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Sunday, September 29, 2019

Pope Francis Receives Kiko Arguello

On September 20, 2019, Pope Francis received Kiko Arguello, the Founder of the Neocatechumenal Way.  You can find the following article here.

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“May the Lord Render to You All the Good You Do to the Church”

Thursday, September 20, 2019, Pope Francis received Kiko Arguello, Founder of the Neo-Catechumenal Way, in the Vatican.
Pope Francis wrote personally to Kiko Arguello on the occasion of the celebration of his birthday in Madrid on January 9, 2019.
“Dear Brother, I don’t want this day to pass without sending you some lines of closeness and fraternal thanksgiving for your 80 years. Thank you to God who chose you and thank you for your fidelity. May the Lord render to you all the good you do the Church,” reads the message reported by “Vatican News” in Italian.
“I’m close to you; I pray and I accompany you. Happy Birthday. I hope that the members of the Way will make you a cake with 80 candles. And, please, don’t forget to pray for me. May Jesus bless you and may the Holy Virgin protect you. Your brother, who loves you and admires you, Francis,” adds the Pope.
On January 8, during the Mass at Saint Martha’s, the Pontiff hailed the “apostolic zeal” of Kiko Arguello, who thanked him in a message, expressing “his affection and proximity, assuring him his prayers for his Petrine ministry.”
On September 8, 2018, Pope Francis surprised Kiko Arguello, calling him on the telephone to express his greetings to the participants in a meeting organized at Porto San Giorgio, Italy. “Always look toward the Lord! Forward!’ said the Holy Father, after Kiko Arguello expressed to him the affection and support of the Neo-Catechumenal Way.
On May 5, 2018, the Pontiff met with thousands of members of the Neo-Catechumenal Way, gathered in Rome for the 50th anniversary of the Movement’s presence in the Eternal City.
The Pope had already received the Founder in the Vatican on September 4, 2017. On the same day, a letter of encouragement of the Pope to this Community was made public.
Every year Pope Francis receives families belonging to the Neo-Catechumenal Way that he sends on mission to the whole world. In 2016, he exhorted them to “protect” their charism, in face of the risk of being closed-in on themselves or of believing themselves “better than others.”
Kiko Arguello’s symphonic opera — who is, however, a painter by formation –entitled “The Suffering of the Innocents” was performed at the Vatican, in the framework of the Jubilee of Mercy, and on the occasion of the liturgical feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, on October 7, 2016, in Paul VI Hall.
The Neo-Catechcumenal Way, founded in the ‘60s by Kiko Arguello and Carmen Hernandez, now deceased, is an Ecclesial Movement present today in 134 countries of five Continents, with some 20,000 Communities and Seminaries. It’s an “itinerary of Christian formation” born in the underprivileged suburbs of Madrid, Spain.

Friday, September 20, 2019

A Catholic Priest 25 Years Wrongly Imprisoned in America

The following article was written by Father James Valladares, Ph.D., which was introduced through These Stone Walls.  The article is about Father Gordon MacRae who was wrongly imprisoned. You can find the article here.  Our justice system is better than those of totalitarian governments, but it is not perfect.  Our justice system have freed guilty persons and wrongly imprisoned innocent ones.  Only God's justice is perfect.  

However, we appear to live in a time when due process and civil liberties are being trampled upon.  The yellow highlights are mine.  
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Image result for father James ValladaresWas it to satisfy justice that Fr Gordon MacRae spent the last 25 years in prison, or was it to satisfy contingency lawyers, insurers, diocesan risk assessors, and a news media that has sold its soul?

Note: The following article is by Father James Valladares, Ph.D., a priest of the Archdiocese of Adelaide, South Australia, and author of the acclaimed book, Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast: A Research Study on Procedural Justice for Priests.

Early in 1966, I commenced my second year of theology in the Diocesan Seminary of Bombay (now Mumbai), India. As part of the curriculum in moral theology, we were scheduled to do a very thorough and comprehensive study of the Seventh, Eighth, and Tenth Commandments (“You shall not steal;” “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour;” “You shall not covet anything that is your neighbour’s”) as a proximate preparation that would render us eligible for the faculty to serve as ministers of the Sacrament of Reconciliation (Ad audiendas confessiones).

Very briefly, that particular branch was commonly referred to as “De Iure et Iustitia” (About Rights and Justice). A right was defined as something that is legitimately due to another. To take it away without authority or justification, therefore, is a violation of the person’s right and a breach of the moral law. Framing it graphically, there is an invisible but inviolable link between a person and a basic right. So a failure to respect and honour the right is tantamount to breaking that invisible bond, and so offending the person and God.

Stated differently, the deliberate flouting of a moral law offends God, the Supreme Lawgiver, and is, therefore, a culpable sin. For instance, each and every human being has a right to his/her life – a priceless gift that comes from God and God alone. None can take it away but God. To do so willfully, violently and maliciously would be tantamount to murder – a grave crime that violates both the natural and the divine law. As a consequence, the perpetrator must bear the entire brunt of the law – civil, moral, and divine.

Similarly, a person has a right to his reputation. Once again, there is an invisible but inviolable bond between the individual and his/her reputation. Therefore, we are all duty bound to refrain from any word or deed that could snap that bond, and so harm the individual, often gravely and irreversibly. So vitally essential is integrity in both private and public lives that, opines Stephen Carter in his: book, Integrity (Harper Collins, New York 1996), “The American dream may crumble – and the greatness of our democracy along with it.”

