MAGA hats for the staged "attack" on Smollett, could not find such hats for sale in liberal Chicago and had to settle for ordinary red ones without lettering.

Indeed, legally sanctioned "homophobia" disappeared with the abolition of sodomy laws. So far, Church teaching still supports traditional marriage, so this, at least for a Catholic, is not "homophobia". What do Bps Stowe and Barron now think "homophobia", on a par with "racism", consists of? What do the Covington boys need to do to change their lives over it?

There's another agenda now at work, which includes linking "homophobia" to "racism", effectively hitchhiking a movement of privileged individuals already in the elite onto the prestige of the black civil rights movement, an entirely different thing. When the USCCB, Bp Stowe, and now unfortunately Bp Barron, say "racism", I think they really mean "homophobia" -- racism is a dead letter and has been for generations. For that matter, the same applies to "homophobia". What's the real agenda here?

Bp Barron and the other bishops who endorse this view are doing it, I think, to preserve their careers and avoid controversy. Isn't this another way to say worldliness?

We need better bishops.

Bp Barron Disappoints

OK, let's think of the pressing issues facing the Church today, or this week. They would certainly include the inability of the bishops to address rampant homosexuality and other sins against chastity among clergy, including bishops. They would include the fecklessness of bishops to deal with the problem of Catholic politicians who seek the votes of Catholics but promote laws that contradict Church teaching. Farther down the list might be the unwillingness of bishops to acknowledge or support commendable conduct by laity if it would force the bishops to take controversial positions,

Instead, Bp Barron has chosen this moment to promote a USCCB pastoral letter against racism adopted last November in Baltimore, when the bishops were otherwise doing what they could to sidestep misconduct among their own. He posted the video below on YouTube yesterday:

I've said here that I'm eager to believe Bp Barron is on the side of the angels, but I'm always ready to be disappointed. I'm not sure when this was recorded; he speaks of the letter as though it were very recent, when it was in fact approved last November 14. I get the impression that he's not entirely comfortable with making the presentation -- the Baltimore conference was not a happy event, and the letter was not given much attention at the time.

Nevertheless, it's not hard to figure out why he's issued the video now, and I've got to hope he was pressured into doing it. I've noted here already that he's publicly characterized the circumstances of the Covington Catholic episode in Washington as "at best, ambiguous", when the archdiocese's own report and their bishop made it plain that the boys' conduct was "one might even say laudatory". I don't believe Bp Barron has changed his characterization, though.

But the Covington hoax that led to the investigation was only the first of two media stampedes to promote a fraudulent narrative that Americans have suddenly become violent racists. The lugubrious figure of Jussie Smollett has dominated the news cycle for a full three weeks immediately after the Covington hoax was disproven. The clear problem now is that the elites -- clearly including many bishops -- want to believe some kind of consistent truth behind the hoaxes even when the hoaxes themselves are shown to have been amateurish stunts.

As one commentator put it after the Smollett fiasco,

AP began its story, "The national outrage that simmered after actor Jussie Smollett said he was attacked by people shouting racial and anti-gay slurs was fueled in part by celebrities who spoke out loud and strong on social media."

. . . A man was not beaten up. That is a good thing, is it not?

The only bad reaction is from liberals who are sad, sullen and silent because a man was not beaten up because the story shows homophobia and racial bigotry are dying.

There's another puzzling feature to the Smollett story that may also be behind why Bp Barron spoke now, or at least released the video now. One development the story reflects is the number of skeptical black commentators on YouTube, a remarkable number of whom are black Trump supporters, but others, whatever their political alignment, who feel the Smollett story damages the black community. This is not simply because false claims of racial attacks damage the credibility of those who may experience real attacks, but because Smollett is claiming dual victimhood as both black and gay.

These commentators make the point that gays, closeted or open, have never experienced anything like the level of suffering blacks have -- note what we've learned here, that for at least much of the 20th century (and probably longer), Adams House, an upper-crust dormitory at elite Harvard, has had a reputation for gay-friendliness, while blacks were not accepted at Princeton at all until the 1940s. Thus there's justifiable resentment among blacks across the political spectrum that gays are trying to hitchhike on the prestige of the black civil rights movement.

Indeed, these commentators make the point that Smollett, who has lived a life of privilege himself, promotes himself primarily as a gay victim, not a black victim. Another commentator, an outside observer in Rumania, makes the intriguing point that as far as he can tell, racism is so unusual in the US that Smollett had to outsource the role of white racists to black Nigerian actors! (Another commentator said that Smollett wanted to hire white actors, but people complained the cast wasn't diverse enough.)

Bp Barron doesn't mention either the Covington or the Smollett incidents in his presentation, and it's possible that it was recorded before either took place. But it's pretty clearly been issued in the wake of both, on the apparent desire of the liberal faction of bishops to sustain a narrative that's less and less sustainable of American racism, and perhaps as well to deflect attention from the impending failure again of the bishops to resolve their own scandals in the upcoming synod.

Indeed, I've got to assume some of the bishops would in fact like to hitchhike their gay rights agenda on the prestige of black civil rights, and this is part of the context of Bp Barron's video. This is a truly disappointing impression.

Bp Foys Releases Covington Catholic Investigation

This can be found here. Key points:

• There is no evidence the students chanted "build the wall" or any variation.
• A voice was heard shouting "It's not rape if you enjoy it", but video evidence indicates another person said, "He does not go to CovCath" immediately afterward.
• Nick Sandmann's January 20 statement accurately reflects his interaction with the Black Hebrew Israelites and Nathan Phillips. (Sandmann's attorneys correctly did not make him available to the investigation and referred investigators to his January 20 statement.)
• Few if any students left Covington wearing MAGA hats. They purchased them in Washington during or after the March for Life. In prior years, they purchased equivalent Obama hats. There is no policy in the school against wearing political apparel.
• Video evidence supports all statements from students and chaperones. Statements from Nathan Phillips are inconsistent, and he did not respond to requests for an interview.