None can deny the harm done to young people by the plague of sexual abuse in our culture, and none can deny the grievous, widespread and irreparable harm done to the credibility of priests and their ministry in the recent past.  By the same token, it must be admitted that there has been - and continues to be - a proliferation of false allegations against priests, and for motives that range from the dubious and spurious to the specious and malicious.  It is therefore imperative that we all judiciously discern, decisively act, and openly speak in the interests of truth, justice, and charity.  That, in a nutshell, was the purpose of my research study that led to publication of my book, Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast.

I began the book with a recognition of some of those who played key roles in my progressive realization and completion of that project. Readers of Father Gordon J. MacRae's Linked In page may recognize some of the names that appeared in the book’s Acknowledgements:

Opus Bono Sacerdotii – an organization (especially the president, Mr. Joe Maher and cofounder, Mr. Pete Ferrara) that has worked strenuously to assist priests in need of defense, canonical and legal, who have neither the personal nor financial means to plead their cause.
  Dorothy Rabinowitz Dr. Bill Donohue Ryan A. MacDonald David F. Pierre, Jr. – whose candid, forthright, and persuasive writings have served as an added impetus in the pursuit of this vital research.

 Fr. Gordon J. MacRae – an extraordinarily heroic priest with indomitable courage, unrelenting tenacity, unwavering patience, and Christ-like magnanimity who personally and admirably reflects what Pope Benedict XVI has confessed, ‘All of us are suffering as a result of the sins of our confreres who betrayed a sacred trust or failed to deal justly and responsibly with allegations of abuse….’ “
YOU CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MAMMON (Matthew 6: 24)

David F. Pierre Jr. author of Catholic Priests Falsely Accused (The Media Report, 2012) has written an explosive revelation with regard to allegations of sexual abuse and the attack on the Catholic Church. It’s a courageous and compelling account of how money, the media, and willful malevolence have distorted and driven the scandal and singled out the Catholic Church as a scapegoat for rampant abuse in our culture. This is what he has to say about the disturbing manner in which claims against Catholic priests were settled in the [Manchester] New Hampshire diocese without any legitimate determination of credibility:
“In 2002, a New Hampshire diocese faced accusations of abuse from 62 individuals. Rather than spending the time and resources looking into the merits of the cases, ‘Diocesan officials did not even ask for specifics such as the dates and specific allegations for the claims, ‘ New Hampshire’s Union Leader reported. Getting money from the diocese could not have been any easier for the complainants. It was almost as simple as a trip to an ATM. ‘ I’ve never seen anything like it,’ a pleased and much richer plaintiff attorney admitted.” (David F. Pierre, Jr. p. 80)
Father Gordon MacRae is a priest of the Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire who has been wrongly accused and unjustly in prison for a phenomenal period of time only because he firmly and unequivocally insists on his innocence. In 1994, Father MacRae was tried and pronounced guilty of crimes that a growing number of people believe never occurred at all. Ironically, he was offered a “plea deal.” That is to say, if he confessed that he was guilty he could then leave prison after one or two years while protesting his innocence would ipso facto condemn him to 67 years in prison for claims that have never been corroborated by substantial evidence, crimes alleged to have occurred over 35 years ago.

In 2002, as a dutiful priest, he wrote a private letter from prison to his Bishop, John McCormack, in which he stoutly maintained his innocence of the baseless claims for which he was imprisoned. These are his precise words reproduced from his 2010 article, "Are civil liberties for priests intact?":

“I was accused falsely, and in the context of being a Roman Catholic priest. If I were not a priest, I would not have been accused. To pretend that somehow the claims against me are not related to the context of my priesthood is false. This is something that most Church officials long recognized but many have put aside the rights of priests in open disregard of Church law.” 
Further, Father MacRae wrote that he would withdraw his defense and remain silently in prison for the remainder of his life if his bishop deemed this in the best interest of the Church. The bishop candidly replied that he could not ask Fr. Gordon to surrender his civil and canonical rights.

Providentially, the Catholic League’s Bill Donohue prevailed on Fr. Gordon that staying the course of truth and justice would be not only in his own interest, but that of the Church as well. These are Bill Donohue’s precise words: “Remember that what will always be of service to the Church is the truth. Pursue the whole truth, and you are pursuing what is best for the Church.” Said Saint John Paul II: “The Church must be a mirror of justice.” 

THE END OF CIVIL LIBERTIES

On October 13, 2005, Dr. Bill Donohue, President of the Catholic League, appeared on NBC’s TODAY Show to contest a panel of contingency lawyers promoting lawsuits alleging sexual abuse by priests. In the heated debate, the lawyers and litigants tarred the Catholic Church and priests with the same broad brush as evil, lecherous offenders, but Bill Donohue had the last word, and literally floored his vehement opponents with one masterful stroke of undeniable truth:
“There is no segment of the American population with less civil liberties protection than the average American Catholic priest.”
What caught Bill Donohue’s attention before that explosive appearance on the TODAY Show was “A Priest’s Story,” a two-part series on the MacRae case by Dorothy Rabinowitz, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist on the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board. [Note: Ms. Rabinowitz and The Wall Street Journal continued the series in May of 2013 with "The Trials of Fr. MacRae".

At a time when many Catholics reeled over the scandal in the Catholic Church, Dorothy Rabinowitz took a hard look at the facts of the case of Fr. Gordon MacRae – facts that the rest of the news media had distorted or conveniently omitted. The result was a disturbing account of greed, false witness, and as the late Father Richard John Neuhaus described, “a Church and a justice system that seem indifferent to justice.”

Ryan A. MacDonald is an independent journalist writing in New York. He is a convert to Catholicism, and he writes religious and legal commentary. His revelations in "Truth in Justice: Was the Wrong Catholic Priest Sent to Prison" at These Stone Walls literally defy comprehension. In other writings, he has made a strong case for how the media has capitalised on the sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic priesthood:
However, scant attention has been paid to the probability of false claims levelled against innocent priests. As one nationally known legal scholar has pointed out, ‘When one understands the role of the contingency bar in mediated settlements, it becomes a virtual certainty that some priests have been falsely accused for money’…The Puritan founders of New England would approve of the purging of the priesthood that is now underway, for it is far more Calvinist than Catholic.” ( Ryan A. MacDonald, Our Sunday Visitor, 29 August 2010). 
Adds Father MacRae to this synopsis:
“Justice has certainly turned on its head when men who stand to gain hundred of thousands of dollars for making a false claim are automatically called ‘victims’ by Church leaders now, while priests accused without evidence from decades ago are just as quickly called ‘priest-offenders’ and ‘slayers of souls’…I once scoffed at the notion that evil surrounds us, but I have seen it. I think every person falsely accused has seen it.” ( These Stone Walls, “ When Priests Are Falsely Accused Part II,” 20 October 2010). 
As Father Gordon MacRae prepares to mark a mind-boggling twenty-five years in prison for crimes that never took place, he also marks ten years of writing “the clear, eloquent, and spiritually-sound monument to [his] trials” that the late, courageous Avery Cardinal Dulles had foreseen in These Stone Walls. In Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast (p. 274) I added this:
“Fr. MacRae’s eye-catching, thought-provoking and conscience grabbing blog, These Stone Walls, has been deemed by many to be the finest example of priestly witness amid the plethora of scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church in the course of the past decade.” 
 These Stone Walls is informative, thoughtful, and spiritually empowering.  "one visit," writes David F. Pierre, Jr., author of Catholic Priests Falsely Accused, "will make anyone consider all the one-sided hysteria we've heard in the media for the last two decades."

Wall Street Journal writer Dorothy Rabinowitz summarizes the highly suspect plethora of allegations: "People have come to understand that there is a large scam going on with personal injury attorneys, and what began as a serious  effort is now a large money-making proposition."  Ms. Rabinowitz made this remark in 2005.  Since then the [U.S.] Church has doled out an additional $1 billion in settlements. 

The Eighth Commandment expressly says: “ Thou shalt not bear false witness against they neighbour.” It is forbidden, under pain of grievous sin, to give false testimony in a juridical proceeding that could result in serious and irreparable harm to an innocent person.

On hearing of his heart-rending plight, a reader of These Stone Walls wrote Father MacRae a letter which, among other things, said: “I don’t know why you haven’t lost your faith. And I don’t know why you haven’t lost your mind.” Adds the noble and brave priest, “I wonder which would be the first to go. There are lots of people around me here with a tentative grasp on both.” 

Note: Father James Valladares, Ph.D., is a priest, psychologist, and published author writing from Adelaide, Australia. 

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Congratulations to Jessica Blas

A young Guam girl from Chalan Pago made a historic moment.  Her name is Jessica Blas who has taken the name "Sister Mariyam Shahar of the Savior".  Before becoming a Carmelite nun, she used to work at the Chancery in Agana.  And yes, she walks in the Neocatechumenal Way.  The NCW in Guam continues to promote vocations.  The following article can be found here.
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Six years ago, something happened! A small group of Discalced Carmelite nuns arrived in Malta from Morristown New Jersey to start a new foundation. Respecting their vocation, they came in silence. They did not make any noise. No trumpets were played.

And they started living their life in silence and prayer. 

On September 12th 2019, these holy souls made a step forward. One of them, Sister Mariyam Shahar of the Savior made her simple profession. In front of her prioress and her community she promised that she will live a life of obedience, chastity and poverty in the spirit of Carmel. Her family have travelled all the way from Guam to witness this joyful celebration. 

As she wrote in the handwritten invitation that she prepared, this is a nuptial celebration between the MOST HANDSOME of all men and myself.

She is a very lucky girl… And the Church in Malta is very lucky that someone is giving up her life for the salvation of souls in Malta and worldwide. 

This is the first ever profession of a Carmelite in this new foundation at Tal Virtu’, Rabat Malta.

The Discalced Carmelites have another foundation in Santa Margerita, Cospicua. They are in Malta since 1726!

  

 

Saturday, September 14, 2019

Australian Justice In The Dock

The following article by George Weigel below was emailed to me.  Unfortunately, Australia is not the only justice system that is in the docks.  The article can be found here.
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AUSTRALIAN JUSTICE IN THE DOCK



George Weigel
... there is no reason to respect a process that reeks of system-failure at every point, from the dubious and perhaps corrupt police investigation through the committal hearing, the two trials, and the appeal.

March 2013: Prior to any credible reports of misbehavior being made against Cardinal George Pell, police in Australia's state of Victoria launch "Operation Tethering," a sting aimed at the former archbishop of Melbourne (who by this time is prefect of the Vatican Secretariat for the economy. "Tethering" includes newspaper ads seeking information on previously unreported, untoward goings-on at the Melbourne cathedral in the past.

Early 2017: The office of Public Prosecutions in Melbourne twice returns a brief to those who mounted "Operation Tethering," criticizing the Victoria Police brief as inadequate for a prosecution.

June 2017: Charges of "historic sexual abuse" from 20 years prior are announced by the Director of Public Prosecutions and Pell is ordered home. The cardinal vehemently denies any misconduct and, despite his Vatican diplomatic immunity, immediately returns to Australia to defend his honor and that of the Church.

May 2018: At the "committal hearing," a magistrate dismisses several charges against Pell but sends others to trial, saying that, whatever their arguable plausibility, they should be aired publicly in a criminal court. Meanwhile, a vicious, lynch-mob atmosphere continues to surround Cardinal Pell, in public and in much of the Australian media.