The video from the Lin Wood law firm posted more than a week ago is actually more detailed than this investigation, which seems almost timid. However, there is no difference in the conclusions of both investigations, and the diocesan investigation will unquestionably support the legal cases of the boys and their families.

The Washington Post report of the investigation turns it into a he said-she said issue, with numerous quotes from Native American activists. It does quote Lin Wood, Sandmann's attorney:

“The MAGA cap that Nick was wearing provides no legal excuse or justification for the politically motivated accusers, rather it only confirms their bias and malice. Anyone who falsely attacked, disparaged, or threatened a minor because of the cap he was wearing should hang his or her head in shame and be held fully accountable in a court of law.”

Further,

The report, he added, “firmly establish[es] the truth that Nick was innocent of any wrongdoing. Nick was the victim of adults who used him to further their own agendas.”

UPDATE: Wood, Sandmann's attorney, has indicated that he will sue Native American hoaxer Phillips as part of his strategy, primarily to get Phillips's sworn deposition. The Foys investigation was unable to interview Phillips.

I think even Bp Barron's reaction, where he called the situation " at best, ambiguous", does not reflect the findings of the Foys investigation.

As I predicted, though, the scope of the Foys investigation was limited to the events in Washington. A much more worthwhile investigation would include how the media contacted Bp Foys, Abp Kurtz, and Abp Lori, the nature of those contacts, what was represented to the bishops, and how the bishops responded in the context of any existing diocesan policies regarding media contacts. A much more worthwhile conclusion would contain recommendations on how bishops can avoid being stampeded by media in the wake of future episodes.

But clearly, influential US bishops are allied with liberal media and the dominant secular narrative, and in the current environment, no such investigation will be permitted. We're lucky to have had the one we got.

Some Things Did Go Well Under Cardinal Mahony

I've been ambivalent about Cardinal Mahony throughout the history of this blog. I've said all along that his call not to bring St Mary of the Angels (or the other three "continuing" parishes in the diocese that applied) in via the Pastoral Provision in the 1980s was the correct one. Naturally, Mahony's record in covering up abuse or promoting a cohort of gay bishops on the West Coast weighs against this in the overall balance.

Last Sunday, we had a visiting priest give the homily who'd formerly been an associate in the parish. He'd left to become a pastor of a parish several miles up the I-5 not long before we came in. I've had the increasing impression that our parish is able to get very promising priests to pass through as associates and then turns them loose to become successful pastors. One reason for this is that an associate vocation director has been in residence there; last year he was promoted to chief vocation director. Presumably he's in a position to identify the best new priests and bring them in for what amounts to post-graduate formation.

The priest who visited last Sunday, Fr Mike, seems to have done so well as a pastor that Fr Sam, the new overall vocation director, brought Fr Mike into the chancery to replace him as an associate. His record at a downscale parish with a gang problem and homeless encampments in its community includes moving its performance in the bishop's appeal from 40% shortfall to 40% over goal and one vocation and several promising candidates, with that new priest in fact now an associate at our parish. A very poised and mature guy, my wife and I think.

Fr Sam, the vocation director, and Fr Jim, our pastor, were classmates at St John's Seminary in Camarillo, which Randy Engel in The Rite of Sodomy excoriates as a "pink palace". Many of the associates who've been at our parish are naturally products of St John's. Nobody is hanging gay pride banners in the sanctuary. In fact, the parish somehow has kept its communion rail, although as is normal, the issue of traffic for the sacrament prevents receiving while kneeling.

Fr Sam and Fr Jim are in their 50s and went through St John's in the 1990s under Mahony. The parish appears to have been strong and successful throughout the Mahony years without gay pride banners or whatever else. I don't completely know how to characterize its success other than to say it seems to have paid close attention to fundamentals. It has more to teach me. All I can think is that Mahony was given the grace to allow this, and probably other good things, to continue.

Strange Bishop

Buried at about 1:45 in Church Militant's Headlines from Friday:

is a story about the Bishop of Joliet, R Daniel Conlon, who is quoted as "casting doubt on whether the Catholic Church was actually willed by God". According to the report, speaking to Elmhurst College on Wednesday, he suggested Christ may not have intended to establish a church, saying, "There is no absolute answer to the question. Jesus did not address it directly, neither will I provide an absolute answer."

Elmhurst College does in fact list an event for February 6, "Did Jesus Really Intend to Establish a Church?". This is described as the Cardinal Joseph Bernardin Lecture, which I suppose is appropriate. A press release from the diocese added to the remarks quoted in the Church Militant piece with "Like many other questions, Christians have to seek answers in the Scriptures and in the living tradition of the Church.”

This is somewhat puzzling. Did George Washington intend to found the United States? Well, there's no absolute answer. Historians must seek answers in primary documents and the tradition of historiography. I suppose if you're a radical skeptic or a postmodernist, there might be merit in this position, but if we spend a lot of time on questions like this, we have less time for more important questions. Is that a stoplight just ahead, and is it red or green? We can debate questions of epistemology and perception, or we can drive the car.

Conlon was installed as Bishop of Joliet in 2011. Although he was installed by the late Cardinal George of Chicago, this site says he's allied with Cardinal Cupich. He's been involved in other controversies related to abusive priests:

The Roman Catholic bishop in Joliet is allowing an accused predator priest to return to limited ministry, and advocates for priest sex abuse victims are livid over the decision.

As WBBM Newsradio’s Bernie Tafoya reports, the Rev. F. Lee Ryan was removed a couple of years ago from his ministry at St. Edmund Parish in Watseka and St. Joseph Mission in Crescent City, both in downstate Iroquois County.

. . . The bishop says Rome has decided that at the time Ryan allegedly molested a teen, what he did was not considered a serious crime by the Church according to Church law at the time. For that reason, Conlon ruled, Ryan could not be moved from ministry altogether.

The Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests says Church law at the time actually said a 14-year-old was at an age of consent.