September 2018: At the trial, the prosecution presents no corroborating evidence that the alleged crimes ever took place; the prosecution's case is the tale told by the complainant, who only appears on videotape. Numerous witnesses for the defense testify that the alleged acts of abuse could not have happened in a secured area of a busy cathedral immediately after Sunday Mass, with then-Archbishop Pell fully vested and surrounded by liturgical ministers, in the time-frame alleged. After several days of deliberation, the trial judge tells the jury that he will accept an 11-1 verdict, if one juror is blocking unanimity. The jury then returns a hung verdict -- 10-2 for acquittal -- the jury foreman weeping when announcing the jury's inability to reach a legal conclusion; other jurors are also reported in tears.

December 2018: At Cardinal Pell's retrial, his defense team further demolishes the prosecution case, for which, again, no corroborating evidence is presented. The jury then returns a 12-0 verdict of guilty, shocking virtually everyone in attendance at the trial (and, according to some present, the trial judge).

March 2019: While sentencing the cardinal to six years in prison, the trial judge never indicates that he agrees with the second jury's verdict, stating only that he is doing what the law requires under the circumstances.

June 2019: At an appeal hearing before a three-member panel of the Victoria Supreme Court, the judges sharply criticize the flimsiness of the prosecution's case.

August 21, 2019: The appellate panel rejects Cardinal Pell's appeal by a 2-1 vote. The dissenting judge, Mark Weinberg, is Australia's most prominent criminal-law jurist; the two judges rejecting the appeal have little or no criminal-law experience. Judge Weinberg's 202-page dissent eviscerates his colleagues' position, which raises the gravest questions as to whether "guilty beyond a reasonable doubt" remains the standard necessary for conviction in Victoria -- not least on a completely uncorroborated charge.

In the wake of last month's incomprehensible and (as measured by Judge Weinberg's dissent) dangerous rejection of Cardinal Pell's appeal, Catholic voices were heard expressing (or demanding) respect for the justice system in Australia. Perhaps the Vatican press spokesman must say such things for diplomatic purposes, although the reason why diplomatic concerns trump truth and justice in the Holy See Press Office is unclear. But as this chronology indicates, there is no reason to respect a process that reeks of system-failure at every point, from the dubious and perhaps corrupt police investigation through the committal hearing, the two trials, and the appeal. There are guilty parties here. But Cardinal George Pell is not one of them.

As this scandalous process approaches the High Court of Australia, friends of Australia, both Down Under and throughout the world, must send a simple message, repeatedly: George Pell is an innocent man who was falsely accused and has been unjustly convicted of crimes he did not commit. It is not George Pell who is in the dock, now, but the administration of justice in Australia. And the only way to restore justice is for Cardinal Pell to be vindicated by the highest court in the land.

Those who cannot bring themselves to say that, in Australia or elsewhere, necessarily share in the ignominy that Australian criminal justice has, thus far, brought upon itself.
George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Thursday, September 12, 2019

The Scales of Justice

Recently, I've been reading the news and social media.  It appears that many people in Guam are very frustrated and dissatisfied with Guam's justice system.  People complained of the reversal of Mark Torre's guilty verdict due to a technicality while others complained about the plea deals made with those accused of drug dealings.  

Father Gordon MacRae brought up a cold case in Guam.  In 2000, Wannee Bailey was reported missing in Guam by her husband, Richard Bailey.  Later, Richard Bailey discovered his wife's body, but there were no arrests made.  In 2017, Richard Bailey was arrested in the United States for child rape and other acts of violence against Pornchai and his brother.  Efforts have been made to contact the Guam Police Department, but there have not been a response so far.  I am hoping that we will get a response soon so that justice can be served for Wannee Bailey.  The following article can be found here.
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Cardinal Pell, Pornchai Moontri, and the Scales of Justice


The cases of Cardinal George Pell and Pornchai Moontri stand at opposite ends of flawed justice. In the case of Cardinal Pell, moral panic blurred the rule of law.

In “Cardinal Pell and I Are Judged ‘Guilty for Being Accused.’” I wrote that Cardinal George Pell has joined me among the falsely accused and unjustly imprisoned for whom a biased justice system has failed. Having lost his appeal, Cardinal Pell now must serve a six-year sentence in an Australian prison for crimes charged with no evidence, crimes for which reasonable doubt could not transcend a media circus and its resultant judicial bias.
On the night before typing this post, I listened intently to the “Papal Posse” on The World Over with Raymond Arroyo on EWTN Raymond Arroyo was joined by Fr. Gerald Murray and Robert Royal of The Catholic Thing for a discussion about current events in the Catholic Church. On that particular night, the plight of Cardinal Pell was front and center.
Robert Royal made a statement that captured well the naivete of Catholics whose sense of the legal system comes from watching TV’s “Law & Order.” I paraphrase from memory, but he alluded to not knowing a lot about the criminal justice system. Mr Royal said, “It seems that in some jurisdictions in Australia, someone can be convicted of sexual abuse with no other evidence than the accusation itself.”
This is not at all unique to Australia. It has been a fact of American justice for forty years. It has roots in the radical feminism of the 1970s and is the origin of so-called “Hashtag Justice” that presides in American courts today. Setting aside a presumption of innocence to accommodate terms like #MeToo and #BelieveSurvivors is creating a new class of victims in the news media and the justice system.
Gone is the professional skepticism upon which both institutions once relied. As an example, here is the actual wording of “New Hampshire Revised Statute Annotated 632-A 6 Sexual Assault and Related Offenses,” a law amended in response to significant lobbying efforts in the 1970s:
“The testimony of the victim shall not be required to be corroborated in prosecutions under this chapter.”
Most people just don’t understand that in nearly every U.S. jurisdiction, a man can be charged, tried, and convicted of sexual assault charges – even charges that are decades old – with no other evidence than the accusation itself from a single accuser. This is so even when the accuser has a clear avenue to financial gain by making the claims, which is the case of virtually every accused Catholic priest today.
The only hope of the accused is to accept a plea deal for a lenient sentence. Not accepting one may be seen today as evidence of actual innocence. The draconian irony is that an innocent defendant who risks a trial will spend far more time in prison than a guilty defendant who is inclined to take the deal.
UNEQUAL JUSTICE THE CASE OF RICHARD ALAN BAILEY
Before writing on the flawed trial and appellate decision in the case of Cardinal Pell, I want to profile an American legal case that many TSW readers will find familiar. It is pertinent because both cases were alleged to have taken place two to three decades ago. You may have read about this story in what I think is the most important post I have ever written: “Pornchai Moontri: Bangkok to Bangor, Survivor of the Night.”
On September 12, 2018, Richard Alan Bailey of Westlake, Oregon appeared in Penobscot County Superior Court in Bangor, Maine to answer to 40 Class A felony counts of sexual assault of two adolescent boys that occurred from 1985 to 1987. Most of his sexual assaults were also violent, a fact that especially inflicted lifetime damage on his victims.
The victims in that case, as readers may now know, were Pornchai Moontri and his older brother who were taken against their will from their home in Thailand at ages 11 and 13 in 1985. Had the case gone to trial, the State was prepared to introduce a long list of compelling evidence against Mr. Bailey stretching back thirty-three years.
That evidence included not just the detailed statements of Pornchai and his brother, but corroborating evidence from neighbors, social workers, police officers, school personnel, medical personnel, and the highly probative evidence of two brothers’ consistent claims over a period of three decades.
This was not a case of “I just remembered the details.” It was a case of “I have lived with the details every moment of my life since.” Both boys were stranded in what was for them a foreign country and neither could speak English when these vicious assaults were first occurring. The compilation of evidence was such that Mr. Bailey pled “no contest,” but the Court found him guilty of all charges.
Unable to be in the court because he was serving his own prison sentence that began when he was a teenager, Pornchai Moontri’s Victim Impact Statement was read aloud in court by a prosecutor. Defendant Richard Alan Bailey was found guilty with ample and compelling evidence of forty felony charges of child rape and other acts of violence against Pornchai and his brother.
As a result of the plea deal, Mr. Bailey was sentenced to zero prison time, eighteen years of probation, and lifetime public registration as a sex offender. He will likely never spend any time at all in prison.
Meanwhile Pornchai Moontri has been in prison for the last twenty-seven years for an offense that every informed observer – including, today, police and prosecutors – believes would never have occurred had Pornchai not himself been a victim of horrific crimes. Richard Bailey’s crimes forced Pornchai into a life of deprivation living on the streets as a homeless teenager in a foreign country.
This story and its grave injustice did not end there. In 2000, while initiating divorce proceedings from the man who has now been found guilty of these crimes, Pornchai’s mother was beaten to death on the U.S. territorial Island of Guam. The murder is today filed in Guam as a “cold case” unsolved homicide.
Pornchai’s mother was reported missing there by Richard Bailey who also later reported finding her body himself. Days earlier, a new witness asserts, Pornchai’s mother telephoned a relative in Thailand in a desperate plea that Bailey was threatening to kill her. Overtures to have this matter reopened for review have to date been without response from officials in Guam.
And thus far, at least, Pornchai and his brother have no avenue to civil recourse either. Richard Bailey has no deep pocket like the Catholic Church behind him. Not a single American lawyer would look at this matter because there is no lucrative forty-percent take from a guaranteed settlement. After being forced from his home and country at age 11, Pornchai will be forced to return from this long nightmare at age 46 as penniless as he was when he left.
I raise this case and its outcome because at every step of the way in the priesthood scandal, just about everyone involved – the Church officials, the victim advocacy groups, the law enforcement personnel, the news media, the contingency lawyers, and the court system have all claimed that the spotlight on the Catholic crisis has had a singular agenda and objective: To protect children.
Pornchai Moontri had to go to prison before he could find anyone who would protect him from the history of victimization that nearly destroyed his life. In his own ironic words, Pornchai wrote, “I Come to the Catholic Church for Healing and Hope.”
THE FLAWED TRIAL OF CARDINAL GEORGE PELL
While that sorrowful mystery was winding its way through the American judicial system, a respected high ranking Catholic Cardinal was charged and placed on trial in Australia. It was a similar case involving two adolescent boys about the same ages as Pornchai and his brother, and the claims came from about the same time period.
The glaring difference is that there was no corroboration or evidence at all. There was no paper trail, no prior evidence that the case had ever surfaced. One of the alleged victims had died an accidental death in the years before the other decided to bring his claims. The case arose in the midst of a media-fueled moral panic about priests and abuse that started in America and spread to Australia. The target was a high profile Vatican official in a coliseum of predator lawyers
Over the last few weeks, the Catholic media has been abuzz with commentary about the failed appeal of Cardinal Pell. Do not take its failure as a statement that justice has been served. It has not. The story behind the initial trial is ludicrous.
A claim that Cardinal George Pell, still fully vested and having just finished Mass, spontaneously sexually assaulting two 13 year-old boys in full view in the sacristy would have raised many eyebrows of suspicion thirty years ago. But now that the priesthood crisis has been weaponized, such details have become lost in the bias.
Implausible accounts like this are now accepted as the norm. Of the three judges who heard Cardinal Pell’s appeal – Chief Justice Ferguson, Justice Maxwell, and Retired Justice Weinberg – only Justice Weinberg seems to have successfully blocked the moral panic from doing his thinking for him.
This appeal resulted in a split (two to one) decision with a compelling dissent from Justice Weinberg. He found the complainant at trial to have embellished aspects of his account and to present his details inconsistently. Justice Weinberg concluded that the evidence contained discrepancies, displayed inadequacies, and otherwise lacked probative value such that it caused the judge to doubt Cardinal Pell’s guilt.
Justice Weinberg further found that the complainant’s account of a second incident of abuse “was entirely implausible and quite unconvincing.” The judge could not exclude the possibility that the complainant had “concocted” his testimony. The appeal summary states firmly that…
“In Justice Weinberg’s view there was a significant body of cogent, and, in some cases, impressive evidence suggesting that the complainant’s account was, in a realistic way, impossible to accept. To his mind, there is a significant possibility that the Cardinal may not have committed the offenses. In those circumstances, Justice Weinberg stated that the convictions could not stand.”
Unlike Pornchai Moontri’s devastating victimization at the hands of Richard Alan Bailey, the claims against Cardinal Pell had no paper trail going back 30 years, no evidence, no eyewitnesses, no history of police or social worker reports, no corroboration from a second victim, no one backing up any of it. There were only the claims themselves, claims that I and others have examined in detail in a compelling article, “Was Cardinal George Pell Convicted on Copycat Testimony?
But also unlike the Pornchai Moontri case, the accuser of Cardinal Pell stands to gain financially just for making these claims. This important factor has driven the Catholic scandal. Thirty years ago, it may have given pause to the purveyors of justice, but today it succumbs under the weight of Hashtag Justice. One does not #BelieveSurvivors by questioning motives such as monetary gain.
The stories of Pornchai Moontri and Cardinal Pell stand as bookends of gross injustice. Richard Alan Bailey has escaped most of the justice that is aptly and demonstrably due to him while Cardinal George Pell remains imprisoned by the perversion of justice his case now represents. In a time of moral panic, justice falters. It did here in both cases.
It remains to be seen, now, what the Church will do in response to all this. Cardinal Pell does have one more possible appeal in a year or so. Presently, he and I are the only priests so accused, convicted, and in prison who are not also dismissed from the clerical state.
That would compound gross injustice with grave sin and further weaponize the priesthood crisis. Remember Hebrews 13:3: “Remember those who are in prison as though you are in prison with them.” Please pray for Cardinal Pell and Pornchai Moontri.