“This is a shocking and dangerous move by Bishop Conlon,” said a statement from SNAP, which pointed out that Conlon is in charge of children’s safety for all of America’s bishops as head of the U.S. Catholic bishops’ committee on sexual abuse.

WBBM has stayed on Conlon's case. Last fall,

The Attorney General promised a sweeping inquiry into the state’s six diocese, and on Friday staff from the Attorney General’s office was in Joliet looking at records.

The diocese in Joliet has 650,000 Catholics, and CBS 2 has been searching for just one–the Bishop of the Joliet Diocese, Daniel Conlon.

CBS 2’s Brad Edwards found him at home on Friday before he slammed his front door in his face.

CBS 2 obtained this memorandum, initialed by Conlon.

In it, he says, “I would like to update you on the status of the Illinois Attorney General’s inquiry into matters involving allegations of child sexual abuse against clergy in the diocese of Joliet. Today, Nov. 16, four members of the AG’s office will be on site at the Blanchette Catholic Center to review files of diocesan priests with credible allegations of child sexual abuse.”

That includes this list of more than 30 priests, including Father James Nowak.

The diocese paid millions to, in part, settle claims brought by eight men alleging Nowak abused them.

This summer, CBS 2 found Nowak living next to a school–with the diocese footing his expenses.

After CBS 2 inquired, he moved to an extended stay motel. He has since moved again.

Nowak once wrote on Facebook, “In regard to our beloved bishop Daniel Conlon, he has cared for me well.”

CBS 2 has been trying to interview Conlon for weeks, but on Friday he told Edwards that he “wasn’t prepared” when CBS 2 showed up at his door.

Conlon has had about two decades to craft a response to a media inquiry about priest sex abuse.

It's hard to avoid thinking Conlon is completely out of touch, incapable of dealing with local media in any effective way.

I'd be interested in any other information visitors may have on Bp Conlon.

A Strategy For Our Lady Of The Atonement

I've received more e-mails than usual about OLA in the wake of Dcn Orr's death and the archdiocese's report. Most have been unhappy at the continued relationship between Fr Phillips and the parish, on the basis that Fr Phillips, based on the archdiocese's report, minimized at least one report of abuse concerning Orr prior to his ordination. This was almost certainly due to a conflict of interest arising from a long-standing relationship of some sort between the two.

One visitor asked who Bp Lopes's superior is -- he is Cardinal Luis Ladaria Ferrer, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. However, given the Catholic principle of subsidiarity, I would work to resolve any issues at the lowest possible level, and it seems to me that this would mean talking with Fr Lewis, OLA's pastor, and the parish council before going even to Bp Lopes. My regular correspondent has outlined some of the problems involved in Fr Phillips's case:

However many bishops enabled priests who were abusing boys, the number of priests who covered for their colleagues and/or subordinates must be in the thousands. The vast majority of these priests "function...as a Catholic priest with full rights and privileges of the priesthood," or did so until their deaths. So Fr Phillips is hardly unique in this respect.

Bp Lopes was certainly between a rock and a hard place when he inherited Fr P. The uproar around Abp G-S's belated attempts to oust him completely indicates how disruptive this course would have been, not just locally but in the entire OCSP. One could make a case for house arrest, especially before details about Orr were public. Now that decision may have to be revisited, although Mr Orr's death has greatly simplified the situation.

I don't know the OLA parish very well, I've never been there, and I've never met anyone connected with it in person. In fact, several who e-mail me about it are former members who perhaps know the situation there only too well. Those who've left probably recognize their position is a minority, which adds to the difficulty. Any attempt to ban Fr Phillips now without carefully preparing the ground would again draw down press packages with pictures of Phillips and his adoring family, Phillips celebrating ad orientem in fancy vestments, statements from Mr Wilson, blah blah blah, the way things went in 2017.

So the first question I have is, "What particular itch do you need to scratch?" I think it's necessary to figure out an achievable, realistic goal that seems reasonable. I think you could preface any efforts by saying the archdiocese's report has changed the circumstances, and we know better now that Fr Phillips had some involvement and knowledge of Dcn Orr's abuse -- now come to light via the 2019 report-- than was known to the public in 2017.

Given this, it might be worthwhile to take the position that Fr Phillips's presence at the parish, saying masses or otherwise, is more extensive than now seems appropriate, in light of what we've learned. I would simply try to sit down with Fr Lewis, put that out, and ask if he can think of ways to dial things back. Again, I don't know the specifics here, which is another way of saying I don't know what particular itch needs to be scratched. But I would certainly proceed with a realistic set of fairly limited goals. If input can be had on potential remedies from knowledgeable sources in the archdiocese or elsewhere, so much the better.

At that point, given subsidiarity, I'd let Fr Lewis try to work things out with Bp Lopes and Fr Phillips as best he thought appropriate. Naturally, it would help if any group or individual trying to accomplish this is already known to Fr Lewis for strong financial and volunteer support of the parish, and is recognized as solid. My understanding is that under Fr Phillips, membership on the parish council was entirely appointive, but I don't know if this has changed. Again, given subsidiarity, the parish council would normally be a good vehicle to work any issues.

Contentious parish situations aren't healthy. My wife and I know this first hand. Sometimes it's important to draw a line and ask what our real priorities are -- do we want "thees" and "thous" inserted into the mass by a Viennese professor so badly that we'll tolerate all kinds of other bitterness? Certainly I've heard from very good people who made that decision about OLA in past years and seem to have moved on quite well.

If you're in the minority and it doesn't look like you can fix the situation, the best thing, I think, especially if you're laity, is to look to your spiritual welfare, leave quietly, and find a parish that better meets your needs. Trade off thee and thou and ad orientem for better companions and peace and quiet! As our pastor puts it, sometimes Plan B is better than Plan A, and sometimes Plan C is better than Plan B.

But in the end, I simply don't know the situation at OLA very well, and I'd simply start with Fr Lewis.