Sunday, September 8, 2019

The Purpose of the NCW

The Neocatechumenal Way is an itinerary to Christian formation.  In other words, it is a detailed path of conversion by discovering the richness of one's baptism.  Ghandi once said, "I like your Christ, but I don't like your Christians.  Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."  There are many people who call themselves "Christians", but they are "Christians" in NAME only.  However, out of the Catholic Church came many holy saints who were once sinners and who led virtuous lives with God's grace. This is the purpose of the NCW....to become true sons and daughters of God.....to become holy saints. 

The most important thing is to put the teachings of Christ into practice, but this can only be done through the grace of God because with man, it is impossible.  Scripture becomes alive as we live out our faith. As an example, Christ taught us not to judge.  This is a teaching we all know, but how many of us actually put this teaching into practice in our life? Another one of Christ's teaching to love the enemy, but how many of us can do this?  This can only be done with God, and so we consistently pray for God to give us the grace not to judge and to love the enemy.

The Neocatechumenal Way has catechists, and each catechist team has a priest. In fact, even the International Catechists has a priest, Father Mario.The main catechists in Guam are David and Maruxa Atienza and Father Harold.  The catechists are like spiritual directors.  I compare them to the prophets of the Old Testament.  God ALWAYS call people to guide His Church. God called Moses and the prophets to guide the community of the Israelites.  

Luke 16:29-31  “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’  “ ‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ ” 

In my opinion, the catechists are like the prophets of the Old Testament who were called to guide the community of Israelites. In the New Testament, the Apostles, bishops, and priests were called to lead God's Church. Each catechist team has a priest to ensure that the laypeople in the catechists follow the Church teaching. Although the New Evangelization allows for the laity to evangelize, this does not mean that we do not need the ministering priesthood.  Together with them can we have a fruitful evangelization. 

The propaganda in the jungle says that the NCW members MUST obey their catechists as though they have no free will.  According to the jungle (the bold is mine):
You have to obey your chatechists yes or yes. Always. No exception allowed. Your catechists do obey theirs as well. And their catechists do obey Kiko blindly. Kiko does not obey anybody. Only God because only God is above him. Hierarchy of catholic Church has to obey Kiko. He will never say that openly. He will always say "hierarchy has to obey catechists" or "the international team of catechists", language does not matter. The fact is Kiko is over them. He is the lay Pope.
Notice what I placed in bold above.  If Kiko never said that openly, then where did they get the idea that the hierarchy of the Catholic Church has to obey Kiko?  

In an interview, Kiko Arguella stated: "It's (Neocatechumenal Way) an instrument at the service of bishops and parish priests to bring back to the faith the great many who have abandoned it".

Kiko never stated that it was an instrument at the service of the catechists.  Only those who opposed the NCW spread this propaganda.The laity in the Way never made any vow of obedience.  They have the free will to listen to the catechists or to follow their own will. 

As an example, if a couple walking in the Way is living together outside the boundary of marriage, the catechists will advise the couple to either get married or live separately.  The choice is theirs to make. Of course, some have left the Way because they did not like the advice of the catechists and would even say that the catechists are trying to control their lives.  However, any Catholic priest will give them the same advice.  A couple cohabitating together is not following the teachings of the Catholic Church.

Many people today view cohabitation as normal and acceptable rather than sinful.  The purpose of the NCW is to make aware of one's own sins.  After all, that was the reason Moses came down the mountain with the Ten Commandments.  After taking them into the desert, God gave the community of Israelites the Ten Commandments so they can be aware of their sins.  When one becomes enlightened of their sins, one then makes a choice to either remain in the darkness of their sins or live a chaste life.  

The Way is an itinerary of Christian formation because we are not simply taught to know Christ's teachings, but to put those teachings into practice.  Those teachings can be put into practice when one is in a community with brothers and sisters with many different personalities and characters.  Naturally, there will be clashes or conflicts within the community due to the many different personalities and characters.  Even among the Apostles, there were also disagreements and indignation.  According to the Holy Bible: 

Matthew 20:21-24  “What is it you want?” he asked. She said, “Grant that one of these two sons of mine may sit at your right and the other at your left in your kingdom.”.......When the ten heard about this, they were indignant with the two brothers. 

Galatians 2:11  But when Peter came to Antioch, I had to oppose him to his face, for what he did was very wrong.

Imagine that!  Peter was the leader of the Apostles, and Paul stood up and opposed him because he felt that Peter was wrong, and Paul sought to correct Peter.  Eventually, the Apostle Paul later understood that he was the one in the wrong. Thus, even the apostles had conflicts in their own community.  However, the Apostles reconciled, forgave each other and did not hold a grudge....a mark of true Christians. In short, they put into practice the teachings of Christ in their walk.  However, it was never through their own effort.  It was through the Holy Spirit that they were able to accomplish this.  

 It is through the Holy Spirit that we ask for forgiveness when we have done wrong.  It is through the Holy Spirit that we forgive those who hurt us even when they did not apologize to us.  If it were up to man, man would wait for an apology whereas a Christian would forgive and not hold a grudge.  It is through the Holy Spirit that we do not judge, thinking we know better. It is through the Holy Spirit that we go out knocking door to door, rather than give in to our fear of rejection.  It is through the Holy Spirit that we humble ourselves.  A person with pride cannot humble himself/herself because he/she thinks they know better.

Despite the controversies, the NCW has produced fruits. Jesus said that it is by their fruits that one will know His disciples. His disciples come to serve, not to be served. The NCW has shown it's service to the parish through their voluntary work and participation in the parish activities, in helping the poor, and in promoting priestly vocations. It has shown it's service to the universal Church through the New Evangelization and in promoting religious and priestly vocations.         

Thursday, September 5, 2019

Judged Guilty For Being Accused

The following article was written by Father Gordon, which can be found here.  Father Gordon's interviews are also found in the same weblink.  Also, if anyone wishes to subscribe to "These Stone Wall," just go to the weblink I provided.
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Cardinal George Pell and Father Gordon MacRae, falsely accused and unjustly in prison, personify what happens when accusation alone is a weapon of Mass destruction.

I am most grateful to Ryan MacDonald and Father George David Byers for a pair of eye-opening posts over the last two weeks. I have to admit that I struggled with the timing and content of these accounts. Ryan’s post on events in The Diocese of Manchester and Father Byers’ on The Signature of Fraud both address recent dark times in the Church that many find burdensome.
I think it is safe to say that few Catholics find these events more painful than I do. And now, as you may know, Cardinal George Pell has joined me among the falsely accused and unjustly imprisoned for whom a biased justice system has failed. I have written several posts about this, and will link to some of them at the end.
On just the day before I type this, I received news from Australia that an appeals court there has affirmed the deeply unjust verdict against Cardinal Pell. The split decision (two to one) includes the clear dissent of one appellate judge who holds that the evidence against Cardinal Pell did not support a verdict of guilty. Those who have studied this case and have stood in solidarity with Cardinal Pell – just as so many have done for me – experience deep sadness over the martyrdom of his good name.
As these newest waves of Catholic storm rage on, I believe it was no accident that also from Australia, TSW Publisher and Technical Editor, Suzanne Sadler, chose this time – before the above posts were written and before the decision of Cardinal Pell was published – to present a reconstruction of These Stone Walls. The first hint I had of it was when Suzanne sent me the new Home Page graphic depicting this dramatic and familiar scene from the Gospel of St. Matthew:
“And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea so that the boat was being taken” by the waves; but Jesus was asleep. ‘Save us, Lord,’ they cried. ‘We are perishing.’ And he said to them, ‘Why are you afraid, O men of little faith?’ Then he rose and rebuked the wind and the sea; and there was a great calm.” (Matthew 8:24-26)
THE GREAT STORM UPON THE SEA OF GALILEE
We chose that image for These Stone Walls because it is a graphic depiction of the state of the Church and the world in our time. If my false imprisonment means nothing else, may it at least be offered in solidarity with you as you come to a suffering Church for your Sacraments. On the day before I typed this, I received the message I cited above from reader Donald Brignac in Texas who continued:
“On June 29, we celebrated the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul which included the reading of St. Peter’s remarkable release from prison (Acts 12:6-11), one of my favorite passages from Acts of the Apostles. I think, in many respects, your weekly writing at These Stone Walls symbolizes St. Peter’s release.
“Granted you are physically still in prison, but your message goes out into all the world. You affect the lives of so many people with your writing. It is as though, in 2009 when you began to write, the chains fell from your wrists as you offered these examples of faith, hope, and charity to your readers, and we are better for it.”
As much as I hope and pray that Cardinal Pell will prevail in his quest for truth and justice, I also hope that in these present moments – which neither of us can control – he will join me in the sacrificial offering of our priesthood and our imprisonment for the life of the Church and the hearts of believers who are wounded in this time of crisis. I am unable to write to Cardinal Pell directly. I hope someone among our readers will send him this message. (Please let us know in a comment so he doesn’t get multiple copies of it.)
I also hope and pray, and urge with the meager voice that is given to me, that the Church will not abandon Cardinal Pell to this fate. Pontius Pilate scandalized humanity for all time when he washed his hands of the Blood of Christ. The Church must now emulate Jesus rather than Pilate in this. We priests who have faced the scourge of falsehood know only too well the great harm done to the people of God when our spiritual leaders assume the demeanor of Pilate. There was a lasting wound when The Chief Priests Answered: ‘We Have No King but Caesar.’
Many Catholics have felt demoralized by the abuse crisis, but now there is a troubling spinoff: the abuse of the abuse crisis. Around the world, the Catholic Church is being unjustly singled out for ridicule, disrespect, and special sanctions as the Church and priests are held to standards for which no other institution is held accountable. The Church is shamed in the public square for not acting in 1950 as it would today.
Many Catholics have felt betrayed and hurt by revelations that some of their spiritual leaders behaved more like predators than priests. Many feel equally betrayed when some of their priests are exposed as self-serving narcissists. A recent post by William Mahoney, Ph.D. at ChurchMilitant.com tells the sad story of two priests, one from my diocese and one from a neighboring diocese, who have abandoned their parishes.
Letters to their former parishioners written after the fact were filled with narcissistic obsession about their own needs “to completely heal” from unnamed deprivations. After assuring their parishioners in their letters that they may return as “better priests” they moved to Minnesota and entered into a same-sex “marriage.”
I wrote about the link between homosexuality and narcissism, and the threat that the latter especially poses to the priesthood, in “Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and the Homosexual Matrix.” Do not think for a moment that such betrayals are unique to the priesthood. A full eighty percent of the young men around me in this prison were also abandoned by their fathers. Our culture is not having a crisis of priesthood. It is having a crisis of manhood.