Dcn Orr And The Zombie Apocalypse

A visitor familiar with the Our Lady of the Atonement parish reports,

There is a good chance that Fr. Phillips is the sole beneficiary of Dcn Orr’s will. Orr was from a well off family. One can imagine the scenario where the school and church are the beneficiary, but with Fr Phillips to control the use of the funds. If that’s the case, then we may see a reemergence of Fr. Phillips in a higher role. I don’t know if you are aware but the school expansion project left the parish in serious debt.

I keep seeing that this must have been a very, very strange relationship. Another OLA-familiar visitor reports,

What I don't understand is how Bishop Lopes refuses to deal with Fr. Phillips now? Now that Orr's true colors have been revealed and Fr. Phillips illicit cover-up has been uncovered!

What the Archdiocese released is really just the tip of the iceberg, as you have pointed out, and yet Fr. Phillips still says masses every Sunday, he led the Rosary (and gave a lengthy eulogy at the Rosary) for his little buddy James Orr (RIP).

It's easy to blame the former Ordinaries (The Archbishops of San Antonio) for their lack of motivation to deal with this awful priest (Phillips) but what is Lopes excuse?

I can verify, as an absolute fact, that there is bad blood between Lopes and Archbishop Gustavo, but not because Gustavo did not want the parish to leave the Archdiocese, as has been widely spun by Phillips and his media machine. Gustavo and his predecessors Gomez and Flores both knew the parish would join the Ordinariate, or it's equivalent, when it was defined and when the the parish wanted it. There was never any doubt, the property belonged to the parish and the parish belonged to the Anglican Use. The bad blood exists BECAUSE Gustavo wanted Phillips removed from active ministry, because of the contents of the now released report and the years of cover-up that Phillips always offered to Orr.

If you remember Phillips was removed for a time, by Archbishop Gustavo immediately before the parish became a part of the Ordinariate. It was Archbishop Gustavo's intent that this situation remain permanent. Lopes knew of the abuses by Orr and the cover-up by Phillips and he did nothing. He knew of the cult of personality that came with Phillips and he refused to deal with it at the time - and he still refuses to deal with it today. In essence, Phillips took personal responsibility for placing literally thousands of children and their families in reach of the sociopath Orr and he is is still allowed to function, not as a pastor, but as a Catholic priest with full rights and privileges of the priesthood.

Is the Ordinariate so driven by debt-load that the money and donations attached to Christopher Phillips by the cult of personality, you so aptly identified, really all there is? Day after day - Week after week - Fr. Lewis has to deal with the megalomaniac Phillips while Lopes sits in his Ivory tower 200 miles to the East. I'm pretty sure if Phillips were the pastor at Walsingham, it would be a different story. This is cowardice!

What does this say to those abused by Orr through the years, not just sexually but abused by his pathological lust for power and his mafioso view of loyalty. How do those affected by this vicious duo see Lopes and his refusal to hold Phillips accountable for the direction, support, denials, obfuscations and fabrications he has always afforded Orr and continues to - to this day? Where is the justice in this?

What puzzles me is how some people -- though not many in the overall scheme of things -- can be convinced that the liturgical innovation in Anglican Use or Anglicanorum coetibus, promoted by a liberal cardinal who was an ally of Joseph Bernardin and the poster boy for clerical abuse, can be the remedy for liturgical innovation and post-Conciliar heterodoxy. Not to mention abusive clergy. But this is the bill of goods that Phillips and his imitators have sold.

Edward Feser On Freud's Civilization And Its Discontents

Prof Feser is something of a puzzle for me. He's one of the best academics currently writing, but he teaches at Pasadena City College, and in the California community colleges, a PhD isn't really a requirement for tenure. His PhD is in fact from UC Santa Barbara, not an academic bright light itself. Yet as as undergraduate at an elite school, I never had anyone as effective as a teacher.

His latest post at his blog reinforces this for me. He brings up Freud as an "Old Atheist", as opposed to the New Atheists whom he frequently discusses.

Our theme has been the tendency of the best-known Old Atheists to show greater insight vis-à-vis the consequences of atheism than we find in their shallow New Atheist descendants. This was true of Nietzsche and of Sartre, and it is true of Sigmund Freud.

He pays particular attention to Civilization and its Discontents, and this is a particular issue for me, because I had it as assigned reading as an undergraduate. Actually, I never quite figured out why it was in the course, which was the sophomore survey Eng Lit course intended for majors. But then, we were always having to read Big Think stuff, as far as I can see in hopes it might rub off, but certainly nobody was getting any smarter there. (This place was the model for Faber College, but recall that when the Delta brothers went on road trips, they were living in the same world.) So I never quite made head or tail out of it.

Actually, I doubt if the prof who assigned it did, either. He moonlighted as a senior editor at Buckley's National Review, and while I was a student of his, he converted to Roman Catholicism. In hindsight, this was to advance his career as a Buckley protégé. But after Buckley died, he wrote opinion pieces favoring abortion for undergraduate women in the campus health center, because they'd have good careers, after all, and eventually he endorsed Obama in 2008 and was finally fired from the National Review.

So Feser's well-reasoned and coherent views are refreshing indeed.

The popular image of the father of psychoanalysis has it that he thought human happiness could be secured if only we would free ourselves of stifling repressions, especially regarding sex. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact Freud believed that human beings were likely doomed always to be unhappy, and that this was probably the inevitable price of our enjoying the benefits of civilization.

This is famously the theme of Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents, wherein he avers that “the intention that man should be ‘happy’ is not included in the plan of ‘Creation’” (p. 43). As maturity brings one to follow the sober “reality principle” more than the “pleasure principle,” one will find that merely avoiding pain and suffering as far as one can – as opposed to finding positive fulfillment – is the best that can be hoped for. “[T]he idea of life having a purpose stands and falls with the religious system” (p. 42), Freud says, and since (he thinks) religion is an illusion, there can be no purpose to life and thus nothing the realization of which could bring genuine happiness.

. . . The three main sources of our unhappiness are, in Freud’s view, natural forces that lie outside our control, the weaknesses of our bodies, and frustration with the ways we relate to other human beings (p. 57). The idea that civilization is the source of our unhappiness, and a return to primitive conditions the remedy for it, strikes Freud as “strange,” even “astonishing” (p.58). In fact it is only civilization that allows us to mitigate the sources of suffering to the extent that we can. Enmity against civilization and nostalgia for pre-civilized times is rooted in resentment at the frustration of desire that civilization entails:

He concludes,

An attractive feature of Freud’s Old Atheism, then, is its realism and sobriety. Science, art, work, a return to primitive living, sexual indulgence, an ethic of nonviolence, socialism, the abandonment of religion – none of these are going to bring human happiness or otherwise substitute for the meaning that religion promised. Neither Burning Man festivals, nor Reason Rallies, nor Bernie Sanders can save us. Deal with it.

Feser's distinction between New and Old Atheists tracks quite well with Bp Barron's distinction between Jordan Peterson and Sam Harris, which I noted here two weeks ago. What I find encouraging is that the quality of intellectual analysis seems to have improved greatly in the 50 years since I had to read Freud for the first time. But then as now, the quality isn't going to happen in elite institutions.

I'd Like To Learn More About How The USCCB Works

Let's think about the three or four highly visible crises facing the US Church right now: the Covington boys; the very late-term abortion laws; child abuse; gay networks among the bishops. Several bishops bungled the Covington crisis independently. Cardinal Dolan, one of the most prominent US churchmen, got Church teaching wrong in response to the abortion law crisis. The responses of Cardinals Cupich, Tobin, and Wuerl to the abuse-of-minors and harassment-of-seminarians crisis have made things worse, not better.

A few courageous but less senior bishops like Daly, Strickland, and Scharfenberger, have been better spokesmen, but as things stand, they speak with no particular authority. Even if there were room for difference on Church teachings -- in these areas, as far as I can see, there isn't -- there nevertheless needs to be a better strategy for dealing with inevitable instant media controversies as they break out. Many of them have national impact even if they arise from issues within a particular diocese, which we've recently seen with the Covington boys or the New York abortion law.

One thing I don't understand is that many of the potential controversies are perennials. If something doesn't happen today to stir up a media frenzy, it'll happen next week or next month. Someone will wear a MAGA hat again. There'll be a new late-term abortion law somewhere else. Yet another priest, or heaven forbid, bishop, will have a lewd conduct or child pornography arrest. There'll be a new controversy over someone hanging a gay pride banner in the sanctuary, or else burning one.

A quick web search shows that the USCCB has a Public Affairs Office.

The Office of Public Affairs represents the Catholic Bishops of the United States to the media and the media to the bishops. Responsibilities include preparing and distributing statements and other resources for the media, arranging for interviews with bishops and staff of the USCCB, organizing press conferences, responding to media queries and credentialing media for coverage of such events as the bishops' annual meetings.

I notice a potentially worthwhile subject area in the column to the left, Trending Topics Q&A, which might be just the place to put statements on some of the issues I mentioned above, but when I click on it, I find only one entry: The Moral Imperative of Budget Spending Priorities, which is basically an endorsement of Ted Kennedy-style social policies -- this may have a place, although I notice it's complaining about President Trump's first budget, now a couple of years out of date. And it's the only entry.

How many people work in the USCCB Public Affairs Office? What on earth do they do all day? Why can't they be drafting responses to thoroughly predictable future controversies, where often you'd just need to fill in blanks with names, places, and dates?

I do hear there's a lot of partying in Washington. The Church needs a real leader who can find capable people to do the real work that needs doing here. Naturally, such a leader would also need to find a way to bypass the inevitable obstructionist bishops who'll try to defeat any such efforts -- but that's the sort of thing a real leader needs to do.

If anyone has insights here, or if someone can point me to resources on the web that might be informative, I'll greatly appreciate it.

But Then There's Bishop Daly Of Spokane!

This isn't the first time Bp Thomas Daly of Spokane, WA has come up on this blog. Late last year, we looked at how his chancery handled the question of about 20 Jesuits who'd been credibly accused of abuse and were living under theoretical "safety plans" in a residence on the Gonzaga University campus, but were actually free to come and go.

As best we can tell from the record, then-Bp Cupich had been aware of at least seven of the Jesuits while he was ordinary there from 2010 to 2014, but did nothing about them. Daly, in contrast, acted decisively but quietly:

In 2016, they all suddenly left Gonzaga for California, a complete coincidence, I'm sure. (However, they were relocated to the Sacred Heart Jesuit Center in Los Gatos, California, in the diocese where Daly had previously been auxiliary.) By 2017, the Spokane diocese was updating its policies to be sure that no more hinky Jesuits (or hinkies of any other stripe) could come in without the bishop's knowledge and approval.

When the news of the Jesuits at Gonzaga eventually broke, the diocese responded with what I thought was a textbook example of good crisis management. Yes, it had happened. Yes, the problem was fixed when the bishop learned about it. Yes, changes have been made to keep it from happening again. It was handled up front, everything out at once, no steady drip of new revelations. This had to say something about Bp Daly, in my view.

This week, we heard from Bp Daly again:

Spokane Bishop Thomas Daly’s call for local Catholic politicians who support legislation enabling abortions to get right with the church drew a skeptical response Monday from two Spokane City Council members.

Daly signed a letter Friday calling on local politicians “who obstinately persevere in their public support for abortion” to abstain from the sacrament of Communion until they’ve “reconciled to Christ and the Church.”

Daly cites legislation approved in New York state and proposed in Virginia in his letter and invokes language from Catholic canonical law indicating that actions promoting such laws are grave offenses to the church that would require public atonement.

“The Church’s commitment to the life of every human person from conception until death is firm,” Daly wrote. “God alone is the author of life and for the civil government to sanction the willful murder of children is unacceptable. For a Catholic political leader to do so is scandalous.”