GUILTY FOR BEING ACCUSED
Compounding betrayal with further betrayal does not mend fractured allegiances nor does it heal wounded souls. After Ryan MacDonald published his post, “In the Diocese of Manchester, Transparency and a Hit List,” he sent me a troubling article written by my bishop, Bishop Peter Libasci, an inherently good priest and faithful bishop who, I think, knows not the extent to which bishops are misguided in the politically correct era of #MeToo.
In “Restoring Trust,” an article in the September-October issue of Parable magazine, Bishop Libasci wrote of his decision to publish anew the list of 73 priests that Ryan wrote about. Here is the excerpt of the Bishop’s article that I find so distressing. You should too, and I will explain why:
“I wanted to let you know that the Diocese of Manchester has launched a new section on our website designed to provide further transparency to our ongoing commitment to protecting minors. Here we have not only compiled resources for victim-survivors, families, and those who wish to report abuse, but the site also includes a single place to review the names of priests who have been accused of sexual abuse of a minor since 1950.”
Since the so-called “Dallas Charter” was adopted by the American bishops in 2002, a “credible” standard has been adopted to determine an accused priest’s suitability for ministry. There are serious flaws with the term and its application. A “credible” accusation means only that it “could” have happened.
For example, if both a priest and his accuser were present in the same community forty years ago, then the accusation is seen as “credible.” But Bishop Libasci’s statement, and that of other bishops who have released lists of names, omitted that weak and unjust standard. Priests now appear on these published lists merely for being accused at all. Bishops sometime say that this is not a prejudgment of guilt or innocence. If not, then what is it? Of all U.S. citizens, only Catholic priests can be robbed of their good name and deprived of their livelihood on such shaky grounds.
And there is a reason why Ryan A. MacDonald referred in his recent post to my Bishop’s published list of accused priests as “a hit list.” As soon as Bishop Libasci’s list was published, activists and lawyers began clamoring for more details such as the actual abuses claimed, the places and locations, time periods, etc. The reasons for these demands may not seem clear to fair and honest people in the Church, but they are crystal clear to the people who populate my current environment.
Having such information in addition to the names of the priests accused, invites false accusers to file claims similar to those that have already been filed against a specific priest. I, too, have been victimized by this. In 2004, just months before The Wall Street Journal published a two-part analysis of my trial, I was accused in a demand for money by two men I have never met or even heard of before. Despite my strenuous objections my diocese mediated those settlements anyway.
Despite the closed-door settlements and the signing of nondisclosure agreements, I released the names of these and other false accusers to The Wall Street Journal, and those names were published. As a result, I was never again accused while many other priests whose names appear on diocesan hit lists have been subjected to multiple claims by people they do not even know.
In October of 2018, I wrote a post entitled “Justice Brett Kavanaugh Is Guilty for Being Accused.” With that now notorious public spectacle, the term “Guilty for Being Accused” has been revealed as a mockery of justice and a denial of due process rights everywhere but in claims against Catholic priests.
Now, thanks to the proliferation of these lists of names published by bishops, merely being accused is held in the public eye to be compelling evidence of a priest’s guilt. Catholics are only slowly catching on to this. The traditionalist Catholic news venue, The Remnant recently published a fair and bold podcast about this by Michael J. Matt entitled “Presumed Guilty: Open Season on Catholic Priests.” I am giving the last word to The Remant:
“Michael J. Matt considers the ramifications of weaponizing the clerical abuse crisis. Should we operate under the presumption of guilt, or do we stand in defense of the right of every priest in the world – Novus, Sede, Trad, Neo-Cath – to have benefit of due process and the rule of law?”