On one hand, Daly appears to be one of very few US bishops to take such a clear position. He isn't threatening them with excommunication, but he's certainly urging them to an examination of conscience. Last Sunday we had a homily from an important guy in our archdiocesan chancery who was pretty darn ticked off (he used a stronger word) that more bishops weren't simply excommunicating the likes of Andrew Cuomo.

On the other, Daly clearly pays a price for his witness. The story linked above continues,

Spokane City council members Ben Stuckart and Karen Stratton, who were both raised Catholic and have taken Communion in the church, said the bishop’s words sent the wrong message.

“It hurt my feelings to read that,” said Stuckart, who said he doesn’t “regularly” attend church but that he’d been baptized and confirmed in the faith. “It’s the exact opposite of what Spokane should be.”

Stratton agreed, saying she supported “a woman’s right to choose” and that she was raised in the church by nuns who encouraged her to be a strong-willed person.

“Those kinds of comments, they split people,” Stratton said of the letter. “He should be setting an example.”

The stories we're seeing about bishops like Bp Foys in Covington show how easily they can be terrified by the press, something Foys himself acknowledged in his apology. This makes Daly that much more an example of courage, all too rare in the US Church. Michael Voris has a similar point about Cardinal Dolan:

His reaction and media comments following Governor Cuomo signing the new state abortion law reveals some serious issues upstairs with His Eminence.

He says Cuomo shouldn't be excommunicated because it would be giving ammo to the enemy — that the Left would seize on the excommunication and portray Cuomo in a sympathetic light. Yeah, they probably would — so what? Is that worse than allowing the world to think — or actually realize — that U.S. bishops are lily-livered cowards when it comes to the hard truths.

Dolan claims it would be counter-productive. What a stupid analysis; counter-productive to what, exactly? What's counter-productive is letting the world think leaders in the Church don't think this is a big deal, and what's worse, other Catholics think it's not a big deal.

. . . For example, when he was on FOX & Friends answering questions from the hosts about all this, FOX actually took down and edited out part of the live interview where Dolan simply got it wrong about Church teaching.

He said, in sum, that those involved in an abortion are not excommunicated, in direct defiance of existing canon law.

The laity needs to demand better bishops. We in fact have a number of them.

Bishop Foys, What About That Report?

Let's recall that from the start of the Covington MAGA-boy hoax, Bp Foys has said he's "investigating" the incident. On January 23, he said to the students at Covington Catholic,

The best we can do is, first of all, to find out the truth, to find out what really went on, what really happened. So we do have investigators who are here today, a third-party who are not associated with our diocese, not associated with me or with the school, who are working on this investigation to find out what happened.

He did say, "This investigation isn’t going to be over overnight — it can’t be if it’s going to be thorough." He went on to say,

It is my hope and my prayer that, in the end, it will show exactly what happened and that we will be able to stand tall and proud. People will still criticize us one way or the other — people will believe it or not believe it — but at least we can say we’ve taken the time to talk to all the parties involved and to get all the footage we can that was taken that day and say, ‘Here, this is not what we think happened or what we would like to believe happened, but this is what in fact happened.

Well, on February 1, a pretty good report did come out. It seems to have relied on "all the footage. . . that was taken that day", and I think it puts out the best, most objective take on what in fact happened. Here it is:

This is extremely thorough, it gives multiple perspectives, and it gives a complete timeline and a great deal more context than we've seen in any other report so far. As of this morning,, it's had close to half a million views on YouTube.

The trouble is that it comes from the Lin Wood law firm that represents the Sandmann family, not from the Diocese of Covington. I don't believe Bp Foys has said exactly whom he's engaged to do the investigation, but typically this is done by a law firm. So as best I can tell, the firm has been on the investigation from Bp Foys's first announcement on January 19. The Wood firm didn't announce that it was representing the Sandmann family until January 24.

So the firm hired by Bp Foys has been on the investigation for nearly a week longer than the Wood firm, but the Wood firm has been first to put out a thoroughly professional, very well-produced video report. Nothing, so far, from the Diocese of Covington. I've felt all along, though, that the "investigation" was from the start something for Bp Foys to hide behind, and it's no surprise that they have no work product to show.

In fact, although Bp Foys has strongly implied it will eventually be made public whenever it's finished, I very much doubt it will cover the initial contacts between the media and Foys, nor any discussions that took place among Foys and his staff, nor Foys and other bishops, who may well have coordinated their initial defamatory statements. As one commentator put it,

The worst thing about this mob against him and his fellows was to have their spiritual leaders -- the Dioceses -- join the mob and betray them without even knowing the full story. I've repeatedly pointed out that all mobs are demonic. Assuming that my assertion about mobs is correct, what can we conclude about the leaders of these dioceses?

. . . Those who the Covington students should have been able to trust were their Judases. One wonders which god they serve. One wonder who those leaders call "father."

The Wood law firm specializes in winning major damages in rush-to-judgment media defamation cases. It has represented Richard Jewell, the hero of the Atlanta Olympic bombing who was wrongly identified as the perpetrator, and the brother of JonBenet Ramsey, falsely identified as a suspect in her murder.

The final settlement amount was not disclosed, but the complaint, filed in Michigan, was seeking no less than $250 million in compensatory damages and no less than $500 million in punitive damages.

The Wood firm doesn't mess around. The bishops, on the other hand, seem to be in a different class.

A Few More Reflections On The Meeks Interview

I'm still pondering the point that, as far as I can tell, Fr Ed Meeks made throughout his EWTN interview that I linked yesterday. At about 10:00, he stresses that he and his wife kept trying to stay in the Church in the 1970s (although he had already left the seminary for unspecified reasons), but they "despaired" of finding a "refuge" from the "aberrations" and "heterodoxy" common during that time.

(I would submit the example of Bl Stanley Rother, ordained in 1963, a priest throughout the 1970s, martyred in 1981. Apparently he wasn't driven out of the Church like Fr Meeks; I have no idea why he stayed in the face of all the liturgical innovation and aberration and chaos and stuff.)

Actually, I'd be interested if anyone can parse out for me the differences in theological position between that for which Fr Treco was removed from his post and that which Fr Meeks espoused in his EWTN interview -- he seems to be saying in so many words that the Church had wandered from the Truth throughout the 1960s and 70s, and only with Anglicanorum coetibus did it again become worthy of him. I'm sure Fr Meeks won't clarify his position to me, but maybe Bp Lopes might want to pursue this with Fr Meeks himself.

In fact, my regular correspondent sees a similar connection:

I think you are on to something in suggesting that this might be a gesture of assistance to Fr Meeks' former CEC colleague, Fr Treco. "Vatican II took my Church away from me; I didn't leave the Church." Of course serious traditionalists would not find CK an attractive parish, as it celebrates the OF versus populum, and has lengthy sermons. You posted a picture, on October 2, 2017, of the (unvested) choir singing around a piano.

The photo at left suggests an evangelical venue that's had the guitars and drums temporarily removed from the dais, replaced by some ad hoc Catholic furniture that could easily be put into storage, and a provisional communion rail, also reconfigurable as needed.

I kinda wonder, in fact, if Bp Lopes figured the catedraticum and donation to the bishop's appeal from St Bede's wouldn't be missed, should the cult of personality surrounding Fr Treco result in defections, while the cult surrounding Fr Meeks could cause more serious damage from a larger parish should Meeks be removed. But someone can maybe educate me about the difference.

What I do see from an uninformed layman's eye, though, is a similarity that runs through Frs Treco, Phillips, and Meeks: the Church has had to struggle to meet their high standards, although none seems quite able to walk their own talk. Treco was an utterly marginal figure. Phillips was at best squishy on the question of the deacon and the altar boys. Meeks hates liturgical innovation, except when he celebrates OF versus populum. But the communion rail makes it all OK.

Why do I get the feeling that a diocesan OF parish half a mile away is more honest?

There are other prominent OCSP priests who play the same game. I guess I need to add their parishes to my prayers.

Yet Another Grandstanding Married Priest

As if it weren't enough to have Frs Treco and Phillips in our faces over the last few weeks, we get another self-promoter on EWTN. This is Fr Ed Meeks of the North American ordinariate. His story is very puzzling. He talks about being in both major and minor Catholic seminaries, but leaving the major seminary after two years. At about 10:00 he talks about being "driven" to the Assemblies of God by the "chaos" and "liturgical innovation" in the Catholic Church. Then he went into the Charismatic Episcopal Church.

I've talked about Fr Meeks here before, because the same puzzling question has come up. By his account, he was raised Catholic in Trenton, NJ, in a good Catholic family. He admired the priests in his parish and diocese and wanted to become one. But he's actually quite vague on why he left the seminary, and then why he left the Church, especially since he bloviates about wanting to remain a faithful Catholic after leaving the seminary.

But he didn't, because Vatican II. (Maybe he and Fr Treco need to find a support group.) The problem here is delict of schism, and I raise this for the same reason I raised it earlier -- some applicants for the priesthood in the OCSP have been denied for precisely this reason, while Fr Meeks was brought in. As I said in 2016,

So as far as I can see, the issue normally involves someone who was raised Catholic, presumably completed catechism and completed the sacraments of initiation, had a mature understanding of the faith, but then, by free will and fully understanding what he was doing, left the Church in some public way (e.g., by getting ordained in a Protestant denomination). This would not preclude that Catholic from going to Confession and returning to the Church, but it would raise entirely reasonable questions about whether he should become a Catholic priest.

So this would extend the restriction I previously understood, that a Catholic priest who leaves his orders is not re-ordained. Here, a serious Catholic who deliberately and publicly leaves the faith is probably not a good candidate for ordination once he claims to have returned to the faith. Seems pretty non-controversial to me.

In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest Meeks left the seminary to ride the denominational carousel, and his longing for a perfect Church isn't too different from that of Fr Treco. But also, Fr Meeks's situation isn't all that different from that of Abp Hepworth, who left the priesthood, got married, divorced, and remarried, became an Anglican divine, and eventually decided to become a Catholic priest again. Not a chance, in his case. Fr Meeks, no problemo. In fact, Fr Meeks became the vocation director for the OCSP for some period of time. My regular correspondent commented,

But he was bringing around 130 parishioners (a third of whom were originally Catholic) and a church building with him---the largest non-Catholic congregation to enter the OCSP. The downside is that the parish seems to be all about Fr Meeks. The FB page is almost exclusively dedicated to videos of Fr Meeks' Sunday sermons. Here is the "Staff" page on the website. Not much else on the website; last event was Christmas Bazaar 2017. Perhaps because of his HR background Fr Meeks was originally Director of Vocations for the OCSP. He did nothing, as far as I can gather; missed every General Council meeting. Parish must be doing okay; a new parish centre has been constructed in a building on the property, and a home school support program has been founded. Torch-passing could be a challenge, however, given the OCSP talent pool.

Well, I guess this does say something about the talent pool. In the EWTN interview, he takes very nearly an hour to be unimpressive. I'm wondering if Houston ought to impose a moratorium on appearing in these sorts of forums, especially when, as Fr Meeks does here, its priests express such a longing for pre-Conciliar times.

Some Orr Followup

It occurred to me yesterday that the announcement of Orr's credible allegations from the archdiocese gives the impression that all the misconduct took place before Orr's ordination. However, I noted a more recent allegation in this post:

Her classmates told her that Deacon Orr had invited three of her male class mates (they were in high school) to his home to “fix” his computer. The students reportedly found child pornography on his computer but did not dare to inform police.

After hearing this from [the former student] I immediately submitted a tip to the FBI online. An officer got in touch with me the following day. I gave him all the information I had but of course he needs to come into contact with the individuals themselves.

I've noted in previous posts, and certainly these posts have come up in many web searches over the past month, that there was plenty of on line commentary from students at the school regarding Orr's preferences. I think it would be misleading to assume Orr's conduct ended when he was ordained.

This passage from the archdiocese's January 31 announcement:

In 2016, the then pastor of Our Lady of the Atonement, Fr. Christopher Phillips, acknowledged that he had received the complaint and had investigated it, finding it to be without basis. He did not inform the archbishop of the allegation, either at the time it was made or later when recommending Orr for ordination to the permanent diaconate.

suggests that allegations against Orr had finally built up to the point that Fr Phillips wound up in the hot seat with the archbishop. Since Fr Phillips was removed as pastor in early 2017, I think it's reasonable to assume this was the proximate cause of his removal, although Phillips had apparently not been a popular figure in the chancery for some time before then. I would not rule out that prior allegations about Orr, and whatever the relationship was between Orr and Phillips, factored into this in earlier times.

The Facebook complaints about Bp Lopes keeping Fr Phillips from celebrating at Orr's funeral mass suggest that Lopes was fully apprised of the archdiocese's concerns at the time the parish was transferred to the OCSP, and Lopes presumably concurred with the judgment.

However, I'm now told that all the Facebook posts about Dcn Orr on the OLA page have been deleted. I visit Facebook only rarely -- there's a respectable body of opinion that suggests Twitter and Facebook can actually lower IQ -- but a brief check of the OLA page suggests there's a real Phillips cult of personality at that parish. This is very sad.

James Orr -- Credible Allegations Of Abuse

I'd noticed since the start of the year that I was getting a lot more traffic from people googling the late Dcn Orr, even before his death. Apparently it had become general knowledge that he would be named as a credible abuser even before the archdiocese announced it, and several visitors had been giving me a heads-up on the situation. It's even been suggested that the knowledge that this would come out had some bearing on Orr's death at age 58. Yesterday, the Report from the Archdiocese of San Antonio confirmed the speculation. On page 8:

Orr, James – allegations of abuse that predate his ordination

James Orr was ordained a permanent deacon for the Archdiocese in 1997. From 1997-2016, he was assigned in the Archdiocese to Our Lady of the Atonement in San Antonio. In 1992 or 1993, a child alleged that Orr, then a volunteer in the same parish, had sexually molested him in the neighborhood pool. In 2016, the then pastor of Our Lady of the Atonement, Fr. Christopher Phillips, acknowledged that he had received the complaint and had investigated it, finding it to be without basis. He did not inform the archbishop of the allegation, either at the time it was made or later when recommending Orr for ordination to the permanent diaconate. In 2007, a victim alleged that Orr had attempted to sexually abuse him in approximately 1995, also prior to Orr’s ordination. In December 2015, the Archdiocese was contacted by a psychologist who stated that her client had given her permission to inform the Archdiocese that he and another survivor had been sexually abused as children in the 1990’s by Orr. Shortly after this, Orr requested retirement and resigned from all active ministry. The Archdiocese accepted his resignation and forbade him from functioning or presenting himself as a deacon. In 2017, a civil demand was made by a survivor alleging sexual abuse in approximately 1993. Beginning in 2007, the Archdiocese notified the Bexar County District Attorney’s office of all known allegations of child sexual abuse made against Orr. While the reports refer to child sexual abuse alleged to have occurred before Orr’s ordination, the Archdiocese found the abuse survivors credible and forbade Orr from exercising any future ministry, notifying the community of these allegations so that the Archdiocese can assist any other survivors with counseling or pastoral care. Orr died in 2019.

Two things strike me. One is the simple timeline, and the other is "known unknowns" we might be able to derive from things unsaid -- and a great deal here is unsaid. But let's start with the simple timeline as given.

• In 1992 or 93, an allegation is made that Orr molested a boy at a neighborhood pool. This is determined to be without basis by Fr Phillips, by his admission a "wonderful friend".
• There is another allegation of attempted abuse dating from about 1995, made in 2007.
• An allegation is made that two boys were abused by Orr in the 1990s, dating from 2015.
• Yet another survivor alleges abuse in about 1993, in a 2017 demand letter.
• The archdiocese eventually finds all allegations credible, and Orr requests retirement shortly after the 2015 allegation.

OK, fine. Naturally under policies established at Dallas in 2002, Orr would not be allowed to mow a parish lawn even as a volunteer given that kind of record, much less be ordained as a deacon and teach at a parish school. This was in a different time. But let's look at things left unsaid:

• Orr and Phllips, by Phillips's recent acknowledgement, were close friends throughout the period when the abuse occurred.
• Phillips, given the close friendship, had a conflict of interest in minimizing the one allegation of abuse that clearly came to light prior to Orr's ordination as a deacon.
• We simply don't know how much Phillips knew of other conduct by Orr during the 1990s, although the two were close enough to live in adjoining properties with a back gate connecting them.
• Following Orr's ordination, Phillips set up a charity, Our Lady's Dowry, that appears to have had the primary purpose of paying Orr a generous salary off the parish books.
• By early 2017, Abp Garcia-Siller removed Fr Phillips as pastor of the Our Lady of the Atonement parish for unspecified reasons.

Those reasons seem increasingly to have been good ones.

A visitor has updated me on Dcn Orr's funeral arrangements:

Also, check out the facebook comments on the OLOTA page, under Dcn. Orr's...It has been rumored that Bp Lopes made sure that Fr. Phillips did not say the funeral Mass:

It’s a very sad thing when a Bishop acts in the way Bishop Lopes is acting. I cannot think of any positive or even benign reason why he would prevent Father Phillips from saying the funeral mass of his beloved friend and colleague of 35 years. A friend whom together with Father Phillips helped to build this parish from the ground up and dropped it into the Bishop’s lap. This is so cruel and hard to fathom. Shame!

Just so you understand, Fr. Lewis was the officiant at the Mass for Jim Orr. Fr. Phillips led the Rosary.

Visitors have asked me from time to time what Orr had on Phllips. Seems like a good question.